Click here to watch our rock music web series Big in the 'Stans. Photo by David Gill.SUPPORT HELO!
Welcome to Issue XIV - January & February 2012
Wednesday, January 25, 2012 at 05:10PM AFGHANISTAN | Hojat Hameed, in a short documentary by Daniel J Gerstle, January 2012. Full short documentary coming soon.
Tuesday, January 17, 2012 at 08:05PM JOURNEY | Documentary short by PichaMtaani.org, January 2012
Take a look at this new documentary from Boniface Mwangi and his organization PichaMtaani.org to see the latest reflections by Kenyans about the brutal political and ethnic violence from which the country is only beginning to recover.
The 30- minute documentary is a touching story and eyewitness account of the tragedy that befell Kenyans after the 2007 December elections. Victims and perpetrators meet together as they narrate their stories on Kenya worst tribal conflict that left over 1,500 dead and nearly 500,000 people internally displaced. A cry for justice and reconciliation rings through this documentary and what will happen if we don't reconcile before 2012 elections.
Friday, January 6, 2012 at 01:11PM SOMALIA, SOUTH SUDAN, KENYA, USA | Photo Essay by Daniel J Gerstle, David Bolen, Mykolas Gudelis, and Shayan Amini, January 2012
We've been on the road producing some fantastic projects. Check it out! If you have stories for our humanitarian audience or would like us to produce media, contact us at HELObazaar@gmail.com. If you're in the humanitarian and human rights communities, go join our brand new Humanitarian Bazaar where you can post / seek / buy sell / trade / request / network.
Since we do most of our humanitarian media work without pay, also consider donating via check to HELO Magazine, c/o The Hive, 20 Cook Street, Brooklyn, New York, USA 11206, by PayPal to HELObazaar@gmail.com, or contact us if you have any questions. Peace and margaritas. Enjoy every day.
Riding ECHO in Somalia. Screenshot: Daniel J Gerstle
Wednesday, January 4, 2012 at 06:45AM WITNESS | Photos by Michael Marquand, January 2012
The fantastic New York-based photographer spent months learning about HELO Media and its pilot project HELO Magazine at our headquarters in Brooklyn. Here we at long last give you a sneak peek at Michael's work. You can find more and his whole collection over at (what a plug!) MarquandPhoto.com. While you're at it, come join and post in our new Humanitarian Bazaar Facebook Group.
HELO Media planning its next mission. By Michael Marquand.
Monday, January 2, 2012 at 10:31AM 
Capoeira. By Martine Perret / Creative Commons.GLOBAL | Daniel J Gerstle, January 2012
Wake up, 2012! Happy New Year, friends. Out of bed. Turn on some music. A hard stretch. Capoeira. Toast. Fresh tomatoes. And a large dark roast coffee. We have fierce challenges on the horizon, so let's get started.
Ladies and gents, we at HELO Media are just back from co-producing the Sound Central rock festival in Afghanistan; producing documentary videos for the aid agency Horn Relief (soon to be renamed "Adeso") in Somalia, Kenya, and South Sudan; and making a mini-doc on Somali music for FreeMuse.org in Kenya. We've been so freaking busy we know it's time to re-connect socially to YOU, our beloved audience. So here's what we're going to do.
After spending our first year creating our pilot project, HELO Magazine, which has reached about forty countries and 20,000 visitors, and our second year creating HELO Productions and the Frontline Music Alliance, we will be spending this third year building the final piece of the puzzle, The Humanitarian Bazaar.
The Humanitarian Bazaar just opened on Facebook as a social network group where you can post your insider questions to the humanitarian community: seeking / buying / trading / need advice / looking for unusual gear/wisdom. Examples:
Got it? Cool, right? We should have no problem reaching 500<1000 people in 20<30 countries by the end of the month, then more and more. Although there are plenty of social networks out there, we would be the first and only one that is sectorless, welcoming expats and locals from any career field, and will be weaved together with a humanitarian magazine (HELO Mag), musician community (HELO's Frontline Music Alliance), and local communities in crisis zones (currently strongest in Nairobi, Kabul, Bosaso, Khartoum, but many more places represented).
Given we reach critical mass and funding by spring we'll create the full online website version which will be like a crisis zone Craigslist including a store for finding gear, guides, and fashion specifically useful to the humanitarian and journalist community.
Sound good? Go post here! You can also send posts, provide advice, ask questions, and donate by PayPal via HELObazaar@gmail.com.
