This is a bit different in some ways from what I usually talk about. However, at the same time it's exactly what I'm on about. I was watching a documentary on Twisted Sister the other night. For those of you who don't know who they are, they're a 70-80s glam rock band that took stage performance to the next level. Google them and watch some of their film clips. My two favourite songs are We’re not Gonna take it! And I Wanna Rock! There pretty cool film clips, especially if you don't like classrooms and psycho teachers!
Anyway, even though they’re not one of my favourite bands, they have such a fascinating history of adversity and rising to the challenges that were constantly thrown up in front of them. It shows how such drive and determination paid off, despite what seemed to be a world conspiring against them at every turn. From the start, they were weird! A bunch of glam rockers dressed up in outrageous costumes and performing on the fringe of the rock scene. Unlike many performers today who think the only way to get their big break is through a contest, they played the pub scene in New York State. Despite everyone having rough and quiet beginnings, not knowing if anyone were going to show up to their performance, they quickly found a following of dedicated fans who followed them from venue to venue for each of their shows. They became so popular in the live rock scene, they were selling out shows wherever they went. However, they could land a record deal. If they'd started today they could've recorded their own songs and have them playing on YouTube and ITunes within days. However, the world was a very different place in the 70s & 80s and getting heard by anyone in the music industry was tough. But they continued to play and do what they loved to do. They got their big break where they were going to perform at the Palladium theatre. The show sold out in record time, but one of the band members collapsed and the performance had to be postponed. Instead of record executives who were originally booked in to see the big show, they got secretaries and assistants showing up the next time around. As a result, no record deal was struck. This went on and on. Then they finally managed to sign a deal, but the executive died of a heart attack on the way home. So that fell through. Then they signed a deal in the U.K. But the record company went bust and back home they were black listed by Atlantic Records who threatened to fire anyone who tried to sign them. By this point most people would've given up. Generation Y certainly would have, but not Twisted Sister. They kept going and going and trying to find new ways of opening doors every time one slammed shut in their face. At one point they drove 56 hours across America to play a 29min show! Now that's determination! This endless struggle would’ve destroyed most people and they probably would've given up and begun resentfully making coffee somewhere and claiming they could've been big, but the universe stopped them. Well Twisted Sister grabbed the universe and bent it to its will! Their big break finally came in England when they were doing a live show and did such an epic performance, they got the attention of a British Atlantic Records executive who signed them up for a record deal! Much to the disgust, it would appear of the head of Atlantic Records US, who had blocked an album deal for so long, obviously realising there was money to be made from this deal, he finally capitulated and with this deal their album went platinum! This shows how being tenacious and persistent can pay off. If you truly believe in something, even when the odds are not only stacked against you, but people are actively working against you, if you stick to your guns and keep working towards your goal, you can achieve anything. If it doesn't work to start with, or if doors keep closing, instead of giving up in five minutes and blaming the world for stopping you, keep working on it. Keep knocking on doors. Keep coming back. Keep fighting to do what you love and despite the odds against you, if you stick with it, you can achieve some amazing things. To get the full understanding of the roller coaster ride they had, watch the documentary We Are Twisted Sister. It really is an eye-opening journey of how what seemed a hopeless pursuit, ended in a platinum record deal and one of the greatest live performance rock acts in history.
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I’ve always wanted to go to Vienna, attracted by the music, the architecture, the history and of course the gigantic pretzels. Recently, I had that chance and took a slow train from Zürich to Vienna. The almost 8 hour ride in itself was an interesting one, traveling along the Swiss countryside, through the tiny country of Lichtenstein and over the snow capped Austrian alps.
