Snowflakes in München

Dancing snowflakes in front of my window. Behind me a bar, nicely buzzing with low voices. My run-away place. The appartement I am living in is as empty as it is cold. I long for some rest...a comfortable environment, sofas, pictures on the wall. But you don´t complain, when you are a guest, you rather go and buy some posters for the walls.
Or you think of a better plan:
The Pinakothek is right around the corner, and isn´t art created to make people happy? To show a different approach to life? Something out of the normal, something exiting! That´s what art is for, so let´s make it real.
I went in, carefully, limping a little bit because of my sprained ankle. Looking around I immediately noticed the big, tall guy right in the first room after the entrance hall. He would be my complice, I decided. So I approached him carefully, looking left and right and up if nobody was watching. No, they were pretty busy with guarding the art, imprisoning it. "Art is meant to be free!" I whispered, when walking past him. A small turn around and a smile and I was again contemplating the piece in front of me. A Klee, if I remember correctly. But the one I wanted was by Max Ernst, Totem and Taboo. It fit the bigger plan. Mr. Big began to move slowly. He shifted his weight off his right leg, it crackled some as he pulled it out of the anchorage. "Not too many people know that." he answered. His voice was as thin as the air on a 8000 mountain, barely hearable. If I had not called him before I would have thought is was the air condition. "Will you help me?" I asked and looked straight into his steely eyes. They began to twinkle and shine, a shiver ran over his wrinkled body. "Young lady, how will I not help you? If you just called on my vocation!" "So let´s bring life to this deathbed!" I clapped my hand on his rough shoulder.
His twisted body straightened visibly and I began to scream, scream as lound as I could and as my lungs would hold. "He moved, he moved!" I screamed and the guard came running from the next room to see what the hack was going on there and who dared to disturb the deathlike silence of the place. I was pale as a blanket, my finger trembled as I pointed onto the statue: "He moved!" Now that was abviously too much for the guard, he had no training in what to do with customers who go mental. First he just stared at me and when he saw me grin he cracked up laughing. He was quite young, had a sharp face and was most probably totally bored by his job. Yes! Perfect person! And this was the best reaction possible, since with every more vibration of life in here Mr. Big would become stronger. His job was to take the picture while mine consisted in keeping up the illusion. I don´t know which one was more difficult. I am quite used to walking and grabbing things with my hands, he probably did it for the first time. He was an expert in letting people see what they want to see while gently twisting their thoughts into a certain direction. But if this was going to work out we had to enter unknown territory, both of us. You can´t preach one thing and do the other. If our plan was to work out, it had to be carried out in its own way. Totally.
So here I was, trying to gently twist the thoughts of the nice, young guard into one direction, away from the moving statue. I had never done this before, but I also had never been in a situation where I needed to steal a picture. Being right there in the moment things come to you when you need them and either you fail or you succeed.
My eyes were fixed, but relaxed, as I talked to him. I let him see right into my mind, at least until the big screen that I had placed there for him. Like in a movie where the projector shows the episodes that were previously recorded. I had recorded a lot in my life, so the only thing to do was to pick the right topic. Fairly easy with this guy. He loved travelling, you could tell from casting just one look. So I talked about the world and its wonders, high mountains and deep seas and kept my eyes straight in his ones. Don´t let go! I smiled and he smiled back. Strike! Behind his back I could see Mr. Big struggling with his uncoordinated limbs, shambling towards the desired object.
A question pulled me out of my trance. What I liked best in my life? (How had we come to this topic?) But let´s go along. In this phase the most important thing was not to disturb the natural flow. "You" I said honestly. It was true. In this moment he was all there was space for in my mind, so he was all I could think about and all I could possibly like. It was quite a risky answer to give, since the band between the eyes was all there was that hold him onto me right now. He laughed. Surprised, a bit uncomfortable. Don´t turn around! I laughed, too, just to loosen up the situation. But my eyes stayed fixed.
I took a step back and he followed. Now I knew I had half won. Mr. Big was moving his clumsy hands near the picture. Totem and Taboo...
We stood closer than before. The next step! Please don´t leave me now, my totem, tell me what to do!
"Why me?" he followed up. Thank you! Now it was easy to continue. I examined him, enough to find out the strong and weak spots and the ones that were open to be talked about. The air was filled with life and Mr. Big kept moving. "Because you are a very human person." "Oh, and what makes me so human? Now I´m curious!" Small challenge there! (Did I say I had no idea how to do this? True, but there was always help in the crucial moments.) Compliments about his attitude, his way of talking, listening and just in general his open personality. "Thanks" he said.
Mr. Big was done. He had taken the Totem and Taboo out of its frame and hung it over his head. This way it looked just like an old rag, poor picture. But it would have to take this humiliation just for a very short time.
"I got to go now. Wanna have some coffee together, later?" His answer made Mr. Big freeze onto his original post again. Not without giving me a last most happy, proud and whimsical twinkle. He had put the cloth in the notch that resembled his pocket. A last hug and I was gone. Totem and Taboo will be the first piece in an empty room that is ready to be decorated.

