Tagged :: 8 things you might not know about Mark

By Andrew Niesen

So I'm in. Here's 8 things you might not know about me:
  1. I lived in Alaska for a year and had a blast. Just a few of the fun things I did there: Two weeks on the Iditarod documenting the race, 8-day trip telemark skiing through the Brooks Range, sweatin' in a sauna with Jewel's grandpa, ice climbing and spending any waking (or sleeping) moment I could doing some sort of mountaineering.
  2. After college, my brother, Phillip, and I spent 4 months traveling through South Africa and Zimbabwe. One of the highlights was being about 10 feet away from a Lion and having it look directly in my eyes and roar. Oh and an elephant nearly killed us. And we spent a night in a tiny cave at the top of the Drakensberg mountains that was infested with the ugliest spiders you've ever seen. This cave was about 2 feet high and 15 feet deep. Just enough for us to sleep in. Only reason we were in the cave was because of an insane rain and lightning storm that shook the mountain all night long and we had nowhere else to go!
  3. In Africa, I started growing dreadlocks (I lost my brush somewhere along the way). I kept them for about 5 years. They were down to my butt when I cut them. Now I'm going bald, so I try to buzz my hair really short. I'll have to dig up some old photos at some point.
  4. I've been learning Jiu-Jitsu for the past two and a half years. I love it if I can make it to the gym 3 times a week.
  5. I am a Multimedia Flash Designer and programmer. Although I haven't worked on anything big in a while, I still love it. Check out some older work I created: WW2 Vets, Can You Step?, Monks of Wat Carolina
  6. I'm a drummer. I have the same Pearl drum set that I bought in High School. It's in our guest room, so if you come to visit and stay the night, you can wake up in the middle of the night and rock out! I've also been collecting lots of hand drums from my travels around the world. Djembes, doumbeks and more.
  7. In college, I took a modern dance class and also an afro-haitian dance class, the latter which prompted a trip to Haiti, where I also learned some drumming and went to a Voudou ceremony (where they had the most amazing drummers ever!). So, let's get our groove on at the next conference. WPPI in Vegas '08, anyone?
  8. Vanilla is my favorite flavor of ice cream. Vanilla Bean, especially!
Um, now I'm supposed to ask other people to list info about themselves. Anne Ruthmann asked us to do this. So let's see, how about:
That's probably enough for now. Hopefully this has been a great distraction for y'all!!
-Mark

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