So if you do follow me on twitter at @jac_theocctrav, you’ll know I’m probably not that much of a tweeter – most of my updates happen here on the blog or at the Facebook Page.
This past week has been quite an interesting experience as I signed up for the Singapore twitter Rotation Curation project @hellofrmSG. The idea behind it is to show people a more personal side of Singapore by showcasing different types of people you can find in Singapore, young or old, local or expat. Rotation Curation, or having a twitter account with many curators, first started with @sweden, but has since spread to many countries across the globe.
With different people helming the account each week, you do get quite a range of topics and conversation depending on their interest and expertise! From local history, flora and fauna, food, families, expat views… this is just a sampling of the topics I’ve seen.
Here’s my curator profile on the hellofrmSG Tumblr page:
The Singapore account usually changes over every Saturday, and I was the curator from 25 Nov to 1 Dec 2012. It was a pretty interesting time for me to take over as the curator before me had caused a bit of an uproar with a controversial statement about her disdain for Singlish and quit the account after quite a kerfluffle.
But you know me, conflict-averse and relatively drama free so I think I acquitted myself pretty well in the wake of that uproar. It was quite a challenge in time management because sometimes you’d get so wrapped up in talking to people it’s hard to extract yourself. Also with a full time job, I wasn’t as active as I would have liked during the day and some nights I was just completely too knackered to talk. Tweeting is hard work~
Had some pretty interesting conversations throughout the week though – I focused a lot of the topics around travel since that is my passion anyway, and I was curious to see Singaporeans views about travel beyond my own, but a lot of it were spur of the moment thoughts. Some highlights:
- My profile picture elicited a bunch of questions and interest about diving and I shared a bunch of my latest pix and dive logs, and answered questions people had about diving.
- Another hot topic was about where Singaporeans were often mistaken to be from, or the weird places people thought Singapore was at – China was the usual suspect, though some were as obscure as Jamaica, Scotland and (for the record, Singapore is in South East Asia along the equator, at the southern tip of Malaysia.)
- Also related was where were the most obscure places to run across fellow Singaporean… basically, every where! You had people running into the President on a mountain, in the midst of hare krishna devotees in India, run-ins at obscure Tibetan hotels…
- And of course a popular topic was favourite Singlish words from fellow Singaporeans
So overall, I really did enjoy the experience! I don’t know if I’ll ever be such an active tweeter ever again – I usually use it as a newsfeed or the occasional comment, but if you guys enjoy the conversation, I’ll definitely consider trying it out on @jac_theocctrav.
Thanks everyone who joined in the conversations! It might not have been to everyone’s taste or interest, but no worries, there’s a new curator each week so you can always join in again then.
Here are just some of the other countries Rotation Curation twitter accounts that I enjoyed talking to, they’ll also be changing every week: @twt_malaysia, @TWkLGBTQ, @iam_pakistan, @i_amgermany @WeAreAustralia @Bangkoking @MoroccoCuration @weareUAE … there are a whole lot more out there!