Cocktail Networking

Was at a cocktail reception last night organised by the British Council in conjuction with its Reading Across Cultures: Teaching English Through Literature conference. Was too busy gossiping with old teacher-training buddies and conference participants to make serious inroads into the lovely food, but also did some useful networking and met up with the writers who will be reading at my Night of the Living Text event tonight: Louise Doughty, Roger Robinson and Isagani Cruz. We also have Taiwanese poet (doctor by day) Ke Hua Chen to add to our list, which is great.

Just talking to these guys, I know tonight is going to be a lot of fun.

Author Tan Twan Eng also came along and was very happy to meet up with old friend (old as in lama not tua, I hasten to add) John McRae (author, academic and much more) who will be introducing him tonight. Hope that makes Twan's first ever reading a little less nerve-wracking!

Also had a chat with Singaporean poet Edwin Thumboo who says that he is very sorry he cannot come tonight because he has something else on, but promises to come up to Malaysia again soon. (Will chase up that promise!)

The lady in the picture above is Thai author and translator Jane Vejjajiva who read from her children's novel The Happiness of Kati. (Read an extract here.) Despite suffering from cerebral palsy, Jane has a very impressive CV in translation and publishing and now runs a copywriting agency. She has also received the Chevalier de l'Order des Arts et des Lettres from the French Ministry of Culture, and a SEA Write Award.

Anyway (nudge nudge) really look forward to seeing you all at Central Market Annex tonight!