Cultural Cartography

World's first online balloon race

I will have a bit more  time on my hands in the next couple of months and so I have decided to celebrate by letting off a balloon. Virtually of course. I am going to take part in the first online balloon race. Don't quite know how it works yet but I like the balloons.

I liked the idea of the orange animal packages from the start. The films were great (see here) and I thought that giving people who use their cell in a particular way an animal name was very clever. It taps into our inate desire for story telling and metaphors. Even if there was some inital discussion about the types of animals. 

And now I get to be my own animal. I chose a dolphin. Like lots of other people. Semiotically it is simply the most sexy animal as far as I am concerned. So help me swim or fly to freedom. Thanks. 

Tubes and Tunnels

On the underground going home recently I looked up and down the train to see that I could see all the way down the train almost to the wall that separated the driver's carriage from the train. I have often wondered about the designs of underground carriages and in this case, they had obviously decided to put all the seats down the side of the train to leave a big long space in the middle. It is probably a very effective way of getting more people in the trains, but it made me feel decidedly strange. For as I looked forward, I realised that I could see the actual way that the rails the train was on twisted and turned, went round corners and then straight on reflected in the way this tube twisted and turned. It was like being inside a very long worm which is sliding along through the earth and you can see the way its body bends, because you are inside. 

I did not like this sensation. It made the whole experience feel much more alien and unnatural than otherwise. Which made me reflect: Do the designers of tube trains talk to the people who travel in them and how it feels to sit in the trains when they are actually moving? 

Going Barefoot

Whilst we were in India, we visited lots of temples. In Hindu temples you have to take your shoes off when you enter the main temple area. Depending on how big the temple is and how long you spend there, this can mean that you walk around for about 2 or 3 hours without shoes on. In one case, the Rock Temple in Trichy, the temple started at the bottom of a huge rock and extended up about 300 stairs to the top of the rock.

At first I have to admit you feel a bit exposed but after a while you remember what it feels like to walk barefoot, to feel contact between yourself and the world and to feel connected to the people around you. It is an unmediated experience. And it feels good.

I know that shoes are necessary in a lot of cases and they can be helpful. But I do feel that we have forgotten the benefits of going barefoot.

What does all of this have to do with planning? Well, it feels to me like shoes and brand positionings share some inherent similarities. In some cases they are necessary but they should only ever be seen as a tool. The most important thing you can do to help understand a brand is to experience it without shoes, in an unmediated natural way, and to feel how you are connected to this brand (or not).

I guess I am pleading for that old conker. Get out there, out from behind your desks and get back to experiencing life. That is where you understand things and believe me, it feels good.

on Automatic

skill1
Originally uploaded by wayne_f14

I realised something this morning on the way to work and I want to see if this also happens to other people. I was cycling along perfectly fine enjoying the sun in Berlin. Then I came to a crossing and crossed over the road. So far perfectly fine. Then I thought as I was crossing the road, funny how it doesn't seem to be a problem to cycle on the right side of the road, that you automatically know what is the right side of the road.

Instantly my brain started spinning around and I started to ask myself what is the right side of the road (remember I am in Germany but grew up in the UK and have lived in the States) and then I was in trouble. I no longer knew which was the right side of the road.

As soon was what was automatic became conscious, I started to question my automatic actions.

This also happens to me when I am speaking - distubingly not only in German but also in English. I say something and don't think whether it is right or wrong, seconds later for some reason I start to consider and all of a sudden I am convinced I have made a mistake or I can't reconstruct why I said what I said.

It sounds like I am a complete nut but it reminds me of Blink. I have become an "expert" at certain things and so can do them automatically, but ask me to reconstruct why and I struggle. Admittedly I am not sure if that last bit is in Blink or not.

Does this happen to anyone else who travels around a lot? Or in fact to anyone else?

Religious understanding?

Sorry for the long break. I wasn't on holiday the whole time. But work does sometime get in the way of blogging.

