Techno Parade Paris 2011

On Saturday, September 17 as we returned to Paris from our quick trip to London, we noticed the police putting up barricades at the intersection of Boulevard Henri IV and the Place de la Bastille. About an hour later, when we went out to shop for food, there was a huge crowd and a Parade around the Bastille monument.

Not even the threat of rain could stop the party. Literally thousands of young people crowded the eight wide avenues that converge on the Place de la Bastille.

Several hundred young people crawled over the fence surrounding the obelisk of the Bastille monument to climb up on the monument itself for a better view of the parade.

Several large parade floats glided by on their way from the Place de la Republique, past the Place de la Bastille on their way to the Place Italie where a big after-parade dance party was planned. I don't know who sponsored this float. I am not a student of techno music, although I have to admit it has a catchy beat.

Another float full of gyrating kids.

Dark Dog is a European energy drink, and one of the sponsors of the Techno Parade.

The Techno Parade started in 1998 and has been held yearly in Paris since then. This year, the mission for the parade was three-fold:

1. To promote the origins and general acceptance of electronic culture.

2. To emphasize dancing as a leading element of the techno culture.

3. To pay tribute to the wind of freedom that has blown throughout the world these past few months.

What better way to accomplish all three than to ignore the fence around a public monument and crawl up on it in full view of assembled police brigades and dance and wave your arms in celebration of music that has a great dance beat? Great Paris event and demonstration of youthful vitality that we were happily caught up in. But in case you're wondering, we didn't join them on the monument. And we didn't go to the dance party either.