EP22

How do you transform someone who is abused as a child, grows up in poverty, is abused as a child, is a petty criminal, is a drug peddler, for Krie Lopez it is as simple as taking notice of these people and giving them an opportunity to be better, to get them out of the cycle of poverty that they themselves do not see a way out of.

Krie Lopez is the founder and CEO of Messy Bessy and House foundation a corporation that not only makes eco-friendly household cleaners but also and more importantly works with at risk youth and giving them an opportunity to end their cycle of poverty through House Foundation and the work that they do at Messy Bessy.

She shares the journey she and Messy Bessy has taken on this road and the difficulties as well as the learning she and her team has found through the years trying to create a successful business as well as funding the important work they do uplifting the lives of individuals and families from some of the poorest communities in Manila. To date their program has helped over 400 youth and graduated up to 50 College graduates - who in her own description have a better resume than most children who graduate from the top universities in the Philippines.

More importantly she shares here the power of opportunity -where one person given a chance to break free from poverty is a pathway not just for themselves but for whole families and communities offering a model that can be emulated not just by other companies but by governments as well.

You can find Messy Bessy on the following platforms:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/messybessycleaners/

Instagram: @hellomessybessy

https://www.instagram.com/hellomessybessy/

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Neil Daza is a Director, Cinematographer, Photographer and occasional Photojournalist.

The son of a political detainee during the Marcos dictatorship and growing up in a family of activists Neil was exposed to the harsh realities of the Philippines early in life. He narrates how growing up he would spend weekends visiting his father, a former military colonel in Fort Bonifacio and picking up his sibling from police stations during the dark days of the martial law period.

At 15 years old after watching Roman Polanski's Tenant -he was so enamored by the emotions elicited by the film in himself that he decided right there that he wanted to make movies. Starting his career as a stringer photojournalist for broadsheets in Manila he photographed some of the most iconic events of the last 30 years -including being right in the action during the Mendiola Massacre where he himself ended up carrying bodies of the victims to the hospitals.

He has worked on some of the most iconic Filipino films including Dekada '70, Etiquette for Mistresses, Yamashita the Tiger's Treasure, Last Full Show, Signal Rock and has worked on numerous TV series such as Maalala mo Kaya, Be Careful with my Heart, and has won and been nominated and for Gawad Urian awards for his work in Crocodile and Signal Rock among others. One thing that truly stands out with Neil is how well regarded he is among his peers for his craft but also for his compassion and concern for those he works with from the biggest celebrities to the lowly production assistant one thing distinct about him is that he cares that people are treated well no matter their station.

Neil believes that Cinematography should never be the focus of a film -it should always blend with the story and shouldn't distract the audience it is there to help tell the story and not be the story. Learnings from 30 years of creating stories for the Filipino.

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Much more than just a pretty face. You'll realize in the first 30 seconds of talking to her what a total badass she is. Cat is one of those women who acknowledges that she has a pretty face, she joined Mutya ng Pilipinas and placed in the top ten and is one of those women who acknowledges that this was a part of her growth as person and doesn't deny its influence on her. But she is much more than that Filipina morena beauty and has found it a constant source of pride in proving to people that she is much more than just her looks. By the time she joined Mutya ng Pilipinas she was already a self taught coder earning her allowance freedom building websites for clients and earning her own keep. Plus she was accelerated in school and graduated college at just 18!

Cat is epitome of the young successful Woman, she is a successful marketing professional working on Globe and Jollibee's brand campaigns. She was one of those that put together the now very famous Kwentong Jollibee stories that went viral a couple of years ago, -and guess what one of those stories was hers! Much more than her marketing skills is really the amount of different things she is doing and is successful with! Her range is quite amazing from coder to beauty queen to marketing savant and businesswoman, not to mention Judo -there is probably not many things she will get into and not do well.

She is part of Planet Cora an organization dedicated to protect life below water and life on land and has mobilized hundreds if not thousands of volunteers to get their first dip into helping become citizens for the planet. She advocates shepherding people into the ecological movement rather than lecturing them on what to do and I completely agree as this has been our way as well with our outdoor events.

She also talks her new passion and business of starting up a healthcare service that focuses on mental health. A product of her own struggles with depression and not finding the mental health support she needed in her own company and finding that her experience wasn't an isolated case -her solution was to build her own mental health focused business and with some brilliant partners they started Mindnation that focuses its services on Mental Wellness in the workplace -the first service of its kind in the Philippines!

There's clearly a lot more to Cat than her pretty face and that is why she is the badass beauty that she is. Slaying through every endeavour she gets into.

