Thank you!

[Aggrav8d]

Just a shout out on behalf of everyone to say thank you to Sofaking, Spikes, GhostRider, and all the other fantastic people who made CSC 2009 so great.
Extra Karma points to everyone who helped cleanup & take down at the end. You totally rock!

This year I learned that, in future, I will bring a bed sheet to put down over all my junk so that when I get back to camp I can easily get rid of (most of) the dust.

I'd like to propose that next year we plan a little differently. Having parties at night is great but even then I think I met maybe 20 people. In contrast, I met at least that many in the three sit-down meals I had with rangers & DPW. I bet there are some CS who are amazing cooks who would be happy to volunteer to make meals for the whole camp in exchange for reduced CSC entry fee. A great bonus is that there will be fewer kitchen fiascos and easier clean up.

I'd also like to propose that we build something like Monkey Huts (http://www.chromatest.net/Lovemonkey/) to shelter our tents. With an RV parked at the windy end it would be a great way to cut dust, wind, and heat. Of course that means next year we'll have to plan the camp layout with the wind in mind.

I hope I'm not ruffling any feathers with these ideas and I would be happy to volunteer my time to help with any of this.

Again, you hard working participants were A++ good times yes. It was an honor and a pleasure and I hope to see you all next year.

Dan

[SofaKing]

Great ideas and suggestions!! Keep 'em coming -- Spikes and I have some crazy cool ideas for next year, and continuous improvement is on the list as well -- Thank you to everyone, particularly the few last people who stayed the extra couple of days (eg Silkkat, Stefan, Glen, KlaireK, Kiki, Toast, Spikes) to get the site finished up. Indeed, Spikes is still on playa, and has just finished the final load up into the storage unit -- this is a community project, and without your help nothing can be accomplished!! Thank YOU everyone, indeed.

[silkkat813]

I have a *few* suggestions.

- when people register for the camp, email them a welcome and a list of rules of the camp. Then give them a list when they arrive so they can have the excuse that they didn't read that email. And email them a link to the survival guide.

- we saw this at Mt Rainer. Photos on the recycling cans of feet CRUSHING the cans. Maybe a photo of a soda can and then one of a tin can with a X across it. And photos of crushing the plastic bottles.

-do no have ANY plates or pots/pans available for the camp. Everyone must bring their own.

-Instead of meet and greet, have a meet at 7pm on Tuesday of a group photo followed by drinks.

-have a camp party on Sunday to use up all the food that people did not consume during the week. And that might encourage people to stick around to help clean up.

-try to have lines where people could set up tents so that it isn't such a cluster fuck. Try to encourage people to not set up so their friend's tents all face each other. how much time do they plan to spend hanging in their tents?

- a few people suggested this: have bracelets or something that allows others to know who is in the camp. There were a few complaints of non-members going into the kitchen and taking the drinks. And maybe members will be more willing to talk to other members if they knew they were campmates.

-make teams and make sure every member agrees to work on one team. Teams like kitchen duty, evaporation pool duty, moop sweeping, alcohol tester. I will sign up for the last duty.

-is it bad that I am still having playa dreams? I dreamt last night that the DJ on the art car was sitting back by where the spearkers were. I think it is dangerous putting the DJ below the ladder full of drunk people.

-Maybe put a bar in the dome to get people to use it? Keep someone guarding it in shifts. But it didn't have much airflow most of the week which kept it hot.

-Or would it be possible to show films on the wall in the dome? Maybe we can do some international movies suggested by members.

-again, I recently heard more complaints about our camp not welcoming visiting members. Not sure what we can do about that except try to encourage people to mingle more????

can't think of more now..... Any thoughts of trying to add Metropolis into our camp? CS City? Maybe make zones of different world cities.

Kerri

[Aggrav8d]

Sofaking, how big was our space this year?
Did we just claim open land or were we allotted a space by the ORG?

I didn't even know we had a shower/evap until a week after the event. I mean, I saw it on some of the original plans but it wasn't in that spot when I got there.

[SofaKing]

Haha -- big camp if you didn't even see the shower and evap, eh? Haha!

One thing you will certainly learn about theme camps at burning man, is that they will never be laid out exactly like the mapped out plan -- it is just one of those things; actually this year it was very close to the mapped out plan; but one thing that I will try to incorporate for next year will be having the shower and evap near the kitchen structure -- generally makes since to keep these two together so that grey water from the kitchen and cooking can be easily added to the system.

