The Singapore Australia Rules Football club started life as the Singapore Lions in 1993. It was somewhat of a false start, as the founders, in their eagerness to create a social sporting club for Aussie rules fans, neglected the fact that there was another football franchise in Singapore also called the Lions – the National soccer team! So, it was a letter from the Singapore Lions’ legal department that led to the birth of the Wombats. Why the Wombats? Every other iconic Australia animal was already claimed as a mascot, and the Wombat was an apt description of the early playing stock.

The Wombats purpose has always been primarily social, the football being a reason to gather on a Saturday and have a few beers. Like all things that have humble beginnings, the Club has grown over the years in tandem with similar clubs all around Asia.

In 1999, a quasi-Asian league was formed, and the inaugural Asian Championships were held in Bangkok, which Singapore won, defeating arch-rival Hong Kong in the final.

Singapore has gone on to be the most successful team in a league that now has thirteen teams. Notably, Singapore went undefeated from November 1996 to August 2002, a reign Kevin Sheedy say is the longest undefeated run he has encountered during his 50 years in the game as a player and coach.

In 1997, the Wombats represented Singapore at the biannual Arafura games in Darwin, and were the only Singapore team to win a medal (a bronze). This led to a televised game between Singapore and Malaysia in 1997 which attracted a large crowd of curious spectators. It is now part of Wombat folklore that the coach appeared on Singapore’s Sunday morning sports program to discuss the game, wearing his shirt inside out and looking slightly disheveled after a massive night out celebrating the win over the Malaysian Tigers, as they were then known.

Finding a space large enough to play our game has always presented a major challenge to the club’s survival. In the early days, a fax would go out each Friday at 3pm, specifying Saturday’s training venue. Over the years, games have been played at Sentosa, Sembawang, the field where the Marina Bay Sands currently sits, and various random fields in the heartlands. Much later, Turf City provided the club its first real home.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the Wombats became famous for hosting large, Australian-style sportsman’s nights which would pack out entire hotel ball rooms and feature legendary Australian cricketers (Dennis Lillie was the first guest), and a procession of Aussie rules identities, ranging from Kevin Sheedy to Warrick Capper. The late David Hookes was one of the most popular. In 2002, the club raised $75,000 for the Bali bombing appeal at an event held at the Regent Hotel, where it is believed that’s the world’s highest price for a VB stubby ($7000) was paid in the charity auction. The grand final functions in the 1990s developed a reputation as the expat party of the year and the only place you could watch the AFL final, semi-live. The games were recorded via satellite at the Australian Naval Base and couriered to the function to be played back, with a ‘slight’ delay.

The demographic of the Wombats has changed somewhat over the years. In the early 1990s, the club was populated with young people looking to find opportunity overseas against the backdrop of Australia’s last recession and general economic gloom, with young engineers making up the majority. Now the club incorporates a broad cross-section of the expat community, with many long-term expats forming the foundation of a club that hopefully will be around for many years to come. To find out more email aussierules@anza.org.sg

This article was originally published in March 2013.

Being a diver means that you have additional health issues that non-divers don’t really need to worry about as much. We don’t need to be Olympians, but we do need a good degree of fitness. Being fit enough to swim 200 metres without stopping is one of the course criteria.

All divers must follow these health and care guidelines:

• Keep well hydrated before and after each dive.
• Avoid colds, which can block sinuses, which are a critical part of the body. Colds can cause equalisation problems, which can be a little painful. So stay healthy and keep your ears cleaned too.
• Smoking is a definite no go, but unfortunately many divers still continue to smoke and accept the risks involved.
• Avoid drinking alcohol prior to all dives, and any evening drinks prior to a day of diving should be reduced to nil or very little.
• Avoid getting sunburn.

Some general tips are:

• Be medically dive fit and physically dive fit – yoga and stretching exercises will help with your breathing techniques.
• Eat a piece of fruit before and after each dive – this helps avoid muscle cramps and replaces vitamins depleted during dives. Bananas and watermelon are especially good.
• Don’t dive if you’re feeling unwell – rest on the boat.
• Be well hydrated – drink lots of water and avoid carbonated drinks.
• Be well insulated – change into dry clothes after your dive.
• Avoid deep, repetitive dives, and reduce diving depths during a weekend of diving.
• Minimise exercise during and after diving – a nap should always be in order.

