Welcome back to Why In The Morning. As usual, if it's Tuesday, it's entrepreneurship Tuesday at Y254 channel, as you can find us across all our social media handles. At Michelle, Ashira, as you can find me across all my social media. In this particular session, we dive into an interview that looks at what it takes to launching a fashion brand. I'm joined with Nani Aver, then Noni Buru. She's a designer for Moni Design. Thank you. How are you doing, baby girl? I'm fine. So for the person, for anyone who is meeting you for the first time, who is Noni and what is the educational background you came in? Nani is Harriet Mutanim Buru. I'm a fashion designer. I did fashion in campus and I've been doing fashion out here. I've been studying from YouTube because I cut short my education in campus. So I've been learning through YouTube and different tutors and fashion designers. Okay, so every iconic brand that I know of when it comes to fashion and design, they always have an origin. So what if a passion for design comes from? Because it's one thing to just, you know, like a dress up style and look good, but it's another to just want to, you know, blueprint from the scratch. Okay, so I think it started when I was younger because I loved to dress up, but it was mostly projected when I was in high school. In foundry, I changed schools. Then my new school, my home science teacher was very fashionable. She was an old woman, but she would, if she's going monologue, she's just monochroming from head to toe and I really liked how she dressed. So my love of fashion was projected from there and you wanted to do fashion from there. All right, nice. So what was your first outfit that you came, that you created? Oh, first outfit. It was a dress, a red dress. Yeah, I made a red dress. Okay, and was it for you, for a friend, a family member? For me, I always started like with dressing myself so that now I can dress others. How was the reception from other people seeing what you had created? They loved it. Yeah, they loved it so much. At the time I had a tutor and she couldn't believe I made it myself. It was the first first week in class. She was so happy. Yeah, I believe like in this, the industry of fashion and design, it requires lots of like a sweat equity. You have to put in a lot of work. Someone who's watching this, like what does what are the requirements to become like a designer? How do you even gain these skills of just drafting, printing and then are they the blueprints? Yes. Okay, as long as you have the passion, you don't need to know everything. Though it's important to know how to sketch, to drape, to sew, to make the outfit yourself. But it's not a must. You can just have someone to make the dress for you or the garment for you and all you have to do is design it. But as for me, I do everything. I sketch, I make the dress, sometimes I even model them. And how do you acquire your fabrics that you work at? I just, I just come out and look for them. Mostly in town there's a lot of good fabrics. Yeah, in town and in easily online, most of the time. Yeah. So what is the ultimate goal for Mooney Design? Like what is the plan? To become a global brand, yeah, inclusivity and obviously to provide employment to a lot of people, including mostly the youth, because a lot of youth are in the fashion industry. What are your talking about is because when it comes to fashion and design, I know that the older generation, they're not much into trends or style. It's mostly the young guys. So what is your like your target market? I don't have a specific target market. I can say my target market is a stylish person. As long as you're stylish, it doesn't matter the age, color, whatever it is, I'm gonna style you or make for you a dress or a suit, anything. As long as you're stylish, that's my target. Okay. Take me through your, when you initially starting, that is when exactly? In 2020. Okay. So take me through when you're starting off and what are some of the things like the tools of production that you used? Did you require any financial capital in your business and how did you go about that? Oh yeah, I did require capital but I only started with a very small amount of capital since I had a machine. If I have the machine, I think fabrics I can acquire at very cheap prices. I actually started with redesigning mid-tomba clothes and made them a little bit like classy and everything. I just transformed it to cabissa. So I started with 260 shillings. Okay. I bought mid-tombas and then reformed them, then sold them at a higher price. All right. I went, okay, one of my directors, I was going through her a profile, of course that actually so she went for a photo shoot and I saw like the outfit that she, I think there was sweat part and I'm not sure but we'll get to see the like her work and what she does. It was an amazing outfit and I had to comment and I was like, and then that's how I got to like introduce to you. So for you, when it comes to just creating something from scratch, what is your mind space at? Do you just sit at a place and to be thinking like, by the way, if I design this just like this and like that, I would even see someone working just, you know, observing and you'll be like, if I, in that particular outfit, I'll drop down ABC and D. How is your designing process? You mentioned it. Okay, first I get to know the person. I try to make it very personal. I try to get to know you, their likes and dislikes, colors and whatever. Also I try to understand your body type because some patterns and prints and designs don't go with certain body types and there are those that go very well with them. So you have to understand that to start in fashion school, that's why I do that. Yeah, so I consider the person's body, what they like, yeah, and what I think they would look good in. I would concur with that because I believe if you're dressing someone, body type is very important. When they see a particular outfit, they'll say, I want that. But when you put it on, it doesn't look the same. Yeah, it doesn't look the same. Let's look at your brand, the branding aspect of your business, right? How have you positioned yourself like you're different in the marketplace? Because you have different fashion designers who are coming up every single day and I'm sure as you're watching and you love fashion and design, I'm sure you get into this industry. So there are so many people out there. So how have you positioned yourself to be outstanding and different in the market? I try to grab every opportunity I can and I try to be loud also. If it's my logo, I'm trying to put it everywhere. If these are events somewhere, I'll just approach the organizers and if they let me come in, I'm gonna I'm gonna be loud. I'm gonna come with my logo there with my my earrings. They are normally like on some papers and they have the logo on. I'm gonna make sure they are a lot on the table. I try to make it like when somebody feels it, they'll know it's money. It's money. So branding merchandise, branding your product. So speak about how aggressive you are. Have you attended or have you been part of any events recently? Yes, I have. I have done fashion shows and I have done fashion shows. Are these fashion shows of any impact? Are they reflecting to sales? Because I've interacted with a couple of fashion designers. For instance, Ashok Sanya and he was like, these like the runways events, they're you know, these are not the outfits that you see day to day people wearing. Yes, so are they reflecting to sales? Like if you go to these fashion runways events, be part of them. Are people going to buy your product? Are they going to just reflect? Yeah, they do. Normally, when you showcase at a fashion show, people get to know your brand and they can see like you can talk to them about your brand through your clothing. So they'll get to understand what type of comments you make and if they like a certain design, they'll come and tell you, I want this, but I want it a little bit altered and everything. Also, fashion shows, they let you know which product will be well received. So if one garment is well received, you must produce that and the one that doesn't get well received, you just put it on hold. Okay, so before we get to look at a couple of your outfits on your page, I'd like to find out what determines your price tag, like in this particular outfit. If it's a track suit or anything of the sort for ladies or even gentlemen, what determines this price? If it's a gown, what determines the price of this gown so that people may understand? First, it's the design. Obviously, how much work it took me to make and the fabrics. Some fabrics are on the high end. So it's the fabric and the design. What is your marketing process? My marketing process, I do shoots and post on IG. Sometimes I try to send people my stuff. I post on my status for people to see and now the fashion shows. Couple of challenges that you're faced along the way? Okay, so people are not willing to pay the price sometimes and there's a lot of stuff. There's like different people want different designs. So sometimes you have to try and incorporate all that. And for me working alone, it's kind of hard doing all that. Also finding employees is a challenge. Finding a good tailor, the one who will reach your standards gets a little bit complicated. Sometimes fabric, you want a specific fabric, but you won't find it sometime or you find it's very expensive. Those are some of the challenges. Like looking back from the day you started to where you are right now, would you say that it's something that can sustain you? Is it like a business that you can really sustain you? Yeah, it can. Though I'm right now, I don't have so much bills to pay. I'm still in my mother's house. So I'm waiting to move out so that I can see really... Exhaust this opportunity. So when I move out, I'll know that. But I know it's an industry that drives because the basic needs are food shelter and clothing. So fashion is there. And for someone who is watching this and they want to get into this space of fashion and make it a business of its own and stand and keep it afloat, what would be your advice now that you are miles, steps miles away? So what would be your advice for that person? I would first welcome them. It's a very broad industry. Also, I would tell them to express themselves. Sometimes when you're trying to be creative, it's hard to express yourself because someone will be like, I don't know, I don't like that type of clothing. But if it's what you like, you can just be free. Also in the industry, you have to harden. You need to harden because some clients don't want to pay for your value sometimes. So you have to just be persistent and passionate. A couple of achievement stories that you've experienced along this journey of yours? Achievements. Well, I think it's the fashion shows I've done because considering I've been in the industry professionally for an year, I've done five fashion shows at two rivers, three at two rivers, one at a university. Is it the current? Yeah, they