Founder's Story - Top Maritime Company in the Philippines | Ep. 21 with Mary Ann I. Pastrana Co-Founder of FastCat

Episode Date: May 12, 2020

Mary Ann I. Pastrana is an entrepreneur who co-founded and currently runs several businesses in the shipping, trading, training, hospitality, cleaning and real estate industries. An advocate of entrepreneurship, women empowerment, safety and marine...Our Sponsors:* Check out PrizePicks and use my code FOUNDERS for a great deal: www.prizepicks.com* Check out Rosetta Stone and use my code TODAY for a great deal: www.rosettastone.comAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Welcome to Inspired by Her, the podcast that will give you the inspiration, motivation and tips for success from some of the top executives, CEOs and influencers from around the globe. With your host, serial entrepreneur and named one of the most influential Filipina in the world, Kate Hancock. We are live. Hi, everyone. This Kate and welcome to the show inspired by her podcast and this show is brought to you by KL Agency. If you need personal branding, SEO or marketing, go to klagency.com. Today I'm very excited by very first Filipino guest ever. Mary Ann Pastrana is a co-founder. She's a serial entrepreneur. Serial entrepreneur, you're doing

everything, right? I don't know how you do it. She's the co-founder of Fast Cat, which, oh, by the way, when I was in college, I would use Fast Cat from Gagendi de Oro to Cebu or Cebu to come again so I was when I first met you in Macau I was so excited to know that you co-founded FastCat

so Mary Ann for anyone who didn't know you can you please introduce yourself? Hello everybody, I'm Mary Ann Pastrana. I'm a wife, a mother, soon to be a grandmother, a serial entrepreneur who's passionate about business, empowerment, safety, and family. Wow. Well, I can't wait to really dig down into your story. You're in hospitality. You're married to, like, Fast Cat. So it's like, it's a fast jet, right? Is that what it is? And you're doing real estate investment and cleaning and educating.

What else you don't do? Yeah. Well, you see, I think we just had to build this ecosystem. It started with a training company that my husband founded. And we started with that. But I was working for my parents at the time. I was in the stevedoring, arastra, customs brokerage business. I was my mom's assistant.

And Chip and I got married in 1988 um he founded a trading company that supplies bulk materials to cement plants and soon after somebody offered him this uh rural vessels that connects the philippine islands He said, yes. I would always joke about my husband finishing agribusiness in the University of the Philippines at Los Angeles. Agribusiness. That's agricultural business.

The entrepreneur in him is that he agrees and agrees on any business that is offered to him. When this shipping business, which we don't know anything about, is offered to him. And so when this shipping business, which we don't know anything about, was offered to him, he agreed and he said yes.

And that's what got us into shipping, you know. So we started a trading business and then he bought this shipping company that connects the Philippine islands by R rural vessels. It's called rural because we carry people and we carry cargo. So it's roll on, roll off.

Oh, that's what it means. That's what it means. So in this kind of shipping setup, we're supposed to carry cargo with the vehicle. So whether it's a bus it's a cargo truck it's your car you can you can roll it in and roll it off on the ship and so that's how

we we started doing that and and in setting up the the rural business there's an ecosystem that is involved so so we have the hardware of the ships that connects the islands. And somehow you need people to clean it, right? And I need to be, I felt that I needed to set up a company that will meet my requirements, that will

meet my quality requirements, that can really custom fit the service to our needs. And so I set up a cleaning company. And soon enough, when we were connecting the islands already, people would say, hey, you want to be able to ride your ships? And are there good restaurants there? Are there hotels where we could stay in?

Is it good? And so that started our hospitality business. And it was good that my second daughter took up international hospitality management in the Philippines. And, you know, she's lucky that she's able to train abroad too. And when she came back, when she's done with her college education, she's now helping us in this hospitality business. So it kind of gives us confidence in setting it up because we have our second girl, second daughter helping us in this hospitality business. It kind of gives us confidence in setting it up because we have our second girl, second daughter helping us in this. And in the ports business, it's also because our ships need to dock in ports and therefore we need to have to run the ports, you know, the professional, as professional as possible,

also to cater to not only our needs, but needs of the other ship owners. And we have our eldest daughter, who's a dermatologist by profession, but she's already helping us also in that business. So she's helping us run the port's business as well. And so this is how we work together. Yeah, it's amazing. So there is a term for that. I think that's called dog tailing.

So you have one business and then you open up this business. You have the training and the hospitality. Just like you said, it's part of your experience. So that's amazing. Before we could really go through that, where did you grow up, Marianne? Well, I grew up in Manila, San Juan, it's called. It's a town in the metropolitan, near everything, and

quite safe. Our past president, President Estrada, used to be the mayor of San Juan where I grew up. And my grandfather, my paternal grandfather, was also the mayor of that town for 20 years before Arab. Oh, wow. So your grandfather is

in politics. Hey, Kate. Can I disturb this with a quick hi from my husband? Yeah, absolutely. Yes. I have to say goodbye? Yeah, absolutely. Yes. I have to say goodbye. Hi, Ted. I love it.

