Celebrity Who?

I think for the great majority of people we dream of making it somewhere. Being big, being recognizable as a celebrity is the most common way of getting there. Having camera’s follow, waltzing down the red carpet amongst a countless number of adoring fans.  With the potential for this to happen, I would be lying if I wasn’t even a little bit excited. Of course at the same time I try and remain as humble and professional as I can. 

2 years ago, when I first departed overseas, one of my closest friends expressed her worry that I would change going into the industry (modelling/acting industry). A fear that over time vanity would take over, searching for that attention. I promised that I would not change, and I fully intend on keeping that promise.

Since I have started letting my face get out there, I have worked my way into some recognizable roles from the Sport Chek home page at Christmas, to ads for a steakhouse before your movie, a couple billboards in Bangkok and even 2 globally released TV commercials. For the progression of a career in the industry these are all fantastic moves on getting to a recognizable face.  Of course nothing will compare to the potential that Go Fish has for myself and other cast members. 

My first experiences with being “famous” happened in Singapore, when Chinese tourists there would be amazed by my white skin and height, requesting pictures. This however was purely due to what I just said and nothing to do with being recognizable.  It wasn’t until I arrived in Korea that I saw a greater awe factor. In South Korea, they are highly educated but also have a strong love for American culture and persona associated with the upper echelon of celebrity. A tall, handsome, Caucasian goes into a coffee shop; men and women both young and old stop and stare. The brave whip out their latest computer phone, while the shy try to hide their similar actions.  The gutsiest of all sum up the courage to ask to take a picture while you sip on your raspberry double espresso at the local Mango. As a modest individual I would happily oblige and get back to what I was doing. Some would take this opportunity to brag and make a big deal out of it. Upon my return to Bangkok this past year, I was recognized by several young girls from my wedding with Thai airways in Phuket. 

Back to what I originally came to post about: This past Friday, I was invited with a great number of those involved with the show to appear as celebrity guests at a charity event. This would be my first official red carpet event, and the first time I was called a celebrity. To all in attendance I am a nobody, someone with potential at best. I like that idea personally, for me it’s grounding. The experience of a limo picking us up, pulling up to a red carpet outside Cowboys Casino and of course an introduction to the attendees. 

It was a fun experience, one to learn from. Although I don’t want my brush with fame to overshadow the reason we were there. The event was held by YYCharity to help raise funds for Pulmonary Hypertension(http://www.phacanada.ca/en/), Calgary Health Trust (http://www.calgaryhealthtrust.ca/) and Leukemia/Lymphoma (http://www.llscanada.org/). If you have some spare funds, I highly encourage your to donate to these causes. Speaking of celebrity they kind of take a back seat to donations compared to Breast/Prostate cancer.

Speaking of that endless pursuit, many take the fake it til you make it approach. One of my best friends recently moved to LA. Whether it be culture shock or the true plasticity of people in LA, she is struggling with finding people who are truly genuine to themselves. I am sure this happens everywhere, but its especially pronounced in LA as I have heard. Personally I have never understood hiding who you really are, but as evidence from her experience many people will to earn their shot at being famous.

I am going to end with this great quote:
Your only obligation in any lifetime is to be true to yourself. Being true to anyone else or anything else is not only impossible, but the mark of a fake messiah.
Richard Bach 
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/fake.html#u8pM7HIaay8jG5qh.99 

Sharpen your tools

In any industry you require a certain set of skills and tools to get your tasks done. Unfortunately modelling doesn’t provide the greatest use of my brain, but does require maintenance of my physical self. The minimal stimulation is balanced off by my strange desire to read scientific journals and non-fiction books ( currently on 7 habits of highly effective people). I frequently discuss what I do to maintain my physique (currently boxing is my sweet tooth). Diet is something crucial as well that I have mentioned. Also very important is maintaining a clear complexion. With all the makeup I have had smeared on my face, sometimes it takes more effort than others.

When I was in Korea, my roommate, said to me you can always tell the models that work a lot by the complexion of their skin. He told me they all have pimples and oily skin because of the makeup. While there is some truth to this, I feel there is much more than that. Genetics is a big part, diet comes into play and of course how your treat your skin.

While I do get the odd pimple, my skin is for the most part rather dry. After running out of my normal moisturizer, I came across an opportunity to try something new (unfortunately not available in Canada yet). I met with the people at V10+ and discussed my skin concerns.  The obvious makeup problem came about so a good cleanser is important. Issues of dry skin, resulted in the hyaluronic serum.  A good sunscreen is essential too, especially being in the hot tropical sun, and needing to have pasty white skin as a model. And lastly a once a per week exfoliating water base peel.  Frequently I laugh at my knowledge as a man that has developed with skincare and cosmetics. 