have current. So at two rivers, I did an international runway. I think that's the best achievement I have had so far. But there are more coming achievements. I'm just my name in the mild ones. There are bigger ones coming. But at two rivers, I did an international runway. I also did a solo fashion show. That's a big achievement. And also at the hub, it was an amazing opportunity because I worked with big names. I work with big names like Sabato fashion and Fintan fashion. I like the fact that you're very confident and there's no other way this way, which is greatness that is coming. You're more coming and you're very sure about that. So how are you positioning yourself when it comes to that platform whereby you'll be working with bigger brands who are more exposed? You're just networking. I'm trying to network a lot and every opportunity I see, I grab. Yeah, that's what I'm doing because I must push myself. And the fact that I'm focused on one path is kind of helping me to push myself forward. All right. Let's check out the outfits that you've worked on. I believe we're going to look at your Instagram. Okay. Yes. All right. So let's do this. All right. Check out this outfit. Oh, this is a free culture event at the hub current. So all that is African fabric and African designs but made in a, in a, it's contemporary, like just made in a modern way. But you can see it's a, it's a sweat pant from Kitanga, a jacket, a dress jacket, like that's a dress jacket. Kitanga one. All right. And this is, is it Ankara? Yeah, it's Ankara. Oh, why? Yeah. And a condom. Very nice. I like the, I love, my favorite color is green. So that dress really is beautiful. Okay. So how long does it take to come up with such a, such a dress? That was really, really hard to make actually. It took me like almost a week. A whole week. Yeah. But, but it's because like sometimes when I'm doing something, I am, if I feel like my creative energies have exhausted, I'm going to pause, go to the next one and then I'll come back and my energies are back. Speaking about being creative. Okay. I think through this. Oh, so this is an Ankara suit. It's a shorts, but sometimes when you wear shorts in Kenya, some people may feel like you're not appropriately dressed. So I put a lace fabric from where the shorts, where the shorts meets the lace fabric. Yanni, if you wear it as a shirt, it will show too much skin. But then when you put lace on it, people feel like you're not showing too much skin, but you're showing just that it's not so clear. So that, that was the idea of it. You can wear shorts freely. Well, well, well on the runway. So take us through this outfit. This one was inspired by Yamiya Lade. Yeah. She, I saw a post of her with such an outfit, but it was a blue one, but I altered it. So for you, the trends of creative or coming up with different design, it's inspired from everywhere. Yeah, from everywhere. Everyone's fashionable. So that's an Aghbada. It's a traditional African outfit, mostly for males. The people who wear this are normally seen as, they're respected. Yes, it's more cultural. It's cultural, yeah. They're respected. They have a very high place in the community. Yeah. Yeah, it's, it's, it's a great piece. It has the shirt, which is ankle length and there's a trouser and the hat. Nice one. And always fancy. There is, there is a gentleman, my daughter. She's looking fabulous. Yeah. So this is the outfit that I saw. Yeah. This is the outfit that I saw. Take me through this one. This outfit actually has opened very many doors for me. I don't know if it's the model. It is the model, no? Yeah, definitely. Yeah. So this is a sweat and collar. It's sweat, sweat fabric inside and a collar on top. And you can get it from different sizes. Yeah, different sizes, different colors. Nice. It looks really beautiful. Thank you. And that was the outfit that I saw, guys. And I was like, tell us how you got that outfit by director, who was your designer and that's how you met him. Thank you. So you did a fabulous, fabulous job out here. So this is the gown? Oh yeah, this is a, this is a dress I made for a wedding. I was attending a friend's wedding, so I made it the night before the wedding. Wow. Because I had too much work. I had too much work load. I didn't have time to make a garment for myself. So overnight I said, let me just make a dress and I did a quick fix. That is a fabulous dress for just a night, like a night before. Yeah. So for this picture, I have accessorized the bride, the necklace, and the earrings, and also the bridesmaid. Fabulous. Yeah. And then we have Moony. Moony design. She's in studio with us. So guys, make sure you stay tuned. You have so much coming your way. So, hey, I am out of, I don't know what to say, because you are really doing great for, especially in terms of how long you've been into the industry. I know you, of course you went to school and studied these, of putting the work and everything, but just seeing your pieces of work, it's really tremendous. Thank you. You're doing great girl. So our financial lesson that you've learned along the way, because at the end of the day, it's something that you love and you need to make money out of it. There's a business aspect of it. So what are a couple of financial lessons that you've learned along the way? Budgeting. You need to budget well. Also, you need to save, at least try to save a little percent so that I can invest later. Those savings is not, I can't advise people to save like most of the time. Reinvesting is what I can advise people because reinvesting is what has helped me to do everything that I'm doing, because I don't borrow money from my mom to buy fabrics or whatever. I just reinvest and make my little amount grow. You say I started from 260. No, no. 260 and so far, the fact that you also planned your own event and you made things happen. So yes, reinvesting back to your business. Another question of the day and we're asking you, what is the craziest customer experience you have had on our Facebook, on all of your social media handles, that is at Y254 channel, at Michelle Lashira, at Ramah Google, what is your craziest customer experience you've ever had? My craziest customer experience is very crazy because I still have the outfits. They didn't come for it. So I did fitting so well. I went, we talked, I did everything, but when it came to the price, the customer was like, no, you know, I'm a celebrity, I'm going to market you, do me at half price, you know. I'm going to give you a free platform.  Oh yeah, because you're putting the work coming out fits with it? It was, it was a, they were true. It was an African outfit. It was a shirt and a trouser. So the person wanted to give me exposure. Markets, yeah. Like, have they paid prior like a deposit because you know, this fabric aspect of it? They had not actually, I learned a lot from that experience. But they tell us what you learned through that experience as you wind up? First, you have to ask for deposit because the deposit will cater for the fabrics. When you've already bought the fabrics with the customers, with the customers deposit, it won't be a loss on you. Even if they don't pay for the rest and you remain with the garments, at least it's just time and labor, but don't use your money to make somebody's garment unless it's, unless you're making ready to wear garments. Yeah, first ask for deposit. Yeah, so that's the lesson. At least we learn something. They say we don't, what's the word, we don't fade, we learn through it. So you learn something. Yeah, I learned a lot. Very impactful. So how can people reach out to you if they want to work with you? They love the design that they have seen and they would like to purchase from you? You can get me at monidesigns.co everywhere, Instagram, Facebook and on LinkedIn and you can also message me. My number is on Instagram and on Facebook, and you can also reach me at email at nonig254. All right, thank you very much, Noni, for putting your time to be with us. Thank you for having me. Looking forward to, you know, rock one of your outfits. Leave, guys. So I'll send you some of what's coming through. Looking forward to just having this conversation again. Okay, thank you. All right, that is Noni Mburu, a designer in Muni Design. Make sure you follow up across all our social media handles and get more information if you want to get into this industry if you want to purchase any of our outfits. There you go, you have it. We are talking about launch, what it takes to launch a fashion brand. And I hope you've learned a couple of things and fell in love with a couple of the outfits like I did. So make sure you keep the conversation going at Y244Channel at Mission.com.


The ultimate aim of the work group is create recommendations for standards and expand knowledge of existing practice for that purpose to get to the recommendations for standards. Digital currencies for our purpose include cryptocurrencies, table coins, e-money, and central bank digital currencies. So, due to the existence of these various types of digital currencies, interoperability is key. And we have been discussing various ways to handle this very tough topic and there are three things that we are working on. One is the perspectives on interoperability, the other is looking at current solutions, which is the interoperability solutions, and the third is recommendations for interoperability standards. These are the three main sections that we are dealing with in the interoperability working group. So, in order to look at the goals for interoperability for digital currencies, we have to look at why we need interoperability. Interoperability is needed because there are, as we said before, multiple systems that create these digital currencies. And this is needed for remittances, that means payments from one country to the other or across digital currency systems and for the payment of goods and services which are across digital currency systems. So, the goals would be very simple, ease of convertibility and creation of efficiencies in time and money. First, we have to come up with the basic definitions and terms used in interoperability. Different countries, different organizations talk about these currencies in different ways. Some of them say crypto assets, some of them say virtual assets just for the basic definition. So, that's one of the major objectives. The other one is if there are two systems that implement digital currencies, there have to be discovery through a basic registry. For example, the three letter codes for currencies like USD, EUR and so on are codified by the ISO. Similarly, there is a move afoot to codify digital token identifiers inside ISO 24165. So, that is one of the requirements. The other requirement is identities for natural persons and enterprises and devices and extend what is available and being used. For example, in Ethereum, ERC 20, ERC 1155, ERC 721, etc. The IWA TTF is one way to extend this. These are the areas in which technical standards are required for interoperability of digital currencies.


