Markku Harju once thought the idea of having a celebration about a man who chased giant grasshoppers out of Finland was stupid.
That was 30 years ago and St.Urho’s Day has become a great celebration for the Finnish community, he said.
“I remember in 1982 when they started this and I hated the idea,” Harju said. “I thought it was stupid but (the celebration) is fun. We got lots of people involved.”
Harju joined more than a hundred other participants at the 30 anniversary of St.Urho’s Day at the Finlandia Club. The celebration normally falls on the Saturday before Saint Patrick’s Day but that wasn’t the case this year.
Yvonne Murray dressed up in the traditional purple and green colours at the parade. While not of Finnish decent, Murray has come out to celebrate for the past six years.
“I like meeting people,” Murray said. “The best part of it is walking in the parade and pretending you’re Finnish for the day.”
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But as the Finnish celebrations wrapped up, some bars in the city were preparing for the coming evening.
Sandy Sellers, owner of On Deck, said Saint Patrick’s Day is one of the busiest days of the year for his business and expected even more to come into the bar because it fell on the weekend. He said he sells thousands of bottles of green beer throughout the night.
Sellers said he thinks the folklore and mysticism that surrounds the Irish is what attracts people to want to come out and celebrate the culture.
“The Irish were such a small island and there’s a lot of folklore surrounding them,” Sellers said. “A lot of people came from Ireland to Canada so there’s a lot of roots. My own family came to Canada way back from Ireland.”
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