The Tribe

It was my first year at BM. The first few hours I was like a kid in a candy store. Wow - Weirdoes, nakedness, explicit art, public sex.... etc. etc.. I experienced a Yahoo's view of BM. Fortunately, the novelty wore off in a few hours. I soon doffed my Gap khaki's and wicking polypropylene trekking shirts and hiking boots and went native. I didn't really change much - just switched over to wearing sarongs (with hiking boots). I have worn sarongs all of my life and sleep in one every night. Once I had my behavior adjustment out of the way, I was free to explore the city and to participate. I was home.

In those days, with a total population of around 10K, the place was large but doable. I loved the party aspect BM - the true city that doesn't sleep (at night, anyway). It was also a time of less rules. Bianca's was still a real "smut shack" with beds both inside and outside for those who wish to umm... make use of their facilities in the company of others.

The temple of atonement had several racks and ran a thriving atonement business. It was a time when their slave auction was set up so that you would bid for the slaves using your soul (or part thereof) as payment.

The Fly hot springs were still open and there was an old school bus that would ferry people there and back for a few bucks. Some people were shooting an art film at the hot springs and three people were doing really bad Tai Chi around the beautiful volcanic mounds formed by the minerals. Fortunately someone came and chased them away before they could do any real damage.

Due to the smaller numbers at the event, the Man itself was much more accessible. We sat on the small pile of straw bales under the man and watched the sun go down while sipping wine and eating cheese and crackers. Rough life huh?

I did meet a naked Jesus cruising around on a motorized crucifix. I also watched some very tough looking women anally probe a BBC film crew (all parties seemed to be having a good time though) because the women were not too keen on the voyeuristic and non participatory nature of the press :-)

Burn night was amazing. There appeared to be little or no crowd control. People just decided how far back they should stand. The fire was started by a flaming person in a flame retardant suit who then walked around in flames for a few minutes before finally walking up to the man and setting him on fire. And when he fell, people immediately swarmed in and threw all sorts of stuff into the fire. When I saw what looked like can of propane going in, I decided that it was time to back out of there! A while later there was a boom - but as far as I know, nobody was hurt.

On an interesting note side, in 1997 the participants at BM were almost entirely caucasian. I saw two other persons of color - a man of Caribbean decent and one of the Tai-chi actors. And yet, I never felt unwelcome or out of place. Having lived for four years in Western PA, about 10 miles from the KKK area headquarters, I must say that this was very pleasant surprise.

The people I went with the first year enjoyed themselves but never went again. They did appreciate the event from more of a spectator point of view and not as a participant - and I think this made the difference.