7s Weekend

This weekend sees the rugby sevens world series come to Wellington.  For those of you unfamiliar with the game, sevens rugby is basically a speeded up version of conventional rugby, with seven players in each team instead of fifteen.  The game’s home is actually Melrose in Scotland, for those of you who like trivia.  When the tournament hits Wellington, the town gets filled up with fans and others who dress up in fancy dress to party, watch some rugby and of course enjoy just a few beers.

I went to see the parade of the teams through the town on Thursday.  It was quite fun, particularly as it was led by a pipe band and the Scottish team also had a pipe band leading them.   Unfortunately I didn’t get any good pics of my home country’s team, but did catch the pipers and some other tartan clad folk.

The picture below is of the contingent from Fiji.

The tournament proper started yesterday, but we were so busy with getting phones, going to Anton’s school and other things that there was no time to catch any of the matches.  Today though I have just watched New Zealand beat Australia 24:5 and could hear the cheers from the 7s party that seems to be happening in a neighbouring garden!  It is actually quite interesting to watch as the stadium is half empty, a lot of people watching in pubs, at home or just walking about dressed up I guess.  I did read something about this in one of the papers, and apparently it is a big concern for the organisers.

Anyway, below are some of the costumes I spotted.