Moving house/Radio silence

My apologies for the blog silence this past week. We moved house on the weekend, didn't get internet until early this week and I have been preoccupied with unpacking boxes and building furniture to get on my computer in the evening. But things are settling down and I'm back into it.

It's exciting to be in a new place in a part of DC I haven't explored much: LeDroit Park, near the NW/NE border. LeDroit Park was originally a whites-only neighbourhood in the late 19th Century but is now a primarily black neighbourhood, although it is, as they say, "up-and-coming", by which they mean more white professionals are moving in. Like us.

It's fun discovering this new (for us) part of town, it has a different vibe from Mt Pleasant, the suburb we lived in (and loved) for the past year. We're within walking distance of the 9:30 Club, DC's premier live music venue, and not too far from U St, a strip of cafe's, restaurants, bars and shops.

Our living situation has changed also, K and I have moved in with a couple of friends. I will miss living just the two of us but it's also cool to be back in a share house, which was always our set-up back in Sydney. This has allowed us to drop our rent while upgrading our facilities. The new house has a huuuge kitchen, massive common room with two fireplaces and our room has a fireplace and ensuite jacuzzi. Pretty nice.

We do have to deal with a pretty relentless amount of traffic noise and very bright street lights outside our big bay windows, which for the first couple of nights, before we got curtains set up, kept us awake and then woke us up early, but we'll inevitably get used to it.

Whereas before we used to like to say we were neighbours of Barack Obama, as we lived just off 16th st, which runs down to the White House, now we live just off North Capital St, which runs directly to the Capital Building, so we still have that visual reminder that we live in the heart of the empire.

Young social pioneers

On Wednesday night I attended the YouthActionNet Awards nights at the gorgeous Finnish embassy. YouthActionNet is an awards program run by the International Youth Foundation which recognizes young social change leaders from across the world. To enter you must be the founder of an organization or initiative aged between 18-29. Meeting and hearing the stories of these emerging social entrepreneurs was uplifting and inspiring. They are tackling some of the hardest problems in the world; creating a culture of non-violence, moving a community towards sustainability, providing quality education to slum communities. It's impossible not to feel more hopeful when hearing of their commitment to addressing these issues and feeling the heart that goes into their efforts.

Despite this I had mixed emotions as I watched the ceremony and the preceding panel discussion. Two years ago that had been me up on the panel, speaking with passion about the work of Vibewire, the organization I founded. Even though at that stage, in November 2007, I already had a departure date set and a succession plan in motion, I remember the intensity of my feeling of commitment to both the organization and our cause, the sense of deep personal connection born of seven years hard work to get to that point.

A year later I was back at the ceremony having just moved to Washington and started work at Ashoka. Life was a wonderful blur. I had been through the desperately-difficult process of leaving Vibewire, had travelled for several months, landed in America, got a job, got married, attended Burning Man and finally settled in DC. So: exciting.

Now a year later I'm just another mid-career mid-level staffer at a big NGO. Don't get me wrong, I love my work and find it challenging and fulfilling, and I'm inspired by our mission. But it's obviously different. It's what I need and where I want to be right now, but I do sometimes miss the unique sense of destiny you get when you're running your own show, convinced of your own power to change the world, and the community you feel when you spend time with other people on a similiar journey.

Thinking about this reminded me that my friend and fellow YouthActionNet alumni Anna Rose filmed me speaking at the 2007 Awards night so at the risk of self-indulgence I'm going to post it here:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKfVPnxNOo4]

Look how young I was!

Read more about this year's YouthActionNet Fellows here. It's also very cool to see the first group selected as "Young Social Pioneers" by the Foundation for Young Australians, a national version of the YouthActionNet program.

Ghosts and goblins and dress-ups

This weekend I experienced my second Halloween, or my third if you count accompanying my host-sisters as they went trick-or-treating when I was on exchange in Spokane, Washington, when I was 16. And,  indeed, until moving here last year that was what I thought Halloween was: kids systematically hitting strangers up for candy, in violation of the rule we're all taught when we're young.

But it turns out it's much, much more than that. In fact, it's possibly the biggest party night of the year, up there with New Years Eve. And it's certainly not just kids - big kids of all ages get dressed up and boogie down. You see superheros and fairies and Spartans and ninja's and computers walking down the street, or rocking out on the dance floor at every bar in town. An entire country attending one big costume party.

Now admitedly my perspective might be skewered here by the fact that the two Halloweens I've been here have fallen on Friday and Saturday. If I'm here in a year or two I'll be able to see how much of the manic energy carried into Sunday and Monday nights, or transfers to the nearest weekend night. But there's something adorable and exciting about so many adults dressing up; it creates a sense of fun and play which is very immersive.

The Burning Man community figured this out a long time ago of course, so I find myself dressing thematically on an unusually-common basis currently. The weekend was a kaleidoscopic blur of people, colour, music and movement, filled with smiling faces and, of course, a spectacular variety of outfits. It was, as they say, a good time, with an energy in the air way beyond an average weekend, a sense of performative abandon which is perhaps only possible when you are wearing a costume.

