Virgin Burns

[Adventures of a first-time Burner at Burning Man 2007, in 2 or 3 posts to be published over the next 3-4 days]

Queen for a Moment

We hear this story from a friend.  Out on the Playa, where tens of thousands of late night desert party people play, a group of dedicated pranksters set their sights on a woman entering one of the PortaPotties.  As soon as she locks the door behind her, they spring into action, and about three minutes later, this random stranger steps out to find a red carpet unrolled at her feet, triumphal music blaring.  Lit up and cheered on by two dozen people she's never met, she's led up the carpet to a platform where she's crowned with a tiara and served champagne.

Such is "the gift economy" that motors Burning Man, a place where there is no commerce (with the exception of one concession stand for coffee and health drinks at Center Camp, the only thing you can buy is ice), and your value as a human being is measured by your capacity for generosity.

Ring Them Bells

When we arrive at the gates after a 12 hour drive, one of a long caravan of vehicles that have passed the signs lining the way bearing slogans that speak to this year's "Green Man" theme (one says, "If you were really green, you would've walked here"), we pull our overloaded pickup truck up to one gate where a pink-haired matron in overalls distributes event books and maps and necessary advice for me, the newbie: "If you get tired and cranky and out of sorts and you decide you don't want to be with these people you came in with?  It just means you need to drink more water."  (One motto of Burning Man, I later learn, is "always piss clear.")  Then she has me climb atop the big brass bell hanging by her station and bangs it with a big stick as I ride. 

My honey Tater -- a veteran of some 11 Burns over 14 years --rushes from the truck to tearfully embrace me as I climb off.  Then I gong the bell myself, yelling (as instructed), "I'm a virgin no more!" while other drivers and passengers applaud.  My greeter gives me the traditional greeting ("Welcome home!"). Virgins used to be routinely spanked upon entering, but to circumvent lawsuits, she presents me with a "Spank Me" coupon, which I redeem later that night.

Life on Mars

The event takes place in a Black Rock Desert dry river bed north of Reno, where not even a bug lives on the thickly dusted hard clay surface.  The city that's built virtually overnight on it and then totally dismantled eight days later is constructed as a giant circle.  Picture a long playing record album where the label area is some three square miles of open space -- that's the Playa, the huge playground, liberally littered with fantastical art pieces one can walk, bike or mutant vehicle motor to, where the 40' high Man himself resides at the center, awaiting his ritual sacrifice at the week's end.

The band between our record label and the end of the record's last song is the Esplanade, ringing the center circle with 24/7 clubs, discos, and other theme camp exhibitions, including a replication of NYC's Astor Place subway stop, complete with revolving cube, station kiosk, park bench and Manhattanite lamp posts.  The 10:00 and 2:00 ends of the Esplanade house the loudest, hottest dance clubs, blasting techno across the Playa till dawn and beyond.  At any given moment out on the Playa you're hearing a bizarre cacophony of a dozen different musics, creating a white noise wall for your confused ears to process.

The concentric circles radiating out from that Playa center are the campgrounds, from street A to K, where the tents, domes, RVs and all manner of surreal crash pads reside.  Tater, best friend Lisa and I are part of the Red Nose District, camping with a circus company whose big top sits on one of the far ends of the Esplanade, so we're only one ring behind the main action; it's like living a block behind Times Square during a week-long Saturday night. 

One morning around 5 a.m. -- after going to bed with a flame-throwing art car parked outside our tent -- Tater and I wake up not because the music from the circus tent is so loud but because the ground is vibrating and shaking so hard from that music.  Some deranged DJ is pounding out a repeated drum-and-bass melody that corresponds to no known earthly scale or rhythm, and even in my half-conscious state, I'm intrigued.  That's new, I muse, unzip the tent flap, put on my Playa boots and pad half-naked to the PortaPotty.  Just another Burning Man dawn.

The Obligatory Life-Transforming Ephiphany

At the Tea House, an elegant Oriental tent pitched out on the Playa, the Tea Master pours freshly brewed teas in small cups from his perch at the center of the circular bar, which is ringed with a clientele resembling denizens of the first Star Wars movie who found the bar there too obstreperous.  It's a place many people come to chill after a long night's revelry, some couples sprawled on cushions in the corners, canoodling.

