Karneval! Hei-Jo!

In the more Catholic regions of the world, the Thursday before Ash Wednesday begins the week-long Karneval celebration. For Americans, think Mardi Gras. In Germany, this translates into massive celebrations in the southern and western parts of the country, the largest, wildest, and most famous occurring in Köln. The high point is Rose Monday (Rosenmontag), which is officially not a holiday but in practical terms is treated as such in many Karneval-crazy towns. Hundreds of thousands of costumed Germans take to the streets in freezing temperatures, watch the Karneval parade, sing a lot of songs, and naturally drink a lot of beer. Courtesy of Deutsche Welle, I’ve linked a video of Karneval in Köln as well as some traditional Karneval music being sung (in a Dialekt that still strikes me as foreign). Maybe open them in a new window and listen while you finish reading here. For some more details from the region, consult the Ampelhead, who now lives in Bonn and is in the forefront of the action.

For us, Karneval in Berlin was pretty tame in comparison. It’s just too traditionally Protestant and straight-laced Prussian around here. Nevertheless, we ventured out to participate with the other Jecken (German for "Carnival-goers") on Sunday to watch the procession and witness some truly bizarre scenes.

As you can see in our pictures on Picasa, adults take dressing up seriously. Shopping for the perfect costume begins months in advance, and all the department stores stock costumes in large areas reminiscent of the children’s Halloween section at the local Party City. It's just a little strange to see the usually serious Germans loosening up like this in public. I even heard that some Boschies in more Karneval-friendly towns were requested to come to work in costume.

The giving of treats to the crowds was also a central element of Berlin’s Karneval. But this wasn’t your typically gentle treat-or-treat style distribution of candy. While the children received candy tossed in their sacks, the costumed Jecken perched atop their floats often hurled candy and other goodies down at the adult crowds with the speed and force of a major league baseball pitcher. Rather than hold out our hands to catch candy, we were often shielding our exposed faces from these projectiles.

And not just candy was being thrown to the crowd: the most random treat of the day? That pair of sausages in the lower left. I was also handed a delicious Kölsch beer at one point.

As I mentioned, German Karneval-goers love their songs. They also love to shout and chant a special Carnival cry called a Narrenruf at each other. Apparently these cries vary from town to town and number well into the hundreds, but are rarely anything but nonsensical words in strange German dialects which make the entire production indiscernible to non-native speakers. At the time all we could do was marvel at the strange songs and yelling that would randomly erupt around us, as though everyone else had received the script in advance. However, eventually we started yelling “Hei-Jo!” upon command like everyone else. We only found out after the fact that that is Berlin’s Carnival cry.

Hei-Jo!