Fasnet

One of the things that we have come to understand about the difference between Europeans and Americans is their deep sense of tradition.  We forget how "new" the U.S. is compared to Europe.  This past Sunday we rode the bus downtown to attend the Fasnet (or fasching as they call it in the north of Germany) parade in the old city or Alstadt.  Fasnet is celebrated in the weeks prior to Ash Wednesday and it has Catholic roots.  Think New Orleans Carnival (Carnival, "carnem levare” (to remove meat)).  Since Baden Wurttemberg(the state we live in) has historically been a Protestant state our Fasnet citywide celebrations are in their infancy but other cities like Cologne have been celebrating for many years with wild parades and such before the 40 days of Lent start.

Since there seems to be some animosity between the Protestants and Catholics here we got major mixed reactions about Fasnet - the Catholics were "you've got to go to this parade" and the Protestants replied with "what parade?" or "Oh, we don't celebrate fasnet".  We decided it was a rare opportunity to witness an unusual cultural event.  As you browse through the pictures I think you'll understand why I chose the word "unusual".  This is not your typical American parade with marching bands in uniform, beautiful floats, or clowns.  It's all about letting loose and having fun before the Lenten fasting, however, the roots of the celebration go back to pagan times, when there were seasonal
celebrations designed to drive out the evil spirits of winter and
encourage the coming of spring and good crops. Ugly wooden masks are worn to
scare away these evil spirits.  Since these heathen traditions could not be suppressed by the Church,
they were gradually supplied with new symbolism and adapted to the
Church calendar.  There are clubs that work on these elaborate costumes and travel to various Fasnet parades to participate.  Lots of witches and smoky, sulphur smelling brew!  (I'm thinking the chicken get ups have something to do with encouraging spring??) I haven't been able to come up with any answers on the significance of some of the things - they all wore basket woven shoes, many wore bells (to scare away the spirits?) and most carried a tin cup.  But again, some cities have been having this celebration for over a thousand years - who even remembers why?  It obviously isn't that important or I would think it would be widely publicized!!

One of the most interesting things is that the parade participants play tricks on the crowd.  Stuffing confetti down people's back, picking people up and throwing them over their shoulder, stealing hats, stealing shoes off people's feet, and the worst was smearing bystanders with black face paint.  Karissa and Dayna both got smeared but they actually grabbed Karissa and carried her down the route - she was smeared from her hair down to her neck.  Although she looks happy in the photo taken from home she was mortified when it happened.  I felt so bad for her.

It was quite festive and many people in the crowd dress up too.   Since we were newbies, we didn't dress up (imagine that?!).  If you dress up, you get more candy, but we got plenty.... a highlight for the girls.