As never before the International Procession did not disappoint this year either – the recession did not manage to reduce the joy and the wide variety of colours, neither did St.Valentine's Day soften the Carnival participants who use this occasion to comment wittily and often in a very direct way the events that occurred in the course of the past year. Nice weather attracted many citizens and their guests who arrived from other parts of Croatia and abroad.
Photo gallery of the 27th International Carnival Procession

The audience followed the procession from seven stages from the waterfronts Riva Boduli, through Delta and Fiumara to Korzo, where costumed groups presented themselves with a brief programme accompanied by the presenters' comments. The audience welcomed the costumed groups from the stands prepared for the occasion, while fanciful costumes and foolishness could be watched across the world via direct broadcasting by Kanal RI, whose programme was also taken by the Internet site of the Rijeka Carnival. Transmission via the Internet was watched by about ten thousand spectators from 61 countries.
In addition to groups from Rijeka and its surroundings and the whole county, groups from all parts of Croatia and abroad (Italy, Slovenia, Montenegro, Hungary) took part as well. The largest international variety was made of student associations – group AIESEC included students from Italy, Hungary and Slovenia, group AEGEE included students from Italy, Poland, Germany, Spain, Turkey and other European countries, group "Kaprićošci" included students from Turkey, Hungary, Poland, Slovenia, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro, and group ODD-EVEN included students from Slovenia, Serbia, Montenegro, Albania and Macedonia.
The international groups also included the groups that arrived from the friendship cities of Rijeka – Estea e Faenza from Italy, Csepel from Hungary, and among the guests at the Rijeka Carnival there were some high guests as well, the ambassadors of Algeria, Austria, Denmark, Egypt, France, Greece, Iran, Israel, Japan, Germany, the USA, Serbia, Spain, and a representative of the World Bank in Croatia also attended the carnival, as well as the representatives of the city of Kawasaki Japan, the city with which Rijeka established first friendly relationships. Although this year the Humanitarian Carnival Ball was not organised, its humanitarian character was preserved, so that the guests were invited to take part with their contributions in gathering funds for the work of the homeless shelter "Ruže sv. Franje" (The Roses of St. Francis) at Kozala.
This year the costumed groups also managed to show their creativity. Some groups joined the carnival topic with the St. Valentine's Day, and the groups of Romans, Egyptians, Spanish women, Scotsmen and Eskimos strolled downtown city, which was also visited by Peter Pan and his Tinkerbell, Robin Hood, Pinocchio and the Flintstones and other interesting masks. But all the creations of the Carnival participants are best illustrated in photos, TV broadcasts or a video record of the Carnival that will soon be available on the Internet site of the Rijeka Carnival.

At the end of the Carnival Procession when the Bell-Ringers from Halubje traditionally concluded the procession, at the central stage, carnival maestro Tony restored the city keys to mayor Vojko Obersnel, but just to keep them until the next edition of the Rijeka Carnival. The final act was a special ceremony of burning Pust (a straw-effigy) organised at sea, near the Adamić pier in the local waters of the Port of Rijeka, by the carnival association "POM-F-RI", with a suitable musical programme in the pavilion on the pier Karolina Riječka.
In Rijeka everyone could actually live the carnival motto - Be who you want to be!