Hi, Ted. Good seeing you. Oh, yeah. Yes. I need to see you soon in the Philippines. You're live. Yes. You should come over and visit, explore the islands after all these things about when

everything becomes normal and we can have a good time together. Yes. I will visit you. You know, she also resorted to Bikini. Oh, really? Yeah, she said she resorted to Bikini. Where? Okay, it's in

Mambahaw. Oh, Mambahaw. Mambahaw Mambahaw yeah okay good you know Jeff's friends with the governor JJ

he might be watching right now I think he's we're hoping that we can connect that island soon also we did

GCO yeah we need that yes anyway I have to go to work. She has to talk to you.

Yes. That's so sweet. So when's my interview? How come she's getting my interview? It's part by Kate has to do it. It's part by him. Yes. Yeah, I have to do it. I have to do it for him he's so sweet

you guys are so awesome and you guys have been married for 31 years yes congratulations make a side comment because we were 3 years boyfriend and girlfriend before we got married so let's say 35 years in total.

Yeah. So both of you are running this company. Who is the boss? Is that you or him? Or how do you guys work together? Well, in the position, he's the president and CEO, while I'm the executive vice president and treasurer. And somehow we managed to delegate it in a very civil and respectful way, such that we're able to stand each other

for the past 30 times. That's amazing. So it's like you guys work together. And what's your secret for that? How do you handle that? I work with my husband, Dan, at the same time. So I'd like to hear, because a lot of couples ask this question, how do you guys handle it without arguing and running companies together? So what's your secret sauce? Wow. Okay.

For us, I think early on, we agreed that we should have that, we should always respect each other. When we're in the office, we engage. We know up to a certain point

how to approach each other. Like if one's heated up already, somebody backs up. So in the homily of the priest the other day, I was on online mass. He was saying family is, how do you say that? Punuan. How do you translate that in English? Like you cover up for others' weaknesses.

Oh, it's like a balancing. It's like, okay. Yeah. Yeah. So nobody's perfect. It will never be perfect, but you have to know how to put that sauce to make it work well. You know, like how do you fuel it? How do you back up, back out when

it's heated up and all? So for us, our ground rules would be knowing our boundaries, knowing our rules. So when things are heated up, we know that we don't curse each other. We still have that level of respect. We don't escape or

leave the house. We know we're just home. Of course, a lot of it is rooted in faith and prayer. Chet and I attended a lot of learning courses on marriage. So name it. You know, we attended it. Couples for Christ, Christian Life Program, Marriage Enrichment Weekend,

all these recollections over the years on how we can improve our relationship I read so many books Gary Chapman, Five Languages of Love so we learned all those basic things on how to communicate well

on how we should handle each other's weaknesses be each other's strength, be an inspiration, never put down another. Ah, I always remember a book I read about love thanks, filling up the love thanks. I can't remember that. Yeah. So I remember reading early on in our marriage marriage a book called Building a Great Marriage by Anne Ortlund.

And I took it to heart, you know, like things like affirming your husband, giving them service, respect, of course, prayer, rooted in prayer. So we had a lot of that. It's not easy. It was not easy. It was not easy. It's not a piece of cake. Like you don't do nothing. It's a lot of hard work, but the, you know,

what you get is so much more out of what you do. So yeah, so that's why. You guys are so involved in that. Now, have you ever come up where you wanted to make a decision and he's not agreeing with you? How did you handle that?

It's a business decision. You know, we have a lot of that. Him getting into the shipping business is something that I really resisted and I even had a time of rebellion because I bought into the business without asking me and then I dived in and then I realized it's so manly it's so difficult like far out way out of my league difficult and so I remember struggling with it and I even went went to my parish priest here and I said, Father, it's too much for me.

I can't handle it. What do I do? Do I tell him? And, you know, my parish priest just said, yeah, you just tell him. You can't handle it anymore. You're stressed. And so that's what I did. I went to him and said, I'm so stressed.

I don't want to handle this anymore. And you know what he said to me? He said, okay. I said, that's it. So did you stop the shipping business? No, no. I mean, I stopped being so involved. I'm not the day-to-day stuff.

Yeah. I wouldn't go to work every day. I'd have excuses. I enrolled in painting classes. I have pre-spreads would say, let's go to a pilgrimage. And I go, yeah,

let's go. So I probably went to three European trips. You know, he just let me, you just let me do what I want to do because I was saying I was so stressed. And so what I realized at that point was that there's somebody who could really take care of the business, our business, the way I can take care of it. So when I'm done with the dramas, I just came back.

And then that's when I realized that, you know, we have roles. You know, the way I talk to God, the way I pray to him, when I was having so much difficulty, I was saying, God, you said, wives be submissive to your husbands. Okay. So I'm going to follow you, but you take care of me. Okay. You take care of me because I was doing a lot of things that was beyond my comfort zone. I wanted to fight it. I was resisting it, but I just followed. I followed the Bible.

I followed what God said. I prayed a lot. I did the ground rules. I followed Chet. I supported him. I think it worked out. It worked out. Ultimately, he appreciated that and he saw that it was helpful. So I think that was the good way to resist it and conquer the battle. That's awesome. That's wonderful. Now, Mary Ann, what is the best memory of your childhood and what's the worst?

