Wetlook World Forum

Message # 34991.1.2.1.1.1.1.1

Subject: ...use ear plugs

Date: Tue 01/04/08 19:55:44 GMT

Name: MK

Email: wamtec@comcast.net

Website:

By Mahony - Tue 01/04/08 16:13:58 GMT

Website:

Mike.

By MK - wamtec@comcast.net Tue 01/04/08 15:40:19 GMT

Website:

But I know FOR SURE that it is impossible for Zurich to be the most boring city in Europe...that is totally impossible...because Zurich has the best and largest street parade and techno festival in all Europe now.....and now Zurich street parade is much much bigger and better than the original Berlin Love Parade (where Zurich copied the idea from). Berlin Love Parade used to be very good (and for wetlook fans) in the 1990's, but then it went downhill, cos they had severe financial problems to organize things properly in Berlin, and then some bright spark decided to drain the ponds and fountains so there was no place to cool off any more, and then they cancelled it in some years due to financial problems. Meanwhile...the smart people in Zurich saw how good the Berlin Love Parade used to be, so they copied the idea and created their own STREETPARADE festival, and they based it near the lake where people can cool off, and set up street shower sprays for people to cool off in the streets too....they really set things up nicely, and now you can go there each summer and see lots of great wetlook....the official site is here

http://www.streetparade.ch/

But you can finds hundreds of better pics on the photo sites, and see Carl Soak's videos of the wetlook events in the street showers too.

Here is clear evidence of what I was talking about....i.e. you create an event....and you create millions on tourist dollars if you organize things well. Here are some actual stats for you. In the 1990's, when the Berlin Love Parade was better, they started doing the same thing in Zurich, and in the early years they only has 10,000 people at Zurich Street Parade.....but by the year 2001.....there were now ONE MILLION tourists going to Street Parade.....and for the last 5 years they have averaged 800,000 to one million tourists each year (all the while the Berlin Love Parade declined and got worse). The stats are right here for you to see...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Street_Parade

If your organize something...and you do it well.....then the people WILL come.

And as for Zurich being the most boring city in Europe....thats baloney.....cos how can the city that has the largest street festival in Europe...with one million people attending....be boring.

I have not been to Zurich since the 1970's...when I used to go there on business trips, and I never recall the place as being boring. I only remember it as being incredibly EXPENSIVE....and thinking what a beautiful city it was....only I could never afford to live there.

MK

By Mahony - Tue 01/04/08 03:44:57 GMT

Website:

M.

PS: By the way, the popular weekend destination of Kazimierz Dolny (an old Jewish town, halfway between Warsaw and Lublin) has an organized Dyngus. They pull out the cities fire trucks into the main town square and get everyone soaked. Well, at least that's what it was. The tradition happened also this year, but with only one fire truck and a grand total of two people getting near enough to get wet. And the firefighters then had a lot of trouble with getting rid of the water in the square, that had in the evening turned to ice :D

By MK - wamtec@comcast.net Mon 31/03/08 20:45:20 GMT

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But there are also very successful wet scenes in very COLD conditions too. Just checkout the dozens of "Special Olympics" events and websites in 16 different states in the USA...and their "Polar Plunge" and Penguin Plunge" events. All you have to do is type those words on flickr.com and you can find thousands of pics, and those events are very successful and draw thousands of people and raise millions of dollars for charity too.

Some countries like Germany have managed to take old traditions like the "Gautchfest" dunking events of new apprentices...and turn those events into major tourist attractions, and the weather is Germany is not hot when they do those events.

Similarly in Austria and Switzerland you have at least 20 different "Dirndl" water dunking events taking place too, and those have evolved from being an old tradition...to being a tourist attraction too.

Your description of Poland sounds very bleak...I am sure it is not as bad as you make it out to be, cos basically you are saying that it is not a good time to visit anytime from Jan to December...and we need to wait another 50 years until "Global Warming" melts the ice caps... ha ha....and I cannot wait that long.

BTW....what you describe about the people in the city objecting to the water throwing and calling the cops....that is EXACTLY how things used to be in Bangkok, Thailand in the mid 1990's, and the water throwing was causing so many disturbances and traffic accidents in the city (i.e. people getting knocked off their motorbikes due to water attacks).....that the city came up with a simple solution. That is, 10 years ago they totally BANNED water throwing during the festival in the main city areas...but they created one "designated area" (called Khao San Rd...next to the Grand Palace park) and they closed off the traffic to that area, and just told people that they must confine all their water throwing celebrations to this one street only....and that is how Bangkok is today...i.e. Songkran activities are banned all over the main city...and only allowed if you go to this one area along Khao San Rd.

That is what they could easily do in Warsaw too....and the cold weather should not be a factor....cos there are thousands of pics you can find on the net of people in the UK and Scandinavia who go for Polar Bear swims etc...and even more such pics on the U.S. sites sponsored by Special Olympics.

MK

By Mahony - Mon 31/03/08 17:51:52 GMT

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We had nothing to record this year.

As for the de-centalized events, well these traditions are getting less and less popular. The climate has changed here. Summers have become very hot and winters rarely see much snow, but not every time of the year has seen warming. Spring time has had some very unusual cold waves lately, and dyngus in such weather is really no fun. Not only with -1 to 2 celsius, like this year, but also 6 - 7 celsius and rain, like last. Most TV material are archives from the nineties, when we had some dynguses with temperaturs like 24C. Anyway, nowadays with such weather most people don't like the tradition and call the cops.

As for generating tourist dollars, Poland doesn't do that well. We generally don't promote the country (like many in our region) and it's attractions. This has changed a bit lately, with for instance Krakow getting on to the main tourist map, but that's only lately and in that time dynguses were poor. And anyway, holidays are not a good time to visit. On easter everything is closed, except a few bars and restaurants and maybe some cinemas (though many of these are in shopping malls that are closed by law on easter and can't open) and Poles spend time with there family, so it's just plain boring to come here at that time. And anyway, to top it off, airports are in total mayhem and completely blocked around easter (and christmas) as Poles working outside the country come back home to the families and also many young and less traditional Poles go the other way around to storm the Alps, Tunisia or the Canary Islands. So generally this wouldn't work IMHO.

Mike.

By MK - wamtec@comcast.net Mon 31/03/08 14:09:59 GMT

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I was hoping the wet fans in Poland would be able to record better scenes from their Polish tv channels, cos we only get 2 Polish channels in my region in Florida.

The problem with Dyngus Day celebrations are that they are totally de-centralized, and disorganized. By that I mean, with the water throwing festivals in Spain, China, Burma, Cambodia, Panama, Ecuador and Thailand -- those are all "centralized" and "organized" ..i.e. you know exactly where to go to see stuff happening, cos those events are specifically organized to occur in centralized locations...so you know where to go to capture things. With the water throwing festivals in Poland and Hungary, those are completely "random" events that can happen spontaneously in any part of the city or rural areas, so you have no chance to see events, unless you happen to be lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time.

If the local authorities in Poland were smart, they could generate millions in tourist dollars, if they just created a centralized location for these celebrations...e.g. like a county fairground or something. This is what they have done in Spain and Korea and Thailand and Panama -- they have turned sleepy little towns that had no tourist industry at all....into megabucks tourist attractions that get 100,000 visitors each year, by exploiting their festivals so that many foreign tourists come to see them.

MK

By uwe - Mon 31/03/08 12:42:29 GMT

Website:

http://wiadomosci.gazeta.pl/wiadomosci/51,53600,4046488.html?i=0

How about this years pics????