Latest posts by Martin Moodie (see all)
- How I overcame Severe Tire Damage to become the oldest influencer in town - April 20, 2024
- Free as a (Kiwi) bird and flying high in Haikou - April 13, 2024
- Discovering Food Accademia’s world of fine flavours at a Hong Kong cha chaan teng - April 6, 2024
Thanks to this wretched pandemic, pretty much everyone in our industry knows someone who has been through a health battle over the past 24 months.
But there’s one member of the travel retail community who’s going through a different and much bigger struggle at the moment.
From travel retail industry veteran, innovator, disruptor and all-round good guy Adil Raïhani comes distressing news about Khaliq Ismail, Owner and Managing Director at UK company AirPromote. Khalid and AirPromote are well-respected for their expertise in managing permanent and high-profile promotion activations in travel retail. Like Adil, Khaliq is one of the good guys.
He’s also a young guy, which makes news of his health struggle even more upsetting. Over the New Year’s holidays Khaliq suffered a brain haemorrhage while in his native Sri Lanka. He underwent emergency surgery and has been heavily sedated for the past few days. While here is not the place for medical updates as things change fast, I can say that Khaliq is hanging tough and the doctors are hopeful about his condition.
Adil and another mutual friend Stephenie Rodriguez (who has herself stared down death over recent months) have asked members of the travel retail community to pray to their respective gods for Khaliq’s recovery. If you don’t have a god then just hold Khaliq in your heart for a moment.
I last saw Khaliq (with Adil) a few years back in the aftermath of my annual (and usually riotous) Thursday night dinner in the Old Town during the Cannes show with inflight industry veteran and pioneer Rakhita Jayawardena, another irrepressible Sri Lankan. As always, he was full of laughter and energy. I don’t remember too much of the night after that except that it was great fun. The next I heard from him was out of the blue after I suffered a heart attack in early 2016, when he took the time to reach out to me and wish me well (see below).
This time the tables are turned Khaliq and I join everyone in our travel retail community (I prefer that word on such occasions to ‘industry’) in saying my own form of prayer to you.
Wishing our dear Khaliq, a wonderful person, a quick recovery!
My prayers are with you, with the hope to see your contagious smile very soon again!
Thank you Martin and prayers are sent and will continue to come for Khaliq. Hoping for a speedy and full recovery. 🙏
He is such a good hearted guy and helped many people in need! I have known him for 30 years since school and wish and pray for him to recover soon by God’s grace 🙏
Thank you Martín for your support! Any prayer helps from all respective gods! In the name of the family, friends and colleagues a very big thank you, they are humbled by all the support and prayers from all over the globe. 🙏🏽❤️🙏🏽
We have seen miracles happen in the last years. And knowing Khaliq as strong, a tiger, a fighter and positive, that is a great start!
Dear Martin, thank you!
And dear Khaliq, please get well ❤️🩹 soon. I heard you are in the right path of recovery and all my love and strength I am sending to hopefully see you laughing again and “pestering” all of us to toast to life.
Cheers, Steven