The WiT Podcast

Anti-ageing, as a branch of medicine, has been around a long time. Today, the term anti-ageing is not used much anymore because it suggests that ageing is a process we fight against. Today, the terms, wellness, longevity, regenerative, are preferred because, well, the experts say we should embrace it actively and proactively.

It’s definitely a mega, global trend among the wealthy who have more to lose... literally. Retreats like RAKxa, a joint venture between VitalLife, the preventive medicine arm of one of Bangkok’s leading hospitals, Bumrungrad, and MK Real Estate, don’t come cheap.

Stream the full story for more.

Last week, I entered Singapore sans passport. I had arrived on a flight from Bangkok and at the immigration gates, when I wanted to put my passport on the scanner, I was told, “No need already. Just look at camera.”

That’s Singapore for you, clockwork efficiency.

It made me think that this is true personalisation – my personal identity verified, recognised and cleared – and it makes my life easier as a traveller.

They put their own money into the business, one of them selling his house. Together, they scraped together $1m. By 2018, their tours and activities platform was valued at around $1b, and the business continues to grow.

It’s hard to say who’s more surprised by the achievement – Ethan Lin (CEO) or Eric Gnock Fah (President) or perhaps their parents whom they talk about openly – but one thing is clear, these two co-founders are firm friends and have each other’s backs.

It’s uncanny how well they complement each other, as you will discover in this special WiT Podcast edition, marking their 10th anniversary, with WiT founder Yeoh Siew Hoon.

In one of the most open conversations, the two founders get into some pretty personal aspects of their lives that have driven Klook to its success, and how quickly their early "lightbulb moment for Klook" went from a “phone note” to financial modelling on an Excel sheet (their banking background showing here), to growing faster than they expected when the network effect kicked in. 

Have a listen.

AI, it seems, is creeping into everything. In a little café in a local neighbourhood in Penang, far from the madding tourist crowd, the young entrepreneurs running it offer “AI Fried Char Koay Teow”.

On this episode, Siew Hoon (Founder, WiT) ponders on a new-ish trend that's being called “theme travel”. New-ish because it used to be called special interest travel - people who travelled for specific interests. In this “Next Generation”, let’s call this tribe, “Themers”.

This includes runners who travel for marathons, music fans who go from festival to festival, and event-driven folks who fly across continents for experiences. 

This trend somewhat overlaps or intersects with the 'Dreamers' - those who dream of finding their little nook in the world in unfamiliar lands. And oftentimes, it's more than one nook. 

Stream this episode to hear more about themed travel, mouseholes and why Siew Hoon prefers to travel like a local.

This week, Siew Hoon (Founder, WiT) reflects on her recent stay in the tranquil village of Sheepstor, West Dartmoor, which also has a surprising connection to Sarawak, Malaysia. The Burrator Cottages, on the estate once owned by Sir James Brooke, the first Rajah of Sarawak, provides an idyllic retreat for travellers seeking a truly authentic experience.

Siew Hoon (Founder, WiT) is back in Shanghai for the first time since 2019, for Trip.com's global partner conference, Envision 2024. Experiencing first-hand the resurgence of China's tourism and hospitality scene, Siew Hoon highlights the cities eagerness to embrace tech, it's robust art scene and everything a revitalised Trip.com is doing to cater to fresh demographics. 

Siew Hoon (Founder, WiT) returns to the Middle East for the first time since 2019 for WiT Phocuswright Middle East 2024. But what she experiences there upon landing serves as both culture shock and eye-opener to the progress the region has supercharged itself with in the last few years.

Yes, there are lots of expected – the masses of cranes; the construction going on everywhere you look; the traffic in Riyadh – but underneath all that, the unexpected open-ness, the overwhelming warmth of people, the unbridled pride of Saudis to share and show off their kingdom and the lack of guile in their conversations.

This is a story that goes beyond the warmth and hospitality of its people. Something momentous is happening in Saudi and it goes beyond the numbers, the dollars, the targets – this is nation-building, social-transformation, call it what you will, with travel and tourism as its engine.

While standing in a long queue at the café at the Marina Bay Sands Convention Centre, wondering why it doesn’t have a robotic barista because the human ones were looking rather frazzled, Siew Hoon spotted a man wearing a delegate badge that says “Black Hat Asia”.

Intrigued because she associated Black Hat with hackers (Google says “the term black hat has been used to differentiate criminal hackers from white hat and gray hat hackers”) and because she has always wanted to meet a real-life hacker, she asked him what he did for a living.

Without missing a beat, the man replied, “My company does security upskilling training in penetration testing.”

While Siew Hoon may have restrained herself from making the joke we're all thinking of, this encounter did lead to revelation at another conference next door. 

Stream the episode to find out.

Author and travel writer Paul Theroux had a very simple way of describing people who travel. He divided them into tourist and traveller, saying, “Tourists don’t know where they’ve been, travellers don’t know where they’re going.”

Of course, he said this, way before social media turned travel into a mass team sport. One wonders what the scribe, who by the way has just published a new book “Burma Sahib”, would think of the many jargons we in the travel industry have come up with in recent years to describe all the different types of people who travel.

In this episode of WiT Stories, Siew Hoon (Founder, WiT) looks at some newer terms, buzzwords and jargon that has popped up in travel, while creating some of her own along the way.