Snap of the Month: November 2013

Background--The camera hadn't been cleaned since I returned from Burning Man and, shockingly, a dry, windy desert environment is not the best place for a camera to be if you want it to remain clean.  We (and by we I mean about 90% Goran and 10% me) dedicated four hours of a Saturday to clean the sensor on the camera.  Many sterile rags were used along with two pairs of tweezers, a pair of scissors, an aluminium ruler, several curse words, and a vacuum.  Part of sensor cleaning is needing to take long exposures on a flat blank surface, like a wall or ceiling, to see where dust and dirt is located.  The camera was held in a vice grip and pointed directly at the ceiling for this purpose.


Thoughts--At one point, boredom inspired me to photo-bomb the test exposure with my nostrils.  I'd never gotten a good close-up of my nose and especially not from a low angle and I was curious to see what came out.  It was then that Goran revealed that one of his nostrils was so blocked that when he inhaled really hard through his nose, the nostril would simply close down on itself.  I like this shot because 1) that phenomenon is not discussed nearly enough, and 2) this photo doesn't look like a nose to me.  It reminds me of the type of story you would read in a children's book about a small, stubby nose-shaped man who experiences all sorts of misfortunes simply because he is a small, stubby nose-shaped man.  This nose has character.  It has personality.  You could write a story about it.  It makes me think more about this incredible anatomical feature than I ever have before and photography is supposed to make you think.  Even if the shot is not technically good, if it makes you think then it has accomplished it's ultimate goal.  And who's to say what is ultimately worth thinking about?  I spend a good chunk of my waking hours thinking about stuff that I know is trivial and/or that I know I shouldn't be wasting my time on in the first place (I'm looking at you MSN.com).  However, if a photo makes you think it shouldn't matter if it's of a starving child, a war refugee, or a clogged nostril.  It's good photography if it makes you think.  That's my story and I'm sticking to it. 

(This was the best defense I had for making this picture the snap of the month when really I just like the picture for no particularly noble reason)

Explaining the Beauty of Backpacking

Often times when I meet new people, my friends will introduce me as their "outdoorsy" friend, or as a rock climber, a backpacker, or some combination of those things.  I usually get the most questions about climbing because it's so steeped in mystery and danger.  It's that fatal combination that people, including me, find sexy.  But, when I am introduced as "outdoorsy", a climber, etc. I always try to emphasize the backpacker part above all else.  After all, it's what I enjoy most of all of my outdoor activities (much like a fairy dies every time someone declares "I don't believe in fairies", there is a climber somewhere who died because I admitted publicly that climbing isn't my favorite activity ever).  Backpacking doesn't get nearly the sexy wrap that it should.  The dangers of it aren't as readily obvious as they are in climbing and people rarely see glamour in strapping all of your stuff to your back and walking into the wilderness.  Most people think that activity is only appropriate for homeless people, vagabonds, or gypsies, all of whom are frowned upon.  But backpacking IS sexy.  It's wild and dangerous, yet beautiful and demanding; all of the things you envision your perfect lover to be.

First off, what exactly qualifies as backpacking?  For the purposes of this post, I'm not referring to the method of international travel, which I also do, but rather I'm referring to the hiking-into-the-wilderness kind of backpacking.  Strap all of your food, sleeping gear, and general survival equipment to your back and off you go!  Backpacking is also very different from day hiking.  One of the most common conversations I have is with people who have gone day hiking and then begin talking to me about how strenuous hiking is.  Now, I am not here to demean day hiking.  Some of the most brutal hikes I've done were day hikes.  But, that being said, backpacking is a whole different beast.  Day hiking involves carrying a pack with a sandwich, water bottle, and camera (for most people).  Backpacking involves carrying the weight of all of your food, camping equipment (e.g., tent, sleeping bag, clothes, cookware), and possibly water for any number of days.  So, imagine doing a day hike with a pack that weighs anywhere between 25-60 lbs or even possibly more.  Also, backpacking days are usually longer than day hikes.  They're designed to be so, which is why you have a tent and a sleeping bag.

Aside from the literal heavy lifting, backpacking is focused on hiking.  It's a walk in the woods, literally.  Or a walk in the mountains, on the coast, or wherever your wilderness of choice happens to be.  The views of the world are just about unbeatable.  Being without cell reception and not seeing people for long stretches hold a lot of appeal to a city slicker like me.  I'm a gym rat so what I like about backpacking is that while it is incredibly physically demanding, it forces you to slow down.  When you're living in the middle of the woods, you can't help but to stop to look around.  It really forces you to be in the moment with where you are.  There are no cell phones, computers, or gadgets to distract you.  Just you and nature, and whoever you might have along with you.  It's amazing how much better food tastes when you've earned it.  It's amazing how much better you sleep, even though you're sleeping on the ground.  It's quiet.  It's serene.  Yet, it's dangerous and wild.  There are no barriers between you and the world.  It's dangerous because you're alone, in the middle of nowhere, there are animals, and any number of opportunities for injury.  And yet...it's so worth it.  Waking up with the sun and not the sound of an alarm clock.  Going to sleep when you feel like it.  Making your home wherever looks good.  It's a great time to get some reading done (paperbacks, of course).  It's an amazing way to bond with friends, family, and lovers.  When there is no TV to watch, no email to check, no phone calls to return, you get to know people really well.  That goes double for when you are on a backpacking trip with them because you get to see them at their most primal.

