Other than the traveling distance, there are a few other things that one should know about the Burning Man experience: There isn't any water, shade or shelter, and all means of survival are left up to the participant. Emergency medical care was on-site, however, if needed.
At the Burning Man, it is occasionally extremely dusty, windy and very hot! Anything that is packed in has to be packed out. If you build a fire, you are responsible for removing all the ashes when you leave. And it is one of the hippest and most exciting festivals I have ever been to. An open mind is a necessity.
As we traveled through the hot desert back roads and neared the festival site, certain fears mysteriously began coming on. Why was I willingly placing myself in the middle of a desert for four to five days where surviving the elements is your primary concern?
To explain a bit further, the Black Rock Desert is a massive dry alkaline lake bed - the largest flat expanse of earth in North America. It's surrounded by mountains and some of the most magickal hot springs to be found anywhere in the West. An amazing and impressive site for a festival, indeed.
For me, the feeling of being in the middle of this flat, cracked and expansive earth brought up an incredible feeling of peace and meditation - having a symbolic impression on me the entire time. At one point, I grabbed up a large piece of white muslin, some water (which is a necessity), disrobed and walked barefoot out into the open expanse with nothing in my field of sight but the level plain and the mountains in the distance.
I found a spot and meditated for a few hours, braving the sun, at times letting the hot light wash over my body, meditating with clarity and intensity. This landscape has a strong voice; the more I listened, the stronger it came. This desert would be an incredible site for ritual when there is no one else around. The spatial quality and energy of the place would transport your rite out into the cosmos.
The festival itself was a ritual of sorts, too. Many people had gathered, for countless reasons and needs, a rainbow family. The components of the festival were constructed and idealized at the core by numerous artists, inventors, builders and performance artists from many places, with the greatest number coming from San Francisco.
In its eleventh year, this festival continues as an open forum for the eccentric, inventive, imaginative and strange. One could expect to see anything here, and weirdness certainly was encouraged. For the week, this was our village in the desert, and it was devoid of any political authority. Anything goes.
I was wowed and amazed continually as I wandered around the village and came upon abstract contraptions that seemed to have been hurled up out of the desert floor. They defied reality, and that was the point. People were building structures and theme camps right there on the spot - structures that would seemingly require numerous tools and equipment to construct, yet the artists had considered it all and brought the tools with them. Electricity, engineering and metalworking in the middle of the desert: These people were serious.
Some of the things that caught my attention most were the structures to be burnt, to be sacrificed. The festival attracts many professional pyrotechnic and fire-crazed types. They were the facilitators of the festival's main symbology - burning away and cleaning out poison from the body. This symbolism was furthered especially with the extreme heat and the focus on the body in order to not experience injury.
At the heart of the burning was the gigantic Burning Man effigy that towered over the village. Lit up at night with blue and yellow neon light - was it an alien or a man effigy? Dunno.
There was a fair element of the alien-chasing type of energy there, too. Hmm. But anyhow it was all good. And I had the pleasure of being in the right place at the right time and was part of the ritual of heaving the illuminated Burning Man effigy up onto its perch one evening. As it was erected, it must have been like a beacon, because the droves of festival-goers flocked en masse as it rose into the sky. There were many things to be burnt, with great care and safety of course. In fact, it would be a realistic account to say that just about anything that was built or brought was eventually set on fire.
At one point, there was a large procession to the evil corporate, religious conglomerate called Helco Village for the public ritual of burning down Helco! Complete with the tower of Helco were a church, Starfucks Coffee, McSatan's and numerous skeleton effigies dressed in corporate attire. This was the first large public burning, and it went off with a big bang. Everyone was ready for more fire.
I moseyed over to my favorite chill spot, the Chai den, and sipped some tea while tripping out to the psychedelic lights, the ambient trance music and the beautiful people, before the opera at the castle began that same night. As my friend and I headed off to the castle, we could hear that it had already begun and the throngs of people had formed a huge circle around the castle.
The castle had been sculpted out of the mud right there in the desert, with a wood and mesh frame underneath. Standing at least 30 feet in height, with three towers with gargoyle faces, a circular staircase and a suspended walkway for the performers, it was spectacular. The opera pounded with drums and mysterious voices, and the performers were worked into a hedonistic celebration. This was a pagan opera. At least a hundred ritual performers danced around the castle as they set fire to it toward the end.
The castle burnt strong and hot to the ground with the rhythm of the drums and voice urging it on. This was the most powerful pagan ritual I have ever witnessed. Awesome. The next day I returned to the remains and was struck by the pile of charred castle, with a face still visible, set against the vast expanse of the desert. The remnants of a great ritual. Every bit of it was cleaned up afterward.
