Пикник Афиши

Recently in Moscow, there was an event of silly proportions. It's called Afisha Picnic, and it's an open air concert, with artists from all around (but mostly Britain). Franz Ferdinand, Mika, Lauren Hill, Mos Def, и Аквариум were among the bands that performed. My friend Olya turned me onto going, and it was such a blast. Honestly, I was pretty skeptical...it just doesn't seem like my sort of thing. But in the end, I'm so glad I went, and here's why...

The weather was super fun, actually. It rained for about half an hour (out of a ten hour event, that's not too bad), and it just made things more fun. We all huddled under umbrellas, trying to stay  dry and dance at the same time. 

 You can tell that spirits weren't dampened by the weather

This was us every half hour, deciding which of the three stages to visit next...I think here we were listening to some group called краснознаменная дивизия имени моей бабушки (The Division of the Red Order Named After My Grandma...band names are weird here too). 

The weather eventually cleared up, and it was time to really dance. I've never really been one to just let go and dance because, well, it's usually for society's benefit that I don't. But here, there was no judgement, everyone was dancing so silly that you couldn't help but join. I felt like a little kid jumping up and down, wiggling around, and doing variations of the hokey pokey, in which I shook myself around. Sometimes, it's really just nice to unwind.

There's a plastic (I think) sheep dancing in the crowd under the rainbow if you care to look for it

Another fun part was seeing slightly famous people. Mos Def (pictured below) was just making fun of everyone the whole time, because he was pretty sure they couldn't understand him.

Finally, it was great to see the weird part of being in a different part of the world. I remember this song from when I lived in Ukraine, and everyone LOVES it. It turns out they have dancing fitness people and dancing robots, so I'm starting to see why everyone likes it so much.

Please excuse the REALLY poor photography and cinematography... you get the idea though. Afisha Picnic was super fun in lots of ways.