Welcome to Chaos !!

What do you eat at Burning Man? Is it like a fair so you can go up to a food stand and buy a burger or a funnel cake when hungry? No. You have to bring in your own food and water.....self reliance - it's one of the ten principles of Burning Man. You can only buy ice and then coffee and chai at Center Camp. Last year I lost weight at Burning Man. This year I was munching away and I think I actually gained a few pounds despite biking around for miles on the Playa. Not that it matters, just a random fact that I noticed.
I make mental notes to what I eat or not so I know what to bring or not for next time.
Why bring in more than necessary? So, I finished my KIND bars (I gave away some). I actually drank some beer, I like a cold beer now and then. I ate a lot of chips and dips and sliced up cucumbers with salt on them, that was my favorite I think. Check out my fancy cheese platter!

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I ate some fruit but far from all the fruit I brought with me......fed leftover apples to some horses on the way home.
So next year it will be pretty much the same as this and last, KIND bars, cut up veggies (cucumbers and peppers) with salt on top, fruit (nectarines) a six pack of beer, chips and a few different dips. Mineral water and fruit juice. I can see maybe bringing in some yummy lentil soup also. There is also plenty of drinks and food that people serve all over Burning Man, you don't have to starve......bring a cup and enjoy what there is to be offered.
But remember, be self reliant!
I had a latte every day in Center Camp, one of my fave moments of the day. Sipping on an iced latte while people watching and maybe making new friends at Center Camp! Sometimes I would go back at night for a hot chai.

Having long hair on the dusty Playa can seem scary. How do you handle it? Will it become destroyed, a total crazy mess of tangles? Having a lot of dust in your hair whether long or short for a week without a proper shower can scare some people off. But my hair did remarkably well. I washed it once, actually Jill, a girl that I camped with was a darling and washed it for me outside. This was my hair Saturday. I didn't comb it once ay Burning Man.
It was all natural. Playa hair!



I would spray it down every day, I think that helped a lot. It added much needed moisture.
I actually loved how my hair looked as Playa hair, the texture and the look. It felt soft, my scalp wasn't itchy at all and it feels great even now after one wash since I've been home.
I think it got naturally bleached too, so to the people out there that wonder if I bleach my hair......no, the sun and dust at the Playa does that for me. I do have some gray hair that I color but I have written several blogs about that already.
Here I am with my spray bottle, I had already left Burning Man when this pic was taken.......



Last week Tuesday while briefly stopped in Roseburg, Oregon waiting to pick up a food order at a Mexican restaurant, I love eating Mexican when on road trips, a girl came up to me and told me she really liked my hair. I told her funny because it was full of dust and unwashed. She asked me where I had been and I told her the desert, more specifically at Burning Man and she told me she and her boyfriend really want to go. I told her, DO IT......GO! You will LOVE it! And I gave her a BRC Weekly, I picked up some extra copies to give out to people in the "default" world. It's weird, some of the connections you make with random people.......!

Once in a while I decide to take my time and cook. I do enjoy it when I do it but I don't think I could do it every day.....when I say cook I do not mean heat up something frozen (like a TV dinner, or a premade frozen apple pie in the microwave) I mean cook from scratch basically.
I only use the microwave for popcorn and it's rare that I eat popcorn. I do not like the microwave, it scares me.
So today I made some pasta (I did not make the pasta from scratch, not that into cooking) with my own homemade tomato sauce, I used up a whole garlic (I'm going to reek tomorrow), I fried up asparagus with garlic and I put thicker slices of garlic in the tomato sauce. Then I made cornbread, I love cornbread. I use a recipe that has sugar in it. I tried a recipe without sugar once and I did not like the outcome. This is the recipe I used today.....
www.allrecipes.com/recipe/grandmothers-buttermilk-cornbread
Now I have a full belly and I feel great. I love food, I love eating. I'm grateful that I can eat.







Goodnight from me and Chhaya!

