Forums > Social Chat > When did you start playing with fire?

Posted: 1st May 2007
Bloody ages ago (August 1999).

You aren't thinking or really existing unless you're willing to risk even your own sanity in the judgment of your existence.

Green peppers, lime pickle and whole-grain mustard = best sandwich filling.

Posted: 1st May 2007
Late 2004 (I was 15)

I was surfing the web for pictures of kids raving, and I stumbled upon somebody spinning fire poi. I flipped and rested not until this new skill was mine.

-James

"How do you know if you're happy or sad without a mask? Or angry? Or ready for dessert?"

Posted: 1st May 2007
It all started when i was about 12.

I was in scouts and me and a few other people were on a camping trip. It was the once yearly high adventure trip. We traveled up to Wisconsin for about 4 or five days, spending half the time rock climbing, and the other half canoing down the Wisconsin River.

Since our canoing time took 2 days to reach our destination, we camped out on a nice Island we found. After dinner it was said that one of our guides had a special trick he wanted to show us. Me and the other scouts kept guessing at what it might be but we didn't come close.

When it was barely light out he came back from his preparation site, and lit up. It was the coolest thing I had ever seen. If i can recall, the flames lasted for quite a long time. At the end he told us that he was doing something called poi, and that if we wanted to start all we needed to do was to put a string through a tennis ball. I went home and thats exactly what I did. I stuck with it and I'm still going with it for almost 3 years now. I haven't done fire yet, and that makes me so mad, but whatever.

I never got a chance to thank him, and i wish I did, he changed my life for the better. If you're there, thanks Todd.

Life is a box full of chocolates. Its full of the gross coconut ones.

Posted: 1st May 2007
pretty early late kid: 1996 when I was 27... call me "dinosaur"

but there must be a poll about that one, somewhere...

the best smiles are the ones you lead to

Posted: 2nd May 2007
I was 18 or 19 and at a rave in brixton and one of my mates demanded my shoe laces so i asked why and he just demanded my laces again. I gave him my laces and then he pulled out two glowsticks, can anybody say glow poi, 5 seconds later i was hooked and demanding my laces back but with the glosticks still attached.

May my balls of fire set your balls on fire

Posted: 2nd May 2007
One of my friends was twirling.. So I had a go and got hooked. That was around 4 years ago..
Been playing with fire since I was coordinated enough to light a match.. So it seemed only logical to combine fire and my new found twirling funness..
I taught myself and made my own gear.. Until I found somewhere to buy it

Proudly owned by the very cute Pineapple Pete. Owner of Noddy. Joint owner of Mr Majestik.

Posted: 2nd May 2007
I got hoked through Scouts too - the fascination with spinning things and fire has always been there but never linked.
I seen someone at camp running a circus skills base and they had poi - I liked the look of it, so went and bought a sey - bad set for beginners - cobra poi with long tails! But needless to say I started practicing and soon got some basics, then I found homeofpoi and bought the POI and Staff DVD's and then for christmas I got 2 new sets - an LED set and a pixie poi training set.
Since I got the training set I have learned so muhc faster and with far less bruising!
That was all about a year and a half ago.
A year past christmas I also got my fire staff which I love now

Posted: 2nd May 2007
I got hooked through Scouts too - the fascination with spinning things and fire has always been there but never linked.



I seen someone at camp running a circus skills base and they had poi - I liked the look of it, so I went out and bought a set. It was a bad set for a beginner, they were cobra poi with long tails! But needless to say I started practicing and soon got some basics.



Then I found homeofpoi and bought the Poi and Staff DVD's and then for christmas I got 2 new sets - an LED set and a pixie poi training set.

Since I got the training set I have learned so much faster and with far less bruising!

That was all about a year and a half ago.

A year past christmas I also got my fire staff which I love now

Posted: 2nd May 2007
twas may 2005 i believe! my mate got me into diabolo and until that i had no real idea about anything when it came to spinning - had no real knowledge that there was so much! and anyway we were just on the internet searching for something spinning related and found this website for 'Fields of Fire'. We didn't have a clue what it was but were well chuffed when we found out it was a local fire meet right under our noses! went down, met lots of very nice people, got into spinning poi, then a little later i started spinning staff! have since unfortunately negelected my diabolo but am thinking about gettin back into it!

Thoughts arrive like butterflies...

Posted: 2nd May 2007
Last years download festival my mate spun poi and we walked past some random doing amasing things with strange streamers (a three beat weave lol) and i was like wow!!! from that day forth i was a spinner

Posted: 2nd May 2007
I started when I was 18. A funny story in my life. I had to return from my transient life of outdoor adventure back to my Nova Scotia home due to a spine injury. I was seriously bummed, unable to work, play or study.

I wound up at a bootlegger party. (Common in the Acadian regions of Nova Scotia) and there was this lady who asked me if I would like to spine fire. My first spin... I was drunk and twirling these fat flaming cath wicks. There I stood in my drunken stupor in a pathetic forward wheel plane. The I tried reverse... and I don't think much else. I'd never recommend that a person be introdiced to poi in this manner, but I am very glad that I was. I was in love pretty well instantly.