As with anything to do with your health, if you are unsure, consult a doctor or a specialised dive doctor.

This article was originally published in March 2013.

When shopping for fashion, most of us like to look for natural fibres, cottons, silks, and linens. Living in Singapore, where the climate is constantly hot and sticky, natural fibers are a must. 

But as with our food, just because it is natural, does not mean it is organic. The majority of clothing produced nowadays is treated by harsh chemicals – recognisable by the “new t-shirt” smell which disappears after a couple of washes.

These chemicals are used to keep the garments crease free and pretty for merchandising and sale. Unfortunately, these chemicals are toxic and not good for us. For this reason, we should be washing everything before we wear it – unless, of course, we have bought organic.

Organic brands promise that no chemicals where used making the fabric – whether it’s in growing the cotton, silk or bamboo, or making the finished product. This includes everything from sprays on crops to transport and shipping.

For me this is particularly important for babies and children, and one of my all-time favorite brands for organic baby clothes, bed linen and products is Nature Baby in New Zealand. They ship internationally and provide organic cotton and wool for newborns all the way through to school age.

There has been a lot of research into the chemicals used in bedding products, and for this reason mattress covers have become a must for all new mums. The same applies for the linen. Choosing organic cotton sheets, pyjamas, sleeping bags and mattress protectors are most definitely a healthier choice.

But what about the ethical argument? Well, as a stylist, I love looking for boutique-type brands that source their own fabrics and stores that deal with boutique designers. This way, not only are we getting unique pieces but we also know there is integrity in their manufacturing.

A new store to Singapore on Amoy St is Willow and Huxley, and they have a plethora of international brands that fit this bill perfectly. They have limited collections, and beautiful fabrics and cuts.

Of course there will always be the need and desire to shop High St and there is more and more pressure on the big brands to manufacture ethically. As consumers we can choose to support or not support those that do indeed have a conscience and protect human rights and the environment.

The environment is also to be considered, and we should look for renewable and sustainable materials. One of the up-and-coming ethical choices is bamboo. Bamboo is renewable, extremely fast growing, and the fabric itself is superbly comfortable and absorbs more moisture on the skin than cotton – so it’s perfect for Singapore. I love the range from Zhai for basics. Getting a healthy wardrobe is easy, it just takes a little thought and an awareness of what your options are.

Happy shopping!

ETHICAL BRANDS

Bassike   www.bassike.com.au

Nature Baby     www.naturebaby.co.nz

Zhai      www.zhai.com.sg

Willow and Huxley      www.willowandhuxley.com

Earth and Me      www.myearthtoo.com

This article was originally published in March 2013, photo courtesy of Zhai.

Part of the appeal of living in Asia is travelling to interesting places and experiencing different cultures and photography is a great way to capture those memories and share the experiences. However, many people use a badge-of-honour approach to their holiday pictures: “here is me in front of (insert landmark or iconic view)”. Too many holiday photos are of people standing in front of things. This type of photographer seems to value evidence of the “experience” rather than the experience itself!

Improving your travel photography can be as simple as asking yourself why you are taking this photograph. What is it about the location that is prompting you to pull out your camera? If you want your photos to be more than a checklist of “been there done that”, then some consideration is required before pushing the shutter button.

Try a different angle

Most people shoot from eye level, so try kneeling or lying down, and shoot up. Or climb on a bench or up a staircase and shoot down from there. At least your shot will not look like the thousands that others have taken at the same location.

Photo 1 – Looking down on Fish markets in Sai Kung, Hong Kong.

Get in close

People often use a wide angle to try and capture everything, but often these photos do not do the location justice. Instead, try getting up close to your subject or pick out interesting detail.

Photo 2 – Detail from Tian Tan Budda, Hong Kong.

Look for something unique

Try to find something different that defines the location.

Photo 3 – Children heading to school in Bhutan wearing compulsory traditional dress.

Create a connection

Photos of people are a great way to generate an emotional connection. Don’t be afraid to ask people if you can take their photo.

