I used to fly around the world to meet my friends in their home countries. Not just a flight a year, or a flight a season, but in 2019 I even visited more than 30 cities in that year alone. I thought it would always be that way. But there's a new normal, now.

"Why don't you just draw people on Discord?" a Norwegian friend in Germany asks me. I'm just not sure how to make that work.

Flash forward a year. A Taiwanese university friend invites me to a small reunion. We're using Kumospace, a cool technology that allows your virtual avatar to move and mingle in the room to hold side conversations or hear what others in the group have to say. Way better than Zoom. 
One of the mingling alums is a Taiwanese MD. He came to my university after I had already left, so we didn't know eachother. "I've heard about you from a few people," he tells me when the event ends. Yeah, I had sorta drawn every student at our dorm two years in a row. Visitors would walk through our halls and wonder who was the mystery artist drawing students by their doors. So my story spread farther than my own academic years. "I'd like to hear more about your story," he continues. "And if you ever make it to Taiwan, I'd love for you to draw my portrait, too."

Well, there's a new normal now. So it's time to give a new hardware setup a try. I tilt two cameras, join the same call, and now can do a live drawing remotely. Though the pixels on the screen aren't quite as clear, though there's a lag between what's said and when it's heard, though I can't physically hand the portrait over when it's done...it's the new normal. 

Oh, and it also means I can easily record the whole thing.

Our conversation went on for two more hours. Talking with academics makes for fascinating conversations, if you put in the effort. Watch the portrait process and conversation in the linked YouTube video.

A video blog entry about a message I received from someone I drew back in 2016.

“Is this just a hobby,” the man says, pointing with one hand at his just drawn portrait in the other, “…or are you building something with this?” He stares at me, trying to figure out just what I’m doing with this skill. “Do you feel like you’re wasting your time where you are? You could make it as a street artist with this,” he tells me while watching me draw.

I already was.

“So why do you do this? For awareness or something?” His colleague is curious too, staring beside us. They’ve flown in from Shanghai for a visit. Now they’re in my living room, casting shadows over my furniture, staring at my work. Because it’s fun, I smile. They’re puzzled.

I’ve learned—after being asked the question dozens of times—that ‘because it’s fun’ is a decent answer. It’s true. It’s fast to explain. It’s easy to understand. It’s true, so I use it here with my two guests. But this Hungarian man flown in from China is still puzzled.

“OK, sure, it’s fun for the other person,” the man says. He’s working things out in his brain. “…You meet someone new and they get a picture, but…” It’s fun, I cut in, to make old women on trains smile. I get on the train, see a frowning white-haired German woman, and when she sees her drawing, she beams. It’s fun to get on a train, make seventeen people smile, and get off. How can you not have a huge grin after that? No matter how the day went, whether it’s raining or cold outside, it just makes your day.

He doesn’t get it. But he sees that I mean it. From my intonation, my facial expressions, the way I gesture, he can see this isn’t just small talk to me.

You asked if I have some plan for this? When I started drawing, it was comics and illustrations. Then six years ago I found people like it when I draw their pictures. Just in September I was invited by the city of Munich’s department of culture to a festival. They wanted me to just sit there, and draw people. That’s it. Over ten hours, I drew seventy-six. My hands were hurting, my back was hurting, I was worn out—but I made so many people smile. Just looking at the crowd watching me, listening to me, how do you beat that?
 

I don’t monologue often. But tonight I do, those questions echoing in my head:

“Is this just a hobby, or are you building something with this?”
“Are you doing this for awareness or something?”

I don’t know.

“You should have your website on here,” the man says, after taking a closer look at the symbols scribbled on the side of the portrait. The lamp isn’t too bright. The Hungarian man furrows his brows, then lifts them. “Oh! You already do! Nice!”

I remember two years ago, being offended when someone told me to invest in my own domain name. I had been using a free webhosting platform. My web address was buried behind the platform’s. “It looks way better if you have your own domain,” the man on the rocking night train said. He was condescending. “…Otherwise, it doesn’t look very professional.” I’m drawing people for free, I answered back. And I write my website on there for their benefit. Why should someone expect me to pay money to remove a few letters from the domain?

It seemed offensive to be expected to dig into my own pocket for something I already invest in: with my time, with my paper, with my ink. But a year later I took the man’s advice. Now I pay the fee for a cleaner website, so people I give portraits to for free, can better enjoy what I’ve already given them. Is that crazy?
 

“Are you building something with this?”

I don’t know. I’ve typed around forty-thousand words on Instagram describing my experiences drawing. That’s around the length of the book The Great Gatsby. For me? No. So people I give portraits to for free, can better enjoy what I’ve already given them. Is that crazy?
But it’s fun.
 

