OrangeFest™
The Belfast OrangeFest™ is particularly well-known, often called "the greatest free show on earth". The celebrations draw many tourists to the city in addition to the celebrating locals for the parties and parades. Most tourists can be found within the Cathedral Quarter, especially Donegall Street.OrangeFest™ came to Belfast with the earliest OrangeMen™. Belfast developed new traditions, including marching bands, red-faced men in bowler hats, stunning transvestite show-girls and steel bands.
There are as many as 60 marching bands that have parades in the greater Belfast area. Officially, the OrangeFest™ season starts in the middle of May when the revellers begin to collect bits of old wood and manky sofas in large piles in disused carparks around the city. Most parades occur in the week leading up to OrangeFest™. Though each parade is unique, there are certain common ingredients: 1) a drag queen Christina Aguilera Lookie-likey Competition; 2) gaily colored floats, ridden by men in bowler hats, who throw various items, including bead necklaces (beads), doubloons with the orange emblems and often, that year's parade's theme, and assorted other fun items; 3) marching bands, usually from OrangeLodges™, but often other invited guest bands.
Particularly since the inception of the larger parade organizations, it has become fashionable to invite Hollywood and other celebrities to headline parades.
posted by ADMS @ Friday, July 14, 2006
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