Photo 4 –Lady holding fish – Ho Chi Minh market

Combine these ideas

The best travel photos encompass more than one of the ideas above, providing an insight into the unique essence of a location or a culture.

Photo 5 – This sums up Hong Kong for me – lots of traffic, lots of people, old and new all stacked up on each other.

 Finally, take lots of photos! Although some of them will be lousy, with some thinking, you will also end up with some brilliant ones.

Post-holiday tip

If you want friends or relatives to enjoy looking at your photos, don’t show them all 263 shots! Don’t make the mistake of thinking photos that are important to you will be interesting to other people. Pick a very small number of photos that capture the essence of the destination, and keep the rest for your memories.

If you are interested in improving your photography come along to the ANZA click club. It is open to all experience levels and is a great way to learn from others. photography@anza.org.sg

This article was originally published in March 2013.

Remember when pilates was all the rage? How about when yoga was just for new-age salad scoffers and not for, well, everyone? While just yesterday it seems exercise was all about breathing, yoga, and pilates – low-impact workouts which, while they could make you huff and puff, were more likely to leave you with a peaceful sense of accomplishment, rather than an urge to collapse into a heap on the floor.

 That’s all changed in the new age of the workout. High-intensity is the new norm, and it has arrived in a variety of different vehicles. CrossFit, boot camp, TRX, boxing and mixed-martial-arts-style training: all those deadlifts, one-legged squats, three-minute heavy bag sessions and burpees are guaranteed to leave the user totally exhausted and in need of a nice holiday to show off those hardened muscles.

 Although you could be a soldier or a champion fighter and benefit from the workouts, more and more mere mortals are taking up high-intensity challenges to shed kilos and tone up.

One person helping everyday office workers and mums take up the challenge is personal trainer Lisa Clayton, 30-year-old mum of two and the face of OZFit. She is a bootcamp instructor at the Botanical Gardens, Fort Canning Park and East Coast in mornings. She’s a Sydney Northern Beaches girl and has been in Singapore for five years now. As well as twins Max and Cooper, she has another on the way. You won’t get called a worthless maggot in her boot camps, however. “I’m not into the military style of training, yelling at you, making you crawl through mud. “We do a mixture of cardio drills and high intensity interval training, where we alternate periods of short, intense anaerobic exercise with short recovery periods. Strength training is also an essential part of the workout. We perform body weight exercises, use stairs, hills and benches to get the most out of all the parks have to offer. With the addition of resistance bands, we really can tone the muscles and build strength.”

As well as the willpower to get fit, Lisa’s boot camp recruits also have to have the willpower to get out of bed – the earliest starts at 6.15am at Fort Canning Park, well before the sun rises. This colourful collection of men and women clutching their yoga mats don’t stay sleepy for long, though. Five minutes into the workout and the beads of sweat are starting to form.

Lisa says these days, people are bored with the monotony of the gym or the daily run, and are thinking about their wallets in these recession-prone times. “Personal training can be expensive, people get sick of the same routines of going to the gym and running the same route.” It’s also good to be able to egg your mates on. “The best way to get motivated is to turn up with a group of friends or like-minded people and not be the only one working hard. It’s not a party, though, “You will have fun doing it but, I don’t let people come for a chit chat, you’re going to work hard! Not to mention, in order to see change and get results, you need to mix it up. No question about it. Boot camps offer the complete package of cardio and strength training-stuff you’re never going to want to do on your own.”

All that hard work can be humbling for cocky guys who think Lisa’s big smile and easygoing manner means it’s going to be an easy workout. “I tell you, it’s the men who sometimes struggle the most as they can be really either cardio-fit and their core is really weak, making the strength component hard, or they are very strong due to lifting a lot of weights but they really could step their cardio level up. Every class can be tailored to all levels so no one will feel like they are holding anyone up. Everyone does their best.”

Lisa’s expanding her classes to include boxing – a response to growing demand for boxing-style workouts, which have long been fabled to be some of the toughest around. The typical image of a boxing gym – that of a dingy shed, smelling of ripe socks and filled with undesirable rogues – has changed in recent years. Now, many are modern, well-lit, smoothly-marketed machines catering for the office set, and are not so daunting for those wanting to give it a try and get fit.