You can see photos from TechArts: A Spooky Union, the party we attended on Saturday night, here.

It's a small world after all.

Sometimes the world seems so large it's overwhelming, but othertimes it's charmingly small. Tonight I ran into two friends from Australia in the same Malaysian restaurant I've never been to before. In fact we weren't even planning to go to it, but another nearby Malaysian place was closed so we thought we'd check it out. And they weren't even there together, they don't know each other. We ran into the first on our way in, then the second came rushing over to us as soon as we sat down. I think this might be the least-likely thing that has ever happened to me, I can't even imagine what the odds of such a thing happening would be. In true DC style they were both here for conferences.

Home(s)

Kate and I have just got back from a week spent back in Sydney visiting family and friends. It was our first visit home since we left in April last year and was every bit as wonderful and as rushed as you would imagine. One week to see so many people we care so much about was nowhere near enough, and there's people I badly regret missing. But, in general, those we saw where those we most needed to see, our closest friends we used to see on the most regular basis and, of course, our families.

Flying back into Sydney was stunning. I've been to quite a few cities but I've never seen one as blindingly physically beautiful as Sydney is. It was heart-stirring to see the sunlight glinting off a harbour dotted with small sail boats and ferries, eucalyptus trees greening the suburbs on its banks. Given Sydney had only just emerged from winter the weather was brilliant – sunny and warm but not too hot. Few cities can compare to this.

But even more heart-stirring was seeing our friends again. As wonderful as the people we've met in Washington DC are there's nothing like being back with old friends, a coherent crew of people who know and love us, and who uplift and fulfill us. Such friends make life fantastic, and we miss them all enormously. We truly felt we were home.

Flying back into DC was an amazing feeling too though, as I realized that DC is also home for now, that we have people we miss here and who miss us, and that I was looking very forward to getting back to our house, our neighbourhood, our friends and my work. I think it's only in leaving then returning to a place that you realize what it means to you. It's good to be home.

One year later

Two days ago it was my first wedding anniversary. I still get amazed at this fact, that I'm married, just as after almost a year I still get amazed that I'm here, in Washington. Amazement is the right emotion I think, an accurate assessment of the import of these things, a refusal to allow them to come to feel commonplace or ordinary I'm sure a lot of people say this but, truly, I never thought I'd get married. It wasn't part of my plans or my world-view, my self-image or my values; I've never understood why anyone felt the need for a certificate from the government to validate the relationship they have. And then we needed to secure a visa for my partner once I had been offered a job in America and all of a sudden it mattered to us very much that we had that government certificate. Without it we were just good friends as far as visa's and such things were concerned.

Let me be clear: this isn't just a marriage of convenience. Kate and I had lived together for almost four years in Australia and traveled together for six months before settling in America. We were already planning to spend our lives together. But marriage? Not part of the plan.

However a year later I'm swept away all over again remembering how breathtaking the moment was, saying our vows in front of Yolanda, the country clerk in Upper Marlboro Maryland, only my parents and sister in the audience, how I looked into Kate's eyes and felt something deeper and more powerful than anything I had experienced. One year later I'm still wondering what this whole marriage thing is all about, but I couldn't be happier to have made this commitment to Kate (and, honestly, I couldn't be happier with how it all happened, with so little stress or fuss). A year later I'm still overwhelmed at how much we've grown, and how much we are still growing.

We know ourselves through our interactions with others. This is the essence of our humanity. Many years ago I saw the then former and now again Costa Rican President Oscar Arias speak to a youth leadership conference in Mexico. He said to us: “a human alone is a contradiction.” In other words it is only through others that we become fully human, that we express and realize our potential.

I have always felt this and drawn my strength and confidence from those around me. But the strength and confidence I draw from Kate, the support and companionship she gives me, goes beyond what I can express. From my family, friends, acquaintances and colleagues I learn of humanity; from how others see me I learn of myself; from Kate's love I learn how to be my best self, so that I might be worthy of it.

It is a precious gift and often seems wondrous to me that in this huge world here we are, keeping each other company, challenging and cherishing each other on this epic adventure. It's not always easy, and it wouldn't be worth as much if it was, but our partnership continues to evolve as we evolve, allowing us to change, experiment and grow rather than to cling in place, stagnate or drift away.

I think this would all be happening anyway, regardless of the surprise marriage, that this is all fundamental to our relationship and who we are. Marriage cannot overcome the absence of qualities that sustain and support a true partnership (and I think many marriages are in fact an attempt to overcome these gaps, when they're not simply a blind allegiance to tradition) but with these qualities in place and values that support our individual growth and our partnership, marriage seems to have clicked something into place even more firmly for us. We knew we were in this for life before, but now we really know it.

This sense of scale helps us keep things in perspective and worry less about the small stuff. We know we'll be here for a long time and we'll continue to work at getting it right. Getting it wrong is just another chance to figure it out, to do it better next time. And better we continue to get.

