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HK Magazine

I am a Hong Kong-born Indian. Don’t assume I love curry because I don’t.
My grandfather went to Shanghai during the 1930s and worked for the British. He was sent to a concentration camp when the Japanese invaded.
My grandpa picked up Japanese pretty fast because they had a death quiz every week. Those who failed the language test were shot.
My coworkers told me vaguely about sending an application on my behalf to the show “Minutes to Fame.” I never watched Chinese TV and never realized the show's impact.
It may have only been a minute or two on stage, but over a million people were looking at you. I figured, I am not in it to win but I had better be prepared.
Hacken Lee Hak-ken and Joey Leung Wing-chung were hosting the show. I figured they’d both like Alan Tam Wing-lun. So I picked his song “Love Trap.”
I sang out of tune, I danced poorly, and I wore leather pants. That’s why I won.
Humor is about making fun of yourself. It always wins people over.
Whenever I did something wrong, people just assumed it was because of a cultural difference rather than rudeness.
Everyone thinks my hip-twisting funk is a form of traditional Indian dance. It is not. It is just poor dancing.
I was an official in the Correctional Services for about 16 years before going on the show.
The most difficult people to deal with are those who lack the fear of death. They have nothing to lose. To reason with them is almost impossible.
We are too civilized to beat people up so we just isolate them, which can be worse.
Respect is ultimately what criminals want.
Many criminals grew up in abusive families so they joined gangs to impress and earn respect from their so-called "brothers."
Everything evolves. Even triad societies have evolved to recruit well-educated professionals to manage their businesses.
Arranged marriages are seen as backward but they have the lowest divorce rate. They seem natural to me. My parents showed me a pile of photos, and I picked my wife from among them.
Photoshop tricked me. My wife looked a bit different when I saw her in person. 
There is no way I can stop loving my wife. I can’t reject her food even when I am full because that’s her way of showing love.
People think I can't let go of the one-minute of fame from the show. They keep telling me the whole thing is so over.
Perceptions are everything. Some people think I am not going to make it because I am a South Asian minority in Hong Kong.
I think it’s the other way around. Showbiz will always need actors of different races. And I can actually monopolize the market.
I am not planning to stay in this field forever. I am a flash mob gang - I get what I want and then I leave.
People offer me all kinds of media jobs. I established a production house with other winners from the game show. We’ve got a business running now.
The biggest misconception about Indians is that we were the inventors of the “Himforte Oil.” No, we didn’t invent that.
Words are cheap. I don’t talk about sex. I just do it.
Sex is the art of tickling a woman’s senses from head to toe. We like to take it slow with a lot of foreplay.
The Kama Sutra is known as a type of bible because you need miracles to get some of those things done.
Discrimination is about overgeneralization. People think all of us use one hand to eat and the other to wipe after going to the bathroom. That’s only true for a small portion of people.
Discrimination is also about the inability to discriminate. People confuse Indians with Indonesians, Hindus with Muslims, Iranians with Iraqis... just like many confuse the Japanese with Chinese and Koreans.
Life is unpredictable. Every day when I open my eyes, I wonder, "What comes next?"
Either life is unfair or I am lucky. Some people work for years and remain unnoticed; I stood on stage for a minute and won contracts.
Work hard, mock yourself occasionally and take life as it is.


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HK Magazine Archive

Actor Gill Mohindepaul Singh

Magazines

Life took an unexpected turn for Gill Mohindepaul Singh after his crowd-pleasing performance on the game show "Minutes to Fame." Before that, he had been working with the Hong Kong Correctional Services for over 15 years. He shares with Jan Leung the significance of his overnight success.
