Mumbai Mirror (India) & Kantipur (Nepal)

Mumbai Mirror/Times of India (India)- 3 March 2012

Click to read the article

On International Women’s Day, we take a look at how a young South Korean woman has taken to the busy streets of Mumbai to ask passersby what their dreams in life are. Paayal Talwaar shares her story with our readers.

Meet Suyong Kim, a self-professed dreamer and founder of Dream Panorama - a year-long project that involves meeting people across the globe and discussing their dreams.

Kim’s recent stop in Mumbai yielded 24 interviews: “I find Mumbai a challenging city where I have gone through various emotions of love, hate, frustration and excitement,” says the 31-year-old. She has met people in Andheri, Bandra and Thane. Some people from the Dharavi slum shared their dreams with her. “I hope to adopt a daughter and name her Arundati,” says film-maker Harish Iyer, a member of the LGBT community, when he shared his dream with Kim.

Kim began her journey of dreams in London, June 2011. As of today, she has interviewed 268 people of 56 nationalities in 21 countries and 73 cities. Her subjects come from all walks of life: Cobblers, construction workers, sex workers, transgendered people, pilots, refugees, soldiers, life coaches, housewives and more.

“Young people have career specific aspirations while older people tend to just dream of a happy family life,” says Kim. “I have met an 8-year-old boy who wants to be a Lego designer to a 78-year-old mother who wants to see her son again before she dies. I have also encountered a Georgian village girl who wants to see the Eiffel Tower, a Lebanese celebrity who wants to live in a village, an Indian who wants to experience snow, a Palestinian refugee who dreams of going back to her old house despite having spent 63 years in refugee camps and an Iranian labourer who wants to be a musician in a country where playing music is banned,” she adds.

There are a few whose dreams have already been realised. An Indian couple had their first date on Christmas Eve where they announced to Kim that they wish to be together for life and are now getting married in April.

The Dream Panorama project fulfills one of Kim’s personal dreams. She listed the project among her 83 dreams as she battled cancer at the age of 24. So far she has realised 36 dreams in 6 years which include learning to sail, becoming a qualified Thai massage practitioner, fulfilling her mother’s pilgrimage trip and publishing a bestseller.

She has also bagged a small role in an upcoming Bollywood film which was also one of her dreams and has appeared on several TV talk shows. Future dreams include climbing Mt. Everest and turning her project into a book and film. “I am dreaming that who will play my role in the film,” adds Kim. “My biggest dream is to inspire the world and reach out to as many people as possible,” says Kim. Ten artists and professionals from all over the world are contributing to her dream project which culminates on May 31. The project is funded through a $110,000 grant from Johnnie Walker Keep Walking Fund, selected from 1500 applicants. She also plans to revisit the dreamers she meets in 10 years to discover what has been fulfilled. Kim recites Shahrukh Khan’s dialogue in Om Shanti Om: “‘Agar kissi cheez ko tum dil se chaho toh poori kainat use tumse milane ki koshish mein lag jaati hain’” and says, “The more people know about your dreams, the more opportunities and encouragement you attract.”

 Kim’s tips for dreamers
- Think about EVERYTHING you wish to do as though it was your last day on earth.
- Make a LIST of your dreams however small or big such as saying ‘I love you’ to your family or travelling to Mars.
- Prioritize them and give a timeline to each of them in the list.
- With the timeline your wish becomes a goal.
- Visualize them and find others who are doing it.
- Make a vision board with combination of such images and put it where you can see it everyday.
- Imagine how you would feel when you achieve that dream.
- Share dreams with your friends and family.

Kantipur (Nepal) -24 March 2012

Click to read the article

Translation:

Dream Journey of a Beautiful Lady

Suyoung Kim wrote me an email from London- My dream brings me to Nepal. Can you help me to show the way to the Everest Base Camp?

After 2 weeks, last Friday this girl was in Dasarath Football Stadium. There was a match between North Korea and Palestine. All of a sudden, she picked up a placard that reads, “We want United Korea”. All camera lens focused on her placard. The officials of AFC rushed to her and seized her placard as soon as they saw her.

31 years old, beautiful Suyoung Kim was at Kathmandu following her dream. She had a dream to climb the tallest peak of the world Mt. Everest for 7 years. She was saying, “This is my 41st dream and still I’ve got 42 more dreams to accomplish in the future.” She added, “Don’t you think everyone can realize their dream, do you?” Suyoung Kim was seated in Pyongyang Restaurant in North Korea and she looks philosophical. She says, “My friend, don’t run away from your dreams. Follow your dreams and your whole life will change afterwards.”

She showed scars around her body. My eyes were on the scars and at the same time on the North Korean waitress aside who was smiling at us.

Suyoung was interviewed 9 times to start her job at the Korean branch of world famous bank Goldman Sachs. However, within some months she had had a setback that she was diagnosed of cancer. She said, “I was 24 years old then. How would I die so young? It was my luck the cancer was at initial stage.” 6 months later she was cured in the year of 2005.

Then she listed 73 dreams from her heart and headed University of London to do a Master’s degree. The year she completed her Master’s, she started working for Royal Dutch Sale Company in London. In the same year she started a blog that she wrote on career-related topics such as how to do to interviews, how to work in international companies, how to cope with Europeans and how to work as a team. Her blog became famous overnight.

