Hello blog. It’s been a while since I was last here; four years to be precise. I’ll be honest with you, after Brexit and Trump happened I needed some space. My liberal leanings were challenged, and with so much rage and vitriol around, I didn’t see the point of being one more voice shouting into the toxic void known as the internet. Four years later, my toxic shock is over.

Nobody reads blogs anymore. Facebook dealt a body blow to online journaling and the rest of social media swept it away in a tsunami of bite-sized bullshit anyone could read and share in seconds.

Our collective attention span was reduced to the length of a tweet. People stopped reading the news and instead read only the headlines. We shared for ‘likes’ and loved the affirmation those hearts and thumbs-up gave us.

When Edward Snowden told us we were being spied on, and Cambridge Analytica was revealed to be manipulating all of us, the world didn’t rise up and demand accountability. Instead, we raised little more than a collective eyebrow, then went back to thumbing through memes and Instagram posts from ‘influencers’ who exist in color-saturated worlds we browse with a hint of envy and maybe a side order of disdain.

So when Donald Trump became the President-elect in 2016, it didn’t come as a surprise to me. Just months earlier, amid a storm of misinformation, lies, and manipulation, the United Kingdom had ripped itself away from its nearest neighbors in an isolationist divorce they called ‘Brexit.’

The term ‘Brexit’ shortened the complexity of the choice voters had and gave it a clickable brand. You were either for or against ‘Brexit’ and it didn’t need to be any more complicated than that. People defined in their own minds what that word meant, irrespective of what the truth was.

Across the Atlantic, Americans had ‘MAGA’ and their red hat revolution that liberals thought could never happen. A ‘pussy-grabbing’ reality TV President was an absurd notion, impossible they thought.

Even Trump didn’t believe he would win, shouting from his campaign pulpit about how the election was rigged and victory would surely be stolen from him by an establishment of unrelatable elites, journalists, and experts.

The sweet joy of ‘owning the libs’ and the idea of building a wall to keep everyone you hate from crossing your path was a delicious idea that ignited citizens who had long felt like nobody in power was listening to them.

Complicated conversations were reduced to a word or a slogan that you could declare or decry then quickly thumb to the next meme or morsel of fast news served in the palm of your hand.

It seemed to me that nobody was listening anymore. Everyone had an opinion, and many were shouting it while others slung bar brawl punches that landed like a messy end to a good night out.

We awoke the next day with digital hangovers, our heads pounding while outside normality was ablaze. Networks created to connect us had done the opposite. Truth and the opportunity to pause for thought had been drowned in an epic flood of fear and fury.

So on that cold November morning in 2016, what was I to write that hadn’t already been written? What point was there to write anything when everything had been reduced to slogans and portamentos?

I felt lost and deflated. How had it got to the point where we knew more about what the people around us hated than what they loved?

As 2016 came to an end I wrote the final post on my 366 Pictures blog. It was a glorious summer day in Melbourne, Australia, far from the Brexiteers and the red hat revolutionaries. I didn’t think it would be four years until I would publish another word.

I thought of writing, even if it were just something to say I’m still here, still loving life and seeing the world. But nobody reads blogs anymore. If you’ve made it this far then we’re probably friends, and if we’re not we probably should be.

Blogging as a form of communication is dead, and that’s why I haven’t written anything for four years. If you and I are friends then we’ve been in touch, haven’t we? And if not, then let’s fix that.

Let’s fix that because in this world of instant communication, communication itself is broken.

So maybe rather than watching another documentary telling us that, or posting something on social media lambasting this truth, we can take back a little control by reaching out to one another to start talking and maybe, more importantly, start listening.

As for my long-forgotten blog, dated and derelict as it is, perhaps I’ll return to writing here. Not because anyone is reading, but because writing itself takes time.

To sit and craft one sentence after another requires thought, meditation in a way. We consume so much, maybe taking the time to create something as simple as a sentence can slow our rush to judgment?

I’ll write like the child who waves at passing airplanes knowing that the passengers won’t see them. They don’t need to see. I’m not waving for them, I’m waving for me.

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Illustrations by Edel Rodriguez and Lennart Gäbel

Tomorrow could be a big day for Canada. If Führer Donald Trump wins the Presidency in tomorrow’s US election untold numbers of U.S. citizens will have to make good on their promises to pack up and move north of the border. Fortunately for them, Justin Trudeau has not announced any plans to build a wall on the southern border of his country… and make the Americans pay for it.

