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Almost Daily Interviews part 3 (Adri of Popagandhi)
Adri gives Angelina Jolie’s lips a run for their money
In today’s edition of the Almost Daily Interviews, I speak to the one and only Adri who runs the extremely popular Popagandhi, a site dedicated to mac evangelism , popular culture and her life. Her blog was so popular that she was kicked off her shared server for consuming too much bandwidth but she’s back now with her own hosted server.
Adri has been blogging since age 15, and she’s all of 2o now. She was blogging before you even knew what the heck that word meant. To make things worst, she was blogging while still a teen which means in terms of blog-years (1 blog year = 4 old media years), she’s in her grandma phase compared to most of us (haha). But from the photo above, you can see she is very hot and has a wicked smile.
Leaving no stones unturned, I pry into her sexual preferences, her parent’s internet surfing kung-fu skills and her blogging habits. So click on page 2 now to begin reading her interrogation.
Caleb: why do you blog
Adri: hmm
Adri: why? well. i dont know what it’s like not to blog. i started when i was 15.. before i knew what the word ‘blog’ was. before it was coined, perhaps.
Caleb: do people walk up to you in public and say they know who you are?
Adri: every once in a while
Caleb: how does that make you feel?
Adri: i expect it and i fear it
Caleb: does it cramp your style?
Caleb: i mean, does it make you choose your topics and words carefully when you blog?
Adri: well, it certainly makes me aware of what i should not say
Adri: and it’s made me a lot more cautious about details of my life, as compared to say, classmates of mine with livejournals or xangas
Caleb: give me an example of what you probably would not blog about
Adri: i would not: write in specific details about the people i am dating/have dated. bitch about my classmates even if i really wanted to.
Adri: that’s about all i can think of..
Caleb: do you have like a secret blog elsewhere that nobody knows about so you can write this kind of stuff down?
Adri: i wish! but that’s called my journal, and it lives in my drawer.
Caleb: you have a dead-tree blog!!!
Adri: paper is best, really
Adri: it lives long after you’re gone
Adri: long after your computer is gone
Caleb: I cant even write with a pen anymore. I forgot.
Adri: yeah, that was me too.. but it’s good to be back with pen and paper
Caleb: Have you slain any sacred cows lately on your blog?
Adri: well.. don’t think so.
Caleb: you have a lot of readers
Caleb: any exact numbers?
Adri: the website gets about a thousand unique visits a day. i dont have any numbers for how many subscribe through the feeds, but when i had those in feedburner (with the old site), it was something like 500?
Caleb: With so many readers, you hold the power to errr influence them to whichever side of the force you wish to. What do you think about this?
Adri: that i’d use it for the good side. :) quite a number have reported switching to macs, apparently.
Caleb: Would you use it for say, political reasons?
Caleb: like opposing uni fee hikes
Adri: hmm. if it’s a cause i truly believe in: i.e. gay rights, i’d say, why not.
Adri: i wasn’t opposed to the uni fee hikes, so..
Caleb: let me check your blog hang on
Adri: ok
Adri: my archives aren’t online
Adri: since the server move
Caleb: yes
Adri: anyway, you asked if i would use my blog for political reasons – i would say, not for political agitation, but for awareness.
Caleb: awareness
Caleb: what sort?
Adri: while i wouldn’t use my blog to agitate outwardly for revolution, or anything like that, i’m happy to know it has at least led to some kind of awareness: like when readers email me to say
Adri: they’re straight men who always used to hold a certain set of opinions about gay men and women, and that while they can’t identify on this point, reading me has led them to be more understanding, and in some cases, more accepting
Adri: are you there?
Caleb: yes
Caleb: liestening
Adri: haha, i was done
Caleb: your gay men awareness thing
Adri: just an example, at least
Caleb: there was this outroar lately on Balaji the Blamer pinning the AIDS problem on the gay community
Caleb: and several bloggers, including me were not amused
Adri: yes
Adri: i had a lot of personal grievance with it, in private
Caleb: why in private?
Adri: hmm
Adri: i think i had come to a point where i sometimes feel unsure about expressing an opinion on gay-related material, because people have come to assume my own identity=bias
Adri: i’m not sure if i’m saying it properly
Caleb: ahhh
Caleb: i get it
Adri: and i thought balaji had been sufficiently flogged to death
Adri: by bloggers, and columnists like paul tan at fridae.com
Caleb: hahaha
Adri: didnt think i could contribute anything to the discussion, anyway :)
Caleb: to tell you the truth
Caleb: I’m very homophobic
Adri: yeah
Caleb: But i just didnt like the idea of homo’s being tossed into the gas chambers without just cause
Caleb: today homo’s
Adri: which was precisely what was happening then
Caleb: tomorrow they’ll go after god knows who
Adri: any easily marginalized minority
Caleb: Miyagi tells me you’re very very smart
Adri: haha, and how would he know!
