...Nothing is sold at Burningman and there is no commercial sponsorship. The only exception is the cafe which sold tea, coffee & hot chocolate, and one of the local high schools sold ice (which normally would be vital, but the weather was so bad we never needed to replenish our supply). Anyone caught selling anything would be evicted from the city. In theory you "barter" - but people just kept giving me stuff - after I took some pictures of a well-costumed man on a bike, he gave me a frozen ice-pop. Another man gave me a free-beer coupon and someone else gave me purple mardi-gras beads for catching something that was flying across the playa (the biggest mantra of all is "Leave No Trace" - all garbage must be removed and you must pick up every piece of litter you see or create - including cigarette butts and beer caps)...
© Sheila Masson, 2001
ECHO: Volume 3 Issue 2 Levitz: In the Footsteps of Eurydice * Kassabian: Ubiquitous Listening * Draughon and Knapp: Mahler and the Crisis of Jewish Identity * Musical Perspectives on September 11 * Anne Elise Thomas: Reflections on September 11 * Garrett: DJ David Chang *Kopplin: Allen Forte* Dickinson: Brain in a Box * Marsh: The Complete Ockeghem * Write to ECHO