Six full moons remain to Boom 2010. Our teams are now
putting all efforts in the engineering behind the design of all
structures. Artists are delivering cutting-edge artworks that will send
Boom 2010 into the next level of aesthetics. Prepare for a feast of eye
blowing optical-wizardry!
The new
location have been pushing our sensations to high levels. Flowers are
now starting to pop up and the majestic settings of the venue assure us
you will have better conditions to camp and party than in the previous
venue.
Boom has been taking many
environmental actions towards sustainability. This includes waste
management, recycling, composting, energy management to source
renewable energy options and water treatment based on plants. The
Sacred Earth need Boomers to be even more involved - let's all do the
change.
Life is too precious to be squandered in a disenchanted world Mia Couto
While travelling the world all members of our team faced an
inspirational pulse towards water. Not only the physical element
itself, but also the symbolism and that which is invisible in water.
It’s amazing adaptation to external conditions and continuous cycles.
How its energy is directed downwards in connection to the Sacred Earth.
For 2010 we decided to pay homage to water.
Water is essential for all dimensions of life. The water we use
today has been around for hundreds of millions of years, and the amount
available probably hasn’t changed very much. Water moves around the
world, changes forms, is taken in by plants and animals, but never
really disappears. It travels in a large, continuous cycle. In this
sense water stands for a continuous reusing and recycling, a metaphor
for one of Boom’s paradigms, the sustainable ethos.
Philosophically, the watercourse-way is an expression that
alludes perfectly to what Taoism describes as appropriate behaviour.
This “way” is wonderfully described in the Book of Change:
“The water endlessly flows and fills, up to a certain limit, the
corners it is flowing through; Under all circumstances, it remains
equal to its nature.”
According to Tao belief, water is that which gives life to all and
asks nothing in return. The Chinese made from water the residence of
the dragon, since all living beings come alive from water. In Chinese
medicine, water is an energy that is directed downward to the earth
thus connecting to it.
In Hermeticism, water is Nun, the substance of which all gods come
from in the first Ennead. Among the Vedas, the water is called mâtriatamâh
(primal mother), because, in the beginning, everything was like a sea
without light. In India, it is generally considered that the water
element keeps life that flows through all nature in the form of rain,
sap, milk and blood. Unlimited and immortal, water is at the beginning
and end of all things.
In its apparent formlessness, in ancient cultures we found the
distinction between the upper waters and the down waters. The former
symbolize the possibilities of virtual creation, the latter correspond
to the completion of nature. The fire element acts, in this case, as
the modifier of water and, therefore, the sun (spirit) makes the water
from the sea evaporate (subliming life).
The water condenses into clouds and returns to earth as fertilizing
rain. This double virtue derives from both its aquatic and celestial
nature. Lao-Tzu paid great attention to this phenomenon of rotating
water, both physical and spiritual, and said:
“The water does not stop day or night. If it circulates on the
heights, it leads the rain and fog. If it circulates underneath, it
forms the streams and rivers. The water stands for doing good. If a
dike is opposed to it it holds up. If you open a pathway, it runs along
it. That’s why we say that water does not fight. However, nothing
compares to it to break the strong and the tough.”
The alchemists called water the mercury in the first stage of
transformation and, by analogy, the fluid body of mankind. Current
psychology interprets it as a symbol of the universal unconscious where
all symbols come from.
The theme for Boom 2010 is an embodyment of the concept of
immersion in water. It symbolizes a return to the pre-formal, with a
sense of rebirth and new movement, as immersion multiplies the
potential of life. The symbolism of baptism, always related to water,
is central in Christianity or Hinduism. When he dives into the water
the old man is completely immersed. When he leaves the water, the new
man suddenly appears.
The Water On the Planet We Have Today
Since the Industrial Revolution, most of our world’s rivers have
been treated unwisely as a convenient way of transporting waste to sea,
affecting the biodiversity of thousands of kilometers of waterways,
harming human health, and in the end polluting coastal and marine
waters.
Of all the trends to watch, James Lovelock maintains sea level rise
is the most important. Given the complexity of the millions of
interactions within the Gaia system, Lovelock argues it is best to
ignore year-to-year temperature fluctuations and instead watch the
oceans. The seas, he says, are the lone trustworthy indicator of the
earth’s heat balance. “Sea level rise is the best available measure of
the heat absorbed by the earth because it comes from only two things.
These are the melting of the glaciers and the expansion of water as it
warms. Sea level is the thermometer that indicates true global heating.”
Lovelock argues that oceans will expand fuelled by feedback loops
such as loss of reflective ice cover, replaced by heat absorvent dark
water; the death of carbon-eating algae as oceans warm and acidify.
These cycles will explode in the coming decades, and we must stop the
fashionable rhetoric about sustainable development and “weave the sound
of the alarm clock into our dreams. We will need to respond more like
the inhabitants of a city threatened by a flood. We have to stop
pretending there is a way back to that comfortable and beautiful Earth
we left behind in the 20th century”
