20/8/02 - Bicon report [back entry]

[taimatsu]

Evening, 20/8/02
I guess I had better do a BiCon report now, even though we have no internet, or I will forget it all :) Well, not all, of course - some of it is pretty unforgettable - but the details will be lost to me. You know what I mean.

Typing feels odd right now as I have managed to get superglue on the ends of three of my fingers and both thumbs. Nothing is stuck together, thankfully, but i have little coatings of glue on my fingertips and it feels very odd. I've been trying to do a craft kit I bought in South Africa which involves sticking semi-precious stones together in the shape of a seahorse - I didn't realise my spiffy new superglue pen was malfunctioning and dripping nastily on things, including me. Fortunately i am not stuck to it, halle lujah.

Anyway, Bicon.

I was meant to get the train from Oxford at about five pm on Thursday; of course, I'm me,and I run on Lucytime, so it ended up being 7pm before I got to the station. This incidentally meant I didn't have my guitar with me, which was a pity, as there were several points during the weekend where I felt like singing to myself and had to do it unaccompanied, which severely restricts my choice of song. (If anyone was in a room near me and got very b or ed with 'On Raglan Road' and assorted Sarah Machlachlan songs, I'm sorry.) As it turned out, I had to wait quite a while for a train; the one I should have been able to get had failed somewhere near Southampton, so I had to go via Birmingham instead of Co ventry. So much fuss caused one delay, and we waited for ages at Oxford. By the time I got to Birmingham, it was late, and there was about an hour & 20 minutes' wait for the final train to Leicester. This then had mechanical problems, and set off around 15 minutes late. After grabbing a taxi (and incidentally catching sight of kaet from the window, and thinking 'I'm sure I recognise that guy... hang on, it's...?') I arrived at College Hall about 12.40ish. Janet, Ian, Sion and a couple of other people were hanging about in the foyer drinking wine, so I joined them after getting my room key, and wibbled and squeaked with nervousness before going to bed.

Friday morning, I made sure I got up at a sensible time, because I had to complete my registration after arriving so late the previous night. I ventured out of my room to hunt washrooms, and noticed chiarklark in the kitchen. We bounced a bit at each other and discovered we were only a room apart, which was nice, and led to so me shared meals and so on over the weekend (yay nice pasta!). I ate a ham sandwich for breakfast and then went off for the opening plenary, incidentally (and this will become significant later on) wearing my 'To Heart' t-shirt with cute anime chicks on front and back.

After the welcome in the opening plenary, there were mixer sessions. Mine was run by the lovely hfnuala, and I got to learn the names of a lot of people and actually talk to a couple too, which was nice. I also managed to avoid standing in the middle during the circle game, go me.

The first workshop I went to was also one of the events I enjoyed most - the Sign Language Basics session led by heteronormative. I can now say 'Phwoar, I fancy him/her/you!', 'I love Japanese animation' and 'I need sex' in sign language, amongst many other things. Signs we learnt did seem to cluster around where we come from, pizza/beer/comestibles in general, and sex, including words for 'slut', 'polyamorous', two signs for 'bisexual' and, obviously, 'threesome'. I had a great chat during the 'no-one's allowed to speak' free-for all with jero, who came up to me, tugged on my shirt and made signs for 'I like!' Needless to say I ended up signing and fingerspelling 'I *lov e* S-A-I-L-O-R-M-O-O-N' at him, and having him misinterpret this as Urotsukidoji. Guess I need to practise fingerspelling some more *sigh*. Final classic signing mishap came in the section where we each signed something to the rest of the group, where jero managed to refer to his partner Alex as a 'pink bisexual onion' rather than a 'pink bisexual girlfriend'. Much hilarity ensued. Thanks for a great session, Howard :)

After this I went off to the supermarket with Ian and chiarklark and bou ght lots of pasta salad and tomatoes and fruit juice, bumping into several other nice piles of bisexuals there too :) Returning to College Hall, chiarklark and I had lunch, and I didn't quite make it to any of the other sessions that afternoon.

