Oh yes, it’s that time of year again, when I attempt to summarize the Sunday parade madness. Things kicked off with mass at St Anne’s Church, where Father Murphy asked parishoners to ‘Remember St Patrick gave us the mass…he never gave us Guinness.’
After mass things started gearing up for the Parade, and this for me was one of the best bits, watching the musicians and dancers wander the Digbeth streets with their instruments and outfits.
By far the best outfit for me was Brian Fitzpatrick’s dead ocelot Susan.
Brian, from the Northfield Caledonia Pipes and Drums, assured me that Susan died of old age in a zoo. Brian was interested to hear about the newer residents of Digbeth, as his father-in-law worked here in a factory on Cheapside shortly after he came over from Belfast in the 1960′s.
After chatting to Brian I wandered up to the parade starting point at Camp Hill to look at all the floats and vehicles assembled. The variety of vehicles was great. There were tractors.
There were bubble cars.
There were vintage double-decker buses.
But the most impressive of them all was Brian’s trike ‘Lady Diana’, a labour of love undertaken by Brian when the outer body of his Robin Reliant was written off 23 years ago.
The level of detail on this bike is astounding, it truly is a work of art.
Shortly after having a little chat with Brian the parade itself kicked off.
All walks of life made their way down the main Digbeth High Street (or High Street Deritend, as Carl Chinn prefers to call it).
Although the sun had come out especially for parade day it was very windy. I thought this poor man was going to blow away.
Parade day this year felt like much more of a family affair, although the atmosphere was lively I didn’t feel the lairy edge that’s sometimes been there in past years.
Maybe this was down to an increased police presence.
After the parade I took a little time out to chat to Councillor Martin Mullaney and Carl Chinn. As Gebby said on The Stirrer’s forum, ‘Carl “knows his stuff” there’s no doubt about that’. He is a mine of local information.
After my little history lesson from Carl I retreated to the Adam and Eve pub, where quite a few were enjoying a post-parade pint of Guinness.
I’ll be popping up a parade links post shortly, as there’s lots of YouTube films and photo sets out there already. In the meantime, a very happy St Patrick’s Day to you all for tomorrow!
Lovely post Nicky. Sunday was great as it always is (and makes you think how we lived without it for so long, how there was a period when the city was too tense to have such a joyous display of Irishness – how I hope we never return to those days).
My favourite element is the flags of each county of Ireland and the group of stragglers who walk behind them sporting the colours of the GAA teams. I was there with my Mom on Sunday whose day is only ever complete when she sees the Galway mob shuffling along. This year they were followed directly by Darth Vader. I didn’t even know he was Irish, let alone from Galway.
Cheers Dave. I was well gutted I didn’t get to see Darth O’Vader and his Merry Band of Storm Troopers. I didn’t know he was Irish either. He doesn’t sound it. Perhaps he’s ‘of Irish descent’.
I see you took no notice of your history lesson from Carl Chinn as you still have mixed up your Deritend’s with your Digbeth High Street’s in this blog.
Although there are some that would that say its best to ignore anything Carl or Martin say anyway.
You’re right Banard, I’ve altered the post accordingly. The High Street has become more known as ‘Digbeth High Street’ over the years and that’s what people tend to call it by nowadays. But as Carl says, with that change a little bit if history stored within the older High Street Deritend name gets lost.
Sunday was the first day I’d met Carl Chinn and I was really impressed with his in-depth knowledge of local history – something that should never be ignored in my opinion.