It’s a cold January night. After dinner, walking up the steps to my building, I don’t expect to hear voices in my apartment. I don’t expect to find two strangers inside. They’re taking a look at the rooms, checking if they’d like to rent it. Because in a moment, I’ll be moving to the other side of the world.
I wait around as my landlord shows one of them the kitchen a second time. Hey, I tell the other, who now sits in my living room. He’s bored after a long day of meetings, scrolling through his phone. Would you like to see a parlor trick?

Three minutes later my landlord and the other guest are done with the tour. “Did you know he can do drawings?” this guest holds up the portrait I just drew of him. He’s totally shocked. My landlord responds: “Yeah,” with a smug smile. “I have one too. I think he draws everyone.” The Hungarian guest, finished with the tour, is confused. “Where did you get that? Who drew that?” he asks. Me. Do you have two minutes for a picture?
 

“You have a hidden skill there,” the man in my living room says. He stares at me; at his portrait. He’s working things out in his brain. My landlord is busy downstairs. “Do you feel like you’re wasting your time where you are? Is this just a hobby, or are you building something with this?” I don’t know. I think it through. I reply slowly. If I were building something with this, the ends and the means are the same. Six years ago I found people like when I draw their pictures. Since then, more and more of my life has been consumed with it. If drawing people is building towards something…it’s to draw more people.

People think it’s being able to draw with two hands. No, that’s not it. People tell me they wish they could draw portraits so fast. No, that’s not it. “That’s a gift you have,” some tell me. It is. But it’s not the drawing that’s the gift.

Today I walked up the hill from my little home in my small Bavarian town. I made my way into a cozy cafe to enjoy an hour of peace. Because it’s been a tough week.

Project deadlines before the holiday vacations aren’t a big deal. Working long hours to get things wrapped up isn’t a big deal. Losing sleep isn’t a big deal. But this week, a friend of mine attempted suicide. That’s a big deal.

So I’ve been blue. I open the door to the sweet little cafe. I take a seat. I order something to eat. And I start to draw: an older couple in front of me. Their conversation slips seamlessly between English and German. My pens move. I don’t know how they’ll react to me drawing them. It takes a bit of courage to just draw strangers. I finish the one, than the other. I snap a photo, and rise from my table. I step over to theirs. This is for you. Their reaction is…

Wonderful.
“Oh this is so nice!” the woman says. “Her nose is better than mine,” she adds, pointing to her portrait. The man stares at his own. They smile. They love it. I sit back down. “Is your name Escher? No? You’re just a fan of his? Did you see the movie?” I wasn’t expecting such a warm response. I sip my cappuccino. I’m warm inside.

I draw two more. They sit at the window: two friends sharing some time. I’m not in a rush. This isn’t a train. There are no stations we need to get off at. Some minutes go by. I’m done. This is for you two, I tell them, handing over their finished portraits. “That’s so nice,” they say. They really, genuinely, appreciate it. “Are you an artist?” one of them asks me. Yes, I say.

I nibble on some bread, butter, and jam. There’s fruit salad and yogurt. I set my eyes on an older man reading beside me. I write the usual details on this page: the date, my website, his portrait number. I take a look at him and start to draw. “I don’t need a portrait,” he says. You don’t want one? I clarify. “No.”
It’s no big deal. I get a new piece of paper. I draw another person, in a corner of the cafe. He’s with a friend. He’s seen me draw these other four. He’s not sure what to do. I take my time like usual. It isn’t long before I snap another photo, and hand it over. This is for you, I say, one more time. He hesitates. He wants to say something. “Einfach so?” (“Just like that?”). I just smile. Just like that.

He and his friend look at the details on the page. “Here’s the date I guess, and a website...” And on the side there, is the number of people I’ve drawn, I tell them. They take a look. “Ten-seven...Ten-seven-two-one,” they read back. They look at eachother. They realize how many that is.

The man with the book pays his bill. “Good luck on the drawing,” he tells me. “I wish you lots of success.” The two men also pay. The one comes to me and holds his hand out. He shakes my hand and looks into my eyes: “thank you,” he says.

The two women friends pay their bill. “Thanks a lot for these portraits,” they say, holding them up for me to see.

I pay too. I pack my things up. The staff tells me, “see you later.” There’s a twinkle in her eye that wasn’t there before. I walk out into the winter day in bliss.

That’s the gift. It isn’t being able to draw portraits with two hands. It’s making people happy—wherever I am; whoever they are; whatever language we speak. It’s making people happy that makes me happy. A few moments of sharing, einfach so (just like that), turn a blue day into a wonderful one. That’s the gift.