I wound up having spine surgery a week or two after that but kept in touch with the lady who showed me poi. I got myself some practice wicks and all throughout my recovery from the injury and the operation, I did poi. It was truly a lifesaver for me. All my life I had never been injured so seriously and doing things with my body was of extreme importance to me. There I was 18 years old, unable to paddle, hike, climb, go to school or even walk properly and I felt like poi was the ultimate therapy for me. Through the gentle art of poi, I was able to use my body to learn, to be active, for excitement, for expression, to pass the time, to distract me from some pain, to keep my mind off of fear and to have fun. Of course I couldn't do much except stand there and spine them. There wasn't much dancing and stuff, but it certainly didn't take very long for me to get the variations of weaves and butterflies and turns that don't require much footwork, bending or twisting. The recovery and operation, by the way, were a success. For a while.

Ever since then I have always enjoyed doing poi, losing myself in the whispery roar of fire and teaching it all to others.

Now I am 22 and guess where I am. I am back at home in Nova Scotia. Had to leave the transient life again for a while. I can't paddle, climb or hike or anything. I was unable to finish my last year of college in an outdoor adventure program. My spine is reinjured and I am patiently waiting for a surgucal consult with the chief of neruosurgery at the Ottawa Hospital on the 23rd of this month. I've been doing a lot of poi lately. This time isn't quite like last time since my learning curve isn't as steep and I am unable to do moves that I previously could do, but I'm still learning some new stuff slowly. And I think I'm a little less scared of my situation since I've done it before.

I just wish there was a way that I could really put into words to make it understood how valuable poi has been to me.

I've been doing a lot of poi

Posted: 3rd May 2007
ooh very inspiring
(btw maybe you could focus on wraps and pendulum and isolation stuff)
no fire, but i started when i decided i needed a hobby, and active one...it was a new years resolution...it helps when i am angry and need to burn off that energy

Faith
Nay, whatever comes one hour was sunlit and the most high gods may not make boast of any better thing than to have watched that hour as it passed

Posted: 4th May 2007
I saw someone doing poi outside oddballs in camden, so i watched for ages then went inside and bought some. I cant remember exactly when it was, but it was the semester i lived in hackney so sometime between february and june 2003, so i would have been 21 (i feel old!)

I dont suppose i learnt much but i enjoyed it, and i liked sharing my new toys with my friends (especially the guys - so funny when they hit themselves in the balls) Then, about 18 months or maybe 2 years later i looked up about spitz (i dont know how i'd heard of it - maybe oddballs told me) and i went along and straight away people were helping me and showing me new tricks. Some guy there told me i had the wrong sort of poi for beginners (lovely pink and yellow tails) and gave me some juggling balls to put in socks. I dont remember who that was, but thank you very much

Then i got persuaded to go to Play and i was watching people doing staff, which i had always been fascinated by and decided to try the beginners workshops and i was hooked - i bought one that day! (i remember having to trudge into town to get money out because i didnt have enough for a staff a t shirt and food and i didnt want to starve cos then i wouldnt have the energy to spin!)

And then, less than a year later i left my staff on the train on the way to the next Play - not even the train there, the train from home to london to get the train there! So i decided it was an opportunity to buy a FIRE staff - and fire poi - because although i hadnt done fire and was a bit concerned about doing it (i might be a pyromaniac but im not about to get myself hurt playing with fire that i dont know how to control!) but i figured i would be ready one day. As it was there was that world record fire spinning attempt and i wanted to get involved and everyone was so helpful and encouraging that i tried fire for the first time on the saturday, i was standing there, quite wasted, with my poi held out at arms length and slowly spinning them in simple circles - then i just shut my eyes and flung them around me into a 3 beat weave until i was brave enough to open my eyes! After they were out some people said well done and such and i was really hyper so i started playing with my staff (much scarier because i was less confident in my abilities), then poi again, then staff and so on for ages! Then the next night, with everyone standing around in position lit up and waiting to start the fire record thingy i thought 'oh yeah, i could happily spend the rest of forever doing this' and that is still a good memory to get me happy again when everything else sucks.

i love spinning, and fire - it legitimises the pyromania, even if i dont do it often enough - and the other day i was doing fire spinning at an event at my student bar, and even though the fire breathers were getting more clapping and cheering (note to self - must learn fire breathing!) there was still my first audience of non spinners watching me twirl fire round my head! im looking forward to one day doing a proper performance!

You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars

"To alcohol, the cause of - and solution to - all of lifes problems!"

Posted: 4th May 2007
good stories

i dont know if i should really post but here it goes:

it was 4/20/07 and i was bummed out cuz i couldnt find anything going on. so i started drinking (didnt have herb) then i get a call saying that i could get some weed. so i go over there and smoke a bowl and end up embarassing the [censored] outta myself. so im sitting outside and i see this guy pouring gas on the ground, i thought to myself, "He's not pouring gas on the ground, it cant be gas im high" then a bit later he asks if i had a light. after that torch lit up and the line on the ground came to life i was hooked. i started about 2 weeks after that. spinning a broom stick

O.B.E.S.E.

Owned by Mynci!

Posted: 7th May 2007
Remember these forums are PG We wouldn't want young children hearing about drugs. Plus spinning under the influnce is not a good idea, TRUST ME. lol

jus helpin the mods out

Awesome stories guys, very inspirational!

"It is far better to know you think than it is to think you know." -FAT-

Posted: 7th May 2007
my bad, what i meant to say was Eating Lettuce.....

O.B.E.S.E.

Owned by Mynci!

Posted: 7th May 2007
don't worry

there's been a few threads about such subjects here and there
EDITED_BY: faithinfire (1178560558)

Faith
Nay, whatever comes one hour was sunlit and the most high gods may not make boast of any better thing than to have watched that hour as it passed