Connection to Change : Ocean Purpose Project - Mathilda D'Silva

Well, it makes me sound like I'm some kind of Oprah Winfrey, like, you know, which is the exact opposite, right, of anyone who's my friends will know that, like, I'm someone who's, how do I put it, like, I'm always doing 10,000 things at once.

I used to be on Singapore Idol.

I'm a singer.

I'm a performer.

I was a TV producer.

I was a social media person.

And One of the things that I used to do as well was to paddle.

So I used to paddle competitively for Team Singapore in Dragon Boat and in Outrigger Canoe.

And I mean, it was a pretty great life.

I wouldn't say that I was super fit, but you know, I used to be able to at least paddle about like 20 kilometers in the morning, another 20 in the late afternoon and evening, cycle all over the place.

And then, you know, jump on stage and just sing.

And during a dragon boat race in the Philippines in 2015, all of that came to a crashing halt.

I was there for a weekend, just kind of representing Singapore in a team called the Singapore Barbarians.

It was really fun.

You know, we won a lot of medals.

We did really well in the races.

But then when I came back to Singapore, I just felt terribly sick, you know.

Yeah.

I was just vomiting all the time.

I couldn't understand why I was so sick.

A month later, I started to develop white spots all over my skin.

And I thought, oh, maybe it's just a bad reaction to, you know, like dirty water or something.

And then when I got it checked out, discovered that I had vitiligo.

which is an autoimmune condition, right? Six months later, my hair turned all white.

And I mean like eyebrows, eyelashes, hair, everything, all white.

Well, it makes me sound like I'm some kind of Oprah Winfrey, like, you know, which is the exact opposite, right, of anyone who's my friends will know that, like, I'm someone who's, how do I put it, like, I'm always doing 10,000 things at once.

I used to be on Singapore Idol.

I'm a singer.

I'm a performer.

I was a TV producer.

I was a social media person.

And One of the things that I used to do as well was to paddle.

So I used to paddle competitively for Team Singapore in Dragon Boat and in Outrigger Canoe.

And I mean, it was a pretty great life.

I wouldn't say that I was super fit, but you know, I used to be able to at least paddle about like 20 kilometers in the morning, another 20 in the late afternoon and evening, cycle all over the place.

And then, you know, jump on stage and just sing.

And during a dragon boat race in the Philippines in 2015, all of that came to a crashing halt.

I was there for a weekend, just kind of representing Singapore in a team called the Singapore Barbarians.

It was really fun.

You know, we won a lot of medals.

We did really well in the races.

But then when I came back to Singapore, I just felt terribly sick, you know.

Yeah.

I was just vomiting all the time.

I couldn't understand why I was so sick.

A month later, I started to develop white spots all over my skin.

And I thought, oh, maybe it's just a bad reaction to, you know, like dirty water or something.

And then when I got it checked out, discovered that I had vitiligo.

which is an autoimmune condition, right? Six months later, my hair turned all white.

And I mean like eyebrows, eyelashes, hair, everything, all white.