Going in winter other than the cold, it was dark by 4pm, which was another thing to get used to. It would feel so late, but not even be close to dinner time. This completely messes with your desire to eat! In Vienna, I started my day with a bus ride around the city centre, just to get a bit of a handle on the layout before adventuring out into the city. What caught my attention right away was the stunning architecture and the prolific number of buildings of the same period. In many old cities, you get a few really amazing historic buildings. However, in Vienna, it’s absolutely covered in them. There’s nothing more stunning than seeing street after street of amazingly designed buildings and churches that have been well-maintained over centuries. These classic stylings are contrasted with gritty punk style graffiti plastered over the underpasses and bridges around town as well as the stunning modern high rises bathed in glass. After a lap around town, I found myself at the Opera House. Unfortunately, I didn’t have time to go to the opera, but that’s definitely on my to do list for next time around. From the Opera House, my next stop was the Schönbrunn Palace. The moment I walked through the gates, I was stunned! This was the most impressive palace I’d ever seen. The Schönbrunn Palace was built in the 17th Century and was designed by Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach and became the imperial palace for the Austrian kings who also had a successive reign as Holy Roman Emperor until the position and title was dissolved in 1806. Whilst I won’t go into all the historic details of the Holy Roman Empire and its emperors, needless to say, it was often a poison challis at odds and in conflict with the Pope and all his cronies. Such an important position however, require an important house and Schönbrunn is certainly a house suitable for an emperor. It was even nice enough for Napoleon in which to take up residence for a little bit when he was invading all of Europe. Had he stayed and not tried to invade Russia, the world might be very different today. From the later Middle Ages, right through till the beginning of WWI, Austria was a military power house and one of the strongest central powers in Europe. However, it wasn’t just the military power for which Vienna was a hub. Due to the wealth that came with empire and trade, the Austrian emperors used a significant amount of this wealth to promote the arts. Mozart was a favourite of Empress Maria Theresa who discovered his talent and helped to promote it by putting him on a retainer. However, as you can see from the architecture throughout Vienna, art, design and culture have been a vitally important part of life in the city. Inside the Palace itself, the walls, ceilings and floors are designed and painted in the most intricate and bold way. No doubt much of it was to impress guests coming to the Palace for functions, but regardless of the motives, it’s left an amazing legacy for the world. Without such patronage, countless musicians and artists would never have been able to follow their dreams. Instead they would have had to get boring awful jobs sweeping muck off the pavement, as flushing toilets had yet to be invented. Since you weren’t allowed to take photos, you just have to go there yourself to see how stunning this Palace really is. The high ceilings, the grandeur of the dining rooms and bedrooms and the sheer scale of the structure is mind blowing. However, the room in which Mozart played his first concert is quite humble in comparison. Outside the Palace, the gardens are extensive and you could spend a whole day just walking up and down the immaculately kept grounds. There’s even a zoo next door and some amazing greenhouses with exotic tropical and desert plants and wildlife. Even though the Schönbrunn is the grandest of the palaces in Vienna, it’s actually just one of many. Although quite impractical as houses these days, various other palaces have been turned into museums and galleries which house some of the most stunning artworks I’ve ever seen. The Belvedere Palace (which is closer to the centre of Vienna) has an amazing art collection, including works by Klimt and Van Gogh. No matter how I describe these works, it will never do justice to actually seeing them yourself. This is really the key point to any place which has cultural experiences different from your own. Without going there and experiencing it for yourself, you can never truly understand the history, the lives that were lived and the amazing talent that artists, designers and musicians brought to the culture of a nation that has out lasted centuries of turmoil, war and everything else that goes with the human condition. For me, I only scratched the surface of what Vienna had to offer, but if you want a truly unique and amazing experience of history, art and music, then Vienna is the place to go. It’s worth doing a bit of reading up beforehand to give you a greater picture and context of how and why Austria became such an important central power in Europe, but well worth the time as once you have this context, everything else makes far more sense. I’m always amazed at people who can speak multiple languages. I mean two is awesome, but on my recent travels around Europe, I’ve run into so many people who speak 3-7+ languages and they transition from one to another so smoothly.
