***Last phase update*** seeking minimum $1500 more to finish the trip with an epic journey to the Arhuaco capital city to record a message for humanity. 

I need funds for transport, accommodation for me and translator, supplies, a substantial contribution directly to the village (so most of donations go right to the hands of indigenous peoples) and an emergency passport to get me back home and on to the next adventure.

I'm embarking on an independent expedition to visit and film with two different indigenous native groups, the Arhuaco, Kogi and Wiwa in Colombia to aid in their efforts as they resist colonization (still), climate change, and work to integrate and connect with so-called civilization. I will be traveling from the US to their villages, on two distinct but highly connected subsequent journeys to understand and help preserve their cultures, listen to their wisdom, document their struggles and help them in their drive to deepen contact with activist movements to creat solidarity between cultures. These are peoples that have sustained themselves for thousands--maybe tens of thousands of years peacefully and sustainably, whose very existence is being threatened.

The Arhuaco were some of the first peoples "encountered" by Colombus, who have lived without money in their traditional societies which once had millions of people and have been reduced to around 60,000. I will be working with a group of westerners called Sun Nation who have become their link to the modern moneyed world as they work to integrate with it. This connection and the integration of our cultures represents the way forward for humanity, egalitarian sustainable values, connection and reverence for nature integrating with more modern systems, each sharing with each.

These peoples stand at crucial doorways intersecting past and future, life and destruction. Preserving and learning from their values is paramount to all of humanity's survival.

I am a filmmaker working on an expansive, truly epic documentary about the interconnected social and ecological crisis that threatens us all, and blazing a trail to the solutions to the biggest problems faced by humanity today. I've filmed all across the US with a vast array of scientists, professors, activists, systems thinkers, and people working on the problems and solutions, with luminaries like Noam Chomsky, Richard Wolff, Adam Mckay, and many more in this journey to tell the story of earth in its most dire moment.

I will be weaving these peoples' stories into my film, giving them all the footage to use to tell their own stories individually, and most likely making a standalone film out of this journey--which is truly only the beginning of a much larger story to save the f*ing world.

Trailer: https://youtu.be/T7Gr3dljEVE

I need assistance to fund this trip. I have no producers or funders and have made all of this out of my own pocket. I need gear (special travel equipment, clothing and hiking gear, medicine, data storage, etc) transportation, food and accomodation and evetually a return trip (one way, baby). There are still some question marks like needing a translator (one of my expenses is a state of the art in ear live translator). I feel this amount reflects these costs, if more is needed I will go out of pocket, if there is extra it will fund the film itself (by which I mean my own life as I travel this world to complete it as my central unpaid (so far) mission. I scored a cheap one way flight to Colombia but don't have a return trip yet so that cost is also uncertain.

This trip is about telling these peoples' and their ecosystems' stories, but it is also a personal connection to their cultures to help learn from and share my own knowledge as a social movement builder with the nonprofit Moneyless Society and longtime activist, organizer and environmentalist, especially the Arhuaco who have never used money and need assistance navigating how to integrate this toxic tool into their society without seriously harming it.

I remember going on mission trips with my do-gooder mother to help give medicine to those who lacked access to it (because of money) and I see this as a fitting continuance and evolution of that drive to help those ailing, but with the reversal that our society is the one that is truly sick and in need of the medicine of their ancient lifeways.

I am honored beyond words to be involved in this story and to have the very rare chance to enter these worlds, with the express intention to bring about healing after our cultures have waged unspeakable war on these vibrant cultures and their lands for so long. On a personal note, this is the adventure of a lifetime that I have dreamt of since I was very young.

Thank you so much for your support. I see no higher cause and have no hesitation to ask for what will assist it.