She then started going to her own country. Many people surrounded and listened to her. She was no more than just a blogger; she was a role model who inspired many people around. 2 years ago, she had published a book which was successfully sold to more than 150,000 people in Korea. The book was mainly her biography.

‘My parents were laborers. When I was 10 years old, my father tried his luck in business. Unfortunately we lost everything we had. We had to flee from Kwangju and started living on a community building. I used to sleep under a same blanket along with 2 sisters and a brother. Many other students teased me because my family was poor. I had attempted my first ever suicide at the age of 12. I left my high school without completing my study afterwards. I had already run away from home 3 times after I left my school. Police returned me home for 2 times. Third time I was on roads for 3 months. I was with gang fighters when I learnt to speak vulgar words. Look at my nose, it is not straight. I was hit on the nose by a knife in a gang fight. I have never drink such amount of alcohol in my entire life which I did at that time. I was a die heart fan of Seo Taiji then. The most popular song of that time “Come back home” was so inspiring that made me come back home.

After returning home, I joined vocational high school. I had a dream to go to University. I had dream to climb Mount Kilimanjaro and Mount Everest and drive my own Ferrari. But my parents could not fulfill my desires back then. They searched a job in Factory for me and they wanted me to marry with a guy from that factory.

Everyone’s got a chance, an opportunity to prove themselves. The only difference is that the doors are not open, we should recognize and open doors ourselves.

In 1999, I had got a similar opportunity to take part in the quiz contest organized by KBS TV – Korean Broadcasting System. That was the real test in my life because winning that contest meant everything for me and my family and I won that contest.

Before going to Mumbai, I watched a film “Slumdog Millionaire”. My whole life was changed the same way the main character of this movie expreienced.
I was able to pay for tuition fee with the prize money that I had earned from that contest. I was admitted to the Best university of Korea, Yonsei University. After I completed my study, Goldman Sachs invited me to join the company.

Suyoung has taken a year leave to fulfill all her dreams she had wished earlier. She says everyone should dream and it’s not that dreams are never fulfilled but it depends on how you approach to your dream. So, she inspires others to dream and fulfill them.

Suyoung has visited more than 60 countries in total, 19 last year. After visiting China, she will go to South Korea.

‘Dreams vary from country to country and person to person.’ She said, “Like 77 year old refugee in refugee camp in Palestine dreams to die in her own home. Her home had been captured by Israel. 43 years old Chemical Engineer in Italy, Paulo De Falco dreams to love 20 years younger girl but he is still single. 40 years old, Afghani Javed in Iran dreams of getting his hand cured which was damaged by bomb explosion. 8 years old boy from Korea wants to be a Lego Designer. There is a difference between dreams dreamt by rich and poor too. Poor wants to get rich and rich wants to get richer. But many poor people have no hope to become rich and rich people are somehow turning into social. These rich people are taking part in donations and other social works. These are the things that happen outside Nepal.

Among all the people she met in Nepal, Lama Dorze, who lives in Solukhumbhu Monastery, was the eldest of them. The 84 year-old monk wants to build monasteries all over the world. Trekking guide Samir Tamang wants to become a singer. Saleslady from Basantapur wants to complete her English language and fly to Japan.

Suyoung visited orphanage in Kathmandu and met orphans. There she saw children with dirty clothes and shoes. She asked them their dreams. Some of them answered to become doctor, some answered to become businessman, teacher, actor and teachers and so on. Then she collected data and bought new pair of shoes to all orphans. She said, “I hope these pair of shoes would lead them to find the way to success. She then met a famous filmmaker Nir Shah. He is one of the most renowned filmmakers and actors in Nepal. He had once won Nepali hat when his film Caravan was nominated in Oscar award ceremony. His dream was to become a internationally successful filmmaker.

Suyoung had planned to go to China after visiting Nepal but she had to change her plan and therefore she directly took a flight to London on Wednesday where she shoot with Bollywood stars Shah Rukh Khan and Katrina Kaif in a film by Yash Chopra. “I was Bollywood fan ever since I moved to London and since then I always dream of appearing in a film with Shah Rukh Khan and it’s actually happening.” It was not easy for her. When she was in Mumbai many filmmakers promised her to give her a role but most of them didn’t. “Many took advantage of me without keeping the promise. Finally, at last I fulfilled my dream.” She added, “After I complete my shooting in London, I will return to China and Korea.”

She had bought a house in Korea for her parents 3 years ago. Every parent wants their children to live with them. Suyoung had the same dream too and this time she is going to meet her parents after a long time.

What would happen to her dreams? Yes, she has answer for every question. She says, “I will write a book on every dream I have seen, my 2nd book.” She had drink red wine after 3 months to celebrate having reached Everest Base Camp and said, “I’ll make photo exhibitions and a documentary film. I will return after 10 years to meet them.”

At first she insisted to drink only a glass of wine but it was her 3rd glass. She was half drunk and then she started talking with a young North Korean Waitress. The waitress asked, “How do you speak Korean?” “I think she is taking me as a detective.” She didn’t want to stay any longer in that restaurant. She was smiling at the waitress while returning from that restaurant. She slowly said, “The day when two Korean nations finally become one, they will all smile at me.”

 

News from Singapore :)

Dream catcher

The Straits Times on 21 Feb 2012

Kim Suyoung is travelling the world interviewing people about their dreams and will compile her experience into a book

From being chased by police through the streets of Isfahan in Iran to receiving five marriage proposals in Uzbekistan and Jordan, author Kim Suyoung, 31, has expe- rienced her fair share of adventure during her travels for her project, Dream Panorama.