Welcome back to the Dominic Doll Show presented by Buffalo Wild Wings. I'm Sam Murray, joined now with Stevenson Men's ice hockey head coach Dominic Dolls and Coach. Last weekend a 2-2 tie versus Lebanon Valley and then a 3-2 win versus Chatham too. UCHE games, how tough is it to go on the road and win in this conference? Yeah. If you look at our standings in this conference, it's throw a blanket over essentially everybody in the middle of the pack and it's pretty crazy. And I think there's a lot of teams that are playing well right now and it's a challenge. So I thought Friday, we played all right. I think we lacked a little energy early but got going and just the ebbs and flows of the game. We've just got to be better at closing out some games and that's been our issue. And I think that's one thing we talked about Saturday and I think that's why I think Saturday was good for us. Regardless of the opponent, we kind of hung around, we had some opportunities, we hit some posts. But we hung on, hung on late. We didn't kind of get on our heels, we played the whole game which I think was important for us. Looking at stats over the past seven games, the line of Dominic Brenza, Carl Leiden and Nick Gray have been paired together. And I think they have 29 points together over the last seven games. Talk about their production and what they're bringing. No question they've been our top group but our thing all year is we need to get a little bit more balance. I mean early we had the one line going and not really anybody else. Now we've got this line going and not really anybody else so we've just got to find some balance. We've got a few guys hurt and injured. I think we are a little bit tired so we're trying to manage that as we kind of prepare for this week. But I think hopefully when we get kind of a full complement of guys back we can get a little bit more energy and go from there. Looking ahead to this weekend, it's a big weekend. It's Kings and Manhattanville, both Mac and UCHE schools. What do you have to do to get wins this weekend? I think for us, the focus is one game at a time from now on. And just making sure that we go and prepare for Kings. I mean they've played us hard the two times we've played us. I think we exhibitioned them and it was like 4-2 and then it was 4-1 up there. They're not going to quit, they're not going to give up and we need to be ready and prepared and work hard and compete for the full 60 minutes and then kind of take it from there. Our kind of focus this week is the Mac. You know usually we talk more about the UCHC but I think the Mac in terms of this week, this closed out Mac play for us. We win in the Mac, it helps us propel us in the UCHC. So we're looking at this week as a championship week in order to play for a championship you've got to win on Friday. So that's kind of been the mantra I guess and that's kind of how we're looking at it. Well coach we wish you the best of luck and we'll see you back here next week. Sounds good. For Coach Dominic Dolls, I'm Sam Murray and this has been the Dominic Doll Show.


to there's a problem with this mower and I'll show you what it is poo bear you will help me I will help you already primed it from again two three well that's a symptom it won't run won't stay running let's see if I can get you down in here show you what the problem is I don't know if you can see it give me lighter and I'll light this so they can see it that's a joke I did just complete first-aid training ten minutes ago so you want to do that let's try it out okay now I don't know if you can let's see if we can turn this I don't know if you can see down in there I don't know if this camera is picking it up but if you look down in there and you see a bunch of bubbles it's water there's water in there I already dumped some of it out but it wasn't covered up got ready now these caps and I'll tell you why well I got a cap on it well these caps have to be vented or they won't run creates a suction in there and I can't suck gas up in there just like if you pour out a gallon of water out of a milk jug or something it makes that glove glove glove noise now if you poke a hole in the bottom of that and dump it out and dump out clear well so that's not gonna keep your water out it's gonna get water in it and it does have a lot of water in it so what I'm gonna do and I hope you guys can see that maybe if I zoom in or something but anyway you see like bubbles in there or like a milky color it's got water in it that's all the problem is so what we're gonna do is I'm gonna go ahead and dump the rest of that out and put fresh water put fresh gas I'm gonna put fresh water in it while you go get the lighter it's a joke but she's still going okay anyway I'm gonna put fresh gas in this thing and we'll see if we can't get it to run it may take a couple times to get it up through get what's in the carburetor what may be in the intake what may already be in the cylinder out but let's put some fresh gas in here and give it a shot I'll be right back with you now what I did oh I'm back what I did was I took a rag and I stuffed down in that gas tank and I used a screwdriver got it all around there inside there turned it up turned it on the side so when this starts up since it was on its side wasn't very long but it may smoke but if you do that and your mother starts smoking like crazy it'll stop smoking in a minute don't worry about it's no big deal so let's see if that work who bear it may take a couple different tries because there's still maybe some water up in the carburetor and stuff but see what happens here but there you get okay there you go that's that's all it takes the worst thing you do when it's acting like that check your gas you know there's a lot of dirt in there you may have to take the tank and carburetor off and clean it but in that case was just a little water about five minutes it was good to go so there's a little tip for you I know it's getting me in the summer but remember that for next year so there you go I think I'm ready to cut grass all right yeah I just got home she said my room start and did this funky thing of acting I knew what it was I told her before I even came outside it's got water in it didn't yeah you know the dealt with them for 35 years or whatever but anyway yeah so there you go that's good to go and well who bear I'm out to cut grass all right she bear I'm going thanks for watching


checking out the hopefully not last critique and you mentioned the jump this is not playing probably because I need to make it all big small again there yeah I can see where you're coming from well I don't know I think for this it would be alright so you're having him go back one thing you can do like so you have you got the fingers so you can argue that he's still holding just the fingers going back but then once he pushes here see how the push starts all over the place here everything is moving including that arm now if he's pushing you want to make sure that initiates the shoulder the shoulder will go up and back a bit that would twist the chest around bring the head down sideways a bit and then bring his root back you want to see a chain reaction basically not everything at the same time and then same thing here this lift you see stuff is happening with the fingers and the hands but the chest and then he pushes off and then you got a slight moment if you watch the head spacing like he goes in a circle and then here it's like a pivot off of here and then comes out forward here so it doesn't feel like it's a specific center where he does like a turn like that feels like he's doing like like a twist and there's another another pivot here and not that he's you know twirls a couple times but there's something about the change of pivot and you got to make sure that that pivot is always out of the center mass like the heaviest point but I think for this you want to make sure that you can see a push off hips first I mean depends if you're pushing off with this right initiating initiating the whole thing with the legs you know is he pushing off with his arms or legs and you can argue if it's a legs and be this going up first then taking the chest and everything else with it so you would have you know you would have a pose where and part of the butt is here but the rest is still down there the chest is here the head is here everything is still there you would just have something like that where you can clearly see pushes off with the butts but the landing is cool again I love all this I mean it's so great you could you know if you want to go into more complexities how he stops here you could argue that this step here this is too high he would be lower around here with the toes and then when he comes to a stop it's boom and then nothing moves right so you could say that after this he would do like a little step forward here a little twist in the legs here some more little movement and settle in his arms if you want to make that a bit more complex potentially look there and this might be a bit strong there at the end like you go there and it's kind of like you're hitting you're going from this right into that and then back into this and it feels like this is your pose a b and back to a as opposed to something else where you might go back and plant his foot here and do like a weight shift where then he's more more like that arms out not that my drawings help anyway it's still a really cool clip and that's the best part is you know how focused you have the head at this point now so it's clear where he looks goes around especially here how he sees it yeah it's great and then this guy same thing as before that's my bad there you go so you mentioned supposed to post stuff breakdowns in between whoop cool I like it there's some tiny things here in there but overall I got a really cool feel to it all right that's all that stuff here so the major points right doesn't work as you continue on you know you can have like a tiny move here not that it has it feels like it's completely completely locked you want to have like a slight little wiggle or something that's fine I think once he goes into this like he goes into all here and then once it lifts here I think you could just bring that head back just a bit further back you know just you know he starts and then as it finally comes up and lifts you will see a change in posing just because of now it's like all through all of this the section of the chest and the head stays the same and then this is a bit tricky here so I love how it settles boom that's great oh right there's a bit tricky where you go down and then here careful you got this moment of this constant backwards move boop and right around here it pivots off his neck almost and then he continues to go back so make sure at this point he always goes back always goes back always goes back into this and then I would make less of a stop it'll be more like and then immediately go forward to because he's countering the whole thing it's not like he's trying to stop he's trying to go against it so to have that pause here feels a bit too weird it's kind of like a pop there kind of moves forward and then I think I think once you go down here I mean it would be so heavy that this would really really really what's the word like you know bring this side down I think you could bring this shoulder out this elbow so it's more like that type of it's got the wrist here and then arm out elbow out and the way you have it here arm out elbow out I guess really really trying in the shoulders up and he's already potentially arching arching back a bit with his back just to make sure that he doesn't let it all drop was quite heavy right so before that we showed that the weight in here to be bent forward I think you would already be bent back a bit because it is so heavy and this is too much of a pause it will be immediately into this so well none of that stopping here I'm not sure if me cutting this will help pretend that this is going to work can be a pop but let's see just idea-wise right and do to do to do and he goes that would be a lot better love your timing of the drop down oh it's great whoop and I think for the ending that's great and then how he hits here that's awesome right but then you could down on the drop here so it's not completely just flat one axis he could drop sideways maybe on one of the shoulders which bounces him more towards us or vice versa whatever and then not that flat you know it could be you could then have kind of a slight twist to it but one leg could be like this and one like this and and I guess you could still hold on to maybe you can drop one arm and so you can see clearly his face and that guy's still here you know something where it's a bit more broken up then just so straight but those are the major points I would look at timing wise but it's really cool I really hope you're gonna continue with that one just some really really nice timing is really nice weight in there all right thank you all right there's an email you can sign up you can start whenever you want you can submit whatever you want you get 16 submissions either way like and subscribe would be awesome all right thank you


