Peanut Butter Cookies & The Sad Time I Was on TV [Ice Cream Sundae]

This newsletter was originally published via email on the 17th April 2016. You can also sign up to receive Ice Cream Sundae with the form on the right-hand side column or here (The newsletter format shifted from long to shorter form since).

Early in my career, I worked as a production manager for Landmark Worldwide in Paris.

It’s an international personal and professional growth, training & development company.

I first did an adapted version of their flagship course, the Landmark Forum, for young people when I was 9 years old.

I don’t remember that much of it now. The chairs were kind of uncomfortable, and I loved the giant peanut butter cookie I had at lunchtime.

I’ve been considering writing a Sundae series about my experiences with Landmark Worldwide for a little while now.

They offer courses for individuals and businesses, the main intention being that participants create new possibilities for success, fulfilment and greatness, whatever their goals may be.

Over 2.4 million people have participated in Landmark programmes from around the world.

The Landmark Forum is a practical enquiry into what it means to be human, questioning areas we all have in common like how we listen, how we relate to our family or colleagues, or what we complain about. It offers a methodology to achieve personal and professional results beyond what looks usual and predictable.

Many celebrities, authors and famous business people have talked about the benefits they received from these courses, like Neil Patrick Harris, Chuck Pahlaniuk, Michael J Parker or Peter Diamandis (in this episode of the Tim Ferriss Show).

Their business branch is called Vanto Group and their client list boasts names like Apple, Reebok, ExxonMobil, GSK, Microsoft, NASA and JP Morgan Chase. Paul Fireman, former CEO of Reebok, said the company’s price stock jumped “from the $6 or $7 range to $25 to $30 range” after he introduced his employees to the Landmark training.

From my perspective as a marketing & brand strategist, it’s interesting that for the most part Landmark successfully relies on word of mouth marketing.

Word of mouth marketing is the most valuable, cost effective and most likely to drive sales form of marketing.

According a recent Nielsen market research study, recommendations from friends and family remain the most credible form of advertising globally. 83% of respondents across 60 countries say they trust the recommendations of friends and family.

To improve your own word of mouth marketing you need to build a foundation for it, bake it in your product or service (to steal the words from Alex Bogusky and John Winsor from their excellent book, Baked In: Creating Products and Businesses that Market Themselves).

Word of mouth marketing is only as good as the quality and trust customers place in your product, service and brand.

In the case of Landmark, I admire the fact this seems to be designed in from the ground up. When I get great results or achieve new goals in life I naturally talk about it with my friends and family.

For example, I stopped smoking while doing a course with Landmark in Singapore a couple of years ago. I told people around me that I’d stopped smoking, they’d ask me how and so I’d talk about the course and recommend it.

The tried and traditional approach to increase word of mouth marketing is simply asking customers to recommend your products and services.

Landmark is open about the fact that participants are going to be encouraged to participate in another course or invite friends to find out about the Forum.

I’ve participated in a number of Landmark courses; I always learn a lot and receive great value from them.

My mother first participated in these kinds of courses in the late 70s and 80s. If you’ve watched the TV show The Americans, you might have heard Susan Misner’ character Sandra Beeman mention going to her “EST course”. EST stood for Erhard Seminars Training and got pretty big in the United States then. Big enough to be mentioned in a TV show produced now, anyways.

It was designed and founded by Werner Erhard, recently dubbed “The Father of Self-Help” in a New York Times article. As explained in the article above, a controversial episode of the 60 Minutes TV show in the US destroyed Werner Erhard’s reputation in 1991. He stepped down and sold the company to a group of employees who rebranded it as Landmark.

All the controversial content from the show was later proven to be false. According to this other cited article, that 60 Minutes episode was so riddled with discrepancies that CBS deleted it from their public archive.

Growth, training & development companies and performance coaching has been going mainstream in the past 10-15 years.

I talk about Landmark courses and what I get out of them in any number of situations from job interviews to board level client meetings and conversations with friends.

I had lunch with a professional acquaintance just a few months ago and we talked about how interesting it is that openly talking about this kind of performance coaching, training and development used to be a little taboo, while now it’s pretty much accepted across the board.

Meanwhile, other people aren’t interested in this stuff and that’s fine, of course.

What’s less fine by me is when people, or more often the media, go as far as discrediting and slandering this type of work with little to no evidence.

I’m absolutely for objective criticism and rational discussion for everything, including Landmark or their courses.

I trust if you’ve been reading this far you’re smart enough to evaluate this story rationally.

In 2004, a prime time investigative journalism show called “Pièces à Conviction” aired an episode about Landmark. The episode was titled “Voyage au Pays des Nouveaux Gourous”  (“Journey to the land of new gurus”).

I was working for Landmark in Paris at the time. We were 4 employees in the Paris office, and we had just moved to a smaller office to save money on operating expenses.

About 2-3 days before the show was programmed to air we received a call from the production company in charge. That’s when we first learned about it.

I think they were legally obliged to tell Landmark they were airing a piece, though I understand they waited the last possible minute to call. No representative from Landmark was invited to participate.

We learned a guy had been filming with an undercover camera for the past 4 to 6 months.

He’d done a few different Landmark courses and came by the office regularly too.

We all thought he was a nice guy, I’d chatted with him a few times.

To this day, I have a hard time believing he really thought there was anything particularly controversial going on in the office or in the course rooms.

A few days later we gathered to watch the show in the office. I was hoping the show would be objective, but the chances seemed fairly slim.

As soon as the Halloween style horror music kicked off, it was pretty obvious they didn’t have rational criticism in mind.

For more on this, this excellent episode of Film Riot explains how music can shape and manipulate a film scene for the audience.
Additional visual editing elements included coloured image overlays with targets. I think this was because the vast majority of hidden camera content wasn’t particularly exciting or offensive (people talking about their lives in a hotel room or in the Landmark office), so they had to ramp up the excitement factor somehow.

Suffice to say the whole show was highly critical of Landmark and its activities.

At some point in the show, I recognised myself with one of those black labels over my eyes, hiding my identity as effectively as glasses hide Superman when posing as Clark Kent.

At 24 years old, I was devastated to see myself on TV, suspected of being some kind of weird cult guru.

It is one of the saddest and most insulting experiences I’ve ever had.

If I remember correctly all I was doing was talking to the undercover camera guy about his career because he’d asked for coaching. At worst I was doing my job and promoting a course.

It wasn’t a very long scene, nor was I the main target of the show.

Still, definitely not an experience I wish on anyone.

I’ve never been the guru of anyone or anything in my life.

If you know me at all, you realise how ludicrous that idea is.

I’m certainly not saying Landmark is perfect. I really don’t think anyone or any company is perfect anyway.

All I’m saying is I can vouch for the quality of their courses from my personal experience as a participant and former employee. If ever you have any questions about it, I’m always happy to talk.

The damage from the 2004 French TV show about Landmark is done but I hope there will be more chances for balanced and objective reviews of their courses in France in the future.

Fortunately it’s not all doom and gloom. Trustworthy media outlets such as The Guardian, The New York Times, Huffington Post, Psychology Today, Forbes,The Wall Street Journal and many more have published objective articles and reviews about Landmark courses.

Thanks for reading, as always I really appreciate your time and attention. I hope you enjoyed it!

Whilst we’re on the topic of word of mouth marketing, please share this with a friend 😉

To finish on a completely different note, if you want to check out more Ice Cream stuff this week on the podcast I had a fun conversation with Tom Williams, the founder of A Door in a Wall, a London based murder mystery treasure hunt gaming events.

Till’ next week!

Cheers
Willem

Playing Football With Care Bears in Tanzania [Ice Cream Sundae]

This newsletter was originally published via email on the 10th April 2016. You can also sign up to receive Ice Cream Sundae with the form on the right-hand side column or here (The newsletter format shifted from long to shorter form since).