I know your grandfather is a mayor in the city, so you must be growing up doing a lot of things in the household, right? Yeah, yeah, pretty much. You know, my dad was the eldest of his brood. And my grandfather was mayor, and my dad would say he was pretty strict and wanted the mayor, my grandfather wanted my dad to be doctor

and he didn't want to. So anyway my point is my dad's kind of tough guy he looked good so he was a chick boy he's a chick boy and he's you know he would say he named himself James Bond so he had a lot of girlfriends uh and that was I think that was tough for for a child to see, you know, when you have a dad who's womanizing and you have domestic violence, you know,

seeing my mom being beaten up by my dad. So that was the tough part of my childhood. You know, it brings a lot of insecurities because you see your parents fighting and you ask yourself, do I still have a family tomorrow? Are they going to make it? So that's the tough one that stands out in my childhood.

But the good memory, there are also good memories, I would say. Good memories would be travel. I remember traveling a lot when we were young. My parents are also into travel. So we do a lot of domestic and international travel when we were young. My parents are also up into travel, so we do a lot of domestic and international travel when I was young. And I think those are really good memories. We spent a lot of time in Baguio because, you know, that's our summer capital. So we would have block days.

That would be Holy Week. And after Christmas, we would spend time in baguio go home to my mom's hometown in zambales uh and stay by the beach yeah so i've never been there i can't wait to visit oh yeah it's right it's beyond uh subic maybe another two hour drive from subic that's in the north so that was fun yeah traveling and so that's why when i decided that um when i have my own family when i have my kids of my own i will definitely take them traveling and good thing chad and i agreed on that and so yeah we did that that's wonderful well when you travel a lot you learn a lot from navigating and you know, adjusting different culture and

being uncomfortable in a place where you don't know where to go. I think that's I think that's that, especially for kids. I think it really helps them mold to be like worldly. That's true, yeah. And street smart, I

guess, you know, they learn how to be street smart. We learn a lot like the culture of people and the food. We always go to groceries when we travel, you know. You learn a lot when you go to the grocery, you know, what they cook, what they eat, what's available there. For us Filipinos, I have a lot of tips for travelers, but I guess it's not a good time to discuss that. Abisa Mary Ann, tell me about your very first entrepreneurial journey. Did you start selling when you were a kid? Where do you have all these ideas of running a business?

Did you start very early? Yeah, as mentioned, my parents are from a political family, but they're also entrepreneurs. So my dad had this belief that we should be brought up the way Chinese people would do to their families, to their kids. And that is exposing them to the business at a very young age. So I remember being a small child and being brought to the office on summer times. And, you know, they would just give us menial jobs like writing down check numbers in the vouchers and just being there pretty much going to work with them, going home with them. And what I realized is that when I was in the office, it's like our playground.

You get exposed to all the situations, whether it's sticky or not. And we saw that the problems pop up and we saw how they solved it or how they dealt with it. And I guess we learned from that as very young kids. So I remember at the age of 16, I went to the University of the Philippines at Los Banos. That was my second choice of a campus. And the reason why I chose that is because our family owns a hot spring resort 15 minutes away from

UP Los Banos, which is in Pansol. It's a known town for hot spring because Mount McKilling is there. And so there's a lot of hot spring resorts at the foot of the mountain. So my grandmother and my aunt lived there. And my aunt decided to migrate to the States when I was 17. And I was in UP staying in a dorm. And she just approached me and said, hey, can you take over the business? Because I'm migrating with my family. And I go, what? Can I do that?

And all it took is that my mom called me from Manila and said, hey, you can do this. I will help you. I will have my brother run the operations. You handle the money and the overall management. And you work on weekends. You work after school. You know, make sure all the income goes into a bank. And you write down all your releases.

Good thing I had accounting subject at that time. And pretty much that's it. She goes, that's it. That's all the handover. I had two-hour session with my mom and my aunt left for the States. And I was running the business at the age of 17. Wow. Yeah.

Yeah. And I tell my kids that, you know, now, I was just telling my two sons two days ago, when my parents handed on the business, my aunt and my mom handed the business, I think it gave them a hard time. It's like, can I do this? Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

Okay. Yeah. So I guess, yeah, being exposed at a young age with my parents running the business um really helped a lot like it gave us confidence to take on what's given to us and my mom would put in uh you know a few ideas like she goes you know if you rent out um lifesavers or swimsuits that's added income and then i listened to people what people say like oh we don't have enough rooms and so i put in the project with rooms i finished nutrition in the university of the philippines and so that helped that i was able to set up the restaurant business

and the catering so that was nice seven that was seven years when i ran the for seven years yeah wow that is really um i could super relate to that i was um i could see that day-to-day of a family business and you you know when when you're in a family business you have no choice but to work right because they're strict. And now I can see the value of how important it is to have your kids be involved with it. And sometimes I would have my kids listen to the meeting. Okay, so this is the problem and this is why I'm doing X, Y, Z. And now my 13-year-old, he's like, then he understand. And he's talking about business. I think he will be an entrepreneur because he listened to me every conference

call and I would explain to them, but I think it's, it's, it's, you know, the value of what you're getting when you expose your kids to the day to day, it really mold them to be an entrepreneur.

