AsianPersuasion
Thursday, July 28, 2005
I was hired to produce a video of Mr.s Blair's official visit to Kuala Lumpur. The Sultan of Perak was her host, and his daughter was the one who hired me.
For five long days, Yazid and I were shooting Mrs. Blair's official visit here in Malaysia and I was watching all the VIPs getting to shake her hand and meet her. There were people taking photographs with her and talking with her... and I was thinking, gosh, I wish I could meet her too. But I also thought, yeah right. The only people introduced to her are VVIPs and Malaysian royalty, so even though I'm shooting the video, it would not be appropriate for me to suddently walk up to her and introduce myself, with her ten bodyguards standing close by. Not a possibility. And, I thought I might get fired if I did that.
Last night was our fifth and last day of shooting her official visit to Malaysia. I was standing in the hallway outside her private suite in the Shangri-La hotel. Mrs. Blair was waiting at the end of the hallway to meet the Prince of Perak who was coming to officially bid her farewell before she went to the airport. So as I stood about thirty feet from her (Yazid was standing next to me with the video camera waiting to shoot the farewell), she suddenly looked at me.
She said, "I saw you earlier and I was wondering who you were." All the body guards and policemen standing along the walls of the hallway stood and stared at me. Then she began to walk towards me.
When she was finally standing in front of me she said with a smile, "And What do you do?"
Stunned, I stuck out my hand and said, "Hello, I'm Lydia. I'm producing a video of your visit here in Malaysia." I was not as nervous as I thought I would have been, but it was one of those moments where everything around you stops. Time stops. and there is only you and that person. I could hear myself speaking, I could hear the words coming out of my mouth and at the same time I was talking to myself saying, am I making sense? I hope I don't start to stutter.
Then one of her British body guards came through a door in front of us and our conversation stopped. I would have liked to speak to her more but nevermind. I got to meet the First Lady of Britain...and SHE wanted to meet ME. How cool is that!?