I first found out about The Great Football Giveaway thanks to a post in my friend Neil’s blog, I think back in 2008 if memory serves. I was immediately hooked by the simple and compelling idea: 1 ball = £10

Thanks to donations from supporters, The Great Football Giveaway organises trips to go and give footballs and netballs directly to children to play with, in poor and remote areas of rural African countries. I highly recommend watching this short video about the project; it really says it all and more. If your heart doesn’t melt watching it you might be on your way to become like Professor Coldheart, I’m afraid even the Care Bears can’t help you.

Quick parenthesis to give you the chance to read this Sundae along with music; last week my good friend James recommended checking out an event his friend John was putting on at The Social in London. He used to organise large Afro-beat parties in China under the name No Go Die a few years ago. The music was excellent for dancing and appropriate for this Sundae about Africa. Here’s a good No Go Die mix, I’m listening to it while writing this.

Back to our main topic, I loved the simplicity of it: £10 = 1 ball.

Stripping down an initiative to an extremely simple proposition, getting to the essence of a message is exactly the kind of challenges I tackle as a marketing and brand strategist. This is the kind of clarity I aspire to as a result of my work.

You know exactly what you’re getting and what is being done with the money.

Moreover, you’ll be shown. Supporters get updates about each trip as it’s taking place: photos, videos and even their personalised messages on balls. Supporters know exactly what happened the day the ball they donated £10 for was given.

Nobody says it’s going to solve the world’s toughest issues.

It’s not feeding the hungry or curing diseases.

It is however going to make the day of one or several children in rural Africa who likely only had bunched up plastic supermarket bags tied with string to use as a makeshift ball until then.

It brings play and the widest smiles on faces you’ve ever seen. The joy is infectious, whole communities, schools and sometimes even entire villages join the kids to play ball and have fun.

It’s serendipitous.

It’s a gift.

It’s sheer happiness.

After all, what else are we after?

And if you can afford it, that’s definitely worth £10.

I also find this kind of project fascinating because it’s a positive difference made on a micro-scale, for one or several kids somewhere in rural Africa.

Of course it doesn’t replace initiatives that I’d qualify of acting at a macro-scale; large non-profit organisations like Save the Children or UNICEF being good examples. I’m no expert on the way they operate, though I understand their goals, infrastructure and methods are anchored in a long-term and large-scale view of humanitarian and developmental assistance. We could say it’s more of the “top down” view of making a positive difference.

This doesn’t invalidate organisations and projects working on what could be called “bottom up” initiatives like The Great Football Giveaway. On the contrary, every time they have an occasion to collaborate, larger charities are delighted to get footballs for kids to play with.

TGFG also focuses on remote areas that don’t have as many visits or activities from other charities, an important point of difference. These kinds of initiatives can also be amplifiers of larger charities working with children who might be lacking in simple and playful fun.

Fast forward to 2010; Neil is looking for volunteers to go to Tanzania with him.

Fast forward a couple of years to 2010 and Neil announces on his blog that he is forming one of the first teams of volunteers to raise money for balls and then go give them directly out to kids in rural Tanzania. He was hoping to find two people adventurous enough to follow him; eight of us raised our hands from a variety of backgrounds: advertising, media, coaching, hospitality and sales. Hugh who appeared on my podcast was one, and later my brother Björn and his wife Justine also joined the team.

We raised money through our personal networks and organised a fundraising event in London. In the end we had about 2,000 footballs and netballs, almost as many hand pumps and just under two weeks to go and give them out. We were given a broad geographic area to cover and a one-page sheet with a few bullet-point guidelines about the best ways to give the balls. Things like: “Always give the ball directly to a child, not an adult unless you’re certain they are in a position to give the ball and let the children play fairly (like a school teacher). Other adults might sooner take the ball from kids and play themselves, or sell the ball for cash.”

The rest of the planning was pretty much up to us. The area was the Southeast of Tanzania, one of the country’s poorest. Most of the international attention and assistance in the country goes to the capital, Dar Es Salaam and Arushanear Mount Kilimanjaro. After a little bit of research I suggested we make the small town of Kilwa Masoko on the coast our main base, from there we’d split out to cover more ground in three separate teams in different directions.

We also took a few days to drive down to the town of Lindi, approximately 150 kilometres to the South, and give balls on the way.

The whole experience was so mind-blowing that for months I didn’t know where to start or what to write in my blog about it. It’s definitely one of the best and most exciting things I’ve done in my life. While we don’t necessarily see each other very often, nor are we necessarily close friends, I know the nine of us on this trip remember it dearly. From the first drink we shared after landing in Dar Es Salaam we kicked things off laughing and taking the piss out of each other as if we’d been friends for years. We formed bonds and memories that will last for life.

We all saw the opportunity to contribute to something exciting and fun. We were also all in some kind of important transition, like changing careers or thinking about it.

We improvised and learned on the go. We had three four-wheel drive jeeps with local drivers to also help us translate and make recommendations about the best places to go. The container of balls had been delivered to Kilwa. Every day we’d stop at the container to fill the back of the jeeps with deflated balls. The two sitting in the back would start pumping them full, ready to be given and played with. At least in my jeep, the person in front usually decided where we’d be going, often randomly, or with instructions from a previously met person.

In the jeep we’d say things like, “Hey look, a dirt path there! Let’s turn left and see where it goes” or “I think I spotted a school to the right, let’s check it out!” Whether we’d come across random groups of children, schools, or remote bush villages each day was filled with joy and surprises.

Online research had yielded little results as to other non-profit organisations we could contact in advance, as we had been told this area of the country wasn’t particularly visible or known. Still, Neil had located and contacted an orphanage South of Dar Es Salaam that we could stop and visit on the way to Kilwa. The joy and happiness of the kids playing ball was beautiful. The establishment specialised in getting orphan children off the streets of the capital to care for them and provide them with an education.

Play is vital for children but with a tight budget essential amenities are of course prioritised; footballs, netballs and hand pumps that they couldn’t afford were welcomed and loved.

We organised playful competitions with the children to “win” the balls for the orphanage. In similar circumstances we’d talk with people in charge at the orphanage or schools to quiz the children on lessons they had recently learned. Other times we’d come across a few kids playing and stop to just throw a ball at them.

We were emboldened and excited by our first day, thinking we’d figured this whole thing out. The following day we thought we didn’t planning, closed the large map Neil had set on a table and just pointed on the map to the nearest town, Kilwa Kivinje.

It was a Sunday morning.

We hadn’t paid attention to the day of the week.

It was a chilling experience.

From the moment we showed up and gave a first ball things didn’t go as hoped – it was immediately was stolen from a larger teen who ran away, we saw adults adults stealing balls and fighting over them It was either mass or market day so the centre of town was busy with people, quickly driving a raving crowd to almost assaulting the jeeps of these crazy Mzungu giving brand new footballs away.

The feeling going on was nothing like what we intended, it was aggressive, greedy, with a hint of violence in the air.

We retreated, a little shaken and confused.

We stopped on the way of the town, close by what seemed to be a makeshift football pitch. Some of us started talking about what went wrong with the drivers. Meanwhile, I think it was Darren and Hugh, took a football from a jeep, walked up to the pitch and starting kicking the ball. That attracted the attention of a couple of nearby kids. They invited them to come and play. In no time we had a several groups of kids playing and having fun with us on the pitch.

The drivers helped us organise a quiz to give away a few balls, having the children promise to play together. The magic was back.

We put more thinking into our planning after that. We organised our days around going to schools in the area as a main objective, and branching out from there if we saw random kids, or heard of other worthwhile establishments to visit.

On our way to Lindi we drove by another jeep with a Save the Children logo.

We flagged them down and learned they were a small unit providing pre and post-natal care to women in remote bush villages. We gave them a bunch of balls so they could give them in the much further away villages we wouldn’t have time to visit ourselves. I’d write messages and take photos of all the balls my friends had donated money for, so I could tell them exactly where the money went.

