It is 'THAT' time
again..." Well here it is the middle of January, Burning Man
Ticket Sales are well under way with at least 15,000 tickets
sold so far as the $175 & $200 Sold Out in just 5 days.
There are 5,000 Tickets @ $225, after that the
remaining tickets will be $250. Get Your Tickets
NOW!!!...
Tickets for Burning Man '05 can be purchased through
http://tickets.burningman.com/
PolyParadise is entering its 7th Year on the Playa, what
an amazing run. During that time many Theme Camps and
Villages come and gone, Their members moving on to different
things, other projects. It is a Tribute to this group, all
of you that have camped with PolyParadise over the years,
contributed in some way to the amazing successes and of course
to all the Playa Citizens that have visited us and taken part in
our Events.
We again find ourselves at a crossroads of sorts, needing to
define ourselves. For the past 2 Years PolyParadise
has camped and been part of Shangri-La Village. It has
been a GREAT experience of sharing Love & Resources across
multiple camps.
Many new friendships, projects and alignments have been forming
between the San Diego & Orange County Ca., Burning
Man communities, as was evident at the
SD/OC Decom this past October. Many of the
OC based Theme Camps have voiced interest in becoming part of
the Village. Some of these Camps are 'Music/Sound'
oriented and want to have Esplanade Frontage.
To accommodate these new camps the Village has decided to Cap
its population around 300, and is at this time looking to
request Esplanade placement by BMORG. New rules
about Village/Esplanade Camps should be communicated to us Mid
February by BMORG.
PolyParadise needs to decide if we again will be part of
Shangri-La Village 2005...Here are some issues and scenarios
to think about. At the moment we are proceeding under the
guise of being part of SLV, pending the outcome of discussions
on this list. We will give a FIRM Yeah or Nay
for Village inclusion on March 1, 2005.
One of our deciding factors should be Space Allocation.
In 2003 we occupied a space 100'x170' with 31
PolyParadise campers. In 2004 our allotted space
was 150'x170' with 50 Campers. We were VERY
tight both years and individual Tents seemed to be on top of
each other. There will be space limitations for SLV 2005,
I presume we will not be allotted a space larger than
150'x170'. That 50' may not seem like a lot,
but in reality it is an additional 8,500 SqFt.
So....
Do we Continue to be part of SLV with the knowledge we
will have a limited amount of Real Estate?
Do we Continue to be part of SLV and cap our own
Population ~ 35?
Do we Continue to be part of SLV and request to be placed
on the First Ring Road of the Village Layout (On the other side
of the street)?
Do we return to the Playa in '05 as an Autonomous Theme
Camp?
Do we cap our Population ~ 35 and return to as an
Autonomous Theme Camp?
Do we return to the Playa in '05 as an Autonomous Theme
Camp and request Playa placement adjacent or VERY near SLV, so
we are still part of them, but not officially?
As a Theme Camp we can request to be placed
'Near' particular Camps, as well we can request 'Not' to be
placed near some camps. As we will request NOT to be near Body
Painting Camp regardless of if we are part of the Village or
not.
Prior to joining SLV, PolyParadise occupied a space of 150'x170', so bumping up our numbers a bit as far as the BMORG is concerned should be able to get us the extra space we want.
Let us be clear about what we are referring to hear...
When you get Esplanade Frontage....You obviously get some allocated space on the Esplanade... The First Block from Esplanade to the first road is 340' deep, as opposed to the block we were on this past year which is 170' deep.
I am wanting to get an extra 8,500 SqFt. For our space, which would be 200'x170'. This area might take up 1/4 of the total space for the entire village, and of course they are not happy about that...But I want what I want for me and my Camp...I mean YOUR Camp...
After I voiced my opinions and concerns to the
other Village Mayors, they seem to have backed off of having
Esplanade Frontage. Even with that information we may still have
to take a space smaller than we want in order to allow ALL camps
that are committed to SLV to have some space and not have PP take
more than its share of available space...
Any other options I have not included above?
Camp Daddy's thoughts...I have had an AMAZING time being
part of SLV over the past 2 Years, but do not feel PP needs to
be in order to survive. I understand that there may be
some past PP campers who may choose to camp elsewhere if the
consensus of the group opts out of the Village, though that is
OK as all things change as much as they stay the same.
Our Playa events are independent of any Village involvement, the
Human Carcass Wash and Poly High Tea will continue as mainstays
of what we are as a Theme Camp.
I personally am not thrilled about returning as a Village to
Esplanade Frontage. It puts us in a position of occupying
the same space in the Village we had in 2003, without the
ability to have our Community space facing the road because of
wind & dust issues. I would much prefer to have the same
location we had this past year, with our 50'x20' structure
facing the Esplanade on the First Ring Road.
I do not want to cap our Population!! With a few tweaks to our
camp layout and numbers for BMORG purposes we could easily be
allocated a space of 200'x170' .
It has been awesome to share our Gray Water Resources &
Knowledge with SLV, though we could easily make some new
connections through Earth Guardians and help spread the
LNT / Gray Water Recycling message to other Theme Camps.
So my vote is to be part of SLV, but not at the expense of
having to limit our population or allotted space. In the
same breathe I would also enjoy returning as an autonomous Theme
Camp.
This decision will NOT be made by just Kathe & myself. I
want to know what all of you think and how you all feel.
When we faced this same decision a year-ago we had
VERY limited participation in the discussion. Final
tally was 7-2 in favor of being part of the Village (2
of which were from my household). That was 5 other votes out
of 175 people on the list at that time that received the pleas
to participate in the discussion. This large decision for the
group was made by a very small number of folks...
So...Please let us know YOUR thoughts and lets make a
decision together...
Please post your thoughts on the
Polyburn Yahoo Group.
Scotto
Camp Daddy