Yes, exactly. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. So does any of your kids will be, I mentioned like two are already involved in the business. Yes. Yes.

Okay. Wow. Yeah, they are. So, so, so the model that we're following, Chet and I is that we involve them in the business, but we, we are allowing them to pursue what they like to do. Yeah. So like Patricia, she's a dermatologist.

She's also finding time to set up her own clinic with fellow doctors. But she works with us part-time. Well, she's expecting now, no? She's in her fifth month of pregnancy. Oh, wow. You're going to be a grandma? I am. our time well she's expecting now no she's she's in her fifth month of pregnancy oh wow okay you get to be a grandma i am if you look like it well i'm so excited yep send me photo i know next phase of life oh my god yeah i'm excited and with alexa she's a chef so she uh so funny i have this funny story because um she trained in John George restaurant

in New York yeah and she was there for a year and so she was enjoying she was enjoying herself living alone in New York and you know

we just visit I probably visited four times every three months I would go but in between the sister went the brothers went

Chet went but anyway my point is she was having such a grand time in New York in the Mark Hotel, John George at the Mark. Two years

when she was ending her internship, called her dad and said, hey dad, can you give me another two years to stay in New York? And I had to say, hey, you know what? You're enjoying yourself because your dad and I pay for the apartment. But if you start paying for your apartment and all,

I think it's not going to be so fun anymore. So Chet said, come back, come back and help us here. So the first thing that Chet asked is, why don't you set up the supply of meals inside the vessels? You know, the rice meals that customers would buy? And you know how very price sensitive our market is? So in the

market, she would tell us, oh, the bill of the table that I cook for is like $200,000. You know, things like that. And they go, what? What did they eat with $200,000? Things like that.

Yeah. And then she comes home and she has to plan for a rice meal for like less than a dollar per meal. So you can imagine. So my friend would say, oh, it's not the mark anymore. It's marked down now. That's a joke. That's a joke. But the thing is, Chet, of course, she was hesitant at first because that was not the training that she went through in the States.

In Barcelona, that was not the training. She worked at Hotel Arts Barcelona. I've been there. I've seen Hotel Arts. Yeah, it's a beautiful one. I like it. Yeah, it's really nice. Yeah, it's really nice.

Very nice. So she worked there for six months. And you can imagine her adjustment for preparing these meals to now a less than a dollar meal to be sold in the boat. But you know how Chet framed it. He said, look, if we carry millions of passengers, you just make one peso out of every meal, that's still a million pesos. Yeah. But he starts there. We just have to start there. So from working in that rice meal, she has grown her brand.

She's now a budding entrepreneur, which I'm so proud of. So she created her own brand called Pina. So she's helping small farmers in the islands and then providing the packaging and the branding and the value-added service in the product so that she would be able to scale it someday wow right now she's we're just selling it inside of boats but the the whole big hairy audacious goal is to be able to make it available on the shelves and probably export helping the farmers that's one that she's doing. She co-partnered with

girlfriends. Four of them. Some trade abroad also on a brand called Good. So it's all this healthy food stuff that's available in the ready-to-eat format

and using all this healthy, gluten-free. I guess there's a niche for this. They just started. It's like a year old, and they're present in some gyms and outlets. It's still not there, but it's a good start. Wow. I think the niche is finding it. So it's a good start. Wow. I think it's finding it. So she's a budding entrepreneur.

And in this COVID time, friends who have farms are offering her to resell the fresh produce here in our village where we live. And last week, she sold about 220 kilos of freshly caught shrimp. Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow. Yes. The demand of like the healthy eating and delivery is up right now, right? Yes, yes. I think that's her vision,

which also got us into a farm, you know. She'd always talk about mom, farm to table, farm to table food and table uh food and all which made me buy a farm remember those i was discussing with you when you were in macau i was saying oh i ventured into a farm and i was yeah yeah so it's gonna it's going to have a a few um rooms for overnighters it's gonna be a farm school farm to table there's going to be a farm to table restaurant so yeah we're doing that all because of her uh it's her hope to to go into farming and really uh promote healthy eating farm to table organic etc wow wow that's i love how you guys

have your own business and your kids are involved into doing whatever their passion is. I love it. So you're building a bigger empire of what you have now. I love that. Thank you. Thank you. Well, Mary, being a female, you're running all these different businesses. Tell me about a mistake that you made.

Well, hindsight, I am, um, 52 right now, and we started very young. Um, I was a mother at 20, um, a mistake I did would be spending a lot of time on the drama. I would say I should have cut the drama. Hindsight, I was thinking if I was not so emotional on many failures, if I took it on and cut the drama, I could have gone further. Just as my point, no? Not that we're not happy where we are.