Hello, let me know when we're live. Yeah, thank you so much for joining us. I'm going to be introducing these two incredible humans. And then we'll be engaging in a keynote conversation with Emily Mann. And you all were so quick to your seats. And now we're live. Great. So thank you so much, everyone, for joining us for the final session of the main sessions for the first national now. Conversation on Parent Support in the Performing Arts. It is my absolute pleasure to introduce on our left here Mary Hodges, who is the Assistant Director of Slave Play. She has participated in the Lincoln Center Directors Lab. And it has a prolific work on her resume as both an actor and a director in TV film and the stage. And she will be engaging in conversation with our keynote guest, who most of you, I'm sure, know of her extensive work. This is Emily Mann, the Artistic Director of MacArthur Theater Center. She was just recently inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame. It is my pleasure to be able to introduce her to you, because I'm going to be reading her credentials, which I admire so much. But in addition, her reputation throughout the theater industry has been in creating a legacy of support. And so we invited her here today to speak on her experiences. Emily is a multi-award-winning playwright and director in her 30th and final season as the Artistic Director and Resident Playwright of the MacArthur Theater Center. During her tenure, Emily wrote 15 new plays and adaptations directed over 50 productions, produced nearly 180 plays and musicals, supported the work of emerging and legendary playwrights, received the Tony Award for Outstanding Regional Theater, commissioned the Tony Award-winning play, Vanya in Sonia and Masha in Spike by Christopher Durang, and opened the beautiful Roger S. Berlin Theater. I'm just going to go through a few of the select awards. The Tony, the Trauma Desk, Outer Critics Circle Nominations. This past June, she was awarded the TCG Visionary Leadership Award. And in November, she was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame. You can clap for that. Woo! I know. I know. She was like, make it informal, make it a conversation. And I was like, OK, but I'm also going to make it about you. Surprise. So my engagement with Emily is that I have jumped at the chance to attend any panel that was within driving distance where she spoke. And finally, I was able to connect with her at TCG and get her contact information. And so it is my greatest pleasure to welcome Mary and Emily here for this keynote conversation on parent support and the performing arts. And thank you so much for what you've done and what you're willing to talk about. Thank you. I think Emily needs a nap after that listing, right? And speaking of which, let's just start with, you've been busy this year. I have. What is it like, before we really dive in here, to receive, to be accepted into the American Theater Hall of Fame? What was that like? I have to tell you that it was one of the sweetest moments of my life. And part of what made it so sweet was having, it's frightening to go back into being a freelance artist again. So to have that at the time, it couldn't have been better. But also because my dear colleague, Mara Isaacs, whom I worked with for 18 years and has just gone off and made her own extraordinary producing career, had just become a superstar with A. Tony's for Haystown. And she introduced me and burst out sobbing during it, during the introduction. So it was a very emotional night. And to be the honor of being, I looked around the room and looked at all of those names, the giants of the world theater. And to be thinking that I was going to join them was just one of the most amazing feelings I've ever had. So I just sort of took a big exhale. Well, congratulations. Thank you so much. I'm going to read a quote. And I'm citing an article from Princeton Info. Does that sound right? Dated September 23, 2009. OK. Quote, being a mother definitely made me a better artist, no question about it. You understand the human race by having a child and feeling that much love. It's just astounding. It affects my writing, my mentoring, and my giving to the education department and my raising money, all of it. So kind of if we were to do, since we're inducted into the Theater Hall of Fame, and a retrospective, if you will. And when you spoke those words in 2009 and being a mother artist, reflecting back and thinking about that to where you are and your son, where he is in this world now, what comes to your mind? My grandson. Yes. He's two and a half. And I'm completely besotted with him. I totally agree with myself. OK, great. I think being a mother, because we all, as artists, work from our experiences and our hearts and our guts and our mind. And until I had a child, I mean, that level of love, I had had great love affairs in my life, and I also adored my parents. But that love is so particular. And so much of the human race does experience that love in their lives. And I felt like I had actually finally joined the party and that I could speak to people in a different way, having had that experience.  I mean, you don't know what you don't know, right? And I think motherhood, parenthood, is the same.  It's just mind-blowingly wonderful. It's that level of love, and it's different. And you understand the generations, and you understand aging, and you understand legacy, and you understand the need to give and how to give in a completely different way that is so enlivening and enriching. And that's gone into my work. And that's gone into my work.  I just think no experience is wasted when you're in the theater, right? Whether it's tragic or whether it's joyous or anything in between, we put all that into our work, right? But I would say this is the biggest is being a parent and grandparent for me. So then we'll segue right into what advice would you give your younger self, the mother, director, playwright, producer, when the support for your work at the time may have been lacking or their places wouldn't? Well, I can say it from being on this side of it that I would tell my younger self it's going to be all right, that you can be a good parent and a creator and worker in the theater. I know that two things happen. I always seem to have tech when my son had an important event in his life, either my own tech or someone's in the theater that I needed to be at or a dress rehearsal. And I kept thinking, what am I missing? What am I missing? And what is this costing him? And then when my son met his wonderful wife, my daughter-in-law, he said, I love her because she is as passionate about her work as you are. I didn't want to marry someone who wanted it to be all about me. I wanted what you had. And it was like, wow. I mean, because I didn't know whether that worked or not. And then my daughter-in-law, maybe she's just a very smart woman, but she is a very smart woman. But she said to me just before they got married, she said, I knew I could marry your son because of how much he loves you. And she said, I've always judged men by the relationships they've had with their mothers. And he loves and admires you. So I feel like I'm OK. And again, you know, tears. So that's what I would tell myself. It's going to be OK. And there were hard times. His adolescence nearly did me. He needed me more then than when he was three or five. That's not encouraging. My son's nine. And that's when I realized I had to rearrange things at the theater so that I did not miss a dinner with him. And I had to lock it down. I could not let him out. And I just took he was going to run off the cliff. I just took him by the scruff of the neck and said, no, you don't. And I got my mother involved, grandparent. Oh, my. She was a great grandmother. She sat him down. She said, oh, no, no. No, no, no. And he listened to her when he couldn't listen to me or my husband. But it can be done. And that's what I would tell my younger self. And it's going to be good. And he is not going to feel like you chipped him at all, quite the contrary.  Can somebody write that down for me, please? Is that in the archives? So then let's go into, because I'm thinking all about what you're saying, dropping some gems. Emily Mann. So then let's go into what are one of the earliest memorable experiences as a parent in the theater? Oh, interesting. Well, there are two that just flashed. One was my son was like two weeks old nursing. And I had a reading of my then new play, Execution of Justice at La Mama. And I thought, and I was going to be directing in. And I thought, well, how am I going to do this? And you have to understand, this is like 1983. So it's still a little bit, not quite the 60s, but people in the room all grew up there.  Because I couldn't take too many breaks, because it was a new play, and it was a mess. And I had to get it together for the reading. No one batted an eye, the milk didn't dry, and AT was perfectly happy. So that's one I remember. Another one I remember is I directed for the first time after that reading, three months after he was born. And it was for Mark Lemos at Hartford Stage. And he'd never had a director who would, well, I think I may have been the first woman who directed there, but he'd never had a mother certainly directing there. And he said, well, what do you need? And I said, I'm going to need to bring a woman with me. We'll have to schedule the breaks around my nursing schedule. I'll need another apartment with a crib. He went, done. That was the first and best time I ever had. But it was because he was a good friend, and he wanted me there. And then he used to call it the Emily Clause. When other women would come to direct there, he knew to ask, well, what do you need? And by the way, I did not pay for that extra apartment or that crib. I did pay for the childcare. But and it worked. I could do it. The third one is the great Alan Schneider. The Alan Schneider Award at TCG. He was directing at the Guthrie when I was an apprentice there. And women weren't directing at that point. And I met him and told him that that's what I wanted to be doing. And he said, well, you know. And he used the British term. A pram in the hallway is a death to art. Basically, no woman.  And he was so wrong. I liked proving him wrong. But those were the days when. And I'm just seeing so many brilliant people in here with their babies and bumps.  