Las Vegas Review-Journal (Sunday)
Proud EDC attendees not just flying their freak flags
At Electric Daisy Carnival, there’s the typical rave attire — plastic kandi beads, rhinestone-encrusted bras, neon spandex and totems, the decorated poles often seen pumping up and down in the crowd.
However, as throngs flow through the Cosmic Meadow down Electric Avenue, another accessory appears again and again: flags. Italian, French, Indian, Australian and of course, American.
They’re tied around attendee’s necks like capes and billowing from poles above the masses. Two Canadian men wear their country’s flag, along with a bear hat and colorful kandi beads. A group of women carries both a Mexican and a French flag among them.
“Every year that I come, I see everyone wearing their flags,” said Carlos de Leon, 43, came to the first EDC in 1997 and has been to the event more than a dozen times in cities around the world. After seeing pictures on social media from previous events of people with their flags, he wanted to make certain Guatemala’s flag, less commonly seen at the festival, would be represented this time.
De Leon tied the pale blue and white flag around his neck to represent the country from which he immigrated in 1978 when he moved to the United States.
Chaitu Ambati, 27, flew from Sydney to attend his first EDC and said he had one reason for wearing the Australian flag: “To represent.”
It also helps him meet other Aussies, of which there are many, often walking through the venue in groups with the flags on their backs, he said.
Kiran Gajendran, 26, has similarly simple reasoning for carrying a huge Indian flag above him.
“I’m proud to be Indian, that’s it,” he says.
Gajendran, who was born in India but lives in Los Angeles, is attending EDC for the first time as well.
“Everyone blends in” at EDC, Gajendran said. “All cultures blend in too. You can come from any part of the world.”