Time for oneself, time for others.

Here I am, back after a long leave. Of late, I have refused to attend to anything to do with work during my off days and leave. It hasn't been easy - many arts people here know that they can call me even at 1 am on a Sat night and I will get, at the very least, a listing out for them. So, I've had to re-train myself to say "Sorry, I am on leave. The best I can do is direct you to my editor or assistant editor."

Why the new measure? Because I've come to realise that everyone needs breaks now and then, even artists/arts people like me who are prone to obsessing about whatever it is that they are working on. And sometimes, an artist just needs to have time for herself, to unravel the ideas she's always had to put on the shelf.

I can say for sure that, in terms of having the time and energy to develop on your ideas, there's quite a huge price to pay if you're always running around trying to make sure there's a enough of a news platform for everyone else's ideas.

Being selfish was among some of the subject matters celebrated painter David Hockney covered during a lunch time art talk as part of the 2004/05 Rolex Mentor and Protege Arts Initiative in New York last December. The talk, that he gave together with his protege Matthias Weischer, was featured in last Sunday's StarMag and was the last of four articles I wrote on the initiative.

Wise words from an artist who has seen much of life. Comforting words when you feel those pangs of guilt because you've "ponteng" (played truant on) yet another chatter and cigarette smoke-filled exhibition opening!

And, yes, I did have my five seconds with the man - happened to take the lift down with him at Prentis Hall, Columbia Uni, NY, but suddenly felt very small and as though part of some surreal painting, and sunk further into my winter coat and happily pretended not to understand English. Oh yes, these sort of "stage fright" moments can still happen to journos, believe me!

Back home, we have our own arts icons. One such person is Faridah Merican, now (finally) a Datuk for all the time and energy she has given to paving the way for other artists and arts workers; hmmm .... very different, in this way, from Mr Hockney. Yesterday, she was honoured as one of five career moms/women entrepeneurs by Avon Cosmetics at the Westin Hotel Kuala Lumpur. And today, the photo of her with her award made front page in The Star - an achievement for arts stories, I can tell you!

Congratulations to the First Lady of Malaysian Theatre!

Sharing gems of moments

Has anyone seen the recent BBC World TV ads of the Rolex Mentor and Protege Arts Initiative ? Boy, this is one unbelievably generous arts programme! I was in New York in early Dec to cover the closing of the 2004/05 cycle and the launch of the ongoing third cycle, and I came back with a renewed sense of awe and urgency at what needs to and can be done for arts patronage.

Filmaker Mira Nair and protege Aditya Assarat gave me a 20-minute one-to-one interview that translated to a fantastic three-page spread (!) in StarMag in January this year.

In early March, StarMag published a two-page spread that came from my interview with the bubbly and gifted mezzo-soprano Susan Platts, and my few but treasured moments with her mentor Jessye Norman at the launch dinner at New York’s Lincoln Centre for the Performing Arts.

And last Sunday, StarMag had my story on the dance workshop choreographer Saburo Teshigawara and dancer Junaid Jemal Sendi gave at Barnard College, Columbia University.

I hope I've managed to translate most of the experience of seeing, listening, meeting and speaking to these artists into stories for the paper and readers. Some part of me feels that I will never be able to share all of what I felt.

Throw in bumping into and chatting with playwright Ariel Dorfman (whose play Death and The Maiden was one of the first stage dramas I saw; it was staged by Dramalab with Jo Kukathas as the "maiden" Paulina Salas in a small auditorium in RHB (?) Jalan Tun Razak), watching the premiere of Tshepang by South African playwright Lara Foot Newton at Columbia University's Miller Theatre, being in a rusty lift with painter David Hockney and dining next to Mira Nair, and author Toni Morrison, and what can one do except be stuck in a starstruck state?

What I do know is that I've got enough inspiration to last me a few years without another overseas work trip!

As an arts writer in Malaysia, I don't travel as often as journos from the entertainment or fashion fields. More than anything else, it's part of the deal. If I travel to write about stuff outside, I inevitably miss out on or can't give my time to what's happening inside.

Arts isn't on the top of a newspaper's priority list, understandably so in a developing country. The Star, the paper I work for, does make a real effort though and has possibly the most number of pages and hacks to cover the arts.

Whatever limited page space is first given to artists, events and issues in Malaysia as a way of encouraging local arts. So, even if I got invited to cover an international arts event, my write-up of it would normally be published after considering page space allocated to Malaysian arts.

The Rolex thing, however, has been something I've truly enjoyed writing about. Feel really blessed to have been even a tiny part of it.