Celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay returns to Singapore to share life lessons with local youth

Gordon Ramsay seated among the audience while answering students’ questions. Photo: Marina Bay Sands
Gordon Ramsay seated among the audience while answering students’ questions. Photo: Marina Bay Sands

British celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay is no stranger to Singapore. The man who roasts amateur chefs on Twitter as a hobby has stopped by our shores in the past — and we won’t be surprised to see him return time and time again (if just to check up on Bread Street Kitchen, his fancy restaurant at Marina Bay Sands).

Besides having time to snack on fish and chips, the 51-year-old arrived in town to show a different side of his reality TV show personality. Instead of yelling at chefs for making mistakes (i.e. Hell’s Kitchen and the occasional MasterChef US episode), he chatted with more than 80 local youths in a dialogue that saw him share his life lessons with the audience.

Gathered at MBS for a cozy “In Conversation With” session held at the ArtScience Museum, the closed-door event saw students and young chefs from AWWA, ISCOC, Students Care Service, At-Sunrice GlobalChef Academy, and the Culinary Institute of America in attendance.

Photo: Marina Bay Sands

On his beginnings in the industry, Ramsay said: “It was a passion – it wasn’t about money. We didn’t get paid well and you don’t start cooking because you want to become rich and famous. I say to all my young chefs – get that knowledge, turn that knowledge into something unique, spend that time studying. A doctor would read medicine for 10 years, a lawyer would read law for 15 years, it’s the same for food.”

He went on to encourage the students with some words of wisdom: “As you adapt to life and you change every six months, you get stronger and better. No one is going to tell you that, so you have to self-edit, self-promote, and visualize climbing that ladder, and don’t worry about sharing it with anybody. You are climbing that ladder, so tell yourself, convince yourself, and more importantly, stay on it!”

 

According to MBS, guests also had the opportunity to ask Ramsay any burning questions they had, and many took to social media to capture their experience.

Ramsay’s parting bit of advice was to tell the youth to follow their passion and “work for a choice”.

“That won’t come quickly, but persevere, because this is a marathon, not a 100-metre sprint. Break down the marathon into four 10K runs. Do the first 10K, congratulate yourself, and again after the second 10K,” he added.

“Achieve something that’s important to you and give yourself some joy, then the third, and fourth – all of a sudden, you’ve done a marathon.”



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