As you all know by now, I am back in Germany. I had a great first week in Berlin hosting a photography workshop at a school around the corner.

A couple of weeks ago I won the German Webvideo Awards ( deutscher Webvideo Preis ) with a video from India and finally, after almost a month, the original Bollywood posters you can see in that video arrived from India. Thanks to Ria at Jaaga for sending them over.

They are limited to 85 pieces. The printing plates from the manufacturers don’t exist anymore so these posters will be the only ones ever printed. No reprint possible.

If you want to save your copy send me a message and let me know how many posters you want. ( Yes, if you wish I can write you a nice “hey, all the best from fabsn”-note on the back )

The price per poster is 10€/13US$ plus shipping. ( Size: 76 cm x 52 cm )

If you wanna meet up for a drink in Berlin, let me know. I live in Kreuzberg.

Cheers
fabsn

Yes, you read correctly. Today is my last day in Colombia, the last day as a Design-Journeyman traveling the world.

I had a fabulous farewell party with the people from Vida Augusta in Medellín. With confetti, costumes, choripán, a piñata, 90’s dancefloor music and lots of Rum.

I will spend a week in Frankfurt to see friends and family and meet some people at radiostations and newspapers for interviews as well as potential publishers for my book. It’s not gonna be boring in Germany.

After that I will move to Berlin in a nice room in Kreuzberg where I will have my base for an undefinite amount of time. I will prepare exhibitions about my trip and write the book. Once that is done, I hope to go on a small tour to give talks about the incredible travel I had.

I will keep this blog running for upcoming information about the whole Journeyman project. Of course there so many things still to do. Lots of videos, photos and stories to present for which I haven’t had time to prepare while traveling and working.

Thanks to the lovely people from Medellín. I had a great time with some amazing projects.

Next week more – by that time from Germany.

Saludos
fabsn

On march 31st 2012 I won the Jury Prize of the German Webvideo Awards ( Deutscher Webvideopreis ) in the category OMG for my protest video from India:
THE BOLLYWOOD MOVIE STAR

Since I am still on the road I couldn’t attend at the award show. So I decided to perform a small speech in the center of Medellín, Colombia…

With help from the people I work with right now I took the chance to visit the not-so-safe center of Medellín to find some real local musicians. With 1 liter of Rum and 1 Liter of Aguardiente we convinced a music group and some other people to take part in our project. After several obscene maledictions by a female group of coffee sellers against the Gringo with the camera, the mood became a little bit aggressive. But as always…the Rum solved the problem and after 5 takes we finally thought we got what we need.

Big thanks to:
Cristina and Clara from Vida Augusta
Edgar from Ragde Design
Lucas from brainwash24hours
Rob from Brik a Brak
as well as Samuel lo mejor, the Ladies, the band and all the people shouting.

Thank you so much
fabsn

// If you want to buy an original poster from the video THE BOLLYWOOD MOVIE STAR, write me a message. And hurry, they are limited to 80 pieces only. 10€/13US$ Per Poster ( plus shipping ) //

Here’s the complete gala. Category OMG with nominees and winners from minute 0:49:40.

winners logo – click to enlarge





the lovely Katrin Bauerfeind announces the winner video The Bollywood Movie star – click to enlarge





the speech video live on screen in the theatre – click to enlarge





sold out Savoy theatre in Düsseldorf – click to enlarge





winners and prizes and a bollywood picture on stage – click to enlarge
all photos by Deutscher Webvideopreis

Behind the scene from the Speech-videoshoot

finding the right composition – click to enlarge





last check for the right order – click to enlarge





having shots of rum with the people around – click to enlarge





the signs after the shoot – click to enlarge

Saturday, March 31st, is the day of the days for me this year…at least so far.

The decision will be announced about the audience and jury prizes for the German Web Video Awards 2012.

I am nominated in 2 categories and pretty excited about it. recently I saw that there will be a live stream of the whole show which takes place in the lovely Savoy theatre in Düsseldorf.

The stream will be available directly at webvideopreis.de or at myvideo.de

// UPDATE: LIVE STREAM AT www.webvideopreis.de/live/

Kick-off is 6:30pm GMT ( 19:30 german time ).

I will check the address again and will update it before it starts should there be changes.

Keep your fingers crossed.

OMG!!!
fabsn

_____________________________________________________________

Just a short notice. I finally reached the mark of 100 articles. Spent uncountable hours to foster this blog and keep it updated. Sometimes more, sometimes less. I’m glad the number of my readers constantly grew. Otherwise I’d propably have kissed it goodbye into the depths of the web.

Here is an update of happenings from the past, the present and the future:

- After 100 articles I thought I could change the header. Was about time.