Europe project, here we come!

9 people. Cracking nuts. Running against walls. Finding doors, here and there. Climbing over self-created obsacles, but they are obstackles nevertheless. You never know why they are there. Sometimes they make you go into another direction, where you then find a nice vally to enjoy. You can build a camp there, to stay for some time. But soon you will break the tents down again and be back in the djungle.
It all started when the other group decided to go to Thailand. You know, sun, beach, laughter, happy faces...pollution...connections, learning, local people. Broaden your horizon. Social innovation! That would be the string that still connects us. We would be here. But there are more worlds than just the geographical one and both our groups would be together in the world of social innovation.

How do you discover a world? How do you set off, loose sight of the shore and discover something completely new? Without knowing where you go? We were hanging in a calm for quite some time, loosing energy, running in circles. We were stuck on trying to figure out where to search for our new world geographically, could it be Eastern Europe? Oh no, some people were severely against that. Berlin? Maybe. Barcelona? Nice shot, but did it have enough potential? Marocco. Ruled out quickly for financial reasons.
How do you discover a world when you don´t have any money? How do you still create an impact in the new area that you are approaching? That we were quite sure about: we wanted to leave a footprint. And not one that vanishes when the air blows over it, but one that really lasts.
Leave a footprint somewhere where you don´t even know how the ground looks like that can embrace the footprint...that´s a hard one.
But taking steps leaves footprints. So here we go.
And somehow, eventually, this new world also reaches out to you. Giving you new ideas and inspiration but also feeding you with its essential nutricious fruits. We came across such a fruit when we finally had the idea of going in two Vans into two directions, one east, one south, further exploring what we had just been stumbling across right there, when having this idea: What the f**k is social innovation? We are right in it. We don´t see it, but we are living it. So let´s make it visible not only to us, but to everybody! Why were movies invented anyways?!
Wading in muddy territories, insecure grounds, robbing forward we had finally reached that island. Wow! Sun is shining again! Blue skies, with rockets shooting through it, like bubbles in a glass of champaign. A firework of new ideas! Maybe we will take people with us along the road! Or we will connect to the underground scenes! Or we will do stand up theater! Or we will just ask people on the street! Or we will open up a dialogue between East and West! Or, or, or. Why should it be "or"? Can´t it be "and"? But where is the focus then?
Damn, we are back in the mud. But now we have a history, we already left footprints. How does the water look like that is slowly gathering in them, condensing into the essence of our quest? Maybe it is not cristal clear. But it is water, the essence of life! What springs to the eye when watching it is its authenticity. It is real.
This is what we are: we are real. Authentic. So let´s bring it on again! Let´s see how we explore, discover and create at the same time something that is like a raw diamond, hidden deep down in the earth, ready to be grinded by us, to reveal its ultimate beauty. How will it look like? Nobody knows, but everybody believes that it will shine. Beautifully. Magnificently! Wow, I wanna see it already!

About

Once upon a time there was an old garden. It was very dark and moist, making you look over your shoulder constantly, but feeling intrigued by the smell of adventure. Being in there you could only see until the next tree, densly wrapped in lianes, emitting sweet smells. Strange sounds were all over the place, making you set your feet very carefully: what would you find behind that next gate of twigs? The question was never: how do I get out? the question was: how do I go in. Since living in this garden made you come across yourself eventually.