nabil laoudji

poetry, prose, design thinking & entrepreneurship

  • HOME
  • PORTFOLIO
    • Audio
    • Video
    • Poetry
    • Prose
  • CONTACT

36 Hours in Buffalo

June 2, 2010 by Nabil 2 Comments

First full day of interviewing / story-gathering is complete. I feel encouraged, anxious, ecstatic, and exhausted. Encouraged because I feel that I was able to access a super diverse cross-section of a new-to-me city. This bodes well for my remaining stops. Anxious because I feel that given my lack of training I may be (okay, am) making super basic and easily correctable mistakes (e.g. framing faces incorrectly in shots). Ecstatic because hey even if I’m making mistakes I’m finally actually doing it. Exhausted because, well it’s been a long day.

My interviews today included:
– Nookie, a grandfather, carpenter, and hilarious rapper
– Chris, a new manager of one of the most important stores in East Buffalo — a covered market that is at the heart of urban entrepreneurship (and will soon host a rooftop garden)
– Chris II, a Cornell-educated white collar consultant who went against the grain and left Washington DC for Buffalo
– Gary, a man who supplies Hollywood with some of the best custom-made hats money can buy
– Albert (below), a 76 year old father of 14 boys who told me a great story about stealing a whistle as a child (and his mother’s retribution)

I’m not sure when I’ll have the time to edit and upload the video (likely once I arrive in LA), however to put a face to a name, I’ve upload some snapshots into the Photo album (see toolbar above).

Tomorrow: Detroit (via Canada).

@

Filed Under: Stream Tagged With: buffalo, community, experiment, rebirth, values

A conversation with Jeanne Dasaro, Co-Founder, NPi

May 5, 2010 by Nabil Leave a Comment

This afternoon I had a great conversation with Jeanne Dasaro, co-founder of The New Prosperity Initiative (NPi), a nonprofit that publishes hopeful stories of people and organizations that are working to build social and economic prosperity in their communities.

I asked Jeanne for her advice regarding my summer project and she imparted some great wisdom. Specifically:
– When conducting an interview, do the video afterwards. Video has a way of taking the air out of the room.
– Beware: It’s easy to get caught up in an interview, lower your threshold for good answers, and then come home realizing that you didn’t get much that you can use.
– Phrasing questions to get a good answer is a lot harder then it seems. At the basic level it’s the difference between: “how was your day?” versus, “tell me about something that happened today”

Jeanne also pointed me to a few great resources that I’m excited to look into:
– I Heart Strangers: A running (daily!) compilation of photographs, and the stories of people in them. Created by Joshua Langlais.
– Theatre of the Oppressed: A theatrical concept where spectators are brought into the performance of a play about social issues. I’ve been thinking about how to mix improv with true narrative and this is an exciting manifestation of this.
– The Small Story: A site based on the belief that everyone has a story. Created by Cara Solomon.
– Positive Detroit: A website which publishes only positive news from the city of Detroit.

Here’s to positive narratives that build community and understanding-

Filed Under: Stream Tagged With: community, interview, launch, learnings, story tips, storytelling

Welcome

Nabil Laoudji Twitter LinkedIn Instagram More Info

Recent Tweets

  • What’s cool about history is that it keeps repeating itself with better technology 🥲 about 4 months ago
  • .@LUMAInstitute Think-Aloud Testing hits TikTok #designthinking https://t.co/OI9PTlvwaY about 4 months ago
  • RT @usopen: That final feeling 🙌 Ons Jabeur and Iga Swiatek will battle for the women's singles title! @Cadillac Iconic Moments | #USOpen… about 4 months ago
  • RT @WTA: 😘 Two worthy #USOpen finalists 🙌 @iga_swiatek | @Ons_Jabeur https://t.co/WrO5W4now7 about 4 months ago
@laoudji

Recent Snaps

This error message is only visible to WordPress admins

Error: No posts found.

Make sure this account has posts available on instagram.com.

Click here to troubleshoot

Recent Comments

  • Don on How meditation helped me get a handle on compulsive thoughts
  • Shehab on Amazon & Wikileaks: Sorting Out the Controversy
  • Mike on On Purpose
  • Katherine Molina on On Purpose
  • Anne on On Purpose

Archives

Tags

AI arab spring boston buffalo business career comedy community democracy design thinking Entrepreneurship ethnography family film improv india interview landscape launch learnings lessons los angeles massmouth MBA meditation mental health MIT music NYC occupy oprah passion performance ethnography public speaking revolution risk rust belt sales standup storytelling story tips tunis tunisia ucb values

Thanks

Thanks for visiting!

Copyright © 2023 · Metro Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in