An example of the primal side of people: I was once on a backpacking trip in Olympic National Park in Washington.  We got to our first camp site and pitched our tent, made dinner, and then stored all of our food and scented items in our bear canister.  At this particular site, there was another party camping roughly 100 yards away from us.  After swearing off water past 8 PM, I attempted to pee one last time (I hate having to get up in the middle of the night, especially while camping on snow pack), and turned in around 10.  Around midnight I was startled awake by the sounds of the other party's cookware hitting the ground.  There could only be two reasons why that would've happened: someone got up to pee and smashed into it because they forgot their headlamp or a bear.  It turned out to be the latter.  I could hear it's footsteps crunching in the snow.  I'd been in bear country before and even seen them while on the trail, but this was the first time I'd encountered one in my camp.  I momentarily panicked.  I tried to wake my partner, but after a few grumbled words he rolled over and went back to sleep.  I decided that I would try to calm my adrenaline rush and do the same.  But then the bear got closer.  It sounded like it was going through our cooking stuff.  OFFICIAL FLIP OUT TIME.  I whacked my partner good and then semi-calmly whispered "There is a bear in our camp" into his ear.  He was instantly awake.  We strategized about our plan of action.  We had no weapons in the tent and not much to make noise with.  We were terror stricken for a good 45 minutes before he decided to leave the tent.  When he left the tent, he grabbed one of our nearby hiking poles for use as a weapon.  Thankfully, the bear had gone.  But, we did set up our first line of defense in case it came back: metal water bottles strategically placed on rocks.  I know, I know; alert security companies everywhere that we are about to revolutionize the field.  Happily, the rest of the night proceeded bear-free, though I was also sleep-free due to my adrenal gland working possibly a little too well.

What I hope you take away from this story is not that backpacking is terrifying and only for the fool hardy.  While that may be true, what was amazing about that particular experience is that is brought my partner and I closer together.  We had faced a truly frightening and possibly deadly situation together.  We both reacted calmly and coolly, he especially, and learned to trust each other in such a stressful situation.  We laugh about the story now and joke that I was ready to burrow my way through the floor of the tent and not stop until I hit Alberqurque.  We joke that my fight or flight response is so powerful that I might die of a heart attack the next time I see a bug in the shower.  We joke about using hiking poles as lances and swords and have been known to dual on trails with each other.  But it's also the story of how we faced down the big bad bear.  While this bear happened to be physical, it's not a long shot to understand how we also learned to trust each other when facing the big bad metaphorical bear.

Backpacking teaches you a lot about yourself and those around you.  I honestly don't know if it's backpacking specifically that is responsible for this, or just living in nature away from modern life that can claim credit.  Either way, it's a good way to get to know yourself and what you're capable of.  It pushes in ways you could never anticipate, though you certainly try, which is why you bring survival gear.  It surprises you in ways you'd never think possible.  And, it gives you a hell of a plethora of stories to tell the next time someone introduces you as "outdoorsy."

Many of you are still thinking that this sounds like a terrible idea but here's the real kicker.  If you have the equipment, backpacking is a cheap vacation.  It's cheap and what better way to experience a place than to be sleeping on the ground in the middle of it?  All you need is the cost of actually getting to and from the trail head and the food that you'll need for your trip.  That's it!  I might recommend springing for a hotel before you get back in the car, plane, or train cabin though.  That first shower is pretty goddamn priceless in my mind and people who are trapped in the car, plane, or train will thank you for not smelling like a backpacker while they're forcible enclosed in a small space with you. All in all, if I haven't sold you on why backpacking is amazing, trust me when I say that it's what my writing is lacking and not what the activity is.

CH. 3: Not all those who wander are lost---Not all those who Burn are total hippies

The Man burns

Burning Man 2013: Cargo Cult

Thus far, I have been writing about each of my days individually, but this post will be a little different.  Instead of going day-by-day, I will give you the highlights from the last part of the week and my final thoughts on BM.  The reason for this is that while Friday was my best day at BM and one of the best days of my life, I had been attempting to keep my posts to fairly brief descriptions of the major events of the day and the lessons learned as a result.  However, I have nearly exhausted the smaller lessons and would like to focus in on my reflections during the final days and in the time since BM 2013 finalized (about two and a half months at the time of this post).