- I recently ( finally ) installed a facebook page where I will post photos from my travels and tell short stories about it. Kind of an appetizer for the upcoming book. Some untold information that you shouldn’t miss.

- An interview that german travel mag MERIAN did with me.

- A great article about my Design-Journey on german mag SPIEGEL ONLINE.

- I was nominated in the german web video awards. The award show will be on march 31st in Düsseldorf. You’re still able to vote for my video THE BOLLYWOOD MOVIE STAR and of course for all the other great web videos.

- Another article on SPIEGEL ONLINE about my nomination at the german web video awards with some interesting user comments.

- I found my last job of this trip in the lovely city of Medellín at a place called Vida Augusta, a new found art collective with gallery space. My first job was to help setting up an art show about traditional colombian laundry and also placed myself as an exhibit as you can see at the photo on top of this post. Tomorrow I will be going to a farm house in the mountains to do a fashion shoot for local label Kabura. Next week a product shoot for an awesome furniture brand called Brik a Brak.

- Early april I will take my last night bus on this world trip, heading to Bogota and taking the plane to Frankfurt city.

- Visiting friends and family and als some media to talk about my travel project.

- Heading to Berlin mid april to give a photography workshop at a school and move into my own room. Yes, I already found a place to stay. How exciting. My own room after 2 years and three months.

- Starting to do a concept for the rest of the year: writing the book, preparing exhibitions and lectures.

Thanks for following
yours fabsn

Once more I am stoked how uncomplicated things can be if you meet the right people.

One week ago I packed my bag in the small fisher village Taganga at the caribbean coast of Colombia to take a 17 hour bus ride down south. The city of Medellín fascinates me since I first heard about it. Former “most dangerous city on planet earth” with 6500 homocides in 1991 it was home to famous druglord Pablo Escobar and to many of his asassins.

The city is a beauty, build in a green valley between two breathtaking mountain ranges. Since the era of Escobar ended with his death the city regenerated pretty fast and is today a sparkling newcomer with a busy night life and a growing art scene.

I contacted quite a few people through the usual websites but also did a call on couchsurfing.org this time. And that was when I got lucky. An australian guy contacted and forwarded me to the young creative community Vida Augusta which just happened to open its doors 6 weeks ago.

I contacted Cristina, the founder and artist herself and the day after I met her at the gallery.

To cut a long story short: Vida Augusta is my new and very last employer on my trip as a Design-Journyman. And what a catch. I am living in the most extravagant appartment just 5 minutes up the hill ( will post photos some day, incredible ) and looking forward to help setting up an exhibition for coming saturday. Next week we’ll be going uphill to a farm house where I will do a fashion shoot for a scarf brand and a product shoot for a furniture brand and many more things afterwards. This – is – so – exciting!

Please check out Vida Augusta on facebook and like it to spread the word about colombian creatives.

Thank you all and of course I’ll keep you updated
fabsn

having a break at the gallery with my new colleagues – click to enlarge

The view from my room into the green

Here are some pictures from the fisher town Taganga and around.
More pictures in the photo section.

]]> http://www.fabsn.com/theblog/2012/03/very-last-stop-very-last-job/feed/ 0 http://www.fabsn.com/theblog/2012/03/nominated-in-german-web-video-awards-2012/ http://www.fabsn.com/theblog/2012/03/nominated-in-german-web-video-awards-2012/#comments Fri, 02 Mar 2012 01:35:28 +0000 fabsn http://www.fabsn.com/theblog/?p=2932


.

Hello everyone. I recieved a message that I was nominated in the German Web Video Awards 2012 with my video from India called The Bollywood Movie Star. There are several categories and I am competing in two of them. Category OMG and category EPIC.

Two different prizes of each category will be announced. One voted by audience and one chosen by a jury.

I kindly ask you to help me win the audience prize because everyone in the web has a vote.

What you have to do have to do is:

Go here and register ( sorry, it’s only in german but it’s very easy and fast ) or simply login with one of your social media accounts.

Once you’re logged in, go to the category pages OMG ( video no. 3 ) and EPIC ( video no. 4 ) and vote for THE BOLLYWOOD MOVIE STAR.

Thanks for your help and I blow a kiss to every voter should I win this.

Bollywood for win
fabsn

Despite all my affirmation about “not having anything done” in the Dominican Republic, except for traveling the country and surfing and living the life in general, I can present you a small doco clip from a night in a cock fighting arena in the capitol Santo Domingo.

I had a crazy night at the arena and the story that follows this evening is even crazier. And even though this would be a story worth telling I kinda have the feeling it might be misplaced here, right after you saw the video. I decided to not tell the story on my blog. If you wanna know, ask me in person…it’s worth it!

