Burning Man….

[PassingCloud]

Anyone been? They reckon it’s all that, but you know…..not really. #GF

[alberto299]

Anybody going to Burning Man ?

 

[paulshane]

loads of people I imagine

[Yoghurt on a Stick]

14 hours ago, alberto299 said:

Anybody going to Burning Man ?

 

Naah! When you've seen one bloke on fire, you've seen them all!

[Pipine]

I’d love to go, can’t see me making it there for some years yet due to having two young kids, it would be too expensive / organisational nightmare.
It looks amazing though and I love seeing the photos and footage every year.  

[Crazyfool01]

would be my sort of festival if i could afford it 🙂 

[Jay Pee]

[Yoghurt on a Stick]

59 minutes ago, Pipine said:

I’d love to go, 

Same here* - only it transpires that I am considered 'persona non grata' by the powers that be in the good old US of A.

 

* - This desire was very strong earlier in my life, but is less so now.

 

 

[Pipine]

I wish I’d gone earlier in my life.. it’s always seemed like a massive undertaking though.. I joined the UK Burners Facebook group to try and get my head around the camps and how best to get there as an international traveller.. it just seemed epic.  
I hope it’s still going in 10-15 years time when I might actually have a chance to make it.

[Masterluke]

The heat and the sand would kill me. No thx

[Matt - Ed Banger Records]

Feel like the modern day Burning Man is full of Silicon Valley tech bros these days, knew a couple of people who went a few years back and it was just completely full of w*nkers who spend $10k a day on silence retreats. 

[G1T]

I went once and honestly didn't really enjoy it. A few reasons really;

- It's all about radical self expression, which is great in theory, but in practice just ended up with a bunch of people doing kooky odd stuff like undergrad students would at a party. One evening lots of people dressed up as rabbits, apparently in protest for Burning Man saying it's better to run over a rabbit in the road rather than swerve to avoid it when driving alone in the middle of the desert. Sensible advice you'd think. Another person stood in the middle of the desert with a loud hailer telling people the desert was closed. Hilarious stuff.

- The biggest issue for me was that the site is bigger than Glastonbury but contains far fewer people. That meant there never really seemed to be much of an atmosphere there. At Glastonbury (and other UK festivals indeed), it's easy to feel part of something due to lots of people and energy. Burning Man felt kind of soulless with huge amounts of empty spaces to feel alone in.

- This may have changed as the weed laws have changed over there, but at the time, everyone was paranoid of being busted for drugs, but everyone also wanted to get high. So no-one was smoking weed, but instead they were taking less detectable class A's. I don't do that, so I got a bit bored by not being able to just have a sensible conversation with people without them suddenly collapsing into fits of giggles.

Overall it just felt a bit contrived and flat. The silicon valley money aspect of it was there a bit at the time, but I understand it's only got worse since too. I honestly wouldn't rush back.

Worth saying though that others do of course have fun there, and if you think you might, then at least don't be put off by the 'oh my god it's in a hot desert I might die' thing. 'Surviving' there really wasn't difficult at all, it was warm but not insanely hot, the desert sand isn't that caustic on your skin, and basically most people there sit in luxury RVs with the aircon on full blast anyway. People only get into trouble when they get dehydrated and wander out into the desert in the midday sun. Don't do that, and you'll be completely fine.

The only slightly interesting thing about the place was living in a basically zero humidity environment for a while. This seemed to mean that your sweat evaporated before you noticed it, but you do of course still sweat. So you end up drinking lots of water which just seems to disappear into your body without ever emerging as wee or sweat. That felt pretty odd.

Other than that though, meh.

[gfa]

On 4/14/2023 at 9:10 PM, G1T said:

I went once and honestly didn't really enjoy it. A few reasons really;

- It's all about radical self expression, which is great in theory, but in practice just ended up with a bunch of people doing kooky odd stuff like undergrad students would at a party. One evening lots of people dressed up as rabbits, apparently in protest for Burning Man saying it's better to run over a rabbit in the road rather than swerve to avoid it when driving alone in the middle of the desert. Sensible advice you'd think. Another person stood in the middle of the desert with a loud hailer telling people the desert was closed. Hilarious stuff.

- The biggest issue for me was that the site is bigger than Glastonbury but contains far fewer people. That meant there never really seemed to be much of an atmosphere there. At Glastonbury (and other UK festivals indeed), it's easy to feel part of something due to lots of people and energy. Burning Man felt kind of soulless with huge amounts of empty spaces to feel alone in.

- This may have changed as the weed laws have changed over there, but at the time, everyone was paranoid of being busted for drugs, but everyone also wanted to get high. So no-one was smoking weed, but instead they were taking less detectable class A's. I don't do that, so I got a bit bored by not being able to just have a sensible conversation with people without them suddenly collapsing into fits of giggles.

