Dark days at Truck the World

Its not all fun and games, us boys at Truck the World have our bad days too. Snowy days, cold temps, failure to get stuff finished in time, all reported in this weeks update.

If this is your first time to Truck the World, please watch the other videos first, this post may disturb some viewers.

Enjoy!

Дүүжин Даажин thats Duujin Daajin for you english speakers

So here we go, Truck the World’s first attempt at making a music video.

It’s a pretty dark song. Sung from the perspective of a child, pleading with their parents to listen to the kids, that the law of the land belongs to the people, not the government.
There’s a presidential election here on Sunday, and the band wanted the video finished in time for it -- they also wanted zombies, but i quoted them some Mick Jagger -- you can’t always get what you want … on this occasion, time wasn’t on our side.

The band are awesome, seeing them perform live is quite the experience. They are all classically trained musicians, playing traditional instruments, in a modern way, in this song there are two singers, one of whom, sings with the classic Mongolian throat singing styles. duujin daajin means see-saw.

The video was made for about $35 dollars, most of which was spent on rope.

Making a Music Video

Here at Truck the World we happily accept any challenge thrown at us, so when one of Mongolia’s biggest bands approached us to make them a music video we gladly accepted.

Alex will explain the whole story when we post the music video later today.

Enjoy the “making of” in the mean time, we had an interesting time making it!

Music on the vid is by Dancing Djedi feat. Mos Def

Whoa, where is this weeks video??

So…… Sunday , you tune in for your regular hit of the sweet Truck the World video goodness, but alas, there is nothing.

What could have happened? Have the boys been kidnapped by the Mongol Horde? Have they got internet and TV in their warehouse and just forgotten their goals, lost their direction??

Could this be the end of the dynamic duo? Will Gorki the truck ever be finished? Is Mongolia a real country? Tune in to next weeks episode where all will be revealed!

Well actually, we are still here and hard at work, life has got very busy here at Truck the World Head Quarters, Ulaan Baatar, Mongolia.

We have managed to convince Mongolia’s biggest alt rock band that we are capable of making their next music video, filming has wrapped and Alex is locked in the editing cupboard as I write.

Two new clips will be up in the next few days though how ever. We have our weekly update including a behind the scenes look at Truck the World’s foray into music videos and we introduce Mongolia’s raining national beat box champion. We will also post the world premiere of Mongolian Rock Band – Altan Urag’s latest music video, written, directed, produced, filmed and edited by us here at Truck the World.

Its busy times and we can’t wait to share. Keep it locked.

Rikki and Alex
Truck the World

Beijing, big city?

So, yup, the Beijing visa run.
Visa’s check. Scorpions check. Pretty girls check.

The big trip to the big city was great fun, now it’s back to work in the warehouse, kitting out the truck for lift off … ETD … ummm … soon??

It has also come to our attention that our lazy kiwi accents are sometimes difficult to understand. This clip has quite a bit of talking, so it might be a tricky one to follow if you’re not a native of Aotearoa. In future, subtitles will be provided for those of the kiwi-slang impaired. In the meantime, enjoy the scorpions and seahorses.

Annoyingly catchy music by Dunkelbunt

Trans Mongolian from Rikki Berger on Vimeo.

The week that was….

Sounds like a sports round up , but this isn’t grown men dressed in silly uniforms playing with inflated animal skins or or guys wearing polo shirts trying to get a small white ball into a hole in some grass. This is silly men, not in uniform, trying to achieve what some believe to be a crazy dream.

Truck the World is rolling full steam ahead, every week, without fail, check it out

Music in the clip is Shook (Mobb Deep And Sigur Ros remix) by Emancipator.

Gorki is famous, and oh so tough!

So here are a couple of clips from the Russian version of Top Gear, they have done a little piece on testing the so called toughest vehicle Russia has ever produced, yup that’s right , its the Gaz 66, our beloved Truck the World Gorki.

