i went to bman last weekend. for a long time i was really unsure whether or not to go this year. last year, i didn’t particularly have the greatest time, and there was just so much stuff i need to do before my RTW, that i wasn’t sure if i could muster up the time or energy to go. but i went anyways, and I’m really glad i did. i ended up having a much better time this year than last year. caryn and i caravanned up there w/ natasha, her friend megan, and a bunch of megan’s friends who were all pretty cool and we got along w/ them really well… until the last day when there ended up being hellza drama. we camped w/ liv and a bunch of other people who were spinning fire w/ the south bay conclave.
the weather this year was pretty cool and not too hot, but we had *tons* of crazy dust storms. much of the time was spent w/ goggles on and still unable to see anything through the intense dust. one of the highlights this year was the pagoda burn. the pagoda was this large 32 foot high structure that they burned on thursday night. caryn and the other south bay fire people got to spin fire before the burn and i did fire safety for them. when the pagoda went up in flames, it burned hella fast w/ a bunch of cool dust tornados coming out of it. also, the pagoda had a propeller on top, so when it burned, the propeller spun around and these two flaming comet shaped things circled around the pagoda.
also, the burning of the man was spectacular. utterly incredible. this year, to do something different, all 600 fire spinners did a synchronized routine right before the burn. i did fire safety for it, and because of that got to sit in the inner circle w/ the fire spinners when the man burned. we were *so* close. so close that you had to cover your face cause it hurt from the intense heat of the flames. i couldn’t believe that we basically had the best seats in the house out of 35,000 or so spectators!!
one last cool thing I’ll mention is the maze. they had this cool maze that was actually really tricky to get through. it had all sorts of secret panels, revolving trapdoors, and other crafty things to make it really confusing.
the one thing that really sucked about bman though this year was the lack of large scale art. where was it?? in the past years there were always tons of huge art pieces around the playa that totally left you in awe. this year, other than the temple, there really weren’t any. sure there was some cool stuff here and there, but nothing that really really stood out.
anyways, I’m really glad that i ended up going. especially since next year i wont be around to go…
I can’t upload photos right now, so that’ll be in a separate entry
*v
DUDE! where were you all weekend?! I came by your camp two or three times and you guys were never there. caryn found my though, which was awesome. I thought you two might be ghosts or something. 😉
did you see the fire pendulum thing out on the playa? it had four jet boosters, one on each side, and the guy controlling it would shoot off diffferent boosters at different times, causing it to fly around shooting fire everywhere. so fucking hot. so fucking awesome.
and where was the maze? I didn’t see it. 🙁
Yeah…we had fun in Flight To Mars didn’t we? I felt that the main “art” area on the Playa consisted mostly of half-working, boring hunks of metal. “Look, if I bend these two pieces of rebar I can make them look like an alien! That’s art, right?”
yeah… it’s all about that pole you had to slide down after the maze!!
that’s so weird, cause we actually spent a bunch of time at camp. too bad we never ran into each other :(. i’m glad to hear that you had a really good time though… it’s pretty amazing out there isn’t it? the maze was called “flight to mars” and it was at 9:15 and esplanade… right next to this huge parthenon looking dance club.
*v
Totally. I think I damaged my pelvis when I hit the ground.