You can find Cat on the following platforms:

Instagram: @sinosicat

Twitter: @sinosicat

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sinosicat

Mindnation: https://www.facebook.com/themindnation/

Instagram: @themindnation

Planet Cora: https://www.facebook.com/planetCORA/

Instagram: @planetcora

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We are working towards making the Wildcast more sustainable by creating avenues where listeners can help us continue to provide you all with these amazing conversations so you can show your support for the Wildcast by buying us a coffee through www.buymeacoffee.com/Wildcast. This helps us invest in better equipment, allow us to host the podcast online, and create better content for all of you listeners.

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EP19

Jamela Alindogan -Journalist

Jamela is an award winning self described belligerent journalist who has worked for Al Jazeera as their South East Asia correspondent in the Philippines for more than a decade. She is one of the recipients of the Ten Outstanding Young Men and Women of the Philippines. She was recognized by the Swedish Embassy and UNESCO with nine other female journalists from around the world for the work they have done in journalism "for defying hate speech and threats, pursuing mission of providing citizens with the information needed to make enlightened decisions about their lives, their communities and their governments."

More recently she started the Sinagtala Foundation after being inspired by the struggle of Muslim women in Marawi during the siege and with bombs falling all around she put up this foundation that has given hope to the women whose lives and homes have been destroyed by conflict and death. They have built toy libraries for the displaced children and taught the women how to weave putting them in touch once more with their traditions and giving them a reason to hope for the future.

In this conversation we talk about her fears and what has driven her for more than a decade working in some of the most dangerous places in asia. She was almost kidnapped a number of times, gone on clandestine assignments to interview rebel leaders like Nur Misuari, and even detained and jailed in Sabah during her coverage of the Lahad Datu standoff in 2013.

From being a journalist and humanitarian and a mother and wife we talk about her life and what makes her lace up her boots and jump on that plane, boat, or 4x4 to bring us the stories that need to be told from the people that have no voices.

You can find Jamela and Sinagtala Foundation on the following platforms:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jamela.alindogan

Sinagtala Foundation: https://www.facebook.com/sinagtalaPH/

Instagram: @jamelaaisha https://www.instagram.com/jamelaaisha/

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We are working towards making the Wildcast more sustainable by creating avenues where listeners can help us continue to provide you all with these amazing conversations so you can show your support for the Wildcast by buying us a coffee through www.buymeacoffee.com/Wildcast. This helps us invest in better equipment, allow us to host the podcast online, and create better content for all of you listeners.

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EP18

Ewegene Tan -Durian And Race Organizing

Ewegene Tan is the founder and race director of the Malaysia Mountain Trail Festival a trail running race that is held in his hometown of Taiping, Perak, Malaysia each year. He is also a very good friend who i raced with for the Dragonsback race in Wales in 2019 covering over 320kms of rough Welsh Mountains together. We also trained for this race together in Sagada so you can say we that we know each other very very well.

This year has been particularly difficult for our trail racing industry with all our events being cancelled and having to differ participants as well as offer refunds on entries it has been a year of trials for both of us with the prospect of having almost no income coming into our organizations. We talk about the work that we do as race organizers and the sometimes under appreciated amount of time we actually put in in order to prepare for the races we organize.

We also chat about his new passion during the beginning of this Pandemic -Durian and how he and a group of his friends in Taiping went about buying and selling Durian on the streets of their town and all the learning they got along the way.

From being a lawyer working in a multinational firm to running the family fabric and logistics business to race organizing and more recently becoming a Durian trader -Ewegene for me epitomizes someone who is an eternal student always wanting to learn and try new things and it is this range of experiences as well as eventual expertise that has made him successful at almost everything he puts his mind to. The MMTF in just 3 years is now one of the most successful trail races in Malaysia and is the only race to be allowed to use "Malaysia" in its name and of course during the Dragonsback in 2019 i can say i would never have finished that race without him shepherding me to the finish line on the last day.

Thank you for this conversation my friend.

You can find Ewegene Tan on the following platforms:

Instagram: @ewegene13 https://www.instagram.com/ewegene13/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Ewegene13

Malaysia Mountain Trail Festival: https://www.facebook.com/malaysiamountaintrailfestival/

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We are working towards making the Wildcast more sustainable by creating avenues where listeners can help us continue to provide you all with these amazing conversations so you can show your support for the Wildcast by buying us a coffee through www.buymeacoffee.com/Wildcast. This helps us invest in better equipment, allow us to host the podcast online, and create better content for all of you listeners.

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Episode 17

Part 2 of my conversation with AG Saño

Imagine a wall of sea water pounding the second floor of the building you are staying in, strong enough that it feels like an earthquake, people screaming all around you and minutes later just silence. AG recounts his experience surviving the strongest Typhoon ever recorded on earth in Tacloban and walking out the next morning to dead bodies strewn all over the streets.

