Hey there sports fans, MOOP maniacs and line sweepers extraordinaire! The Hun here, reporting from Gerlach where the DPW Playa Restoration team is in fine form.
Vaughn Solo, in full regalia.
In their second day of Line Sweeps, the team marched through the remaining blocks between Liminal, Kindergarten and Journey. Then, with barely a break for water, they continued through most of Initiation and Hajj, setting an all-time record of 62 blocks!
Those of you who know how the MOOP Map is made will immediately recognize that a record-setting day translates to a lot of green, MOOP-free areas. So without further ado, here’s your MOOP Map as of Day Two: Read more »
Hey there sports fans, MOOP maniacs and line sweepers extraordinaire! The Hun here, reporting from Gerlach with your first set of SCORES!
And what a great start your DPW Playa Restoration team is off to. The front line kicked off at 10:00 and Liminal, and marched through block after dusty block — passing through the entire area of Liminal, Kindergarten and Journey! Talk about a “rite of passage” for our intrepid DPW team.
Now I’m proud to announce the results of that march: Read more »
Hey there sports fans, MOOP maniacs and line sweepers! The Hun here, reporting from Gerlach where the DPW Playa Restoration team is off and running. We’re all getting excited to find out how Black Rock City did on the 2011 MOOP Map — but before the scores start coming in, let’s talk about how they’re set.
What is MOOP?
This is MOOP.
MOOP 1. (noun)
An acronym for Matter Out Of Place, meaning any thing or impact not native to the immediate environment, especially as it applies to the citizens of Black Rock City and the greater Burning Man community in regards to the founding principle of Leave No Trace.
Examples: trash, bottles, cans, cigarette butts, fireworks, glow sticks, bottle caps, but can also be in the form of debris from camp fires, wood, plastic, metal, glass, and plants.
Sentence: “I’m glad that everyone had a wonderful time but your camp sure did leave a whole lot of moop behind!”
Moop can also be a condition not natural to the environment: burn scars, grey water, and dunes.
Hey there sports fans, MOOP maniacs and line sweepers extraordinaire. The Hun here, reporting from Gerlach where Burning Man is entering its final inning.
Though the festival ended weeks ago for most, the brave men and women of the DPW Playa Restoration crew have stayed behind to make sure this epic year ends in an epic win. To do that, they’re picking up every single piece of MOOP in town, making sure Burning Man honors its commitment to Leaving No Trace.
This is the crew that makes sure Black Rock City passes its annual inspection by the Bureau of Land Management, so we can do it all again next year. The stakes are high, and the standards are higher — but your Restoration team is strong and experienced, and they haven’t lost a game yet.
Like I said, this is the final inning and that inspection date is less than three weeks away. The Restoration team’s success depends on all the people who came before, all those valiant Burners who picked up errant water bottles and tucked their cigarette butts into their socks, who stayed an extra hour to MOOP their campsites.
And oh yes, the people of Black Rock City are just as dedicated to Leaving No Trace as the Restoration crew is. For proof, we turn to the MOOP Map, an annual chart showing the cleanliness of the city as DPW Playa Restoration found it.
To The Burning Faithful -
Senior officials in the Earthalujah church have informed me that my god-reaching pompadour collapsed midway through this sermon. This is like the Nike swoosh turning into a swastika – a total brand collapse. But we stand by the heartfelt hysteria in this week’s lesson. We must inject joy back into our activism, and you who erupt in dance and song every year in the desert are the prime example. See you on the playa! -Rev.
As The Church of Earthalujah takes off for our European tour, Reverend Billy gets a lesson in hysterical revolution from British activists and his one-year-old daughter.
[Editor's Note: For those of you unfamiliar with him, Reverend Billy is a New York-based performance artist whose work speaks to the heart of Burning Man's principles of decommodification and radical self-expression. He was a Burning Man honorarium artist in 2003, where he performed in front of the Man as part of that year's "Beyond Belief" art theme. Enjoy!]
Reverend Billy’s brilliantly bombastic, boldly brief Earthalujah sermons — now available as a podcast! Watch more episodes and subscribe at revbilly.com/podcast
Sometimes people come up to me and ask “The Church of Earthalujah…what is that? Is it a political rally? Is it a real church? Is it a comedy sketch? What is it?!”
Question: Is consumerism, is consumption, is consuming too much killing us right now? Yes it is. In the Church of Earthalujah we are definitely fighting consumerism. And that starts with the flags, the banners of consumerism are labels. There’s a label on every product, Amen! So, let’s not label anything. Let’s get beyond labels – that’s the devil!
We have an Earth crisis right now that we can’t label. In the old days it seems like there used to be people who would run down to the village common and shout “there’s an emergency here!” The traditional town crier. Someone should be shouting “Hey! The atmosphere! Too much heat! Extinction! Everything’s dying! Do something!” Where’s that person now? There seems to be a giant hush from the governments, celebrities, corporations, religions, armies – all the people who are supposed to be leading us. There’s a hush because they don’t have the right labels. But they look around them and they see what we all see: fires, floods, tsunamis, quakes, typhoons, tornadoes…Yes! That is the town crier! That is the force that is so powerful it’s chasing the God-forsaken celebrities off the front page of the newspaper. And that is the Earth itself getting our attention, and killing some of us.
In the Church of Earthalujah we regard these events as expressions, as words, as communications from a living being. The Earth is talking to us not just through these tragedies but every time we love each other, the Earth is whispering in our ear. When we walk out across a field on a beautiful day the Earth is alive.
Lets continue to live here. Let us ask the Earth to teach us to save the Earth and save ourselves. Amen.
The Black Rock Arts Foundation‘s latest ScrapEden Project, The Composting Contraption, rolls on, delighting kids and adults alike and educating about the importance of composting. This pedal powered, fun and funky kinetic sculpture is touring events throughout the summer. If you’re at an outdoor event in San Francisco this summer, keep your eyes peeled for the contraption!
I recently met a Reno local who is preparing for her first burn. “Do I really need to get an RV?” she asked me. “My friend told me you can’t do Burning Man without an RV. I just want to bring a tent.”
This hurts me on the inside. I haven’t been around that long — my first burn was 2003 — but I’ve spent many burns in a tent, and a couple of two-month work seasons besides. One of the things I hate to see is the rapidly increasing number of rental RVs on playa. They have their place, sure. If you’ve got small kids or a physical need for top-notch shelter, you might want to spend thousands renting an RV, plus hundreds in gas to drive it to Black Rock City and keep the A/C running. But that is a LOT of money (and a fair amount of pollution), and it’s not necessary to spend that much. You can be smarter about it, and I’m about to tell you how.
It is completely possible, and pretty easy, to build your own shelter and cooling system. You can have an airtight, windproof, shaded and cool place to sleep away the day, and you can build it yourself for a fraction of the cost of an RV rental.
THE INCREDIBLE HEXAYURT – $300
Holy wow! In 2007, Treehugger and Current TV hosted a contest for the best “eco-ideas” for Burning Man. The winner was a DIY shelter that costs under $300 to build, packs up flat into your truck, and can be reused year after year. Vinay Gupta’s Hexayurt is now being tested as disaster relief and refugee shelter. Why? Because it WORKS. This is far and away the best shelter idea I’ve heard of. Read more »
