Month: August 2017

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A Brief Primer about Six Off Piste

We as a family left the USA five years ago to move to Paris, France to learn another language, see, meet, expand, explore, challenge, be frustrated, persevere and learn. Little was easy about the experience, yet in the shared struggle, for the kids, Stacia and me, came a heightened awareness and powerful alertness, much like an Elan that is without it’s own herd, at dusk, at a new watering hole. Perhaps the best description is simply more alive.

In France, based in a global crossroads like Paris, Nicholas, Alexander and Annika were able to experience and meet and befriend people from pretty much everywhere. Being challenged to live and learn in the French language, whilst in Paris can be simultaneously fun… and humiliating. Character building, I suppose my Dad, James Sr. would call it. But the root transformation that transpired was what one broadly might define as “experiential learning.” And with ages comes the realization that there is no “dry run”, no “Mulligan” in this life.

After five years, the French tax authorities were less welcoming, and we decided to try something newer, bolder, scary, and yet wholly right for us. Determining there is likely only one window in which we could take a ‘gap year’ as a family, and continue to view and immerse ourselves in the world “experientially”, we decided to “step off the dock” and set sail one more time.

With these watch words of learning as our guide: experiential, immersive, service to others, gratitude, unifying, familial, humble, expansive and joyous, we have set off for a year to travel 360 degrees of the world. We began heading West from Paris on an around the world ticket that is so cheap as to be nearly incomprehensible. (More on that in a later post.) After family visits in the USA, we now head primarily to parts of Asia: Indonesia, Japan, China, Hong Kong, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Bhutan. And Africa: Ethiopia, Uganda, Cote d’Ivoire, Senegal, Kenya, Zimbabe, Zambia, South Africa, Rwanda, and…

The kids will be home schooled with a supreme STEM tutor in the 3 R’s, plus experiential astronomy, immersive physics, and other learning possibilities that arise. We hope to eat lake fly burgers in Uganda, document chimp interactions on Lake Victoria, visit cocoa bean farmers in Cote d’Ivoire, eat scorpions and tarantulas in Cambodia, visit robots in China, and study art and aesthetics in Japan.*

This and other craziness we discover and encounter will be documented in print and on video at our blog, WWW.SIXOFFPISTE.COM, or trip photos which tell the tale on Instagram, @SIXOFFPISTE.

Feel free to join us as voyeur whilst stowed away in our “virtual luggage”, (as with the political climate, some have requested join us in the real luggage)**. The trials, tribulations and unvarnished experiences will be there for all to see, laugh with, and laughed at!

It is with a sense of unbounded gratitude and limitless humility that we sign off…for now

May all the love, safety and good forces be with you all.

Nicholas, Alexander, Annika, Stacia and Michael

* If you have any questions, comments or wished for topics or views not covered as we progress, feel free to email us with ideas and requests.

** If there is anyone that you think might enjoy or benefit from our experiences, feel free to invite them to our perch noted above.

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Our First Gift Gotten

We have come to realize over our lives that gifts gotten, and gifts given, often arrive when and from places one might never expect.  And frequently gifts arrive in a form one might not anticipate. Some of life’s gifts are obvious, and sometimes they come in the form of what Garth Brookes refers to as “unanswered prayers”. (If you don’t know it, have a listen)  

Well, our first surprise gift on our journey came from Jane and Chris, two finer friends and playmates you will never cross paths with. As we left their delightful home and warm hospitality, Jane handed me a gift that is worthwhile reading for young and old alike. It is a letter written in 1940 by a British family, racing across Northern France as they try to outrace the Nazis, with tanks and troops around them, as they try and keep their dog from barking. And the end result is, well, properly British. It’s a wonderful read and a keeper. I won’t spoil it for you. Thank you, Chris, Jane and kids for hosting our tribe.

Enjoy. (Click them twice to enlarge)

 

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Ding, Ding. School is in session. Arthur has sent your first assignment.

