BERNICE NARAYANAN
KUALA LUMPUR: From reporting for the Sydney Herald, Australia to a public relations stint in New York and authoring several books including two on former Prime Minister Datuk Seri Dr Mahathir Mohamed, licensed publisher and writer Bernice Narayanan has done it all.
“And enjoyed every minute of it,” she says as Weekly-Echo (WE) meets her at the club of the Royal Commonwealth Society of Malaysia for which she has been Chairperson since April 2015.
The lady is gracious, soft spoken and compassionate as she speaks of her staff at the society’s club.
She also says she considers the club coming through the COVID-19 induced MCO periods almost unscathed as the highlight of her term as the Chairperson of the society.
“We had to let go some of our foreign staff, but we managed to ensure that they were taken care of when the club was closed during the MCO.”
While the heavy public relations days, that saw her working around the clock with reporters from all over the world due to the international accounts she handled, are over, Bernice continues to run her PR company, as well write apart from working with youths from the club to empower various communities.
She speaks about her late brother, Tony Edwin Narayanan, who had Down’s Syndrome and who was also the subject of her best seller “Overcoming the Odds. The Life Tony Edwin Narayanan” and who was under her care.
One of the reasons for returning to Malaysia despite a successful career in Australia was also due to her late mother, she says. “Careers can come and go but we have only one mother, and I was real close to her.”
On her successful writing career, Bernice, who also produced the award-winning Mystical Malaysia tourism magazine, says apart from her passion to write, discipline was key to the success.
There is no short-cut. “Even though I work at home, I start writing at 9am sharp. I allow a break in between and I stop work at 5pm.”
Bernice discloses to WE the subject of her latest book due for launch. She is kind enough to give some tantalizing details but gently reminds that “all that is off the record”!
The published works of Bernice include her best seller on Dr Mahathir Mohamed, “So you think I’m funny”, “The Fisherman’s Daughter and Other Stories”.
–WE