It totally works. And it just, oh, goodness. Who is that over there? Thank you. Thank you. Oh, my, hi, darling. So then this is not on my list. Good. Are you then still like, are you surprised when you hear other parents talk about the struggle that not receiving that support when they're offered jobs or hesitant to take a job? I was just. Oh, gosh, no. Not surprised in the least. I mean, there was no support. I had to fight for it every place I went when I was freelancing. And then at MacArthur, we made, you know, I wanted to make sure that it was a child-friendly theater, a family-friendly theater. And I wanted to make sure everyone had what I had to fight so hard for and make sure that people felt very supported in it. So obviously, for staff, childcare, leave, and all of that, but we set up dressing rooms. When there's a nursing mother, we set up places to either pump or nurse. When people come to, you know, just depends on how far along you are, what your needs are, to make sure that we hear what people need and we do our best to help them out. So even when Nicolari Parker came just eight years ago, she had her two kids over the summer. And she said, what am I going to do with them while I'm working in our wonderful production stage? My manager said, well, my kids love the Y camp. And we can figure out, you know, company management can get them there or pick them up. Well, we're always working to see how to make it work. I'm often told we're a rarity. I'm not surprised to hear that. But I think sometimes you just have to tell people what you need. Often they will say no. And then you have to have a plan B or C. So I'm always thinking, so how can we get that word surprise taken away? Yes. And I think it is like having a conversation. And if en masse, all of the parent artists, you know, spoke up, and this is a start by having a summit and we need to probably have them twice a year to make enough noise to get it noticed. I think that's right. This is so important what you're doing and so exciting. And I think the more it gets into the conversation, I mean, a lot of people don't think about it who are in charge because it never was part of their lives. They never had to think about it. If they were guys and they had families, then it wasn't their issue in those days, right? So there was someone at home taking care of things in my day, anyway. Then there are a whole lot of folks that are childless who run theaters. We know many of them. It doesn't reach their consciousness. I mean, so having the conversation is the beginning, I think. And say with Mark, he was really happy to be a pioneer in this. He felt very good about himself. Give them the opportunity to feel that they're doing the right thing. So you mentioned your mother as a support system. What other support systems did you have in place? Because I'm guessing your son, at the time when you went over to the MacArthur, was seven? Six. Six? Yes. And then I was a single mom. I was no longer married to his dad. So I was a single mother running a theater. And really, I did it because I wanted to keep my son. So it could not fail. So I did not have a partner at home supporting me. I went with a huge cut in salary and had been saving since, I don't know how I knew this, but I was saving since I was a kid, for childcare. Because I always knew I wanted a child. I always knew I was going to do something with my life. So I spent a great deal of my salary on childcare. So I had everything from living people for a while, and then part-time workers when he was more in school. But I, and I got older, but that was a support. And then I would say I had women friends who were incredible. And some of them would take their kids with my son and do after-school things together so that I didn't feel bad. Because I couldn't get home till six. And then I had a fantastic second husband. So I think you've already answered this. But this is like the part two of that is, so taking all of that support, how did it play a significant role to where you are today? I mean, I think. Well, you know what's interesting? I was just interviewed about mentorship.  And everyone says, well, who were your mentors? And I think I didn't have any. And that's why I believe so much in it. I want to give to people what I didn't have. And I didn't have the support. I was always told what I couldn't do. Except there was Mark. He was the one and only. Then I had to fight to get what Mark gave me. So that's why I mentioned him, because that's the positive. The idea of mentor, that word makes, when it first started being used all the time, it made me laugh. Because I thought, everyone wants a mentor. Well, sure. But then I was, oh yeah. I didn't have it. So I do a lot of mentoring within the theater itself, with the staff and with the interns and apprentices, but also in the profession. But I didn't expect help. And I didn't get much. I fought really hard. But hopefully, because and my generation did fight hard, there are more places that will give you what you need contractually than when I started. But I don't know that. I just know we do. But I think there are more places open to it than in the old days. I'm not sure. Do you know? You probably know. Rachel probably knows, right? Yeah. Yeah. Right. Right. Yes. Exactly right. Exactly right. Yeah. Yeah, sure. So you spoke a bit about just a moment ago about what you've set up in place because of the lack of support maybe you ever see at the university. Well, we're not at the university. We're in a building at the university. But we're not for profit. The campus. The theater. Yeah. Right. So and now you're setting an example, a legacy of what other institutions can do and of what other smaller theaters can do.  So we can't do much. But there's always something that you can do. Like I've brought my son. If there's a space, any little space in the back that I can bring my son and he can have his headphones on and his tablet, I take the space. So I was like, oh, I was like, oh, we're so sorry. You know, it's just this corner. I was like, oh, we take the corner. That's fine. We'll take the corner. Absolutely right. And it's also shifting attitudes of where you go. Yes. So that I work with a stage manager who actually was able to be a mom because she worked for 28 years with me at the theater. And it was all about when she was pregnant, we made nap rooms. When she was nursing, she had her own place to go. When her kids were going to school and camp, how did we work that all out? So I have this thing with her. I say, I want every single parent for you to have a conversation with them, whether they're acting, directing, designing, composing, whatever it is, that you find out what their needs are. And she just does that. But if you come into a situation where you're freelancing, you can also then, if you're directing or that you say to the stage manager, this is a child-friendly room. You can set rules. Or you can ask these questions. I mean, if you came into her mind with a child and gave me out the corners, well, yeah. Just tell us what you need. But I think, again, it's communication. I think more people will be open when you know what you need and not expecting that they will offer it. And everyone is different. And everyone parents differently. And everyone needs different things. And so you need to help the management understand what you need. Amen. I want to just open it if that's OK. Does anyone have any questions or comments based on what we're just talking about? Distraction versus, like, in my bringing my son into creative spaces, it's like this dose of light that just brings everybody up and more energized. And the work is actually as productive and maybe better. How do we reframe that idea that it would be a distraction? What do you usually, what is usually your role in the room? Or is it change all the time? It changes a lot. But he is most welcome in my theater company's room. And we just have a child-friendly place. So are you a director? A performer and writer. And a performer and writer. Right, right, right. Yeah. I know. It's interesting. If you're not a parent, it's hard to explain. But for example, I remember doing, I do yoga for the first half hour of a rehearsal. And so I just had, and there was a husband and wife with three kids in that company.  Well, you can't imagine how much we learned from those kids because they have perfect everything, right? That's how you do a down dog. OK. So I agree with you that they bring so much light and life and energy and beauty into the room. I don't know how you change it. I just know how wonderful it is when you do. And my guess is, if you're a writer, performer, and you have a good relationship with the director, I mean, there's some rooms that are very hierarchical, mine are not. So I don't know. It's navigating it. Yeah. And also assuring them that if there's a distraction that you'll find a way to get them out or to another place and you'll take care of it, just making sure that they know that the work will still get done. I think that's what's, for people who don't know kids, that's what scares them. I know I've been on both sides of it because I'm actor, director. And there was a point at one point where I thought I couldn't. But then I got tired of like, I'm not sitting at home and not doing this job. Right. And so I kind of phrased it in a way where I didn't necessarily ask, unless I felt it was inappropriate material and content you didn't need to be around. But I would say I don't have child care in place for this rehearsal. My son will be coming. And this is what he'll have to do. Yes, that's good. So I didn't ask permission for that. And it was fine. And actually, once he's there in the place, and they saw that, oh, they would say, oh, he was so well-behaved. And I could take offense to that. Like, why wouldn't he be well-behaved? Yeah, right.  It's going to be in rehearsal. It's just like taking a child to the theater, right? Or most recently, I was busy doing something in rehearsal hall. And there was a class trip to, where did they go? Mark, there was a dance company at Lincoln Center. And my son has dance classes. And the dance teacher had tickets. And I had to send a friend with him because I couldn't go. And one of the other parents went.  So there is still a set of people that think children should mind their place in the arts. And that's a made, they're responding to the dances. Why shouldn't they be allowed to respond?  Go move somewhere else. But these are people who are patrons of the odds. And they're going and they're shushing children. So there's a whole culture that has to be educated and re-taught. Yes. And in a rehearsal room, we have to be helpful to people who don't know. For example, one of the last shows I did, Rachel Nix, was nursing. And so we had nursing rooms and all that sort of stuff. But she was getting into a different schedule. And so she was thinking she had to miss notes. I thought, miss notes? No. And so I said, why don't you nurse during notes? Just sitting there? And I said, is everyone OK with that? And it's interesting. The men who were parents were all going, yes, great. Everything. And then the one kid who was just graduated from Julia went, you mean? Yeah. And then we all realized it would be so good for him. So she nursed during notes. And then it was like, well, that's just what we do here. And it was, you know, it took about a second for him to get cool with it. But it was a first for a lot of people. Yeah. So that gave everyone some food for thought about conversations, conversations. Yes. Any other thoughts, comments? I just want to affirm this idea of, this is me, speaking of showing them young, because we've done pal conversations in universities, where we're like, we know you're not thinking about this yet, but you are someone you know well. And you can see how hungry these young people are to know that they're going to be validated in their options in the future. And so they have such an appetite to know how to make a supportive space. And I've heard stories now of how like third level ASMs have known that this is a human rights issue and have advocated for parents in the room. And so it goes back to this intergenerational conversation of expose them young. And then the strange behavior will be the people who don't know how to handle it. And so we flip the behavior there. So just thank you for that story. It's important. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Questions? All right. A comment. Just that what has kind of clicked for me today in both in the earlier conversations and in this conversation is that the thing that is being so often framed up as a problem is actually the solution to so many of our problems. Right. That to have children and parents and grandparents present at all stages and all phases of theater creation and theater performance is the solution to the problem that has been posed was like, how do we get people to value theater, to participate in the theater, a new generation of theater goers, and people that from all walks of life and of all faiths and creeds, whatever, that we have to, it starts in the creation and we just want to make the space not just open to but inviting of parents and children, then we're actually thinking holistically about community. Yes.  