BUZZ BUZZ!
My cellphone flashes blue and white: Instagram. “Press ‘allow’ to see this message,” the app says. My thumb hovers over the button. I think it over. I’m skeptical when I receive a photo from a stranger without any text. Sometimes ‘hot Russian women looking for love’ send photos to strangers. I don’t need to see that. Tonight though, I press ‘allow.’

“Found one of your portraits on a train,” the caption to the photo reads. “I’ve fallen in love with it since then.” The photo shows a Mac computer screen in warm indoor lighting. There’s a portrait lying on the computer: it’s one of mine.

I’m glad I write serial numbers on these things. This portrait has the digits 9-6-2-0 written on its right-hand side. I open my Google Drive, open a folder called ’10000 Smiles,’ and start looking. June: 9428. 9466. Too early. Wrong month. July: 9564. 9620. Bingo.

This was on a train. I see the DeutscheBahn patterned blue upholstery in the side of the picture. There’s a colored bag and a few brown toes of a man showing from a corner of the photo. He’s number 9620. Who is he? Where was this? I flick to pictures a few over in my Drive: 9619, 9618, 9617…a family. The kid brother and teenage daughter had Christopher Streets Day wristbands. I remember them. The brother was shy, the mom talkative. This was July 20th: a day I travelled 560 kilometers over 7 hours with 8 train connections. So 9620 was on a short regional connection. It wasn’t my first that day. It wasn’t my last.

BUZZ BUZZ!

My phone blinks again. “Found it some weeks ago and love it,” the stranger types in another message. “I’m gonna frame it.” It’s not his. Somehow this portrait got separated from its owner, got lost on a train, and travelled to some tiny town with 15,000 residents, named Lohr am Main. Then this Instagrammer messaging me picks it up. He sees a sketch of a stranger just lying on a train. He keeps it. Two months later he snaps a photo of his find, and sends this pic to the Instagram of another stranger: me.
Why would he frame this? Isn’t this crazy?

I usually think of these portraits I draw as being between the subject and myself. But they’re not. This guy is a stranger neither the subject nor I know. Yet somehow this portrait of a stranger affected him enough to keep it. Then to want to tell me about it. Then to someday (he says) frame it. Isn’t this crazy?
I never know what happens to the pictures I draw. I’ve drawn a lot. Some tell me they’ve framed theirs; others tell me theirs end up on desks; taped to walls; in folders for memories; in closets. Two I’ve seen torn to pieces in front of me. I don’t understand why. One I saw bitten into. That was a crazy teen dressed as a nun trying to be funny. I know what happened to a few. For thousands I never will. But for this one, just tonight I learned the adventures it’s been on.

“What are your thoughts on existence and experience and the universe?” I take a moment. I smile. That’s a broad question, I reply. Could you be more specific?

We’re at a bar. Actually, we’re at a speaking event hosted by a bar. Eight speakers talked of Darwin Awards and veganism and brain chemistry and infinity. I talked about infinity. The night is now late. The event is now over. The speakers spoke. Now everyone is sipping beer and chatting in small groups. I join a table of three in the corner. Is this chair free? I sit down. I draw one of their portraits. The three stare. This isn’t what they expected when they said “yes, this seat’s free.”

Yes, it takes a few moments for them to resume talking. Now I am the subject of conversation. The one I draw has a question for me: “do you think we discover math,” he asks, watching my two hands drawing his picture, “…or that we invent it?” I give him my take: patterns in data are there whether they mean anything or not; whether it is chance or something deeper is behind I don’t trouble myself about. Yes, I reply, We discover math. We discover these patterns.

This isn’t the response he wants to hear. He’s spent a week in a meditation retreat, eating once daily and staring at walls. I’m a guy that just gave a talk about hierarchies of sizes of infinity impossible to truly comprehend, now handing him a portrait of himself, drawn with two hands. These are strange circumstances. So he decides to ask a strange question: “What are your thoughts on existence and experience and the universe?”

I take a moment. What can you say to a question like that? Under what context do you ask someone a question like that? It’s flattering to be asked about the meaning of life by a sixteen-year-old. It’s flattering to be asked what one should do with her life by a fourteen-year-old; by a new high school grad; by a college freshman. But this gentleman is older than I.

It’s strange I’ve come to accept that answering these kinds of questions comes with my hobby. I don’t know all the answers. I’m just a beginner, learning as I go. I only answer what I can.
 

