Gay Pride parade

I managed to catch the Brussels Gay Pride parade after I got back from dropping Ben off In Brugge (it's in Belgium).

There was a huge gathering down by central station and I met up with Myriam, who was photographing bits of the fanfare as it passed, and Christoff, a fellow couch surfer. It was quite amusing to me; I never made it to the DC parade while I was in Virginia and it was just too depressing to even consider going to the Richmond parade (I had this horrible fear that it would be this tragic gathering of 20-some-odd folks and a flag down by the 17th street market and could never bring myself to attend for fear I might be right).

The festivities had a good chunk of downtown tied up in knots. People in the parade looked like they were still having fun though I think they'd been parading for better than an hour by the time they got to the place in the route where I was sitting. There were a few floats that were on the tragic side, namely the AIDS awareness float which consisted of a large container truck with roof and no sides with 6 banners hung from the top edges. The truck was empty except for 3 guys on folding metal chairs who were there, i guess, just to keep an eye on things. A bit stark in the midst of float after float that looked like a cross-section of a dance club. The other that kinda made me chuckle morosely was one truck with two old queens smiling and waving their hearts out under a deck umbrella. It's hard to describe and I don't have a photo, but suffice it to say it was all I could to to keep from chasing them down and hugging each of them. Keep the faith, fellas! On the other hand we did see a spot-on Mary Poppins and Burt 'steppin' in time' only a few dozen meters in line behind "float" (read- large green hum-vee) sponsored by the apparently military and muscles themed private men's club....hmmm

For the most part though, good fun and some of the most amusing crowd watching I've ever done.

It takes all kinds.