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Published: June 27th 2007
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Untitled Today I'm off to Tent State Faslane. Before I go, I thought I really should recap.
HIGHLIGHTS
the people the people i live with are exceptionally excellent. they are mostly all artists, and it is amazing the amount of art making that goes on in this house on a daily basis. when i'm not running around trying to do anything and everything (sounds familiar ay) there are always people around doing very low key things that i find are a nice change. it's going to be tough to leave this lot, i can already tell.
edinburgh so this lovely lil lot all get together and do this event called What They Could Do They Did (WTCDTD), which is a multi media arts event with visual and performance art of all kinds, made by them. The way they structure themselves is very similar to Tent State in many ways, and I have sat in on many discussions that seem all too familiar to me, all the same issues any small group organizing might run into. its really interesting to continue to draw the parallels. looking forward to getting more involved with this group.
On
that note, by some stroke of luck or genius, WTCDTD, which did their first event last summer in edinburgh at this place called The Forest, has been asked back to the Forest this year to curate a whole week's worth of art and performance as PART of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. I'm going to be performing my bench solo (which only Yael and X have seen i think), showing my dance video i made this year, giving a pubic workshop on Tent State and perhaps a group-oriented workshop on moderating meetings, and helping design lights for all the peformances. WAHOO! very exciting. I'm working to change my ticket so that i can be around for the whole thing, so i may be home as late as Aug 16th.
Tent State UK/ Glastonbury So. last week was glastonbury AND Tent State Sussex. I knew I would have to choose between the two, and quite honestly, i knew that if i had the chance to go to glastonbury, i'd do that hands down. I've been wanting to go to this festival since i heard about it, when hestia first went years and years ago. It may just be the
largest in the world, and definitely one of the coolest. But the issue was getting a ticket. Notoriously hard to get your hands on, this year, the tickets were made even more unattainable. People are so nuts about this festival and so many people want to go that this year, you had to REGISTER to buy tickets in january, before the lineup was even released. Onle those who registered would have a chance at buying tickets, but that still didn't guarrantee it. Not only that, but in order to discourage touting (people have been known to buy tickets and sell them for 400 pounds on ebay - imagine paying 800 for a ticket to a festival), everyone who actually was lucky enough to get a ticket, had their name and photo on the ticket. You can see the dilemma i was facing.
We tried all sorts of ins. There was sneaking into the sight a week early and camping out with some of the vendors and miraculously getting a job with one of them. There was getting in touch with greenpeace through some random connect and shoving my resume under their noses, asking if i could canvass for them
during the festival, and do like a knowledge exchange with tent state. There was plain sneaking in. But nothing was actually working out.
The day before everyone left, last tuesday, I resigned myself to the fact that I wasn't going, and got in touch with the Sussex folk to let them know I was definitely coming. TSU started on Wednesday, so i had a lot of packing and preparing to do. It was gonna be really really fun. i was bringin my firespinners. Then Anna, one of the girls i'm living with, decided she might just sell me her ticket because she didn't really want to go after all, and had a lot more productive things she needed to be doing. We were all just a little bit shocked. She left to go to the pub to think about it. She was gone all day. I didn't know what to pack for. She came back around 10 pm and said, sorry avi, i think i am going to go. Which was fine. I was just as equally excited about TSU Sussex at that point. I started packing. got to bed at 5 am.
woken up by anna at
9:30. ticket in hand "avi, i'm certain i don't want to go. i got drunk and confused last night. But this is really the right move." hands me glastonbury ticket. i have just the day to prepare.
mind you, i'm not even certain it will work. anna and i both have red hair, but that's where our resemblance ends. the pictures weren't the greatest tho....so it might work. these were my thoughts running over and over my brain as i packed, as i purchased a 51 pound train ticket, took two tubes, 1 train and 1 bus, a total 7 hour journey, to the sight. lugging a 20 pound pack on my back. how the fuck would i get back if they didn't let me in? there were no more trains back to london at that hour, so what would i do? i didn't know i was in until i was in. what a crazy day it was.
such such such a great time. the festival is so much more than just a music festival (i only saw two bands). there was so many things going on.
Circus and Theater Fields - dance, cabaret, brass bands, circussy
people;
Trash City with its towering scultures of trash (mark and reid and colin you would loooove it);
Stone Circle - a beautiful (and relatively unmuddy) place to sit among all the wreck heads and look out over all of glastonbury, a sea of fire flames, and also where all the firespinning happened;
Lost Vagueness - the afterhours bit that had oxygen machines, smokeless hookahs, its own entertainment and performances;
GreenFields which had loads of cheap and organic yummy food;
Healing Fields where you could get rieki, reflexology, homeopathic care, or go for a meditation, free yoga class, etc.;
Green Futures Field which had a pedal powerd launderrette, and a solar and wind powered stage, among other really really cool things;
Tipi Field where we spent many recovery hours under a massive dry warm tipi drinking chai, watching the drum circle outside around the massive campfire.
and then there was bjork, who was INCREDIBLE i can't even begin to describe. her set is all on youtube, but i'm sure could never even give the taste of the real thing.
there it much more i'm sure. but those are highlights
Tent State, Really This Time As
for Tent State Sussex, i intend to get in touch with them and do a bit of a debriefing session.
And I'm off to Tent State Faslane tonight. 8 hour bus up to glasgow. wahoo. to be honest, after 5 days of camping in the mud, i'm not particularly looking forward to getting back in a tent. But, on the upside, Anna is coming with me. She's been really excited about all the Tent State business, we've been talking a lot about everything. And I'm giving a workshop about the history of TSU in the US. It's going to be lots of fun, Just a bit cold and wet.
That's it for now. More updates on my return.
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Justin
non-member comment
Damn you and your awesome vacations. I'm sitting here in fucking Hoboken buried under two days worth of work because I got sick.