Hundreds of thousands throng Stockholm for EuroPride

0 Comments | AFP, August, 2008

STOCKHOLM (AFP) — Hundreds of thousands of people braved pouring rain in Stockholm Saturday to watch or participate in this year's colourful EuroPride parade to protest discrimination against homosexuals.

"It's just marvelous to feel this sense of community, that there are so many other people like you," Mickael Norrell told AFP, tossing the hair from his long blond wig over the pink feather boa on his shoulder.

Sweden is hosting the week-long EuroPride 2008 festival, which takes place in a different European country each year. Organisers had expected as many as 100,000 to take part in the parade and around 500,000 spectators.

But the heavy rain pounding the Swedish capital appears to have dissuaded many from coming out.

"Around 45,000 people took...