Romania's Independence Day

  We experienced our first Romanian Independence Day and parade (December 1).  It was so much fun!  We got there about 10am and walked down to "Arcul de Triumph" to find a good spot to watch the parade.  How you might expect a parade to be, with candy and such, is not how this parade was!

Generals prepping before the parade began.

  When we arrived in the vicinity of where we wanted to watch the parade from, we tried every angle within the crowds so we could see the best.  We even tried to cross the street thinking we could get the best view being as the politia were beginning to close off the walkway.

About to be apart of the parade!

    Well, when we crossed, no one was budging an inch so we decided to turn back around where the fun began.  In Romania people do not have much of a boundary line like Americans do...you know, where you have your little bubble of perfect distance between you and the next person, well this country is all up close and personal!!  : )  Anyway, we ended up being pushed back into the crowd we just came from.  We continued to search for the perfect spot...we even tried one at a time, to stand on one foot on those little posts that are on the sidewalk.

Wax on...Wax off!

 We could see everything, but it hurt and there was no way we could balance for even a short while.  Soon after we noticed people were standing on the little fence back from the sidewalk and thought that would be the PERFECT spot!!  We hopped up there, with each other's help, and NO-ONE FELL OFF!!  We stood up there for 2 hours, leaning against and holding on to the nearby trees of course!

Great view, but not a lot of room to move.

   So, after we watched all of the cool tanks, secret service (all women, I might add), different army, navy, swat, bomb squad, missile and rocket vehicles go by.  We went back to the metro from where we had come, knowing that most everyone would be taking public transportation.  EVERYONE...I mean EVERYONE!  Again, the pushing began although we really got through pretty quickly and our ride really wasn't crowded!

we moved like fish in the sea!

  And so this was our first Romanian Independence Day parade.  La Multz Ani Romania!!  : )