We are, but I could have done more if I cut all those drama and mistake. And then one thing is I think I had those dramas when I was also pregnant. And now that, you know, when we had issues with the kids growing up and I had to fill up forms, doctor's forms, they were asking, how was your pregnancy? And, you know, that was one reflection that I had. Had I known that my baby would be affected by all my drama, I should have

deliberately stopped it and not do that. I was telling Patricia that. Patricia is my elder. She's pregnant now. Just take happy thoughts. That was when I was younger. Over time, reading, I learned how

classical music helps. And you know what? With my youngest son, I would make him listen to classical music like an hour a day. And you know, he plays very good piano. Yeah, he plays really well. You know, over dinner now, at this

time, we would have dinner together. After dinner, he would play the piano. And I would say, wow, he's good play the piano and i would say wow he's good he's good and yeah you have pregnancy so okay that was my mistake had i known i should have just got the job and just be productive and just chose to be happy at that point another would be chet and i were discussing at one time how we we are serial entrepreneurs and we would just you know if an opportunity comes just grab it because you know you think it's good and all um but then i said oh we should have put more thought in it thought and you know if it's if it's not a business that we

really want to do you know if we don't want to scale it and be number one and be good at it, we might as well not enter it. For what? We're just adding small business and we lost a lot of money doing that because we thought that we can run it well with somebody else doing it and

that's their expertise. Hindsight, we were saying we should just put the money in real estate, you know, because then invested it in real estate and then let the price go up and all. So we did some of that, but not all. So if you can say that is a regret and a mistake, yeah, that's a mistake. But it's okay

i think yeah i think i i could i could totally relate to that it could be too in our filipino culture we can't say no to a lot of opportunity and i've seen my mother doing the same thing and she's doing two different things and i was like why are you doing two different things you're spreading yourself so thin and you're not perfect into one thing and you're all over the place, right? Yeah, I had that. Yeah. Yeah, I think it's in us that with my decision because the time and, you know, the energy of building a startup is so much. Like, I would rather work smartly.

Yes. Right? Yes. Yes. Yes. So if there are young people listening to us, I hope they learn from it, you know? Yes. Yeah.

Maybe focus one or two that you're so good at instead of doing 10 that's true that's true yeah and something that they're really passionate about something that they're really good at something that they see themselves doing for the long term right yeah yeah um i have a husband who's an idea man so he has to tell me all this idea. And I'm very focus driven, like, OK, that's not, you know, I also I would shut him down all the time because for me, it doesn't make sense. So but, you know, if I'm probably an idea person, then I'm doing everything and none of them will succeed. Right. Yeah. yeah, yeah. Well, yeah. Maren, can you name a person who

has had a tremendous impact on you as a leader? Well, definitely it would be my mom. Mom, she's my model. You know, she underwent a lot, as I mentioned earlier in the podcast.

Our home was an entirely model home, you can say. Not perfect, but my mom's so formidable. You know, she endured all this. She's very focused on keeping our family together, making something out of her life, learning from the mistakes of the past. So she endured all that. If I think about what she went through, I'm just amazed. Jaw drop and say, wow, wow, she's really strong.

You know, she's really strong in and out. She made good decisions. She had a very strong character that got her to where she is right now. So she's 82, but you know what? She still works in two offices. Wow. Yeah.

Yeah, she works in the office that my dad and she set up, which is now being run by my brother. So she goes there in the morning and then in the afternoon

she goes to the office that is being run by my younger sister, which she also set up and I helped her set up. It's now run by my sister. She goes in the afternoon. So she's pretty much on top of everything.

She signs checks every day. She has her apartment rentals that she handles on her own. Like she, she would contact the construction workers to do the repairs. She would deal with the hardware and, you know, collect, even collect rent.

Wow. She's 80 years old. 82. 82. Yeah. Wow. Wow. Wow.

And she has a lot of advocacies too, right? So it's not like she's all work, work. She also takes care of a women's center wherein they provide free dental treatment, free medical treatment to a barangay in San Juan where we have our, we used to have our home when we were small. And she maintains that, you know, she'd have meetings every month. And, you know, she takes care of this group of women.

They're called Barangay Once Women's Club. Wow. So she's the leader. Yes. That's, yeah. That's Club. Wow. She's the leader. Yes. That's amazing. Yeah. Wow. Do you consider your mom as a tiger mom? Or no?

Was she very strict? No, she's not a tiger mom because she was working all her life. You know, she was working so hard for the business and dealing with a difficult husband and five kids.

So that was hard. So she's not a tiger mom. I tell my kids that, you know, when we were growing up and we needed dental treatment, she'd just go with us one time, introduce us to the dentist. This is the dentist. So when we were growing up and we needed dental treatment, she'd just go with us one time, introduce us to the dentist. This is the dentist.

So when we were small, she would take us. But when we were teenagers, go take care of it. Make your appointment. If you have a driver to take you, do it. So I remember studying in UP Los Manos, which is like an hour drive without the traffic at that time. One hour from Laguna to go to Green Hills where my dentist is. I go on my own.

Just tell the driver, can you pick me up? And I go. I would have root canal treatments, which means going every other day. And I take care of myself. And you know what? I did that with my kids. Now they're pretty much the same. Same.

Yeah, they go to the doctor on their own. I would go with them when they were younger, when they were preteen. But once they became teenagers, now they go. They do it. I can see your mom thought you to be self-sufficient and you hand it down to your kids.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's very important. I do the same thing with my boys. Now they learn how to cook salmon and egg. When they're hungry, then fix yourself. You have fingers and

two feet, you can figure it out. True. Yeah. Those are skills that they have to learn. That was why I was having that conversation with my boys here because the two boys, one is studying in New York.