In the evenings, we’d regroup and talk about our experiences of the day, trying to make sense of it all – from sometimes feeling kind of useless with meagre footballs in the face of so much needed in the country like health care, education, infrastructure, clean water, and more. And the following moment, one of us would share one of the magical moments we kept having of sheer happiness of these kids playing. We also had memorable laughs and stories around the dinner table and drinking the local firewater with the actual image of a fire on the label; Konyagi.

We weren’t helping solve tough issues yet we also knew that whatever we were doing was so emotional and magical that I’m certain it was valuable.

I guess this could be what I’d like to leave you with for this newsletter. As we grow up and become adults, we might occasionally take too much of a serious approach to what’s important. We worry about our work, taxes, paperwork, healthcare, retirement, etc.

Of course these are all important but ultimately not the best indicators of happiness or even fulfilment. In your planning of everything serious and important for your life, make sure to leave room for play too.

Whatever play you enjoy: kicking a ball with friends or children, playing a game, finger painting, playing a musical instrument, or even fun behind closed doors with your partner.

Happiness is never far away from play, and that’s kind of invaluable.

If you have £10 to spare or more, why not give a ball to a child somewhere in rural Africa?

Thanks for reading, as every week I really appreciate your time. If you’ve enjoyed it and know someone else who might, can you forward them the email please? Sharing it on social media also works, look to the bottom and you’ll find buttons to post it on Facebook, Twitter or Linkedin.

If you’re looking for something to listen to as well, this week I published a fun and fascinating conversation with Anjali Ramachandran for my podcast. Anjali is the Head of Innovation for a global media agency and also co-founded an online support network for women in technology and business, Ada’s List.

To finish, I’ve officially completed my last client project, if ever you hear of anyone looking for a brand & marketing strategist (preferably in London) please keep in touch, I’d be glad to be introduced and find out how I can help.

Till next week!

Cheers
Willem

Welcome to the Future, We Have Ice Cream Cookies [Ice Cream Sundae]

Image Credit: Roxanne Ready

This newsletter was originally published via email on the 3rd April 2016. You can also sign up to receive Ice Cream Sundae with the form on the right-hand side column or here (The newsletter format shifted from long to shorter form since).

A few Sundaes ago I started a series to illustrate my top Gallup Strengths. For those who missed it, Gallup is an American research-based performance management consultancy. They’re particularly known for their opinion polls, and increasingly for their Strengthsfinder test and strengths based coaching.

Based on extensive research and in-depth interviews with over a million professionals in almost any type of field you can imagine, Gallup identified 34 Strengths themes in total. As of December 2015 over 13 million people have taken the Strengths test and found out what their top strengths are. I already wrote about my top strength, ideation.

This Sundae is about my second strength: Futuristic.

This is what it’s about, from Gallup’s short description:

“People exceptionally talented in the futuristic theme are inspired by the future and what could be. They energize others with their visions of the future.”

I just turned some music to listen to while writing. I appreciate mostly instrumental or electronic music while I’m thinking, writing and working. Music with lyrics distracts me. I first thought of classical and started Beethoven’s 6^th Symphony “Pastoral” that I love. It only took me a few minutes to realise it wasn’t right for the context of sharing how this Futuristic theme occurs for me.

Tron Legacy’s original soundtrack by Daft Punk popped into mind and is working a whole lot better. You can read and listen along for additional atmosphere and context. Whatever you think of the movie itself, I think the soundtrack is pretty cool. It boasts a great balance of elative tunes and gritty tones.

If you have also found out about your strengths, I recently found out there is a series of discussion videos about each of the 34 strengths and how they occur for people. I just watched the one about Futuristic and learned that so far approximately 11% of the people who took the test have it in their top five, apparently one of the more uncommon ones to have.

Welcome to the future (We have ice cream cookies).

Well not the actual future, more like a few of the many visions I have of the many futures I constantly think about.

Have you ever read Choose Your Own Adventure books? You might have at least heard about them, they’re written from a second-person point of view and the reader assumes the role of the protagonist. As the reader, you are offered to choose the main character’s actions and the plot’s outcomes. At each page or two, you can either go to page x for action a; or to page y for action b.

Of course I loved these kinds of books. Imagine each one of these stories are like decision trees, different actions branching out from one beginning and leading to a variety of different outcomes.

At almost every moment of ever day I envision sights, smells, sounds and flavours of what a multitude of different possible futures could be.

That’s how my mind works, almost every moment of every day. Images, smells, sounds, flavours of what alternative moments to follow this one could be. The scenes I picture are extremely vivid. They bloom and disappear replaced by another faster than I can entirely appreciate them. There’s so much going on it can even get confusing. I need to make a mental effort to focus on one at a time, consciously slow down the flow.

I constantly play out entire fictitious conversations in my head before talking to people, many of them completely hypothetical. More often than not, it’s someone I’m going to talk to or should because I have something to tell him or her. I imagine all the different things I could say, the many different ways in which they could respond, what I’d reply for each of those, etc. On one hand I think it’s something you can identify with and to a certain level we all do, but I wonder if I, or people with similar strengths to mine, do it more than others.

I naturally ask friends what they have in mind for their future; we share and exchange how things might turn out, what could happen. I build and expand on what they’re telling me. I don’t really ever ask where people see themselves in however many years. To me the future is so fluid and bursting with possibility that a thousand answers to that kind of question would barely do it justice. All of these visions are exciting and inspiring.

Once I focus one particular vision of the future, I can share and inspire friends, family, colleagues and clients with what it can make possible.

Fortunately I can also focus on one inspiring vision and share it with others, bringing it to life. This shows up in the way I can take the lead and instigate plans for activities with friends and family for example. I share the excitement and inspiration I have for an event or occasion, I tell people how amazing it’s going to be.

I already wrote about how I love theme parks in a previous Sundae. The Disney connection reminds me of the film Tomorrowland. I thought it was brilliant and unfortunately didn’t get the box office success I it deserved. I don’t want to give away much, I just recommend checking it out if you haven’t seen it. I believe you’ll at least smile. I felt great about the future watching it.

That’s another funny thing about it: future is never here; it’s a conceptual imaginary projection. We create and recreate what the future might hold may it be a few minutes from now, a couple of hours, tomorrow or in a year. We’ll never actually get there. Meanwhile, I draw strength from imagining what could be and sharing it with others.

You probably won’t be that surprised I love science fiction.

I love reading science fiction. I get excited about new technologies and what they can make possible to benefit humanity. I look up to Star Trek’s universe; it’s a positive vision of the future and of humanity, where real global issues like hunger and poverty are no longer in large thanks to technology. Star Trek’s replicator technology can make anything including food; so material objects and possessions don’t have the same value as we give them today. I’m not a specialist Trekkie so I’m abbreviating its fictional history; in short the kind of technology described were precursors to shifting to a moneyless society and paving the way to explore space. The near ubiquitous touch screen devices we own these days owe much to Star Trek and other science fiction stories designers, scientists and engineers grew up with.

A several points in Dan Simmon’s beautiful Hyperion Cantos, we discover different branches of humanities in a far future, people evolved and adapted to different spatial, chemical and climatic environments rather than the other way round.

As a game master or storyteller in tabletop roleplaying games, I share my visions with players and bring these fictional and fantastic universes to life.

I get excited about reading and sharing about the possibilities of the future and visions of other worlds far from our own. It’s likely to be one of the reasons that got me interested in tabletop roleplaying games. As a player interpreting a character, I get to play out different possible and fictional futures of different personas I can imagine. As a game master or storyteller, I share my visions with a group of players and bring these fictional and fantastic universes to life by telling friends around the table how the world around them looks, feels, smells, tastes and sounds.

Gravitating towards new technologies was natural. The opportunity I had to learn and work as a designer was of particular interest because I’d be working with 3D technology. When I had the opportunity to start working as a strategic planner, I was and still am fascinated by how digital technologies impact communications and present both opportunities and challenges for brands to leverage. These days Virtual and Augmented Reality headsets like HTC Vive (I’ve experienced this demo, it’s amazing!), Oculus Rift or Microsoft’s HoloLens are one of the hottest topics discussed around technology and video games. The technologies aren’t yet going to be in every household, though possibilities they promise are impressive.