Overall it just felt a bit contrived and flat. The silicon valley money aspect of it was there a bit at the time, but I understand it's only got worse since too. I honestly wouldn't rush back.

Worth saying though that others do of course have fun there, and if you think you might, then at least don't be put off by the 'oh my god it's in a hot desert I might die' thing. 'Surviving' there really wasn't difficult at all, it was warm but not insanely hot, the desert sand isn't that caustic on your skin, and basically most people there sit in luxury RVs with the aircon on full blast anyway. People only get into trouble when they get dehydrated and wander out into the desert in the midday sun. Don't do that, and you'll be completely fine.

The only slightly interesting thing about the place was living in a basically zero humidity environment for a while. This seemed to mean that your sweat evaporated before you noticed it, but you do of course still sweat. So you end up drinking lots of water which just seems to disappear into your body without ever emerging as wee or sweat. That felt pretty odd.

Other than that though, meh.

Cheers for the writeup

Found it very funny that burning man has urban sprawl 

[MrZigster]

On 4/14/2023 at 5:25 PM, Yoghurt on a Stick said:

Naah! When you've seen one bloke on fire, you've seen them all!

Make a man a fire and he'll be warm for a day.

Set a man on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.

[Yoghurt on a Stick]

1 hour ago, MrZigster said:

Make a man a fire and he'll be warm for a day.

Set a man on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.

Confucius Da Twisted Fire Starter?

[philipsteak]

On 4/14/2023 at 9:10 PM, G1T said:

I went once and honestly didn't really enjoy it. A few reasons really;

- It's all about radical self expression, which is great in theory, but in practice just ended up with a bunch of people doing kooky odd stuff like undergrad students would at a party. One evening lots of people dressed up as rabbits, apparently in protest for Burning Man saying it's better to run over a rabbit in the road rather than swerve to avoid it when driving alone in the middle of the desert. Sensible advice you'd think. Another person stood in the middle of the desert with a loud hailer telling people the desert was closed. Hilarious stuff.

- The biggest issue for me was that the site is bigger than Glastonbury but contains far fewer people. That meant there never really seemed to be much of an atmosphere there. At Glastonbury (and other UK festivals indeed), it's easy to feel part of something due to lots of people and energy. Burning Man felt kind of soulless with huge amounts of empty spaces to feel alone in.

- This may have changed as the weed laws have changed over there, but at the time, everyone was paranoid of being busted for drugs, but everyone also wanted to get high. So no-one was smoking weed, but instead they were taking less detectable class A's. I don't do that, so I got a bit bored by not being able to just have a sensible conversation with people without them suddenly collapsing into fits of giggles.

Overall it just felt a bit contrived and flat. The silicon valley money aspect of it was there a bit at the time, but I understand it's only got worse since too. I honestly wouldn't rush back.

Worth saying though that others do of course have fun there, and if you think you might, then at least don't be put off by the 'oh my god it's in a hot desert I might die' thing. 'Surviving' there really wasn't difficult at all, it was warm but not insanely hot, the desert sand isn't that caustic on your skin, and basically most people there sit in luxury RVs with the aircon on full blast anyway. People only get into trouble when they get dehydrated and wander out into the desert in the midday sun. Don't do that, and you'll be completely fine.

The only slightly interesting thing about the place was living in a basically zero humidity environment for a while. This seemed to mean that your sweat evaporated before you noticed it, but you do of course still sweat. So you end up drinking lots of water which just seems to disappear into your body without ever emerging as wee or sweat. That felt pretty odd.

Other than that though, meh.

Thanks for the account.

Never been myself, but to be honest I've never really wanted to. Largely because my perception of it was largely how you've described it and I think I'd enjoy it about as much as you did. I knew a fair few people who went 20 years or so ago and they loved it but just didn't sound like it was for me. part of me kind of wanted to try it just the once but the expense and effort involved didn't seem worth it just for that.

[Olshansky]

On 4/14/2023 at 2:29 PM, Masterluke said:

The heat and the sand would kill me. No thx

me too.  I once had a housemate who went quite a few years in a row.  the stories she would tell me about the heat... nope. No thank you 

[maelzoid]

Personally, I’d struggle to justify paying $400+ for a festival where all they provide are the toilets and nothing in the way of live music. Where does the money go? I know Glastonbury is not cheap, but you can see how they’ve spent the money.

[fred quimby]

I always wanted to go. Mainly back in my 20's. Bit late I think now and it appears to have changed alot.  Know a few people who went many years ago and they loved it.

Met a chap at Edinburgh Airport last year who was going out to help set it up. Obviously loves it as he goes every year, only just moved to Edinburgh.  Was telling me how much it had changed with the type of people there. He mainly stayed in the area where all the old school types were still.