What's Your Spirit City?
Plus my experience navigating Bangkok with the Meta AI Ray-Bans
Sawadee kah from Bangkok, Thailand!
I love this place. We visit every year. In fact, I love it so much, my personalised car number plate is BANGKOK.
Strangers ask me all the time: "Excuse me, why do you have that as your plate?"
There are two reasons:
As above. We love this city. I often joke, “If you can’t get it in Bangkok, it doesn’t exist”. There’s incredible food, service, best rooftop bars, massages, variety of shopping malls, amazing hotels.
Bangkok is my spirit city. It's a crazy, messy, chaotic place... but somehow, it just works. It reminds me of how I operate: don't judge me on my process (or what my desktop looks like), judge me on the end result.
There’s always something new to learn here, so sharing some anecdotes with you today.
Oh! And I also packed my Ray Ban Wayfarer Meta AI glasses for this trip, so scroll down the bottom of this email where I’ll unpack my experience using them.
1. Who is the Real Influencer?
Chris and I were at a bar in Sukhumvit, the expat area of Bangkok. He was happily working his way through a few beers, and I was starting to slow down, definitely thinking about the exit.
The bar staff were totally on to it.
They were that type where you only need to accidentally glance in their direction and they’re already picking up your eye contact and offering you another drink.
And when they saw me, they saw a woman who was about to tell that guy it was time to go home.
So, they scooted over and offered me to try their home-made sausage rolls for free (which I politely declined because I’d already filled up on hot chips/fries, of course) but I appreciated the gesture.
And then they offered me something I couldn’t resist.
They invited me to jump on their bar laptop and pick my favourite songs for the entire bar to listen to - my first DJ gig, ha ha!
That worked.
I happily stayed a little longer.
By keeping me engaged, they kept us both at the bar, and made more money.
There is almost always a “Shadow Stakeholder” in the room. This is the person who can veto your idea with one comment because it’s too much work, or it doesn’t fit their vibe, or they just don’t trust it.
Or, hey…Maybe they were just being nice? Or, maybe they just KNEW I had great taste in music?!
Who knows.
But I like the lesson here:
→ Are you paying attention to the person who decides when the party is over?
2. Texting Mr T
We’ve been using a transport fixer named Mr T for years. If you need a lift from Bangkok to anywhere, you send a Whatsapp message to Mr T.
The exchange is always the same: a couple of quick texts, a driver in a decent car appears reliably on time, you pay cash, and the job is done. He once rescued a friend of mine whose original trip was cancelled at the last minute; Mr. T had a car there in five minutes.
For a long time, I thought Mr T was just a guy with a busy phone, lots of friends with decent cars, and very quick texting skills.
Yesterday, I asked my driver about him. He laughed. “Oh, it’s a huge operation. Very big.”
How has someone scaled to this size while keeping it feeling this personal?
The systems are there, they’re just invisible to you as the customer. All you experience is quick, reliable, human service, just like you’re texting a friend.
→ How can you make sales feel low friction, like you’re just texting a mate?
3. Solve All the World's Problems With a 2x2 Framework
In 2022, I released “Two by Tuesday”, where my challenge was to create a new 2x2 framework weekly.
2x2’s are great because as you start drawing them and filling in the gaps, you can’t resist but place yourself in one of the boxes as a super quick self-reflection exercise.
I use them all the time to frame a concept or idea at the beginning of many workshops I’ve delivered for clients.
So, I was delighted to see it used to pick the perfect cocktail as you overlook a Bangkok sunset!
Cheers 🍹
(and if you’re wondering, I stayed on theme and selected the ‘Sunset’ cocktail)
4. I Wore Meta AI Ray Bans for a Week (Here's What Happened)
If you’re a regular reader, you know that last year I pre-ordered a pair of Halo glasses. But they’re still in pre-production mode and I’m an impatient person.
I want to give these wearable smart glasses a go, so I picked up a pair of Meta AI Ray Bans and packed them in my suitcase.
Actually, that’s a lie.
I didn’t pack them in my suitcase.
I wore them as I walked onto the plane.
I wore them when my bubbles arrived.
I wore them when cabin crew took my order.
And I captured all of that footage.
Which is Point 1: Privacy.
It’s a bit scary. On the pack of these glasses is some instruction text “Make sure you ask someone if you can film them” (and yes, I did tell cabin crew).
But how do you monitor this? At least when you’re holding a phone, people know they’re being filmed. But with these, it takes a pretty astute person to look at the sunglasses, try to see if the blinking white light is on (which isn’t so obvious).
And scarily, a secondary industry has popped up, where you can pay someone to disable the LED privacy protecting recording light.
So, just sharing that with you upfront.
Aside from privacy concerns which yes, admittedly, are a big consideration, what’s the upside?
Okay, so much.
Point 2: Hands-free-freedom
The fact you’re NOT waving a phone around is strangely freeing.
I’m surprised at how much I LOVE not having to get my phone out to take photos and record videos on my trip. If you find you pick up your phone to take a photo, then get sidetracked by clicking an app, then you’ll love that freedom, too.
You can use both hands - so for any type of sport, hiking, or movement, like driving, you can capture it, it pretty much works like a Go Pro.
The footage is incredible, too. I was amazed at the clarity.
Here’s a YouTube Shorts video I made running through Lumphini Park so you can determine the quality yourself.
But, can’t you film this with your phone, Leanne?
Yes. But there is something so lovely about walking around, hands-free, shooting content. I think it gives an interesting perspective as well. You’re filming literally from your point of view, from what you are actually seeing at your height, at a moment in time.
I think because they are so discreet, you can take it out and not feel self-conscious when you walk around the breakfast buffet, filming all the food stations (which is yes, what I did as well. Although, if you’re the type who gets self-conscious taking out a phone to record, you’ll probably also feel very self-conscious wearing shades indoors!).
Point 3: Other random features:
I had directions on my phone and as I was walking, it was like driving a car - I had navigation in my ear, telling me where to turn, so I didn’t look like a tourist.
I was talking to a client, Jax at a workshop recently who works with blind and visually impaired students. She mentioned how these glasses are incredible because you can enter a space/look at something and ask, “Hey Meta, what do I see here?” and it describes the scenario for you.
You can stream music directly from your glasses and make calls, all without having to pop anything else in your ears.
Do I recommend getting a pair? It really depends on what you want to do.
If you’re like me, and enjoy capturing footage on the go, I think you’ll LOVE these. Just check to see what data you’re signing over to Meta AI, as that is also a major consideration..!
Hit the heart 💙 if any ideas here resonated, and I’d love you to tell me in the comments: What is YOUR spirit city, and why?
🌴
Leanne “Just Call Me DJ Hughesy” Hughes
Great breakdown on shadow stakeholder dynamics! The bar story ilustrates something I noticed in my own work: the actual decision-maker often isn't the person talking the most. In enterprise sales, it's usually the person who stays quiet during meetings that ends up killing deals. Identificaton happens by watching who everyone else glances at before commiting.