In the evening, there was a wonderful concert from Jennifer Moore (memevector), performing as 'Single Bass'; I particularly loved the reworking of Rapunzel into '[I'm staying here] in my high tower/ With my wise woman/ and I'm not coming d own!'

After the concert, there followed a brief sojourn in the bar and then the DIY Disco, for which I had submitted CDs and subsequently forgotten to vote. Neither of my selections got played, and I weep for Biconners having missed out on the bouncy fab ulousness that is Sonique's 'Sky' ;) Nevertheless, despite big gaps between songs and some odd combinations, it was a great disco, and my stripy socks went down a treat with softfruit ;)

On Saturday, I started off with 'Just a Bisexual Minute' led by Jenni; it was good, but was a little early in the morning for mental exercises, and would have been more fun if it had been less dominated by one madly competitive player. I was most relieved when Janet lost the topic of 'Candles' without managing to say very much :)

Next up, Bellydance for Women, led by sanjibabes. Yay! Much coolness! It was a nice way to, well, if not meet people exactly, at least eye them up, and the exercise was great too. I'm still trying to get those figure-of-eight hip circles right. I really enjoyed myself, despite being tired out by the end.

Lunchtime I spent relaxing and reading in my room; I'd taken Ahdaf Soueif's 'The Map Of Love' with me, which is a lovely book I hadn't read for a while. I hear the Poly Picnic turned into a food fight, which makes me rather glad I skipped it (aside from the fact of not actually being poly at all, just ending up with these women who happen to be that way inclined, dammit...)

After lunch, Sandra ran Shag That! a body image workshop which was so packed it had to be moved outside. I didn't say much but really enjoyed listening to people and thinking over what was being said. Based on past history, I seem to have a clear type when it comes to women; men are pretty tricky, though. I think I ought to consider why my female partners have all looked the way they do, because I find lots of other types of women attractive too :) Interesting, anyway. And yay Nadine for getting up and being brave enough to say what she did; I was really immensely impressed by that.

Next up, the Decision-Making Plenary. I didn't actually notice any particular decisions getting made, except that in one case we decided not to make a decision yet. Insight into some of the possibly slightly cliquey politics going on under the surface. I'm glad I went, anyway.

Dinner! chiarklark had decided she wanted Chinese; we met up with other would-be noshers at the Noshers' Network meeting point, and had a very very nice expedition to a noodle bar. Thanks especially to purrthecat for knowing the way, cryx for navigating our carload, and everyone for being super and interesting. Engrossing discussions about all sorts of things were had, particularly with matthewp and 36; all in all, it was most cool and perhaps even bodacious.

Back to bedroom to faff and change for disco! On Friday night I went black-velvet with ponytails (kudos to chiarklark for doing my back parting) - Saturday I was sparkly and booted. I danced about a bit and winced at the height of Janet's shoes - she was about two inches taller than me instead of two or three shorter! kaet's blue and glowing Friday outfit impressed all who saw it, and deserves mention :) After a chat in the bar with matthewp, chiarklark and I gave up on getting ourselves body-painted owing to the queue (a couple of full-body artworks were taking up the volunteers' time) and went off to watch Rocky Horror. It was good, and I'm glad I saw it, but I don't think I quite get the cult thing. Maybe it's because I missed the first ten/fifteen minutes or so, but, you know, it wasn't *that* amazing :) Columbia, though, in that tap-dance outfit... oooh.

Sleep followed.

Sunday morning, bright and early, 'What does the Bible really say about Bisexuality and Homosexuality?' Well, that's a pretty big question, and I plan to deal with it better next year than it was presented this year. The chap running the session was obviously very enthusiastic and very interested in the subject, and he did his best, but he seemed to leap right from the very conservative interpretations of classic gay-bashing texts to very radically liberal ones, and he didn't quite present i n a helpful way exactly what's going on when the issue is discussed. Nor did he make it sufficiently clear that there are enormous difficulties standing in the way of reaching any clear understanding of the exact terms used in the text (which are what the whole thing depends on), since context is very hard to reconstruct, and we can never be quite sure precisely what was meant at any particular time, to any specific author.