As a native English speakers, we tend to be rather lazy when it comes to learning other languages and rely on the fact that someone else has learnt English wherever we go. However, as I found in Japan, the further away from Tokyo, the less likely this is and you find yourself pointing at pictures on menus and smiling a lot. Europe is quite different though, as it’s a rich mix of cultures and languages due to the open boarders of the EU and the fact that national boarders have been quite fluid for centuries due to trade and of course constant warfare between church and state and state and state and frequent incursions by barbarians, the French and the Germans. Although I survived this trip without mentioning the war, being a Fawlty Towers fan, it’s always on the tip of my tongue when in hotels and when I did an exchange to Germany when I was still at school, I managed to unintentionally give my host family a present from Australia, which had the El Alamein Fountain on it, which was the battle in which my host’s father fought. Thankfully, it was taken as nice gift, rather than the Fawlty Towers faux pas that it was. Over the past couple of months, I started refreshing my German in preparation for my trip. The ability to do this on your phone is tremendous, getting daily reminders to do my language session. However, the deeper I delved into the training, the more limited I found it to be. Other than some great reminders and the ability to learn new words, it doesn’t give you the training nor the real world practice needed to converse with native speakers. As soon as I landed in Switzerland, I had to switch up my mind into German mode. (No, that doesn’t mean I wanted to annex the Sudetenland). It meant I had to focus on what was being said far more actively than I would normally in English. The concentration it took to pick up what was being said was also far greater than being able to flick through questions and match words on an app. As with most things digital, they’re a great help, but no substitute for real world interactions. Suddenly, you’re trying to communicate with people who are fluent and speak far quicker than an AI on any app. However, despite this challenge, the immersion in the language and culture of the countries made it far easier to learn than playing on the phone. Being surrounded by native speakers, I pushed myself to speak German despite being uncertain of words. I constantly found myself saying half sentences, not quite knowing what a certain word was, or what to say next to complete the sentence. However, the easy option would have been to speak English and not bother, but where’s the fun in that? Again, this is another fear that needs to be faced or comfort zone boundary that needs kicking down. Sure, it feels weird and awkward that you’re going to say the wrong thing in the wrong way, but hey, lots of people say the wrong thing in their native language. People are more forgiving when it’s your second one. Thankfully I didn’t ask anyone any stupid questions of which I’m aware! Despite only spending a few days In Switzerland and Austria, I found myself picking up on so many different words, mannerisms and even slang in different regions. I could understand more about what was going on around me and even felt increasingly comfortable about speaking in German. If I’d taken the lazy and easy option, I would have learnt absolutely nothing. If you’re learning a language, or want to, then the best way to get started is through some lessons combined with some sort of digital trainer. However, to truly gain a handle on the language, you really need to immerse yourself in every way possible by travelling to a native speaking country and only using that language to communicate. It might be challenging to begin with, but so rewarding when you do. A short one this week, just to let you know that the Xperiential Education Podcast is Live!
The first two episodes are out and another will go live tomorrow! It’s been a wonderful educational experience for me traveling to meet the different educators and cover a huge range of topics and educational contexts. Please join us on this great journey for updates and some key links check out the website & twitter feed: Web - www.xperiential.education Twitter @XpedPodcast @dxgregory Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/experientialeducationpodcast/ You can subscribe to the Podcast on: iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/xperiential-education/id1355283223 Stitcher http://www.stitcher.com/s?fid=175873&refid=stpr Blubrry https://www.blubrry.com/xperientialeducation/ If you’re running a cool experiential education program, please get in touch, I’m always searching for great new ideas for shows and exploring different techniques and strategies for experiential education. This week is just a quick heads up on a podcast I’m launching soon called Xperiential Education (www.xperiential.education)
Over the past year, (in my spare time), I’ve been travelling around and interviewing some fascinating people who work in experiential education. Now my definition of experiential education is very broad and intentionally so. This is not a podcast about classroom practice nor is it about outdoor education. It’s about a whole range of interesting and unique approaches as to how leaders, teachers, trainers and businesses are educating others, be it at home, in school, at a retreat or specialised venue, on the job, or any other context where those with experience in life create valuable and meaningful learning experiences for others. We’re at a pivotal moment in history. Technology has suddenly impacted on everything that we do, so as the world rapidly changes how does education need to change to remain relevant? Does it digitise? Or does it take a step back into more traditional approaches? Or are we yet to really discover and understand what the next step forward is in education? This is just one of many great topics I’ve been able to cover with my guests, with the overall aim of discovering some really effective and powerful learning experiences. I’ve tried to keep the interviews as diverse as possible, covering: Art STEM History Workplace Training Outdoor Education Theatre & Performance I hope you enjoy Season 1 of the podcast. This has been a challenging and interesting learning experience for me as well and I look forward to people’s feedback. The full guest list is below and links and show notes will be added on the Xperiential Education website as each episode goes to air. Season 1 (not in episode order) Cyn Smith – Tihoi Venture School - NZ Adrian Deakes – V&A Museum – London Dr Brendan Nelson – Australian War Memorial – Canberra Rebecca Cameron – Former Australian Federal Police Officer Matt Purcell – GovHack - Canberra Grammar Glenys Thompson – Australian Science & Mathematics School – Adelaide Mary Preece – Bundanon Trust Noel Mifsud – Antarctic Adventures & Christian Brothers College – Adelaide Tim Nolan – Wesley College Clunes – Victoria Some of the ideas that these great educational leaders have shared with me are truly amazing. Please send me a message with any feedback, ideas or guest suggestions for Season 2. I look forward to sharing with you some great insights into learning through doing and hope you can use them in your own work! Late last year, I was involved with another film project called The Merger! I enjoy the different sort of challenge that comes with a film project. For me however, the biggest challenge was just finding the time to get there. With that in mind, I was able to sneak it in between work days and I’m so glad that I did.
Film projects are lots of fun (although there’s a lot of work behind the scenes that goes into them and a lot of sitting around doing nothing). I think the bigger the budget, the more sitting around doing nothing there is. I would imagine that actors should be very well-read, as the time spent doing nothing at all, is significant. A few years ago, I was in the movie Unbroken, directed by Angelina Jolie. Most of the film was done in Australia and I somehow ended up in it as a journalist. The free haircut was probably the most exciting part of the whole experience and when it came to the day of filming, I sat around for eleven hours in a room full of Nazis and did nothing. Ok, so to be honest, they weren’t real Nazis. They were just dressed up as Nazis as we were supposed to be at the Berlin Olympics. Finally, everyone was called onto the set, where we stood around for another hour waiting for something to happen. As if in the blink of an eye, the scene was filmed and everyone was sent back to get changed out of their SS uniforms. Not really the most exciting of days as the illusion of stardom feels so much emptier and extremely uninteresting after thirteen hours of standing around and waiting. However, I don’t want to discourage anyone from giving this a go. It’s one of those things where I can say, “I’ve been there and done that.” I was however, far more interested when I became involved in two much smaller Australian films. The first one being “The Backyard Ashes,” and most recently, “The Merger,” which are both by Director Mark Grental. I only became involved by a chance meeting at a political party convention back in 2011. Mark was the guest speaker and a very unusual one to have at a political meeting, because he was funny and interesting. He’d told his story of growing up in a rural community near Wagga Wagga and what it was like being interested in the arts. He’d moved away to study at NIDA and was now back to work on a feature film called The Backyard Ashes. As expected, this was a movie about cricket. As soon as he gave the overview of the film, I was hooked. It was a great Australian Story that tells the tale of a neighbourhood dispute where the main character and his friends are playing backyard cricket and after hitting the ball for six, accidentally incinerates his boss’s prized cat on the barbecue. He collects the ashes of the cat and returns it to the owner. Long story short to resolve the neighbourhood dispute, they then play a game of backyard cricket with the ashes as the prize! It’s a funny movie and throughout it, I was able to be involved on the set and off the set with a cameo as an extra and also helping out with the post production marketing! I’d never imagined that a chance meeting at a fairly dull political conference could lead to me to meeting so many interesting people and going to so many cool parties. When I saw that Mark was making another film, I decided that I wanted to be involved once again! The Merger is another sports movie, this time based around AFL. The basic story is that this country football club is basically going to wreck and ruin. The team’s gone, the clubhouse condemned and it’s not looking good. However, there’s a chance to revive things with the idea of enlisting and training refugees to play on the team. I won’t give any more of the plot away and you should go and see if for yourself. It’s a very politically topical movie given the debate in Australia around refuges and what we should be doing as a nation and there’s not an easy solution, as it’s a very emotive and devise debate. The beauty of art and film however, is that it can present ideas in such a unique way that’s outside of the standard partisan political debate we see in our daily media. If you look at how art has pushed the boundaries for centuries in helping our world modernise, fight for human rights and become more equitable, you start to really appreciate the value of art within our society. Whilst I have no intention of going into the film industry, for me, being involved in projects in this way, gives me something different to do. It’s a chance to be part of something much bigger and something that’s going to last forever. Whenever I see The Backyard Ashes advertised, or on TV or even on the inflight entertainment, I feel excited to have been part of it all. From the first meeting of the actors and crew, which happened to be at a BBQ, to the green and red carpet premiers in Wagga and Sydney. The people I met, the friendships I developed, the experience I gained and the stories I now have, were all a wonderful part of this. I now have two films I can watch with great pride and also scream out when I spot myself standing obscurely in the corner of a scene. As we’re now into a new year and the holidays are coming to an end, why don’t you find something you’ve always wanted to try, just for the sake of it. I challenge everybody over the next twelve months to get yourself involved in something completely different. A random project that you’ve always wanted to try out! You never know who you will meet, or where it will take you. Live your life to the fullest and make the most of every opportunity that comes your way this year. |
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