Yumemigaoka Rainbow Pride 2023!

[beautifuldreamermods]

⭐ Who: Everyone!
⭐ When: June 10th – 11th
⭐ Where: Yotsuba Park, around Koubai
⭐ What: Yumemigaoka Rainbow Pride weekend!

RAINBOW PRIDE

Since the last week or so of May, there's been posters and advertisements scattered around Yumemigaoka so everyone's known it's coming - but if you're a new arrival maybe you're still a little surprised when the weekend of the 10th rolls around and brings the 6th annual Yumemigaoka Rainbow Pride event with it! Though it's a relatively recent tradition to the city, those that take part in it seem to have turned the whole thing into a well oiled machine with a cozy festival on the 10th followed by the parade around the city on the 11th.

The weather turns out to be just right for the whole thing - apart from some passing drizzles on the 10th, the weekend is mostly dry and sunny with only a chilly wind dampening the mood occasionally. Other than that, it's perfect weather for a celebration!

Whether you're here for solidarity or just to show your support it's sure to be a good time, so why not stop by?

YOTSUBA PARK

The first part of the Rainbow Pride proceedings is the cheery and lively Rainbow Festival hosted at Yotsuba Park. There's a small entry fee of a few hundred yen, just to help offset some of the costs of running the whole thing, but once you're in and you've got your little hand stamp you're free to stay as long as you like and to come and go as you please. And as it happens, there's plenty to see!

The festival is set up a little like a summer festival at a shrine, with a central "street" of stalls and vendors leading up to the open air stage that's been set up to pump out live music. While there's some food and drink stalls at the top and bottom of this little central street, the majority of the stalls are vendors and sellers with various Pride related goods, art or are otherwise independent queer artists and crafters with some cool goods to offload on the nice folks at the festival. Those of you who attended the DU's anniversary event might find things a little familiar and... well, given that this is the DU we're talking about it shouldn't come as a surprise that there's a big overlap between "Dreamers" and "people who go to Pride".

Apart from the stalls, the main draw of the event is the stage that's been set up for today's festival. A few announcements and speeches get made from up on here but for the most part it's here to provide the promised live music for the event. The music lasts more or less all day with at most a half hour break in between acts and while it's mostly smaller, independent musicians and groups you might also spot a few familiar faces up on stage!


🌈 Ai Hoshino (liedol) will be performing a small set of three songs – a newer solo song and two from her B-Komachi days for old time's sake.
🌈 Connor Murphy (yourattention) is busting out some choreography from a performance planned for a Pride event back in the States – just uh... try not to pay any attention to how much cussing there is in the backing track.
🌈 Rue Lette (loungelizard) will be making an appearance in a killer look put together just for Pride with sax in tow and some equally killer lipsync.


... and plenty others to follow!

The event itself is an all day affair, getting started at around 9:30 in the morning and wrapping at around 10pm, with the live music acts wrapping at 8pm - consideration for the neighbours, yanno? The event is mostly a family friendly festival but the food and drink stalls will start serving alcohol at around 4pm and the final few hours of the festival will turn into a full on party!

Don't get too crazy on Saturday though - as the organizers remind everyone at the closing ceremony, there's still the Rainbow Walk through the city on Sunday so make sure you're fresh faced and ready for that!

KOUBAI

Bright and early Sunday morning, everyone shows up fresh faced and raring to go (or, you know, dragging themselves along the pavement and longing for death and/or an alka seltzer) for the second leg of the Rainbow Pride weekend – the Parade! It's a briskly paced march that heads out from the front of Koubai's most central train station and loops around the district twice before breaking off and heading to the plaza just out front of the Dreamer Union. A much more relaxed answer to yesterday's celebrations has been set up, with a few food trucks and stalls and a large tent set up with seating in the shade and out of the glare of the sun.

Once everyone's back at the tent, there's some speeches and toasting from the organizers, some cheers and promises to be back here for the next year... but mostly, the idea is to relax, unwind and just enjoy spending some time and solidarity with the people you just marched with. Maybe you'll make a new buddy or two on the way!

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Comments

Kozakura | Open

[flatcola]

Yotsuba Park

Kozakura isn't much of an event-doer. It's too bright and noisy, there are too many people, and there's no way she's staying out for the whole festival part of this even if she's making a brief appearance. It'll make a few people happy at least, probably, and she's acquired rainbow colored Crocs for good measure.

There are two goals on her list - take a peek at Ai Hoshino because her chat's been talking about her a bit lately, and acquire a beer (her ID in hand well before anyone asked for it) the size of her head to help her survive the throng.

Anyone who doesn't know her is permitted to find the sight comical. If you do know her, keep it to yourself dammit.

Rainbow Walk

...she wants another beer.

Stupid of her to get dragged into the walk, she's clearly forced herself to finish out of some twisted sense of pride (ha) despite being a bit red in the face and sore in the feet by the time she returns to the starting point. And yes, this is a normal walk that a healthy adult should be able to complete pretty easily, you're right about that, she's just weaker than many children.

rainbow walk

[saynotobugs]

[Maki sighs and walks over, holding out a sports drink from a cooler she brought for the people walking with the DU.]

You doing okay? I didn't expect you to end up in the parade after how much you drank last night.

[flatcola]

It wasn't that muuuch...

[ Unless you have the body mass of a chipmunk. Kozakura can put away a lot of food and drink for someone her size, though.

The sports drink is rapidly acquired and practically dumped down her throat. ]

[saynotobugs]

[Maki closes the cooler and shakes her head.]

Remember to hydrate. I think they have a mist tent down that way. Hey, at least you managed the walk, right?