I always said modelling wouldn’t change me, well it has. My knowledge of makeup and maintaining good skin is far higher than 99% of straight guys. Oddly enough I know which makeup feels like a layer of mud on your face and which ones breath. With that experience I have truly gained value for good skincare. 

For the past few weeks I have been trying these products out. The hyaluronic serum stuff is unreal. I am used to a cream, but with 3 drops from a dropper and rubbed over my face, I get rid of that dry stiff skin feeling and don't have the cream residue on my fingers. Which turns out to be a real pain when everything these days is touch screen.

The other one that I really like is this water base peel. It's pretty cool. Just a little bit left to dry on your skin for a few seconds. Then rubbing it all you can see all the dead skin that you have left over. Seriously no wonder my skin is so dry. I am results driven so seeing what the product does at the moment of use is rewarding.

Personally sunscreen is sunscreen for me, but when in Asia as a caucasian model it is crucial to maintain that healthy white skin. And I have never really used a cleanser much, so I haven't noticed the same impact as with the other 2 products. 

A mark to remember

3 weeks ago, I went forward with a taboo of the modeling industry. In the ever going effort to keep a clean slate (untainted body in this case) agencies everywhere ask to hold off on getting body art, or tattoos I should say. For years, I had been planning on doing this, deliberating on what, where and how big.  After all this time and a serendipitous invitation from a friend I began to move forward.  

Why now though? Well a few reasons:

•  I am in a warm humid environment. This provides a great place to allow the tattoo to heal.
•  I feel like I moving forward with my life into an as of yet undefined career but still a significant change.
• Slight rebellion against the plain white canvas this is a model.

Flash back to beginning of May, my friend Babs (who claims to have a bad influence on me) mentioned she would be meeting her tattoo artist to discuss her next tattoo. Light bulb! I asked about tagging along and began to put my best efforts onto paper to demonstrate what I wanted. With artistic skills aside, you could begin to get the jest of what was in my head for years.

Paper in hand, Babs and I met up with Moon of Moonstruck Tattoos. He had done a number of her pieces and they were all impressive.  I began to describe what I wanted. Starting with a Canadian coat of arms, removing insignificant parts to me, and adding others.  The union jack and fleur des lis have little significance in my life, so I dropped those flags completely. Moving to the crest I decided to use symbols significant to me, mountains and a sheath of wheat to signify my prairie roots and love for being in the mountains. Icelandic Mjolnir (thors hammer) and Ukrainian Tryzub would highlight my ancestorial roots with the Scottish thistle below. Lastly I would replace the lion and unicorn for deeper meaning. Dreki the Icelandic dragon was a protector from the particular region my ancestors set sail from in the late 1800s.  Lastly the gyrfalcon is a symbol of Iceland, Ukraine and Canada.

My significance came together into an image that Moon created. A far cry from my original drawing I was impressed. Off to work we go.

Normally I am not one to get nervous, I am actually someone that tries to be so prepared that nervousness is the last thing on my mind. Even still waiting for that first contact of needle on skin did leave me a little on edge. I was prepared though, having a large healthy breakfast of eggs , apples and oatmeal, with cinnamon to give that longer lasting glycemic effect, I mean for flavour of course.  Packed with me was my 1L Nalgene and a recent discovery of Stephen James organic energy bar (mmm so good, sushi flavoured). 

With the stencil on, we decided to shrink it a little bit and restencil. For those of you that are still wondering, yes this will be big and no its not on my arm or lower back. I decided to go with my thigh.

One of my other big concerns was how to I keep myself entertained for 5 or 6 hours. Well moon had me covered on that, besides being a great conversationalist (which you kinda have to be), he had a tv set up for me to watch Hansel & Grettel, Vikings and a little big bang theory to round things off. 

Naturally curious I wanted to watch as that hum of the tool began to scrape and etch ink into my skin. As the day began it was a dull scrape, different but not uncomfortable.  With the inking progressing to scratching a sunburn then about 6 hours in feeling like a cat was scratching your sunburn for you.  Final details being drawn in I was nearly biting my fist, but came out with a smile.  

The healing is now done and I have shown my family and friends in Canada.  Cheers everyone, I hope you like it.