One way to do that? How about signing up for a charity boxing match, training for months to get in the ring with another amateur for three rounds? That’s exactly what ANZA member Jemma Hooykaas is doing. The 31-year-old Kiwi is a teacher at the Singapore American School, and when she’s not teaching, she’s at the gym, working the heavy bag and building up her endurance to last three rounds in the ring. That’s more than three months of training for six minutes of fight – some of the most exhausting physical stress any normal person can put their body under. Jemma wanted to get involved “just the opportunity to see how far I can push myself”. “Also, it’s for an amazing charity,” she says. Fighters are raising money for the Cambodian charity, the Children’s Surgical Centre and its affiliate, the Cambodian Acid Survivors Charity.

Boxing training usually involves a variation of body-weight exercises such as push-ups and burpees, interspersed with shadow boxing, spar play, heavy bag work and other explosive exercises. It’s incredibly draining work, as Jemma can attest to. She reckons she was pretty fit before signing up for the training. “I thought I was – but I wasn’t! It’s a whole another level of fitness.” The first training was a bit of a shock to the senses. “We started with a 30-minute run, then did circuits. It was intimidating! “It’s the first time in my life that within two minutes I’m dripping with sweat.” And the training sessions don’t get any easier. “They’re hard. Man, you walk out the door and get on the train and I have to fight to stay awake!”

Of course, the bag doesn’t hit back, and the exertion steps up a level once you get in the ring. Jemma had just started sparring with head coach Alexis. “I learnt that I drop my guard. It’s thinking that you know something and quickly realising that you know very little. When someone starts punching you in the head [the training] all goes out the window.” For Jemma, boxing training has it all. “It combines everything. I feel it’s the ultimate fitness workout.”

With that in mind, I went to see personal trainer Brendan Loo, founder of Fitness Evolution. I meet him at Energia fitness club in Robertson Quay, where he trains his clients. As a Singaporean with Australian residency, Brendan has been a personal trainer for 13 years, which he claims makes him an old man. He says CrossFit, boot camps, TRX, and other high-impact training regimes gaining popularity are all quite closely related. “Every few years someone will come in with something new. “CrossFit, kettlebells – they all come under the same thing. They all have the same benefits and variety. “People want variation in training – they want benefits.”

Crossfit is a fairly new, high-intensity workout involving excercises with and without weights, from kettlebell swings to weightlifting-style snatches. Participants can score their progress to compete with others. All this new-age exercise isn’t for everyone, warns Brendan. “Hardcore explosive exercises, you need a strong mind for it. Some of them are too hardcore for the average Joe.” Brendan says exercise regimes like this are good, but only as a complement to more traditional, weights-based training methods. “Ninety per cent of [clients], they want to look their best. “But if they want to achieve these goals, the majority of the time has to be spent on the core basics. The other new-age methods complement them.”

So, with that in mind, I had Brendan take me through a training combining some traditional and some new-age exercises. We started off with some traditional gym weight exercises. First, some incline bench presses. While managing to emasculate me by starting off with just the bar, Brendan eventually added more weight so I was lifting 60kg, with a lot of effort, shaking arms, and huffing and puffing. Brendan says these types of exercises build muscle on lots of different muscle groups. After that it was some lat pull-downs, which again work lots of muscle groups. This was a warm-up for the pull-ups which were to come next – pull-ups are a part of the CrossFit regime. Again with the emasculation, as I needed Brendan’s help to compete a set of 10.

From there it was more new-age exercises, with kettlebell swings to strengthen the hips, and horrible TRX jump squats where I lift my feet off the ground and pull myself up by the arms. The latter truly did need explosive power, and I could barely manage 10. Then Brendan got me on the exercycle to tire me out, more weights, and finished with a hellish combination of sit-ups and boxing. It wasn’t even an hour, and I felt like I’d been through the wringer, and as a fan of these new-age workouts, the extra weights had worked muscles I didn’t even know I owned. Well, as they say – no pain, no gain!

This article was originally published in March 2013.

Some fitness clubs that may interest you: 

OZFit www.ozfit.com.sg

Vanda Boxing  www.vandaboxing.com

Fitness Evolution www.fitnessevo.com