After my intense experience of homesickness on Wednesday, I took Thursday to decompress.  I spent the majority of the day by myself.  I ran a 5K, did yoga, took a shower with someone's solar shower bag (THANK YOU BRET AND LAINE! You're both going to heaven for your joint efforts to make me smell less like a dead animal and more like an unwashed burner), and bummed around in my campmates' RV.  I rested.  I reflected.  It took a lot more than that one 24-hour block of time for me to fully process what happened on Wednesday (two and a half months later, I'm still processing) but I NEEDED that time to myself.  BM is intense.  If you don't take time for yourself, time to process, reflect, and recharge your batteries, you'll fizzle out and you may miss some of the larger philosophical points that BM has to offer as a result.  If you were to take away the fire, colors, and sounds BM would be a lot less fun.  By the same token, BM would be a lot less fun without the seemingly mandatory existential crisis.  Decompression time is a necessary pseudo-evil.

This is what your eyes do after two days at BM

Throughout the week, I had several conversations about ways to describe BM to those who have never been.  A campmate described it as Mad Max dropped into a bag of Skittles.  He was right on and he wasn't speaking metaphorically.  The bag of Skittles is just really, really big.  On Friday night I got to experience the Mad Max part of that equation: I fought in Thunder Dome with my friend Ian.  Ian's playa name is Panda and as a direct result of this, my playa name is now Panda Slayer.  For clarification, I am on the left in the video and Ian is on the right.  This was easily one of the best things I've ever done in my entire life.  It was such a rush, such a thrill!  Months later, I find myself breaking into a huge smile and laughter at incredibly inappropriate times (e.g., like when my boss is talking to me about terrorism in Kenya).  I still can't watch the video without laughing so hard I cry.  At some point in your life you should get together with someone who is near and dear to you and beat the shit out of each other with bats (preferably foam or at least foam-lined).  If you can get a crowd of roughly 200-300 people to cheer you on, even better.  It's the kind of experience that if I ever have a kid and if said kid made it to the ripe old age of 18 and wanted advice from dear old mom about what to do in life, I'd tell them to do this.  Or maybe I'll just send the kid to Burning Man.  Either way.

Saturday was the night The Man burned.  It was an intense bonding experience with my entire camp and with basically everyone there (all 69,000 of us).  It was really moving to be a part of such a deep emotional current.  If Disney World is the happiest place on Earth, I think Burning Man on Burn night is the most loving place on Earth.  The entire day is fueled by an urgency spurred by the realization that it's almost over.  Burning of The Man is basically the closing ceremony.  The Temple is burned on Sunday night, but for many burners Sunday is tear-down and travel day.  Hence, the sense of urgency.  So many weird things left to do, so many crazy people left to me, but not enough time to do all the weird things and meet all the crazy people regardless of how little you sleep.  Burn night is a great way to culminate the week. All of the art cars create a ring, inside which is every burner and The Man dead in the center.  There's fire dancing and chanting.  There's hugging and cheering. There's a huge fire works display and then The Man finally goes up in flames creating it's own mini-weather system that spawns fire tornadoes into the people unlucky/lucky enough to be sitting downwind.  It's incredible in every sense of the word and I got to experience it.  Fist bump me, bro!

Since The Man burned, I've had a lot time to reflect on my experience and even when I didn't have the time I did anyway.  What I've come to realize is that BM is an experience that is ongoing.  While the event itself is only officially a week long, after you've been it stays with you.  You experience the world differently.  I can't help but feel satisfied in a way I never had before because I have bonded with so many people so deeply.  BM didn't change me, but it did put me in touch with a part of myself that I wasn't aware existed until I ventured to BRC.  Yes, it's silly.  Yes, there are a lot of hippies.  Yes, there are a lot of cliches that are thrown around when talking about BM.  But.  BUT.  BM serves as a modern day vision quest for many.  It's our time go seeking our higher calling, find the meaning of life, ponder what we want out of life, and all of life's other big questions, but the catch is that you get to ponder them with thousands of other like-minded people.  And, also while setting stuff on fire, dancing your ass off, and fighting your friends in Thunder Dome.  One of my campmates described the essence of BM very well in a recent post to our Facebook group about a conversation he had with some non-burners in New York:

...How the dust makes its sunrises eternal and its people the same.

How it is terrible and lonely and not for the weak.
And how it is beautiful and inspiring, and not for the weak.

How along the way you’ll see yourself for the very first time in the looks you’ll get from others, seeing themselves for the very first time in looks from you.

How you’ll meet people you’ll never forget, and others you’ll never remember, and others you’ll never leave.

How you’ll find strangers eager to give, to share, to teach, and to be given, be shared, be taught.

How you’ll dance when it’s time to dance and you’ll hug when it’s time to hug and you’ll sleep with regret, because it’s never time to sleep.

  ... [It is the] search of the unique, the inspiring, the scary, the uplifting, the enlightening, and hell, the fun that is captured too rarely.

... I’ve traveled to the desert and found only those I’d gladly find over and over again.

--S. I.

