pollution is always on everyone's mind - even in black tie

a few interesting moments to report from tonight's illustrious inaugural session of coutts' women in asia awards at the four seasons hotel. i found it hard to believe that, literally, i knew 7 of the 9 nominees tonight, making it a banner day for both friendship and "girl power", to borrow a term from one of the winners' acceptance speech.

Claire Hsu, winner of the Rising Star award, who ascended the podium first during the evening, closed her remarks by saying, "I hope that someone's going to do something about the air pollution." The fact that Claire is pregnant reinforced the unexpected pointedness of the remark.

Then, Christine Loh, our chairman (of CAN, i mean) won the award for the "Woman who has made a difference". it was of course somewhat of a bummer that sally lo, of the hk cancer fund, had to lose, as a result : ( but, in my heart, i felt that christine's victory was more than just. she then exhorted coutts to send some of that private banking money "our way" (to ALL those women in hk making a difference to society and the environment.) in closing, christine mentioned air pollution -- again -- like claire.

the two of them were a real 1-2 punch for our cause, actually! after all, there were two Exco members in the room, plus numerous tycoons and titans of industry.

i decided it was a good moment to remind my good friend, esther heer, of coutts north asia, of the importance of supporting CAN by including a flyer from us in their annual diary mail-out this year. but she poured cold water on my hopes by telling me that "the committee" was not ready to support this initiative because it might offend some clients : ( it just goes to show the difficulties of promoting such an issue in HONG KONG. honestly, i could NEVER imagine such a cause meeting resistance in any developed democratic nation. i may very well ask the winners of tonight's three awards to write to coutts tomorrow -- to underscore the importance of championing this cause publicly. WHO CAN POSSIBLY FEAR A BACKLASH FROM SUPPORTING CLEAN AIR? it makes one wonder what kind of society we actually live in -- i suppose it goes to show that some people continue to believe that clean air is not a necessity -- but a luxury. for shame....