The Russian Top Gear Team, test the truck through a series of brutal processes, first they drop a mid size family car onto the Gaz from 12 metres, then knock it around with a wrecking ball, finishing it off by hitting it with a flame thrower and then submerging it in a cold Russian river. Will the mighty Gaz survive the tortuous tests? Will it still start and be able to be driven?

The clips are well worth a look, giving you a look at the Gaz in its native homeland, the clips have subtitles too, so you can enjoy the dry Russian humour while you watch.

So, trucktheworld has been in hiatus. No, that’s not a holiday spot in the Caribbean, it means we’ve taken a short break – reason being, Rikki was back in New Zealand, and Alex was growing his beard. (Rikki sarcastically strokes his beard and laughs with a hearty tone)

But all cylinders are firing once again. Got a couple of new updates for you, letting you know what’s going on with the truck, the warehouse, and our new foray into professional documentary making.

It’s feeling good. The truck isn’t ready yet, but we are. Rikki got back, and joined the ranks of the un/self-employed, finally joining trucktheworld full time. Up until now, he’s only been dreaming this shit, and working on it after school, but once he returned from his holiday in NZ, both of us were up the creek -- build your own paddle.

He didn’t return empty handed however, he had a bottle of codeine, a new motorised rotor for the camera’s, and a crossbow. Yup a crossbow. We will now be able to shoot grizzly bears from a hundred feet, and still be able to re-use the arrow once it passes through the torso. Cool.

Other things are changing. Looks like we’re going to have to go to china soon, and when we return from that visa run, we’re going to be homeless. Nothing like a bit of pressure to up the ante, put a spring in the step, and, well, get that bloody truck up and running.

The weather has been delightful. I can already sense that summer in Mongolia, is an amazing time, a beautiful thing to behold. It’s like the rains arriving in India, the wet finally hitting Darwin after a month of teasing, or daylight savings in the south island. It’s not just the land that is affected, it’s the people, who are very much of the land, and there’s a change, like world cup fever in England. To survive the winter, five months of sub zero conditions, to be alive, healthy, and in many cases, beautiful, is something to be proud of, an achievement.

So yes we are about to be homeless. Yes, we have to go on a visa run to china, temporarily forsaking the truck and our documentary making expedition here in UB. But, it’s impossible to miss the vibe, summer is here, and as d.i double z double e said before us ‘it’s gonna be a long hot summa!’ believe it -- we will share it all.

We think the truck will be up and running some time in may. Rikki truly is a mastermind, his attention to detail is inspiring. It’s a daunting trip, task, challenge, this journey we have set out for ourselves, but I have no doubts about the practical sides of it. I have complete faith in the truck, and the concept, and any time a difficulty seems to arrive, it is solved before it gets time to sink in and fester. Yeah – I’m gonna live in a truck for the next few years – and yeah, I reckon there’s nowhere else I’d rather be – that truck is going to be better than most accommodation I’ve had in the last five years. It’s gonna be pimped – and the places we plan to go … shit, I haven’t heard of most of them.

I realise that there are many details left out from our website. To be honest, we’re not sure who’s reading – we figure it is only people who know us, and therefore, have missed out lots of details we figure you already know. Like, how we got here, why we’re doing this, how long we’ve been planning it, what we plan to do .. etc etc.

Truth is, we are very much learning everything as we go. We’ve never made videos, audiocasts (coming soon) or documentary’s before, we’ve never built Russian military trucks from scratch either. But we’re ambitious. We are doing it. We don’t know if it will work, or how it will end, but that’s the point.

Sorry, I actually got off point there for a minute, my point, is that I think we should write a little over the next few weeks, about ourselves, and where we are at, in order to level the playing field, put all our cards on the table. So if there’s anything you’d like to see, anything you’d like to know, let us know, and we’ll get it online. Trucktheworld … it’s a family.

So welcome to trucktheworld as a full time entity.
It’s gonna be a long, hot summer


A quick technical update for you gear heads.


A showcase of our professional ambition.

Keep the truck running, we are!

Ok so bit of a gap here but we are still rolling, plans are coming to fruition , and the truck inches towards completion.

Enjoy the spoils, hard work, we bloody love it!!!