Bay City's Seventh Anniversary

By Bixyl Shuftan

Sunday May 17 was the seventh anniversary celebration of Bay City, the "first project of the Linden Department of Public Works," described as being built to represent the North American urban experience in the mid-20th century (1940s to 1960s), and the community behind it. Every year, the event is marked by a parade down several sims, followed by a music and dance party with tunes from both DJs and live performers.

As the clock ticked to 12:30Pm, the starting time of the parade, people gathered at Harwich.

The idea was for the paraders to be divided in groups, Marianne McCann and Pygar Bu at the lead of the first group.

The horse rezzed, but the car didn't in this screenshot.

Finally at 12:31PM, Marianne started things up, "Here we go! Happy 7th Anniversdary Bay City! ... er ... Anniversary! ... ONWARD!" The others cheered, and followed her and Pygar, "Hoooo!"

I ended up crashing, but teleported ahead to a harbor area ahead of the parade, and took pictures as the procession approached.

 Going down the road was an avatar Yoda, as opposed to a toy yoda.

Marianne and Pygar were whooping it up as they went down the road.

 Where did this guy learn to brake? "The Flintstones?"

I had a hard time focusing the camera so this mesh horse would rezz. In the end, I managed to avoid looking like a horse's ... well, you know.

 I went ahead and skipped ahead to the finish line at the Fairgrounds in North Channel. That's my friend Shadow with me.

And before long, the parade was in the home stretch.

And one by one, the parade's participants made it to the finish line.

Kenny Luckless, in a mesh tiny skunk. He was looking a little "pail."

A couple horses in the line-up were among the last to arrive.

The paraders were welcomed with music from DJ GoSpeed Racer, the first of the music performers.

GoSpeed's KONA stream no longer operates on a regular basis, but she plays it for special events, such as Bay City celebrations.

While no relation to the anime character of almost the same name, GoSpeed did have a cheerful "big eyes small mouth" cartoon on her stream info sign. Of her ethnic look, she commented at one point, "Everyone should have at least one ebony avatar (in one's inventory)." I responded, "Does a Luskwood furry black cat count?" GoSpeed laughed, "No!"

 And the dancing began.

Conga line, with a couple tinies mixed in with the normal human avatars.

Marx Dudek was going to DJ for the event, but there was a change of plans, "One of these days, I won't have a system that chokes."

Live performer Christov Kohnke followed DJ Gospeed, singing to the tunes of his guitar.

And we soon had a blue dot on the map, a Linden had showed up. April Linden, appearing in her old Lusk bunny avatar, came to join in the dance. The locals happily greeted her, "Welcome April..wonderful to see you!" She couldn't answer any questions about the Lab's policies, "I'm just an engineer." Someone asked if there were tours of the Linden Lab office building available. April answered no, "They only let me in because I have a key."

Following Christov was Oble (Obeloinkment Wrigglesworth), in his marionette avatar. His act had no strings attached, even if he did. Amforte Clarity (no picture) would be the last performer.

 Daniel Voyager, who can be seen here in his owl avatar, put the number of those at the party at 55 avatars.

At one point, Marianne told the crowd, "Hey all, I also want to take a moment to thank those who made the event happen today! Thanks to Kinn for helping to arrange the music, and for GoSpeed Racer, Chris Khonke, Oblee, and AMForte for performing! Thanks also to Marx Dudek who was originally going to DJ today Thanks, Marxie! Also, thanks to our parade marshals.... ADudeNamed Anthony, Rachel Seelowe, and Uncle Galaxy... er, Uccie Galway! Thanks to the Bay City Alliance for being here and helping to put on great events like this... ...and to Linden Lab - especially Michael Linden and Xiola Linden for help above and beyond. And finally, to BlueGin Yifu, Hyper Mole, and Ever Dreamscape for all the did, and for continuing to inspire today. Shine on!"

It was a party to remember as Second Life's biggest city celebrated seven years.

Bixyl Shuftan