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Sunday August 14 2016 - Montreal Gay Pride Parade with Gaymer Zone	Blog entry
So, I participated today for the first time in a parade. This is the 10th Montreal Gay Pride parade and I heard that we made history because the Canadian prime minister (along with many other political figures) was there to walk with us about a few cars down ahead of our float. Apparently, no other Canadian prime minister before this one ever did this... I actually didn't know of this until I went back home after the parade was over. Anyway, this parade was an event I really didn't want to miss. I mean attending it is one thing... but being part of it for the first time is completely different. I canceled off my train and replaced it with a bus ticket in order to get back from Ottawa to Montreal earlier. That way, I would have enough time to join the crew for the float I was part off. It made the difference between returning to Montreal at 1 pm or returning at 10:30 am. I walked along with many of the players from the Gaymer Zone because I felt they best reflect some of the other things I like to do. The Gaymer Zone encourages people to get out from their living room and play the games socially with other players at the dance club/bar right here in Montreal. Half the players play competitively in games like Super Mario Kart, Super Smash Bros, Mortal Kombat, Soul Calibur, etc... but the other half plays Just Dance, a game that detects your movements and requires you to follow a set choreography. This is not a strict segregation, most players will mingle on both sides. I have to admit that I've been playing a lot of Just Dance lately, in fact, I did it for the past year and I do it mainly because of the Gaymer Zone. Walking (and dancing) with them was a way to show that I am supporting them and that I'm encouraging other gay gamers to join this very friendly community. This also has obviously the added benefit of making you move and stay in shape and be social at the same time. I also have to confess that I was a bit fearful and anxious about what the crowd was thinking about us. Truth be told, I never really looked at the crowd because I was busy following the on-screen choreography instructions for the game. I heard a few giggles, but most of the time, the crowd were cheering at us and this gave us such a great and amazing boost. My only rant during the parade was that we've set the playing console to randomize the song and the system kept choosing a lot of bad bad songs. Most of the guys at the Gaymer Zone are experts on songs like Gibberish, Blame, Cool for the Summer, Circus Extreme, Chihuahua, Ievan Pollka and I'm an Albatroz, but none of these were ever randomly selected during our parade walk (dance). Instead, we get stupid songs like the William Tell Overture (it was even picked twice!?!) that was never really designed for a dance in the first place. I think the solution to this was to create a Sweat Playlist and include the Top 10 or Top 20 songs the group was comfortable with... and have the randomizer choose from that playlist. I'll try to suggest this to the organizers next time. In any case, we did occasionally get good songs, like this one called "Fancy" (I unfortunately really suck at this one). The Gaymer Zone posted this video of us dancing to it: The official Facebook page of the Montreal Pride organization also posted the full length recording of the parade. Our float is at the third minute where we dance to "Drop the Mambo": The owner also posted a series of photos which can be accessible by clicking here, but I'm pretty sure a facebook login is required. Honestly, I look terrible in the pictures. There's only these two I felt I looked okay: Honestly, the photographer had a difficult task at hand with everyone doing weird gestures and grimaces to accompany the choreographies. Playing Just Dance is already a tough thing to do... doing it in public is a greater challenge, but the biggest challenge is that sometimes, you need to run after the pickup truck.... so you have to dance as you run!!! It's like Just Dance on treadmills! That's one of the best workouts ever! You probably won't see me well in the videos, because several players were also wearing green along with a green headband. Green reflects the base color of the Gaymer Zone, but I'm thinking next year to have a custom made t-shirt with their logo on a black background because I felt I was the only one in their group where you can see huge amount of sweat running down from my neck to the bottom of my t-shirt (so.. if I wear black, you probably won't see the sweat very well...). I don't know how they do it, but the elite players in this community are so good that they don't sweat when they dance! The Gaymer Zone community exists since at least 3 years ago. The owner, Mike Savoie, is one of the most dedicated person I've ever seen, putting all his time and commitment to this organization. I don't think anybody else can give as much heart to it than this exceptional guy.
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