I begin to Wonder
I’m standing on a corner of Rosenthaler Platz, three blocks from the small apartment in Berlin that I’ve called home for nearly three months. I’m waiting for Alex. “We’re just finishing up dinner at Kreuzburger,” he says in a message. We’re meant to be meeting up for drinks. A short while later, I spot him about to cross the street — tall, blue-eyed, tousled curls, a little more muscular than he was when I last saw him — with a dark-haired friend wearing the all-black-and-slightly-athletic Berlin club kid uniform that my wardrobe has also morphed into.
As he crosses to my corner, by the bar Mein Haus Am See (that my friend Tracy took me to when I first set foot in this city two years earlier), I marvel at the circumstances that led to this reunion in Berlin, halfway across the world from where and how we first crossed paths over six months before: as total strangers seated across each other on the shuttle to Wonderfruit Festival in Pattaya, Thailand.
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“We might have to camp,” said Mikhail Schemm, managing director of Third Culture Music (the festival’s Philippine partner), when he first broached the subject of attending the festival. Wonderfruit has gained a reputation as the closest thing to Burning Man you can experience in Southeast Asia — a place where art and music mix, with a social responsibility, sustainability and naturalist slant to remind people that fun can go hand-in-hand with respect for one’s environment and the world around you. The festival grounds would be expansive, with areas set up where festival-goers adventurous enough could pitch their own tents free of charge, and a special area for high-end boutique “glamping” options for those who wanted to be as close to all the action as possible.
Wonderfruit would be going on for four days, with acts and activities around the clock (literally 24 hours), but shuttles to and from The Fields at Siam Country Club would only run until just before midnight — and just before the electronic acts would get started at one of the stages (The Quarry, which would become my favorite). The wide, breezy, beautiful venue would be half an hour away from the city of Pattaya itself, accessible only by extortionist taxis. (But hey, that would ultimately turn out to be just another part of the adventure.)
We ended up not camping, thankfully. (“I can’t camp, I need a toilet and a shelf for all my cosmetics!” I half-joked.) Instead, our merry band of musicians and music enthusiast members of the media checked into a hotel in the city, walking distance from amazing Thai food, dodgy Thai hookers, and the pickup and drop-off point for the shuttle service.
And that’s how we met Alex.
After waiting for one of the designated hours for the shuttle, and then finding other small pockets of similarly lost foreigners trying to look for said shuttles, we managed to locate them — like our own jeeps, but giant; windowless, allowing the fresh air to flow through. Half of the Philippine contingent caught the morning shuttle to attend some workshops, but we hardened partygoers — Third Culture Music’s PR manager Celine Ferros, and Pulse Radio Asia’s David Sorrenti and Anna Buquid — took the afternoon one, planning to stay late into the night for the music.
Strangers in strange places always manage to recognize their own ilk, and if you’re all headed to the same place to live, laugh, and wonder, then you already have something to talk about. Soon enough, we began chatting with fellow festivalgoers on the shuttle. There was a Canadian couple based in Thailand, with a baby in tow; a jovial Italian fellow lugging his small suitcase around, planning to buy tickets at the gate and then set up camp in the fields; and a young man all by himself — who turned out to be German like our own Sorrenti — who just happened to hear about the festival while on a solo adventure around Southeast Asia. By then, I already had plans to spend a few months in Berlin, so we talked about the city on the way to the venue, and when we got there, parted ways — us, to get our passes, and everyone else, to go back into the fields — without exchanging names.
We crossed paths with all kinds of people in crazy, colorful outfits on our way in, and even came across a Caucasian couple decked out in wedding clothes. “We met here last year, and we got married here this year!” The idea astounded me. What an incredible story to tell!
We walked in as the sun set over the Molam Bus and the people chilling out on top of it, listening to a band playing Thai music. Based on pictures alone, I already had an idea of what the stages and many areas of the festival would look like — massive, unique but congruous with each other, beautifully designed, and seeming to blend into nature with perfect harmony — but I had no idea how big the area actually was. It was huge. The stages were a fair distance away from each other, with assorted areas distributed in between for food, shops, and activities. Perfect, so the sound systems wouldn’t battle with each other, as musical acts’ timetables tended to overlap. Most of us worked out our festival attack plans as we regrouped in front of the Molam Bus, marking on our phones — whether in Notes or in the official Wonderfruit app — who we wanted to see, where they were playing, and at what time.
