In all the years I've lived in New York, I never actually experienced the annual St. Patrick's Day Parade in Manhattan. Usually the day landed on a weekday when I would be in either work or school, or the weather would be too cold to be standing outdoors for so many hours. This year the holiday fell on a Saturday anyways, and the mild winter we've been having made for a pleasant day for a parade. Even the morning of, I was still debating on whether to go or not. If I was going to go, I needed to leave early and get down there well before the parade's start time in order to secure a good viewing spot against a rail. With hopes of seeing someone trashed and puking in the street afterwards, I finally decided it was a go. I grabbed a quick granola bar from 7-11 and took the subway into the city.
When I was on the subway I needed to pick where was it that I should get off at. The parade starts at E. 44th st. and heads up 5th ave. until 86th st. There were two others on the subway dressed in the green gear headed to the parade, and overhearing their conversation they were planning to get off at 59th st. It seemed like a good idea to me, so that's where I got off as well. By time I reached 5th ave. it was around 9:45am and there weren't many people lined up at all along the street. I made sure to take up a prime spot against the railing and was going to plant myself there like a statue till the parade's 11am start time. After a few minutes I turned around a noticed several hundred people bottled up behind some rails on the corner. I was confused; were those people lining up for the parade too? Was the spot I was in going to be cleared soon and those people would take the prime spots? Then a sudden head turn to the left and I saw the gigantic Apple logo on the building behind me. Those people weren't lined up for the parade, they were up earlier than I was for the new iPad3, which had just come out the day before.
The Apple Store had its own security detail and the entire front was gated off from pedestrian traffic. Every fifteen minutes, an Apple associate would come out of the store to take in five patrons at a time. When it was someone's turn, the look on their face was as if they just won a million bucks. Soon enough the crowds started gathering and next to me of course I had to have one of the worst families right next to me. There was a husband and wife and two pesky kids aged about six and four. The kids didn't even want to be there and kept fidgeting the whole time. Then the dad had the bright idea to give the boy a big Irish flag and told him to start waiving it around. I estimated the amount of time that flag was going to hit and stab me to around thirty. Once the kids wanted a snack or something to eat, one parent would go to the store to bring stuff back. I could've used something to eat too since I only had the granola bar in my stomach, but in no way was I going to lose my spot. Since the crowds were getting fuller, the parent would have to push their way back to reclaim their place against the rail. By that time I probably had at least four out of the thirty pokes I thought I was going to get from that flag. With about twenty more minutes left till the parade start time, I noticed a mysterious black jeep with the window rolled down and a camera sticking out strolling by, with the camera pointed at the crowd. It was probably some type of anti-terrorism tool to read everyone's face in the crowd and matched the pictures of any known terrorists on record.
In semi-relation to that, a few minutes later a large corrections bus drove by, probably on sight as a place to store anticipated drunken and disorderlies. On the news there was mention that the police were trying to make this a family-friendly parade and there were certainly cops all over the place; streets, subway stations, etc. After the corrections bus drove by, a smaller van came by passing out bags of potato chips. I was legitimately hungry and tried my best to catch one, but known were thrown close enough to my range. A few minutes before the parade was to start, a group of people walked alongside of the rails to hand out mini-Irish flags. It wasn't food, but I took one anyways. One thing I learned early on from the logistics of the traffic, was that the street wasn't completely shut down for the parade. At least where I was at, a busy crosstown street like 59th st., police would let traffic cross over 5th ave. all during the parade, which held it up several times. A few minutes after 11am, the vibration from the street and echos of bagpipes gave the signal that the parade was approaching. The first items on display were a number of Ford vehicles; Ford was one of the official sponsors of the parade. I couldn't believe what passes for a Ford Focus these days. I was surprised I was asked to head the parade, I have a Focus, and its even green!
Once the horses showed up, then it was time for the real parade to begin. The biggest applause early on went to a pair of sanitation workers to where pushing trash cans. The next big buzz not too long after that was the appearance of New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Police Commissioner Ray Kelly. Both were walking together and had about twenty bodyguards on each side of the street in case someone wanted to throw a pie in their face. With that was also a handful of cops with plastic twisty-tie cuffs ready to pounce on anyone daring to jump over the rail. There was small group across the street from where I was standing that seemed to be protesting the Catholic Church's stance on not allowing homosexuals to join the parade, but they didn't take any chances with the mayor. From there was a complete onslaught of all sorts of parade participants; army, navy, marines, air force, cops, correction's officers, firemen, state-troopers, high-school bands, college bands, bagpipe groups, boy scouts, Gaelic societies, more sanitation workers, and sometimes it seemed like thousands of people from some town in Upstate New York would be marching. They just kept coming and coming, it looked like this parade was never going to end. In about the three hour mark I was starving, my legs were cramped, and I had enough of those pesky kids next to me, so I decided to escape from my position along the rail. Even as I leaving, more and more of the parade kept continuing.
With it being St. Patrick's Day, my ideal place to get something to eat was going to be a real Irish bar. I figured being in the city, that wouldn't be difficult at all. So I would walk a few blocks, then walk a few blocks, and every Irish bar I encounter was absolutely mobbed with lines out the door. My stomach was growling in hunger and I didn't have time for wait on some line. I figured I could at least get a Blarney Stone, they're all over the city like Starbucks. I kept heading east of the city in hopes of finding a place, but was getting no luck; they were all packed (with firemen most the time). My journey took me to 1st ave. with no further east to go but into the East River. I was somewhat surprised to see the named the Queensborough Bridge after former New York Mayor Ed Koch. The city was an absolute toilet under his tenure, can't see why he gets a bridge, but whatever. I didn't want to continue on this wild goose chase any further, so I told myself I'll just go into the first anything that serves food. I went back to 2nd ave. and encountered the Afghan II Kebab House. The sign gave me the impression there was an Afghan Kebab House Part 1 somewhere lurking in the city. It was the polar opposite of an Irish bar to have a beer and a shepard's pie, but under the circumstances it was going to have to do. I started out with an sambosa as an appetizer. It's a fried turnover filled with ground beef, herbs, and spices, then topped in their minted yogurt sauce. For my main lunch dish I went with the lamb tikka kebab that's served with a side of jasmine rice and naan. Everything tasted excellent and silence inside the place allowed my ears to get re-adjusted from three hours of bagpipes.
To make amends, next time there's an Afghanistan Day Parade, I'll go to a Blarney Stone.
The lunch you had does not sound too bad, but I would say na na to the naan.
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