Sunset on the playa

Yes, it's sounds kind of dramatic.  Yes, it's sounds totally cliche and too good to be true, and you know what?  It might very well be all of those things.  However, like so many things in life, it's also what you make of it.  Except that this thing has so much more potential than anything else you've ever experienced.  So much potential, it's beyond my grasp.  It's a place designed for potential to be realized in whatever way you see fit or best.  So, in your search for the unique, inspiring, scary, uplifting, enlightening, and fun, I would highly recommend you journey into the Black Rock Desert.  You might regret it, but I doubt it; how could you ever regret participating in something with so many flamethrowers?

**Post script: This video captures the feel of the place really well.  It was created by a virgin burner this year and I L.O.V.E. it.  It's the kind of thing I want to start my day with every day because of how it makes me feel.  You may not feel the same about it, but even if that's the case it's still a really kick-ass video. 

 Glossary of useful terms:

Art Car--a motor vehicle that has been transformed into something else entirely, though it can still be driven.  These art projects are massive undertakings.  For information about art cars see the following links:

Artcars.com

Art Car Museum

Wikipedia on art cars

Art Car World

Art cars at Burning Man

Burner--someone who has gone to Burning Man

BM--Burning Man

BRC--Black Rock City

Deep Playa--when you have gone so far on the playa that there are very few art projects or people.  If you go far enough into deep playa, you hit the trash fence, which functions as the official border of BRC.

Gifting--BRC does not allow any sort of economy whether it be bartering, capitalism, or otherwise.  It's strictly a gifting culture.  There's no quo-pro-quo.  It's simply because people want to.

Playa--refers to the large central part of BRC where most of the large art projects are found.

Playa Name--name by which you are known at Burning Man.  These names are earned and usually bestowed by friends or campmates, but really anyone could give you a playa name.  Not everyone has one but they are very common.

The Man--refers to the large wooden effigy of a man that is the center of BRC.  The Man is burned on Saturday night of the festival and generally thought of as the closing ceremonies.

Snap of the month: October 2013

Background -- I can't take credit for this photo.  Suleta Foto is often a joint effort by me and Goran.  Yes, I am usually the one responsible for the photography stuff but he has been known to step up to the plate every once in a great while.  On one of the last warm days, I insisted that we take a walk around the neighborhood with our camera.  I am rarely the subject of pictures since I'm usually the one behind the camera, but on this particular day Goran was finally paparazzi-ed out and insisted on taking a few shots of me.  The sun was just starting to go down and we were at our neighborhood beach with no one else around since it's basically abandoned after Labor Day.

Thoughts -- I like this shot though it makes me super self-conscious about the part in my hair.  It makes me think about the possibility of going bald.  At 28, I'm just now beginning to realize my own mortality and aging process and am having some trouble adjusting to both ideas.  I'm sure it will be fine, but ultimately death and aging are things that happen to other people...until they happen to me.  There's no logical reason why this picture should provoke more than five minutes of good hard thinking on my part, but it's been a lot longer than five minutes and I'm starting to freak myself out.  It seemed only fitting considering how this picture makes me feel that it be the snap of the month for October.

CH. 2: Not all those who wander are lost---Not all those who Burn are total hippies

Burning Man 2013: Cargo Cult

DAY 2--Tuesday

I awoke from my first night at BM to a tent temperature that by 8 am was 93 degrees.  I realized that if nothing else, the desert heat would ensure an early rise from me every day.  Since it was so early and all of my campmates were sleeping off the night before in various places and positions, I decided to go exploring on my own.  The mornings became my favorite time in BRC.  Burners often will fall into one of three categories: 1. Night burners, 2. Day burners, and 3. Burning-the-candle-at-both-ends-to-an-inevitable-collapse-usually-around-Thursday burners.  Day burners are a wholly different crew from the other two.  In general, day burners are older and seem more relaxed about BM than the other types of burners.  They seem less flamboyant, though there's still plenty of flamboyancy to go around.  They are more likely to strike up a conversation with you because there are less distractions.  When there are 40,000 other people around, it's difficult to choose who exactly you want to talk to at any given moment.  When the vast majority of people are asleep, it's easier and more relaxed.  BM goes off of its steroids in the morning and this made mornings less pressured and a much more comfortable environment for me to adapt to.

Morning view of my street with The Man in the middle

The mornings became my "me" time.  I liked getting up before everyone else and wandering around the city. While BM is very much a biking culture, I preferred hoofing it.  BRC is large and there are a lot of things to see.  I'll be the first to admit that without a bike, there are a lot of things that you would miss because they are too far away.  But, even with a bike it doesn't mean that you'll see more.  If you walk BRC, you really absorb all of the camps, art, and random occurrences around you.  If you bike it, you are more likely to pass a lot of that by.  There is beauty to both forms of transportation in BRC, but I prefer walking.  I connected with a lot more people because of my walking, too.  One guy who was biking by me decided he wanted to talk to me so he got off of his bike and walked with me around the city for a while.  People would come up to me and give me fruit, water, granola bars, or any number of random playa gifts just because they were excited to see me walking around.  There were occasionally people who would shout stupid things (e.g., "GET A BIKE!") but those were usually night burners who had just awoken.