He's a sophomore in SUNY Maritime College. And the youngest one, he's about to enter college. And he already got accepted in SUNY Maritime College. And the youngest one, he's about to enter college. And he already got accepted in SUNY Maritime also for naval architecture. And so they're finishing,

they're schooling now online. So Matthew, we had him fly over from New York as soon as we learned of the lockdown. And CJ is also in lockdown, finishing senior year. And so I was telling them, hey guys, as soon as school is over, you got to be working in the office. And another day, you have to learn how to cook.

Cook. You have to learn how to cook sinigang and adobo because that also give you points when you court someone. When you're finding a girlfriend, it's impressive to cook Filipino food. Oh, yeah. That's true. That's so true. Well, I tried to do that with my kids.

When I was building my company, their grandma was taking care of them. So all their food, they're never super exposed to Filipino food. So I tried to force them some Filipino food. And they look at me like I'm going to poison them. It looks like. But now they like that adobo and some other food. I slowly introduced it to them. But, yeah, so it's's you know i i tried to force

them well one like the he likes the maggi noodles because now we're in quarantine so now oh my god i love it's like yeah that's what we did every day i put some egg and cabbage on it yeah yeah well mary ann um with this current situation what scares you the most egg and cabbage on it. Yeah. Well, Marianne, with this current situation, what scares you the most? What scares me the most is letting people down, you know.

With this COVID situation that we have right now, we have like 800 people working for us and working with us, I mean. And it's scary if we don't keep up with sustaining them. So right now our concern is how to be able to sustain their salaries because they depend on it and their families depend on it. How do we keep afloat?

That's for our business. But generally, what scares me now is for the Philippines, there's so many people who are hungry. There might be a revolution of some sort if government doesn't handle this well because people are going hungry. You know, I live in Alabang, and we're near the state penitentiary. You know, Munte. Have you heard of Munte?

You say Munting Lupa. Yes. We're in Alabang, Munting Lupa. And, you know, if there's some sort of a revolution, you know, people, we can have that outbreak, breakout. What's that? They're like, that shows. So that's scary. That's such a scary thought. So I hope that this ends soon and that we're able to, we'll be able to go back to normal. I was talking to my HR director just before talking to you,

and we see right now some of our people getting depressed. A lot of them have anxiety and this uncertainty. And so I was telling her that, you know what, after when we go back to office we should have a way of processing this you know hearing them out you know having sessions maybe on a limited number in the room where we can process this so that we can also aid in the mental health of our people because it can just be so daunting and scary. Well, mental issues are prevalent at this time, so that scares me. It's very difficult.

I don't have a big – I think there are 40 of them, but it's very hard when they just rely on their job for a day to day food. And when they don't have that, I mean, I could see how people would, you know, that's very difficult, like mentally. And how are you going to fed your family? So that's very hard. Yeah. That's true. Yeah. Yeah. It's hard. Because people just rely and they don't have a savings for emergency funds. So they're just relying in the government help and that doesn't come in all the time.

And I mean, we don't expect the government to do it every day as well, right? But like the reality of it is really hard because they can't go out. That's true. And, you know, the serial entrepreneur in me and, you know, root cause analysis, when I think about this, I say, so how do we solve this? With our people, I would say, oh, then we should put in more training in financial management or, you know, all the basic stuff.

We should be able to educate people to get out of this, to prepare for disasters like this. You know, there's just too much, too many things to do and to inspire people to do. You know, the root cause, you know, we were discussing this over at dinner with my kids and I was saying, I can't believe that there are people like that. You know, you like really have nothing. Like how do we help them to get out of that? How do we break that poverty? Yeah. It's the thing that we should really think about.

And, you know know Over the long term Get these young people to help soul You know Kids who have access to education And Leadership positions You know At least on my kids

That's what I tell them God gave us this life What we do with our lives is what we give god so with all the blessings that's been given us you know we have roof over our head we have food on our tables we have access to education what do we do what can we do to help solve the world's problems how can we be a help to others so anyway that's just a question in my head um something to do um yeah conversation we should keep going yeah it's it's that's very hard and it's very tough and even the property that have income again we have a lot of

ferns so i would tell myself why don't you just harvest it and give it to the neighbors so they have you know food to cook or like i think everyone should do farming we have all this land yeah so we'll be sufficient yes yes and you know what kate uh the the secretary of the department Agriculture, just came out with a press release on that. So if the president came up with a build, build, build project, this secretary of agriculture just came up with a campaign called plant, plant, plant. Yeah, that's true. Yeah, teaching people to plant,

do backyard gardening so that it will help. So you know how we Filipinos love rice and how we cannot live without rice. So people will say, as long as I have rice. So they have a sack of rice,

they'll do backyard gardening, have some salt, soy sauce. Soy sauce and oil. Oil and you're good. Good to go. Yeah sauce and oil. Oil, and you're good. Good to go. Yeah. So, yeah. I'm paying now.

Yeah. Well, that's very good. I hope everyone will be, you know, if they have a chance to plant and be sustainable, instead of relying just going to buy, I think it's time to, you know, start farming. Exactly. You know, we're doing that in the ports, in our ships. We're really putting plants, you know, just getting the awareness done. I tell our people, I say, come on, let's just inspire people.