Nevertheless, she takes notes. There are four of us at this table: two speak of existence, experience, and the universe, one with glasses listens wordlessly, and the last takes a piece of paper, a pen, and jots my words down as I say them. She’s a quiet type—preferring to make herself invisible at the table than join the discussion—but you can tell there’s a lot going on between her ears. It’s a strange night. It’s strange to be asked these kinds of questions. It’s stranger to see someone recording my responses in careful scrawl to remember them by.

I place my warm pastry, my hot cup of tea, and Harper Lee’s book on a table in the coffee shop of a bookstore. ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’—I’m buying it for a friend. I pull out a sheet of hard, sturdy cardstock paper, and carefully measure lines across it. I crease the paper, checking that the book fits like a glove inside it’s new sleeve. I pull out my brush pens, and draw a new cover for this book. My cover.

A man watches me as I alternate between eating my pastry, sipping my tea, and drawing this cover. I’m not using one, but two pens to draw. I’m not using one, but two hands to draw. “You’re an artist, huh?” he asks me. Yeah, I respond. I like to draw. He returns to his book. I to my work. He puts his book down again. “How are you doing that with two hands?”

I push my small plate away. I set my tea aside. I grab a piece of paper. I draw him. He’s surprised, of course. He asks questions, of course. I answer them, while I finish his picture.

Then it’s back to my gift. My friend’s birthday is today. I finish the book jacket, and take another sip. I think through what to write inside. I write a few words. I cross them out. I write a few more. The man now has company.

He’s a big man with a beard. I recognize neither his smell nor his accent. The first man tells the one with the beard: “this guy next to you, he draws with two hands! Look, he drew me!” The bearded man now asks me questions. I pull out another sheet, and draw his picture. When it’s finished, I plan to return to writing.

“Amazing,” the bearded man says, holding his portrait so he could see it. “You know,” he begins. “I collect rare pictures.” The first man joins in: “tell him about your Merkel picture!” The big bearded man is happy to be asked. “You won’t believe it,” he tells me, “but I have a picture of Angela Merkel from the FKK days.” Freikörperkultur is a nudist movement especially common in 1980’s East Germany. He draws back, pleased with his find. “You wouldn’t think so today, but she was quite a looker then. And,” he leans back in to me: “she was completely naked.”

I try not to laugh. I tell him that’s an interesting find. I return to my work, and complete my dedication on Lee’s novel. Finished, I stow my things. “Will you be back here again?” the bearded man asks me. Maybe. “I’ll be here. Every weekend, right in this café.”

I walk into the bar, and find a free seat at the crowded table of the Japanese Stammtisch. “How was your day?” one of the Germans asks me in Japanese, taking a sip from his beer. すごいでした！ (Super!) I respond. I forget that Germans never say they had a great day. They say ‘passt’ (which is something between ‘it was OK’ and ‘it happened’). So my expression of ‘super’ is especially out of place. “Oh?” he continues confusedly, “What happened? Why was today a super day?” I had a wonderful train ride. He almost chokes on his beer, he laughs so hard. “You took the train here,” he switches to German, “…and that’s what made today super?” He’s hoping he misunderstood my Japanese. Yes, I tell him, that’s right.

Just one hour before, I get onto a big train this Friday afternoon fresh off work. My eyes scan this way and that, calculating a place to sit where I can see the most people. I decide on a spot near a group of women. They take a hard look at me, plainly wondering why of all the free places in this train car, I’m sitting near them. Even so, their conversation soon resumes its normal pace. Suddenly it slows down again. They notice my two hands drawing a woman in my view. “Look, look at him!” one whispers to the others, drawing their attention to the portrait quickly taking shape on a bright yellow piece of my drawing paper. The whispering woman twists her body around to see who I am drawing: someone sitting one row behind her. “And he draws with two hands,” whispers another woman from this group.

I finish this portrait. I hand it to the subject, who is quite surprised. She hadn’t been paying much attention. Her neighbors had. But I have much more than these women’s attention when I start on the next portrait. Again, I draw someone I can only see thanks to my particular position near these ladies. This woman nudges her boyfriend, and soon he watches me draw as well. I finish, snap a photo of the portrait, and hand it to her. “This is wonderful,” she exclaims. “You’ll have to draw my mother next,” she says, pointing to the row of seats behind her. “She’s sleeping back there.”

Unfortunately, her sleeping mother is not in view, hidden behind chairs and people I can see. But now the ladies I sit beside are so thoroughly intrigued, I have to draw one of them next. I make eye contact with one of them. She knows the drill now. She tries to keep still. She tells the others how nervous she is to get a portrait. She is finally glad I chose such an odd place to sit.

