CapeConversation

Afrika Burns 2008 is official : 16-19 October 2008.

Also a “decompression gathering” in Cape Town, Sat 8th March.

I repost the official Afrika Burns announcment from Monique Schiess.

What a fantastic first desert shindig Afrika Burns 2007 was! We were so touched, amazed and generally overwhelmed with the fantastic level of participation and sheer fabulousness and cleverness of what people brought to Afrika Burns.to make Afrika Burns. But Black Lil said it best in the mail that she sent out to friends after Afrika Burns, read what she wrote further down.

In this email

• Afrika Burns Decompression Gathering

• Dates for Afrika Burns 2008

• Art proposals for 2008

• Afrika Burns 2007

The Afrika Burns Decompression Gathering.

When: Saturday 8^th March 2008, 6 p.m. until late

Where: Oude Molen Eco Village, Alexandra rd Pinelands

Cost: R50 per person, children free

There will be a cash bar but feel free to bring your own drink too.

Primarily this is an opportunity to re-gather our growing community, to celebrate, participate and have fun. We plan to have a mini burn for those that missed the burning of the clan on the Sunday night at Afrika Burns…(lets hope the wind holds out). Part of our aim is also to raise money. As a first time event it is no surprise that Afrika Burns didn’t quite make ends meet , so ticket revenue will go towards making up the shortfall we experienced on our production costs. Remember that Afrika Burns is a section 21 not-for-profit company. After we have paid our production accounts, it is our intention to make funds available for art projects. We will publish our accounts on the website as soon as they are finalized.

Like Afrika Burns, please think of this Decompression as a mini (or major if you like) blank canvas, which means that if you desire to bring any form of self-expression…be it art, performance, a fabulous outfit…whatever it may be…please feel free to do so. It would also be good to know about it too, so if you plan on doing so, please email Monique on info@afrikaburns.com. We will send out an updated line-up closer to the time.

The date for Afrika Burns 2008 is

16^TH – 19^TH OCTOBER 2008

Ta daaaaaa……Put it in you diary!

Art and theme camp proposals for 2008 are starting to trickle in.if you are hatching a planhowever elaborate or small we would love to know about it. Please email Lil on art@afrikaburns.com with info. The deadline for proposals is 16^th September 2008. Remember, its good to plan these things early!

Afrika Burns 2007….what Lil wrote…

’sand in my hair and a smile on my face’ – yup that pretty much describes us all and some of us will never be quite the same again having made and shared and survived OUR first ever AFRIKA BURNS! now we get what community is about, definitely understand the radical self-reliance aspect (very very definitely), acknowledge the extreme nature of the project and totally comprehend the indescribable high of sharing and creative self-expression.

• we collectively created our own reality…how impressive is that?

• we did so in perhaps one of the most extreme, challenging but exquisite natural amphitheatres in southern Africa…

• we made fires and magic and music and art and cuisine and performance in the back of beyond..

• we built temples, townships, post offices and pondoks… we bent many tent pegs!

• we rearranged the karoo klippies, carved fire pits in the shale, blew anvils into a velvet black sky, constructed soaring architectural poems with wood and sweat, left touching anonymous installations for all to enjoy…

• we danced in swanky discothèques, were serenaded off the back of flat bed trucks, line-danced in smoky saloon bars or woke to the strains of a string quartet outside our pup tents, we were welcomed with blue grass tunes strummed on a ukulele and I swore I heard Worsie Visser’s trek orrel belting out across the binnekring at breakfast.  the sound of our laughter, drums, whoops and wails reverberated across the Tankwa plains…

• we drank (iced/cold/tepid/hot) water, martini’s, marguerita’s, cosmopolitans, mojito’s, chai tea, cappuccino’s, rather good wine - you name it somebody was mixing it. we were offered sushi, strawberries and cream, ice cream and home baked cookies…the generous culinary and beverage selection was quite remarkable given the circumstances… I don’t think anybody went hungry!

• some of our endeavours were sabotaged by wind and dust and unfortunate (but unforeseen) placement, others played to an audience of one – however your supreme effort and inexhaustable energy did not go unnoticed!

• we seriously stomped our signature in the dust and left a labyrinth of trails and tracks but not one stompie…

• we endured the wrath of the elements and were rendered mute with wonder by an ever unfolding opera of dervish dust devils, cloud poodles, bloody sunsets, stars and rheumy moonscapes…how WAS that moon?

• we each of us endured trials and tribulations to get there, made sacrifices or lost jobs because of it (my partner!), some of us navigated the binnekring in wheelchairs or with prams, certain of us missioned all the way from Malawi to get here (never mind the Greek, Dutch, Israeli, Swiss, Japanese, German, Irish, British, American, Thai, Italian and French participants that I know of), and one of us even arrived on a bicycle from Worcester and apologised for being late for voluntary ranger duty!

• we got sand in more than just our hair, some of us got tummy bugs and sunstroke (me), one of us got tetanus (get well Gerald you are our hero), we have cuts and blisters, scorch marks (afrika burns?), rips in our tents, permanently collapsed camp chairs, punctured spare tyres, maxed out credit cards and Tupperware with missing lids…

but just LOOK what we created!”

I am in the process of updating our Afrika Burns survival guide, so please feel free to email me with any recommendations you have. Monique on info@afrikaburns.com.

Photosharing will be up on the website soon, but in the meantime have a look at the Facebook group. Afrika Burns  Burning man in South Africa.

Happy days all, we look forward to seeing you soon.

Monique Schiess

info@afrikaburns.com