It involves her travelling around the world for a year, “collecting” the dreams and aspirations of peo- ple she meets. She will eventually compile her inter- views and travel experiences into a book in July.

“I want to inspire people in developed countries to strive for their dreams, just like their counter- parts from poorer countries,” says Kim, who was in Singapore last week as part of the project.

She embarked on Dream Panorama after quitting her job as a manager who does sales and marketing at Royal Dutch Shell in London in April last year.

“I believe that this project will inspire many people, so I wanted to travel for a longer period of time,” she says.

Since June last year, the spunky South Korean has travelled to more than 20 countries, spanning Europe, the Middle East and Asia. She has so far interviewed 260 people of 55 nationalities.

Her travels are largely funded by a grant of $110,000 from the Johnnie Walker Keep Walking Fund. The fund, which is sponsored by the whisky brand, aims to inspire individuals to turn their dreams into reality.

She was one of the five winners in the contest, which was held in South Korea in November 2010. Contestants had to submit their proposals, which underwent four rounds of judging.

Kim, who mostly travels alone, finds her interviewees from interesting profiles on couch- surfing websites, references from friends and requests posted by individuals on the project’s Face- book page and website, dreampanorama.com.

In less developed countries, she simply hits the streets in search of people to speak to as “that is where the life is”, she says.

Among those who have made an especially strong impression on her is an 80-year-old Palestinian woman called Mrs Badeaa whom she met in Aida Refugee Camp near Bethlehem. She was forced out of her home 63 years ago after the town in which she lived was occupied by Israel.

She has been living in a refugee camp since and, according to Kim, “she clutches her house key and still believes that she can go back home to die there”.

Aside from asking people about what they wish for, Kim has been using her travels as an opportuni- ty to live out some of her own dreams.

One of them was to appear in a Bollywood film. While in Mumbai in December last year for more than two months, the Aishwarya Rai fan snagged a 30-second dancing role in an as-yet-untitled movie directed by Sudhir Mishra.

Kim, who learnt Bollywood dancing from well-known Bollywood choreographer Shiamak Davar while in Mumbai, says: “It involved around 10 rounds of meeting people related to the director to get this role, but I also met a lot of wannabe actresses who shared their life stories with me.”

It was also in Mumbai that she says she found the “city of dreams”.

She recounted that people, from slum labourers to aspiring Bollywood actors, strive to achieve their dreams despite the tough living conditions.

She says: “Everyone there has a story to tell and you could see that they are very driven to become rich and successful.”

In contrast, she found the dreams of the six Singaporeans she interviewed during her stay here to be less inspiring.

“Many Singaporeans dream of owning a condominium apartment. Perhaps it is because life is relatively more smooth-sailing here,” she says.

The same cannot be said of life on the road for Kim. In Isfahan, Iran, she was chased for 30 minutes by a police car. The reason: She was on a motorcy- cle with her male Iranian host and it is frowned up- on for strangers of the opposite sex to be in close contact in the conservative Muslim society.

She recalls: “My host could have gone to jail. He was running for his life, I was so scared.” They managed to escape the police car after it got stopped at a traffic light.

As for the marriage proposals, one involved a Jordanian border guard who offered 300 camels in exchange for her hand in marriage.

After completing her book in July, she hopes to travel to the United States later this year for a second book of interviews. She also hopes to revisit all her interviewees in 10 years to see how their lives have changed.

“The past 10 months of my life have been equiva- lent to living 10 years of my normal life,” she says. “I have realised that happiness can come from small pleasures in life.”

kengohsz@sph.com.sg

Original link:  http://www.straitstimes.com/Premium/Premium_20120221.html (requires login)

Corrections:

- Noted amount is Singapore dollars (not US dollars)

- Suyoung took dance classes at Shiamak dance school, not personally from Shiamak Dhavar

- “Less inspiring” was very relative and superficial impression about Singaporeans in general but not particularly about the 6 interviewees in Singapore for this project

 

 

A dream of dreamers

Today on Sunday (Singapore), 19 Feb 2012

For three travellers on unusual journeys, it’s the strangers they meet who make all the difference. First, meet Kim Suyoung, who is going around the world compiling the dreams of ordinary individuals

Walking down the crowded streets of Mumbai, Kim Suyoung (top left), 30, met a seven-year-old girl from the slums selling flowers, the burden of being her family’s sole breadwinner on her frail shoulders.As they talked, Suyoung asked what her dreams and ambitions were. The girl replied that she wanted enough milk and bread to feed her family.”I said, ‘No, what’s your dream? Imagine you have milk and bread and money. What would you like to do?’ She kept saying ‘milk and bread’. She just couldn’t think beyond that,” Suyoung recalled. It was the same sense of sadness and frustration she felt each time she met other members of marginalised communities who just could not grasp the concept of a dream.

They are among the 365 people from around the world whose dreams the 30-year-old Korean is compiling for her Dream Panorama, a personal project that will see her trotting the globe for 365 days while attempting to give real time updates on Facebook and Twitter – an effort that’s become harder since her iPhone was snatched in Lebanon.

Winning sponsorship from the Johnnie Walker Keep Walking fund, she began her journey in June last year in England, leaving her riverside apartment and managerial job at Shell Chemicals. As of the middle of this month, she had been to 20 countries, including Singapore.

