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Manila Bulletin devider Entertainment devider AXN Ultimate Challenge Indonesia: The action singing stars

AXN Ultimate Challenge Indonesia: The action singing stars

Published Nov 19, 2021 10:11 am

AXN Ultimate Challenge Indonesia

AXN Asia ushers in their new show, the AXN Ultimate Challenge Indonesia, on Nov. 25, Thursday, at 8:30 pm (Philippine time). You can watch the show on AXN Asia, and it streams worldwide on the official AXN Asia YouTube channel starting Nov. 27.

Consisting of six episodes and hosted by Richard Kyle, this season has been created in partnership with the Ministry of Tourism and Creative Economy of Indonesia (MOTCE). It stars two young celebrity singers, Afgansyah Reza (AKA Afgan), and Isyana Sarasvati. Each have respective travel partners who join in the competition - on teamAfgan, we have Reza Chandika, a good friend of Afgan; while Rata Sekar, joins teamIsyana.

Afgan

We were given the chance to do a round table interview with pop star Afgan, and he was visibly excited to talk about the upcoming show and how the series brought them to three magnificent Indonesian locations - namely Labuan Bajo, Mandalika, and Bali. Each place is a known Indonesian destination, and Afgan enjoyed how the culture and people of each of the three locations become integral to the flow and execution of the show.

Labuan Bajo is known for the Komodo National Park, home to the largest lizards in the world, for its flying fox bats, and majestic snorkeling points. Mandalika, found in Lombok Island has crazy water parks, water sports activities, and racing circuits, known as a surfing beach. Bali is the one that needs no introduction, as it’s on most everyone’s wish list of beach destinations.

Afgan

As George Chien, President and CEO of KC Global Media Asia was proud to mention, “The series demonstrates AXN Asia’s continued commitment to Asian original productions across multimedia platforms to put Asian personalities and destinations in the spotlight.” We can only wish that the Philippines gets its chance soon.

Back to Afgan, and he confessed we’ll be watching him surf for the first time - embarrassing, that he’ll do canoeing, and fly boarding - even if he’s afraid of heights. For him, all the activities were physically challenging, the hiking in the heat, but his conquering his fear of heights was the one challenge he’ll be proudest of and claim as his favorite.

Given how COVID had kept him stuck at home for the longest time; Afgan was happy to report that getting involved with the show, the 10 full days of shooting, became something of a ‘healing trip’ - putting him back in Nature and traveling around his beloved country.

When I asked him about his singing career and when he’d get back to live performing, and doing concerts, we got the information that Afgan is a friend of our Christian Bautista - and I recalled how a little over a decade ago, that was the time that Christian was extremely popular in Indonesia. Afgan mentioned that he gets a lot of comments and words of encouragement on his social media assets from the Philippines, and he’d love to perform here when that’s possible.

That would be great, as Afgan has even recorded in the USA with the likes of Robin Thicke - look for the video of their Touch Me, a smooth, slick R&B number. In the meantime, if you want to watch Afgan making sweet music with the sun, the sea, and the mountains of Indonesia, head to the first episode of AXN Ultimate Challenge Indonesia.

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AXN Ultimate Challenge Indonesia
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