That said I don’t believe technology is an answer to anything in and by itself. In order to leverage them as part of a solution; challenges and opportunities need to be defined. As part of my work as a marketing strategist I often hear digital technology to be the answer before any question was asked. It’s one of the pitfalls of shiny and exciting new technologies.

The usage and democratisation of technology is growing at such a pace it is not just a dreamer’s fancy to quite seriously mention Star Trek or other science fiction franchises as inspiration to build a better future.

We don’t have to wait for negative impacts to make up a different kind of future.

I know there are heavily negative impacts to the way we’ve evolved and the technology we’re using. We are damaging the Earth we live in and large swathes of the global population live in dire conditions, lacking regular access to necessary water, food or healthcare – not to mention education. Meanwhile, I don’t think the kind of prevalent sensationalist and scandalous media is helping build and share visions of what a better future could be, nor is the trend for young adult Dystopian future à la Hunger Games.

We don’t have to wait for that to make up a different kind of future. It’s down to all of us, in every small or big way you can contribute. Consider what inspires about the future you and tell friends, family and colleagues around you. You might be surprised where the conversation takes you.

I had the chance of speaking with Cindy Gallop for the podcast a few days ago; it seems fitting to borrow her favourite quote to complete this Sundae:

“The best way to predict the future is to invent it.”
~ Alan Kay, Computer Scientist

The conversation I recorded with Cindy will be out in a few weeks, in the meantime this week I published a brilliant & fun conversation I had with Luke Crane, an award winning game designer known for his roleplaying games Burning Wheel and MouseGuard. Luke is also the Head of Games for Kickstarter, the popular online crowdfunding platform.

I hope this Sundae gives you a flavour of what having Futuristic as one of my strengths means to me. If you’re looking for science fiction of fantasy novels or movie recommendations, give me a shout. Similarly if you’d like to talk about how you or your company could be leveraging digital technologies to solve business and communications challenges, I’d definitely be up for talking.

Live long and prosper.

Best,
Willem

Nanabozho vs. Flying Church Bells: Easter Clash [Ice Cream Sundae]

Image Credit: Shannon Hauser

This newsletter was originally published via email on the 27th March 2016. You can also sign up to receive Ice Cream Sundae with the form on the right-hand side column or here (The newsletter format shifted from long to shorter form since).

It’s Easter weekend, time to eat lots of chocolate!

Some bits of celebrating Easter are glorious, particularly as a kid.

I remember Kindergarten days in America, we painted hard boiled eggs in a variety of colours and other fun activities. We were told a magical bunny rabbit wandered around gardens and hid chocolate eggs for children to find. This was all great news; hunting for chocolate items was heaps of fun. Add the anticipation of plenty of chocolate to eat afterwards and Easter becomes one of the most exciting times of year.

We were told a magical bunny rabbit wandered around gardens and hid chocolate eggs for us to find.

I love how you can explain what seems extremely outlandish stuff to children and they’re candid sponges for information. I was wide-eyed at these brand new revelations.

A piece of research from a few years ago showed three year old kids tendencies to be more trusting to what they were explicitly told by an adult than what they could see. I guess audio scepticism only kicks in later. It was a small experiment, though interesting. There are two plastic cups, a red and a yellow one. An adult would then show a three year old that he hides a sticker under the red cup. The kid has to guess where the sticker is. With some children, the adult would lie and explicitly say that the sticker is under the yellow cup. With other children, the adult would place an arrow on the yellow cup without saying anything.

The kids who were told the arrow was under the yellow cup would follow the instructions and not find the sticker. The other kids mostly managed to figure out the arrow was a false lead. At that age we’re biased to believe just about anything we’re told.

I also listened to a fascinating episode of TED Radio Hour about brain science this week. One of the stories was about how we know what other people are thinking, from Rebecca Saxe. Apparently a developmental stage happens between the ages of 3 and 5 years old when we grasp the concept that others don’t necessarily think or like the same things we do. To introduce the idea, they played a portion of an interview with a small child explaining to him that pirates love cheese sandwiches; the excitement of the kid when he said he also loved cheese was infectious. The kid was proud to be like a pirate. I was grinning while listening to the story and walking around London.

At first I thought there might be a link between the Easter Bunny myth and the Native American Indian cultural hero and legendary figure Nanabozho of the Anishenaabe tribes who live(d) spread around the Great Lakes area of Northern America.

Nanabozho is a benevolent trickster figure and strongly associated with the hare or rabbit. He features in many stories, such as stealing fire for humans or giving the porcupine its pricks to protect him against bears.

It turns out the Easter bunny comes from Germany rather than Nanabozho Native American Indian legends.

I first learned about Nanabozho thanks to one of my favourite Franco-Belgian comics series as a child; Yakari. In the fourth tome, the young hero of the series Yakari is introduced to Nanabozo, a giant and sorcerous rabbit spirit. It was translated into English a couple of years ago if you’d like to check it out.

After some research it turns out the Easter bunny tradition comes from German settlers to America in Pennsylvania, apparently no link with the American Indian legends. The first written references can be found in German texts dating from the 17^th century.

I still wonder if Nanabozho has any links with other trickster rabbits like Bugs Bunny; that will be a story for another time.

Both rabbits and eggs feature in Easter traditions as symbols of spring and fertility. Typically birds lay eggs and rabbits give birth to large litters in early spring. Rabbits and hares are prolific breeders. They mature sexually at a young age, they can give birth to several litters per year and females can even conceive a second litter while still pregnant with the first.

The name Easter itself is intrinsically linked to spring and fertility: it comes from the Germanic and Old English Goddess Eostre. She’s a Goddess of Dawn, bringing light and spring. In French the celebrations are called Pâques; Latin languages derived their name for Easter from the name of the Jewish Passover celebrations, from the Greek Pascha or Hebrew Pesach.

Also, I found out you can call a group of rabbits a fluffle. A fluffle of rabbits.

After I moved to France, at first Easter tradition seemed to approach as per usual. Other kids were talking about the chocolates they were equally excited about getting and devouring for Easter.

But then I raised my eyebrows at a few points. I heard classmates refer to bells.

Winged, flying Church bells to be more specific.

I inquired about this new and unforeseen piece of information.

These church bells supposedly migrate from France to Rome in the days before Easter Sunday and then flew back carrying chocolate eggs that they then dropped in gardens for us to find.

I thought these new revelations were completely ludicrous. I was pretty sceptical about them.

At six years old, I knew the truth: A bunny hopped around with a basket of chocolate eggs and hid them around the garden. The bunny had a plan and left us with a treasure map.

I’m sure you’ll agree it is vastly more sensible than these silly winged Church bells dropping their chocolates willy-nilly. I was OK to give consciousness to a rabbit but not to a Church bell.

It didn’t make sense. The clash of Easter myths was pretty confusing.

It’s interesting to see what happens when one childhood held belief is confronted to another. For a smile, check out I Used to Believe, a website where people share the stuff they used to believe in as kids.

This dude Jesus confusingly died and then apparently came back to life three days later.

I was even more confused when I learned some people believed that at Easter Jesus died on a cross, came back to life three days later and then died again – or something along those lines. Later on I learned that for Jewish people, this time coincided more or less with the anniversary of the Jewish Exodus from Egypt for Passover celebrations.

From what I’ve read, it’s usually between the ages of 5 and 7 years old that children start asking their parents about myths like Easter bunny, the Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus. Usually another kid at school told them these characters weren’t real.

These kinds of beliefs start cracking around the edges for children alongside the development of logical thinking.

I was still ready to believe in Santa for a while longer but Easter myths had taken a beating.

That said I still really enjoyed the treasure hunting and of course the chocolates so I didn’t ask that many questions, in case the answers might mean less sweets to enjoy later on.

So I’d go and hunt for chocolates, eat them until my belly ached and suspend my disbelief about bunnies and flying Church bells.

The myth of the flying bells comes from the fact that churches in France, Belgium and Netherlands stop ringing a few days before Easter, explained to children by saying they had gone to Rome. I guess they go to Rome because of the Vatican is, rather than where the best chocolates can be found.

I enjoyed the chocolate hunts so much that later on I’d help my parents hide the eggs and make up the clues for my little brother and sister.

Talking about treasure hunts, I recently had a brilliant conversation with Tom Williams of A Door in A Wall for my podcast, they organise murder mystery themed treasure hunting game events in London. I will be publishing that in a few weeks.

In the meantime, you can listen to my conversation with Richard Huntington, who writes in his popular advertising blog Adliterate. Richard is the Group Chief Strategy Officer at Saatchi & Saatchi, one of the largest advertising agencies in the world, and one I used to work at while in Singapore.

I attended a great event this week about the skills gap and lack of diversity in the digital industries organised by Digital Futures. Great speakers included Marc Lewis of the School of Communication Arts, I’ve joined as a mentor and will be volunteering there soon, if you work in the industry I recommend checking them out. I also learned about Apps for Good and Supa Academy from their founders, both exciting initiatives the first for students to create applications that will make a positive difference in the world, and the second to help young people create new businesses.

Finally, if you enjoyed reading this please share it with a friend who will enjoy it too! You can simply forward them the email, or share it to your social networks.

Thank you for reading, have a fantastic Easter weekend!

Till’ next week.

Cheers
Willem

How Chewing Gum & Digger Toys Stimulate Our Memory [Ice Cream Sundae]

Image Credit: Taz

This newsletter was originally published via email on the 20th March 2016. You can also sign up to receive Ice Cream Sundae with the form on the right-hand side column or here (The newsletter format shifted from long to shorter form since).

Do you remember what you got up to every day this past week?

You probably do, though you might also be drawing a few blanks.

I think the first reaction is like “Yeah, of course I do.”

And then a second later: “Oh wait, what did I do that day?” or “What did I have for lunch on Friday?”

“Like successive waves crashing on a rocky shore, the first level of memories are immediate.”

We perceive everything through our senses. Like successive waves crashing on a rocky shore, the first level of memories are immediate. The stuff we see, hear, touch, smell and taste every moment of every day. Our brains filter out what may be important before it even hits our conscious mind or else it is believed we’d be overwhelmed. It’s a defence and coping mechanism.

Our brains tell us what is important or not, whatever can be managed on autopilot is.

The morning routine is a good example. Most of the time we’re barely conscious, particularly if we’ve been repeating the same routine for a long time. We may not do it with our eyes closed but half our brain is elsewhere. We can think about other stuff, or in my case not so much at all until I have a coffee.

As long as I don’t have anything special or urgent going on, I’ll get up in the morning after a short snooze, get in the shower while yawning, brush my teeth, get dressed, be done. I don’t have that many clothes so that’s a conscious choice I’ve simplified (I believe many men tend to). I haven’t gone to the extend Mark Zuckerberg has dressing in the same way every day, though I guess the idea is similar.

As Forrest Gump said about no longer having to worry about money no more afterLieutenant Dan invested in some fruit company: “That’s good. One less thing.”

“Short-term memory is the frothy surf at the base of the rocks.”

Back to our waves crashing on the rocks, short-term memory is a little like the frothy surf created by the waves receding at the base of the rocks. The surf lasts for a short while as one wave recedes and another arrives. This is where our brains start manufacturing memories from our perceptions and storing them. It doesn’t necessarily store them for long, just a few things for a few seconds. The name of the person we were just introduced to at a party; that a couple of minutes or an hour later we’ve probably already forgotten.

Another easy analogy to stay with an aquatic theme is the gold fish one, with a memory span of a few seconds, just long enough to circle his bowl and rediscover the view with a brand new and fresh perspective. That’s short-term memory. Guy Pearce in Memento shares similar issues with the goldfish, with the tattoos as an advantage.

There are well known tricks to improve our short-term memory. I imagine we all use them to a certain extent, though consciously practicing them can really make a difference.

Firstly repetition increases the chances of remembering something. Imagine someone just tells you a door code on the phone and you have to repeat it to yourself a couple of times before you get to it and type in the code. I think we’ve outsourced a lot of this stuff to our smart phones though it’s still a good practice on a regular basis, if only to better remember names of people at parties.

The second common trick is called chunking.

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Having had a quick glance at the numbers, which one do you think is easier to quickly remember? Depending on how phone numbers are usually written where you’re from, one version might seem easier than another. In France where I grew up, phone numbers are usually set by two digits separated by spaces. In the UK and US, I believe they are more often separated in three or four digits with hyphens.

Much about memory still baffles scientists. Every new piece of information they uncover raises more questions than it answers about how it all works.

For a long time it was believed memory was stored in one area of the brain, now they’re pretty sure it’s processed, spread out and distributed across the whole brain’s neural network.

Moreover different kinds of memories and the way they’re remembered live in different parts of the brain: information like phone numbers or addresses, emotional and sensory links like eating a meal reminding us of childhood, skills like riding a bike, etc.

Scientists also understand little about how we remember things, retrieve memories from wherever they’re stored.

“Long-term memories are basically the water waves are made of.”

In my waves analogy, as far as I can determine from the reading I’ve done to prepare for this, long-term memories are basically the water. It’s all there; the waves are made of it, though they’re also distinct.

We have everything stored, except the stuff we’ve forgotten. And that’s only until we remember it again, those water particles brought back to the surface into a new wave and crashing over the rocks.

I like this image because I think that’s how it feels when memories emerge seemingly out of nowhere.

I find it strange when I hear other people tell me of their very early age memories. If only given a short time to consider it, I’ll say I remember very little of my early childhood. I only recall a few vague images and scenes from about the age of four. Very little seems to have stuck from my time lived in the U.S. and I wonder if half of it was manufactured from photos and stories I heard from my family rather than my own recollection.

We had a half sunken basement level in the house with a room I believe was next to the garage; our play area. A couple of brief images come to mind playing with Transformers, wooden bricks and LEGO toys in there.

“I was very excited about playing the brand new digger toy at Manorhaven Beach Park.”

We’d go to the nearby Manorhaven beach park, to the playground. I was very excited about a brand new digger toy I played with. And this is the funny thing about memory. I’d completely forgotten about this digger toy until I started writing this and questioning what my earliest memories were. Retrieving memories is a practice; like working the digger controls to bring shovels of sand from the bottom back up to the surface.

As I think about it, images surface unbidden in a mysterious order: quietly playing LEGO and bricks with my friend Juan-Pablo, reading my favourite Dr Seuss books, like The Cat in the Hat, dropping a heavy wooden bench on my right big toe immediately followed by a trip to the hospital.

I’m no expert and a knowledgeable scientist may disagree; I think the concept of long-term memory was amazingly represented in Pixar’s Inside Out. Easily one of the best movies of 2015 if you ask me.

If you haven’t read it I also highly recommend Creativity, Inc. by Pixar co-founder Ed Catmull and Amy Wallace, one of the most amazing non-fiction books I’ve read.

Somehow short-term memories are transferred to long-term memories and again, scientists don’t understand everything about it. It’s certainly correlated to need, use and repetition. The more those take place, the more likely a memory will be stored for the long-term.

In Inside Out, they represented long-term memory as gigantic maze-like corridors of individual memories in coloured balls. Technicians we are completely unaware of are constantly going through the collection and deciding which are no longer needed, apparently based on the last time the memory was recalled by central emotions and consciousness – or in the case of the TripleDent Gum advert, memory technicians just having a laugh.

“Working in advertising and marketing, I have a few TripleDent Gum in mind on a regular basis.”

Working in advertising and marketing, I have a few TripleDent Gum type adverts that pop back to mind on a regular basis.

