The Rhineland's Mardi Gras

Carnival has finished in the Rhineland.

It is a five- or six-day party – depending on how many days you take off from work – and we got to live in the middle of it.

What’s Carnival? It’s like the German (mostly Rheinish) version of Mardi Gras. But it’s not what you think. Efficient? Organized? Dismiss any of the stereotypes that pop into your head about Germans. It is Mardi Gars in all its beautiful chaos and debauchery. 

There are differences. People wear costumes instead of beads. There's almost no flashing. No one is drinking Hurricanes, but there is plenty of beer. 

Kata and I live in the middle of the Old Town, or the Altstadt, I think I have mentioned that the Altstadt is a bunch of old-style buildings on pedestrian-only cobblestone streets filled with bars, restaurants, and souvenir stores, but mostly bars.

I walk to work on Thursday, the beginning of Carnival through the Altstadt and people are already lined up for the Carnival kick-off at 11am. Oh, they're in costumes. Clowns. Fighter pilots. Nuns. Priests. Men in nun suits. A lot of FBI agents. Cops. Devils. White-haired aristocrats. Farmers. Mexicans. Maybe one or two angels.

I get into work and people are in costume too. There is a lunch party and colleagues are decked out as pirates, Indians (not so culturally sensitive over here), cows, cats, nerds, she-devils, and so on.

I get a text from Kata. She says it sounds like there’s a riot outside our windows. There are drunks in costumes stumbling up and down the streets. She’s trying to work at home, but that’s not going to happen. I walk home, through a crush of costumed partyers on the streets of Altstadt.

We venture out and wander the streets that evening. It's quite an incredible spectacle. Again, the streets and bars and patios are rammed with costumes. It’s a fun, but short, night out.

Then I get sick, so I stay home on Friday. I get sicker. I get vertigo. I lay down and I get the spins with dizziness and nausea. We go out for a walk, but I can only last an hour or so, then I have to lay down.

I try to get better but below the windows those costumed revellers are shouting, drinking, pissing, puking, and singing until 4am. Then the street cleaners blast down the streets to clean the mess for the next day’s debauchery.

We manage to escape the Carnival Chaos a couple of times during the weekend, for a walk in the park or down the river. But we return to the chaos every time.

This goes on until Monday, when the parade goes through town. We last through 45 minutes of marching bands and floats and people shouting 'Helau!' It's fun. Many of the bands are also in costume. The floats are amazing, and there's even a few political floats in the line-up. 

Then we have to go back in because, you know, I have this vertigo thing and I am a wimp.

Tuesday comes, the Carnival is over. I’m seeing doctors, everyone’s back to work. In Canada, there are pancakes and then Lent starts the next day.

That was my Carnival. Next year, maybe I might wear a costume and I promise I will try to be healthier.

Preachers gotta preach... and drink.
Photo by Kata Varga

Onesie buddies.
Photo by Kata Varga

There is so much going on here, it's awesome.
Photo by Kata Varga

Parade Day. Snow White and three of the dwarves made it onto a float.

Some of the floats were political, and therefore cool.
The translation: "Terror has nothing to do with religion."

Köln vs. Dorf: The Eternal Battle

If you have carried on a conversation with a Düsseldorfer or Cologner – or whatever you call someone from Cologne or Köln or whatever – you will discover quickly that there is an intense rivalry between these two cities.

Both have their virtues. They sit on the Rhine, but on opposite sides. Cologne is bigger, but Düsseldorf is the state capital. Düsseldorf is wealthier, but Cologne feels decidedly more international. Beer, carnival festivities, soccer teams are all fodder for this intense civic competition. 

It's not serious they all say, laughing. But it is, you can tell because it's a passive-aggressive laugh.

What becomes apparent, is that Cologne is the big favourite, while the Dorf is the scrappy underdog. You may insert a passive-aggressive laugh here as well.

Being a polite guy from nice, neutral Canada, I've decided to step in and run a tally between the two cities over an array of categories as I encounter them. There is no concrete methodology, just my admittedly ignorant opinion, which is what this blog is all about.