Taking a mustache ride

I spent most of Tuesday exploring the playa.  I especially wanted to explore some of the art projects I had seen the night before in the day light.  I came across a mustache teeter totter that two girls were on and they were good enough to allow me a turn on it as well.  They also gave me a pair of 3-D glasses to experience the lights on the playa at night.  I found the glasses entirely unnecessary considering that the playa at night is already the most intense scene I've ever indulged in.  Everything glows, throws fire, and has a sound system.  It's like a carnival on steroids.  It's the most intense place I've ever been and really needs no help from exaggeration, substances, or 3-D glasses but it was nice of them anyway.

While strolling around the playa with three campmates, we came across a photographer who was doing silver nitrate exposures on metal plates and gifting them to his subjects.  This is one of the most interesting parts of BM culture: gifting.  I had read about it online and decided that I wanted to participate even though virgin burners basically get a pass in how they do BM since it is their first time to the rodeo, so to speak.  But, virgin or not, I decided that I wanted to take part in the gifting part of the experience.  My playa gift was lighters.  I bought lighters in bulk from Costco and jazzed them up a bit with some stickers.  I gave them to random people I saw on the street, campmates, people with cool hats, people who looked uncomfortable, people with two legs, people who breathe.  You get the picture.  I gave them to whomever I fancied.  I really got into it.  It was really fun just walking up to a stranger, smiling, producing the lighter, and walking away.  By the same token, I experienced just how into gifting and BM culture some people get.  The silver nitrate exposure is one of the coolest possessions I currently own.  It's very dear to me because it captures a moment in time I never want to forget and if I keep it out of the direct sunlight, it will last two to three hundred years.  But gifts don't have to be as complex as that photograph.  I was given granola bars in the street by morning burners because they thought I looked hungry.  I was given a turquoise necklace from someone at Death Guild just because we made friends.  I was given all manner of camp swag from a campmate, whose playa name is Swagger, because he makes Mystikal Misfits t-shirts, tank tops, dog tags, patches, stickers, bracelets, and other random stuff for everyone in our camp.  I was even gifted a bottle of Sriracha by a camp of photographers who had brought 15 bottles for the week and they discovered on Thursday that 15 may have been overkill.  Also, stumbling into a random camp and having someone cook you eggs Benedict with ice cold lemon water after a week of eating trail mix is just about orgasm worthy.  So, yeah; gifting is sort of awesome.

The silver nitrate exposure

Before BM, it was always really difficult for me to accept gifts from strangers.  This normally wasn't a problem since the US isn't really a gifting culture in that way.  However, I married a European and his culture is that way.  The first time I met his family and friends in Europe, I was bombarded by gifts from people I didn't know.  My Midwestern roots kept insisting that I give the presents back.  I felt awkward and didn't think that "Thank you so much" really covered it, even when I bumbled through that phrase in Bosnian/Croatian.  I would even plot how I could "forget" the gifted item so that it wasn't really gifted to me since it remained with the original owner.  Receiving gifts was downright stressful for me.  Until BM, that is.  I had never really thought about how humbling and almost embarrassing receiving a gift was for me until this experience.  There was also a moment of sheer panic when I realized I didn't have anyone's addresses to which I could send the "Thank You" notes.  Thankfully, I was talked off of the ledge by (seemingly) understanding campmates who were very good about hiding their judgment.  I have a sneaking suspicion that I still have problems receiving gifts, but BM has at least made me aware of my awkwardness and I can attempt to keep it in check and respond in a socially appropriate manner.  It's not often in Chicago that a stranger walks up and gives me food (I probably wouldn't eat it if they did, as it's weird to do that in Chicago), but the next time that it happens I'll at least be somewhat prepared and practiced in my receiving skills.

After a stressful day of gifting and being gifted on the playa, a small group of campmates and I decided that a low-key evening was in store.  We dressed in dark clothes and carried very few glow-y pieces with us (at night, the playa is PITCH black and so in order to avoid being run over by an art car, bike, or other people everyone wears glow-y stuff) and headed to a particularly dark intersection a couple of blocks away from camp.  The objective: hippie fishing.  Hippie fishing involves taking a glow-y object (in our case, a ring that changed colors), tying a string around it, and throwing it into the middle of the street.  One more vital piece of information before this story can be properly told: the mantra of BM is "LEAVE NO TRACE."  The goal is that after the festival, there should be no way to tell that there was a city of weirdos partying in the desert for week.  If something is dropped that wasn't in the desert when you got there it is called "MOOP": matter out of place.  When people see trash, food, or orphaned glow-y things, "MOOP!" is usually shouted before cleaning up the mess.  So, back to hippie fishing.  We tossed the ring out into the street and waited for good citizen hippies to try to grab it while we coyly pulled the string, and therefore the ring, just out of their grasp.  You would think that this would get boring after about 5 minutes, but you'd be wrong.  This provided non-stop laughs for at least 90 minutes.  Hippie fishing should be made into an Olympic sport.  It would definitely be voted the sport that is most fun to train for (that's a poll that all the athletes take, right?) and I think make the world a better place in general.

