SINGAPORE — It was a Friday night and the man on stage at local comedy haunt, The Merry Lion, was telling the crowd about how his father had taught him and his sister to share while they were growing up.

“I remember one day I went out with my dad and asked for ice-cream. He said no as my sister wasn’t there.

“We got home to find my sister eating ice-cream.

“Saying he would handle it, my dad went to my sister, took the ice-cream, and threw it away.

“He taught us an important lesson that day — how to share misery.”

The crowd erupted with laughter and the comedian on stage waited for a few seconds to pass before launching into his next joke.

Few in the crowd would have realised that the man on stage was also the co-founder of what was once the darling among local start-ups.

Mr Isaac Tay is one of the three co-founders of grocery delivery company Honestbee, which in its heyday offered its services in up to seven regional countries and territories.

Mr Tay resigned last September to pursue his own path after disagreeing with the direction the company was taking.

The other two co-founders, Mr Jonathan Low and Mr Joel Sng, left the company this year.

A DIFFERENT PATH

While the embattled company has been in the news recently for its financial woes, Mr Tay has been making his mark in a different field.

Since his departure Mr Tay has been pursuing stand-up comedy, which he has been dabbling in since 2013.

In March this year, the 38-year-old packed up his bags and travelled from Singapore to Germany via bus and train to perform stand-up comedy.

Mr Tay, who returned from his trip in June, told TODAY during an interview last week that he had decided to set off on the journey as he had more time after his resignation.

He has also always been fascinated about travelling by land, having completed a trip by rail from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia back in 2010.

“I guess sitting in the M113 (armoured personnel carrier), covering a long distance by land for two-and-a-half years of my life also played a part,” added Mr Tay, who served in the armour infantry during his National Service.

When asked how his friends and family had reacted to his decision, Mr Tay said: “Well, the joke is that it’s a mid-life crisis.”

“Is it? I don’t know man. It depends on when I die. If I die tomorrow, I guess it’s a full-life crisis,” he laughs.

MAKING ESTONIANS LAUGH

He has visited 13 countries and performed in 10, including Thailand, China, Russia and Germany, scoring opportunities in comedy clubs through references along his travels, or simply by contacting clubs after looking them up on Google.

When I asked how difficult it was to get people to open their doors to an unknown like him, especially in more far-flung countries like Russia or Estonia, Mr Tay said he was fortunate that everything had “come together” for his trip.

“There was never a door that was closed that could never be opened. I think everyone was very helpful,” he said.

“I needed to be persistent in some cities but I never felt like it was a lost cause.”

The generosity shown by comedians he met along the way also helped, such as when a comedian in Moscow introduced him to a show organiser in Saint Petersburg.

“I think all of us just want to be better (at stand-up comedy) and we see the struggles in each other. So we help each other as we grow together. I think we share that bond in our struggle,” he explained.

Mr Tay said that the moment he truly felt confident in his material — which centres around family relations — was when he performed in Tallinn, the capital of Estonia.

It was the first place where a majority of the audience was made up of locals, rather than expatriates as was the case at his previous stops.

Mr Tay said that his routine was well-received by the Estonians.

“From a confidence level, it definitely increased tremendously when you see these folks from quite a different part of the world relating to your material and laughing. And the laughs weren’t awkward laughs. They were rumbustious laughs,” he recounted.

The highlight of his trip was winning King Gong, known as one of London’s most brutal open mic comedy competitions. Held monthly, the competition gives contestants five minutes to perform their act.

Random members in the audience are given red cards to hold up if they do not like the act, and a performer has to leave the stage if three red cards are held up during his or her act.

Those who make it through then go on to the final round, where the winner is decided by the loudness of the crowd’s applause.

Mr Tay said that to prepare for the competition, he sought the advice of fellow comedian Jinx Yeo, a Singaporean who won the competition back in 2015.

Acting on Mr Yeo’s advice, Mr Tay studied videos of past participants as part of his preparations.

“It’s like mugging for the O-Levels,” said Mr Tay. “You go through one assessment book, and that’s still not enough. You need to do another one.”

His Singaporean pragmatism paid off, with Mr Tay edging out a British contestant to the top spot.

NOT DONE WITH TECH YET

Having found success overseas, does he plan to do stand-up comedy full time?

Mr Tay did not rule out doing so one day, but he said that his journey in the tech industry “is not over yet”.

Mr Tay said: “I still very much like tech, that’s the thing.

“I guess if I can find something that marries both tech and this passion of writing and performing, that would be awesome.”

He added that there is a lot more that he wants to accomplish in the tech industry before embarking on a different career.

“I want to build a profitable, sustainable business,” he said, adding that he has met people whom he is keen to work with.

However, Mr Tay is not letting go of his passion just yet.

He has been hard at work since March trying to grow his beard and moustache — something that will be integral to a comedy show that he plans to stage at the end of the year.

Until then, he will be testing out his new material at comedy clubs around the island.

He is aware that the audience may not get all his jokes.

“But if there’s something that you want to do, then you’ve got to keep trying,” said Mr Tay.