Festivals are a special place; they’re a place where it’s perfectly acceptable to crack open a cold one at breakfast – a place where glitter and neon paint is practically mandatory, and a place to try out your new sparkly, jazzy pants without the fear of judgment. Festivals bring people together and bring out the best in them:
1. Sharing is caring.
Be it a spare tent peg, a fresh brewski, or the last toots on a blunt, sharing is what festivals are all about. In the “real” world people hoard their resources; in festival land it’s all up for grabs.
So long as you’re friendly you can turn up with nothing and be the richest guy there.
2. Everyone looks out for the drunk girl.
There’s a sense of community at festivals, and that means looking after one of your own. If someone has had too much to drink, smoke, snort or swallow, you can be sure there will always be people looking out for them and lending a hand.
If they just need a quick breather and a swig of water, or an urgent piggy back to the medical tent, you better believe the collective will be there with the necessities.
3. Mosh pits are surprisingly civilized.
Having a good ol’ boogie is what a good festival is all about, and sometimes that boogieing can get a little hardcore. Much like the morning subway ride when the crowd gets boisterous, the shoving starts.
Occasionally the odd person falls down, but without fail there is always someone to extend an arm, help them up and dust them off, and it’s usually the biggest, baddest, hardest looking mo’fucker there.
4. Everyone is a friend.
You’ll strike up conversations with complete strangers about the most bizarre subjects in the oddest of locations: at the bar, collecting water, charging your phone, in line for the bathroom – wherever, whenever, with whomever.
You’ll be on a Facebook friend adding frenzy as soon as you rejoin civilization – that’s if you can remember their names of course.
5. It’s a collective experience.
You live in a tent for three days drinking wine from bags, eating food off your lap, and listening to the best music in the world – all with 20,000 other people.
When you listen to the headliners, you listen with thousands of others; when you go to sleep at night, you’re going to sleep next to everyone else; when you dance, you dance with the collective.
You share the experience, the bond, and the joy with so many other people – and that is something truly special.
6. Everyone shows their true self.
When you have thousands of others around you doing their own thing and expressing themselves, it’s easy to get on board and show the world who you really are. There are no social constraints, and no one looking over your shoulder.
You are free to dress, dance, party, and experiment in every way you have always wanted. Go to town: this is a no judgment zone.
7. People get weird (in a good way).
Some people like cross dressing and walking around on stilts. Other people want to teach you the ancient art of Mongolian throat singing and there are plenty of guys ready to educate you on the benefits of tantric yoga.
You don’t often see these communities in everyday life, but festivals have a way of bringing them together. This is a moment to broaden your mind and reject your everyday skepticism.