Burning Man 2022

I have finally gotten the pics and videos off my phone and somewhere I can transfer them from.  As I promised, here are some of my visual memories of Burning Man 2022.

Primer:
Burning Man is, basically, a 7 day art colony in the Nevada desert.  It happens on federal land (Black Rock National Park), ergo its name "Black Rock City" (BRC).  There are BLM (Bureau of Land Management - US Department of Interior) agents as well as county law enforcement there since we are subject to federal law.  It's pretty much a live-and-let-live relationship with law enforcement, but serious crimes (e.g. assault & battery, rape) will result in you being arrested and transported from BRC to a federal jail in Reno.  

It starts off as a completely pristine desert.  Then, as we get closer to the date DPW (Department of Public Works) starts laying out the city with GPS, defining avenues and streets.  It is designed like a big, thick horseshoe with concentric horseshoes inside of it.  Those concentric horseshoes are streets (A through L or so).  Then, superimpose a clock on the horseshoe.  The avenues are the clock.  The main road, the first one after you come off the middle of the horseshoe ("the Playa") is Esplanade.  Esplanade is like the Vegas Strip.  Behind Esplanade is 'A' (this year it was called 'Apparition', because the theme this year was Waking Dreams.  In 2019 'A' was Andromeda because the theme was Greek mythology.  Veteran Burners just call them A, B, C, etc).  Our camp was at 3 and Esplanade, right on The Strip.  

I have been trying to copy-and-paste a picture of the layout of BRC but, for some reason, my laptop won't let me right-click on a pic to copy it.


BRC covers approximately 7 square miles.  To provide some perspective Cambridge, MA is 7.1 square miles.  The population of BRC is 80,000 people.  By comparison the population of Cambridge, MA is 118K, and that's a dense urban environment.

BRC has its own medical facility, manned by MDs and RNs (who are residents of BRC and who volunteer their services and expertise).  It has its own quasi-police force (the Black Rock Rangers, who are the first interface between trouble and BLM.  If they can't handle it they have walkie-talkies).  It has a heavy equipment department, HEAT (Heavy Equipment and Transportation), which has big fork lifts and cherry pickers and bulldozers and all the stuff you'd need to lift/move big stuff.  It has its own Post Office with its own zip code and its own airport with its own airport code.  ALL of this is manned/serviced by volunteers from within the BRC community.

Other than ice, which you must pay for, there is no exchange of currency in BRC.  There isn't even a barter system.  If you want to give something, you do without the expectation of being repaid in any way.   My camp is called Hardly.  We run a 24/7 whiskey bar (except for Friday night when we were a tequila bar for 6 hours).  Any time of day or night you can stop in and have a shot of whiskey, as many as you'd like, for free.  We went through about 120 gallons of whiskey this year.  I've had people give me trinkets as a thank you for serving them but that isn't required, they were just showing me their appreciation.  There was a camp 2 blocks from ours (3 and B), that served sausage/egg breakfast sandwiches and coffee everyday between 9:30-11:30am.  I ate there just about every day.  No money, nor anything else, was exchanged.  They gave me my food, I helped myself to their coffee, I thanked them, and that was it.  This is a very, very, very different culture and system than we are used to in our everyday lives, to say the least.  We all know it isn't real, we all know it isn't transportable back to real life (or, as Burners refer to it, "the Default World").  All we try for is that we can bring some of the caring and support back and try to keep it going for as long as we can before The Default World drags us back down to its level.

At the end of the event we diligently do what's known as MOOP (Material Out Of Place).  That means anything, ANYTHING, that has no place in a Nevada desert must be picked up and carried out.  Everybody, from the residents to BLM, are fanatics about this.  The motto of Burning Man is "Leave No Trace".  It was a pristine desert when we showed up, we created a city complete with infrastructure and services for a week, and then we returned it to its original pristine condition.  If you went there today you wouldn't see any evidence whatsoever that a city with almost 70% of the population of Cambridge, MA had even been there.


And now, to the pics.  I have tried to upload my mp4 videos but lack the technical expertise (a recurring complaint of mine).  If someone can help me with that I'd be happy to do so.

Hardly.  The bar, the hotel (just a facade on top of a 20' shipping container.  You climb a ladder, walk across a catwalk to the hotel for a better view of the city) and the Livery across the street.  The Livery is where you park your bikes and can sit on a couch and relax.  As you can see there's a big of a logjam at the door.  We need to ID everybody, per Federal Law, plus we are an extremely popular place.  Free all-you-can-drink whiskey!








Art cars.  Once you get to your location in BRC you cannot drive around the city unless the DMV (Department of Mutant Vehicles) approves you.  To do that you must contribute to the art colony.  You cannot look like a car.  To drive at night you have to be very lit up.  Some of these art cars are MASSIVE.  You can see, in at least some of the pics, there are people on bicycles in the pic.  That should provide some perspective on the art car's size.








The Man:





Bob


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Thank you Bob! Truly a unique experience I imagine.

Never made it to one, though it would be right up my alley.

This is unreal. Seems like something right up your alley. Thanks so much for sharing some of your pictures. I have wondered about this ever since you first described it to me. I will show my son, he said he had read about this so he will be interested in your recount as will Bill.

We can always count on stories of your trips. Thanks again

Rosalie

Found some videos of Burning Man.  I'm posting them to make up for the fact that I can't upload my videos due to file size.

The art car at about 2:15 is the famous "El Pulpo", which was highlighted on a "Simpsons" episode.  At about the 3 minute mark, where there are art cars waiting in a row, that's DMV.  They're waiting to get their night-driving certification.  Yes, there are even lines at Burning Man DMV.





At about 6:15 of this video there's a decent video of the Man burning.




Bob


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