When they ride their boats or they see our ports, they see all this vertical gardening that we're doing, the vertical gardening using containers, you know, those old pet bottles of the soft drinks. We plant vegetables. And I was happy to know for the janitorial cleaning business, my managing director sent me pictures of them, of their families, of where people are locked down and how they are saying that the plants that they planted at the ports and their backyard is now helping them.

Providing them vegetables that can help them on a day-to-day basis. Wow, that's neat. That's cool. Let's continue doing that. Yeah, I think we can cook pichay. Pichay is not hard to cook, right? And those are good.

You can eat it with onions and garlic. Those are very good. Yeah. Mary, and what have been the most influential experiences in your life? Okay. Looking back, I would say being a part of entrepreneurs' organization really helped us a lot. My kids grew up

knowing people and the brand because that's how I associate them. Like, oh, she's an EO. This makeup brand is an EO company or this right now, Ankas, like Grab for motorcycles.

She's a new EO member. And they will be part of the experiences of EO. And growing up, they would say, oh, it's an aspiration. We want to be EO members. We want to be EO members because they see how good, how great it is. So it really added um to our family life you know to the experience the richness of our lives influence us in many ways like um put these education for us and you know the network that we

work around with that was really good so i'd say that's a big help um another um influence would be interferi organization it's an organization of ferry owners of the world suppliers of ferry businesses and i remember when you were invited to join in right we started when chet was invited to speak in new york in the Interferi conference. That was 2010. And then we became members soon after. And I was thinking, you know, attending the conference, it's like, wow, they're really big ship owners. You know, their ships are not like our ships.

If we're talking about our ships are like 700 gross tonnage, 300 people capacity boats, we're talking about their ships, thousands, like 30,000 gross tonnage of those ships. And I would feel small, right? But I would say, what are we doing here? They're like big and we're small. And over time, what I realized is that I learned a lot from them. I'm like a little child when I'm around them, I pick their brains. I just sit down beside them and I go, how do you start the fairy business? What are your problems?

And I'm just like, I'm like a little child absorbing all their stories and learning. And now that I'm in this position, I am able to share that with our people and the young ones and my kids and all in the hope that we will have a better industry and, you know, for the long term. So I think I was even I remember one prayer time and I said, what are we even doing here? It's so expensive to be in this circle, you know, because you have to have juice and you have to travel. Of course, you pay for your own travel and all. But now I get it. You know, as I age, as we grow the business, I get it. There are valuable lessons that can be learned that you will not get unless you're there.

You will not get unless you interact with people uh you do the same things with pretty much the same with eo and that really helped us a lot that was that's another part of my family now we look forward to our annual inter-fairy conferences and you know what we had the pleasure of hosting all these members here in the philippines in 2016 um 350 uh ferry owners came to the Philippines and just shared. I always said, why are we even doing this? Anyway,

I get it now. We share with them our culture, the Philippines, and they're like our big brothers in the industry. The amount of learning that I get is just a lot. The support that we get is a lot and I value that. Another would be being a part of a bigger community outside our family. It's my church. So we got involved in our parish. I live beside the church here in Alababang and Chad and I actually prayed

for it. We said we prayed for a house beside the church and when we had the opportunity, it's like next door to the church and I remember sighing a prayer and saying, God, it's too close. You know, I can imagine God probably wanting to smack me right there. He's like, you prayed for a house near the church, right? I give you a house very near the church. But anyway, my point is I tell the kids because some would comment like, are you sure you want to be near the church? Like high risk because it's noisy, high risk because people come and go,

and, you know, the risk of burglary and whatever, whatever, the noise of people coming and going. And I would say, you know what? I prayed for this. And if I got it, I don't have any complaints. And the reason why we prayed for a house near the church is just because it's a way for us to be close. It's a way for us

to, you know, the peace of mind knowing that you can run to the church when you have problems, you have issues, you made a mistake, you can go run and pray. It's just us. It's just our wiring and it helps. So being involved in church, being able to pray, being able to be active, sensing that we are part of a bigger community. Like I'm friends with my neighbors.

I serve as a lector. You know, I read the Word. And I've been reading for the past 26 years. So I go, I serve in the 7.30 p.m. Mass and the 6.20 a.m. Mass on Saturdays, every other Saturday. So it's like part of the rhythm of my life such that when I travel, I make sure that I find a substitute to take care of my slot.

It influenced me a lot in the sense that I come running to them when I have spiritual issues, when I need directions, I mentioned earlier. So I surround my friends with good people who can help me in my life, more of lift up, you know, more of the lifting up, more of the positive side than the negative side. So I think that really influenced me a lot. And I think we're

passing it on to our kids in the sense that on Sunday evenings after I serve the 7.30 Mass so we have this ritual where we pray before and after Mass those who serve that Mass. When we say goodbye to our priests and I bless in Philippines we go, bye father.

