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The Fire Desire Attending Crew: Bruno Kopf, Joey Amvrosiadis, Cean Herzfield, Evan Crankshaw, Kath Hayward, Tertius Swanepoel, Kei Krober & Trevor Botha

Written by: Bruno Kopf


Moksha Spring Pollination is an open air festival (Genre: Psytrance) located in the Cradle of Mankind in Southern Africa. The Fossil Hominid Sites of Sterkfontein, Swartkrans, Kromdraai and Environs, are known as the Cradle of Humankind, which was declared a World Heritage Site on December 2 1999. The Cradle of Humankind covers an area of over 47 000 hectares of privately owned land in the north western corner of Gauteng. The area is of outstanding universal value, because it contains a complex of palaeo-anthropological sites, which have yielded some of the most valuable evidence, world-wide, of the origins of modern humans, hence its name “ Cradle of Humankind”

Fire Desire is proud to be part of the crew that make these gatherings/festivals possible. I would like to thank the entire Moksha Crew for it is every ones’ contributions and love that make these gatherings possible. Moksha was very special and Magical, we look forward to the next gathering.

Departing Johannesburg we were all excited to escape the city, even if it was only for one night. The drive from our residence to the Cradle of Mankind is surprisingly quick, only taking us 30minutes to get to the entrance of the farm/plot. From here it would take us another 30-45 minutes of driving up a dodgy dirt road, deep into the hills and country side. We had learnt our lesson the last time we were out in the cradle for a festival and so this time we arranged a 4x4. The drive to the venue is really special if you take the time to appreciate the landscape, truly breath taking.


We arrived before the venue was completely set up and quickly helped with the small things that remained. The decor and sound guys were however on top of things and were just waiting for the generator to be started. We spent some time exploring the main floor and deciding where the best spot to play would be. The main dance floor was large with amazing decor, all the stalls were positioned around the sides and back of the dance floor. This really created a comfortable atmosphere. There was even a large open patch of grass with no decor where we could perform.



Exploring the venue further we discovered a path leading down into a small valley where a river once ran. The path was decorated with many colourful decorations and works of art. Once in the small valley you were greeted by the inviting cool shade cast by the trees. Below the tree canopy was the chill floor which was set up by my new good friend Eugene ‘Trippy’ The entire chill area had a natural cover of shade from the trees, There was beautiful decor all around and Eugene really put in lots of effort and love. There were cushions, small tables, blankets & hammocks for all to enjoy.


We enjoyed a late afternoon walk admiring the nature and all the cradle had to offer. We found ourselves on top of a small hill where we witnessed a truly breathtaking sunset. As we watched the red and orange beams of the sun melt into the horizon we knew tonight would be a truly special night.



The darkness of night revealed to us the majestic Milky Way, The billions of stars our companions for the evening. The time had come to begin our performances. We started the evening with a group LED set before moving onto fire.

Now I need to stop here and quickly say we are sorry if we do not allow people to play with our LED props. It’s not that we don’t want you to play or we are mean people. These props are expensive and especially imported. We use these for performances all the time and can’t afford new sets if they get lost or broken. Cassie you proved to me again at Moksha why we don’t let people outside our group play with our props. I asked you nicely when I handed them to you, not to give them to anyone and look after them. Then next thing I know you no longer have them. Lucikly Vicky returned them to me. We are willing to let people play with some of our fire props as we have spare ones for people to use.

We then decided to start some fire performances. I had broken my toe the week before running outside in the middle of the night to break up a cat fight. This was not going to stop me, I had prepared for too long not to perform at Moksha. After a brave dose of pain killers before the night started my foot felt normal and I managed to jump around like nothing was wrong. I would end up regretting this the next morning but it was worth it. All the guys enjoyed performing for the crowd that had gathered to watch. I cannot speak for the rest of my crew but there is nothing I personally enjoy more than performing. Especially if the crows appreciate it, the smiles and cheers from the crowd drive me and inspire me to keep pushing the boundaries of my performance.

Evan and I went and did a LED performance on the chill floor. It was an interesting performance as I have never spun to music that chilled. It was an interesting experience yet well received by the people. We brought along with us a friend’s fire flow wand. These are so much fun to play with due to the floating illusion it created. People really enjoyed it. I also discovered that night the art of fire eating. It was the first time I had attempted this and it was during a live performance but it went well and its pretty fun, I look forward to experimenting with this art more.

Tertius as usual was amazing with his fire breathing and is planning on attempting to break the world record for the highest fire breath. Sadly the conditions at Moksha were nowhere close to right to attempt this. Something very interesting that everyone in SA should know about Paraffin we purchase from pumps. Many gas stations are selling depleted jet fuel as ‘Paraffin’ and this is absolutely no good for fire breathing. This fuel burns hotter than usual paraffin and has impurities in it. I will get Tertius to write a bite more on this topic but just be aware. It is better to purchase the more expensive paraffin from shops like Spar.




I cannot explain how happy I was to see so many staff performers come forward and spin with us. There are so few staff performers versus poi in our country it saddens me. I made a point to speak to every single staff performer at Moksha, to let them know how happy I was to see this and encourage them to keep playing with a staff. I am a very modest person and to hear from each of you that my performances inspired you, truly touched me. It is one of my goals to inspire and help grow the art and I thank each one of you for your kind words. I now know my efforts in creating the Fire Desire Community and all my hours of practising are paying off, thank you all for you support.

The team ended off the night by watching the sunrise from the same hill top we watched the sunset. Looking back on our night it was agreed Moksha was epic a truly magical and special gathering. We look forward to many more.

Moksha Obtained! Special thanks to everyone who attended!