In honor of our arrival, Zurich hosted its annual Street Parade. The best way to describe the parade is to take a combination of San Francisco's Castro district on Halloween for costumes, St. Patrick's day in U.S. Irish neighborhoods for drinking, and New Year's Eve for the partying/dancing. 500,000 to 1 million people flood the city each year to party around Lake Zurich. There is a "parade" of techno floats with dancers. The real parade is the people in attendance. Hundreds of food and drink booths line the street. The festivities start in the early afternoon but get progressively "worse" throughout the evening. We figured it would be a perfect opportunity to show the kids the European laissez-faire approach to clothing (or lack thereof). We didn't take pictures of the more daring costumes as I didn't want to draw more attention to them for the kids. Lets just say that one woman made her outfit from fishnet stockings. Her entire outfit. And for those of you who hate boys in low rider pants? Try men and woman wearing just a thong.
Here are a few pictures of some techno floats:
You can see the mobs of people in these pictures:
And disguised behind our little family photo, you can see the Swiss efficiency at work. Why bother with long lines at the men's bathrooms when you can just have urinal troughs lining the streets? Abbie had to use the bathroom. I opted to pay the 1 Swiss Franc that Starbucks was charging to use theirs.
My favorite part of the day was when John got a long lecture on brining the dog to the parade. Apparently, the music is way too loud for our little puppy. No one seemed to mind that the children were there. Somehow I don't see this event becoming a family outing each year.
5 comments:
Love the parade. What a fun party - -maybe without the kids though. Do they make ear plugs for dogs? I think we saw some sort of techno type parade in Paris. We just stumbled onto it.
I think the urinals are quite efficient. Not necessarily a bad idea especially if they were in a better location. In Paris, they have things to pee in hidden by bushes.
Please try to include some info about your feelings and emotions in your blog posts. Does it feel like a vacation? Has it hit that you are there to stay? How do the kids feel? John ready for work tomorrow? Also, can't wait to see more pics. You might be waiting for your air shipment before shooting more of the temp quarters. Wow. Forgot you will need local movers to move you from there to prem housing.
I love the family picture with the urinal!! Classic! Gosh you guys are right in the heart of the city! Will you be there when you move into your house as well? Hope you are having fun!
I would have loved to see the picture of the fishnet lady!
We are in the city for a month and then move to the "country" (10 minutes outside the city).
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