One set are weird and quirky French ads for a brand of mints: Kiss Cool. These were really famous when I was a teen. We quoted them constantly – or least my friends and I did. We weren’t the only ones. They’re not subtitled but if you have a look at the early 3D animated graphics you’ll notice how wonderfully weird they are.

Of course watching the ads, now I’m remembering the friends I used to quote these ads with and a bunch of images and events that were stored away somewhere.

A more recent one I’ve appreciated and often comes back to mind unbidden is The Chef, a lovely South African advert for Amstel lager. I just watched it again; it gives me shivers every time. It’s probably personal, at least to a certain extent. Both my brothers are chefs. I enjoy the music track and I like how the story is shot. I don’t think it’s a particularly original ad. It’s well done though, and it works for me. It’s inspiring.

While I’m writing about advertising; this as good a segue as any to plug my brother and his business partners’ new restaurant opening in London at the end of March: KOJAWAN – 21^st Century Izakaya. It has amazing panorama views of London. Futuristic designs are inspired by Blade Runner, Japanimation, Gattaca, 2001: A Space Odyssey and more. You can learn more about it in these recent articles and by listening to the podcast episode I recorded with Björn and Omar.

Now where was I going with this again? I forgot my train of thought.

Right, memory.

It’s known that memory degrades with age. Some parts of the brain fulfilling important functions related to memory lose nerve cells over time. Also I’m no moralist but it’s worth knowing that heavy drug and/or alcohol use isn’t great for your brain on the long run. I’d wager too much reality TV doesn’t help either. To be more specific and perhaps less snobby, it’s really just too much of any one thing repeated over and over and over that doesn’t help.

Repeating something helps us retain it and transfer it to long-term memory and it’s very useful. Repeating it constantly narrows our focus until the thing in question is rendered near meaningless, like a word you repeat to yourself until it makes no sense. Our brains all but shrivel in the face of increasing routine and sameness.

We need a variety of stimuli to keep our memories active; according to this Time article and a few others I’ve read, scientists say the main two ingredients for this are pretty straightforward:

1. Regular physical exercise, supporting a healthy blood flow to the brain.
2. New stimuli: novelty, conversations with other people, talking about new ideas, learning new things, doing things we’ve never done before, stepping out of our comfort zone.

Who knew reading this newsletter with a different topic every week helps your brain keep healthy and active. If you’ve enjoyed reading you can thank me by forwarding to two other friends whom you think will benefit from some Sundae novelty! As some of you know I’m interested in play, games and game design. In a game format to practice all this, I recommend checking out Jane McGonigal’s Super Better book and application. I’m also referring to information gleaned from a few posts on Maria Popova’s excellent Brain Pickings.

Finally, how about learning a few more things in audio format this week?

I talked with Rachel Thompson for my podcast. Rachel is a strategist at a creative marketing agency called The Barbarian Group in New York. She studied Live Action Roleplaying Games (LARPs) in the UK as part of her cultural anthropology masters. It was a fun and fascinating conversation, I think you’ll enjoy it. The full list of episodes is also on iTunes if you’d like to check it out there.

Thanks for reading, see you next week!

Best,
Willem

Spanish Civil War, smoke bombs and Spaghetti Westerns: Papi Antonio’s stories [Ice Cream Sundae]

This newsletter was originally published via email on the 13th March 2016. You can also sign up to receive Ice Cream Sundae with the form on the right-hand side column or here (The newsletter format shifted from long to shorter form since).

My name was meant to be double barrelled: Willem-Anthony.

I was named after both my grandfathers. You can probably guess Willem was my Dutch grandfather on my father’s side. Unfortunately I never knew him, he passed away before my birth. My middle name is Anthony — for some reason it was changed from my grandfather’s name Antonio. My mom told me it was also meant to be the second part of a double-barrelled name: Willem-Anthony. In my opinion that idea was sensibly corrected by whoever was working at the birth registry office that day and Anthony became my middle name.

Antonio Fernandez is my Spanish grandfather. His wife Carmen passed away before my birth. He’s still very much around though and if I’m not mistaken he’ll be celebrating his 95th birthday later this year. Today is not linked to any dates in particular; I just thought I’d write about him and my Spanish ancestry.

He was born in Almería, a city in Andalucia situated in the Southeast of Spain on the Mediterranean Sea. I visited once; thinking it would be a nice idea to explore the area. It’s a port town with regular ferry and cargo connections with Northern African countries. The surrounding area boasts many greenhouses and fields growing fruit for export. Nearby is the driest area of Europe and the continents only true desert climate: El Desierto de Tabernas.

If you’ve seen Spaghetti Westerns, you’ll be familiar with the Tabernas Desert near Almería in Spain.

If you’ve watched any Sergio Leone’s Spaghetti Western movies, you’re pretty familiar with what the area looks like. Starting in the 1950s several film studios set up in the Tabernas Desert. I visited Mini Hollywood, whereFor a Few Dollars More was shot in 1965 and The Good, the Bad and the Uglyin 1966. They turned it into a tourist attraction though it is still occasionally used for commercial filming. There is a daily cowboy stunt show that was fun. It’s definitely worth checking out if you’re in the area.

I also recommend going to the southeastern peninsula of Spain in the Cabo de Gata-Níjar Natural Park, beautiful walks to go on in Spring or Autumn on the ancient volcanic rock cliffs and cactus pear (Barbary fig) fields. I was there in April several years ago. It was still too cold to swim in the sea but the right weather to go hiking. It would probably be really hot to walk around in the summer. Take the opportunity as I did to visit another famous film set: Playa de Mónsul, a beautiful beach where a scene from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade was filmed. San Jose is a great base for a couple of days to explore the Natural Park. It used to be a little known secret, though I think more people have been visiting in the past few years.

I also recommend a fantastic book that begins in Almería: Andalus: Unlocking the Secrets of Moorish Spain, by Jason Webster. A brilliant read about searching for what’s left of the thousand years of Moorish occupation during the Middle Ages in modern Spain.

My grandfather wanted to fight Franco’s army in the Spanish Civil War. He was only fifteen years old.

All that said, my grandfather was only born in Andalucía. He grew up in the geographic centre of Catalonia, in Manresa. He was only fifteen when theSpanish Civil War started. He wanted to go fight Franco’s Army with the Republicans, along with his brothers, but his family didn’t let him. At least this is the story he told me. By the end of the Civil War, Franco had won and Antonio was old enough to be drafted in his army. He was sent to Spanish Morocco for training. His main goal was to rebel and he still had thoughts of joining the small band of resistance fighters, mostly operating from the Pyrenees Mountains in the Basque country and Catalonia.

Shortly after arriving in Morocco he deserted with a small group of like-minded friends. They managed to cross the border into French Morocco and hid there while looking for a boat to take them across the Mediterranean Sea. This was the middle of World War II, not many ships available or captains too keen to cross German infested waters. I recently learned from my aunt this was also the time he started playing chess. He was broke, in hiding and waiting. He played chess ever day for over two years. I also imagine him drinking a lot of mint tea though I have no evidence for that.

If I understood the last part of the story he told me correctly, they didn’t secure transport until after Operation Dragoon had taken place in August 1944, the Allied invasion of southern France. The German armies withdrew after the invasion and southern France ports slowly started operating again. Antonio arrived in Marseille; presumably late 1944 or early 1945 though don’t quote me on dates. He’d heard the Republican Spanish government in exile was based in Toulouse, so he made his way over there. I’m writing his story from memory when he told me about a few years ago and I hadn’t grilled him on dates to get a firm chronology.

He met my grandmother and stayed in Toulouse. As far as I know he never fulfilled his ambitions to join the Spanish Maquis in their guerrilla war againstFranco’s regime. He started a masonry and construction business instead, and kept playing chess. He still plays most days at the Centró Español in Toulouse. He taught me how to play when I was a child but I’ve never pursued this as an interest and I haven’t played in years. He travels a lot; he went on two Transatlantic cruises last year. He’s just gone on another trip to Spain this week.