She finds her dreamers on the streets of the real world, as well as in cyberspace through netizens’ recommendations, and via friends. Ten years after meeting these 365 dreamers, Suyoung intends to retrace her footsteps and find out if they have managed to achieve their dreams. Some she meanwhile keeps in touch with, through Facebook and email.

NOT EVERYONE WANTS TO BE RICH

That each dreamer has inspired her is plain on her face, as she earnestly retells their stories: The elderly lady in Armenia whose only dream was to see her sons again; the 20-something Iranian man who wanted to be a musician, even though no music is allowed in public places in Iran unless it is traditional or religious; the young man who said he wanted to be a neurologist “in the free state of Palestine”, placing the dreams of those who want liberation alongside his own.

Before embarking on the project, Suyoung admits, she’d thought everyone wanted to be rich. In six years of living luxuriously in London, the people she met there typically aspired to retire early, have a yacht or become a millionaire.

When she met village children on her travels, she expected them to say they wanted to get out of the slums. Instead, they wanted to be engineers or doctors. By contrast, there was the famous talk show host in Lebanon who wanted to move to a village and live a quiet life.

INDECENT PROPOSALS, AND THE KINDNESS OF STRANGERS

The journey has been a test of her faith in people. A few freelancers she hired ran off with her money and, on occasion, the men she intended to interview ended up making indecent proposals. “A lot of people try to take advantage of me because I’m a young, foreign woman. I go to meet some people, but then I realise they just want to sleep with me.”

In Mumbai, she was chased by a pack of dogs and got her clothes bitten off, and got into a car accident with a cow.

At other times, she gets by on the kindness of strangers. Travelling alone, she often finds herself being fed and taken care of by the locals – she has crashed in new friends’ homes, a Bedouin tent in Jordan, a bamboo hut in Goa, a chateau in France. “It makes me realise how people live, and you connect to more stories and people,” she said.

While she keeps her followers updated on her blog, Facebook and Twitter, sometimes they shape her path too: Someone suggested she come to Singapore after a difficult time in Myanmar where she ran out of money.

RUNAWAY REBEL

Growing up in Kwangjoo, South Korea, Suyoung had no dreams of her own.

Born to a struggling family of four children, her father was a construction worker, while her mother did odd jobs. When she was 10, they went on the run from debtors after her dad, who tried to start a business, went bankrupt. They settled in a small village, living “in a hole with no toilet, no kitchen, nothing”.

The once quiet and timid child snapped. In middle school, she turned rebellious, getting involved in gang activities, motorcycle rallies and fights. “I ended up at the police station so many times I cannot even count,” she laughed. She pointed out the fading scars from stab wounds and motorcycle burns all over her body.

She ran away from home and got into alcoholism and drugs. Then one day, she heard a song by one of her idols – aptly titled Come Back Home.

“I hated the whole world. But this song said that, because you are still young, you deserve a better future. It just went straight to my heart,” she said. “Nobody told me I could have a good future. My family was poor … I was kind of guaranteed to have a pretty difficult life. But this song, for the first time, made me realise I could have a good life.”

FINALLY, A GOAL

Returning home, it wasn’t easy to change her ways. Her former gang-mates would show up at her house and try to snatch her away. Her relationship with her parents was badly fractured. Entering high school a year later than her peers made it tough to connect with them.

“This is silly to say but, once a gang leader … it wasn’t easy to accept being an ordinary student. I considered quitting many times,” Suyoung said.

It was after reading an article on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that she finally found a goal in life: To become a journalist.

Friends and teachers discouraged her, saying no one from her vocational high school had ever managed to go to university. Her parents could not pay for textbooks either – so she dug for them in other people’s trash. “Now that I had a goal, I couldn’t just walk away from it.”

Eventually, she won a scholarship to the prestigious Yonsei University. While there, she became the youngest freelance journalist at Donga Daily and won best article of the year. She worked at more than 30 jobs, from emceeing to real estate.

FROM CANCER TO KILIMANJARO

But shortly after she joined Goldman Sachs Korea, at 24, she had a cancer scare. Though she made a swift recovery, it left her feeling unsettled with life. “Like Gandhi said, ‘be the change … in the world’. Rather than reporting the changes, I wanted to be the change myself.” She looked at me and laughed: “Sorry, no offence.”

Suyoung wrote down her bucket list of 73 dreams (which later grew to 83) and started crossing them out. One of the first things she did was move to London to get her masters. She has since climbed Mount Kilimanjaro, learnt Spanish in Latin America and built a house for her parents.

This year-long road trip has also been an opportunity for Suyoung to fulfil more of her own dreams, such as appearing in a Bollywood film and becoming a certified Yogi.

In 2010, she published a book, Write Your Dreams, Write Your Future. It became a best-seller in her homeland, and the response gave her the idea to start Dream Panorama. “Many people emailed me and said they either don’t have a dream or don’t have the means to achieve it. I realise I cannot provide them solutions, but what I can do is give them inspiration.”

The project will be turned into a travelling exhibition, book and documentary series, after Suyoung completes her journey in Seoul this May.

Original link:

http://www.todayonline.com/Sunday/FaceintheCrowd/EDC120219-0000004/A-dream-of-dreamers

Make your DREAM as your Facebook profile this New Year!