More will follow about India, but I thought I would start off with one thing that really struck us on this holiday. We were in Tamil Nadu and so of course we saw lots of temples. Now I have seen Hindu temples before but never really studied them (to my shame). As we were seeing approx 2 amazing temples a day, we decided it would make sense to try and understand the significance of the temples, their decoration and their role in people's lives, not to mention of course who the gods and deities were who were being worshipped there.
We hoped that way to be abe to explain to ourselves why certain statues in the temples were covered in yellow and red colouring and had flowers and candles in front of them, and others didn't.

I have to confess, it was all a bit confusing. First of all there are a multitude of different gods and incarnations of the same gods and different stories about them, which are all somehow interlinked but don't really add up. And then of course there are the different branches of the religion, not to mention the Shivaite and the Vaishnavite followers. So all in all a lot to take in.

At first I was a bit irritated. Why couldn't it all be logical and clear? Why were people contradicting themselves. But then we started to talk about other religions, in particular Christianity, which is the religion we know best. When you start to think about it, Chrisitianity is not only far from logical, it also contradicts itself internally. There are many different branches of Christianity, many of which exist under one roof (take the Anglican Church for example). Catholics and Protestants have a fundamentally different understanding of the role of Mary for example and so it goes on.

Once we had gained this perspective on the religion that formed our cultural background, in fact to be honest, once we imagined a poor Hindu being taken round the UK and shown a multitude of different churches, chapels and cathedrals, it became clear to us that it was only the greater familiarity with Christianity which made us think it was logical and clear.

Not an amazingly new insight but still powerful. If you put yourself in the situation of being a stranger on your own cultural map, then you realise how difficult it is to navigate.
We became a lot more understanding of the diversity of Hinduism and felt less pressured to make everything logical.

Of course we still didn't work out why certain statues were all yellow and others weren't.

Play away

I am off on holiday to India for two weeks, and of course before that I have to survive some days of pure madness, so I won't be posting for a while. But look forward to more details on navigating your way through the cultural maze that is India, when I am back on air.

Talking the same language

When I left my last job, my client was upset (which was flattering). One of the things he said to me was that basically I was leaving just when all the hard work of learning each other's language was over. Just when we all knew what each other meant by word a), then I was leaving and they would have to teach someone else what they all meant by word a).

The more I think about it the more I realise that this is true. I am in a situation in the moment, where I am starting to really notice the danger that is inherent in the fact that none of us know each other, none of us know what the other person means when he says "brand campaign". Some think it means "range campaign", others think it means "big mood film" and others think it means "internal communication".

Without working together for a while, we won't be able to clear this up - and of course this being an ad agency, we won't be working together for a while. So hey ho - it's off to complete confusion we go!

Nothing new under the sun

Are there really any new planning tools? I doubt it, because it's always the same problems.

Maybe it is just the usual or unusual optimism that lets people believe there can be radically new ways of approaching old problems. I know I don't feel often that way, but sometimes I am disappointed by my own lack of vision.

Boys and Toys

The Lost Toy
Originally uploaded by idoru45

It seems to be something pretty universal. At least I have seen it in Germany, US and the UK. Refuse collection trucks (or as we Brits say Bin vans) with toys fixed to the front of the grille or stuck in the window. I saw one again this morning and found it both sad and inspiring at the same time.

Do the bin men find these toys and refuse to throw them away, instead giving them a new lease of life, presenting them in the truck. Does it make them think about their truck differently? Do the toys do the same for them that they do for children - give them a sense of belonging and something that is just theirs. Or is it just something that bin men do? Part of the code of being a bin man.

I would love to know.

PS: Still haven't got into the habit of carrying my camera round with me, since I got a blackberry that doesn't have a camera. So couldn't take a pic.

What social networking does to us

I found this on Post Secret (which I am sure you all know about). I am sure there are thousands of thousands of people doing just this. That is what being permanently virtually on show does to us. It's nothing new but this is definitely a whole new dimension.