Kölle Alaaf!

If there is one thing I like, it's a parade and Köln's legendary Rosenmontag Zug did not disappoint. On Shrove Monday morning, Kyle and I got dressed up (I as a red-cheeked clown, he as an overgrown gnome) and took a train 20 minutes to downtown Köln.

Carnival is a big deal in the Rhine region. The Carnival season begins on the 11th of November at 11:11 am. Between then at its culmination on Rose Monday, there are parties, concerts, and parades. This site has more information on the history of Köln carnival, which originated in ancient Roman and Germanic traditions before merging with Catholicism. City officials long tried to put down the raucous celebrations, until it was institutionalized in 1823 with the founding of the "Festordende Kommittee" (festival organizing committee).

And organized it is! According to the official parade website, the parade is 7 km long, lasts 4 hours, counts on the participation of 10,200 official participants, 124 muscial bands, and 440 horses. During the course of the parade, 150 tons of candy is thrown to the crowd, along with over 300,000 small bouquets of roses.

There were over 50 different associations marching in the parade, some with hundreds of members marching. The biggest groups, dressed in early 19th century military uniforms, date back to the 1820s, when former city militias established themselves as official carnival societies. Many of the societies had large motorized floats from which the crowd was showered in candies and roses to our shouts of "Kamelle" (candy). There was some intense competition to get the treats, and not only from the children.


In addition to the uniformed and wigged paraders, there were also several floats from what appeared to be local trade unions with  satirical political content--Chancellor Merkel doing a handstand to reveal her thong, the emerging economies of the BRIC countries depicted as wise men bearing gifts. Some kicks were made at Germany's recently resigned President, Christian Wulf, and the Euro crisis was frequently referenced.

After about two hours, Kyle and I were cold and getting tired. Thinking the parade was nearing its end (a novice mistake), we headed back to Bonn. When we turned the TV on back at home, the parade in Köln was STILL GOING. We had missed the finale--when the three figures of carnival, the Virgin, the Farmer, and the Prince and his guard file by. We'll simply have to go again some year. As they say in the local Köln dialect, Kölle Alaaf!