The final episode of the long running reality TV show called the U.S. Presidential Election will play out tomorrow across the United States and the world. Most of us non-Americans are hoping that it will be the end of the absurdity that the U.S. has inflicted upon us, but in truth I suspect it might merely be a transition into a new season of ridiculousness.

My hope is that the Reality TV twerp, Donald Trump, will not emerge the victor, and that once beaten, he will graciously step aside and allow the only marginally less acrid character of Hilary Clinton to begin her term as the next President of the United States of America.

Trump supporters will, of course, cry foul. They’ve been trained to rattle on about voter fraud and election rigging, and facts to the contrary will only strengthen their resolve about the so-called ‘liberal media’ being part of a grand scheme.

I’ll agree with Trump on one point; The political system is a mess. But he’s not part of the solution. In fact, he’s actually a product of the problem. Trump was born into wealth and as such he is part of an elite section of society that enjoy the spoils of a growing state of inequality that is beginning to look reminiscent of pre-revolutionary France.

In his 2014 TED talk, billionaire Nick Hanauer warns his fellow plutocrats that “the pitchforks are coming.” Though there seems little evidence that anyone of them are paying attention.

Efforts to “Make America Great Again” will require more than just a tag-line and a ring master who can whip-up a crowd like a travelling faith healer. But then again, “Hope and Change” haven’t exactly worked wonders either.

The word we hear a lot these days is “broken,” and after months of unavoidable political mud-wrestling thrust upon us, few would disagree that the system is indeed dysfunctional to say the least. The pity is that despite the rallies, the promises and the slogans, tomorrow won’t fix anything.

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Don’t forget to check out 366pictures.com where I am blogging every single day through 2016. Check out a new picture and story each day, sign-up to get the pictures and stories delivered by email, and see them on facebook too!

I’m no longer a European! After the “Brexit” referendum, Great Britain has somehow managed to make itself into more of an island and less “Great” than ever… if you ask me.

I haven’t blogged on here because I am blogging every day this year over at 366 Pictures. However, I wanted to return here just to express my shock and disappointment that the UK has decided, by a small majority, to divorce itself from Europe.

The vote seems to have been carried by the “grey-heads” and people who seem to rattle on endlessly about immigration for reasons that I have yet to understand.

It wasn’t all down to the oldies though. One of my friends said that he was “delighted” with the result of the referendum because he wants to see an end to the “uncontrolled exodus from Eastern Europe” to the shores of Britain. Ironically though in the past he lived in another European country for a while, and he says he wants to do so again. I wonder, would he classify himself as an “immigrant” in that case or an “ex-pat?”

While I am sure that many people have sound reasons for wanting to exit the EU, I can’t help but think that many of those who voted in favor of the divorce, did so out of thinly-veiled racism.

How did immigration become such a talking point in this referendum when it seems that the issue isn’t actually one that any clear position has been stated by any of the powers that be? And what do those who want to see an end to the “tidal wave of immigrants” think is going to happen? Do they think that people from EU countries who are living in the UK will be summarily rounded up and sent back to Europe?

I am very concerned that the word immigration now seems to be an incendiary word capable of bringing out the ugly side of so many people who disguise hateful racist fears under a flag of national pride.

U.S. Presidential hopeful, Donald Trump, has endorsed the exit vote in what I think is a chilling preview of what might be to come in the coming election in the United States. Trump unashamedly whips up fear and racism with comments that it seems only excite his supporters. His tactic of using controversial claims and outright falsehoods has put him in a head to head fight for the White House, with facts playing second fiddle to fiction.

The so-called “Brexit” (and I REALLY hate that term) referendum seemed rife with the same problems. Facts and figures were set aside for fear-mongering and misinformation served with a familiar dose of racism dressed up as “national pride.”

So now I am no longer a European, despite what my passport says on the cover. I’m not sure what effect this will have on my life, though as someone who lives overseas, I can tell you that today I am not happy with the British Pounds I have in the my UK bank and now worth significantly less as I spend them. Other effects will take longer to see and experience, I suppose we’ll have to wait and see what happens. Time will tell if it was a mistake or not.