I draw the second, third, and begin on the fourth of these women friends, when one of the train employees comes by. She’s checking tickets. I put my things aside, show her my pass, and continue drawing. The Kontroller (ticket checker) slows, then stops her work. She stares at my drawing. The women friends now chime in: “yes, he just draws people. He’s drawn almost all of us already, look!” They show the train Kontroller their portraits in turn. She stares a bit longer, then continues with her work. But some minutes later, with all tickets checked, she returns and asks me: “would you be able to draw me too?”

We make good conversation. She’s curious about where I’m from and how this hobby started. She’s so engrossed that she doesn’t notice as passengers try to pass her in the walkway. She’s very happy when I hand her the sketch which, more or less, looks like her. She wishes me luck as the train stops once again, letting on passengers with tickets needing to be checked. She returns to her work with a smile on her face that’s just a little bigger.

I draw an Australian with a leather jacket who’s travelling Europe. “Are you in the Guinness World Records or something? It’s amazing what you do.” I draw two Eritreans. We can’t communicate too well with eachother, but as the train arrives to its final station they shake my hand and thank me. An older German couple I didn’t even draw approach me: “it’s a wonderful thing you do,” they say.


I walk out of the station, still aglow, still sporting a grin, and enter the bar for tonight’s Japanese Stammtisch. I find a seat at a crowded table. “How was your day?” one of the Germans asks me in Japanese, taking a sip from his beer. Super! I respond.

‘Punctual, like the trains in Germany.’ The train is delayed by fifteen minutes. Then, the train is cancelled. People huddle in jackets, scarves, hats and gloves on the platform. When we finally get on the red regional train to the big city, it’s full with two train’s worth of people. So there is nowhere to sit.

I draw a few people, standing up. I can only use one hand, so I alternate with each portrait: one with my right hand, one with my left. They’re still defrosting from the long wait in the cold. Someone soon lets me use his giant suitcase as a table. Both hands make good use of it. An older couple can’t stop watching me. They can’t stop talking about me. I manage to draw one of them, before our train reaches its final destination. They wish me good luck.

I make it in time for our lunch appointment. Living far from friends means we have to schedule these kinds of things. The line to the restaurant stretches far into the sidewalk on a freezing afternoon, but that’s no big deal. Once we’re waiting inside, it’s warm. I take a seat with my friends in the crowded reception area. I draw a family that, like us, is waiting for a table. As I draw each young daughter, they run over to show their dad. They proudly display their portraits to their grandma. Their dad gives me a nice smile. We get a table. We enjoy four delicious bowls of piping hot ramen.

My friend and I get off. He’s never seen me draw in a train before. I was lucky he joined me on a day I received an ovation. As we talk, two Kurdish men from the tram approach me. “Could you...also draw my picture?” one of them asks. I ask my friend if he’d mind. Sure, I tell them.

We find a café there in the station. They buy me a cappuccino. We take a seat on the long couch and I draw their pictures. A balding man with glasses can’t stop staring. His mouth hangs open the entire time I draw. My hands move fast now, warm and comfortable. I draw both men, then their girlfriends from photos they share with me, before I cap my pens; before I return my folder to its place in my bag. I make my way to leave. The balding man looks up. He points at his face. I close my eyes and smile. OK. I take my paper and pens out again. I draw one more portrait in this coffee shop. He can’t stop admiring it.

 
I find the big red train that will take me home. I walk past each train car, surveying which will have the most faces for me to draw; which will have the best possibility for interesting conversations. I pick a seat, and realize I know the girl across from me. I drew her only two weeks ago! She was an artist herself, and drew me too. I smile at her. She recognizes me too.

I draw a young couple. “…und mit beiden Händen!” says an older woman near us. Naturally, I draw her next. We talk of studies and work and my experiences being new in Germany. I set my eyes on someone sitting a bit farther from us. I draw her picture. I hand it to her. Ano…kimi wa nihonjin desuka? (um…are you Japanese?) “Ehhh? Yes I am!” she answers. I change seats. I sit next to her and her boyfriend. There are no Japanese people in my small town. A chance to practice like this is a rare treat, I explain. She watches my hands move, mouth open as I draw her boyfriend. “…Ryou te de!” (“…With both hands!”) she exclaims, at least a few times. “I find it amazing you can talk and draw at the same time,” the boyfriend tells me, in German. No, the hard part is drawing and speaking in Japanese at the same time, I explain. I get a few minutes of practice in. What I can’t say in Japanese I explain in German, the gears of language in my brain shifting with less friction now. Kore wa watashi no eki desu, (this is my stop), I say, telling them goodbye. “Hopefully we’ll meet again,” the Japanese woman responds.
The doors open and I step off the train. I put on my jacket, scarf, hat, and gloves at the platform. I head home.