He lost a good friend that day. The same day his brother Nadrev Saño was asked to deliver an impassioned speech at the climate conference. That day changed his trajectory in life and much of his work after Haiyan has been focused on seeking climate justice for his friend as well as the almost 10,000 other people who died during the wrath of the strongest storm ever recorded on the planet.

In 2016 he and his brother Yeb Saño walked 1000 kilometers from Tacloban their home town all the way to Manila to point the light at the need for climate justice for the victims of climate change in Tacloban and Leyte it took them 40 days. If this was not enough they repeated this feat walking from Rome to Paris for the climate summit that same year which took them 60 days to do. Throughout these walks AG painted murals along the way and even created art pieces from scrap he would pick up along the way.

It is often easy to dismiss artists like AG for the lack of science but he in fact has more science based knowledge about the environment than most people being a marine science researcher for over 20 years and a climate advocate working with the world's top scientists over the last decade.

One of the last things we discuss and something i personally feel myself is the depression of knowing where we are going on this planet, seeing us humans destroy and burn ourselves to the ground, and yet feeling helpless as we scream and shout and no one will listen -he shares some lessons of what gets him through these thoughts and continuously fighting for what is right and just. I am constantly inspired by the work that AG does and the insights into a lifetime of working to protect our world. A true earth warrior. AG Saño -thank you for what you do for the planet.

You can find AG on the following platforms:

Instagram: @Whaleboy2000

www.instagram.com/whaleboy2000/

Twitter: @whaleboy2000

twitter.com/whaleboy2000

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We are working towards making the Wildcast more sustainable by creating avenues where listeners can help us continue to provide you all with these amazing conversations so you can show your support for the Wildcast by buying us a coffee through www.buymeacoffee.com/Wildcast. This helps us invest in better equipment, allow us to host the podcast online, and create better content for all of you listeners.

SUPPORT THE WILDCAST BY BUYING US A COFFEE:

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Episode 16

If you see a Dolphin on a wall anywhere in the Philippines whether it is in a remote little village in the middle of nowhere or on a skyscraper in Makati -there is a big chance that the Dolphin you are admiring was painted by AG Saño.

AG is one of those rare people you come across whose life is lived with intense passion. An artist, environmentalist, activist AG has for the last 20 years devoted his life to the environment and preserving life on earth. He is the son of activists so he grew up largely influenced by his parents work but has found his own way and brand of activism. He has been involved in marine research since the year 2000. He has also done assignments on sea turtles, dugong habitats, sharks, reef conservation and other environmental work with reputable NGO’s and institutions such as WWF, Greenpeace, OXFAM, RARE, Sea Shepherd, Conservation International, Silliman University, LAMAVE, PFEC, Earth Island Institute, among others.

A.G. founded the Dolphins Love Freedom, a network supported by advocates from more than 63 countries, which is a movement to help save dolphins and whales from the slaughters and from other threats, particularly dolphin captivity and dolphin shows. He has painted over 700 murals and up to 23000 dolphins on walls all across the Philippines and in several other countries including U.S.A., Vanuatu, Japan, Hong Kong, China, Italy, Switzerland, Greece, Netherlands, France, Slovenia, Germany, and Poland.

Because of the breadth of AG's work and experience i've decided to cut his episode into a 2 part series -this first part episode 16 we chat about the sea, dolphins and the things that drove him to pursue the advocacy to save these creatures which in many ways are very much like us humans if we only cared to look deeper they are creatures that span oceans and literally planet earth learning to respect this ability to span oceans, their intelligence, their experience, their histories will go a long way for us to find the respect necessary to save them and ourselves.

You can find AG on the following platforms:

Instagram: @Whaleboy2000

https://www.instagram.com/whaleboy2000/

Twitter: @whaleboy2000

https://twitter.com/whaleboy2000

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We are working towards making the Wildcast more sustainable by creating avenues where listeners can help us continue to provide you all with these amazing conversations so you can show your support for the Wildcast by buying us a coffee through www.buymeacoffee.com/Wildcast. This helps us invest in better equipment, allow us to host the podcast online, and create better content for all of you listeners.

SUPPORT THE WILDCAST BY BUYING US A COFFEE:

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Episode 15

Prasenjeet Yadav is a National Geographic photographer based in India whose work in wildlife and nature photography has been published in the National Geographic's yellow border magazine. Imagine living in the remotest mountains on earth for months, alone trying to catch a glimpse of one of the rarest animals on earth, often in minus 40C degree cold and in the very barest of creature comforts. That was Prasenjeets life for month's before COVID19 hit the world and for him lockdown and quarantine at home with internet and cooked food is like a luxury vacation.

We met each other in 2015 at the National Geographic Headquarters for the Young Explorer's meetup and have been friends since. He is a molecular biologist by training who grew up on a farm in the jungles of India. He describes his youth as having tigers often walking into their front yard and growing up with an inherent curiosity about the natural world around him. His amazing work with the Snow Leopards in the remote Himalayan mountains of India can be found in the pages of this month's issue of National Geographic Magazine.

