A Report on a Recreational Land Use
Extravaganza
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The view on the Playa.
CLUI photo |
A CLUI volunteer was dispatched to witness the
Burning Man event which takes place every Labor Day Weekend
in the Black Rock Desert in Nevada. He submits this report:
Imagine a tent city of (an estimated) 3,000 people
erected in the middle, literally, of the largest (in total cumulative
area) flat space in North America. 3,000 urban hipsters, from
all over (but mostly San Francisco), engaged in various forms
of frivolity, debauchery, and countless other forms of hedonistic
pursuits, both mentionable and unmentionable, for (at least)
three consecutive days and nights, culminating in a ritualistic
procession and destruction through fire of a 40-foot tall wood
and florescent-tube effigy, the Burning Man.
Throw in music (from notable Bay Area bands such
as Three-Day Stubble and the Mermen) and other performances
on three stages and the roofs of vans; Art Cars (including that
of Mr. Art Car himself, Harrod Blank); periodic punctuation
by homemade explosives and fireworks; eurotrash; an occasional
medevac chopper; elaborate raves blasting techno into the flat
expanse day and night; relentless sun relenting to sudden choking
dust storms whipping unsecured items into infinity; lightning;
showers; then, to the joy (especially) of countless tripping
people, a double rainbow over the Burning Man.
Add, on the periphery, a hundred heavily armed
people shooting at dozens of stuffed animals on a "drive-by"
shooting range; an over-run hot spring; countless evacuated
vehicles stuck in the mud; cops from the State, Bureau of Land
Management, and County (in dune-buggies with light bars); and
a disgusted and amazed small town of Gerlach, with a happy gas
station endlessly dispensing ice and petrol.
Include everything in between, and you've got
the picture of what transpired at Burning Man '95. Now multiply
by two, and you get Burning Man '96!
