The Fifth Season

Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Carnival.

I am fortunate enough to witness a very interesting time here in Germany. It's called Carnival and basically it is a celebration of the beginning of spring. It starts off on Thursday before Rose Monday (Rosenmontag) with a big parade, and finishes on Rosenmontag with another huge celebration. It's a very popular festival in Germany and so it's a public holiday on Monday.

Having arrived on Wednesday, I get to see and enjoy all of it. Luckily I was warned what is about to happen, otherwise I would have thought something very strange is going on. Thursday morning when I left my house, as I walked down the street around 9am I saw people dressed in costumes, walking around with beers - drinking, being merry and celebrating.

Keep in mind, it's perfectly okay to drink beer on the streets in Europe... also keep in mind... these pictures were taken around 9-10am... the Germans start early, so as to ensure proper debauchery by the time the sun goes down.

The festival sort of reminded me of Halloween - everyone gets dressed up and goes out to have a jolly good time. However, what was really different about Carnival for me is that almost everyone participated. From the young to the old, from vendors to buskers, even the government employees. And the costumes are so varied. Unlike for Halloween, where the costumes have a general dark and eery (or more recently, a slutty) theme, the costumes here were bright and happy full of colour and delight. Many people would also wear matching costumes and walk around in large groups. It is quite an uplifting sight to see a group of grannies enter the train with hot pink wigs and sparkles all over their faces.

Thursday was a day of errands for me - I had to register as a Bonn citizen at City Hall, and when I entered the building, I almost burst out laughing. Behind one of the desks, serving a customer, was an older woman, in fantastic clown makeup. She looked somewhat serious in her discussion with the customer, yet with a giant smile painted on her face.

I then had to take a tram to the Uni to register as a student and receive my student card. By this time, it was already closer to noon, and tonnes of people were out on the streets, drinking, dancing, laughing and singing.

After the visit to the Uni, my buddy - Bashi - took me to Köln, where the Carnival celebration is one of the biggest ones in Germany. The main celebration is on Rosenmontag, but he said that it would be near impossible to go anywhere or see anything - it would be absolutely packed, and so we decided to check it out on Thursday.

When we arrived in Köln (which is only half an hour away from Bonn by train (which is free for us as students)) it was bustling with people, music, drinking and a really happy party vibe. We walked around the pedestrian area and took in the sights, sounds, and smells. There were street vendors selling beer and sausages; there were buskers playing music; and a sea of people in brightly-coloured costumes.

To be honest, it was a little messy. There was lots of teenagers out, getting sloppy drunk, throwing empty bottles wherever they finished the beer, making a mess with broken glass and garbage. Police and ambulance sirens were going off every half hour, and on our way back to Bonn the train station was overcrowded with people due to delays with the trains - I can only assume someone got drunk and fell on the tracks. We had to take a different train to go around through a smaller town just so we didn't have to wait for the main track to be open. And even then when we were taking the tram from the smaller town into Bonn, there was a delay because some drunks were causing a scene on the tram in front of us.

I guess it's nothing new - I've experienced things like this on a smaller scale in Toronto during Pride, Taste of the Danforth, Nuit Blanche, Blackout 2004, Snowpocalypse 2011, and Canada winning Gold in Men's Hockey during the Olympics of 2010... but having something like this on a city-wide and region-wide scale is quite incredible. The entire nation joining together in joyous celebration - drinking, dancing, singing, and of course... making a mess of the place.