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Madrid World Pride Day 2017


This is a true story.

Shortly after I landed in Madrid, it turned out that the only person I knew from home was my gay colleague. Now we got along very well, and he asked me if I knew that Madrid was celebrating "Orgullo 2017" which is their annual LGBTI pride parade also known as "World Pride Day".

Of course I had no idea so he invited me to join him as he knew I would be slightly uncomfortable!


At around 6pm, I made my way to Atocha station which was to be the starting point of the parade. However, there was a sea of people, and I simply couldn't cross the road to the station. Luckily, my friend met me in the middle, and we used references such as "I'm near 2 shirtless men, one of which is pretending to be Thor" which worked like a charm.

2 shirtless men, carry on
Now the parade was supposed to start at 5pm, and we got there around 6.15pm but the event only took off around 8pm. Nobody was surprised about this however, and people simply shrugged their shoulders and said, "we're in Spain".

As it was summer, the sun was still crazy bright at 8pm, and it would only get dark from 10pm onwards so everybody was just have a good time in the sun.

This person fascinated me because I simply could not decide if he was male or female. He looked very feminine but sported a moustache and beard.

 When the parade finally did start, several 'community groups came out in full regalia to the cheers of the crowd.

Spanish Leather & Fetish Community

I'm not quite sure how to explain this one

Madrid Nudist Society


And then the floats started coming. Actually they were converted buses not floats.




At about 10pm, it started getting dark and we were tired so we left the parade to find a bar nearby to have a drink.

This was a wonderful experience, especially seeing Spanish families (grandparents + young kids too) turning out in full force to support the LGBT community.


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  1. David LowJuly 16, 2017 at 8:44 PM

    In Amsterdam we have the Gay Pride Canal Parade celebration every year.The LGBT community celebrate this event in the summer mostly in August and even the Dutch police and cabinet minister take part in the parade!You never heard of Concita Wurst from Austria?She won the Eurovision Songfestival in 2014 and she has a Beard!

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