 

Dear DREAMERS,
May all your dreams come true in this New Year!!!
As 2012 kick started, what better way to let others know of your new year resolution than Facebook profile picture?
In DREAMPANORAMA project, we’re collecting ‘dream’ photos of Facebook users around the world as a special edition for our book/exhibition/documentary film to be released this summer along with 365 dreamers we interview.

All you need to do is: 1) simply write down your dream in a paper, 2) smile for camera with the paper 3) put it on Facebook and 4) tag* DREAMPANORMA to let us know!

*To tag, you need to ‘like’ DREAMPANORAMA page (facebook.com/dreampanorama)

The more you’re open about your dream, the more likely you’ll attract encouragement and opportunities from others!

So, why not try it? it’ll only take 5 minutes!
If you like this event, you can invite other friends of you too.
KEEP DREAMING & LIVE THE BEST OF YOUR LIFE!

For full details, visit the event page: http://www.facebook.com/events/245614065505532/

 

Half way through the DREAM JOURNEY

Since we started the journey on 1 June 2011, it’s been more than half way – although we were not able to share every single story because of time constraints, we would like to offer you a snapshot of the full story and a peek into this journey.

Enjoy!!!

 

 

What’s your dream? Watch this video – [DREAMPANORAMA:365 days, 365 dreams]

Here’s a 2-minute video sharing dreams of the people and the journey so far…

Made out of footages from last 7 months, it can give you an idea about this project and the journey has been made so far..

Please tell us what you think about the video by commenting on the Youtube page and SHARE with your friends on Facebook or Twitter!

Twitter hashtag: #DREAMPANORAMA

Direct link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Np5Z3lQvWKk

Media coverage continued

Mid Day, the best tabloid newspaper in India on 20 Nov 2011 (click here to read full article)

Goa Herald, 13 Nov 2011

Al Akhbar newspaper 12 Nov 2011

Translated version online (click here to read full article)

 

[dreamINTERVIEW#50-52] Making of a Hotel

Here I am in Gokceda Island, the largest Turkish island. It was once called ‘Imbros’ island when it still was part of Greece.

According to Wikipedia,  the palace of Thetis, the mother of Achilles and the stables of the winged horses of Poseidon in the famous Greek mythology were located near here. Homer wrote:

In the depths of the sea on the cliff

Between Tenedos and craggy Imbros

There is a cave, wide gaping

Poseidon who made the earth tremble,

stopped the horses there.

Now there are only 250 Greeks remaining in this small island of less than 10,000 in population. I arrived here with my belly dancing outfit. The reason for this dates back to September 2010 in London.

My Turkish friend, Cihan came to our lunch appointment excited and saying that he bought land here to build a hotel.

“Really? I’ll come and help you open it!!! How about a belly dance show? A Korean belly dancer will definitely make a sensation in this small island!”

We all thought (or maybe it was just me) that it was cool idea and I came here to keep my promise. But the hotel is not yet completed due to ongoing delay of construction.

Everyone was exhausted and working extremely hard under pressure. So I forgot my belly dancer outfit for the moment and decided to help.

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I polished the stone walls, lifted and assembled several dozens of furniture, planted flowers, and washed massive refrigerators in the kitchen.

I would be so dead tired after hours of working. I would then resume after a few hours of rest. But the construction workers are working over 12 hours!

Amidst my feelings sympathy, they seem pretty happy. They even invited me to join their lunch and taught me how to work better.

So isn’t it time the perfect time to ask about their dreams?

[dreamINTERVIEW#50] Mesut, 17, Turkish, construction worker/student

“My dream is to buy a motorcycle with two wheels. I will work and gain money to buy a two wheels motorcycle.”

Most of the workers come from Istanbul as the island doesn’t have many skilled workers. But Mesut lives here in Gokceada. He is a son of  local farmer. He has worked in a coffee shop, a barber shop and a car repair center. Since it’s school holidays for him, you can catch him working full time at the construction site carrying building materials or cleaning up leftover debris. “Isn’t it hard work?” I asked.  ”It is hard but I got used to it.”, he answered with a smile. He is now saving money to buy a motorcycle which is his dream at the very moment. He hopes to have his own business and acquire a great social network in a big city like Istanbul or Canakkale in the future.

[dreamINTERVIEW#51] Tekin, 19, plumber 

“My dream is to have an income to plan future.”

Due to constant water interruption, Tekin was the busiest and most industrious person in the site working from 7AM to midnight just to save us from the water crisis. Although he’s only 19, he holds a 4-year experience in plumbing, having worked all over Turkey since he left his hometown near the Syrian border at the age of 15. As a child, he used to work as a shoe shiner and bread seller being the eldest of 5 children from 3 different mothers.

“Don’t you want to go out and get a girlfriend?”

To my question, he replied, “No, girls give me headache. I want to hone my skill so that I become more valuable.”

When asked about his dream, he said, “I want to have an income to plan future.” Although he wrote in his dreamboard, “I learned how to stand up on my feet and learned what life is just living through it.”

“What kind of future?” He gave no answer.

“If I see you again in 10 years time, what will you be doing and where will you be?”

“Hmm, I’ll be much more experienced that I’ll have my family, house and a car.”

“What kind of house where? What car?”

“Hmmm… I’d like a house with big garden… I really like Fethiye (a town in the South West coast of Turkey) and I’d like BMW X5.”

He seemed very shy, but I believe it’s important to visualise one’s future rather than just hoping for something.

With his hardworking spirit and passion for a better future, I’m sure that he’ll walk up the ladder to success one day!

