Fusion Forum

First time supporters, fifth time to fusion. Had a good time but the supporter kitchen and food was only good the first couple of days and then it mostly wasn’t. Vegan options were slim and lines long. Three shifts also seemed like a lot and made it hard to enjoy the festival (wed, Friday, then Sunday morning shifts!). Love the free shirt tho!

Don’t think we will be supporters again but glad we had the experience and got to meet lots of cool people.

How were your experiences? Hopefully good!

Nice to hear you had a good time and thanks for your help!
Unfortunately, as hard as it sounds, there is a hierarchy behind the scenes where the people with the "more important" jobs get better treatment. In no way I want to say that you and the other supporters arent important, please dont misunderstand me.
Ive been several times to Fusion to work as well, but part of a bigger crew with a task that gets us one of the good backstage camps with fewer people and nice living conditions.
But like you, we also had to do 3 shifts, 6 hours each. Other crews pull even longer shifts of 8h or even 10-12.
Working at Fusion is great, but it is no joke. Some tasks can be chill, most are pretty intense and can be tiring. Fusion is a massive undertaking and barely controlled chaos, it takes a lot to keep it going. Some people expect to do some chill tasks in the sense of "helping out a bit" and then have enough time for partying, but thats not how it works and thats a wrong expectation to have.
Ive heard something like 15000 people in total like you and me, the artists and so on making it happen, and the hard reality of that is that not everyone can get the same treatment. For all the working people to get nice camping with plenty of food and enough kitchens and staff to feed all of us in a timely manner, that would require the Kulturkosmos to hire several thousand people extra to make that happen, hire more people to make the space, build the infrastructure, etc. Organizing an event like this is a headache of astronomical proportions, and concessions have to be made all the time. No matter how much you plan, how much stuff and and resources you have, there is always something that will go wrong and not to plan...

There was a protest last year at Fusion, supporters and crews that happened to be on the lower end of the Fusion worker hierarchy were protesting for better conditions. Ive read slogans like "Backstage camping 1 for everyone!", which sadly is just not doable. The festival grounds are pretty much at maximum capacity every year, and giving all supporters and crews the same space and same infrastructure as in backstage camps 1,2,3 e.g. is just not feasible. And that sadly means that some of you, like in your case can sometimes get "the shorter end of the stick".
Sorry to say that, but thats the hard reality of a massive event like this, you and me are literally among thousands of people doing our part, and sometimes people slip through the net that is meant to support us.

If you get the chance to hook up with a crew doing stuff like lighting, decoration, building, maintenance, whatever, I suggest doing that, you will have a much better time! Its less anonymous and you feel more of a sense of purpose, as after all, doing randomly assigned tasks for a huge machine isnt always fun.

Thanks for the context. Helps us understand the situation better and how it played out. Next time we try for the lottery

Travis hat geschrieben: Mi 3. Jul 2024, 17:20 Thanks for the context. Helps us understand the situation better and how it played out. Next time we try for the lottery

What you also can do is come together with your friends and come up with some creative contribution to the festival and write an application to the festival organizers. Or if you happen to have relevant skills that can be helpful to the festival, thats also a way to get a place in one of the crews