There are two sides to this issue. Firstly, does the Bible as a historical document, a collection of books written o ver several hundred years before and after the time of Jesus, condemn homosexual activity? Second, does God condemn it? The first question is more academic; the second depends largely on personal faith and experience. They are linked, but how they are linked depends on your beliefs about divine inspiration, which is yet another can of worms to open. I'll elaborate some other time - ask if you're interested :) (it's partly 'what can you tell about God from the Bible? Does the Bible accurately represent God's voice, Word, opinions, as it were?')

Anyway, after the workshop I chatted a bit to Janet and a few other people about it. One girl (whose name I forget, sorry!) said she'd learnt more from me in five minutes talk than she had from the whole workshop preceding; Janet said I should run a session next year, and Vicky marvelled at my bounciness about it and agreed with her. So I think I'm up for it. I have a year to prepare, and a tame RC priest whose pet subject is Sexuality and the Church whose brains I can pick. Look out for it next year, people, and feel free to prod me with questions or comments or suggestions for things to include/look out for/address. For once, I'm interested in an aspect of theology :)

After that, I went off to pack, ate lunch on the grass with a nice bunch of people including mhw, matthewp and ruth_sedina (fruited teacakes and ham, incidentally, are not a good mix. I thought they were plain baps, honest) and then went to the closing plenary. Photos happened, and I finally had the guts to identify myself to other socbiters, including baratron and halibut. Anyway, yes, hi, I'm me :) Talked to lots of people, bounced wildly and alarmingly at lots of people, hugged lots of people, said goodbye to lots of people, and got a lift to the station from fluffy Janet and fluffy Sion. And that was that. Bicon virginity irrevocably lost. I loved it; how was it for you?

A final note; if you are reading this and wondering about getting in touch with me and thinking 'oh, she probably won't want to hear from me' then YES I'd *love* to hear from you. Whoever you are. There's probably an email address in my profile; if there isn't, prod me in comm ents and I'll post a contact method. If I take ages to *reply* to you, it may be that my email access is still flaky, and I apologise.

Comments

[emperor]

Ah yes, the Bible and bi workshop. Last bicon, jaff and I said that we should run one of those this year, but we were faff (and I was in the Hebridies this year). I should send you some email once I'm less busy with Oxonmoot...

[taimatsu]

yes, do send me email. I can use piles of input. ,

[halibut.livejournal.com]

craft kit I bought in South Africa

Huh? Um? What? When? That makes you, kingginger and Fritz Klein who've all been here shortly before I variously met you.

I hope you got my email earlier. It come through alright?

[taimatsu]

That ws last year's summer holiday - my brother was on a school rugby tour in Johannesburg and Cape Town, so the rest of us came too. We really enjoyed ourselves :)

Yes, email I have and am aout to reply to :)å

*hughug*

[purrthecat.livejournal.com]

I'm still kicking myself for having missed the 'What does the Bible really say about Bisexuality and Homosexuality?' workshop. I was sleeping though... so I suppose I missed it for a proper reason. However, it would have been interesting to see what information was presented and in what manner. Considering my background, I have been soaked for a long time in the Bible and teachings thereof. It's difficult to disassemble my parents' 'brand of religion' from what the Bible ACTUALLY says though sometimes (not to mention their church's doctrines). I think it's pretty much impossible for most people to present such a subject without injecting their own views and beliefs no matter how careful or how aware they are of it. It's inevitable - it's human nature. I look forward to not sleeping through your workshop next year. :)

[sanjibabes.livejournal.com]

(waves) Hiya!

Glad you enjoyed the bellydance - should I leave more eyeing up time next year? ;-)

[taimatsu]

You could lengthen the 'sexy walking' bit ;)