DAY 3--Wednesday

The greeter shift Misfits

Wednesday began at 3:15 AM for the Mystikal Misfits.  One of our fearless leaders had signed us up for the 4-8 AM greeter shift.  Greeters are responsible for welcoming people to BRC.  The Aussie wolf who hugged me on Monday was a greeter.  Greeters are usually stationed at the gate and as soon as people have gone through the gate, they are made to get out of their cars and indulge in some inappropriately long hugs with people they don't know.  Greeter shift was great (minus the actual time our shift took place at).  I met people who had driven from all over the country for hours on end just to come to BM.  I even greeted a crew of people who had driven from Colombia, the country not the school, to come to BM.  They were so excited to finally have arrived!  I greeted people from LA, San Francisco, Toronto, New York, and Miami.  From all of these people that I met there was one person that sticks out in my mind in particular.  When you greet people, you INSIST that they get out of their car to hug you and talk for a minute.  One guy drove up in a truck and I bounced over to say hi and welcome him.  He told me he'd been on the road for something crazy like 12 hours and was just so relieved and excited to finally be there.  I commanded him to get his ass out of the car and give me a hug.  Then, he obliged.  He opened the door of his truck, grabbed a wheelchair that had been sitting next to him, plopped it on the ground, and wiggled into it.  He couldn't walk but damn it if he wasn't determined to roll his way through the thick playa dust and take in all that BRC had to offer.  He gave me the most genuine hug, possibly of my life, and proceeded to talk with me and three of my campmates for a good 10 minutes.  As I stated on Facebook when a campmate posted a link to a photo he found of the guy, I think this guy was the baddest mother fucker I've ever met.  We're talking Samuel L Jackson in Pulp Fiction level.  Seriously, you should know this guy; he's fucking awesome and campaigns for awareness and equality and all of those are things I can stand pretty firmly behind.

Wednesday was a full day with more bonding experiences and silliness.  But something else happened on Wednesday that I couldn't have anticipated: I got homesick.  Rewind: I travel a lot.  Most of the time I travel with Goran (the spouse) but sometimes I travel without him.  Sometimes he doesn't have the time or just isn't interested in where I'm going (the case with BM).  Needless to say, I'm used to being away from home a lot and rarely find myself homesick.  But on this particular day, it hit me.  HARD.  I had been gone for only 48 hours but they were possibly the most intense 48 hours of my life to date.  So much had happened since I'd left Chicago on Monday morning.  There were so many experiences I wanted to share with him.  I usually miss him when I travel but this was like an aching sensation I'd never experienced.  I've always prided myself on being incredibly independent.  The kind of person who doesn't need a partner around.  But Wednesday night revealed just how necessary he has become to my life.  I hesitate to say that I need him, because I don't need him to survive.  But I do need him to live.  I love my life.  I'm incredibly lucky.  I have the means to travel and live life how I want.  I have a good job.  I'm overly educated.  I live in a great place, location and specific to my actual unit.  And I have a partner who has helped to make all of that possible.  Remember when I said that BM is all about bonding?  Well, I can't think of anyone I'd rather bond with than my partner.  He's been my rock and to not have him with me was a bigger absence than I've ever experienced.  This all sounds very mellow dramatic, I know.  But think of it this way; think of the best moment in your life.  Think of how high you were flying.  Would that moment have been nearly as sweet if you had been alone?  Would that moment have been nearly as sweet if you didn't have someone important there to share it with you?  Someone important doesn't have to be a romantic partner.  It could be a friend or family member or someone who is like family to you.  It just has to be someone who you care for deeply.  So, when I say that I got homesick, what I really mean is I missed Goran because he is what makes my home my home (sappy, I know.  EWWWW.  But, it's true).

Glossary of useful terms:

Art Car--a motor vehicle that has been transformed into something else entirely, though it can still be driven.  These art projects are massive undertakings.  For information about art cars see the following links:

Artcars.com

Art Car Museum

Wikipedia on art cars

Art Car World

Art cars at Burning Man

Burner--someone who has gone to Burning Man

BM--Burning Man

BRC--Black Rock City

Deep Playa--when you have gone so far on the playa that there are very few art projects or people.  If you go far enough into deep playa, you hit the trash fence, which functions as the official border of BRC.

Gifting--BRC does not allow any sort of economy whether it be bartering, capitalism, or otherwise.  It's strictly a gifting culture.  There's no quo-pro-quo.  It's simply because people want to.


Playa--refers to the large central part of BRC where most of the large art projects are found.