[flatcola]

[ Kozakura does not remember to hydrate. Just look at her username. That's most of what she drinks. ]

My annual... display of support, and display of walking, all in one.

[saynotobugs]

Looking at you, I can believe it. Really don't get out much, do you?

[flatcola]

[ The girl nearly drowning in sports drink? Yeah. ]</small. ...I can make myself like people long enough for this.

[saynotobugs]

Least the rest of the day's pretty easy if you're staying. Compared to the markets and parties and stuff, anyway. Anything else you need here? First aid should have sunscreen if yours melted off already.

[flatcola]

I'm pretty pale, so I oughta. ...at this point I may as well hang around until the last ride back, too.

[saynotobugs]

Yeah? Long as it works for you. I gotta say at least this is going well. Any event with no disasters is a good thing.

[flatcola]

Kinda pessimistic, but also not at all wrong.

[saynotobugs]

Nope. That's kinda my whole philosophy at this point.

[flatcola]

It's practical. I'm mostly that way too.

[ Even if she would LIKE to hold higher standards. ]

[saynotobugs]

Can't just get by on sparkles and dreams, can you? Even if we do work for the DU.

[flatcola]

That's for the kids. The realist adults should keep it that way.

[saynotobugs]

Not that no one ever gets what they want in life, but you gotta work for it. And even then you mess up. I sound like a sad sack putting it that way, huh? Just glad someone around here gets it.

[dullshooter]

Yotsuba Park - afternoon

[Misfire's well used to the concept of Pride - he's been every year - but the Yumemigaoka Rainbow Pride festival is a new experience for him. He certainly dresses the part though, slapping on some rainbow tie-dye and wearing his typical red shades. He wanders around the stalls, picking up and inspecting a lot of things but not really buying very much of it, chattering to himself and - by eextension - the unsuspecting vendors.]

Y'know, on the one hand, I'm glad this Pride's escaped the clutches of capitalism and isn't one big rainbow commerical. On the other hand, though? I miss free stuff. Is this the trade-off for having no cops?

Yotsuba Park - evening (cw: alcohol)

[Come 4PM Misfire's immediately at the booze, participating in a Pride tradition he knows and loves: getting absolutely smashed. Catch him singing and dancing along to the rest of the night's music (to the best of his ability, which is to say, not very well), but be careful he doesn't try to rope you into joining in.]

Rainbow Walk

[Misfire did not heed the organizers' warning last night and so, this morning, he's hating himself something fierce as he struggles on through the Rainbow Walk, unable to even finish the energy drink he holds shakily in his hand.

Collapsing first to his knees, then to all fours, he gives up in the middle of the street, weakly raising the Bisexual Flag he's wrapped around himself.]

This is it, I'm done for...just leave me here...but somebody...take my flag...

Yotsuba Park - afternoon

[darknesshotpot]

Dude, all stuff is free stuff if you're sneaky enough.

[Ango tosses him a cold can of beer, one of several he's stolen from the back of a food stall even though alcohol sales haven't officially started yet. It feels a little wrong to steal from the indie artist booths, but any stall that's sponsored by a local business is fair game. Somehow he's acquired a bubblegum pink T-shirt (slightly too small, but freebies are freebies) with a sparkly manga-style drawing of Hoshino Ai from the Dreamer Union's own promotional booth.]

Be gay do crime, right? And if you're bi... do double crime.

[dullshooter]

[Misfire catches the can clumsily, almost dropping it.]

Heh. Double crime. I'll cheers to that.

[He cracks the can open and raises it to Ango before taking a first swig. Damn, that stuff tastes better when you don't have to pay for it. He looks over Ango with some scrutiny, mostly a force of habit in trying to eye up the valuables on a person.]

Nice shirt, loser. Where'd you pinch it?

[darknesshotpot]

Over at the Dreamer Union booth. They're only paying me minimum wage, so I've gotta make up the difference by stealing swag and office supplies. I've got so many glitter pens now.

[Ango still doesn't have a house to store his ill-gotten gains, but now that he's got a semi-steady job, it's probably time to leave his comfortable park bench and start looking for a cheap apartment. He's been getting by with public baths and coin-operated laundromats for the past month and a half, but now that it's Japan's rainy season, it's a pain to dry clothes on trees in the park.]

So, you come to these things often? It's my first Pride in Yumemigaoka... seems pretty wholesome so far, but I hear that shit gets wild after dark. Gonna find an after party and try to sweet talk my way into an actual bed tonight.

Park - Evening

[flatcola]

Gyeeeh... no one wants to hear me sing...

[ The little creature known as Kozakura has already had plenty of beer for a girl her size, and yet she resists! ]

[flatcola]

Work for it. Be ready to fail.

[ Some things never come to you. Some... some things go away. ]

Yep yep. That's life.

[saynotobugs]

[sigh]

You need to sit down? Before you end up in the medical tent, anyway.

[dullshooter]

Wrong! I do. In fact, the more you protest, the more I wanna hear it.

[He accentuates his point by quite literally pointing at her.]

C’mon, don’t you want to cut loose? ‘Tis the season.

[dullshooter]

[Misfire looks so thoughtful at the mention of glitter pens, so much so that he almost misses what Ango says next.]

Do I look like I go to these things often? Here I thought I reeked of hetero-masculinity.

[Says the guy literally wearing rainbows. And camo pants. It’s a Look(tm).]

Been to a couple in the States, first time here. The difference is pretty stark - I mean, I’d already be drunk by now, for example.

[It is like, 12:30pm. He takes another sip of his beer.]

You need a wingman? I might know a guy. By which I mean - the guy is me.