You were here. The festival that was

The You Are Here festival wrapped up with the showcase of Canberran poetry, "Poetry is The Real Winner", hosted by fellow Tragic Troubadour, Andrew Galan.

The Tragic Troubadours had a busy schedule performing to the milling populace as they waiting for buses, doing eight one hour sessions over four days, capturing a new audience(some of whom didnt know there was a festival on and others who couldnt believe we weren't begging/busking).

Drawing in a new audience is the ethos of You Are Here, which spotlights the culture of experimental art in Canberra, and though biased, I believe the Troubs achieved this with their ambush style poetry to greater extent than any of the other acts. 

That said, saturday events like the secret gig and Going To Hell In This Handy Basket drew (willing) crowds to the newsroom that included people of all ages, and proven performer Bad!Slam!No!Biscuit! had the phoenix bar packed to the gunnels.

What I read coming out of the festival is that it was a massive success, far surpassing the runaway results of YAH 2011, which can only auger well for YAH 2013

Poem within the Mall Stories walking tour at the You Are Here festival

Mall Stories is a crowd-sourced walking tour for the Canberra Centre conceptualised by Canberra poet and creative type, Julian Fleetwood.

A mixture of prose, poems and a few songs, the Mall Stories are available for download to listen to on your electronic device, be it a smart phone or iphone (crapple).

I have written one piece, The (de)Escalators At The Food Court, and read two amusing ancedotes.

Mall Stories is a part of the You Are Here festival, which is running in Canberra the 8th - 18th of March