Newbie wants to get involved!

[CURIOUSER]

Hey everybody,
This is my first burn. I also recently moved to San Francisco. I've been going to the parties and events and am loving it! I've met a few people but I want to get more involved and meet some more.
So. Is there a common starting point for getting involved?
Thoughts? Tips? Snark? :) How did you find out where you fit in?
How did you meet your camp/ crew/ best friends ever?

[theCryptofishist]

Don't stress it. You will meet people on playa. If you're not easy with strangers, you can sign up for voleneer shifts at center camp.
Basically, get yourself to the desert now, worry about meeting people when you get there, worry about meeting san franciscans when you get back.

[gyre]

You can just walk around and help people when they need it.
The bike repair places always are overwhelmed.
Contrary to rumor, nothing at burning man works on self reliance.

Some of us volunteer in a dozen different places, rather than just one job.

I showed up at one camp at teardown, asked for tools and went to work.

Before I ever went, I volunteered for a particular division, requiring specific skills.
They turned me down, until I had attended one year.
But they couldn't get me after that.
They should have taken me then.

Some places have started getting full before the burn, for whatever reason, and you have to reserve shifts ahead of time.
And sometimes those people can't make a shift, another option.

You'll find you have a lot of choices.

[bluesbob]

You can always stand out by the trash fence and moon the city. They always need volunteers for that.

[lucky420]

wonderful idea especially since it is going to be a dark year...

[Ugly Dougly]

Mostly at night.

[gyre]

It was dark at night last year.

How is it this year?

[robbidobbs]

Hey everybody,
This is my first burn. I also recently moved to San Francisco. I've been going to the parties and events and am loving it! I've met a few people but I want to get more involved and meet some more.
So. Is there a common starting point for getting involved?
Thoughts? Tips? Snark? How did you find out where you fit in?
How did you meet your camp/ crew/ best friends ever?

Good Morrow Curiouscer!

If you'd like a splendiferous 4 hours out there doing something exceptionally important and will make you instantly cooler than your friends, then join me in Poop Patrol.
See: Get Involved > All about participating in the Pottie-Project
for more details. I'll be living at the Booby Bar 3:30 & A. Best time to get me is early morning.

Enjoy your "virginitis" - you can only catch it once.

RobbiDobbs

[Dr. Pyro]

I want to give a tip o' the hat to my dear and longtime friend RobbiDobbs. What she and her crew do is indispensible. We all should give her a big "huzzah!" for her selfless work. Thanks Roberta! There are those of us who love you. So Curiouser, that would be an excellent place to start.

[bluesbob]

I remember those Burning Man nights. They were dark.

[DustHand]

It was dark at night last year.

How is it this year?

I am guessing this is a reference to it being a new moon on august 29.

New moon on Monday the new theme song for 2011??

[TiffRaf]

Hi, I'm Tiffany, I'm not a virgin anymore and my friend who's second year was last year has a big awesome idea, i want to be a part of it and help with a side project, but i need to find a way to contact as many camp leaders as possible preferrably before next years burn. where do i find who's in charge of what?

[TiffRaf]

i found out how to contact the regional leaders BUT i HAVE to download a program thing that has all kinds of access to my computer in order to contact them?

[Savannah]

Hi Tiffany. Many camps don't have a presence here on ePlaya, so you might have to google around a bit, but you could try looking under the 2011 Theme Camps forum here, and send PMs or emails to camps whose goals sound compatible with your project.

I'm glad you've found your Regional contacts, which was going to be my next suggestion until I saw you'd found them. Without knowing what region you mean, it's hard to tell what difficulty you're experiencing. Most Regional pages just have links to websites, yahoo groups, and emails to which you're supposed to send a blank message to subscribe.

(Have you checked to see if your Regional people have a Facebook group?)