Words by Jeff. Pictures by various.
With a very chilly start to the day, the sun was coming up with a cloudless sky and the weather gods were on our side.
The previous evening I spent collecting suitable leafy gum tree branches and filling up the boot supporting the opening of Pride with the Rainbow Aboriginal contingent because I do enjoy smelling my backyard smoking away down Fitzroy Street, with a connection to Country of course. According to the livestream commentary “It smells absolutely beautiful”. LOL.
So a perfect day with beautiful weather and a great club turn out, was this belated Pride March for 2021, where Motafrenz once again made itself known. The first six cars were dressed up in sequential rainbow flag colours, feathers, balloons and streamers followed by a wide variety four more members showcasing their wonderful variety of vehicles which looked great and shows the diversity within Motafrenz.
The crew had great fun dressing up our cars and everyone was put on notice not to spoil Alan with the results of the Eurovision song. I trust Alan got home unspoilt and kicked back for a great night’s entertainment after a great big day.
Once again the lovely Jessica Jessica supported Motafrenz and got a ride in the march with Colin in his topless Elegance Mercedes Benz. It was lovely to see Jessica support Motafrenz albeit without being in James’ red Celica.
Our Motafrenz marchers looked the part with the new Motafrenz banner, which was bigger, better, brighter, and lighter. The new magnetic Motafrenz signs on the cars looked great too and no tacky Bostik Blu Tack to deal with for a change although I suspect the camouflaged Land Rover might have had aluminium doors.
The lead car carrying the tenacious Boon Wurrung Elder N’arweet Carolyn Briggs with the beautiful Rainbow Aboriginal contingent made 11 Motafrenz vehicles all up. Dressed up with Motafrenz magnetic signs and gum leaves, in keeping with the spirit of the Indigenous mob, this year I had the honour and pleasure of driving Aunty Carolyn in a wonderful burgundy V12 XJS Jaguar convertible that was a perfect colour match for her hair.
Once we started moving, Aunty Carolyn was soon handed a specially prepared roll of emergency relief COVID toilet paper by an interesting drag queen with a mission.
Aunty Carolyn took delight in using as a prop on route. Soon into the march, there was an issue with ‘not enough smoke’ from my gum leaves so Aunty Carolyn jumped out and ran a head to fix that problem quickly and jumped back in as we were all slowly moving down Fitzroy Street with the Lovely WA singers keeping the crowd roaring.
Aunty Carolyn explained to me about the space for young indiginous LGBTIQA people in the Pride Centre and some of the finer details with connection to Country as we drove past that soon to be completed building, and I was pleased to tell her about the Motafrenz contribution.
Most of us made our way into the back entrance of Catani Gardens for the Pride March after party with only access to those participating in the march due to COVID. Here we got to display our vehicles as did last year. Midsumma had afforded us a marquee which was a surprise to us so we just hung the banner over the table and chatted to people at our cars.
There are three award categories for Pride March being: Most Fabulous, Most Significant Message and Most Innovative. Motafrenz managed an Honourable Mention in the 2021 Midsumma Pride March Awards on the main stage in the Most Innovative category, so a big thank you to Nick for making that rainbow work for us. And big thanks to everyone involved making the Motafrenz contingent at Pride March another great success.
Straight after the awards, Chris and I made our way back to our cars on display, but everyone had gone. Understandably because it was a very big day with a very early start and everyone there had made a wonderful effort in making Motafrenz once again look great as an important fixture in Pride March.
The Motafrenz contingent can be seen in the YouTube Midsumma Pride March livestream from 55:43 minutes in or click on this link to take you straight there: youtu.be/i7tsGuT4k3k?t=3353
