"If we are to survive as a human race we have to hide our hatreds, we have to find things we have in common if we want to progress and move forward." I first met Shazia Mirza in 2002 when I had my late night talk show in Amsterdam when we did shows around The Netherlands together. I was riding high with the dream TV job and Shazia was a cultural juggernaut at the time because she was playing a pro terrorism Muslim character on stage with her one liners and was getting a lot of media coverage at the time. When we met on this tour Shazia had a reporter from the Guardian following her and writing a story about her. It was a very exciting time for both of us in our careers and even though we are both from very different cultures we bonded because we are in the same tribe of stand up comedy. "The Jews have a great history of producing comedians, so do the Catholics, we have never had a history of comedians. Islam is a new religion and so is our comedy and satire. It takes time before you can laugh at something." "You have to have life experience to be a comedian and instagram is not a life experience. You can't not die, suffer and struggle and be a great comic." It is a privilege to be in this business and creativity is the key to happiness. Last year Shazia was on a reality TV show on the BBC called Survival Island, for one month she had to survive with people from different backgrounds, cultures and ethnicities and she had a major revelation from the experience. "What we needed to do to survive was to keep our hatreds to ourselves. You can survive on your own for a while but in the end you need other people to survive. It made me see that if we are to survive as a human race we have to find things we have in common and hide our hatreds if we are to progress and move forward." "Spending time with people you don't like is a waste of life. You can only judge people by two ways... some people give you energy and other people drain you of your energy. Avoid the people who suck the joy out of life." Brilliant insights and sentences like "Starving to death on a desert island is a once in a lifetime experience." is why it is my pleasure to present to you now the one and only Shazia Mirza! patreon.com/tomrhodesradiosmartcamp