Move aside, Mario! Iceland gets a real Rainbow Road for Pride

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A road in Icelandā€™s capital city of Reykjavik has been painted with a huge rainbow, ahead of the cityā€™s Pride parade.

Ahead of the cityā€™s Pride event, which is set to take place this weekend, local residents came together to help decorate the city centre for the parade.

Move aside, Mario! Iceland gets a real Rainbow Road for PrideRainbow roads usually live in the nightmares of Mario Kart fans.

According to the BBC, even the cityā€™s Mayor, Dagur Eggertsson, took part.

He described it on Facebook as ā€œmore powerful and beautifulā€ than he ever imagined, thanking the organisers of Pride.

The Mayor added: ā€œThis is one way to make our city livelier, more human and simply a better place by great collaboration and beautiful thinking.ā€

Reykjavik Pride director Eva Maria Thorarinsdottir Lange told the BBC: ā€œIt was lovely. A large number of children lent us a hand and some even brought their own paint brushes.ā€

Move aside, Mario! Iceland gets a real Rainbow Road for Pride

Iceland has a population of just 329,100 ā€“ but is ahead of most of Europe when it comes to LGBT rights.

Same-sex marriage has been legal in Iceland since June 2010, when its Parliament passed it with zero votes against, and overwhelming public support.

The countryā€™s former Prime Minister, JĆ³hanna SigurĆ°ardĆ³ttir, became the worldā€™s first openly lesbian head of government on 1 February 2009.

When same-sex marriage was legalised in Iceland, the politician and her partner JĆ³nĆ­na converted their civil union into a marriage, becoming one of the first couples in Iceland to do so.