Tuesday, December 27, 2011 at 07:39PM 
Midigale, Sanag, Somalia. Daniel J Gerstle.Mighty Somali camels carry nomad homes past Midigale, Sanag, northeastern Somalia. HELO Media founder Daniel J Gerstle and filmmaker Seth Chase had the opportunity to produce media for and about the African aid agency Horn Relief this fall. Since we were riding along on this one, consider this an editorial essay. Now at long last you can see where we were during our break between stories. All photos by Daniel J Gerstle, November 2011.
Saturday, November 26, 2011 at 06:43AM 
Outside Eldofar, Somalia. By Daniel J Gerstle. SOMALIA, KENYA, SOUTH SUDAN | Daniel J Gerstle, Nov 2011
Dear friends and enemies! Yes, after heading to Afghanistan to co-produce the world's first "stealth" music festival, also known as the Afghan rock festival Sound Central, we, HELO Magazine (and its parent company HELO Media), disappeared off your RSS and Facebook scrolls. What happened to us?
We were doing what we love and that's journeying through the African desert producing videos, photo essays, and stories about how peope survive the most extreme conditions on Earth. On this trip, Seth Chase of Drewstone Productions joined HELO Founder Daniel J Gerstle on location with the humanitarian aid agency, Horn Relief, in Somalia, Northern Kenya, and South Sudan, producing promotional videos for their work.
Along the way, we did some high speed off-roading which resulted in a flipped car (above), slithered through bandit country (hence the armed guards, above), embedded briefly with camel-herding nomads in the remote desert, and got completely demolished by swarms of mosquitos after a shock rain.
Coming up soon, we have Whitney Eulich's long awaited story about minority voting rights in Guatemala, Benedict Fleming's short story about jogging in Cambodia, and a number of dispatches from Daniel J Gerstle on Afghan and Central Asian rock, Somalia's snuggly underbelly, and more.
Remember to enjoy every day when you can, cause life is short, and complaining causes wrinkles. Unless you're a genuine supermasochist, in which case maybe you'd like to get into aid work or crisis journalism? Stay frosty. More soon.
Monday, October 17, 2011 at 05:12PM 
Monday, October 3, 2011 at 08:09AM AFGHANISTAN | Directed and produced by Ruth Owen. Starring Ru, Travka, and Andronik of the Kabul-based rock band White City. Motion graphics by James Chaliz and Ruslan Shukurov. Post-Produced by HELO Media, Sep 27, 2011
Episode Thirteen of Fourteen. Go here for the full series to date.
Ladies and Gentlemen! White City- is -"Big in the 'Stans." Tune in every Tuesday and Thursday July 26th through late September 2011 for our fourteen-part web series which follows the Kabul-based rock band White City as it tours Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Pakistan. Let us know what you think by writing below, or to HELObazaar@gmail.com! Follow and contact the band at WhiteCityKabul.com. Watch the series here at HELOmagazine.org/big-in-the-stans/.
Saturday, October 1, 2011 at 02:26AM SOUNDSCAPES | Daniel J Gerstle, October 1st, 2011
We're witnessing a historic moment today in Kabul, Afghanistan, where, despite the war, all four professional Afghan rock bands based in the country - Kabul Dreams, White Page, District Unknown, and Morcha - plus Eklektika (Kazakhstan), Tears of the Sun (Uzbekistan), White City (Afghan-based expats), MC Izzy (Australia), DJ City Power (UK), and Massa Cygent (Australia) are performing a day-long rock music festival main event.
Outside, in Kabul's lovely, mountain-ringed Babur Gardens, women singers, hard rockers, as well as heavy metal heads will enjoy melodic noise in full view and ear shot of Kabul. Today's concert main event comes after a series of underground bunker side show concerts in Kabul, as well as an opening night in New York, all of which were last minute "invite only," both for security reasons and to remind global visitors of the risks many musicians take for their art. More events are to follow today's big show.
The world press will insist this is a story about security, putting on a show during a war in which insurgents actively want to destroy modern music culture and prevent women from public roles.
But for the musicians and organisers, many of whom live and thrive in a relatively safe micro-climate in Kabul's moderate Qala-i-Fatullah neighborhood, and feel the security threat is overblown by media, this festival and its main event are really more about forming solidarity for those who enjoy - and need - the Kabul and Central Asian rock and alternative music scene. In fact, the festival's underground shows and the mentoring relationships between local and international bands is much more akin to the '70s Kabul psychadelic scene or '80s Salt Lake City punk scene than it is to any war zone Band Aid project.