Talks and workshops were littered throughout the day, from guided partner massages and meditation, to yoga, to dance, to reiki, to face-painting. There were even farm-to-table feasts by renowned chefs that you had to book for to attend, because health, wellness and excellent food are among the pillars of the festival. But while all those things seemed fairly interesting in their own right, I was there for the music.
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The festival boasted a hefty lineup, and more importantly, an eclectic one. Wonderfruit isn’t your typical crowd-pleasing music festival. Sure, there were heavyweights on the list, like The Faint, Blonde Redhead and Yasiin Bey (who ended up not making it). But Wonderfruit is a place for discovery, where you come across acts you’ve only heard of in passing from more in-the-know friends, or you chance upon an amazing set by someone you’ve never heard of before. We stuck to the Living Stage (the main stage) on the first night. We caught Harts, a young Australian singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist of Indian descent; then had our minds absolutely blown by Submotion Orchestra, with Sharlene Hector and her soulful, powerful voice taking over vocal duties from singer Ruby Wood while the latter was back home, about to give birth. With a stage dreamed up by Coachella and Burning Man veteran artist Joel Stockdill, and lighting designed to mesmerize, it was a feast for the eyes.
We left halfway through The Faint’s set to catch the last free shuttle home, a little gutted to be going so early, especially since The Quarry — the electronic/dance stage — would only open at midnight. But it was only our first day, and we had two days to go. There would be time.
It was at the Soi Stage on Day Two, during a live set by an Austrian trio called Elektro Guzzi — who sounded like they were playing techno on actual instruments! Analog techno! — that we danced upon (literally danced) our new German friend again, and finally came to know him as Alex. The Soi Stage — designed seemingly out of dozens of colorful sarongs — was playing host to some of the more danceable of the many danceable acts the festival had to offer. Jacques Greene and Daedelus had already performed, and the Philippines’ own Tarsius would be rocking it up. It was incredible to see people of all nationalities shuffling their feet to Deathless Gods, and wonderful to see a regional festival truly embrace artists from all over Southeast Asia.
Having deduced that we all liked electronic music, we stuck together and set out for the Living Stage, just in time to catch the breathtaking, death-defying acrobatics of the Lucent Dossier Experience — a visual treat, to say the least. But we were really there to catch the iy_Project, a collaboration between producer Jon Hopkins and light artist Chris Levine, who combined soundscapes and lightscapes into an unforgettable sensory experience.
We then decided to ditch the last shuttle and trek into the forest instead, to find the Quarry, a “stage” made of thick, towering poles of bamboo, arranged in a tent formation and littered with lasers and disco balls; a techno club built in the midst of lush, green foliage and rock formations. We all danced for hours, and ended up losing each other in the crowd. I made my way back home before the DJs at the aptly named Solar Stage started to play to greet the sunrise.
Our final day was filled with more music — courtesy of the incandescent Rhye at the Living Stage — lots of food, and even more exploring. We ventured into a nipa hut marked only by a red fluorescent light to discover a small bar playing retro tunes and power ballads. Daedelus himself walked in then promptly walked back out, probably because Total Eclipse of the Heart was on. Celine and I, exhausted, still ended up dancing at the Solar Stage, checking out the Forbidden Fruit stage, and spotting a nameless, pocket dance area on our way to the exit.
Music will always find a way to move your feet, and Wonderfruit was nothing short of magical.
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So here I am, a girl from Manila in Berlin, catching up with a European friend I made in Thailand who has since moved to New York, drinking spätkauf-bought beers with new friends in an empty playground on the other side of my street. Funny where the world leads us, and it’s amazing that music can bring people together, just like that.
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Wonderfruit is happening again from Feb. 16-19 at The Fields at Siam Country Club, Pattaya, Thailand. Visit wonderfruit.com and check out Third Culture Music on Facebook for more information.