My grandfather is a bit of a hoarder. When I visited as a kid I was both fascinated and weirded out by the stuff in his apartment.

Antonio still lives in the same apartment my mom and her siblings grew up in, a council estate called Les Mazades. He’s a bit of a hoarder. When I visited as a kid growing up I was fascinated and weirded out by his apartment in about equal parts. It was like exploring stacks of treasure and artefacts from the past, but it was also musty, old and dusty. After close inspection most of the stuff to explore wasn’t all that exciting.

He kept huge stacks of stuff on a large wooden unit in the living room and on the main dining table. I’d take a peek, a lot of were 10–15 year old promotional supermarket or retail offers. Completely out of date. He’d tell me not to touch his stuff. He was never a particularly warm character. Talking about post World War II geopolitics is his favourite topic. I didn’t understand much about what he said until I studied it in high school. Before that we’d play chess, or I’d explore stuff in his apartment while my parents talked with him.

For Christmas he’d occasionally pull something out of a stack of hoarded stuff and hand it to me. More often than not it turned out to be a branded promotional watch he’s been given. I wasn’t convinced when he’d say he was keeping it for me but I’d play along and thank him. To this day he still pretends he doesn’t know who I am whenever I talk to him or visit. He also says it’s a mistake when I call him papi, given he’s way too young to be anyone’s grandfather.

I was usually a pretty nice and well-behaved kid, except for that one time. Well, maybe not the only time but this one had to do with my grandfather. I was about ten or eleven years old when he turned 70. At that point I read several kids magazines that featured gadgets and pranks of various kinds. For a short while I was fascinated with stuff from joke shops.

I used my pocket money in a joke shop to buy coloured smoke bombs that seemed pretty wicked.

We went to Toulouse for his birthday celebrations. A few days before that I used some of my pocket money in a joke shop to buy a few things, including coloured smoke bombs that seemed pretty wicked. I was with my cousin Manuel, he’s about my age and we spent a lot of time together on holidays when we were kids. In front of the Mazades’ main block of flats was a sandy and ugly play area with the strangest kids play area.

The implements looked like a kids playground from afar, but close-up you’d realise it was actually all made of concrete. We’d still go and hang out there, rasp our bums and ruin our clothes on the big concrete slide. I tested one of the smoke bombs, a yellow one, and it turned out to be pretty effective. That’s where I came up with the idea I candidly believed would surprise and delight my family around the dining table.

A couple of hours later, the large table was set for everyone. I’m not sure how many we were, I’d guess at least 12 or 15 people sitting down for the kind of all afternoon lunch we tend to have in Spanish families. In the middle of Antonio’s birthday meal, as everyone was eating Paella, I discreetly lit a purple smoke bomb and threw it under the table.

Thick purple smoke quickly rose from under the table. Let’s just say I was a slightly off the mark with my “surprise and delight” intended effect. My mischievous smile was wiped clean off my face as I realised the grown ups didn’t think this was fun at all.

My mom and aunts completely freaked out. They were terrified and thought the living room was on fire. I only realised later it was probably a healthy reaction to sudden large amounts of smoke rising from the dining table. I guess I’d have a similar reaction nowadays. Not to mention the smell wasn’t that great either. I can’t remember details of how the rest played out, but someone — maybe me, pointed out it was just supposed to be a joke, people calmed down and the smoke bomb was thrown out on the balcony. Grown ups argued whether this was funny or not, with the latter opinion winning that debate. Windows were opened to air the room. I was justifiably told off. That marked the end of my interest in stink bombs and other prank shop favourites.

On the plus side, I learned to consider what other people might think of something and how they’d appreciate it before doing it. Funny enough being to learn about people and putting myself in their shoes to consider what they’d appreciate is an important part of my job as a strategist.

As I remember it my grandfather stayed pretty calm throughout, the smoke didn’t particularly seem to disturb him. He can easily grumble and get angry, on the other hand I don’t think I’ve ever seen him show surprise. I haven’t seen him in a few years, it would be nice to go visit this year. He’s not going to be around forever and I’m pretty sure he still has many stories I don’t know about.

Do you have a close family member whose stories you haven’t heard? You might want to ask them while they’re still around.

I hope you enjoyed reading this. This is the first time I’m sending a Sundae late; I thought I’d acknowledge it. You can blame procrastination for that.

This week on the podcast, I’ve published an interesting conversation I had with Tanya DePass who created a community and movement to promote diversity in the art of gaming.

On the work front, I should be completing my current freelance work this month and I’m starting to look for new freelance project(s) in London starting next month. If you hear of anyone in need of marketing strategy and advice, please give me a shout.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Best,
Willem

The body, backbone and soul of beer brewing in Singapore [Ice Cream Sundae]

This newsletter was originally published via email on the 6th March 2016. You can also sign up to receive Ice Cream Sundae with the form on the right-hand side column or here (The newsletter format shifted from long to shorter form since).

Shortly after I had settled in my new flat in Singapore a few years ago, I was out for a walk on a Sunday afternoon. I stopped at Brewerkz on the Singapore River, a bit of an institution in the City-State, a brewery-pub and restaurant open since 1997.

I sat outside with a view of the river, Clarke Quay and the Saatchi & Saatchi office just across, where I worked at the time. I ordered a pint of their beer to enjoy on the terrace.

After a few minutes appreciating my surroundings, I started writing a list of things I like.

I was looking for a new hobby to keep myself busy in Singapore.

I was looking for something new to learn or practice, a new hobby to keep myself busy in Singapore outside of work. The two previous years while travelling I’d learned new skills with scuba diving and Thai massage, I thought it would be good to pursue this burgeoning tradition.

I got into drinking different kinds of British ales and beers when I first lived in London. A colleague at my first employer drank London Pride, a great example of the London porter beer style. The name porter appeared in the 18^th century and was popularised by street and river porters in London, hence the name. It’s a dark beer, quite strong and hoppy by 18^th century standards, hovering around 6.6% ABV. Shortly after for increased taxation reasons they started brewing a range of porters with different alcoholic strengths. Brewers called them “Single, double and triple Stout”. This is where the “stout” style of beer comes from, including Guinness, originally a “Double Stout London Porter” that was later exported to Ireland.

I started appreciating British ales and found out about CAMRA, The Campaign for Real Ale. They are an independent, voluntary organisation campaigning for real ale, community pubs and consumer rights. Founded in 1971, the four men who founded CAMRA were concerned that a handful of companies were taking over many pubs in the UK and standardising products with low quality and arguably bland flavoured beer.

Traditionally, British cask ales are unfiltered and unpasteurised.

Traditionally, the Great Britain is known for cask ales. This is unfiltered and unpasteurised beer conditioned and served from a cask. The carbonation is natural and no additional Co2 is added to the process. As a result they typically don’t have a lot of bubbles like German or American styles tend to have. The casks are served at room temperature, which is why I kept hearing about Britain’s “warm and flat beers” while growing up in France.

France and England having been “frenemies” for centuries I grew up hearing many such legends of the curious habits of our English neighbours, gathered from peers who had been on holidays or school exchanges there and telling us tales of the mysterious foodstuffs they consumed like jelly, Marmite and lamb in mint sauce.

I warmed up to most English foods since, except Marmite. I’ll probably never get why people inflict this upon themselves. It still fits with the overall theme given the black substance is made from spent brewer’s yeast. The process was originally discovered by a German scientist in the late nineteenth century (go figure what he was trying to accomplish when eating concentrated brewer’s yeast. I imagine it was some sort of bet).

While I worked at iris, I was lucky to be near one of the only craft beer bars in London, The Rake by Borough Market. That’s when I also started discovering craft beers from other countries such as the United States, Norway or Denmark.

In 2008 I found out about these new Scottish brewers, growing and sponsoring a few different events I attended like Twestival in 2009, now they have bars everywhere and are apparently planning to build a brewery in the U.S. as well.