[dreamINTERVIEW#52] Halit, 45, Carpenter

“My dream is to be a useful person for people and society, and to be a good servant to god, to provide a good future to my children. I do not expect much from life. Everything is transient in this world. I have met nice people here.”

Halit was the one who looked after me all the time. He always wore that  fatherly smile on his face. Although we couldn’t communicate, he proudly showed me photos of his family. He also provided me with a shady spot to sit down for lunch. Language was unnecessary to show his warm heart and kind gestures towards me. He’s also one of those hardworking people, too. Even though he works under the sun all day, he just keeps working without complaining. His dream is to be a useful person for people, society, god, and his children. Being selflessly kind and devoted seems to give him such peace and joy.

So after all the hard work given by over hundreds of people, the hotel opened successfully and all the rooms were 100% booked in the first month. I was so pleased to see the stone walls, flowers and furniture looking great. If you need a quiet and relaxing holiday in a beautiful island unspoiled by tourism and coupled with organic wine and slow food, this is the place that you may want to consider. Check http://www.anemos.com.tr

[Press] Hibr.me “Suyoung wants to be a Bollywood dancer.”

http://www.hibr.me/content/suyoung-kim-inspiring-world-dream

Suyoung Kim: Inspiring the world to dream

Sarah Owermohle

Suyoung Kim wants to be a Bollywood dancer.

This is one of the 73 dreams she wrote down six years ago, following a cancer diagnosis at the age of 24. At the time, she was an employee at Goldman Sachs in South Korea. Today, she’s traveling the world, recording the dreams of spontaneous acquaintances in her documentary film, Dream Panorama. She’s fulfilled 39 of her dreams so far, and continues to check them off as she road trips through Europe, the Middle East, South Asia, and eventually back to Korea.

Kim’s story began in Kwangjoo, Korea, with a difficult childhood plagued by poverty, gangs, and drinking problems. By 15, she had dropped out of school and ran away from home. When she returned to school, she had aspirations to become a journalist, but her family and friends didn’t support her goals.

“When I was young, no one encouraged me to have a dream,” Kim recalls. “Koreans are very ambitious people, but my father used to say that this proverb about this insect can only eat this one type of plant. Meaning, being from this small family with these circumstance, you can’t have a big dream.”

But Kim continued to dream. She eventually landed a job with Donga Daily, South Korea’s leading newspaper, and became their youngest freelance journalist while she was in university, earning an award for the “Best Article of 2000.” However, her subsequent job with Goldman Sachs was tainted when she received a cancer diagnosis. Following her recovery, Kim knew she wanted something more.

“People say they have a dream, but my question is what do you really want in your life? Because we could die any moment,” Kim said. She resigned from Goldman Sachs and set off to fulfill her first of 73 dreams: moving to London.

“The first [dream] is always the hardest but the most important as well. For me, the first one was to leave Korea and see the world. It was hard, because I was working for Goldman Sachs, a very prestigious career…but I knew this wasn’t what I wanted. I knew that if I died, this wouldn’t be where I wanted to be. Once I made the first decision, I became very free, and that made me a more free person, and things became easier. It became a life of choice.”

Inspiring others

Kim went on to publish Write Your Dreams, Write Your Future, which became a bestseller in South Korea. Immediately following the book, emails and letters poured in from around the word. People wanted to fulfill their dreams…but didn’t know how.

Kim noticed two main themes in people’s messages. “Mostly, people were saying ‘I have a dream, but I don’t have money, time, I’m married, etcetera’…all these reasons. The second thing; I don’t know what I want, I don’t know what my dream is. I thought, I can’t be a solution to everyone, but I can be an inspiration. I am one person, one life, but I can show so many more—there are seven billion people in the world, seven billion ways of life. People don’t know what’s out there,” Kim said.

The Dream Panorama project

And so Kim embarked on Dream Panorama. The project, sponsored by Johnnie Walker’s “Keep Walking Fund,” documents Kim and her crew’s year-long road trip from London to Seoul. Since June, Kim and her team of photographers and filmmakers have been journeying through Europe, Eurasia, and parts of the Middle East, spontaneously meeting and interviewing dreamers from all walks of life. As of her arrival in Beirut, Kim had interviewed 127 people from over 45 nationalities; meeting them in 43 cities in 13 countries.

“In the beginning, I had no idea how to go about interviewing people, but it just worked. Many times, it just happens in the street…I just build a rapport [with an interviewee], and its gotten better and better. I feel like I’m carrying 127 lives in my heart and mind all the time,” Kim said.

And each life has had its own story, from heartbreaking to heartwarming, inspiring to puzzling. There is Dioni, a 61-year-old Greek woman, who lost her 29-year-old son Panos to cancer a few years ago. Since then, she has helped found schools in Kenya and Nepal through a charity in his name, ‘Panos & Cressida for Life’.” Her dream is to help children in honor of her son, but it is too difficult for her to travel the difficult terrain to see the results of her work so far. Kim will visit the Nepalese schools later this year to photograph and record them for Dioni.

There is Emma a 26-year-old Nigerian who crossed the Sahara and Mediterranean to come to Europe and live in Rome. He now sells socks for a living, and dreams only of returning home.

And 43-year-old Paolo, a chemical engineer in Napoli, whose dream is marry a woman 20 years younger than him, because “it makes getting older better.”

