Be-decked in tinseled shirts and colourful trews, paul and i set off to join the
Reading samba band New Year parade . We all gathered at the civic centre, for a
briefing and to collect party passes, paul and I were assigned to keeping the
BIKE ( a pedel drawn float covered in clocks) company. Splitting in three bands,
the drummers headed into town, gathering followers as they toured the streets,
we went along with one and danced when they stopped , and bopped along at the
back whislt they were on the move. Eventully All the bands converged at the end
of Friar st, the street was lined with spectators, marshalls trying to keep a
wide enough path clear for the band, which moved off slowly with The BIKE and us
( as out riders) at the head of the parade. We managed to take 25 minutes to
cover 400 maters. Thats a lot of sideways ideling, a lot of ideling in circles,
a bit of helping the BIKE to pull the float up onto speed tables and some trying
to avoid drunken revelers.
On arrival at the Town Hall, the bike and us were seperated from the drummers,
there just wasn’t room to take the float through the crowds. The rain which had
been light and barely noticable started to get heaveyer.Paul and I took shelter
in the Town Hall doorway and enjoyed listening to the drummers and watching the
crowd get more and more excited. Just before midnight we sliped out of sheltered
spot and found a quiet patch of road at the back of the crowd. The rain was
coming down in stairrods.
As the Band counted down to a drum roll, and fireworkes were let off by the
river, Paul and I saw in the New Year spinning each other around on our unis.
Danceing in the rain.
Fireworks over, the Parade turned around and we slowly made our way back through
town on a different route , The crowd was even denser now, people hugging, high
fiving and kissing compleate strangers. With shouts of Happy New Year and the
throbbing drum rythums pounding we gradually drew towards the Civic Centre
again. Now the stiltwalkers came to the front of the parade, accompanied by a
little drummer boy ( about 6 years old and a fine drummer for his age) with a
snare drum. They lead us to Dussledorf sqaure where the band gave one last
display of noise before getiing down to the serious business of partying.
I had a great time, I found it was much more fun to be involved than to be a
spectator, and as part of the parade we got to go to the Party , a good DJ, as
much as we could drink and lots of tired but happy people.
We unied into 2000 How about you?
sarah