You might have heard of Brewdog by now.

I was hooked on the wide variety of flavours available in unpasteurised and unfiltered craft beers.

Quite naturally, beer appeared on the list I was writing that day.

It occurred to me that I’d heard some people make their own beer at home.

I walked back home and started watching home brewing videos on Youtube to learn the basics. I also found out there were two shops in Singapore selling home brewing material.

A couple weeks later I was the proud owner of a new home brewing kit.

The basic beer-making process is surprisingly easy.

Beer is the world’s most widely consumed alcoholic beverage as well as probably the oldest.

After all, beer is the world’s most widely consumed alcoholic beverage as well as probably the oldest. After water and tea it is the third most drank beverage in the world.

Beer features in the written history of ancient Mesopotamia and Egypt. Its main attribute being fermented cereals, some believe initial forms of beer to be as old as the first steps in agriculture of cereals. A 6,000-year-old Sumerian tablet depicts people drinking a beverage believed to be beer through reed straws. A 3,900-year-old Sumerian poem honouring Ninkasi, the patron Goddess of brewing, contains the oldest known beer recipe.

Talking about recipes, modern beer is made from four key ingredients:

1. Water, the body of beer

Water constitutes over 95% of the beverage. In fact, during the Middle Ages when water wasn’t deemed safe for consumption, people drank beer instead.

Water often contains minerals, nutrients that yeast will use to ferment the beer and give it flavour compounds. The water matters greatly to the style of flavour of the beer brewed. For example Plzen (Pilsen) in the Czech Republic is famous for having soft water and being almost completely free of minerals. That turned out to be great for making the clear and crisp Pilsener lagers the Czechs are famous for.

In the UK, Burton upon Trent in Staffordshire is kind of the opposite in the brewing world. Their water is hard. Local water from boreholes contained high levels of dissolved salts and resulting sulphate in the mineralised water famously brings out hop flavours.

2. Malt, the backbone of beer

Beer is fermented grain. We use barley in vast majority. Malting is the process by which the harvested grains are steeped in water just long enough to begin sprouting, and then are dried again to interrupt the process.

The sprouted grain releases nutrients and sugars that would be used by the plant to grow, and that will be used to ferment into beer instead.

The malted grain can also be roasted, and depending on the time and technique, this contributes an important to part of the colour and style of the beer being made. Stouts for example contain roasted and grilled malt, giving darker colour, hints of coffee and cocoa in the flavour.

3. Hops, the beer’s personality

In antique times grain fermented beer-like drinks in France or the UK didn’t use hops. They used a variety of different foraged herbs to give the fermented drink flavour.

In 1516 Brewers and legislators in Bavaria got together to draft the “Reinheitsgebot” (“German Beer Purity Law”), stating that beer would contain water, barley malt and hops.

Hops provide the bitterness in beer as well as a great deal of flavour and aroma. It’s the flower of a plant and was first used in beer in the 9^th century. In addition to bitter, zesty, flowery, zesty and citrusy flavouring, hops have convenient antibacterial effects that preserve beer. This also helped make it a very common water replacement during the Middle-Ages.

As a side note, the hop plant is a cousin of cannabis and their flowers look similar. The active compounds in hops that are used to bitter and give aromas to beers have psychoactive effects in cannabis. Human beings have been interested in and experimenting with a variety of psychoactive substances for a long time.

4. Yeast, the beer’s soul

When they wrote the “Reinheitsgebot” in 1516, they omitted yeast. That’s because we didn’t know about it and wouldn’t find out for certain until Louis Pasteur came round to study and identify these microorganisms and their role in alcoholic fermentation in the 19^th century.

These little microbes absorb simple sugars from the barley malts and transform them into alcohol.

Yeast also provides a whole range of flavours depending on the beer styles sought. It is often the most kept secret from brewers as an important point of differentiation amongst breweries. Indeed they often purchase malted barley or hops from similar supply sources, while the recipes and know-how from the brewer matters of course, the choice of yeast can be the distinctive yet difficult to explain reason people go back to one beer rather than another brewer’s.

The difference between ales and lagers are a matter of the type of yeast used and the fermentation temperature. Ales ferment at higher temperatures (around 20-25ºC / 68-77ºF, while lagers ferment at colder temperatures (often around 10-15ºC / 50-59ºF).

Now we have all the main ingredients let’s find out about the basic beer brewing process.

First you have to measure and heat all the water you’re going to need to brew. This has been calculated in advance based on your recipe. It changes based on the volume of beer you’re brewing of course, and also depends on the material you are using.

It has been heated to a specific temperature conducive to extract most of the simple sugars from the malted barley. The target temperature approximately ranges from 65ºC (150ºF) to 76ºC (170ºF). This part of the process generally calls for pouring the warm water in a prepared recipient like a water cooler that can maintain the water’s temperature for an hour to 90 minutes.

Then you extract this sweet barley juice called the wort, and pour it into a large boiling pot.

Boiling has two functions: sterilizing the mixture and for hops to provide bitterness. When they’re boiled, the alpha acids in hops are broken down and add to the bitterness.

The brew boils for an hour to 90 minutes for most recipes, with different varieties of hops added at different stages of the boiling time depending on recipes.

From the moment you turn the stove off, the wort’s temperature has to be brought down from boiling point to approximately 20ºC (68ºF) as fast as possible in order to add the yeast.

This is a tricky time and everything in the preparation area has to be spotless clean to avoid contamination.

This is a tricky time and everything in the preparation area has to be spotless clean to avoid contamination by bacteria that can easily spoil the beer. Different techniques can be used to cool the mixture down, from throwing giant iced plastic bottles in there, to copper coils running continuous cold water. At the same time stirring the wort aerates it, which is a good thing, sufficient amounts of oxygen will stimulate the yeast and allow it to multiply and thrive.

When the wort has finally cooled down, the yeast will be able to survive in the wort. If it’s too hot, a lot of the yeast dies off. It should be dropped in and then the fermenter is hermetically sealed to prevent air into the fermenting environment. An air lock, usually with a small amount of water, lets the C02 generated by the fermenting process to evacuate while preventing air and bacteria in the fermentation environment.

The primary fermentation takes a few days and generates a scum of dead yeast that accumulates to the surface of the brew. If the recipe calls for it, this can be the time to add hops to brew in the fermenter like tea. It’s called “dry hopping” and gives the beer citrusy aromas. It is a popular process with the American-styled pale ales and IPAs (India Pale Ale).

Leave the brew a few more days and it will be ready to be bottled. A small amount of brewer’s sugar is typically added during the bottling process to encourage any residual yeast to finish fermentation and creates Co2 in the bottle, giving the beer its final carbonation level. Bottles should be left to complete fermentation for a few weeks before being drank.

All in all the process takes three to six weeks from the brewing day to the day you can invite friends around to taste.

In Singapore, I typically alternated between traditional and original beer styles. Even though I didn’t completely master main styles like pale ales, I enjoyed experimenting with ingredients.

My most original recipes included a brown ale with pecan nuts and maple syrup; and a bourbon and vanilla pod oatmeal stout. The latter was like a dessert beer and quite delicious.

I haven’t brewed since I left Singapore and I miss it now.

I haven’t brewed since I left Singapore and I miss it now. I hope to brew again once I’m settled in my new place in London. I love that while it’s fairly easy to make a drinkable beer, there’s a whole world to learn in order to make different styles of beers and it takes mastery to be able to reproduce the same beer again and again. I’ll tell you once I start again and maybe offer to send you some samples to taste it.

I hope you enjoyed reading, enjoy the rest of your weekend! If you have beer, drink with moderation of course.

If you’d like to listen to something I’ve just published a new episode of the podcast, an interview with Philippa White. She founded The International Exchange (TIE), a fascinating organisation that works with creative communications professionals and places them with non-profit organisations in developing countries in need of their skills.

Cheers,
Willem