Just a quick entry before I head out for my latte and start my day. And this is not Burning Man related. Although I can add some thoughts about Burning Man to it now that I think of it.......
At Burning Man you can saunter around naked or in different stages of undress all you want. The majority of people do not care, after being around naked people that act like it's the most normal thing in the world being naked.....it becomes normal. And I like that. Plus I am so used to nudity.
I was biking around in shorts, skirts or sarongs and either a small shirt or some sort of a sports bra. Do you hear of sexual assaults at Burning Man? I haven't but I guess they happen (although I am pretty sure it's very rare). I have been twice now and never felt even the slightest uncomfortable because of somebody else's behavior towards me. And I never witnessed anything inappropriate, as in another person being assaulted in any shape or form. Miraculously people at Burning Man seem to get along great. Go figure!
So this morning I am reading about some rape gang in Afghanistan. Seven men that posed as police, stopped four women.....proceeded to rob them, beat them and rape them. One of the women was pregnant. Well, these "men" got sentenced to public hanging. And I am glad.
That is exactly what should happen to them. It's probably not their first time raping women.
In some countries like Afghanistan and India you hear about these gang rapes on girls and women and then the perpetrators get away with a slap on the wrist, or some ridiculously low sentence. Because rape is the norm, it's probably the women's fault anyways.....you know for having a vagina. Finally they get some kind of a justice, a message to all the other men walking around just waiting to attack and rape women. What should be noted here is that they most likely got hanging because of the robbery, not the rape. But they still get to die - GOOD!
What I find so very interesting is this, "Under the Taliban's harsh version of Sunni Islamic law, women were forced to wear the all-enveloping burqa, banned from jobs, and forbidden even to leave the house without a male chaperone. Rape and violence against women and girls was rife, according to Amnesty International, which says that Afghan women are still routinely discriminated against, abused and persecuted."
From what I understand women wear that ridiculous burqa to protect themselves from a man's desire (I guess some men can't control their desire) and even when wearing that burqa that covers them from head to toe, they get raped! Here in the US and other CIVILIZED (compared to Afghanistan obviously) countries I can walk around an event with thousands of men present, showing LOTS of skin and people look me in the eye when I talk to them.
So I guess that damned burqa isn't serving it's purpose after all?
And then people like these men with no form of understanding for how to behave, no respect for women because that's ingrained in them since childhood, try to leave places like Afghanistan to go to a country like Sweden for example where women and men are equal, sure some wage gaps still exist and yes women get sexually assaulted and raped there too, to be politically correct her. But that women routinely feel scared to go outside in Sweden because rape and violence against them is the norm.....that is not happening. Yet. Do I want men with absolutely no respect for women and children and animals for that matter to spread their filth in Sweden or the US? NO, I don't. Stay in Afghanistan and starve to death, I really don't give a shit to be honest. People like that do not deserve to live. And I certainly do not think that Sweden should take them in and pay for their existence, housing and food out our generous welfare system (that routinely gets misused and abused I think). Stay were the fuck you are, I don't want to be around you. Don't breed, try to get an education (if possible) and become a better human being. I know that there are many individuals out there that feel sorry for people with hardships and think Sweden should willingly and gladly accept every immigrant wanting to come in. But I do not agree with that, at all. Especially not since a fair share of them most likely have the rape gang mentality. And no, I am not a racist so don't even go there. I'm a REALIST.
OK......my latte is beckoning me.

So to get to Burning Man this year I flew into Portland where I was lucky to find an RV last minute basically AND for a good price, free miles and generator included. RV's are hard to come by for Burning Man, they get snatched up fast and paying $3000 for the week is nothing unusual. Last year I got lucky too and got to be in a huge RV for free! This year I had a 24' Winnie Minnie and I fell in love with it, my next large purchase is going to be an RV.....I've been wanting one for a while. Actually I wish I would had gotten a really nice RV instead of property in Las Vegas but oh well.....you live and learn.
Driving from Portland to Gerlach is less than 500 miles and wasn't too bad.



I drove and was the passenger. I LOVE road trips, one of my fave things to do.
Road trips - seeing new things while driving to whatever destination, stopping for yummy food, peeing outside, exploring, hiking and going to hot spring - that's when life is good!
I have many future road trips planned.





Once at Burning Man I used my brand new Fjällräven (which means arctic fox) backpack every day. On it I attached the wooden Burning Man and the vial of Playa dust I got last year plus some other trinkets. So when I came across Deery Lou, a Sanrio character that is super KAWAII I just had to stop and take a pic of my backpack right there. I was really excited!
Yes, all things KAWAII make me excited.





On the way home I really traveled in style once I got to the airport in Portland. My backpack was dusty so I put it in a WalMart bag, that was my carry on. Very stylish! I actually thought that was rather funny. And my hair was total Playa hair (more on that subject later).



Leaving Burning Man (also known as Exodus) was surprisingly easy this year. I left around 7 am Monday morning and basically drove straight out, that was great. Last year I waited in line to get out for at least six hours if not more, I can't remember exactly now.
Tonight I have some serious Burning Man withdrawals. I miss it terribly. I'm bored and I wish I was back at the Playa, dancing somewhere.......here is a pic of the sun coming up while I was packing and somberly getting ready to leave.

The bikes at Burning Man are amazing.....well some of them. I am fascinated and very appreciative of the bikes that some very creative people made.
Like this one.....I think this was my favorite. Her name is STAR and the eyes light up and so do the long wispy eyebrows, this bike was soooooo cute! I fell in love with STAR!



And here are some other bikes that I came across and took pictures of. There were many more. And I HIGHLY recommend that you bring a bike to Burning Man, without one you will be kind of removed from the things that there are to do and see. And trust me, you will want to do and see! Sure you could walk but the distances on the Playa are long, walking takes up valuable time and biking is so much more efficient. There are community bikes but finding one of those can be like looking for a needle in a haystack. So yes, absolutely bring a bike to Burning Man. There is at least one place in Gerlach (the closests by town) that rents bikes if you don't want to buy your own or transport it.......or abandon it on the Playa.













My bike. I did not decorate it because I didn't have the time and I did not get any supplies for decorating. I only got a Hello Kitty basket to hang in the front and it definitely came in handy, that too I recommend. So you can put your stuff there instead of carrying it all in a backpack at all times. I got the bike on the drive to Burning Man at a WalMart for $80 and it worked GREAT! The only complaint I have is that the seat was rather uncomfortable and made my butt ache, so I have to get a better seat for it so my poor butt won't be in pain. Now the bike is at my friend Sarah's place in Vegas where I will pick it up at some point and use it at the next Burning Man I go to.









I enjoy biking at Burning Man.....I miss it. Yes, it can be hot (it's the desert so it's hot during the day), dusty and windy but it's part of the experience. Sometimes you have to put some effort into pedaling through some deeper sand and other times a dust storm engulfs you but it's Burning Man and you are one of the lucky ones that are there! Enjoy and embrace it while you are there!