Spark: A Burning Man Story Page #3

that shows up with just a

backpack and no water, no food,

and expects us to take care of

them 'cause it's a gift economy.

I think, everybody should carry

their own weight,

and enough to help the rest of

the community out.

I mean, obviously we are, most of

the people go to Burning Man...

Hey! Stop hammering!

[JOHN LA GRACE]:

I got married at 24.

She was 21.

And she at the time was a

professional figure skater.

I'd always tell people what she

does and what I do

it's the exact same thing.

The curtains go up,

the lights go on and it's either

the Jon show or the Jamie show,

you know, she'd come home

with a medal,

and I'd come home

with a bag of money,

but it was still a show.

[LA GRACE]:

Well, it's very disconcerting,

in a one week period of time,

to realize that

everything that you've done

in your entire life

leading up to that point

could potentially be wrong.

The a-ha moment for me was,

like, the burn of the man.

And I saw myself in that image.

I saw myself and my life

and everything that I thought

that it was supposed to be

going up in flames.

I lost my job in banking,

I got a divorce,

I came out of the closet.

The last decade of

my life has been

in a constant state of change

and the only thing that's been

consistent in my life

in the last 10 years

has been Burning Man.

Playa Skool is a Burning Man

theme camp.

And we're about

150 members strong.

It was created as a school

because we thought that

our form of giving back to the

Burning Man community

was to create a

platform of learning.

Welcome, citizens of Black Rock

City, is this amazing or what?

[LA GRACE]:

I was a founder of PlayaSkool,

I've been leading the project

management aspects of it,

leading the communication

aspects of it.

We have water trucks that we

have to rent.

We have a 40 foot

kitchen trailer.

All of those things need to be

transported to the Playa

and picked up from the Playa.

It's an overwhelming amount

of work.

[GOODELL]:

Yes, we decided four yes...

Okay... for crying out loud.

[ANDIE GRACE]:

Okay... four per person.

This is hard...

Okay so then the better

way to do this is...

Because that's actually what

we should try to do here...

[GRACE]:
So the question isn't,

"How does the system work?,"

maybe the question is, "How can I

get tickets to Burning Man 2012?"

And we need to change this to not say,

'Burning Man Ticket Lottery FAQ, '

this is 'Burning Man Ticket

Distribution process FAQ.'

Are you going to make these

edits or do you want me to?

[GOODELL]:
There's a lot

happening right now.

We're trying to improve

our infrastructure,

we're trying to improve

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