Without a doubt the great credit for pulling this concert together goes to Travis Beard, the festival founder, organiser, and performer, an eccentric motorbiking rocker who is turning out to be Kabul's version of Malcolm Mclarren, his team of organisers, and the four Afghan bands who wanted to perform no matter who might threaten them because of their being part of a movement that shows youth what a peaceful, free, alternative Kabul culture scene may one day look like.
HELO Media, and this writer, have the unusual pleasure of being able to cover the entire festival, all events from Kabul to New York to Los Angeles, from the inside, as well as being festival co-producer.
We've got to run to the main event now. Stay tuned for more stories from inside the festival, here on HELO Magazine. This short piece will soon be followed by a feature showing you back stage and behind the scenes of this exclusive and incredibly unusual "stealth" festival.
The full festival and its schedule can be found at SoundCentralFestival.com.
Eklektika, of Kazakhstan.
Thursday, September 29, 2011 at 02:54AM AFGHANISTAN | Directed and produced by Ruth Owen. Starring Ru, Travka, and Andronik of the Kabul-based rock band White City. Motion graphics by James Chaliz and Ruslan Shukurov. Post-Produced by HELO Media, Sept 29, 2011
Episode Thirteen of Fourteen. Go here for the full series to date.
Ladies and Gentlemen! We have finally reached the climax of the series, which is a lead in to Sound Central: The Central Asian Modern Music Festival, the world's first "stealth" music festival, which White City took a leading role in, set in Kabul, Afghanistan. The festival succeeded. Watch this series to learn about the bands of Central Asia on the road, and then follow it up with a drink from the ongoing coverage of the festival.
Most importantly, stay tuned for Ru Owen's feature documentary version of the White City story which will include not only hijinx as seen in this web series, but will follow more personally the story of a journalist (Ru), aid worker (Andronik), and filmmaker/photographer/motorbiker (Travka) as they battle fate, the elements, and sometimes each other to succeed as the first Afghanistan-based expat rock band.
White City- is -"Big in the 'Stans." Tune in every Tuesday and Thursday July 26th through late September 2011 for our fourteen-part web series which follows the Kabul-based rock band White City as it tours Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Pakistan. Let us know what you think by writing below, or to HELObazaar@gmail.com! Follow and contact the band at WhiteCityKabul.com. Watch the series here at HELOmagazine.org/big-in-the-stans/.
Tuesday, September 6, 2011 at 02:30AM AFGHANISTAN | Directed and produced by Ruth Owen. Starring Ru, Travka, and Andronik of the Kabul-based rock band White City. Motion graphics by James Chaliz and Ruslan Shukurov. Post-Produced by HELO Media, Sep 6, 2011
Episode Twelve of Fourteen. Go here for the full series to date.
Ladies and Gentlemen! White City- is -"Big in the 'Stans." Tune in every Tuesday and Thursday July 26th through late September 2011 for our fourteen-part web series which follows the Kabul-based rock band White City as it tours Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Pakistan. Let us know what you think by writing below, or to HELObazaar@gmail.com! Follow and contact the band at WhiteCityKabul.com. Watch the series here at HELOmagazine.org/big-in-the-stans/.
Tuesday, August 30, 2011 at 11:00PM AFGHANISTAN | Directed and produced by Ruth Owen. Starring Ru, Travka, and Andronik of the Kabul-based rock band White City. Motion graphics by James Chaliz and Ruslan Shukurov. Post-Produced by HELO Media, Aug 30, 2011
Episode Eleven of Fourteen. Go here for the full series to date.
Ladies and Gentlemen! White City- is -"Big in the 'Stans." Tune in every Tuesday and Thursday July 26th through late September 2011 for our fourteen-part web series which follows the Kabul-based rock band White City as it tours Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Pakistan. Let us know what you think by writing below, or to HELObazaar@gmail.com! Follow and contact the band at WhiteCityKabul.com. Watch the series here at HELOmagazine.org/big-in-the-stans/.
Thursday, August 25, 2011 at 11:00PM AFGHANISTAN | Directed and produced by Ruth Owen. Starring Ru, Travka, and Andronik of the Kabul-based rock band White City. Motion graphics by James Chaliz and Ruslan Shukurov. Post-Produced by HELO Media, Aug 25, 2011
Episode Ten of Fourteen. Go here for the full series to date.
Ladies and Gentlemen! White City- is -"Big in the 'Stans." Tune in every Tuesday and Thursday July 26th through late September 2011 for our fourteen-part web series which follows the Kabul-based rock band White City as it tours Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Pakistan. Let us know what you think by writing below, or to HELObazaar@gmail.com! Follow and contact the band at WhiteCityKabul.com. Watch the series here at HELOmagazine.org/big-in-the-stans/.
