A Little Oppi Magic

[Photo cred: Ari Brest]

So one week after the start of Oppi Koppi : For the Lovely Young Taken to the Unsea, I find myself sitting in front of my laptop, ginger tea in hand, wondering how on Earth I made it to this moment alive.

Yeah I’m alive but not unscathed. I wear my battle scars proudly. A scratch on my cheek that I have absolutely no recollection of getting; was it a thorn bush that just jumped right in front of me? From the drunken hug of a heavily pierced stranger? I don’t know. Not to mention my nonstop dust cough that is so loud and so hoarse that even I think I’m a bit disgusting.

Yea, Oppi is hard! And at the start of this, my fifth trek, I asked myself if I really wanted to do it again, would it be worth it? But on my first day back in reality, walking my all too easily paved way through varsity, seeing the bored faces of people not willing to greet a stranger, missing the sun beating down on my face, I decided yes! I would trade breathing this city polluted air for a week long of dust any day!

Everyone who has been knows there is just something special about the Koppi, it’s got a little magic. It becomes its own self-enclosed world, a kind of paradise; in a dirty, fucked up, showering is no longer a requirement kind of way. The unspoken rules of the world no longer apply.

Fashion plays by a different set of rules. I see it as working in two ways and both are equally acceptable. #1 is the practical route: dress to survive the day, the sun, the dust , the walks and ensure that you have a bottle filled with alcohol attached to you for easy access at all times. #2 is the not so practical route: dress as fucken fabulously and extravagantly as your heart desires, like it even surpasses Coachella’s dress code. This tends to be the one my friends and I go by and it is so much fun! I could never get away with these outfits in Joburg but here they are the shit!

Back home we live by unspoken rules like “don’t dance in public for no reason or you will be assumed insane and evidently frowned upon.” At Oppi, no one gives a dam, or rather, they dig it! One night a friend found himself with a group of men who were so fascinated by the glow sticks attached to his jacket that they started doing a ritualistic trance dance in a circle around him. Ok this may sound a little weird but my point is that at the time everyone was just enjoying themselves! Even the people walking past didn’t flinch about it. And it happens everywhere! People walking to the Redbull stage who can’t contain the jam till they’re there, hoola girls on the grass making me jealous of their hips, a group of friends in matching purple speedos doing a synchronized dance routine. My point is, clearly we all love to dance like a bunch of idiots in public and I keep going back to Oppi because it is the one place I am allowed to do it!

This Oppi in particular showed shifting demographics. Finally the racial odds are beginning to even out and the festival is no longer a predominantly white, Afrikaans male pit. Perhaps this is due to the refreshing line-up that’s offering a wider variety of music but I can’t say for sure. What ever the reason, getting low to Ricky Rick as a united South African crowd was definitely a highlight! No one who watched any music acts can deny that South Africa is a bubbling volcano of musical potential. Every local musician came to the party and delivered world class beats and riffs to the crowds. At the end of the day, this festival is and always will be all about the music!

Oppi Koppi comes at the perfect time of year. It saves me from a seemingly never-ending Winter, it reminds me that there is more to the world than paying for petrol and submitting assignments on time, it re-excites me about the bucket load of talent in this music industry. It sprinkles its fairy dust all over me and rejuvenates me.

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