Growing up in the early ’70s, I was totally in love with soul music, mostly Tamla Motown and music from the Stax label. With my best friend, Mags, I used to sneak out of school to go to Manchester to buy rare soul records. In my late teens, I started going to Wigan Casino, a massive northern soul music venue.

Fit for a prince

I left college aged 18. I worked in Newquay, Cornwall, for two summers as a chambermaid. I also worked for (department store company) John Lewis on its staff holiday retreat. When my family bought a hotel in Devon, I managed it for a few years before heading to Austria, where I worked as a cook in a ski resort, which was great fun.

How Anna Sui, fashion designer, got her foot in the door

On returning to the UK, I decided to move to London. I took a job in Belgrave Square as a housekeeper for a Nigerian prince and his family. I loved working in the big house, which was reminiscent of the television show Upstairs, Downstairs. There was always some drama, especially with his older sons.

Hitting Hong Kong

I was almost 30 and knew I wanted to travel but didn’t have a plan. A friend had joined an ad agency in Hong Kong and she invited me to visit. Telling my mother I’d be back in two years, I set off for six months in Hong Kong before planning to go to Australia.

I got to Hong Kong in February 1986 and the energy hit me full force. Everything smelled and looked different and I absolutely loved it from day one. I lived with a group of friends in Discovery Bay on Lantau Island, which, in those days, was cheap and popular with young jobbing professionals who weren’t on fancy expat packages.

I had a great social life, playing tennis after work and enjoying the fabulous nightlife in Central on Hong Kong Island.

Fish and chips

I worked briefly as a medical secretary, then as an editorial assistant on a building and construction newspaper.

The parent company had a defunct trade publication called Catering & Hotel News and, as I had experience in hospitality, I persuaded them to let me resurrect it. I did everything – wrote the stories, took the photos and sold the advertising.

I began to receive invitations to the city’s top hotels, and this is where I discovered the world of PR. I met professionals such as Lynn Grebstad and was bowled over by the glamour. I got my foot in the door after I wrote a story for Ramada Hotels and they offered me a job as regional PR manager.

Perhaps the most memorable event I did was inviting world-famous UK company Harry Ramsden’s to cook fish and chips in the middle of the airport. Expats used to come out from the city just for a portion. The promotion achieved massive publicity and really helped my professional profile.

Handover junk

In 1990, I started to do freelance PR for Jimmy’s Kitchen, the first independent European restaurant in Hong Kong. My second client was the Hong Kong Jockey Club, for which I produced its clubhouse newsletters and menus.

I started my own agency, Susan Field and Associates, from a rented desk in a factory in the depths of Mong Kok in Kowloon, with just a computer, a telephone and a pager. Within a couple of years, I had moved into an office in Central and re-branded my firm as Impact Asia.

One of my favourite PR stunts was creating a giant Glenfiddich sail on the traditional sailing junk Duk Ling during Hong Kong’s handover in 1997. It sailed around the harbour throughout, in front of a worldwide audience.

Inside China

In 2006, I interviewed a dynamic lady, Sarah Woodhouse, for a job and within five minutes had hired her. She soon became my business partner and held the fort in Hong Kong while I focused on expanding our operations into mainland China. I had visited many times from the 1980s onwards and found it fascinating.

Many of our clients in the West were keen to enter the market and we were able to help them establish their brands there. We also promoted Chinese enterprises to the international market. Our first client was Three on the Bund, in Shanghai, followed by the reopening of the historic Peace Hotel, also on the famous waterfront.

Operating in China was definitely more challenging than in Hong Kong, where most people speak English, but we successfully established offices in Shanghai and Beijing. At the height of our expansion, we had a staff of 80 people across the three offices.

Chen Jin, performance artist with a sideline as a chef, on easier times

Island Life

I first visited Koh Samui, in Thailand, with my mum in the 1980s and we stayed in a simple beach bungalow, which was the start of my love affair with the island. I had bought a plot of land in 2001 and built a villa, which I eventually sold and bought my current home.

I’d planned to retire when I left Hong Kong with my partner, David Birchall, in 2015. However, a business opportunity in Samui property development transpired and we realised there was a gap in the market to acquire old, unloved or ugly properties and transform them.

We have completed several projects in the past few years, our most recent being a poorly maintained resort on the beach at Bangrak, which is on Samui’s popular northeast coast, just opposite Koh Phangan. On acquiring the plot, we set about demolishing around 85 per cent of it and starting afresh. The result is Tembo Beach Club & Resort, which we opened in November last year.

It was a challenge to make it happen during the pandemic although the local community has shown us a lot of love and support. Now Thailand is finally lifting arrival restrictions, we are welcoming visitors from all over the world.

It’s great to have my own piece of paradise and to run a resort imbued with my personality after years of doing PR for the hospitality industry.

Dogs and elephants

I’ve always been an animal-lover, but it wasn’t until the late 1990s, when I lost virtually all my savings through a financial adviser in Hong Kong, that my course started to change. Before this personal catastrophe, I had lived in cheap flats in Hong Kong but after I lost most of my money, I decided to live for the “here and now”.

I rented a nice flat in Mid-Levels and fulfilled my dream of getting a dog. Since then, I have never been without one and now have eight rescue dogs at home. I feed about 20 street dogs each day and have rescued and found homes for more dogs than I care to think of. I support local animal sanctuaries through fundraising activities.

‘Cultural chameleon’ in Hong Kong drawn to her Ukrainian roots by war

My other pet project is Save Elephant Foundation. When I moved to Thailand, I read an article in a magazine about the plight of elephants in tourism. I was lucky to cross paths with the founder, Lek Chailert, and learn about the foundation’s incredible work across Southeast Asia.

Our Koh Samui resort is named Tembo, which means “elephant” in Swahili, as a nod to the cause and we will continue to support them however we can.