And then there is Marina, the 23-year-old Georgian woman, whose dream is simply to see the Eiffel Tower. “There are some people who live next to the Eiffel Tower, but she doesn’t even know anyone who’s been to France,” Kim said.

“Sharing these stories, I’m sure people might not find everyone’s story inspiring, but I think they will find someone with the same background or dream, and think, despite all these obstacles and challenges, she’s working on it…it gives encouragement, and connects people,” Kim said. “Also, by having their stories now made public, it makes them make a promise more to themselves to make their dreams possible. Ten years later, I’ll come back to the same people, to see if their dreams have been fulfilled.”

Kim comes to Beirut

Kim’s arrival in Beirut was serendipitous, following trouble with her original plans to travel through Syria. She got to the country days after a trip through Iran, and couldn’t help but remark on her first impressions.

“Lebanese people, they’ve been through so much with the civil war, war with Israel…and yet they are really impressive, and open-minded,” Kim said.

Kim spent her week in Beirut primarily interviewing people in the media and arts, and continued on her journey of dreams into Jordan. By November, she plans on getting to Mumbai, India, where another one of her own dreams awaits.

“My biggest aspiration of this journey is to be a Bollywood dancer. First I have to get in shape, climbing part of Mt. Everest and doing yoga training for a month. I’ll start auditions, learn Hindi…I’m giving myself a minimum of one month to find an opportunity,” Kim said. “This isn’t a part of the filming process, it’s for me. I’m still fulfilling my dreams.”

“Having gone through such discouragement I realized that having a dream is a process, and you have to have it officially, it is so important, it makes so much difference— just having the belief is so much.”

[Press] “Who is Kim Su Young?” NOW LEBANON 8 October 2011

This might be the first English article that introduces DREAMPANORAMA and Suyoung.

It’s very well written and will definitely inspire you! – Click here for the link.

 

Who is Kim SuYoung?

The story of one woman who dared to follow her dreams

Coming from a poor family from the city of Yeosu in South Korea, Kim SuYoung’s parents never had a lot of aspirations for their daughter. Their goal for Kim was to graduate from high school, become a factory worker and get married. But it seemed Kim was never destined for that life. She admitted that those bleak prospects for her future made her contemplate suicide at 12. At 15, she dropped out of high school, ran away from home, and began abusing drugs and alcohol. At 25, she was diagnosed with cancer.

It was her brush with death, Kim said, that shifted her perspective of the world.

Today, 30-year-old Kim is an inspiration to those who know her or know of her. Her dream, she told NOW Extra during her brief stay in Beirut, is to inspire others. She spoke about how music saved her life and how it allowed her to dream of a better future. She too wanted to help those who believed they had no place to go and nothing to look forward to.

By the age of 25, Kim had graduated with degrees in English Literature, Business Administration and International Management, won the Best Article Award from her local newspaper, landed a prestigious job at Goldman Sachs in Korea, and had beat cancer. It was then that she decided to draw up a list of all the things she wanted to achieve in her lifetime.

“Some things [on the list] are important, and some are small things. My number one goal was to leave Korea and live abroad. I want to travel the world and settle down in the place I love the most,” she told NOW Extra in a quiet bar on a hot Monday afternoon. Within five years, she had covered 32 items on her originally 73-item list, although she admitted that her current list has expanded to 83 items. So far she has managed to buy her parents a house, travel through Latin America, run a marathon, open her own art exhibition, publish a book, be on TV and climb Mount Kilimanjaro.

She told NOW Extra that she realized “that a lot of people have the wrong approach [to life]. I wanted to share my stories to inspire people.” So in May 2010, she published her first book titled “Write your dreams, write your future,”  in which she shared 30 of her life lessons. The book became a best-seller in Korea and will be published in China and Taiwan.

But the book did not suffice. Kim embarked on a new journey called Dream Panorama during which she will tour the world and interview one person a day, asking them what their dreams are. On her 12-month journey from London to Seoul, Kim will also gather footage and photographs that will be consolidated into a documentary film and an art exhibition with the help of fellow artists, she said.

Kim has so far interviewed people from five to 83 years old, from diverse races, ethnicities, religions and social classes. While some wished for love, happiness and peace, others wanted to create centers and charities to help people, craved to be musicians in a country that banned music, dreamed of traveling the world by sail, yearned for motherhood and sought fame in Bollywood.

She said that her aim is to share people’s dreams in order to inspire those who are still searching for theirs. But it may surprise many to learn that Kim’s project has a 10-year lifespan. In 2021, Kim will contact the 365 individuals whom she interviewed in 2011 to ask whether or not they were able to achieve their dreams.

“I still have seven months until the end of my journey… I will visit Jordan, Israel, Palestine, Nepal, India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and South East Asia before returning home,” said Kim. She confessed that after having to wait for two months to be allowed entry into Iran, the idea of returning to the Middle East seemed less appealing. “But I could not skip visiting the Middle East, even though it meant making a long detour to my original trip itinerary.”

Her journey, enriched by people’s dreams and experiences, has taught her that one person’s dream can change another person’s life. “A five-year-old boy I interviewed wanted to have a big toy, while a girl I interviewed had talked about owning a toy of that size but had been reluctant to give it away to someone who didn’t want it. After I told her about the boy, she decided to mail him the toy. She has been able to fulfill his dream, regardless of how small it is,” said Kim.

