Because this was the weekend before St Patrick’s Day (which is on the 17th) there were a lot of activities in Birmingham. There was a big parade for example. After New York and Dublin the biggest St Patrick’s Parade in the world!!
So this was something I really wanted to see. Unfortunately the weather was awful. It was raining the whole afternoon and it was very windy. I felt really sorry for all the people participating in the parade.
There were a lot of floats (praalwagens) which basically were just trucks with people on them. There were some nice ones though. (Like the one on the picture with all the flowers)
But what was so special about the parade was the amount of bagpipes! I really enjoyed the music they were playing. It certainly brought you in the right mood.
After the parade the pubs were crowded with people dressed in green and black. Another excuse for everyone to get very drunk :)
I also went inside the Selfridges building today, which is 4 floors high. Certainly not to buy anything, as they only sell brands like Prada, Versace and Gucci. I was constantly shocked by the prices!
On the ground floor there were even people eating oysters and drinking champagne (2.30 in the afternoon!). Crazy! Especially the sushi bar was crowded. It was in the middle of the store. People were sitting around the open kitchen and all kinds of different sushi dishes were going around on a lopende band (dat engelse woord ken ik niet hoor!). You could just take one of the dishes going round, while drinking a glass of wine. Really strange! Can you imagine doing these things in the Bijenkorf or V&D?
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