Tales from Burning Man
Thursday, August 19th, 2010Browsing through a recent thread on a certain forum, I came across a post about people relating the experiences they had while attending the barren hippie desert-punk festival known as Burning Man, you know, that one annual gathering held in the middle of the Black Rock Desert for an entire week at the end of August? For someone who might not be able to imagine the image or even the purpose a tent city springing up in the middle of the alkali flats of Nevada, you’d be hard pressed to get a straight definition about the whole experience from someone else whose heard about it or has even gone in the past.
That’s how insane Burning Man is, able only to be described as an experience and all. This is just a sample of some of genuine moments people experienced while living life on the playa for seven days strange. If reading them doesn’t make your mind wander into the possibility of going to do this for a week, tickets are still available, then I don’t know how you came across this article and you should probably stick to not camping in the desert. Enjoy them anyway:
Kurei:
Funny because the first thing that a greeter said to me when I drove into burning man was
Greeter: “Are you bringing any drugs or alcohol into the camp ground?”
Me: “Uh…”
Greeter: “Why the fuck not? Go and have a good time!”
Me: “OK!”
what a great way to start the week.
BlueBayou:
On the last morning we were there, my friend and I went out for a ride… just to see what we could find, no real destination in mind. We rode past a big ole white tent where there were people drinking and as we passed someone inside called out and asked if we wanted to take the Whiskey Taste Test. Hell yes we did.
Turns out it was a big camp full of Texans with weird shit written on the walls such as ‘Time for pie” “God damn this is some big hippy nonsense” and my personal favorite “‘Go drink water’ is the new ‘Fuck Off!’” Anyway the whiskey taste test was pretty simple. The bartender had about ten bottles from different kinds of alcohol (so like gin bottles, vodkas bottles, whiskey bottles etc), but they were all filled with whiskey… and he told you they were all filled with whiskey. You picked a bottle and he’d pour you a shot. You’d down it.. and then the test – “Did that taste like whiskey?” “Uh.. yes.. of course..?” “YOU WIN!!!!” “What do I win?” “Another shot!!!”
We stayed there most of the day. Helped move a broken truck on to a flatbed tow truck. Watched a guy fall asleep in a chair with his shoes on, get drawn on, then taken away by medical once it was determined he was really out of it. Then we ate a while bunch of their leftover food, played in their giant pit full of stuffed animals, and watched some people in the next camp over set a car on fire.
Wandering around during the day and finding a place to stop for a drink was always the best.
minato:
Everyone has a Burning Man Moment. My favorite last year was going for a 2am bike ride out into the desert. There couldn’t have been a soul within a mile’s radius of me. I noticed a small winking light off in the distance and headed towards it. In the middle of nowhere, it was… a parking meter. My friend’s moment was when he was caught alone out in the desert in a sandstorm. He was wandering aimlessly for a while, safe but disoriented, when out of the dust a bus slowly rolled up to him. The driver leaned out and offered him a hot dog.
spite house:
In ’01 my campmates and I were hanging around our geodesic dome at about 10 in the morning, eating corned beef hash and gradually emerging from our collective stupor, when we heard a very loud voice with a thick Russian accent hailing us from the doorway. “HELLO MY FRIENDS!”
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