And so she, the mom would come during the weekend. The husband would come during the weekend. So the grandmother was in and out of the rehearsal room as well with the baby. And we would stop for, oh, yes, it's time for nursing. And then grandma would come and then she would watch a scene. And then she brought all her friends to the theater. So having the generations is just so life-giving. So beautiful. So what I failed to mention to say when I was up there is that we can be a solution to this as well. We are putting together packages with Pal for institutions to hire us to come and have childcare for rehearsals and have childcare for matinees, like we said. But in the rehearsal studio, that's next door. So you can have them in the room if you'd like. You can have them next door if you'd like. We provide all of the accoutrements, all the things that is necessary there. And then the parent can go next door and see the kid. So we have tiers of packages that we can sell institutions and we can work with you on having childcare right there for everyone involved, not just the actors, for anybody involved in that production. So if you have any questions about that, come and ask Rachel or I. I have a question related to that. So because we work indoors a lot, what happens with kids in outdoor time for anyone or anyone? I'm sorry, I didn't hear you. How do kids get enough outdoor time? I would answer that. With our company, we always have a couple of sitters on and we have enough sitters to have a two to one ratio. So if you would want a sitter to take your kid to the park or take them on a walk, they absolutely could do that. I would say. We're good. Five, seven minutes. Great. I was just curious, this is a question for both of you actually. If there was ever you were with an institution that instead of you having to ask for something, the institution was already like, this is what we provide or what do you want? And how was that experience? And how was that experience different than having to ask for a corner or having to ask for an apartment? There was, I can only speak of, I decided to go out of town, take a change the first time I decided to go out of town to do a show. And I was like, oh, I have to do this show. It's not like my phone was ringing, I was getting parts in New York and I wanted to do a full production. So I decided to do the best of enemies down at Florida Rep and downtown Fort Myers. And so, yeah, and so at the time I didn't know that I could ask for certain things. I said, okay, I'm just gonna take this job, I'm gonna find somebody to sublet the apartment. And I asked and I begged my mom to take him for seven weeks. My mother's in Virginia. And so I don't have any family here with me. So it really is myself and my son.  Everything happened by email, by phone. I got him registered, transferred, got him set up with my mom, I took the train. So this is what I told the theater I'm gonna take the plane out of Virginia instead of out of New York. And I took the Amtrak down, got him settled, I had to get there at a certain time. And then the next day he started school, sent him off to school and then I went straight to the airport. So then let's fast forward. An actor friend of mine said, oh, well I went to this theater in the Midwest and then I asked for a trip to see my son and they paid for it and then I asked for this and then I asked for this. I was like, my job, I was like, you did? And they gave it to you. She's like, well, yeah, they did. And then she said, I did have a relationship with them but I still ask for those things. She's like, you totally need to ask for that next time. So there was a next time. I went back down, they offered for me to go down and do disgrace. So then I spoke to the, I said, well, I will say going back they did research because I contemplated bringing him with me. There was that discussion. I think he was second grade. And so they did all of this research for me about schools and all of this stuff and I looked at some of them and then Florida has a whole complicated system with their schools. And so I was like, no, not gonna answer them. And so the next time what I decided to do was like, I'm gonna ask for train fare. I had to go out of my way to drop him off to grandmoms. So I did that. Oh, and I did ask for a trip. I was so proud of myself. I did not get the trip but I got the train fare. And that was just I think enough to push to say at least to put it on their radar that they're gonna be parents. I may be the first or maybe not. That may ask for things and they have every right to ask for things and to compensate. And I think that was a big deal for that theater to compensate me for the train fare. That is a good thing you did. Yes. Yes, for everyone in this room actually that you got that. But sometimes they will give more. And once you make the first step, then you go, well, actually what I need is. And what I found was I did not find it difficult to be on the road with my son even alone up until he needed to be in school school. He wasn't portable anymore after kindergarten. Yeah, yeah. Right? Because you can go any place and there's interesting childcare and there are these interesting crushes. There are all different kinds of places all over for all of that. But then once you get into school and having to enroll a child in school for a short period of time, that can get tough. Yeah, yeah. And that's where kind of like where I am now, like I just said no to not even go into the room to interview. No, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like, and then also the conversation with your agencies and the management, if they're not on your team. And I keep having those same conversations with them. I'm like, look. I was like, he's older now. I was like, I can't go and take him, uproot him now and take him to Virginia, put him on grandma and grandma's getting older. And it's like, I can't do that right now. You know, it's like the critical. So you're staying in New York. Yeah, so now I have to now be careful about, okay, now I can't just up and say yes to this. I was like, maybe there's another opportunity that I'm looking for certain opportunities here.  Stop putting me in these positions to say, I have to say no. Right. What do you think? Well, I'm just thinking what is commutable also. It's not just the city. I mean, you can get into Connecticut. This is something that's out of state. These are jobs out of state. You could go to New Jersey. Yes, I can go, yes. Yes, I would love to come to New Jersey. Yes. But just jumping up and going to Florida. Florida is challenging. One time Arkansas and then somebody like Dallas was on the table for something. They have money than Dallas. Yes. They can do some stuff for you. Yes. But we'll often put in an extra airfare or you know, when we very much want somebody who's either dealing with say someone's in LA coming to MacArthur and either the performer or director needs to get home at least once or the partner needs to come. And so we, you know, you can start asking for things. And not everyone has the budget and sometimes we do and sometimes we don't, but we try. I just want to contribute a really brief story to this and then ask Emily a question. This is not me. This is not like a fake friend story.  And there are a few people in the room who also know this mother who had the standard things she asked for to accommodate her with her kid. This is when her son, before he was in school, he was young and she asked for the larger apartment and the specific schedule for rehearsals, et cetera. And not only did they say no, they retracted the offer for her job. So however, this was just like a couple of years ago. Instead of accepting that and just being internally angry, she raised a stink and she basically was like, I just want you to know I'm not going to be quiet about this. I'm taking this to my agent. I may take it to a lawyer and I'm just wondering if you want to make that worth your trouble. Like is this the road we want to actually go down here or can we have a conversation? And I was really proud of her because it ended up working, she got the job, they conceded to a lot of stuff. They ended up repairing a lot of that when she got there and now she has a good relationship with this theater and that managing director learned a good lesson. But I wanted to put that in the room because even I honestly think in this day and age, don't even take no for an answer. I think there's always something that you can get. But yeah, even in this day and age, not only was it a no, it was a retraction of a job. And I'm like, how many people would not know that they could fight that? And she just happened to and she did, but you can and I think we all should. That's a great story. Yeah. And so, relatedly, but not really, my question for you, Emily, is it was very reassuring to hear what you would tell your sort of younger self about everything is going to be okay. And I'm just wondering kind of along those lines if there's anything that you look back and would do differently as a mother in the field. Well, gosh, you know, it's a perfect parent, right? So I'm sure there are a lot of things if I really looked back on it that I would rethink. But no, oddly, it's a nice feeling. I mean, given how it's all worked out though.  I mean, sometimes when I was, you know, Princeton is sort of split between a university community and a suburban community.  And I would absorb it and hurt a lot over it and worry about it a lot. And I think what I would tell my younger self now is that's their problem. And I look at her children now, they are not doing all that well. So, you know, you do your best. And I think, you know, I really made a mantra of what my mother said, you know, that a happy and fulfilled woman is a good mother.   I mean, all those things, no, no, no, no. Kids are resilient. If they're loved, they're loved. If you're a happy, fulfilled woman, this is what you can give. So, I'm sure I made a lot of mistakes along the way in terms of the details. But I did keep my eye on the ball. And I also surrounded myself at MacArthur with extraordinary colleagues. And some amazing young women, one of them sitting right there. I mean, who just, we were there for each other. And, no, I think keep your eye on the ball.  I really believe that. Well, holy smokes. Yeah, just a huge thank you to these two brilliant women. I know that I could, I'm going to be grabbing them for more opportunities in the future. They've been warned. And just join us tonight for a happy hour. We're going to keep talking with Mary as well tonight at the Art New York theaters. And that'll be livestreamed as well. I just want to say a huge, huge thank you. She's ready to go. I would say a huge thank you to our partner, the public, again, for providing this space. What an incredible gift. Pleased to meet. Thank you so much to HowlRound Theater Commons for making this available to everyone. Thank you to Broadway babysitters for taking care of our children on site so that we could have lunch with them, bring the babies into the space. Welcome, baby. And thank you so much to the New 42nd Street Studios for being our child care sponsor because it's that sort of intentional giving that makes that work cohesive impossible just in the first place. So thank you all for coming. Join us for a happy hour. And child care grants for individuals and institutions December 15th deadline. That's administrative and artistic. All discipline, all gender grants. PAL awards to nominate family-friendly theaters that you know so that other parents can find them. And then the PAL membership so that we can start developing resources that really reach you. Just again, just a thank you if we could close out. Thank you. Mix and mingle and enjoy. They're gonna kick you out of the space but swap as many business cards as you can. I don't know. Rachel. Oh man.


