Let's finally get back to the party. It works like this — you pay a fixed entrance fee (in our case, 10 euros). In return, you get to hang out at two stages and stuff your face with pizza. That is, of course, if you have the patience to wait in line. They bake the pizzas in these huge wood-fired ovens and lay them out on stones in front of the hungry crowd. The stones are faintly marked to show what kind of pizza is in front of you: meat, fish, or vegetarian. Nearby at the counter, there's also a dessert pizza on a plate, which I think is their most successful creation. The rest are pretty average and slightly burnt, though there's a certain charm to that — they are baked on wood, after all.
If you walk further, you can buy little tickets, which serve as currency here for booze or tea at the mini-bars. Mangol bought one but ended up not spending it all, and I later gave them away, with some difficulty, to a random vagabond I ran into in Seville.
A path winds among small hills, which, passing by the chill stage, eventually leads you to the main one. It felt like there were 200-300 people at the party, and many showed up right in the middle of the night, after twelve or even around one. This is pretty weird because by two or three o'clock they already start clearing the area of trash, and the bars gradually close down. Nevertheless, the music and dancing go on until five or six in the morning. The best music (for me) started right around two o'clock when we had to leave, which is a bit of a bummer. Alas, you can't catch everything in life, and it's better to be content with what you have, otherwise you'll be devoured by the dopamine monster of endless desire, spawned by the beast of dissatisfaction known as Dukkha.
I chatted a bit with the attendees at the party, especially with one young guy from Lisbon who looked devastated and lost. From his slightly rambling story, which I won't recount here, you can draw only one conclusion: if you absolutely must try psychoactive substances, don't do it at 13, and 15 is a no-go either. Better wait until you're about 20, or ideally — 25.
The party was at night, so I hardly took any photos, my gear just isn't up to it.
I'll just say that the decorations at the party were pretty mediocre; our festival was a hundred times cooler. The only solid idea was illuminated cups of water, whose reflections on the canvas ceiling of the stages created a shimmering, wavy play of light and shadow.
Overall, the party is worth ten euros, and if you're nearby, or just love electronic music and hippie communes, you might as well drop by. However, there were fewer locals at the party, mostly trust fund kids from Germany and so on. Mangol was skeptical about how much people here ~~follow the precepts of Grandpa Lenin~~ adhere to the ideals of PLUR, versus how much they just come to party and have fun. I guess it all depends on the person and their attitude, and generalizing is inappropriate. Plus, there are those who live in the commune permanently and search there for the ideals and values that resonate with them. They are the ones organizing the Friday Hapiness Pizza Party.
The question of true values versus outward attributes, by the way, comes up quite often. It sounds slightly different in various iterations, but the theme is the same: how much authenticity is there in this or that movement, in the actions of certain subcultures, and personally in every individual, and this authenticity is tied to identity — that is, how a person defines themselves, what they are. Nowadays, everyone laughs about how you can write "Viking" or "unicorn" in the "gender" box on forms, and the LGBTQI+ acronym will soon run out of letters in the alphabet to keep adding to the end.
All this isn't that bad, really. The group you associate yourself with pulls you into certain behavior models and cultural codes. The main thing is to choose it correctly and try to follow its ideals, although this usually turns out half-assed, because they conflict with your other social roles. To be honest, I don't know why I'm writing all this: these are obvious things, and I haven't added anything new so far.
For myself personally, I've realized that it's better to identify as a gym rat, a cyclist, and a secular Buddhist than a neo-hippie. The latter is too vague and smacks of New Age, plus who the hell knows how each neo-hippie defines «spirituality» and ethical behavior for themselves. From an ethical standpoint, I'd rather call myself an effective altruist (effective altruism), where everything is clearer and more precise. As for psychonauts, it's completely unclear whether they have anything in common at all besides a craving for the unknown and curiosity. Maybe even that is enough not to consider such parties a sheer waste of life (which is probably how Andrey looks at them).