If you’re intent on doing it right, preparing for Burning Man should be a feat that tests your organisational prowess, even just as an individual participant.
Burning Man isn’t just a huge doof in the desert. It’s an opportunity to encounter a truly foreign culture, based on generosity and creativity.
I reckon you can’t properly participate in that culture unless you’re ready for environment which gave birth to Burn culture – the playa, also known as the Black Rock Desert.
It’s an equally majestic and inhospitable place. Golden alkali flat earth, cracked and baked by a relentless sun, with scattered drifts of sand and dust.
At night, the temperature drops near freezing. Dust storms, vicious winds and sporadic downpours can obliterate your eyes, your tent, and bring your entire experience to a miserable standstill.
Unless you’re ready.
Which means writing a fuck-off packing list and having everything you need to survive.
Now all of this sounds like a masochistic ordeal because I haven’t mentioned the things that make Burning Man worth going to.
Gigantic structures and impossibly engineered interactive artworks. Colossal mutant vehicles trundling round the desert blasting tunes. Titanic platforms for people, with open eyes, ears, hearts and arms to wear, say, do, sing and make.
The overwhelming majority of these gifts great and small are built and made by volunteers. Some grants from the Burning Man org help cover costs, but even the designers and builders of Temple compete to give up their time each year.
Each of those volunteers is self-reliant before they help build, and that’s the case with our little crew for Pleiadian Oasis. We’ve all flown out from Sydney with our own money, time and energy to build something for a foreign festival that will last a week.
Don’t misinterpret this as a whinge, or that we’re seeking a pat on the back. We’re also thankful to the support in our fundraisers by generous Sydneysiders who are encouraging our vision.
The point of this is that it’s worth it.
Countless hours planning, preparing, packing, building.
It’s worth it to contribute to a culture that can offer the lesson that generosity is beautiful, that art is meaningful, and that if it isn’t easy to party, you party all the harder.