Being put in the hospital was really really exciting. I can remember driving, it sounds ridiculous, but I got kind of teary coming in like I was like I'm actually going to be doing this. Here at the Gosford campus I think it's a really big benefit that we have everyone from all the different disciplines here. So we have medicine, we have nursing and we have big wifery and I just feel like it gives you grounding. When you go over to the hospital you know people, you don't feel afraid because you turn around and there's someone you know from another degree.


still rusty still rusty just early days easy now way back into it that's me in of the year that absolutely Zeigar with a good start now look at the inside Robert Lambert with a stunning switch up the inside watch out for the man in blue Max Rick he's charging hard now third in red is Mattie Zeigar but Robert Lambert riding a lovely line Zeigar comes through into second spot again superb stuff with Brick third and Yanovsky squeezed out early on what to move from Robert Lambert that was and they're still at it for second and third yeah frickin Zeigar really going at it Lambert superb in the first corner Yanovsky I thought he was coming down he hit the Burma dirt in the first corner and he got well out of shape Zeigar having to work very hard indeed to keep Max Rick back in third place just about hanging on there but Robert Lambert said in his interview when it gets a bit choppy to see which way I go and this is a fabulous way to bounce back after a disappointing heat number four for him frickin hard night ready outside yeah he's gonna try the inside run now as well Mattie Zeigar of Slovenia just holding out here but what's a right from Robert Lambert of Great Britain his first GP victory of the year and that was very impressive a very clever switch up the inside and I'll tell you what Kelby looks to have some speed yeah he did indeed he looked terrific once he hit the front and he wasn't far away in heat four but it was a hell of a lineup and just didn't quite get there this time made no mistake and really rode very strongly out in front bit of drama for Yanovsky in the first corner crikey almost ran in the back of the opposition now and got off the bike but for Robert Lambert it'll be police's punch to have won his first race this year in the Grand Prix will indeed Lambert Zeigar Frick the finishing order good stuff from Robert Lambert and so far Leon Madsen top of the standings unbeaten with six well it's getting a bit more lively now on there and you've got to say that that was a good effort we'll see it again tapes are up and it's an even break and what you know ski just keep an eye there straightens up and he runs into the dirt and his race is done but great first corner from Robert Lambert just hugs that inside chops back from the outside not easy from gate four but it opens up a treat for him look they all run wide look at that from you know ski I thought he was gonna put the bike down there and he's all over the place and he fails to score after such an impressive ride first time and Lambert well he had speed you said it nice great battle for second and third with Zeigar really having to use all of his experience to keep Max Frick who was charging hard back in third place good battle that for second and third Frick just picking up the solitary point after winning first time out before points and to rise he'll still be relatively pleased with that but for Robert Lambert well that's a real confidence boost for him yeah more to come for Robert potentially tonight


Hi everyone, thank you for attending our talk, TikTok story, how to manage a thousand applications on Edge with Argo CD. In today's talk, we'll do a case study on how TikTok is managing 3,000 applications across 100 global Edge clusters with Argo CD. And we'll discuss some considerations, tips and techniques for using Argo CD to manage cluster applications on the Edge. So before we start, some quick introductions. My name is Jesse Sun and I am an Argo project lead and co-founder and CTO of acuity.io, which provides application delivery solutions powered by Argo. Speaking with me today is Chin Kun Li and I'll let him introduce himself. Thank you, Jesse. My name is Chin Kun Li, Tech Lead Manager of Edge Platform Team at TikTok. We use Kubernetes and co-native technologies to manage TikToks on-prem Edge clusters and help developers deploy and manage applications on the Edge. This is the overview of TikTok's Edge cluster. We have around 100 Edge clusters distributed around the world serving TikTok Edge services such as video seeding cache, live streaming, gaming, and so on. The size of our Edge cluster varies from 10 to 60 nodes on each Edge. Those are powerful server nodes with currently 96 CPU cores and 256 giga memory for each node. We also have the data center that can talk to all of those Edge clusters. The data center functions as both the management control plane as well as the service data for those Edge clusters and Edge services. For example, we have the Argo CD that runs in the data center to deploy Edge services to those Edge clusters. Talking about Edge cluster deployment, this is the high-level overview and architecture of our deployment infrastructure. So each of our Edge cluster is a standalone Kubernetes cluster. They talk to the data center where we have Argo CD and the Git repo to manage the deployment for the Edge services using GitHub. So our developers will push their Kubernetes configuration for the Edge services to the Git repository and the central Argo CD controller will pull those configuration from the Git repository to sync and deploy them to the specified Edge clusters. For the deployment of all Edge services, they actually all follow the same pattern. Usually an Edge service is deployed to many Edge clusters and the service functionality and behavior of this Edge service on all Edge clusters are very similar or the same. For example, for the video seeding cache service, when deployed to all the Edge clusters, they all serve the same seeding functionality for the local users. As a result, the Kubernetes configuration of the Edge service will also follow the same pattern, which is the deployment of an Edge service on all Edge clusters will share a large portion of common configurations. And at the same time, there are also a small portion of cluster-specific configurations. For example, the replica count, resource quota, IP address, et cetera, might be configured differently on different Edge clusters for the same Edge service. This is because different Edge clusters may have different number of server nodes at different IP address range. Here is an example of the configuration of such deployment pattern. In this example, we use the sample engine service deployed to three Edge clusters. We can see the majority part of the deployment and the service configuration of this engine service in all three clusters are the same, except for some cluster-specific configurations. In this example, they are the replica count, image version, and the external IP configurations. Although the actual configuration for the real Edge service might be much more complicated than this, but the idea is the same. For such kind of deployment and configuration pattern, in Kubernetes, we can use tools like Helm, the Customize, to manage the common and cluster-specific configuration parts. In this example, we use Customize to show how we manage such configurations and how we structure our deployed directory for those configuration files. In this deployed directory, we have both the base directory for the common, the shared configuration parts, and we have the overlays directory for the cluster-specific configurations. In this example, here we see in the base directory, we have the deployment and the service.yaml file that defines the common deployment and service configuration for this sample engine application. Here we show an example of what's in the cluster-specific overlay configuration directory. Here, in the customization.yaml file, we point to the base directory for the common shared configuration part and also apply the patches for the cluster-specific configurations. In this example, we apply the replica and image patch to the engine's deployment configuration and apply the external IP patch to the service engine's configuration. We use Argo CD with app of apps dial to manage those configurations and to deploy those configurations to the corresponding edge cluster. We generated the parent application for the edge service and the parent application will then generate the child application for each cluster to be deployed. Inside the child application, we will specify the corresponding overlay cluster directory as the application path, and we specify the destination for the corresponding edge cluster. And the central Argo CD controller will continue to process those child applications, and in this example, using customers to generate the Kubernetes manifest by reading the configuration from the specified path from the git repository, and then we'll see how the deploy generated Kubernetes manifest to the corresponding edge clusters. Let's do a live demo to show how we use Argo CD with such app of apps dial to deploy an edge service. The configuration we are using in this demo has already been uploaded to the GitHub and the link is attached here. Please feel free to check it out. In this demo, we will deploy the example engine's application to the three edge clusters as shown in this diagram. Let's get started with the demo. This is the GitHub repository for this demo, and in this GitHub repository, we have the deploy directory, and then we have the base and overlays directory, where the common configuration for the deployment and the service are stored in this base directory. And in the overlays directory, we have the cluster-specific configurations. For the demo purpose, I just add the cluster-specific service external IP here, and also in the customization.yaml file that first point to the base directory for the common shared configurations and then apply this service patch. In addition to the base and overlays directory, there is also the applications.yaml file. So this is what the apparent application will use to generate the child applications. In this example, we're going to generate the three child applications for the three clusters, and for the child application for cluster one, we can see we specify the configuration path as the corresponding cluster one overlay directory, the same for cluster two and the cluster three. Okay, let's go to article CD to create this application. Let's first create this engine's application by creating this parent application here. For the parent application, we call it demo parent, and we use the KubeCon demo project that I have already created, and we set the repository as this GitHub repository that we just saw, and we set the path as the deploy directory. So this is the path that points to this