I will continue to update the score at the bottom of the page:


Köln vs. Dorf – Beer

Cologne has Körsch, which by law is only allowed to be brewed within 50 km of the city (oh, Germany and your rules!). It’s light, crisp, and yummy. If you drink enough of it you feel just swell.

Düsseldorf’s home brew is Altbier. If you walk through the old town in the Dorf, almost everyone is drinking a small tumbler of this stuff. It’s dark and delicious, yet hoppy and filling. It also makes you feel good if you imbibe enough.

Both are served in short glasses, which are replaced quickly by a surly, tray-bearing server – the surliness is mostly tradition, I've been assured, nothing personal. The quick, grumpy service means you’re never stuck with warm beer and you never run out.

They both get a point, because they’re both so debaucherously delicious.

Köln vs. Dorf – Churches

Cologne has a stunning gothic cathedral. It survived Allied carpet bombing in World War II because it was so immense that bomber pilots used it as a waypoint for bombing runs deeper into Germany. 

The Dorf has a cute church near the riverside. Its tower has a twisty roof, which is quirky, but comes up short against the Köln Dom.

Advantage: Cologne.

Köln vs. Dorf – Christmas Markets

Christmas is a big deal in Germany. For one thing, they call it Christmas, not the Holidays or the Festive Season. Then they gather around a bunch of stalls on a street to eat sausage and drink mulled wine.

Cologne’s is not only larger than the dorfy Dorf's market, but the Christmas market in its old town has incredible handmade crafts. Cologne gets the point.


Köln vs. the Dorf – The Two Towers

Every world-class city must have a tower. Toronto? Check. Berlin? Check. Calgary? Surprise! Check. Cologne? Nein! The Dorf is a part of this pantheon of cities with towers, with its Rheinturm. The Dorf wins this round.

 


Result:

Köln    3
Dorf    2

The Day it Snowed in the Dorf

I shouldn’t be this enthusiastic about frozen water particles, but I am. It snowed in Dusseldorf!

I woke up Saturday morning, opened the blinds to see big fluffy snow flakes falling from the sky and settling on the pedestrian street below. 

"It’s snowing," I yelled to a groggy Kata.

As an adult, I understand that I'm supposed to resent the snow, or at least feign resentment. It’s dangerous to drive in, back breaking to shovel from your driveway, and, for four to five months of the year, serves as natural fodder for water cooler banter in the office.

But a little bit of snow occasionally is nice, in some cases needed. Take the Christmas season, which I spent in Canada with only a dusting of snow. There are no carols called Green Christmas.

On the other side of the Atlantic, winter in the Dorf consists of greyness, high winds, cold-ass rain, and more greyness. I made fun of the darkness of Hungary once, but the Dorf''s grey, soggy, wet cold trumps that. 

And! While Toronto has gotten snow days and cold alerts, the temperature here sits above zero, with a wind that whips through the streets and a wet, rainy cold that chills you down to your bones. No wonder waterproof Jack Wolfskin winter jackets are worn by so many people they could be Germany's national uniform. 

Yes, I sympathise with everyone back home with their Facebook snow photos and Twitter complaints about driving in the stuff. I've been there, I understand. But winter is not winter without a bit of snow.

Anyway, we got some snow. So on this snowy Saturday, we walked through the Altstadt to a bakery for breakfast and sat by the window and watched the snow fall. The Altstadt is also the Dorf's party centre, so there was almost no one around, aside from the odd parent struggling to pull sleds carrying a kids dressed like eskimos. 

As the falling snow let up, we visited the Japanese garden – there is a big Japanese population in the Dorf, though not as big as the German population. Nothing was in bloom, of course, but the pond was frozen and the snow has settled on the trees.

I’ll let the photos speak of the garden for themselves, but it really demonstrates that a little bit of white makes the grey a little more bearable.

I'm not the only one happy about the snow. Check out this photobombing snowman:
happy about the snow and likely happy about being made. 

The Japanese garden.

A happy Hungarian in a Japanese garden in Germany, posing for the Canadian photographer.