I think for many of us who are Nat Geo Explorers the phrase live curiously is almost a given. But for Prasenjeet he has taken living curiously to a level that has taken him to some of the highest most remote mountains in the world and into places and situations many of us can only dream of being in and the limit to what he can do is really just the breadth of his imagination.

You can find Prasenjeet Yadav on the following platforms:

Website: www.prasenjeetyadav.com

Instagram: @prasen.yadav (https://www.instagram.com/prasen.yadav/)

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We are working towards making the Wildcast more sustainable by creating avenues where listeners can help us continue to provide you all with these amazing conversations so you can show your support for the Wildcast by buying us a coffee through www.buymeacoffee.com/Wildcast. This helps us invest in better equipment, allow us to host the podcast online, and create better content for all of you listeners.

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Episode 14: Koi Grey on the evolution of being

(Entire episode is in Filipino)

Mga anim na taon ko nang kakilala si Koi isa sya sa mga batikan sa larangan ng trail running at hiking and trekking sa Pilipinas. Dito sa episode 14 ng Wildcast nag kwentuhan kami tungkol sa buhay nya bilang isang mamumundok. Pinag-usapan namin dito ang hirap na dinanas nya sa buhay nung kanyang kabataan at kung paano namulat ang kanyang pag-iisip sa kalikasan.

Nung kabataan ni Koi naging taga tulak sya ng tricycle, nagtrabaho sya bilang balloon artist, naging aktibista, namundok, nakipanirahan sa mga katutubo, at bawat karanasan na ito ay naging parte ng pagkatao nya ngayon. Marami nang versyon ng Koi Grey ang dumaan sa mundong ito at sabi ko nga sa kanya na yung una kong nakilala ko noon ay iba na sa Koi Grey ngayon. Naikwento nya sa akin ang prosesong dinaanan nya para marating ang kanyang bagong pagtingin sa buhay nya . Kontento sya sa katayuan nya ngayonat pati narin sa pagkarera sa bundok -itong bago nyang pagtanaw sa buhay ay nagdulot ng isa sa pinakamagandang taon nya bilang isa sa mga batikang trail runner sa Asya at isa sa pinaka kalmado at kontentong panahon sa buhay nya.

Ito si Koi Grey 2020.

Mahahanap nyo si Koi Grey sa mga sumusunod na plataporma:

Instagram:@koigrey https://www.instagram.com/koigrey/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mountainman.ph/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Expeditionsupport

Contact number: 09568021684

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We are working towards making the Wildcast more sustainable by creating avenues where listeners can help us continue to provide you all with these amazing conversations so you can show your support for the Wildcast by buying us a coffee through www.buymeacoffee.com/Wildcast. This helps us invest in better equipment, allow us to host the podcast online, and create better content for all of you listeners.

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Welcome to Episode 13 of the Wildcast

This episode was recorded in May and I talk to Mary Anne Potts and Ben Clark from Ben’s ancestral home in Tennessee. Mary Anne is of course the former editor of National Geographic Adventure and with a real wealth in experience covering adventure and outdoor stories over the last 20 years her insight into the adventure space and the changes that have happened in the last 20 years is seen from the eye of a journalist watching some of the best outdoor athletes and some of the biggest adventures the world has seen in the last 2 decades. Ben is a film maker and an accomplished outdoorsman he was the second youngest person to summit Everest many years ago and is now known for his trail running films like the Snowman Trek where they ran through 300 kilometers of Himalayan Mountains in Bhutan with Anna Frost and Timothy Olson, he also produces Run around the World a trail running series with Jason Schlarb and Meredith Edwards.

They share with me their flight from New York and how they see outdoor and adventure evolving post pandemic and what we can all look forward to in the adventure space in the coming months and years. An incredibly insightful conversation with both of them who I can say each bring a different perspective to the experience of the outdoors -they are very much alike but also very unique in what they bring to the outdoor and adventure space and i truly enjoyed picking their brains in this fruitful conversation.

You can find them on the following platforms:

Instagram:

Ben: @bclarkmtn

MAP: @maryannepotts

Facebook:

Ben: https://www.facebook.com/bclarkmtn/

MAP: https://www.facebook.com/maryannepotts

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We are working towards making the Wildcast more sustainable by creating avenues where listeners can help us continue to provide you all with these amazing conversations so you can show your support for the Wildcast by buying us a coffee through www.buymeacoffee.com/Wildcast. This helps us invest in better equipment, allow us to host the podcast online, and create better content for all of you listeners.

SUPPORT THE WILDCAST BY BUYING US A COFFEE:

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