I tend to think that this referendum was won by selling a soup of fear and misinformation to the public and getting them to vote on a single issue, rather than truly understanding the wider question. Maybe that’s just the game of modern politics, in which case, I think our friends across the Atlantic might want to ready themselves for President Trump!

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I’m blogging over at 366 Pictures this year – though I am really behind with that right now. I will catch up though, so please check it out, even if you voted for Brexit, I’ll still love you over there :-)

Back in 2012 I embarked on what I thought was a minor photography project of publishing one picture taken that day. 366 Pictures turned out to be anything but a minor project, and perhaps against my better judgement, I’ve decided to do it again next year, which of course starts tomorrow!

This is a very last minute decision, and hopefully one that I won’t regret! At times doing 366 pictures was exhausting. My travel itinerary that year was grueling. I travelled to 20 countries around the world, with the hardest stretch being 10 countries in 100 days, spending ten days in each country.

Along the way I had a few disasters, the worst of which was losing my passport in Japan, or so I thought. I actually found it in a hidden pocket in my luggage at the end of the project as I packed my case in New Zealand to return to Australia. (Seriously, I really did look hard for it! Losing it changed the entire itinerary!) But all of those minor catastrophes were eclipsed by the experience of really being engaged with every single day of that year.

So, I’ve decided to do it again! Just as in 2012, I have no real idea of what the itinerary is. It’s going to follow a rough plan, but where I’ll go, and what I’ll do, that’s unknown.

I’m going to hurriedly try and review the current site over the next few days, and I’ll probably archive it to make way for the new material. Like I say, this is all very last minute so give me a few days to get up to speed on this.

I really hope you’ll come along for the ride. I’ll do my best to try and have a little more social media interaction on the site too. Head over to 366pictures.com and start following me there.

I will also be launching the first season of 5 Minutes of Somewhere in 2016 too. Probably February, but we’ll have to see how that goes.

I hope 2016 will be another amazing year, and I hope it will also be amazing for you too.

Happy New Year everyone!

And a Happy New Year too! :-)

It’s Christmas time again, and while for the last few years that has usually meant hot summer days for me in Australia or New Zealand, this year I am spending Christmas in Paris. So with the season in mind, I decided to take a look at a few alternatives ideas and innovations on our beloved Christmas tree, surely the essential component in any Christmas decorations.

Back when I used to live in the UK I had a Christmas tree that stood at about about knee height. It came pre-decorated and just needed to be taken out of the box and plugged in. It was quick and simple and required no effort or imagination. Perfect for me because while I love Christmas, I’m not a big fan of time consuming decorating.

When I was a kid, before my sister fiercely took over decorating the Christmas tree as a task only she was allowed to perform, my Mom and Dad used to do the honors. The house would fill with the smell of the pine needles that would herald the beginning of another holiday season.

Dad would decorate the rest of the house while we were upstairs in bed, and thats when I would learn all those wonderfully fizzy swear words that I’d hear him saying as the paper lanterns he carefully pinned to the ceiling would fall down one by one.

I’m glad we had a real tree. I like the trendy and imaginative alternatives, but a tree made of books, bottles, or palm tree leaves doesn’t have the same aroma as those giant trees I used to sit by as I tried to guess the contents of the presents beneath its needles branches.

Of course, there are many alternative ways to create a Christmas tree. Just the other day I saw a giant tree made entirely of disney character soft toys. As much as I like a real Christmas tree, I also like alternative Christmas trees that show a flare of imagination.

Weirdly enough, Christmas always seems to be a time when good taste can be briefly put aside. People take pride in doing terrible things to the outside of their homes with fairy lights and displays of electrical nonsense that would be almost unforgivable at any other time of the year. But what about the taste violations taking place inside homes across the land?

A friend of mine once proudly displayed a large pink and glittering Christmas tree that twinkled like the sparkles on drag-queens make-up. But even that cannot compete with the terrible rainbow Christmas tree that has surely caused as many gasps of horror as it has delight.

In my own apartment I tended to go for a more low budget approach to Christmas trees. But low budget doesn’t mean low imagination as these budget Christmas trees show us.

Then again, some people are just lazy!

However, there is always that showy person in your neighborhood who has to create something so absolutely ostentatious that people come from miles around to see it. Like this example of the most over the top Christmas tree I have ever seen, and it’s right here in Paris.

I mean come on, did it really need the search lights on the top?