The poi pendants are finished and available on homeofpoi.com!

This is one of my cherished projects from Bali. They are carved out of bone and horn by a sweet family of Balinese artists I met in Ubud (the cultural hub of Bali). The design ideas came via a series of visions and a lot of sketching, and were influenced by the people and events and art I encountered in Bali. The symbols have been a work in progress ever since Alex and I designed the first DVD. We'll add more symbols as the ideas evolve.

At first I wanted to make the pendants with silver but Made kept showing up at Chakya Muna to deliver his carvings to the others. He is so sweet and smiley that I couldn't help but work with him. We've made 15 of each of the seven symbols to begin. We'll limit production to 100 pieces of each symbol. I might still do a run of pendants in silver one day but I'll re-design them first.

This is the first manifestation in a series of design-projects. It is hopefully the beginning of a very positive relationship with the talented artists of Bali and a small group of supportive online shops. If it works I can return to training and developing a special show (and more video tutorials of course). I've had visions of performing ever since I started poi, but everything has simply been too hectic. With a little luck this will be the flexible part-time job I've always dreamed of. I might even be able to buy a video camera and a computer more capable of editing videos. That would definitely make more videos more plausible. :)

The other projects include the pants I wear in some of the videos, poi-specific hip-sacks, and practice-poi. The timeline is unclear, as I don't want to get buried under logistics and administration.

All of this has moved forwards largely because I received so much support and enthusiasm from George at homeofpoi.com, Sean and Prisna at flowtoys.com, and Sam at feuershow.de... also Cole and Lisa in England of course, oh, and Ge and Olivier and everybody else from the summer and Jocelyn obviously and my mom and dad for taking me shopping for much-needed supplies but I digress.

So, if you like the videos I've made over the years, please have a look at the pendants and the playpoi-approved poi (coming soon). I think it's a perfect win/win relationship in the making.

Next step for me is finishing the tutorials with Jocelyn and the Website with Darren. Pray that I don't experience too many more "hickups," because we've had enough this past two months!

Much love from... some train in Germany,

Nick