Playa Name--name by which you are known at Burning Man.  These names are earned and usually bestowed by friends or campmates, but really anyone could give you a playa name.  Not everyone has one but they are very common.

The Man--refers to the large wooden effigy of a man that is the center of BRC.  The Man is burned on Saturday night of the festival and generally thought of as the closing ceremonies.

CH. 1: Not all those who wander are lost---Not all those who Burn are total hippies

Burning Man 2013: Cargo Cult

When deciding upon summer activities, there was one long-standing item on my bucket list that loomed large: Burning Man.  So, with this in mind, I had a conversation with one of my inner-circle hooligans (aka, Ben) who was moving back to the U.S. from his two year Korean hiatus.  Quickly the idea of our next adventure was up for discussion.

"So, when should I come to California?

"I have an idea that's better than California.  What are you doing the last week of August?  I'd like to see you, but more so at Burning Man than in L.A.  Let's get weird in the desert!"

And thus began my quest to see The Man burn.

The planning for this event was no small feat.  I first had to acquire a Burning Man ticket, then think about booking my airfare to Reno, figure out how I would make it from Reno to Black Rock City (BRC), not to mention my food, water, and random other necessities for an entire week in the desert.  I won't bore you with the details of this planning stage, but think of the last time you staged a siege on a large city and you've got the general idea.

DAY 1--Monday

With planning behind me, it was finally go-time.  I barely slept a wink the night before since I was up late packing and wide-eyed with anticipation.  I had an early morning flight out to Reno and arrived there at 10 am PCT. Upon landing, I was immediately distracted by the madness of the Burner Express check-in and registration.  Burner Express is a bus system that gets you from Reno or San Francisco to BRC.  There was no doubting when I'd stumbled upon the registration tables.  Firstly, I should say that upon disembarking the plane there was a large banner across the hallway that read: "From runway to playa, Reno-Tahoe International Airport welcomes BURNING MAN."  Apparently "this little hippie festival" as my hubby so fondly refers to it (he actually used a much cruder phrase that refers to a circle and a bunch of men who participate in the same self-gratifying activity simultaneously) might be just a tad larger than either he or I thought.  When I strolled up to the Burner Express tables, a woman with red and white dreads to her ass gave me an inappropriately long hug (since we didn't even exchange names nor would we ever see each other again, I thought a hug of any length was inappropriate but the length of this hug would have been inappropriate for my mom to give me) and instructed me to sign in.  After obtaining my boarding bracelets amidst a sea of dread-locked, semi-naked people I decided it was time to locate Ben.  I found him not far from the Burner Express tables napping on his obscenely large suitcase.

Crappy cell phone picture of the welcoming banner in Reno

When we were finally en route, I quickly realized that we were literally going out into the middle of nowhere.  Signs of humanity were quickly disappearing.  Cell phone towers were few and far between.  Power lines were even becoming sparse.  By the time we actually got to the city, the only signs of humanity in the Black Rock Desert were the 60,000 other people who were there the burn The Man as well.  Yes, that sounds like there were a lot of signs of humanity, but seriously: stop and think about the last time you were somewhere where you couldn't see power lines or cell phone towers.  Unless you are a dirty backpacker or live in very rural America, this exercise should be difficult for you.

Burners stuck in 9-mile-long line to BRC

After nearly 5 hours on the bus (we were stuck in the traditional BRC gate back-up), Ben and I had discovered that we were two of only a handful of Americans on our bus into BRC. We were surrounded by people from Israel, Australia, South Africa, Denmark, and so many other places that I've lost track.  I needed to revise my idea of Burning Man as merely a West Coast hippie phenomenon.  This point was further emphasized when I got off the bus and was greeted by a large scantily clad Australian man dressed as a wolf (i.e., furry hat and furry Speedo).  The Aussie wolf enveloped me in a bear hug (again, inappropriately long) and welcomed me home**.  He then ordered me to drop down and roll in the playa dust.  He reasoned that I might as well get used to it because soon enough that dust would be in my every crack, crevice, and hole.  I obliged by diving in and performing my best impression of The Worm (I was just writhing around since I can't actually do The Worm)  in the dust to a cheering crowd of costume-clad burners.  When I was done rolling around in the playa dust, I was again hugged and welcomed home by at least a dozen people.  If all of this sounds weird, it's not.  This is as normal as it gets at Burning Man.

2013 map of BRC

After my playa dust initiation, Ben and I quickly made our way to our camp located at 4:30 and C.  BRC has a circular layout that corresponds to a clock with The Man in the middle where the hands of the clock would be pinned.  All directions are basically given according to the location of The Man.  It makes for a very easily navigated city.  Also, because the city plan is a circle, it's very difficult to get lost in BRC.  That being said, people have been known to disappear from their camps for days but it's usually because they kept getting distracted (easily done) on the way back to their camp and less because they couldn't find their camp.  To be totally fair, I have heard of people not being able to find their way back to their camps, but as I understand it there is usually an obscene amount of substances that are involved in such a situation.

