Bastille day

This year, the theme for the military 14 of July parade was "honoring France's overseas territories". And yes, the polynesian guys did the haka. Woohoo!

Sadly, they only did it once up by the big shots, and we were way at the end of the parade so we missed it. Lucky me, it was online, so you get to enjoy it too!

My sister Sylvia came to stay with us in Paris, so there were three of us to fight our way through the crowds.

We survived, and we even saw the back of Sarko's head.

No, that's not him, although wouldn't it be awesome if presidents still wore cool hats?

 

There he is. I think. And here are some more cool divisions of various parts of the french army, and overseas divisions. There were so many of them, don't ask me who's who.

Check out those 'staches! Pretty sure these were North African

Yeah swords and feathers!

Some people were smart and sold these sweet contraptions: they're called periscopes, and the English translation on the side was hilarious: "what a pity, your neighbor can't see a thing! Maybe he should do as you, and get a periscope. But, the real." Cool eh? Just a simple cardboard box with mirrors. I had totally forgotten these existed.

So watching guys in fancy costumes march by got pretty old, but then the planes started flying over and that was awesome. Plus, everybody can see those just fine :)

The little girls next to us were so excited to see the horses. Again, some pretty sweet helmets too.

We got tired of the marching and the haka guys never came, so we ended up leaving before it was over, but I'd say we got the full experience. And as a favorite French pastime, we had lunch at McDonald's. Hey, don't judge, we had coupons. You don't pass up 2 euro 50 for a happy meal (organic yogurt included).

That evening we braved the crowds again to go see the fireworks. Let me tell you, you might think Stadium of Fire is nuts... that is nothing. PEOPLE EVERYWHERE! Plus, everybody smokes, so I was giving a lot of dirty looks... hey, I'm slowly turning into a Parisian. That is not a good thing people... But we did get a good spot and were able to lay out our little blanket and enjoy the rest of a massive multi-artist concert against racism while we waited, so it was awesome.

please note: Andrew and I wore bleu-blanc-rouge 

Best Bastille Day ever.