More parades

Now that I have caught up with Venice posting, I need to tell you about the rest of Sunday and yesterday. When we arrived back to Siena from Venice, the first thing we saw of the city was that a major road was blocked. After walking a block from the bus stop, we ran into a parade. The Oca contrada's parade. Yet again! And this time, it was a style I am a little more familiar with. The horses' name was Mississippi (Meeseesseepee if you are Italian) and so they made the parade a little bit like part of what you might see around New Orleans...which is not Mississippi, but I guess its close. Including a sort of Jazz band with women following with Oca colored parasols waving them up and down. It was quite a site! They were parading along the route that we were to follow home, so I took us back another way. Later on that day we saw them again on the Piazza del Campo. They had set up all of the things from the parade there and were having a big party on half of the square. Even later on in the afternoon, we returned to the square just in time to see something happening- a huge crowd had gathered, and there were people near the front cheering. About half of the Contrada banners were hanging out of the Palazzo Pubblico. we watched for a while as banners moved and then people cheered, and then moved home when it looked like another parade was about to start.
When we got back, we found Gianfranco and Flora sitting watching the television, watching what was happening in the Campo square. I asked them what was happening. They told me that it was the selection of the contrada's for the Palio that will be held on August 16. Giraffa will be running! Too bad I am leaving only two weeks before the second Palio will be held...but I will be watching it on the internet from the States. It turns out too that my homestay mom is sewing the jacket for the jockey. THE jacket! So I got to see the jockey's jacket, even if I don't get to see the race in person.