St. Patrick's Day

Today was an unusual day - even by our standards. We woke, called Hong Kong to wish a brother Happy Birthday, went to a St. Patrick's Day parade in Germany, then had Indian food for dinner.

It was cold and crisp like our memories of a Chicago Parade but they don't dye the river green.

You can see from the pictures that there was plenty of room along the route but the organizers claim that this is the biggest St. Pat's parade in Europe outside of Dublin. 15,000 to 20,000 people come out.

It was not a huge parade. One Irish sheep hound.

A couple of walking pints of Guinness (the sponsor).

Two bagpipe groups. Don't get me wrong - it was nice - just not huge. I think the parade took about 45 minutes to go by us.

It also had some marchers that seemed to be looking for any occasion to march. There was a traditional Bolivian dance troupe and several sports clubs that were marching in the hopes of gathering new members.

The final picture is Odeonplatz were the parade ended and they have a concert. Nice.