Dancing to the beat of the Paris drum.

Dancing in the streets with thousands of other people following a massive truck decked out with a huge disco ball, lots of girls wearing short skirts and small tops waving pom poms probably isn't your average Saturday morning activity in Paris, but that's how I spent mine.

While the day was set aside for a trip to Versailles, apparently people had 'too much work on' and wanted to 'study' (I use quotation marks to insinuate these are phrases I'm not familiar with). So we decided we'd spend the day raging to some techtonic beats, taking drugs and hanging out with the infamous hoards of gay men. (Just kidding about the gay men.)

Anyway, we were up early after thinking we were going to Versailles (and therefore extremely over tired from only 4 hours of sleep) so decided going to a techno parade was the only way to keep awake. (Other friends were going to les jardins de Monet. Seriously. I think I would have fallen asleep in a bush. Either that or sleep-dribbled on his paintings.)

I caught the metro to the beautiful Bastille with my tour guide/historian/crepe obsessed friend and saw it for the first time since I've been here! Did you know that it commemorates the French Revolution and stands in the place of the prison that was bashed down centuries ago? Many people died there and it remains a statement to the Revolution. There are names on the statue as well as the dates of importance (hence the Bastille day celebration on July 29th every year when everyone gets really drunk and messy in order to show their pride for red, white and blue). It was under the time of Marie Antoinette's rule and her famous phrase "Let them eat cake!"

So we did just that. We visited a boulangerie, picked up a crudite poulet (probably my best one since I've been here, with an amazing curried chicken) and a suisse chocolat (which I actually felt travel to my thighs instantly). We ate them at Place des Vosges and did our best to imagine Victor Hugo walking through the garden, smoking a giant cigar and playing with rocks (or whatever you did to entertain yourself in his time). Afterwards, we made our way to Place de la Republique, the start location of the parade. We didn't really know where it was, only the general direction but that was definitely all we needed. Within km's of this place we could hear the music droning out.

There were huge trucks everywhere but one truck had a huge mass of people jumping up and down and being generally crazy in front of it (I'm guessing either on drugs, or gay. There were a lot of rainbow umbrellas). We joined the masses and slowly the truck began to move. As we paraded along the streets we got closer to the truck and could see scantily clad girls, lots of important looking businessmen dancing like they were in the 70's and a massive disco ball taking up the majority of space. People were going crazy, climbing on bus stops shelters and shop roofs, climbing trees and acting like ruthless NZ'ers. We felt at home (minus the dozens of drunken messes). People were craning their heads out their appartment windows (presumably disgruntled that their morning baguette and cafe had been disrupted).

Bob Sinclair (of Love Generation, and another song I don't the name of, fame) came on to an outcry of delirious applause and said "ca va Paris?" to which my eardrums almost burst. (It was at this point that I realized he was in fact french and not American as I had assumed as he was mildly well known). Bob was actually the person who started the techno parade event and has since featured in it every year (consequently developing a breeding ground 1. for gay men to meet each other through the sign of a rainbow umbrella and 2. young teenagers to have an excuse to dress up as wildly as humanly possible, I'm talking zebra masks and tribal paint). It was an amazing atmosphere as everyone was pretty crazy for a Saturday morning, definitely something I'm glad I didn't miss out on and much better than a visit to Monet's hood.

We arrived home to a protest at the Cite but couldn't understand the signs to figure out what they were protesting. They had stopped all the traffic trying to get through and this resulted in some dangerous driving and serious horn honking.

I am now off to bed because I am so tired I think I might have actually written this with my eyes closed. Hopefully I stayed between the lines.

Bonne nuit!