Restaurateur Benjamin Yong, who survived last year’s Breast Cancer Charity Bachelor Auction, relates his ‘ordeal’ and provides tips to his junior, newscaster Owen Yap. RIDZWAN A. RAHIM listens in. FIRST you get tricked into it. Then the hundreds of women inside the room make you do unspeakable things before they sell you off.

And the after-effect lasts a good six months. Thankfully, it is all in the name of charity so you don’t feel so bad.

That was how restaurateur and bachelor Benjamin Yong remembered his first and so far only outing in a charity bachelor auction.

Yong and 13 other of the city’s most eligible bachelors were “on sale” last year at an event called The Breast Cancer Charity Bachelor Auction.

It was jointly organised by Soroptimist International Club Petaling Jaya (SIPJ) dan UK Women’s Alumni Network (UKWAN) mainly to raise funds for Breast Cancer Welfare Association (BCWA), a self-help group for people newly diagnosed with breast cancer.

“I got in because of a trick question from a friend,” said Yong with a smile. “It was one of those open ended questions where you can’t really say no. She said: ‘Hey, do you do charity?’ I mean, how do you answer that without saying yes?”

This year, the organisers are coming up with the event again and one of the bachelors in the lineup will be 8TV newscaster, Owen Yap.

Yap was at the interview as well, listening intently to Yong for tips.

But Yap will be in for a shock. “They will only tell you what to do on the day itself!,” said Yong.

Yong was sold for RM7,000 “partly because of whipped cream. And I had to live six months of humiliation.”

So what exactly happened? The bachelors at the auction, who came from diverse professions, were required to show off a bit of their talent.

Coming from the F&B business, Yong decided to show his talent in icing cupcakes: 20 cupcakes in under one minute.

“We were on stage. The numbers were kind of stalling and Joanne (Joanne Kam Poh Poh, the emcee of the event) told me to unbotton my shirt a bit to fetch a better price.

“After that, she went: ‘Ok, who would give me another RM1,000 if I smear whipped cream on his chest?’ A few hands went up. Then Lim Meng Hong the auctioneer, shouted from across the stage: ‘Who would give another RM1,000 to lick the cream off his chest?’ A few more hands went up.

“Basically, I was at the women’s mercy,” said Yong.

That picture ended up in the newspaper the following week. “A friend called and said: ‘If you didn’t look like you were enjoying it so much, I would’ve felt sorry for you’,” said Yong.

“But hey, you raised another RM2,000 so I guess you can’t complain,” said Yap after he stopped laughing.

“Just make sure there’s no whipped cream in the room, that’s all I have to say,” Yong shot back.

The auction was the brainchild of 30-year-old Regina Yau, who is somewhat like Archimedes in that she had her eureka moment while in the shower.

“One day while in the shower, I was thinking about men and thought why don’t I line up a bunch of them and sell them off, not for dates to other single women like me but for charity,” she said.

She also wanted to pay a tribute to her grandmother, a breast cancer victim. “It was a very severe case. She suffered for more than five years. It spread to her throat and she literally starved to death. I was only eight when she died,” said the graduate from Oxford University.

Yau got in touch with SIPJ president Sharon Saw, who liked the idea immediately. They joined forces and after just 10 weeks since that day in the shower, Yau’s vision became a reality.

It was a big success, too. “Last year’s auction was much more successful than we had anticipated. Our target was RM7,500 but when we started, the first guy’s bid was already over RM1,000.

“I was very moved by the generosity. Even now talking about it, my hair is standing on end. These were women who were paying for nothing. Usually in an auction, you get your antique or whatever but these women were just supporting the cause,” said Saw.

Many of the sponsors from last year have returned because they believe in what the girls are doing, including Kool Kutz which will do the guys’ hair and Bobbi Brown which will supply the makeup.

Starwood Hotels & Resorts is the official partner. It will provide the venue for the event and the high-tea.

Yong, albeit having been “humiliated” last year, is returning, though not as a participant. He will provide the wardrobe for this year’s dudes.

The enterprising 30-year-old has just launched his own fashion label, Dude & the Duchess, with a store that opened this month at Bangsar Village II. Yong will sponsor the shirts for the bachelors.

“Yes, shirts only. Our specialty is the more casual shirts, or what we call Friday shirts. We encourage jeans and all that. I’m sure everybody has a good pair of jeans. I think it’s quite nice to get the bachelors to come up with their own trousers because it allows them to add some personality.

“Our chief designer, Richard Tsen, did the styling for the photo shoot with the bachelors. He took the trouble to come one Saturday and meet all the guys, get a feel of their personality, look at their trousers and match the shirt to the guys,” said Yong.

Yap showed up at the interview wearing one of Tsen’s creations. It was a blue striped shirt that was paired with his favourite jeans.

“I went into the pool the other day with this shirt for a photo shoot,” said Yap. See the things they make you do to raise money from women?

“I had all these makeup and nice haircut done and then had to get myself wet. So what’s the point? But very sexy lah, I was told,” Yap added.

“Right. But nobody gets to see the pictures until the auction day,” Yau chipped in.

Yap, who is also one of Cleo magazine’s bachelors of the year is looking forward to the auction.

“It’s an interesting way to bring men to the forefront of a women’s issue. Usually breast cancer is looked at as a women’s problem.

“In reality, it does affect men. We may not be someone’s husband or father, but we are definitely someone’s son. Everyone in the family has to cope with it” he said.

• The Breast Cancer Charity Bachelor Auction will take place on July 20 at The Westin Kuala Lumpur’s Grand Ballroom. Tickets are priced at RM120 and RM180. E-mail charitybachelors@gmail.com or contact Sharon Saw (012-489 4891) or Regina Yau (016-229 8860).

How it works

FIRST, let’s get something clear: there will be no hanky-panky involved in this auction.

Sure, the 15 fine male specimens will be paraded on stage. Sure, there will be plenty of innuendos and suggestive remarks and cat calls. But it’s all done in the spirit of good, clean fun.

Plus, the audience will get to really let their hair down as this is a women-only event. This is a strictly-upheld policy of the organiser. Even the waiters are all female.

Bidders can choose to bid as individuals or as part of a table of 10. The bulk of the winning bids will go to BWCA. The SIPJ and UKWAN will be inviting corporations to match every ringgit raised.

So what do you do once you’ve “won” a bachelor?

Well, you don’t exactly get to take him home. What you do is choose an organisation from Soroptimist International’s list of charities in the Klang Valley and the bachelor will devote a full weekend to work at the selected organisation.

Last year’s participant, Benjamin Yong had a whale of a time entertaining children from Angel Home and Rainbow Home at an ice skating jaunt.

“Six of the bachelors, including myself took 37 kids from the two homes to Sunway Pyramid. After that, we went to my restaurant d’lish for afternoon tea,” said Yong.

He also spent a weekend painting walls and cleaning up one of the orphanages. “I told my friends about my duty and they tagged along and helped as well, even though they were not required to.”

Support for breast cancer patients

IF you’re going to have a cancer, have breast cancer. According to BCWA vice-president Dr Kanaheswari Yoganathan, breast cancer has the best prognosis among the many types of cancer, provided you find it early.

“I think the word cancer is the biggest scare here because you always associate it with death,” said Dr Kanaheswari. “You think ‘Oh I’m going to go and not be here until I’m 80’. Women with families especially think this way. They think they’re not going to see their children grow up and get married and all that.”

But it does not have to be that way.

“Early detection actually means you have a good chance to survive and a very fulfilling life afterwards. It’s not the end of the world,” she said.

A big part of the worry comes from chemotherapy which causes hair loss and the person feels she looks awful, which makes her worry all the time.

“You feel reasonably well but you look like you have gone somewhere and may not come back from the other side of where you’ve gone,” she said.

This is further compounded by the therapy, which often involves surgery to the breast, whether it’s a total mastectomy or partial lumpectomy. And women being women, the breast is their idea of sexuality and self-esteem, so this traumatises the patient.

Dr Kanaheswari, who started getting involved with BCWA after being diagnosed with the cancer herself, said patients do better when there is adequate support.

“Often the psychological effects affect the patients more than the actual treatment,” she said.

Founded in 1986, BCWA is a support group to help people newly-diagnosed with breast cancer to cope with the diagnosis, treatment and recovery. It has a membership of over 600, with 90 per cent being patients and the remainder family members and doctors.