application.yaml file. So this is how this parent application is applications.yaml, and we use it to generate the child apps. The destination here is the, the destination here is actually the Kubernetes cluster and namespace where we're going to create this parent application. So that's in the data center, create this parent application. Now in the parent application, it already uses, used the configuration we just did for this parent application to see the three child applications in the GitHub repository, and we do a sync to create this three child application. We're created. We go back here. Now, now we're at the stage those the parent application is created, and those three child applications are also created, but they're currently in the out of sync state. So this is when we have created those Rgo CD applications, the parent app and the three child app, but we haven't synced to generate the Kubernetes manifest and deploy them to the edge cluster yet. We can sync and deploy by click on these sync apps, and we sync those three out of sync child applications. This may take a minute for the three applications to be synced and deployed. Now they are all synced. Let's go inside this demo cluster one application. We can see it create the service and the deployment for this engine example app. In the service, the lab manifest, we can see the cluster specific IP that we have already configured, that we have configured in the GitHub repository, and we can verify this is working by access this IP, and we see it's working because we're able to see this engine's page. And also on Rgo CD, we can go to the pod to see the logs. If we do it refresh here, we should be able to see the corresponding access log from my browser. And if I do another refresh, another two refresh, we can see two more accesses here. It's pretty useful. Okay. This concludes our demo part. Now we have talked a lot about Tiktok Edge infrastructure, our deployment architecture, and how we use Rgo CD to manage our edge applications and the deployment. Now let me talk a little bit about the challenge that we have in so far using Rgo CD in this way. So first of all is for the performance. Now because we are having, so we get over 3,000 applications managed in the central Rgo CD controller, we do start to see the speed to list all of those applications becomes slower, especially for our developers who have permission to see all of those 3,000 applications. So luckily for us, like most of our developers, they only have permission to see their own applications, which are already like 200, 300. So this is not that bad for them. But we do see the performance degrade when we have more and more applications in Rgo CD. Second is for scalability. We see some imbalanced application handling for different edge clusters. So because when we have more and more applications managed in the central Rgo CD controller, then we start to roll out more and more controller instance to scale the ability to handle those applications. But currently Rgo CD will sharp the applications to the controller instance by the destination cluster, which means all the applications for one destination edge cluster, they will all be assigned to the same controller instance. As a result, because we have some of our edge clusters are big and some are small. So for the big edge clusters, when we deploy more applications to those big edge clusters, and then there will be more corresponding Kubernetes resource to be handled for that big edge cluster. However, all those applications and Kubernetes resource can only be handled by a single Rgo CD controller instance. So therefore, we can see some controller instance might be idle, but some controller instance might be busy. And we can not easily resolve this problem by simply adding more controller instance. Next is for functionality. So we'd like to have support from the Rgo community for the project level support, because currently we use Rgo CD project for the multi-tenant support to support different teams and developers in our company. So one issue with the current support for the project is that the application name in different projects conflict. For example, if we have the engines application in project one, and another application named engines in project two, so they can have conflict with each other. In addition to that, often to see a better project level view and management to be supported as well. For example, for the management of the project level applications, Kubernetes resources, repository, et cetera. But not least, for the developer of the reliability, we find currently we like the internal observability for tracing, such as the open tracing capability. Because we are a Rgo CD user, so sometimes we need to go inside the Rgo CD source code to do some public shooting. But now we don't have a very easy way to trace and track a single request in the source code, because we don't have the open tracing enabled in Rgo CD yet. So those are the challenges that we have seen so far. Instead of that, we still think Rgo CD is pretty helpful, useful, and reliable for our edge scenario use case. We do recommend Rgo CD if you have a similar use case and scenario. Next, Jesse from the Rgo CD site will talk more about the suggestions of using Rgo CD in such edge scenario, as well as how those challenges could be addressed. Thank you, Jinkun. So now we'll discuss two different edge deployment models, which we call a centralized push model and a distributed pull model. And then we'll discuss some of the trade-offs between the two. So the first model, the centralized push, is one which you should already be familiar with, because it's the one that Jinkun had just described. And with this approach, you have a centralized instance of Rgo CD, which is connecting to and managing your edge clusters. And this Rgo CD instance is rendering the manifest from good and pushing or keeps it applying those manifests to the edge clusters. And the biggest advantage of this model is that you're able to use Rgo CD as is intended, as a single pane of glass. And so from this control plane, you're able to view and manage your applications in any cluster. And second is easiest to manage since you only need to maintain that single Rgo CD instance. And because this instance is running inside your data center, you can automate and create integrations against it. On the other hand, a single large Rgo CD instance will require some performance tuning and sharding as your cluster fleet grows. And you may encounter some of the same scaling issues that TikTok experienced. Secondly, because Rgo CD needs to connect to these clusters, the Kubernetes API servers of these edge clusters do need to be made available to Rgo CD. And finally, because this is a centralized model, Rgo CD does become a single point of failure. The next model is a distributed pull model.  And these instances would be configured to pull from a Git repository and auto sync changes from a directory specific to that cluster. The biggest advantage of a distributed model is that scalability is no longer a concern. Since each cluster has its own application controller, the work is distributed evenly amongst the edge clusters. Second, with this technique, you can choose to actually close off Kubernetes API server access to these edge clusters and increase security since you no longer need a central Rgo CD instance to connect to them directly. The biggest disadvantage with this approach is that since Rgo CD is no longer running centrally, you lose out on a lot of its features. So there's no longer a central control plane to view and manage your applications. Instead, anytime you want to want visibility into your applications, you would have to access the remote Rgo CD instance. You're also less flexible in how you can control your deployments.  Finally, with this approach, you do need to make your Git repository available to the edge clusters, which may or may not be a problem for your environment. So next, I'd like to describe some specific features of Rgo CD, which would be useful for managing edge clusters. And the first is Rgo CD core. So if you do decide to go with a distributed pull model and run Rgo CD on every edge cluster, you should know about this installation mode. Essentially, you can decide to only install the core components, namely the controller, the repo server, and Redis.  And this is a good option if you never had the need for end users to access an Rgo CD UI for these edge clusters. But one nice thing about this feature is that you can still use the CLI and UI as long as you have Kubernetes access to the cluster. For example, you can run the admin dashboard command and then visit the UI through your local host. Second, a second feature which was useful for edge is application sets. And this is a feature in Rgo CD, which allows you to automatically generate applications from things like paths inside a Git repository or clusters which get registered to Rgo CD, or even some combination of the two. And this was created as an alternative mechanism to the app of apps pattern. And this technique works for both a centralized push or a distributed pull model. So here's an example of an application set, which is using the cluster generator, which would be useful for a centralized Rgo CD model. And this cluster generator is creating a new application as soon as a cluster gets added to Rgo CD. In the example we see here, this will create a nginx application targeting that cluster as soon as that cluster is added to Rgo CD. The next example is using a Git generator. And this generator will create application based on files or paths inside Git. In the example we see here, this will iterate all subdirectories in the cluster-3 directory and then automatically create an application for that. So we've been working closely with the TikTok team on many of the issues they encountered in their use case. And these were some of the many improvements which they've made as they scaled out their usage. And first, they've made many performance and caching improvements on the API server. Second, with global edge clusters, the networks tend to be unreliable. And so there have been many tuning options introduced to make this more robust. And in terms of future improvements, we're discussing ways where Rgo CD applications can live in different namespaces. And so this would help with things like name collisions, as well as improve the UI performance. If you do run a large number of application controller charts, we are introducing a utility that can help you automatically rebalance and reassign charts based on cluster size. And finally, other features which the TikTok team has been contributing to are open telemetry support, as well as the ability to exec into pods through the Rgo CD UI. So that wraps up our talk on how you can leverage Rgo CD to manage your clusters on the edge. And if you have any questions, please connect with us over at the CNCF Slack. And thank you for watching.