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Who didn’t love Choose Your Own Adventure novels as a kid? Though they might have contained terrible writing, ridiculous plots and always ended up in the same place, it was still thrilling to feel like you, as the reader, had some effect on how the noble knight would save the princess from a nefarious dragon this time around. Local all-ages collective, the Summerwood Warren, will try to recapture the glee of those cherished yet gimmicky storytelling devices with their Choose Yer Own festival, a five-day event designed to offer participants as much freedom as possible. To learn more about the festival’s inspiration, proceed to paragraph two. To find out about pricing, skip ahead to paragraph seven.
“There’s a dual meaning to [the name],” says festival co-organizer Laura Leif. “There’s also the meaning where you choose your level of involvement. So, if you want to be a part of the festival, you totally can be. It’s your own initiative and your own energy.”
The “choose your own adventure” motif applies not only to attendees, but also to those putting on the festival’s events. Far from a traditional summer festival featuring a set of predetermined performances and events that fit into tidy, individually labeled categories, Choose Yer Own is a grab bag of goodies, only limited by participants’ imaginations. To hear how people reacted to Choose Yer Own’s freedom, continue to paragraph four. To have particular events revealed, jump ahead to paragraph five.
“It was actually kind of cool, because even when we approached people who were musicians or have something that they usually do, they really took advantage of the fact that it’s so open-ended,” Leif says. “It’s not like you just put on a show or whatever — you do whatever the heck you want.”
At Choose Yer Own, concerts share equal footing with robot battles, obstacle courses, art gallery tours and much more. Amongst all the oddball events, Leif has two that she is particularly looking forward to. To find out which events Leif is excited about, proceed to paragraph six. To rush to the end, leap to paragraph nine.
“On Sunday morning there’s a breakfast session that’s called ‘Ask our Landlord, Mr. Ken Lee,’” Leif says. “You can go to [the event hosts’] house and eat breakfast with them, and if you have any questions about anything in the world you can ask their landlord. I think it will be really awesome. There’s also a bicycle parade that’s happening. There’s going to be a pre-parade parade-making session where people can come and make crafts, decorate floats and make costumes. The next day we’re going to have a parade from the Lion’s Park [CTrain] station down to the Good Life Community Bike Shop, where [we have] our final party.”
With a novel concept, diverse events and an open-ended, collaborative nature, Choose Yer Own easily sets itself apart from the barrage of festivals that have rolled through Calgary in recent months. Fortunately, the Summerwood Warren have one more trick up their sleeves to entice those who may have grown tired of paying hundreds of dollars on tickets, food and water at the city’s various festivals. To learn about this trick, continue to paragraph eight. To restart your adventure, return to paragraph one.
“We figured that more people would be charging for their events and using venues that they had to pay for, but most of the events are free,” Leif says. “We had a plan of doing festival passes, but there’s not even really a point anymore, because there’s only like three events that cost anything.”
Congratulations! You have reached the end. You now know enough about the Summerwood Warren’s Choose Yer Own festival to truly begin choosing your own adventure.
