Burning the Clocks 2016

Brighton, being Brighton, doesn't have a Christmas parade. As the city with highest proportional Jedi population (as per a nationwide *religious affiliation* census), Brighton prides itself in its quirkiness, it irreverence, its artsy, original, outside-the-box flamboyance. After all, that's what makes it Brighton, that place we love to call home. So when the days grow short and the air gets chilly, Brighton celebrates the winter solstice. In a town full of artsy types, their no shortage of creativity when it comes to the lanterns the locals make and parade through town, all the while knowing the main aim is to load them into a giant whimsical boat and burn them all at the end of the evening in a spectacular show of light and fire.

The Burning the Clocks Parade begins in the center of town, just outside the Royal Pavilion (not pictured).

To celebrate our first Burning the Clocks, Nicolas and I joined two of our friends with a four-person lantern kit and parade wristbands. Noobs that we are, we thought we could just whip together a lantern in a half-hour in a bar before joining the ranks. Let's just say that no lanterns were required to take advantage of our wrist bands.

Brightonians came out in full force for the parade, with more takes on the basic lantern models than I might have dreamt up. The creativity of the inhabitants of my city never ceases to amaze me, even as they know full well that all their efforts are literally destined to go up in flames.

About 20,000 people annually come out for the parade, 2,000 of whom (ourselves included!) march in (or wander in and out of) the ranks. The wristbands ultimately came in handy as we got the front row view of the fire and fireworks show to ring in the solstice. This town may be little at just about 300,000 residents, but it's got one big personality.

The parade ended on the beach, where the lanterns were collected one by one laid in the whimsical boat of dreams, which burned and finally exploded into a massive fireworks show.