The day that never ends

After spending nearly the past 6 months in SE asia…again I find myself trapped in a time capsule sending me back in time. Of course I am referring to the plane that sends me across the international dateline.  And what would this trip be without a bit of adventure and reflection.

Fresh on my mind I thought nothing better than to sum up the adventure of my work experience since I departed Canada in January. Reviewing my tally’s I completed work for:

•        2 tv commercials
•        5 magazines
•        2 billboards
•        more fashion shows than I could imagine have ever doing around 8
•        1 advertising campaign
•        6 ultra luxury events
•        5 lookbooks

There is possibly more but that’s about as far as my memory serves me with this regard. It’s been a relatively productive experience, but as that goes I have also managed to grow more as a person.

Last year around the same time (possibly a week later), I wrote a post called, reason, season and lifetime. (Reason Season Lifetime Post)This was related to an outstanding email I received from a past client. To prevent blatant repition I thought best to just some it up before continuing to my next point. 

People are introduced to your life in many ways, each person serves a purpose in some respect or another. For some the role is small, and others it grows to serve a larger impact in your personal development.  Without placing people into specific boxes you naturally discover where someone sits in that scale of reason, season and lifetime.  Using my past adventures as examples I thought I may enlighten you:

Photobomb Success

The reason: The easiest example for this would be a client on a job. Maybe a photographer or stylist, While sometimes you get along great and others its an oil and water separation you work together for the purpose of completing a job.

A season: I will continue with a model example again. A seasonal influence on your life is frequently a roommate or classmate, maybe someone that you work on a project with. For the month, 2 months or an extended amount of time, you help each other out. However, at the end of that period, lets say a modelling contract, you essentially stop communicating. The relationship provided what it needed during the season, but no longer is something that has extended influence. I find many of the people I meet slide into this category whether it was university, modelling or otherwise.

Lastly, a lifetime. As you travel about your daily life or around the world there are people you connect with on a deeper level. These people, make extended efforts to maintain a line of friendship and you do the same. Sometimes its that gym rat buddy from university, a roommate from travels abroad or even just a happenchance encounter that blossomed into something more than a passing of shoulders. These are my favourite obviously, at the same time they are also rare. 

As I go back and read this I can name specific people who each sat into a particular category I mentioned above. While some influenced me more than others each person is very important in my life and I thank them for it. My travels have extended my friendships far beyond the reaches of Canada’s vast boarders and interestingly enough introduced me to some amazing people on my global doorstep.

Oops, almost forgot about the adventure of the day. The genius I am booked a 7 am flight out of Singapore to come home. Silly and smart at the same time, I realized that by pulling an all nighter with a friend and a few coconuts would help me crush 8 hours of the 20 something of travel time.

In standard fashion I arrived 2 hours early for my international flight. Upon boarding we sat waiting on the plane for an additional 3 hours while one of the doors was not closing properly. Eventually we were all deplaned. The good news is, the plane was safe to fly, the bad news was the door would be inoperable and safety standards stated that rows 18-38 needed to board a different plane. Guess who had lucky seat number 34C.

As luck would have it I missed my connection towards SFO almost instantly, so I felt no pressure to get anywhere ultra quickly. I obviously wanted to get home, but the few empty seats I would rather surrender to someone on business or travelling with children, and that I did.  Alternatively, I was rebooked for a 12:45 flight to Hong Kong, then through Vancouver and finally making it back to cowtown. The downside I wouldn’t be flying on United’s old school fleet. Gosh darn it.

I seriously have to commend all the customer service and everyone from United, Cathay and Air Canada for their efforts. This messed up door created quite the shit storm, and while some passengers reacted poorly, these staff managed to stay calm and get shit done.

Unfortunately with all that commotion, my bag is sitting somewhere. As of this exact moment, I have no clue, and neither do the airlines. But they are seriously working hard on it and I have great appreciation for that. Lost baggage claim is all ready, and despite it originating with United’s issues all the 3 airlines have put in a diligent effort to find it for me.

I am a lucky person to be honest. My flight is taking back home, where I have most my clothes so a few days without that suitcase isn’t going to hurt me (unless I want to play squash) and despite a large delay, I am only arriving home 5 hours later than originally scheduled while following a vastly different route.

I am always listening to music as I write my blogs, one of the few times I listen to music (its usually audiobooks and podcasts). As I pitter patter across the keys I can see fingers rattling off the ivory keys to the tune of Mozart (concerto of two pianos and orchestra in e flat).