Tuesday, August 23, 2011 at 11:00PM AFGHANISTAN | Directed and produced by Ruth Owen. Starring Ru, Travka, and Andronik of the Kabul-based rock band White City. Motion graphics by James Chaliz and Ruslan Shukurov. Post-Produced by HELO Media, Aug 23, 2011
Episode Nine of Fourteen. Go here for the full series to date.
Ladies and Gentlemen! White City- is -"Big in the 'Stans." Tune in every Tuesday and Thursday July 26th through late September 2011 for our fourteen-part web series which follows the Kabul-based rock band White City as it tours Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Pakistan. Let us know what you think by writing below, or to HELObazaar@gmail.com! Follow and contact the band at WhiteCityKabul.com. Watch the series here at HELOmagazine.org/big-in-the-stans/.
Monday, July 25, 2011 at 04:13PM SOUNDSCAPES | Mamady Kouyaté, interviewed by Jack Mayerhofer, HELO Magazine, July 2011
Stepping off the streets of Brooklyn into Café Barbès you immediately become aware of the rich culture emanating through the front door. You are taken straight to the northern suburbs of Paris on an early Sunday afternoon where you can still find jazz musicians of all ages playing from one café to another. This is whereMamady Kouyaté and the Mandingo Ambassadors play every Wednesday night from 10-12pm. I was lucky enough to interview Mamady Kouyaté before his latest show....Go here for the full interview.
Monday, July 25, 2011 at 03:57PM SOUNDSCAPES | Mamady Kouyaté, interviewed by Jack Mayerhofer, HELO Magazine, July 2011
En approchant Café Barbès dans le nord du Brooklyn, on devient immédiatement conscient de la culture riche qui s’émet au travers la porte du bar. Dès que l’on entre, on est rapporté aux banlieues dans le nord de paris où l’on peut trouver toujours des musiciens de jazz qui jouent dans les cafés les dimanche matins et après midis. C’est à cet endroit-là, que Mamady Kouyaté et les Ambassadeurs du Mandingue jouent tous les mercredi soirs, de dix heures à minuit. J’ai eu le bonheur de parler un peu avec Mamady Kouyaté mercredi dernier et après de regarder son concert...Allez ici pour l'histoire.
Monday, July 18, 2011 at 05:18PM 
Aid compound in Darfur. By Olivia Grey Pritchard / UN Photo / CC.GLOBAL | ShotgunShack, J, & Manu
StuffAidWorkersLike.com & HELO Magazine, July 2011
Ladies and gentlemen! This is one of those stories where we cater hard to one part of our fanbase with the hope that everyone else will run and catch up with the inside humor. If you ever wanted to know what goes through the minds of expatriate aid workers overseas and how and why they can be, ahem, witty in their cynicism, here's a sampler platter for you.
Over the past year, aid workers Shotgun Shack and J, pseudonymous so they can freely ridicule our lovely aidland, started a blog called Stuff Expat Aid Workers Like. It is an easy "like" you can find here on Facebook. Here's what they offer. Now what is it that expat aid workers like about their work exactly?...Go here for the full story!
Friday, July 15, 2011 at 12:17PM 
Flying into Jonglei, South Sudan. By SideLife / CC.SOUTH SUDAN | Jack Mayerhofer, edited by Daniel J Gerstle, HELO Magazine, July 2011
You're landing in the new country of South Sudan. Out the window of the plane, you see gorgeous, verdant landscape, rolling hills, quiet villages, and winding rivers. Yet in the stack of papers and PDFs you've brought with you for context, all you read is fighting, starvation, and nationalism. What do you expect when you get off the plane? What lies ahead for this ancient society, now a new country?...Go here for the full story and list of hits.
Tuesday, July 12, 2011 at 03:06PM 
Malian lunch: Bicycle chicken, onion sauce, and manioc. By Julia Ritz Toffoli.
MALI | Julia Ritz Toffoli, The World is My Oyster, HELO Magazine, July 2011
If you know me at all, you know that I love food. When I arrived in Mali and people told me to be careful of (read: avoid) the street food, I was devastated. I love street food. It's really the best way to really discover a new place.
Gelato in Rome, crepes in Paris, paper cones of alioli potatoes in Madrid, french fries in Amsterdam, hot dogs, and waffles, and cupcakes, and falafels in New York; every city is known for something delicious it serves out of a cart or street stand, including Bamako....Go here for the full story and photos.