Dave is…
A Burning Man?
Ok, for starters? Sleeping in the back of a dusty Merc is not the same as sleeping in the back of a station wagon in a Wal-Mart parking lot. God that was uncomfortable.
Which of course is how I managed a picture of dawn. Sigh.
Today my only goal was to explore the camps better than yesterday when I sort of just went along for the ride. It started only a few tents down where some guys had rigged a TV and antenna to watch the Spring Boks Tri-Nations game. Lot of drunks yelling at a 5 inch television.
There was a teepee tent that inexplicably featured several ladies in 19th Century hoop skirts.
Another camp was overrun with giant flowers. And those were just the sort of generic camps around the fringes.
This guy, in the center art installation circle rigged a washing machine to play music. A computer program controls the release of the gas from the pipes and the corresponding flames play (identifiable) “music”. I guess every night he does the national anthem and he is takes requests if you supply the MIDI.
My favorite stop was the Homeless Hotel. Operated by the Pans Labyrinth orange guy from yesterday it has a check in desk, room keys, a pool, and six hammocks which are all made out of recycled 2 liter plastic bottles. It was surprisingly really comfortable.
And as soon as I lay down room service brought me a sliced orange and another came and scratched my head with a scary looking, though very effective head scratcher.
If it wasn’t for the fact that I was roasting in the sun I’d have stayed there all day.
Next was Let’s Go, a rather clever pun and an incredibly impressive installation. The pieces even fit together Lego style if you moved them.
Really this was probably mine, and many people’s, favorite as the giant Lego in the desert was surreal even in this place of lunatics.
From there my initial intent had been to head to Shipwrecked at AfricaBurn but I had seen a postal delivery at the Homeless Hotel, so when I saw the post office I had to go that way.
Burning Mail is amazing for both the amount of work and cost it must demand. This is a long running camp that allows you to send crazy AB postcards to any of the camps at the fest (thanks to a team of red clad people on bikes) or around the world (thanks to what must have been an impressive outlay for postage). I have been in South Africa for 4 months now and haven’t sent a fucking thing home, (Give me addresses and I promise to rectify that) but I did send a card from AB. Of course I only know one address in the world by heart, so Pablo, there’s a card headed your way. The post-master said this was the case for just about everyone.
Next door was Devoid of Fridge Poetry which while entertaining had too high a rotation of the word fuck for my delicate sensibilities.
Just past 3-ish Street (all “streets” were similarly named) was the Sin Dial where you could confess your sins, place them under a magnifying glass and as the sun tracked across the sky they would burst into flames.
Right next to it was the Ego Booth where you can check your ego. You can either claim it later or leave it to be burned ceremonially tonight. They really hit you over the head with this new-age cleansing stuff don’t they?
I much preferred Snakes and Ladders, a Burn for children, created by someone who was sad that the real Burn last year took place after his/her kids were already asleep. It lights up at a child friendly hour tonight.
It’s worth mentioning the kid aspect. Before I came I assumed this was not a place to bring kids. I don’t know if Burning Man in the US has a lot of kids but I do know it has a ton of nudity and drug usage and even if I were a damn SF hippie from the Mission I wouldn’t want my kids around that. However I was wrong, this place was full of kids they were all over running around, biking, exploring installations with visible awe and glee, shoot they were even walking around gifting people with candy or refreshing spritz from water bottles. And you know it totally made sense. I mean here in South Africa everyone seems so crazy about crime that running around with total freedom (and freedom from worry) is just not something the kids get. Here though the parents can let them go crazy with nothing more troubling that sunburns. And the environment is one that encourages questions, interactions and exploration. I did not see a single kid that was not having an amazing time.
Almost made me wish my parents had been more hippie. But then I remember the photos of my dad’s handle bar mustache back in the 70s (Ooooh man if I had that picture I would post it here every day.) And they did take us to Clayville a lot when Max and I were kids, letting us run around in the woods there playing Civil War. Hmm, that in its own way sounds even goofier than being a hippie.
Eventually, hot and sweaty I hopped onto one of the big shuttle cars for a ride out to the reservoir. A good 15 minute ride out of camp, it’s a large water filled cistern full of slimy and icy cold water. But it was very refreshing on a day like this.
I hung out there for a little while and then took shelter from the worst of the day’s heat in the shade of the car reading my book.
A midafternoon walk revealed another handful of overlooked insanity.
