Friday, April 24, 2009

Rose-Lipped Trumpet Lichen: Counterculture in Europe?, Harbin Beginnings, Hippies Creating Love

Where is counterculture in Europe, say, in France, today? In Club Med? Probably not, although students, long hairs, hippies, revolutionaries, artists, bohemians, artisans, activists, organic farmers, builders, Peace-niks, academics, teachers, writers, meditators and others might have visited Club Med in the 60s a lot, especially those around the world ... {Probably in Paris, though ...}

And is Club Med - two words - with its possibly 200 sites, 'placeless?'


One of the things that makes Harbin different from Club Med is its beginnings - in the period I'm interested in, starting in 1972, - so, its emergence with counterculture. And does Harbin's continuation as a hot springs' retreat center business give a location, or place, to ongoing hippie counterculture, whereas counterculture isn't that much 'in the air' in many other places?

Might we even begin to do kinship studies at Harbin, which reflect anthropological studies of tribes historically, thus partly defining group, as well as anthropology as a discipline? Why not? Hippies hearkened to Native American traditions, for example, and I've heard Harbin residents call Harbin a tribe.

Does Harbin's continuation signal a kind of ongoing emergence of a new kind of group - hippies - and their sustainability, - in this one place, for one? There are actually a fair number of related places around the U.S. (and possibly around the world), that are somewhat countercultural, and which may also think of themselves as independent from one another 'culturally,' but in which I see a lot of similarities. Is Club Med loosely part of this?

And why doesn't Harbin expand, as Club Med has? I think it would keep its je ne sais quoi.

I hope to begin by making virtual Harbin very similar to real Harbin, including ...


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Hippies can create a kind of liminality and communitas in most interesting ways. I wonder whom among 'counterculture' has elicited loving bliss {think ecstasy - MDMA} over a lifetime, when and as they want. I suspect there are some individuals, whom I haven't heard of, who have done this. Who are they? How to do this?


How do hippies create love? They tend to put it out there ... :)

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