Happy St Patrick’s Day everyone! The festivities have been taking place in Vancouver since Friday with a section of Granville St closed off to be filled instead with stalls selling merchandise, krisy cremes and a stage for Irish dancers as well as some fiddle playing! Canadians love the Irish here and everyone’s been in really good spirits! Tommy lee has been showcasing various acts throughout he weekend. I saw Kalissa Rander, a fiddle player since the age 2 perform a few songs which was very lovely. She was fantastic at playing the violin and had a beautiful personality but she did keep making a few mistakes and then stopping and saying sorry which I kept thinking can you do this when playing professional?! Then again it was a pretty informal event so I’m not going to judge since I would probably break some windows if I picked up a violin! When played well though it is such a wonderful instrument and just seeing her play made me think, ‘Right Fiona pick up that guitar again or even go back to playing the flute!’I could be the next Michael flatly! There have been a few times while here I’ve wished I had my guitar with me to practice but I know what I’m like and it would probably sit in the corner of the room.  It looks like quite a common thing to come to a new town and want to learn an instrument. I’ve seen at least half a dozen people on international travellers in Vancouver try and sell their instruments off. So anyway that was all pretty lovely. I was slightly suffering from partying the night before in would you believe the Irish bar Dollins. It was my first proper night since getting here that I went out and had a fun night dancing until late in the morning. It does catch up with me though and I have to remember I’m not 21 anymore!

 

Despite this, Saturday was a beautiful day so I wanted to explore the stalls and be out and about. Unfortunately this weather didn’t keep up for the parade itself and it was blooming’ freezing! I was working for a company called Car to Go. The whole concept is pretty cool actually, Think Boris bikes for cars!

I was told by the agency to just arrive at 10am and I would be walking down the parade handing out flyers. Well it got even better than that I got to do 3 exciting things:
1) Wear a big shiny plastic St Patrick’s day vest (always fun)

2) Hand out some free sunglasses to people along the parade. You’ll be surprised with the amount of adults I found reaching out to grab these more than the kids! I suppose it’s free – I’d probably do the same!

3) Told some sweet little lady to kiss my ass in Irish. She wanted to know how to say hello how are you and unfortunately I couldn’t remember how to say his in Gaelic so said the only thing I knew how to say which was kiss my ass. póg mo thóin. I thought she might laugh but she looked horrified. Thanks for the education mum!

So altogether a lovely St Patrick’s day parade was had. Sunday weather wasn’t quite as glorious as Saturday’s, rather it rained from the heavens all day. Typical Irish weather. The country must have cast its spell on is. I didn’t mind it so much as I ended up spending the afternoon with a lovely girl I met from the UK just shopping, sampling free sticky toffee pudding and the spent the rest of the day having a chilled one. Just as well as I had a super long shift lined up for work the next day so an early night and a cup of tea was just what the doctor ordered.