The past 15 months have been the most exciting, adventurous, empowering and fulfilling of my life. As we've moved through ten countries, rebuilt our lives in a new city, met hundreds of new people and made some incredible new friends, deal with challenges and opportunities at work and questions about our career paths, our relationship has grown into a rock upon which we can build, which provides us with the foundation from which to launch new adventures. As we left everything else behind it become more and more apparent what we had taken with us, that wherever the other person is is home.

“We tell ourselves stories in order to live.” Kate has turned my story into a love story. And just between you and me I've actually always been a little bit of a sucker for a good love story, provided it also has enough adventure and comedy mixed in. So far so good.

Time in the forest

I spent last weekend at Orb Festival in upstate New York. It's the largest pystrance festival on the East Coast, headlined this year by Hallucinogen, Shpongle, Rinkadink, Logic Bomb and many more top international artists. It was a lot of fun, camping festivals really are one of my favorite things to do.

But it wasn't the music or the people, great as it and they were, that made me most happy about being there; it was the forest.

Orb was my fifth multi-day camping festival since arriving in the States late last August, but my first set in a truly wooded setting. It was glorious: haphazard trees interspersed with ferns spread thickly across a hillside leading down to a lake, in which sat a flower- and moss-covered island, a single sapling rising from the middle. In a word: pretty.

There's nothing like being out in the bush to relax your mind and recharge your emotional and physical batteries. Back in Sydney we used to aim to get out of the city at least once a month. If I go too long without escaping the concrete jungle for trees and scrub I get worn down and frustrated. I had forgotten this and have, somehow, gone ten months since really getting away from civilization. I suspect that this lack of contact with nature is not uncommon for city dwellers, which is to say most of us. And I don't think it's good for us. I know it's not good for me.

Human civilization creates the illusion of order, filled with straight lines and moving machines. But underneath all that is chaos, fueled by the bewildering and often-bizarre actions and desires of humankind. The forest, meanwhile, is chaotic on the surface, the unique contortions of trees and folds in the landscape. But underneath the chaos is order, a world produced by laws which are complex and yet somehow simple, embedded deep in our unconscious. When you allow yourself to feel it the forest can feel, on a very primal level, like home.

I think much of our societies unsustainable lifestyle can be connected to a lack of contact with nature. People grow up completely disconnected from where their food, clothes and goods come from and where their waste goes to. They feel the effect of climate change as unseasonal weather, but usually do not see the real impact on watersheds and landscapes, like the cracked and blasted creek beds we so often see in Australia. It is spending solid time in nature, going to sleep in your little tent and waking up to the sounds of birds and rain on the fly, that reminds you that we are a part of this life force, that we come from the forest and rely on it still for so much.

Part of the relaxation of being out of the city is unhooking from screens. I'm away from my computer, I switch off my phone, I settle into a very different pace; slower, more measured, more aware of my surroundings. As someone who lives online I luxuriate in the peace and quiet of days away from email, text messages and phone calls, spent in good conversations, exploring, being in my body. If you're doing hard, emotionally-draining work, like organizing, advocacy and social entrepreneurship, finding time to get away can feel impossible, but it's critical to your sustainability and effectiveness. It allows you to step back and reflect on what's working and what needs to be changed. It allows your mind to meander down new mental paths, unlocking creativity and insight. It reconnects you to your humanity, and the slow pace of the sun moving across the sky. Unhooking from the constant pulse of digitized information and conversation helps you to understand it while the resulting time to think and consider helps you to understand yourself.

We are hoping to get back to the same location for Desiderata Festival in August, but I don't want to wait that long to get back out into nature again, it's too important to me, too affirming and re-energizing. And, frankly, too much fun.

Here (we go)

At a bloggers panel at a conference recently one of the guests, when asked for his number 1 piece of advice for new bloggers said: stay focused. Pick a topic you know about and stick to it. This is good advice. This won't, however, be that kind of blog.

This blog will, I suspect, meander as my attention does, covering both my interests but also my life, to the extent that I consider it worth sharing. It won't be a personal diary or anything like that, but I'll undoubtedly talk about travel, Burning Man and psytrance along with politics, (sub)cultures and social media for social change.

I've had several blogs before and none did I do a good job committing to. But as I preach the importance of blogs and blogging in my day job as Digital Marketing Strategist at international citizen-sector organization Ashoka I began to feel increasingly that I really should do a bit more of it myself. Having recently instigated a monthly conversation on twitter amongst social media for good proponents and practitioners in at least five countries the #4change organizing collective has also kicked off a new group blog which I'll be contributing to at least a couple of time a month. My goal here is to post a couple of times a week, at least initially, and see how it goes.

Context: I'm an Australian living in Washington DC. I'm progressive, and deeply committed to the democratizing potential of the internet. I am a burner and a doofer. I was married last year to the love of my life, but inspired largely by the need to secure her a visa. I love traveling, music and people. I'm happy to mix work and play here as I believe we're all best served by being our whole selves the whole time rather than segmenting our lives into arms-length parts.

Image created at Wordle.net.