Anyway, to answer your question, our camp size was:

175' x 200'

This was not specifically alloted to us by the ORG -- but was due entirely to Spikes being on playa with the DPW and making it happen for us -- I do think we have proven ourselves as a theme camp, and if we come up with a few more creative ways to interact with the city, I feel we will be placed more officially in the future.

[tallbird]

Thanks to everyone who helped to create and build and make the camp happen this year!

Overall I really liked how the camp was structured - I thought these things worked really well: the bike rack, kitchen trailers & tent & communal eating area, the solar panels, the art car & driveway, the tower and the shower curtain with the map of the world!

The Meat & Greet was good, but I thought we were having vodka for this - hence all the vodka in the kitchen for this which didn't get used, and ended up at the Snake Pit (least I hope it got there!)

Loved the art car - well done to everyone who worked on this! The DJ's were great & thanks to Ghostrider for driving it around. Such a shame about the speakers blowing - is this fixable off the playa?

The communal meals worked really well - though we could have done with more seating / a larger group setting for people to gather in - the tower was a good chill out space, but a bit closed off for communal meals. The kitchen area with tables worked well, but filled up quickly for the mass gatherings.

Things which need improvement:

- Kitchen usage - I though it amusing that as couchsurfers we are used to cleaning up when staying in peoples homes, but for some reason in camp people left dishes for others to do! I didn't even use the kitchen for cooking, yet I ended up cleaning & sorting it out a lot!
- The tower structure - this was a great idea in terms of being able to find the camp - but those ropes all over the place were a nightmare! This wasn't a good idea for the entrance to the camp - being on a corner, this was the main point of entry, and it was hard to get into esp the bit between the flatbed truck & the tower.
- Perhaps have a bar area in the centre of the tower at the bottom - people sat around in there, and there wasn't much of a flow, or process to meet others, unless you sat next to them.
- Could the flatbed truck and the tower areas be connected without having all the flappy bits of material and ropes everywhere?

What was the white dome for? It would have been good to have this contain a stage, or cushions for communal meal seating. Perhaps the dome could be the welcome centre - so that if you arrive when no one is on site, you still have an idea of where you are supposed to camp & what to do.

Suggestions:

- EL wire sign for couchsurfing camp, so that people can find us in the dark & better signage for daytime - the tower banner was great but not everyone looked up! I'll try to make this for next year.
- Greetings - I arrived in the dark & was lucky to get a couple of surfers to help me with my stuff & find a camping spot. Perhaps each morning for the first 3 days, groups are taken around the camp & introduced to the diff areas like the tower, the bike racks & notice board, shown what to do with garbage, kitchen clean up etc As well as being signed in & given swag etc.
- More flags on the top of the tower, so that people can easily find the camp.
- I saw a coat rack at one camp - it was very simple, but really useful. The camp was much smaller than ours & everyone had hung up their camelbacks. It created a nice wall between the kitchen and seating area too. Shelving also does this job.
- Where the art car was parked - have a bus stop type sign with details of where it will be going & when.
- A large noticeboard at the entrance to the camp to list daily activities for those passing who want to join in.

[tallbird]

And the communal water was a good idea, but I didn't use any. I brought the recommended 5 gallons and didn't need more than that. The shower was great - didn't use that either... yes i did shower; randomly at other camps ha ha

Bug about the shower - people leaving the empty plastic bottles of water on the ground for someone else to tidy up - what exactly did you think you were leaving them there for?!

The communal water would work very well for saving people from bringing so many plastic bottles - recycle camp don't collect them - which is a bit mad! So of course, these need to be carted out with the rest of the garbage. We did need a sign which said 'flatten your cans & plastics!' - actually flattening everything would have made a huge difference to the amount of garbage bags we had.

And the garbage bags & bins around the camp - there was one in the Tower structure which had everything in it - I sorted through a few bags which was messy! Frankly, people are lazy - campers and guests - so we needed 4 large bins clearly labeled with Aluminum cans - crushed, plastics - flattened, Paper/cardboard - flattened, and general garbage.

[Spikes]

Hey,

Spikes is back online AT LAST!

About 2 days ago I FINALLY packed all the stuff away and stored the VAN and COUCH TRAILER in Gerlach for the coming year.

I shall be more online over the coming days but I am still travelling the USA and hitch hiking my way to Canada to take my flight back to England.

For those of you that know; after my Costa Rica problems I am going to England to get hold of some money again!
I hope to get to Kiwi Burn, anyone else going?

So, byefornow...