Oh father, do you want to have dinner in the house? And so it has become a norm when we would have priests over for Sunday dinners with our kids. And now I see that with my two girls now, they're also close to priest friends. And I think it worked out well for us. So it's not only me. My husband is also close. We're influenced by them, by their teaching, by when we have

questions, when we have doubts in the faith. So, yeah. So, that would be my influence. Wonderful. So, what advice would you give to an aspiring Filipino entrepreneurs? Ah, okay. Filipinas! We have so much to give

and share. I think for young Filipinas like my mom, there will always be challenges, there will always be difficulties, but what is important is for us to

forge on, you know, go ahead, go, jump in, work, work, give your best, and then learn, continuously learn, read, network, pretty much what we're doing in EO, network, and then pray, course pray it comes in many many forms you know Warren Rustin right? so she was here yes he was here like two years ago three years ago to talk to us and

he shared that set yourself for success every day. How to set yourself for success every day. So he said three things. Set aside 30 minutes every day, 10 minutes for purpose. So every day you think about what's my purpose today? So think about that. 10 minutes. And then another 10 minutes

on meditation or positivity. So that may be reading or meditation or prayer. And then 10 minutes of journalizing. You said 10 minutes of journalizing. So you write it down every day so that you get your thoughts on paper

and you're able to process. And, you know, it's like a gratitude journal in a way. And you know what? Since he said that, I have been doing it. And if I can go back in time, I would probably do it when I was so much younger. I think it helps a lot with the introspection and, you know, grounding yourself and putting your thoughts together.

And could have eliminated all the dramas. Well, that's wonderful. That's a very good advice. Yeah, you know, he's doing live series on his Facebook page. And I'm actually going to listen later because he just comes down, values, or clarity. And so, yeah, if you get a chance. But that's some very good advice, the 30-minute, 10-days of meditation, 10-days of journaling. And what's the first one? 10-day of purpose.

Yeah, purpose. Purpose. What's your purpose? And then 10 minutes of positivity. And then 10 minutes of journalizing, writing. Yeah. And I have, like, four books books and it has become my diary. You see, when you start, it's like just writing down what you did for the day.

But then over time, when you develop the skill, it's more of the deeper, what's inside, what's going on in your head. And what he was saying is that it's for legacy. Who knows? Maybe I will have a grandchild later on who's going to be a writer. Writer on your journal? Yes. And maybe tell stories out of my journal. Yeah.

He actually said that it's for legacy. It's for processing. It's for, you know, going back later on. Yeah. Yeah. legacy it's for processing it's for you know going back later on yeah yeah and i'm a big believer of the um the vision board vision boards yeah just get in our forum in my spousal forum we had a um we call it the sme the subject matter expert. We invited this lady to talk about the vision board to us. And I have done it. And I have actually realized a lot of the things that I put in my vision board.

One of which is meeting Oprah. Okay. Maybe she's listening. Meeting Oprah. I put it in my vision board and it happened. Wow. Wow. Yeah.

So, Anna, how do you want to be remembered? I want to be remembered as someone who has loved much, who has laughed hard, who have made a difference. You know, my prayer every day is that when I encounter people, I pray that they see God in me. As I always say,

our lives is God's gift to us. What we do with our life is God's gift to us. Our gift to God, sorry. What we do with our life is God's gift to us. Our gift to God, sorry. What we do with our life is our gift to God. And I pray that my life was worth something. I was telling my son, you know, when we go to heaven,

God will not ask, oh, how many cars did you have? How many cars or houses or clothes? Did you wear good clothes? Did you party much? But maybe what he will ask is, have you loved much? Did you love much? Who did you love?

So I pray that my life will be that. I will be remembered as someone who has loved love god love love love wow i love it well mary and thank you so much i was that i could talk to you forever we need to do this all just us chatting i love how you're so positive when you're running all your you know your energy is just it's you're just you just running all your, you know, your energy is just, it's, you're just, you just have all this positive energy and you're, you seem so calm in the midst of pandemic. So I love that. I need the energy to diabetes today, the rough day for me. So thank you for sharing. And that's

really wonderful. And, um, where can they find you? Do you have a website? I do you have a website i know you have fastcat.com do you have your personal page no okay yeah but yeah fastcat would be the page yeah well um is that part of your vision board in 2030 you wanted a 60 boat i see is that in your vision board? Yes. You know, Kate, how many islands we have in the Philippines. When we meet people, they go, we would have a lot of governors and congressmen calling us, coming to our office, mayors coming to our office

saying, we want you to connect our island. This is just one example. The mayor was there and said, I want you to connect my island. I go, oh, but mayor, it takes a year to build a fast cat and it's not cheap

at all. We have old boats that maybe we can put in your island. He goes, no, I want fast cat. They don't want the old boats they want the model of a fast cat they want the brand new catamaran mid-speed vessel and you know the it's it's it's already um implanted in their minds the expectation and the brand itself. So that's what they want. So 60 FastCast by 2030 is our big area of the school. It's not enough to connect the Philippine Islands,

but it's our dream to be able to connect with the Philippines and be able to help business, trade, education in what we do. Well, you're making a big difference. And like I said, I grew up in riding one of your boats and just going from places to another and helping our economy. You're making a big difference to all the Filipinos. So thank you so much.

Thank you. Thank you so much, Miranda. I can't wait to see you in the Philippines in one of these days. Yes, and have a wonderful day you too we hope you enjoyed the show don't forget to rate review and subscribe and visit katehancock.com so you don't miss out on the next episode