My favorite place at Burning Man.

I made the intention to go to Burning Man in Jan 2023 when I saw the 3D model of the temple. It was Ela’s work, and I was weird to know so much about her existence but yet never met her. I need to meet her.

Paper Cranes Living Room

I reached out to Antonio’s ex-girlfriend, Lily. I wanted to join her camp. Lily intentionally guided me to a camp called Paper Cranes. When I asked how to find camp, she said patience. I said, is that the name of a website? She said, no, it doesn’t work that way.

I’ve not met Lily yet.

I arrived at Playa on historically the best weather. We just had rain; the mountains looked so crispy and far away, and the sky looked lightly pinked with no cloud, like a glass candy, sweet. People yell at me, “You are home. ” I didn’t know how to respond to that.

During the build week, Tessa and Alvise offered to cook for everyone for the entire build week. It was some of the best cooking I had in my life; it made me feel at home.

I worked hard, and for the most part, it was exhausting and flowy; it didn’t feel mentally draining at all. I got great exercise. Towards the end of the build, I realized how beautiful our camp was after setting up the ambient, real furniture and lanterns. It was filled with a warm glow. I was so proud. Our living room immediately became my 2nd favorite place on Playa, especially because I built it.

Temple

On the second build day, Lisa took me to the temple, and I went into the building shade structure to take photos. Someone told me I couldn’t be there; I left with bittersweet.

Build week went by fast. We had a chill night, and most of our build crew went on a bike tour together; we rode to the trash fence, which was lit up. Then we passed the temple again. On our way back, I rode over a sand pile and knocked myself into the sand. Will came and picked me up, and I fell again to the other side. As soon as I stood up, Tessa stepped on me, I fell the 3rd time. Tessa said, “Now you are being a little bit dramatic.” I immediately started crying. Sandstorm began. I felt so far from the temple. I was so close yet so far, and I still didn’t know where Ela was. In the middle of the sandstorm, I cried and told Olivia about the temple. She listened to me the whole way.

When I returned to rest in the camp, Olivia surprised me with the lead engineer a couple of Temple. I met Eric and Jenna; I named Jenna Jellyfish because of her purple Jellyfish hair. Eric invited me to volunteer in the temple the next day.

I went. I very soon ran into Seth. It was a huge surprise, but then I realized I shouldn’t be surprised. This is his wife’s largest art, literally. I should be the surprise. We hugged twice, and the second time, I felt like his kid.

I started on Temple work by sanding the print words on wood pallets. It was an insignificant job, but I loved it; it felt meticulous. I love small things.

In the moments of sanding, I saw Ela through the holes of a pattern of those wood pallets; I peeked at her, then stared at her.

She is so strong. Such a reliable, warm, and trustworthy heart.

We met. She complimented my dress, which was my scarves pinned together. I said, your playa's name is Woman of My Word. She said, can it be shorter? I said no, it came from Wonder Woman. She asked about my playa name; I said none. She said, I don’t know much about you, but I will look out for you.

Everything about the temple is San Francisco thought-out. Of course. Starting with a registered Delaware LLC, the set up for lunch and snack, transportation, and schedule. There is nothing weird about it; it wasn’t any trial and error; it was one try and a huge success. It was such a perfection that I almost felt uncomfortable.

A guy, George, spotted me and asked me to be on his crew to build the front gate. I had a hard time using the impact driver because the gloves were ground by the heat of the screw, and I was so scared my fingers would be ground. “Can you help me?” “No, you will have to learn yourself.” After switching the gloves almost thrice, I finally screwed in the first screw; it hurt my finger so much. But because of that screw, I told everyone I built the temple like I did. I stole two screws from the piles and kept them as my souvenirs.

I walked by Temple so many times and stared at it. Then, not walking in.

I led a birthday girl and her cloud art car to the Temple on a sandstorm night. In the middle of the sandstorm, the temple was led up with so many saturated colors, and it was cloudy and mysterious inside.

I led the crane team to the Temple after the mud dried out. Pops cried so ugly.

I led Aric to Temple 5 minutes before its final closing. He took a terrible picture of me with the temple, but that was the only solo picture I had with the temple.

But I still don’t know how I feel about Temple. I didn’t grieve for anyone; I didn’t feel it was holding space for anything or anyone for me. I was happy I went but realized I didn’t care much about it. I didn’t see the temple burn. And if I cared about it that much, I would have stayed no matter what, just like other things I cared about. Instead, I cared about meeting Ela, bragging about my “build” of the temple to people, and seeing the reactions on their faces. But because of Temple, I met Ela; because of Temple, I bonded with Olivia; because of Temple, I almost met Lily; because of Lily, I met Pops and many warm souls.

Why do I care about meeting Ela? I am just so curious about her. She is a big mystery in my life film. I knew so much about her before I met her, and I had to meet her. And I did. She made sense. And I am finally not thinking about her anymore. So was the temple. And I can move on to conquer other mysteries. As I slowly ease into my regular life, I realized, Temple was a prompt for my Burning Man; that was it. And it was my 3rd favorite place in Playa for the sake that I talked about it so much for obvious reasons.

My Tent

Shiftpods was the tent Lily recommended to me from day one. However, I was not a big fan of the idea that I was sleeping inside a giant cooler without natural light. I slightly panicked when Shiftpods mini was sold out, but it led me to learn about canvas tents, especially Springbar.

I grew a slight addiction to Springbar, and I can’t stop myself from opening its website on hourly basis.

Because of the price tag and not knowing what I was getting myself into, I bought a cheap second-hand tent from a girl in Venice. The tent was not that new, and I found holes in the mesh, and the stakes were completely rusted. It functioned for sure.

Because of how small it was, I had to pack my size down. I tested and bought and returned so many things. And I measured, measured, measured, and ended up with this highly minimalistic setup that I never imagined myself in so much love.

During Burning Man, I had an open house almost daily to show people my life. I was very proud of how small it was and how well it was functioning, and I couldn’t imagine owning a better piece of gear. It’s a satisfaction that I can fall into, and my thoughts just wave in it.

I slept fully every night, and I woke up naturally when the sunlight started to glow over the tent skylight, reluctant to leave. Every time I came backed from a long adventure, I felt so at home crawling into my tent and turning on my ambient light.

Even after Burning Man, I spent quite a lot of time just looking at the Springbar website and appreciating its craftsmanship and the Zen it brought me in Burning Man.

It was clearly my favorite place at Buring Man.