This is an archived blog from when I ran Conscious Public Relations Inc. from 2008-2018. Excuse the potential outdated-ness!
This past weekend’s #sayhitoastranger campaign
It’s true that the work that lights your soul on fire is exactly the work you should be doing.
I just completed our media report for the most recent edition of the #sayhitoastranger campaign that we sponsored, and it turns out that not only did we increase our results by 23% from February 2015, but we’ve gotten the most results from this project than the others we did this past year.
While this was a pro-bono project, this campaign is a great example of the work we love doing and probably has the most impact than all of the projects we have worked on this year. I expected to be exhausted coming back to work from being active all three days of the weekend, but I purposely did less street team shifts than before, and found that my soul was energized from the weekend of meeting people in the Vancouver community and having meaningful conversations. We would of course say yes in a heartbeat if this project paid us, but it really wasn’t about that in the end. The benefits of being a part of something like this are priceless. And in the end, it’s a reflection of our best work yet in 8 months.
Here are some snapshots of us (mostly me) in action around town. My selfie skills are getting better.
Me on the Skytrain in the morning, in a lonely car. No strangers to say hi to!
First group of girls from Japan that I had a conversation with at Grandview Park.
Dada Anandamarga is the first Tantrik Monk I’ve ever met and he schooled me in Tagalog. He had beautiful and wise things to say. Photo: Kaare Long
Wahida and I with #sayhitoastranger founder Kaare Long (centre).
The t-shirts by The Print Doctor looked awesome (thanks, Matt!).
I got a shot with Iria from Spain just before the sun went down. She had a beautiful accent that I only hear in Pedro Almodovar movies and she adorned herself so beautifully with vibrant colours and glitter makeup.
This group of students from India, Tanzania, China and Thailand were awesome to talk to and represented the unique diversity of cultures that make up Vancouverites.
Councillor Andrea Reimer came out to see what it was like to say hello to random strangers. I can’t wait to see what conversations came out of the video footage.
Brent is a bit of a celebrity in the DTES at The Uncommon Cafe, where we were stationed.
He is a great conversationalist and we talked about a range of topics.
Sam lives in Tinseltown but also seemed to be pretty popular in the area too.
He was one of the happiest fellows I met during the whole weekend.
Lloyd of Magpie Vancouver took a photo of Sam, Katrina and I outside of their amazing vintage store. I highly recommend a visit whenever you come down to Main Street. Their hanging flower bouquets were absolutely gorgeous.
I also ran into Chef Vikram Vij outside of Magpie. Even though he probably didn’t remember me from when we worked together last year, he was at least friendly. And that’s all that you can hope to expect when you say hi.