The aquarium was a pretty awesome place. It had a very old, I think 10,000 years old, long boat. At the end we got to hold starfish and feed fish bread.
This is my friend Katie in front of the aquarium tank.
Sunday evening we saw the Galway Art Festival Parade. It was very strange. We got there a good hour early to get a nice spot on the sidewalk. Keep in mind most Galway sidewalks are only big enough for one person to walk on (if you want to pass you have to step into the street) the "large" Galway sideways are big enough for two people side by side.
There were signs that you weren't allowed to park on the parade route- people did. They were NEVER towed. The parade started at 10:00 at the Spanish Arch- the cops were still letting cars and public buses drive on the parade route at 10:30.
When the parade started coming down the street people were standing in the street in front of the park cars to see- almost entirely blocking the path of the parade. People were walking backwards in front of the parade taking pictures. We are talking no crowd control here.
Then this very drunk guy stumbled into the front of the parade. The lead in the parade was a transvestite. She grabbed on to this drunk fellow and sorta danced then straddled then proceeded to pretend to whip him. The crowd got a good laugh and then the police picked the drunk guy up, and told him "there's a good wall over there for you to lean on" (this so wouldn't happen in the US). Then as the floats start to come, the drunk guys decides to sit in one. This stops the parade. The cop comes up to him again, puts his arm around his shoulder and goes to find him "a nice place to sit down right here, hang on to the sidewalk, there you go" and leaves him again. I was informed by my host family that "Irish police have better things to do than arrest drunk people." Not really sure what, because there is really very little crime in Galway. My host family also said there is a law against drinking in public but its clearly not enforced.
The parade was at night. The floats were lit up. It was a very odd parade to watch. There wasn't much to it and no candy for the children either. There were three people spinning around "dogs" - they were cans with teeth cut out the front and fire burning on the inside. The parade people would go into the crowd and nab a child then swing the child back and forth like they were going to throw the kid into the flames. The kids were laughing. If they had been American children, they would have been crying and the media would have been outraged. Instead of giving candy to children, we throw kids to flames in Ireland!
Then the crowd started to follow the parade (very strange) so I did too (why not?). We went to the church and in the parking lot the other half of the parade (they came from two different directions) met up and they had some kind of crazy music sort of dance. There was a fire display best described as giant sparklers.
Video clips from the parade:
I will add that it was really cool seeing a parade at night and now I wish they would have night parades in the states.
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