Her trip was funded by a $90,000 grant from the Johnnie Walker Keep Walking campaign, who chose five out of 1,500 applicants to give the money to. The money has enabled her to travel, spread the word about her project and touch people’s lives. It also helped her achieve some of her dreams and tick them off her list.

While Kim seems to have many dreams still waiting to be fulfilled, her life story and many achievements remain without a doubt a source of awe and inspiration to others.

For more information about Kim Su Young’s project Dream Panorama, please click here. To learn more about Kim SuYoung, please click here.

[Press]Emirates Today 16 September 2011

Here’s the first article that DREAMPANORAMA is introduced in Arabic – over 2.5 pages of Emirates Today (Emarat Alyoum) on 16 September 2011.

Original link: http://www.emaratalyoum.com/life/four-sides/2011-09-16-1.422992

English translation with a few corrections:

A Korean director believes that everyone keeps his dream to live with it

Kim films people’s dreams and she promised to check them after 10 years

Ola El Sheikh – Abu Dhabi

“Nothing surprise in life like a dream”. It is written, one day, by a Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk. If we revisit the achievements of civilization and humanity, we find it the result of dreams before being a result of a science or an idea, if there were no dreams no one would have had the courage to fly. Without the dreams, people would not have dared make the revolution.

“Today, in the era of technology we are now officials more than ever before of our dreams”, that’s how the director Korean Suyoung Kim thinks, who is currently working on documenting the dreams of more than 300 people from around the world, to return to them after a decade from now and ask if the dream had been achieved and she records it with sound and pictures. Saying in an interview for “Emirates Today” that this film, titled “DREAM PANORAMA”, which will release the first part of it in May next year, Suyoung Kim, who has more than 70 dreams, explained her visit  in the UAE “because UAE sumerizes the world by embracing 200 nationalities on its territory “. So far she did interviews with 100 people in London, Turkey, Armenia and many other countries in the world then Abu Dhabi and Dubai.

The beginning

After an unbalanced life because of the poverty that was experienced with her family, kim decided to become a journalist and the reason behind it “ I was just 15 years old, and I was watching the news on TV, by accident I saw war between Israel and Palestine, and did not leave my imagination the image of man weeping for her children who the Israeli bullets did not have mercy for these innocents”, saying “ the time I knew that life deserves to be an active actor “.

Noting that, it was almost lost in the poverty and escape from the school and many things to the extent of drug, but the war that I’ve seen on TV “raised myself and gave me a push forward to love life for justice”.

She adds  “I challenged the difficulties and I said to myself  if I can raise from this darkness that surrounds me and realize my dream to enter university and study media, the I’ll help a lot of people. This is what happened to me and I decided to go around the world to observe people’s dreams”.  Kim said that among her 83 dreams 39 dreams still has been fulfilled or in  progress.

Kim has work in journalism and makes reportages for other newspapers because she’s good in translation, she told about her film project it’s” summarized in the questioning peoples about their dreams through photography and giving them a paper written in their native language to write the dream in bold and then return them after 10 years of time to meet them again, and ask them if they have achieved their dreams or not”.

She also noted that “it is an adventure through a journey that I started in June this year and I will finish the first part in May of next year”. She added “from London to Seoul to Turkey, Armenia, Oman and finally in the UAE, many dreamers just want a chance that is different between people to another by the country and the cultures and needs”.

Random categories

Kim who received a master’s degree from the University of London after his entourage mocked it because she’s unable to challenge, she said about the nature of the people who have chosen “the choice was often random and ages ranged mostly between 10 and 40 years ago”.

She said “but through my website I receive each day people’s dreams and I also keep them, because I’m producing a book that has the same idea like the film”. About the difference between people’s dreams, she said “I have not found people with similar dreams, but the majority were talking about the desire to achieve their own businesses through establish their own business”. She affirms “the categories that I interviewed are different also in their social positions, there are those who live in poverty and there are those who live in palaces, and everyone has a dream”.

Accompanied by a team of photographers and filmmakers, Kim said “there are simple dreams like the dream of becoming a singer by a 40-year old ma, and there are painful dreams of a woman who wishes to see her daughter, and people who dream of a return to their home territory, like many of the Armenians and the Palestinians”.

The reason behind the choice of a 10 year period between revealing the dream and achieved Kim said “I discovered that there is a cancer cell to grow in my body, I realized that life is short, and we have to accelerate the achievement of our dreams, 10 years is long enough and adequate for everyone who told me his dream and it’s a long enough to give him the opportunity to be accomplishing, and sufficient to change the world for the better, as is currently done in several Arab countries, such as what happened in Egypt and Tunisia”.

She said “When I finish my conversation with the person of his dream, and I tell him I’ll come after 10 years to see him, I put him practically in front a hope that push him to life”.

The youngest journalist in Korea

Fascinated by the world of journalism, Kim worked as the youngest in the newspaper Donga which is one of the great Korean newspapers, one of her articles won in 2000 the title of the best article in the competition of a local journalist while she was still in a school, but the written reports have not achieved what she dreamed of a transfer of the truth votes and a picture. She moved to the world of photography and directing to create stories that must be known to the world, after the discovery of cancer in her body Kim decided to write her dreams she must do before she died and they reached 73 dreams. Her first dream was to explore over the next 25 years, Kim has made 36 dreams to now such as to have a career abroad, and learn music, and climb mountains and travel to other parts of the world, and still seek to achieve the rest of the dreams started.