For those of you that have never gone to a pride event or don’t live in Virginia, you may have never heard of Pridefest in Richmond, Virginia. I hadn’t heard of it until last year, during my freshman year at CNU. I only heard about it once I saw some posts from my friends who live in Richmond who attended. So, my sophomore year, I vowed to go because I have always wanted to go to pride.
Firstly, in case you’re wondering how we got there, we drove. That was a much more exciting experience than it had any right to be because this guy in Mustang tailgated us for about 15 minutes. We finally moved over, and then we watched within literally five minutes that same car get pulled over by a state trooper. #karma
I had already looked up the address of the parking garage before I left and so when we arrived it was pretty easy to park. We both had dressed up a little bit – I wore a shirt that read, “Why be racist, sexist, homophobic, or transphobic when you could just be quiet?” while my roommate wore a shirt that her mom got her at Phoenix pride.
Once we exited the parking garage, we were bombarded with the music playing from the stage. We joked about it and entered through on a bridge, as the event was at Brown’s Island in Richmond. Once we got to the place where the actual event was happening, we were greeted by a large field with booths and everyone holding various pride flags. There was a gay flag at the entrance as well as a group of middle-aged women wearing shirts that stated, “Free Mom Hugs!” The whole atmosphere seemed very welcoming and just wonderful all the way around.
Disclaimer: Pridefest (or VA Pride, there were conflicting names for it) is the only pride event I’ve been to. So, my experience of this pride doesn’t speak for all pride festivals by any means.
At VA pride, while there were a lot of people, the only thing to really do was to get free stuff from all the different vendors. The different vendors included everyone from the ACLU to local newspapers to the SSA (social security administration). That was a little bit strange to me, but nonetheless, we walked around and grabbed a lot of free things. These free things included candy as well as condoms and lube.
There were also different voter organizations that tried to get people to vote – which by the way I am registered to vote – and others who tried to get people to sign up for their various mailing lists. That part of the event kind of felt like a misguided career fair which was a little awkward, but we enjoyed all the free things regardless.
The most interesting part of the event for me was the entertainment. Now, we didn’t stay for the drag show (that was at 3:30, and we left around 3:00), but the entertainment before that included a country band and a star from the Real Housewives of Potomac. Neither of the people I expected to see at a pride event, but there they were.
Also, interestingly, the pride flags that were available for purchase were not expensive by any means. They were actually pretty cheap, which was really nice. The largest flag, about 3×5 feet, was eight dollars, while a flag on a stick was about five, and a smaller version of that flag was three dollars. Their flags weren’t only the typical rainbow flag; they included bisexual, pansexual, asexual and various other lesser-known sexualities.
All in all, I did enjoy my time at Pridefest. The atmosphere and the people were really cool, and the weather also wasn’t too bad. I might return next year, and I will be doing my very best to try and get to DC Pride in June. If you’re considering going to pride, even if you’re not part of the LGBTQ+ community, I would highly recommend it because it’s a lot of fun.
I’ll leave this to my LGBTQ+ friends – be proud of who you are and remember knowing who you are is the most important thing.
Were you at VA Pride/Pridefest? How was your experience? Let me know in the comments below!