Check out the RAINBOW!!!
What a beautiful Pride Parade we had this year. We haven’t done one for a while, so it was a real pleasure to be asked to take part once again.
A long lead-in time waiting in the backstreets to begin meant that we all had plenty of time to decorate each other’s faces with rainbow coloured crayons and multicoloured stickers. I was also thrilled to see how many of us had really embraced the colours and added many and varied rainbow elements to our standard performance outfits.
There were rainbow flags, rainbow wigs, rainbow jewellery, rainbow drum decorations, rainbow leis, extra bits of rainbow-patterned clothing, rainbow crowns and other headpieces… we were a veritable riot of colour, as were all the other groups taking part.
Our dancers were going all-out with a slightly edgy version of my favourite outfit theme “Sparkle Ponies”, and looked quite spectacular. It was such a beautiful happy smiley positive atmosphere.
The joy continued on the parade route itself. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a Pride Parade with such a huge crowd lining the streets, and with so many people also dressed up in Pride gear, with face paint and rainbow flags to wave as we went by. Wellington City Council did a great job of decorating the street with rainbow flags too – and I felt very proud to be part of this wonderfully accepting and gay-friendly city.
There were a good number of drummers and dancers performing this year, which always makes for an extra-special sound and spectacle – more is more in our world, for sure.
As we approached the Courtenay Place/Taranaki Street crossroads, our director Tim separated the band into two halves, one on either side of the street, with a lovely big dancing space down the middle. We invited all the paraders who were behind us to shimmy their way through the dancing space between us, so that they ended up in front of us in the parade. They did so with great gusto, including the firefighting crew complete with rainbow-decorated fire engine. Brilliant!
This meant we were now at the back of the parade for the final bit, from Taranaki Street to the Rainbow Crossing at Cuba Street. The entire audience (it seemed) had gathered together to follow along behind us, which was just fabulous, and the atmosphere of drumming and mad dancing in the street was just electric.
It had been a bit of an uh-oh-looks-like-rain afternoon, but it managed to hold off until just before we reached the Rainbow Crossing. We were having such a blimmin’ brilliant time that we didn’t want to stop when we got there, so we just carried on drumming, with the crowd dancing madly all around us, led by our beautiful dancers. Tim was at the front, facing us, and all of a sudden he looked up and pointed wildly at the sky behind us. We turned as one to see what he was pointing at…
…and of course, it was a rainbow.
“Ooooooh LOOK AT THE RAINBOW” we all yelled at each other, jumping around with joy. And then we carried on drumming and dancing until they had to tell us it was time to stop.
What a brilliant gig.
Photo gallery
Photos by Alison Green, Amanda Hill, Amelia Francis, Cameron Bayly, Epu Tararo, Hillary Reid, Kamille Joyce, Kelly Etuata, Michelle Sergeant, Mini Rose and Satya Priyomarsono. Click on any thumbnail to see the larger version:
