'Keep chasing your passions': Meet the ski speedster set to represent Singapore at the Winter Olympics

SINGAPORE: Faiz Basha will become Singapore's first alpine skier at the Winter Olympics next month, but it is not his first brush with fame.

About six years ago, he landed an internship with the Land Transport Authority (LTA), after a proposed MRT map design he shared online went viral.

"I've always liked trains and planes, I'm quite nerdy when it comes to those things. And I always found the old Singapore MRT map to be quite aesthetically unpleasing. So I had a go at designing it myself," he told CNA.

During Faiz’s internship with LTA, he was invited to see the map they were working on and give his input.

Redesigning MRT maps is not his only passion. When he takes to the slopes next month at the Stelvio Ski Centre in Bormio, Italy, he will be only the second Singaporean to compete in a Winter Olympics.

Faiz started skiing after moving to Switzerland when he was three. His father, a diplomat, had been posted there and the family relocated.

"When I was in the preschools over there, you have your physical education (classes). Maybe in Singapore, you play volleyball or football, but in Switzerland, they will take you up to the mountain once a week and teach you to ski," he recalled.

Picking up the sport at a young age came with certain benefits. "When you're very young, you don't have fear," he said. "It gave me a lot of the correct instincts."

Faiz, who also learnt skiing from his mother, Madam Sharifah Albar, recalled how he was a bit "unhinged" on the slopes.

"Everybody has a different personality on the slope. For me, I was a bit more unhinged," he said. 

"I remember being quite notorious in my class for being like that ... I was quite disruptive to my group because I had no fear, and I like to ski fast."

It was this desire to