This shopping cart has future burn victim written all over it.
The isn’t art nor insane but I thought I’d show the waste facilities here. The nudity may have been at a minimum here thus far but privacy is still not a concept given much thought.
I was perfectly set up to enjoy dusk, by far the most beautiful part of the day in a beautiful in its own desolate way part of the world.
I wasn’t the only one watching the sunset.
Sunset behind San Clan, AfrikaBurn’s burning man. It’s a sculptural representation of the San rock painting.
Nightfall, in additional to a bitter cold amplified by higher winds than yesterday, brought forth an orgy of fire. I guess when you have to take out everything you bring in there is a lot of impetus to burn it as opposed to pack it. The first to go was the Ego Booth, followed shortly thereafter by some installation I didn’t recognize that consisted of stumps arranged in a pattern.
Dancing around them was a giant puppet. I kept waiting for him to catch himself on fire.
Night brought out a couple installations that were impressive, albeit uncinged. 2Infinity was two figure eights joined by all these fiber optic cables that were lit up. Created a really cool visual.
Here again with amped camera settings.
And of course there was more burning. Eventually in a lull in the flames I went back to came to refill and rand into my neighbors again. We gave it ago at some trance tent. I was exhausted from lack of sleep and sun and beer and I, as I have mentioned, hate trance so I laid off to the side and watched them dance to the beats of a DJ wearing a huge Battlestar Galactica Cylon helmet to which he had fused to giant Satan style goat horns. That was way cooler than anything he played.
When I couldn’t take that anymore I went over to the burning man, who was yet to burn despite it being 1230 and claims it was gonna light at 11. It was damn cold and windy and I could see why those guys felt the need for a kids burn (though a lot of kids were still present, bedtimes being one of those things like ego that are left behind or burnt at this thing).
Eventually, with much fanfare they lit it. And…it burned slowly. Goddamnit. Don’t you treat this shit with something? Shouldn’t it go up in a big plume? Or at least have the flames steadily climb it? I watched for probably close to a half hour and at best the tip of one of his many feet was fairly burnt. I’d be here all night to see this thing get some real flame action going.
So eventually I left. And actually that was pretty awesome. After last night’s trance lesson I had my IPod and I must say that the middle of a dark desert, with hundreds of thousands of stars in the sky and almost no lights other than the flicker from a giant burning idol in the distance, the addition of Sigur Ros was enough to make it about a spiritual a moment as I am capable of having.
Perhaps spiritual is the wrong word, in fact, it definitely is. I don’t want to suggest I achieved any enlightenment, or looked at the world differently during or after; it was simply one of those times where everything clicks to form a fleeting moment of beauty that is just about perfect.
A Few Misc Notes:
• While en route to the swimming hole I saw a paraplegic with a cart rigged up behind his wheelchair so he could offer free rides to people. Damn, that’s awesome. He’s almost completely incapacitated and in the middle of a harsh terrain and he still embraced the spirit of the event. Really made me feel shitty that I was doing so little to participate. After the costume idea busted and my friends bailed I was left with little ideas and less inclination. Other than sharing liberally of my food and water with my neighbors and whoever else looked like they needed it I really didn’t do anything to contribute. I’m not saying I was ready to dress like a fairy princess and walk around bestowing wet-wipes on people but I did feel lousy that I wasn’t obeying the rules of the festival, that I was free riding.
•Some of that was undoubtedly due to the fact that I was there alone and not mingling enough. Now there are people who can instantly strike up conversation and bond with anyone on a moment’s notice and no matter where they are or what they do they will have created a group to do it with them within a few minutes. I am not like that. I know I am pretty outgoing and crazy and all that but it doesn’t come naturally, least not when I am totally solo. I am much more that person when I have at least another with me to bounce off of or fall back on. On my own I am less inclined to want to constantly be doing the work necessary to cold-start talk to someone, specially over and over again. So at a thing like this I tend to quiet down. It wasn’t helped by the fact that as a newbie at this thing I was never quite sure where the line was between community and imposition. Is this a tent I can just walk in? Is this food I am just allowed to take? Etc.
Anyhow coming after all my issues finding a good social circle in Cape Town it bugged me how bad I was at this even in a place that exists to foster community and stranger exchange. Don’t get me wrong I talked to people and I had a lot of fun but this would have been WAAAAAY more awesome with people, even if just the couple friends who bailed at the last second.