Kids, your new teacher, Arthur has sent your first assignment.   “In a brief video, no more than 3 minutes each, tell me about yourself and show me who you are.”

Teacher feedback:

“Annika’s vocabulary and comprehension are off the charts. She will be (is?) a force to be reckoned with.

Alexander: introspective and humble. Perhaps the Philosopher-Scientist.
Nicholas: favorite comment: American kids are more American. When I was in Europe it was so easy to pick out the Americans.
I do play video games: Simcity, Civilization, Pokemon Go (caught 230), Battlefront.
Most important thing to convey about school next year: each child will have a significant voice in what they will be learning. If Alexander wants to learn more astronomy then that’s what we’ll do. If Nicholas wants to learn more technology then that’s what we’ll do.
The video was amazing. You were correct when you felt that your kids felt comfortable in front of a camera.
Two weeks!”
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The Vesuvius ExperiMentos: A Trial Run at Silly Video Making

 

In the spirit of beta testing the idea of making a fun video, the creatures spent a day researching the science behind the famous Mentos experiment. While learning about new subject matter, they didn’t realize they were developing their writing, public speaking skills, and general confidence through the history of the Vesuvius volcanic explosion, and the concept of making life learning fun. (A first attempt).

Enjoy.

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“Plastics Benjamin, Plastics”

A couple years ago, I was asked to speak to a group of very bright high school juniors and seniors for career day at my high school Alma Mater. This would definitely fall into the category of “elite private school”, by any standards. The subject at hand was “a career in Finance.” Three segments consecutively, with a few minutes in between, no break. Very enlightening.

I was paired with a sharp young man who was then working 26 hours per day for Goldman Sachs, “Straight Outta Undergrad,” from Johns Hopkins which is highly unusual.  He was sharp, poised, and a delightful young man. Two years in, he said he’d had about just one year left in him to do that job before surrendering.

Career Day. There were probably 10 or 15 occupational pursuits in which students had a choice about which to learn, and each segment ran every 40 minutes. Having chosen three potential interests each, they rotated from one room to the next. Everything from film, entrepreneurship, journalism, arts, engineering, lawyering, accounting and the like. (I wish I’d kept the list of choices to see what else was…and was not on there.)

I had looked at the roster and noticed one anomaly. As such, as contrarians, we began by asking the students, “Do any of you know which occupation had the largest number of the same segments running simultaneously”? ie. There was so much demand for certain careers by kids for which they needed to add more rooms and more presenters for that field. None knew the answer.

As it turns out, the most demanded occupation for career day was? Finance, by a factor of four.

We then asked the kids, many of whose parents were in finance themselves, and this being the NY Metro area, “How many of you know anything about what is involved in various aspects of banking and finance”?

Very few hands.

Next, “How many of you came here because you were told to go to this session because your Mom or Dad told you, “go to the finance breakout”?

Almost three-quarters of the hands slowly rose, sheepishly, as they looked around at their peers.

Like in most vocational pursuits, the most important requirement is unbridled passion, that comes from within. As my Dad always said, “if you’re going to be a ditch digger, be the best damn ditch digger you can be”! But in any profession, if you’re going to do it, do it for yourself and your own motivations. Enduring the long hours, taxing nights, the heartaches, the missed this and that, the cramped flights and often the humiliation along the way is impossible to endure if you’re there because “Someone else thought it was a good idea”. Or because “You heard it was good and pays a lot of dough.”

One of my favorite expressions has always been, “The secret to a rich life is when your vocation and your avocation are the same, and you never have to work a day in your life”.

I’ve been lucky. My skills, interests, and personality fit hand in glove with my career pursuit. I often “air thank” every teacher I ever had for not recommending Ritalin. And I thank my lucky stars for somewhat successfully navigating choices that placed me in each of those “right” times and places.

But my career pursuit doesn’t exist anymore. Nor do many related careers. And therein lies the message.

Learn to learn. Search far and wide. And embrace change.
Choose wisely.