Caleb: he can read minds
Caleb: according to him
Adri: hahah
Adri: i’m ok, i think
Caleb: haha I can hear your head swelling from here
Adri: :) well… there’s no point being very very smart, really
Caleb: oh yes I would rather be rich any day
Adri: yeah!
Adri: nah, i think i’d like to have a bit of both. haha i’m greedy
Caleb: How about slightly smart and stinking rich?
Adri: i’ve put it at err, 70/30
Adri: smarts/rich
Adri: or just the right amount of smarts to make you rich, and not so rich your brain falls into lack of use
Caleb: here’s comes the bomb
Adri: hmm
Caleb: Miyagi (a kd lang fan) suspects you’re a lesbian man
Caleb: true or false?
Adri: “suspects”?
Adri: are you kidding?
Caleb: suspects only
Adri: i mean.. haha
Adri: i thought i was err, explicit enough.
Caleb: i tell you, his mind reading powers are not accurate one
Caleb: so are you a lesbian man?
Adri: ;) i like to think of myself as a gay man trapped in a woman’s body, and who likes cross dressing men.
Adri: (which means, yes.)
Caleb: you just gave my brain a cramp
Adri: haha. post modernism has made everything possible
Caleb: this part can include in the interview or not
Adri: can. i think 90% of my readers know lah.
Adri: but if my father reads it
Adri: then… never mind. haha
Adri: he probably already does.
Caleb: stop
Adri: aye?
Caleb: so you admit to being a lesbian?!!?!!
Adri: i’ve been quite open about this what
Caleb: jeng jeng jeng
Caleb: thats the sound that starts when gargamel appears to catch the smurfs
Adri: haha, i was too young for that. :)
Caleb: so your parents read your blog, that’s very rare
Caleb: did they find out or did you tell them?
Adri: i dont know if they do, but it’s quite easy to guess. they know i spend al ot of time online, they know i can and have made websites, and… well, google!
Caleb: your parents googled you?
Caleb: coolness
Adri: i mean, i wouldnt put it beyond them
Caleb: I wont ask you any questions about lesbians
Adri: haha
Adri: why not?
Caleb: because it makes me hot and bothered and then I have to take cold showers
Adri: :)
Caleb: different if you’re a guy
Adri: it makes me hot and bothered thinking about lesbians too
Adri: hahaha
Adri: esp. if they’re in my shower!
Caleb: yes maybe one day I can share my pron with you (kidding)
Adri: *nyeh nyeh*
Adri: don’t like pr0n lah
Adri: so fake
Caleb: ok no more lesbian stuff
Caleb: the temperature is rising liao
Adri: :)
Caleb: If you ever stop blogging, what would be the reason?
Adri: can’t afford the hosting anymore? :)
Adri: (or, i finally get a life)
Caleb: define getting a life
Adri: i was just kidding about that one. but my (offline) friends are always saying that i have no life other than blogging.. i dont know if they’re for real.
Caleb: why do they have a life?
Caleb: what kind of life?
Adri: i also say!
Adri: :)
Adri: i have stopped blogging for small intervals
Caleb: why did you stop?
Adri: it’s… difficult
Caleb: ?
Adri: well, first time was when my website got hacked into (at another domain, pre-popagandhi) – i stopped so i could concentrate on my A levels, and so i could move to a new domain after that.
Caleb: and then?
Adri: then popagandhi came about and has been chugging along. killed it for a month in September. i got tired of blogging.
Adri: i wanted to try to live wihtout a blog for a month
Caleb: how did that make you feel? Not blogging for a month, I mean
Adri: one part of me felt happy… the other parts couldn’t deal with it
Adri: it was just weird
Caleb: withdrawal symptons?
Adri: getting mail and being begged to return didn’t help, either!
Adri: yeah, withdrawal.. i mean, you do something everything for 4 years
Adri: and then you stop
Caleb: what made you come back then?
Adri: like you have no voice anymore
Adri: err, i just wanted to try out Textpattern. heh.
Caleb: **smacks head**
Adri: ;P it’s the honest truth!
Caleb: Ok last question
Adri: yup
Caleb: Any advise for the other fresh young bloggers out there who have yet to build a following like you?
Caleb: *advice
Adri: (1) learn basic html (2) don’t write in aLt CaPs, or about your boyfriend/girlfriend/how you love them so so so much (3) read good bloggers, not just your friends (4) link link link (5) it’s really quite easy to get noticed, as some people will say – get browned, xiaxued, popped by gandhi, whatever. :)
Caleb: hahah ladies and gentlemen, that was the one and only Adri from popogandhi
Adri: popagandhi?!
Adri: :P
Caleb: ** end **
Visit Adri’s blog here.
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