The first step in nominating travellers for NomadMania Travel Awards 2022 was the nominations done online by our community between August 21st until September 21st. Members of NomadMania were free to nominate anyone they wanted in six different categories, regardless whether the nominee was our member or not.
After that we needed to make some order and to decide which of all proposed nominees were the best for this year’s Awards. We formed our Committee to help us do that job and the work started. This year we wanted to have more members and less involvement in the decision making process by our team, as our aim is to make this truly community based Awards.
The selection started by reviewing the lists and our founder placing his vetoes. This is the only involvement by him in the whole process.
Committee had worked hard in the previous weeks under guidance of our manager Milana. She did not have an active role in the voting process either, except in three cases. We had situations where either a member of our Committee or a member of their family was nominated and in such cases Milana replaced that Committee member with her votes.
Basic rules that our Committee was instructed with:
- Nominees must be nominated for their performance last year only, not their whole life.
- Biggest Travellers must be nominated based on independent travelling efforts alone.
- Last year's winners cannot be nominated in any category this year.
- We will end up nominating only travellers that can be reached and that accept the nomination of NomadMania’s community.
So without further ado, we present to you the NomadMania Travel Awards 2022 Committee which worked to bring you the final nominees in 6 different categories.
Bengt Hildebrand
He was born in 1969 and lives in Stockholm, Sweden. He’s a physician and has worked in several African countries. He’s been on the board of the Swedish travel club ”Club100” for several years and is its current webmaster. Bengt visited his final UN country (Yemen) in January 2020.
Yui Pow Redford
First Asian woman to visit every sovereign country, and first Singaporean. UN 193 completed in 2017. Linguist, educator, business owner, nonprofit founder, and mother. Loves exploring the world through travel, language, and music.
Ric Gazarian
On a quest to travel to every country in the world and has so far traveled to over 150 countries. He is the host of the Counting Countries podcast, Co-Founder of the Extraordinary Travel Festival and blogs at GlobalGaz.
Jack Goldstein
Travels with Colombian, Hungarian and US passports. Runs a hotel in Bogota for the past 25 years. Passionate for long drives. Chases sites of jewish historical relevance, and remote communities.
Billy Offland
I'm Billy Offland, 25, from Manchester UK and a trip to Eritrea away from travelling to every country in the world! I was lucky enough to grow up in a family that loved to travel and since then i've gone off solo trying to complete the goal with a big focus on nature and looking at how communities, NGO's and governments are responding to the climate and biodiversity crises.
Eugenio Bregolat
Eugenio has spent his whole life on the move. Born in Singapore and raised on three continents, he likes to call his current location home, no matter where that may be. His latest travel adventures include climbing up the Winding Minaret of Samarra, Irak, watching sunset over the ancient Nabatean town of Mada’in Saleh, Saudi Arabia, or sipping a cappuccino outside the Teatro in Asmara, Eritrea. Originally from Spain, he currently spends most of his time in Shanghai, China.
Gianni Bianchini
Gianni Bianchini has been a digital nomad since 2013, traveling across the world full-time with only carry-on luggage, visiting 50 countries. He is a digital nomad mentor, youtuber, blogger, photographer and podcaster. He is the founder of the “Accademia Nomadi Digitali,” a platform that assists people in embracing the remote working lifestyle.
Erik Futtrup
Erik Futtrup, 54, proud of being recently verified in the NM region. I plan on finishing 193 in spring 2024. I travel alone, with good friends I have met in my Danish travel club and EPS, and my wife and two teenage children. I like the planning and organizing part as well and have designed adventure trips that are run today by different travel agencies. I work in IT but my main hobby is travelling.
Laerke Helene Ehlers Mikkelsen
Laerke has grown up in a family of four generations of female travellers – and with a thirst for knowledge and political implications. Now, at the age of 19, she has visited 114 countries spanning from Syria and Chad to solo-travelling in Brunei.
Aurélien de Saint Blancard
Aurélien was born in Paris, has lived in Beijing and now lives in Brussels. He has travelled to 75 countries and then his passion became business, as he has started his travel company, notably focusing on uncommon places. He is a member of the TCC and has organized the meetings of NomadMania in Paris and Brussels.
Milana Bojinović
NomadMania general manager, working within the community since 2019. Her role here was organising the voting process, facilitating meetings and (very) long emails and documents to help the team work. She took an active role in the voting process only in three exceptional cases: where a member of our Committee or a member of their family was nominated, they didn't have the right to vote for obvious reasons and in such cases Milana was the one to cast the vote. Her role in the organisation of the whole Travel Awards is multilateral, however.