A man comes to the tent opening.  "I don't know, I don't know," he announces.  "I'm either in this body -- and what I see is real -- or maybe it's all in my head!  And I could be discovering the meaning of my entire life -- or this could all be bullshit -- I don't know!"

He babbles on for a bit, the Tea House customers smiling and nodding, before the Tea Master speaks.  "What's your name?"  "Milan."  "Milan, come in and have a cup of tea.  Relax.  Take it easy."  "Okay, okay," says Milan, stumbling into the tent, "but I don't know -- I want to believe this is reality, but then, what if it's only my reality?  I don't know."

"Milan," the Tea Master interjects.  "You'll work it out.  But you have to take your shoes off to come in here.  Okay?"

Milan does as he's told, still talking.  A guy in a long kaftan robe lounging on the floor behind us is quietly chuckling.  "There you go," he says.  "Even in your moment of enlightenment, you have to take your shoes off before you come into the tent."

The Tea Master has poured a cup and passes it along the bar.  "This is Milan's tea," he says.

Living the Gift Economy

In spite of the depleting heat, the daunting dust storms, the massive sleep-deprivation, the Playa gives so much more than it takes away.  Tater and I are walking down an outer circle street, tired, hot and cranky.  "I'm hungry," she says.  I look to my right, where a tarp is stretched by the side of the road with Snack Food Glory Hole emblazoned on it.  There's a duct-taped hole in the tarp ("Place Mouth Here"), and someone on the other side, informed that Tater is vegan, feeds her a mystery snack that turns out to be delicious dried mango.

We walk on, feet leadened by midday heat, and suddenly behold a water slide that's just been completed.  Naked and half-naked people are climbing up a 20' ladder to the top of this makeshift wooden chute, a slide that drops you down a 70 degree-angle, spits you into a flat straightaway, then dumps you into a pool (where you're requested to kiss the rubber duck).  Tater strips down and climbs up first, despite a fear of heights, and I follow.  Zooming down the water slide is the definition of a rush.  We emerge entirely reinvigorated, dripping with new leases on life.

There's only one more thing one could ask for, and that shows up later in the afternoon: a bearded man in a top hat carting a cooler on wheels, proffering vodka tonics.  A hose attached to the cooler has as its nozzle a plastic red penis which Mr. Top Hat calls "Rick."  Stimulate Rick and he'll give you something nice.  We blow on Rick and tell him jokes and he gushes vodka tonics into our plastic cups.  Hungry-hot-tired-thirsty no more, we bicycle onward, ready now to cook and serve dinner, gratis, to some 250 circus folk.   

[to be continued]

Comments

[E.C. Henry]

Your vaccation (?) looks and sounds it came right out of one of those "Road Warrior" movies of the 80s. Did you see Mel Gibson floating about by chance? OR did you face-off against against any mutants?

- E.C. Henry from Bonney Lake, WA

[Christina]

I love the pictures, especially the last one. I hear having a bike is a good idea. Can't wait for the next installment!

[Blake]

This is awesome. You might be my hero, Billy. Looking forward to reading more.

[Writergurl]

HA1 This sounds like a blast! It also sounds like memorial day weekend in Pensacola, FL. I don't know about these days as I haven't been in a couple of years, but when I used to go, it was the weekend for all the gay folks in the Southest to trek to the beach. We would descend upon P'cola Thursday, about 100K strong, departing on Monday, after having dropped several million dollars on the local economy. Of course that part's wildly differnt from Burning Man but the attitude (hedonism laced with generosity) is the same. Rick, particluarly reminds me of P'cola. One year, there was an encampment of women who had hauled a block of ice to the shore which they then poured shots of tequila into which became a very cold shot once it hit your lips. The "fee" for this? Either a kiss or a display of your breast. I, of course, proffered a kiss. *wink*

[mernitman]

EC: Thankfully the mutants were benign. There was a Thunderdome there, however, where people actually fought out their grudge matches.

Christina: Biking is totally the thing. Dress it up in El-wire bling and you're good to go!

Thanks, Blake: Glad you're enjoying the show.

Writergurl: Yup, that's totally the spirit...