The Double Kiss

To spice up my blog I really want to draw you in with a new special category “culture shock of the day.” Remember the guys from Germany that wanted us to be in the commercial? Well, we saw one of them again today. In many other countries when people greet they kiss on the cheeks instead of shaking hands or hugging (you’re probably thinking duh Morgan) but anyway I thought the German guy was going in for a handshake today and it turns out I received CHEEK KISSES haha. I ended up air kissing both sides of the check, which I find extremely awkward but very COOL at the same time. This happened earlier in the week with the Dominican Republic guy and I was placed in the same situation. I feel so cultured when placed in these scenarios and I find it quite entertaining. I have observed that this is a common way of greeting someone at the festival and may try out my new expertise soon!!

Today was the last full day of the festival (tear!) I started my day with a hot tea (from our favorite place) but instead of water I asked for skim milk, which was a nice change (switching it up a little bit haha!) Our whole group attended the HP Graphic Arts and BBDO workshop, which was titled Creative Engineering: The Digital and Physical Background. Their campaign was for Billboard music. BBDO and HP digitally created small pictures of influential music artists. These pictures were then added to a database of famous artists for consumers to choose their “inspiring entertainment artists.” Once the consumer chose the face/faces of their music role models they could digitally upload a picture and these small photo dots would combine and eventually create a modified image of them. It’s a little hard to grasp the concept without seeing the presentation but it was really ingenious and creative idea. The workshop was a little lengthy and disorganized but the concept was profound. I was amazed with the graphic artist who digitally created the images in Photoshop!

After the workshop, we spoke with the BBDO guy from Atlanta. It was a nice change to actually have somebody from USA and even better the South! He told us that we are in the golden age of creativity and that the world is like a Nascar uniform... you can make it what you want (now that’s a true Southern boy haha) Also, he said there will be more changes in the next 5 years with technology than in the last 25. (Bring it on...I’m ready J) He said that his generation (the older one) is the “digital immigrants.” I laughed when he said that because it’s so true. My parents have technical problems with their computers all the time and I have to always go help them “cross the border” when it comes to these issues!

After our entertaining speaker, we went into the overflow room and listened to The Cannes Debate. I thought it was very monotonous and uninteresting except for the part when they talked about iPads. The speaker said that the tablet is the most powerful and impactful device in our day. It can start to engage and educate kids at a young age. It has many opportunities that have not yet been explored. He also said that the iPad can tell you a lot about the person from the apps they have on it. I started to zone out and think to myself that I wanted my iPad, which is back in Georgia. I was considering the apps I have on mine and what he said is definitely true. I have news apps, photography apps, reading apps, and food apps (which I consider all very HIGH priorities on my list!)

The last seminar I went to was with the CEO of Nestle. I would venture to say that the only reason I went to this seminar is because of my interest in chocolate haha! So here’s some cool/interesting/strange facts:

-Nestle sells 1.2 billion products a day!

-The CEO told us that chocolate was healthy (sure Mr. CEO a 250 calorie bar of chocolate is stocked with the sugar and fat you need to promote healthy food choices everyday)

-Only 10% of his company is using digital marketing (that’s disappointing...so how does Nestle reach out to the younger generation (which is me!)?

-And the best thing we got FREE CHOCOLATE BARS! I repeat we received free chocolate (exactly the reason why I went!)