Mystikal Misfits camp

We finally arrived to our camp and home for the week which featured a large atomic bomb (with accompanying fire-throwing system that could get you a nice 30 feet of flame,at least) and three stories of scaffolding, not to mention the large wedding tents in the back that covered at least 40 tents, two yurts, and several RV's.  Yup, looks like home to me!  My new home and family for the week: the Mystikal Misfits.

Our atomic bomb bar

Our address

Ben and I arrived at the tail-end of a happy hour our camp was co-hosting with an art car (see glossary below for information on art cars).  We arrived to many inebriated campmates and several random burners occupying our camp.  Our campmates greeted me with hugs from those who knew me and hugs from those who got to know me over the course of the week (I was much more comfortable hugging these people since I was guaranteed to interact with them at some point...but I was still kinda uncomfortable with the hugging thing in general).  Here's the thing about Burning Man: when you get to BRC, there's no easing into it.  BAM!  It's right in your face.  There's no escaping it.  The motto of Burning Man (one of many) is "There are no spectators."  It's completely impossible to not participate in Burning Man if you are in BRC.  Hell, even the cops who were assigned to bust people for drugs and underage drinking were costume-clad and partying their asses off while taking pictures with the hottest burners they could find.  I even got a temporary tattoo of the the Washoe County Sheriff's Department from some cops who just wanted to hang out during one of our parties.  When you are at Burning Man, you live Burning Man.

El Pulpo Mechanico

My first night included a group outing to the playa that began with 11 people.  By the end of our tour, we were down to 5 people.  Like I said, it's real easy to get distracted at Burning Man.  My playa tour began with flaming mushrooms, then onto a fire-spewing, tentacle-moving octopus art car with accompanying sound system (El Pulpo Mecanico), a deep playa French diner with menus only in French, a drive-in movie theater, a stationary bug car, and finally ended in a seashell in deep playa.  The seashell acted as a small shelter and came with soft music, a faux campfire, and cushions designed to fit five people comfortably.  Once inside the sea shell, our small group began one of those stereotypical conversations that you've probably heard happen at Burning Man.  It began with this question:

"What does everyone hope to get out of this experience?"

French diner in deep playa

I assumed that most people would BS their way through their answer but was completely flustered when three people I'd just met began opening up about incredibly personal things (e.g., divorce, heart ache, family issues) and answering earnestly.  Not just earnestly, but in a way that I am hard-pressed to do with even my closest friends.  When it was my turn I started by bumbling a bunch of generic answers but soon found myself slipping into incredibly personal feelings about exploring the meaning of family and what direction I want my life to take.  WHOA!  I'd JUST met most of those people and I felt like a complete tool.  I was so vulnerable and...raw.  But the conversation was really supportive, considerate, friendly, and seemed significant.  If I hadn't given into the feeling of the moment, I believe I would have been deprived of an experience that is pivotal to Burning Man.  I soon learned that bonding moments like those are really what Burning Man is about.  Yes, there is a lot of silliness and collectively questionable decision making but at the heart of why Burning Man exists is the need to bond with people.  Bonding with friends, family, campmates, strangers.  The idea is that Burning Man creates a safer emotional environment so that bonding is not only promoted but downright difficult to avoid.  So, in a seashell illuminated by black lights and a plastic camp fire, I was initiated into Burning Man.  Whether I liked it or not or whether I was ready or not, I was about to experience all of what this crazy week in the desert had to offer.

Flaming mushroom.

**The idea of Burning Man as "home" runs deeps in BM culture.  It is said so often that I began to believe it was a mantra instead of a conversation piece aimed at bonding with other burners.  The idea is that BRC is really the only place that you can freely express all (or at least most of) your desires and personality quirks.  The idea is that BRC is accepting of all people.  The idea is that BRC is made of hugs and bunnies with nothing but love for everyone.  While not all of these are true, it's not a bad ideal to strive for and by the end of the week, I was starting to understand and agree, at least somewhat, with the sentiment.

Glossary of useful terms:

Art Car--a motor vehicle that has been transformed into something else entirely, though it can still be driven.  These art projects are massive undertakings.  For information about art cars see the following links:

Artcars.com

Art Car Museum

Wikipedia on art cars

Art Car World

Art cars at Burning Man

Burner--someone who has gone to Burning Man

BM--Burning Man

BRC--Black Rock City

Deep Playa--when you have gone so far on the playa that there are very few art projects or people.  If you go far enough into deep playa, you hit the trash fence, which functions as the official border of BRC.

Playa--refers to the large central part of BRC where most of the large art projects are found.

Playa Name--name by which you are known at Burning Man.  These names are earned and usually bestowed by friends or campmates, but really anyone could give you a playa name.  Not everyone has one but they are very common.

The Man--refers to the large wooden effigy of a man that is the center of BRC.  The Man is burned on Saturday night of the festival and generally thought of as the closing ceremonies.