Eventually the Man effigy burnt too, in the largest ritual of the festival, with at least 10,000 people looking on. I chose to stay back away from the mob, as the act of burning the effigy started to take on an extraterrestrial vibe. The energy had culminated into this kind of intensity over the weekend. I chose to stay back by the stupa that was connected by a procession of lantern-lit towers that reached like a runway to the large effigy.
The stupa was a small Himalayan-styled structure built of wood, mud and discarded library books. The layers of open-faced books made up a large circular base, with mud as mortar, that held up a wood multitiered structure on top. Truly imaginative and magnificent. I wanted to be close to it as it burnt; the artist had built it as a stupa of hope, and it was powerful as he set it on fire.
From there on, the festival was chaos; most things in sight were burnt to the ground (all of which were cleared away), wild music played through the night, and the people were crazed. I opted for going to another of my favorite sites, the alien egg landing circle, out away from the camps.
The moonlight lit up the desert playa, the cracks like a mosaic's. The lights flashing through the petroglyph-stenciled eggs created patterns of light out in the vastness that were totally surreal. I needed quiet space after all that excitement.
The quality and artistic craftsmanship throughout the festival was remarkable and made for a great visual feast. We were provided with hot showers with water from the springs, at cost. I only took one after taking a mud bath in the Mudhenge with many other naked, beautiful ones. After paying $40 and having to bring all my own food and water, I was a little surprised that they still wanted to charge for things!
Which brings up the flip side to this festival. It is getting too big, unfortunately, and size could be the downfall of a great event. This year had a 50 percent increase in attendance from last year. I estimate there were 15,000-plus people on the playa by festival's end. And too many of them were too stoked about driving their dirt bikes and vehicles over the playa, so that they stirred up a huge dust cloud that hung in the air, since there was no wind. I had alkaline dust blocking my nasal passages and in my eyes for the next 24 hours because of that. Too many people, too many cars; no more festival, perhaps.
Ultimately, the positive aspects were the most outstanding. I had an amazing experience, had many adventures. And I met up with some great like-minded people whom I would have liked to add to my tribe of people at home.
There were too many things to remark on them all, but there are at least a few I would like to mention because they were so damn cool: like the man and his wife who hauled 88 open-faced pianos and bolted and welded them together into a two-layer-high circular structure that, when finished, people could climb upon and bang the strings with drumsticks. When you went inside it, there the builder was, serving up champagne and cocktails while 30 to 40 people banged away at his creation. What a sight. It was strange coming upon it at the village's edge - like a Daliesque mirage. Later, he burnt it to the ground.
One group had built a large mouse-trap game, which looked impressive, but I wasn't there for the demonstration. I liked the Irrational Geographic Society camp, where I spent a blissed-out late afternoon at Blanca's Smut Shack dancing under the sun to jungle, dub and trance music and later fooling around on their Moog synthesizers making trippy ambient music and noises and playing a gong. Thanks, guys, that was a fantastic afternoon!
All of the wild, futuristic alien landing site structures were a stimulating sight, as were the various movie screens projecting wild and unruly visuals - especially the Porno Camp, which was in a direct line only 30 yards away from our camp. And it wasn't just hetero sex, either. Yeah!
There was a multitude of impressive music, performances and interesting sights going all the time - everything from tribal, funk and DJ music, to masquerade processions, puppet shows and anything in between.
As well, there was a medical camp and ranger station in case of emergency, and it was hot and brutal out there. The organizers and volunteers did an amazing job putting the festival on; it was truly a cutting-edge technological, artistic event, and they pulled it off with grace.
They have had practice, though. This was their eighth year in the Black Rock Desert. Still, it was an incredible feat. Some of them stay for three to four weeks afterwards to painstakingly clean up, making sure that there is nothing left on the desert playa, especially the cigarette butts. This is sacred ground - why would anyone litter it? There should have been an R.J. Reynolds structure burnt in the Helco fire.
For anyone interested in attending, here are few more things you should know: Don't go if you're not open to all types of people, or not open to nudity (neither seemed to be a problem this time); remember too that it will be very hot and dusty, and at times not very comfortable, and although it is a great event, it is starting to become overpopulated. Too many people translates to too many of the wrong people. It could be that this was the festival's last year, as a result of this.
It might transform into something else, I hope. One of the organizers suggested to a campmate that people start their own festivals, with artists at the core. We can possibly keep these festivals more focused and special.
I personally didn't feel comfortable doing transformative work on myself there, because there were so many people I didn't feel safe in that context - not like other festivals I have been to. After all, I thought that was one of the great things about festivals - getting away from the mundane and effecting change. I've heard that a strong element of personal change was formerly present at this festival. It is still there, but it is not as paramount as it was in the past.
Eventually, the festival was over. The throngs of people took off for San Francisco. Some of us stayed behind and enjoyed the beauty of the place as long as we could. There was an entire journey that lay ahead of us, our return to Seattle. And we had been truly inspired by the festival and the wonderful people whom we met. The Burning Man rocked!
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