Last week was pretty cool. I went out for some dinners, met some new people, pulled an all-nighter at this hip-hop spot by Julu Road called Ninja, hung out in parks... Overall a nice, warm and feel-good week with a healthy dosage of work on top. However, the most important shit took place between Saturday and Tuesday. I cancelled all of my weekend plans, hopped on a metro Saturday morning, and went to Shanghai Indoor Stadium – the pick-up spot for buses heading to Tan Xiang Shan Village aka the venue of this year’s Dragon Burn. For those, who don’t know, Dragon Burn is a regional version of the infamous Burning Man festival.
Now, this festival is not your usual festival. The main
difference is that it’s not
commercial. And when I say that, I actually mean not commercial. Money does not
mean anything on the site. There are no shops, no ads, no bars – literally no spots where you can
exchange money for goods. That leads to the second rule – visitors are expected to be 100% self-reliable. Whatever
you eat, drink or take, you bring with you. Water, food, alcohol, whatever
kinda shit that makes your time better. And of course, you are expected to
leave no trace – so no fucking trash bins, no
cleaning squads, it’s all you. People exchange
shit, talk to each other, the vibe is just different. And trust me, walking
around for 3 days with no wallet and no phone feels almost magical. Btw, I took zero photos over there so none of the pics around relate to that. Just to be clear...
Same as Burning Man, this festival has a number of volunteer
based theme camps. People who want to contribute more can simply set
up a camp and come up with workshops, seminars, yoga classes, workouts etc etc.
There were about 5 official camps and some unofficial ones. I almost got
involved in the vegan one but I missed all the deadlines and pretty much all
the meetings too, so I ended up freecamping (same as the majority of visitors).
So there I was. I packed my tent, sleeping bag, mat, some
clothes, cooked some beans with tofu and veggies, and threw in some nuts,
apples, crackers and peanut butter. Oh, and like 10 liters of water. And a
bottle of Ballantine’s. I came along with my Macedonian guy and his gf. The
festival site was fucking beautiful. It was quite huge, there was a reservoir
right by it and the camping area was located by this path in the forest,
providing enough shade over the day. Apart from all these theme camps and
freecampers (they sold about 700 tickets), there was a major stage named Temple
of Boom, some restrooms, and several other smaller stages ran by some of the
camps. I met plenty of great people, I tried out a bit of meditation, some
extensive workout, I got to party quite a bit and I even got little twisted
the last night. I don’t wanna
really go into details, cause this is one of the things that you actually have
to go through to understand how it feels, but man... The vibe was amazing and
when I got back, I really felt relaxed. Both physically and mentally.
After arriving back to my place, I took a long ass shower,
went to get some veggies, made a proper dinner and spent the rest of the
evening chilling and doing absolutely nothing. This week might be little more
challenging, but I feel rebooted and recharged like a mothefucker. Let's get it!
Highlights:
- The age range of people at Dragon Burn. You got mostly young motherfuckers being young motherfuckers, but there are also middle aged couples or even people in their fifties and sixties. There was also a family camp. And it all works. Kids running around, people enjoying whatever they wanna enjoy, no garbage anywhere. Fucking utopia.
- The last night of the fest, they did this fire show followed by setting this huge wooden dragon on fire. There was full moon, there was massive flames, there was some live hypnotic music. Pretty much all the people around... God damn...
- Tabata workout – I consider myself being quite in shape but this motherfucker really got me. Gonna have to do it more often...
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