"Who are you!" the girl exclaims as I for the tenth time pull that one of 'Mirash Luciano… chronicler from Italy!' while hiding my camera under the cloak. "You are so mystical, just sneaking around here all the time," she adds.
    I was at my first LARP (Live Action Role Playing), held by scouts for scouts. I'm not a scout. I stumbled on it trough a friend from back at the military service. My role was not significant for the progress of the LARP itself, I documented it. There was just one little catch: I couldn't show the camera to any of the players. Which made me to this mystical person, sneaking around the area, fervently claiming he was Mirash Luciano, chronicler from Italy but who just as the Knights Who Say Kni, didn't seem to have any reason at all of his existence.
    The LARP could be divided into two groups of people: the functionary staff and the players. Just as the players the functionary staff had their roles to play, but while the players only part was to play their role as they imagined their characters would the functionary staff was the ones creating and seeing behind the illusion. They also were the ones responsible for "steering" the story in the right direction (in contrary to other LARPs where the functionary staff usually has none or very little control over what course the story may take or how it will come to end).
    The reason for me not being able to show any of the players my camera was simply not to spoil the illusion. The illusion was a world based on the medieval stories about the Holy Grail. To bring in an item, such as a camera into that world, which was set in a time long before the invention of any such thing, would spoil the players' feeling of illusion. Therefor all such things were banned to show, wear or use visible for players as well as functionary staff during the LARP. Luckily I could photograph all of the functionaries, while no players where to be seen.
    This special LARP had a story inspired by Monthy Phytons version of the Holy Grail, why I came across the Knights Who Say Kni, a Three Headed Knight as well as King Arthur and Merlin among others.

mirash