Newtown Festival

I wandered along to the Newtown Festival today.  I really don't know why, I've gone for the last few years and each time I wonder why I go.  I'm sure there isn't anything particularly wrong with the festival but there is only so much you can do when there are only four different places to shop at.  There are heaps of stalls but pretty much without exception they will be;

1) henna tattooing
2) jewellery made from bits of odds and ends
3) "tribal" clothing which indicates that every tribe on the planet spent most of their time tie dying pastel colours onto lengths of cheesecloth
4) T-shirts

That's pretty much it.  There were also food stalls, live music and the inevitable Chinese massage people.  OK, I liked the Chinese massage.  Not so much for the massage itself as for the skillful way they upsold me from a twenty dollar head and shoulders job to a fifty dollar full back massage.  I went up to one of the food stalls but they were charging $9 for a hot dog so I went away again.

The live music might be a drawcard for some but I must admit I have got past the stage of being prepared to sit in the sun and listen to strange music for several hours on the offchance that some of it is good.  Some of it probably will be good, almost certainly some of it will be bad and I could be sitting in the shade drinking coffee.  I used to pop along to the festival looking for Christmas presents for my family however I think I've exhausted their patience with homemade jewellery and amusingly captioned t-shirts (and I'm not game to try the henna tattooing or tribal clothing on them).  This year they had a jumping castle for the kids which certainly didn't smell as bad as the pony rides they had last year.  Obviously the organisers are trying to make it a family friendly affair.

Families certainly responded, there were families everywhere and everywhere there weren't families there were other people.  Walking along was an extended exercise in jostling.  I think the most frequent words out of my mouth were "Excuse me" which I needn't have bothered with as the person I was saying it to was invariably being jostled by somebody else by the time I got the words out.  Still that's the whole point behind a festival.  Getting a large number of people into close proximity all of whom are enjoying themselves sufficiently so that they don't feel the need to respond with violence.  On that count it must be counted a success.

Although I must confess I'm getting a little creeped out by the preparations.  The first time I went to the festival I just walked into the park.  Now they have erected a fence around the entire park and have security personnel checking your bags as you go in.  Considering the population density inside the fencing its starting to get a slight concentration camp feel about it, albeit one that provides henna tattooing.

And this is the real reason that I keep coming to the festival.  I'm waiting for the inevitable year when they have erected guard towers and searchlights as well.