As most of you know, I am staying in Colombia at the moment, looking for a job. So if there’s anyone out there with a contact in design, photography/videography, architecture or has contact to companies/communities/festivals in the creative fields…you know what to do.

It’s gonna be my last job. Yes, job no. 15 on continent no. 6. In april I will return to germany to work with what I have. Writing the book about what happened to me within those years, giving lectures about the things I learned and prepare exhibitions to show what I saw and captured with my camera(s).

I am in a strange mood, I tell you. The end is near ( not talking about 2012 Maya horseapples ). And I realize it more each day. I am looking forward to it but also already have this sentimental feeling growing that you always have when a journey is soon to be over.

Wish me luck for the last chapter.

Yours
fabsn.

( for the german speaking fellows out there: check out the interview I recently gave to travel mag MERIAN )

So it finally happened. After 2 years of traveling I almost thought I am immune against mugging, robbery and pickpocketing. Na ah, never feel too comfortable is what I learned today.

Colombia is not the most welcoming country so far. 3 hours delay in Bogota on my way to Cartagena due to drug screening of the plane I was sitting in. When I arrived at the north coast, I didn’t have any colombian Peso so I paid the cab driver with dollar but he wanted to give me way less Peso back than he should have. I finally solved that problem at 3am with a helpful pedestrian.

The next day I wanted to change my Dominican Peso ( around 300US$ ) but no exchange shop in the city wanted to take it. The only guy who was willing to exchange agreed to give me Colombian Peso worth 80US$ back. No thanks.

After running around checking ATM’s I kinda got nervous that all of them rejected my credit card as well as my bank card. On the way back, pretty frustrated from the first day, I found another ATM in a corner well hidden. And surprisingly this one gave money. So now I had cash and knew a place where to get more. Problem solved!

I worked the past few days on a project and didn’t go out a lot so today I decided to explore my area a little. Cartagena is described as extremely save. Cops everywhere to protect foreigners. It’s a touristic city ( lots of old pirate fortresses ) and they don’t want to see that busy tourist life destroyed by criminal activities. So today I walked around. Without my camera or any bag. Just my ipod in the pocket. I took a break at one of the old city walls towards the ocean, listening to music. When I turned around, 2 lottery card vendors blocked my way.

I said “Hola” and tried to walk around them but one of the guys stepped in front of me and pushed his tray with all the tickets into my face. “No Gracias Amigo” is what I said while trying to walk around him. He kept blocking my way and showed his hand that was covered by the tray till now. A nice little switchblade appeared, reflecting the sun while he was slowly rolling it in his hand. He pointed with the knife on my pocket. When I think about it know, I am sure they must have spotted my headphones somewhere in the city and followed me to that perfect mugging-spot.

Two men of my age ( although not that tall ) and a knife made me realize that I shouldn’t try anything weird. Like get into a fight or something. I didn’t even see a sense in arguing since I don’t speak enough spanish to hammer out some convincing stories. I took the ipod bag out of my pocket, umplugged the headpgones and handed it over saying something like “Aaaww maaaan, reeally?!?”
I still don’t know why I unplugged the headphoes but they didn’t seem to be interested in them anyway. What I did forgot until the guy without the knife checked the little bag was, that I left a couple of things with the ipod in that bag. And those other things were the reason that they didn’t ask me to also empty my other pockets. The day when I went on the mission to get money, I forgot to take out the cash as well as my credit card which I usually carry around in that bag. It’s the thing I check the most and take good care of all the time so it was in there and not where I should have placed it – back in my big backpack in the hostel. Inlcuding 140US$ and my credit card there was also my drivers licence and a couple of business cards in that little bag.

And when you guys, yes you who stole my stuff, happen to check my blog which you find on the business cards, this is for you:

yours, truly
fabsn

…and the game is on again. How to get money? We’ll see tomorrow. Wish me luck, please…

The other day I recieved the proposal of an old friend of mine, who recently became a teacher, to use my travels as a Design Journeyman in his class. He wanted to prepare a special geography lesson so that the 5th grade students could travel the way I traveled and answer specific questions about my trip with a world map, a globe and a fictive letter of mine. With lots of photos and interesting facts about the several countries I visited it seems like they enjoyed their own little trip around the world.

And when I saw the photographs from that day in school, of course my heart was melting. Lovely project. Nothing could make me feel more honoured.

Dear 5a of the Brüder-Grimm-Schule, YOU ROCK!

Yours
fabsn

top photo: traveling on the map and a globe.
bottom photo: group work, a journey around the world – click pictures to enlarge