So whats the deal with burning man anyway? In my mind I always envisioned it as being some kind of hippie love-fest where everybody is high, hallucinating and doped out of their minds the whole time.
Haha! I thought that too! In fact, everyone in my immediate circle of friends and family, including everyone I traveled with to BM (we were all first-timers) thought that as well. I describe my pre-conception of the place as a "dirty hippie festival" that people used as an excuse to hang out in the desert half-naked, sitting in a circle looking at a burning straw man while smoking on bongs and singing songs.
Boy was I wrong. I barely saw any qualified "hippies," and the vast majority of people there were in their mid-20s and early-30s. There were older people as well, but the ones I met were just nice older folk who had gone there before. I met many professionals, from engineers and specialists, to company owners and directors, though their "real life" positions in life rarely made it into conversation, nor into how people treated you.
How 'commercialized' is it? And it is like a week or two long? Whats the draw of going to this place? Good techno music, people watching, interesting things to buy or see?
Virtually no commercialization at all. No sponsors, no advertisement, no exchange of money (except for ice and coffee in the center if you really want). In lieu of currency, there is an emphasis on sharing and "gifting" with people (but not "bartering"). Note, however, that BM isn't a big "share fest" or collective; the gifting is just something to do from the general feel of the festival (it's fun!), and because people are generous with you. While on our way out (4.5 hour wait!) people were regularly bringing around food for other people in their cars, and we packed out some of the trash and belongings of people who had left their stuff behind just to help out.
The length of BM is about 2-weeks, but we only went less than one week (Wednesday night to Monday). It was just about the right length of time for me because of the "disruptive" sleep schedule (we wanted to go out at night all the time, and sleeping during the day can be a pain), and our supplies. The want of a shower also helped, though our camp did have a porta-shower. I'm sure with a well-equipped camp and good pacing the 2-weeks is quite nice, especially with friends. Rent a car if you don't want your car covered in dust. An RV is even better.
There
is a ticket price, and it was $210 at its lowest this year, up to about $350 I think. However, once past the gates, everything is free with respect to what you can participate in, including many of the "bars" that are around (bring a cup). The most commercialized aspects of the event are the scalpers that you might see on your way there, and all the supplies you have to provide yourself. You need to provide all the food, water, and shelter you're going to need for yourself to survive, but many people just hopped from camp to camp seeing if they could get some free food.
BM does provide
excellent toilet (porta-potty), medical, and security facilities, especially for a festival on that scale. Toilets were regularly cleaned, did not smell, had toilet paper and hand sanitizer except in super busy times, and were nicely spaced out around the camp areas, with some rest spots in the middle of the playa. The graffiti in the toilets was pretty funny, and there were some signs in there encouraging people to mark them up.
One thing nice about the relatively high ticket cost is that it keeps the riff-raff out. I saw no fights, no douchebags (I'm sure there were some), no beggars, no transients, no groups of teens, no hoods or gangs. Some people did bring their kids (I saw
two the entire trip), but that was a very rare case, and I believe they were charged for a full ticket, which helps discourage BM from being one of those "family" events full of annoying kids and babies. From what I saw, nearly everyone was well behaved, and some people even pointed out a drug dealer to the law enforcement there, who was promptly hauled away.
What I really liked about the festival was that there wasn't an "agenda" to it. BM isn't a drug-fest, a hippie-fest, or a free-love fest. There are no environmentalism, anarchy, or religious platforms trying to draw you in. Nobody is preaching to you, trying to sell their agenda. It's just what you want to make of it. If you're not into the techno, or partying, or the night life you can hang back, or go at a different time of day or night. There's literally something for everyone, and it was refreshing to take breaks to go out and enjoy the art that was everywhere, away from the lights and sounds.
From that second pic, it almost looks like some kind of city!
Yup, it's called "Black Rock City" and it appears for the duration of Burning Man and essentially disappears after it is over. The center circle is about a half-mile in diameter. Many volunteers go across the desert/salt flat to find trash and other remnants of the festival and clean it up.
