A couple weekends ago we decided to give Carnival a try. Now, I don't know how the rest of the world celebrates, but in Germany, it involves a lot of old guys dressing up in sweet costumes and strutting around like they own the town.
Mike, Dan, Martha and I took the s-bahn 45 minutes out to Mainz, a smaller city near Frankfurt known to have a decent Carnival scene. We waited an hour and a half for the parade, which we soon realized was for children. And by 'for children,' I mean it was a parade with the local kindergarteners as the marchers, with your friendly local marching band donning short skirts and playing the triangle. It was strange... maybe we should have known when realizing we were the only adults hanging over the railing trying to score candy.
At least the day provided excellent people watching opportunities!
I have my "I-love-Germany" face on again...
On the way home, Dan was accosted by a drunk lady on the train who wanted to draw a heart on his face with her mascara. She was relentless, even to the point of chasing Dan up and down the aisles. Finally, Martha had the brilliant idea of telling her to draw someone on the police officer's face, who promptly kicked her off at the next stop. Win for Martha!
The next three days we traveled to Cologne for their own celebration with our friend Vikas and his own two friends who flew in from the states, this time festively dressing up in costumes of our own. They had American flag onesies; people kept asking them for a picture!
Mike was a parrot, and I was just red and warm. Feel free to ignore the beers in each hand. And the special facial expression.
We found a great local bar with older people dressed up and decided to park it for a while. Cologne is proud of its kölsch beer which comes served in smaller glasses, and traditionally will continue to be replaced one after the other by the server without you asking until you tap out and place your coaster over the top.
Imagine loud German music and this guy twirling his scarf over his head. Yep.
The Americans and the communists attempt to find a common ground
So completely inappropriate, but kind of funny at the same time. There were quite a few people dressed as monks/nuns/Jesus/terrorists, stuff that wouldn't fly in the states...
Phone died after this, which was probably a good thing.
Oh! And there was a cathedral--an incredible one at that:
(Not the main cathedral)
Check that one off the bucket list!
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