It will all start at exactly eleven minutes past eleven. On the dot.
If you are an unsuspecting male visitor here in the Rhineland, the first you’ll know about it is when a horde of middle aged women in coloured wigs and clown noses descends on you wielding scissors. They will then cut off your tie. Possibly your shoelaces as well. Laugh about it (even if it was an expensive tie).
You see, tomorrow is Altweiberfastnacht… “ladies’ day” if you’re being polite… or “old crones’ day” if you’re not. Don’t worry… they’re only emasculating you. Have a beer and lament your lost manhood.
The Altweiber will not detain you once you’ve lost your gender-symbol. They’ll continue on their way to the Rathaus, where they will force entry, storm the mayor’s office and eject him (also minus his manhood) until next Tuesday, installing their Karneval Prince in his place. The lunatics have taken over the asylum. Don’t panic. Have another beer.
Karneval is the start of five days of mad excessive celebration. Everyone on the streets, in the bars and in shops and businesses will be wearing fancy dress and drinking to excess. Half of the population throws themselves into the madness… and the other half flees the cities, either barricading themselves into their homes for five days, or heading for the airport to escape.
School children particularly love Karneval. They go to school in fancy dress and spend their time partying and spraying each other with silly string. Well it’s more fun than doing sums.
The older ones leave school at eleven minutes past eleven and hit the town with the rest of the adult population… arriving home late afternoon, trying to disguise their underage drunkenness as youthful exuberence. It usually works. Their parents have been dressed as clowns and drinking beer since before midday too.
The question is whether to hide, or whether to join in the madness….
Continuing the Monty Python theme… one of their most thigh-slappingly hilarious clips is the Hungarian phrase book sketch. This is what most of us ex pats experience on arrival in a new country, because the phrasebook never quite communicates what you were expecting to say….
I came across this radio show from the BBC where a group of comedians explore the question of whether the Germans have a sense of humour. A marvellous mix of prejudice, chuckles and new angles on old clichees.
I happened to come across this travel site on one of my recent excursions around the internet.
Of all travel writing about Germany, it is the only one I’ve seen that makes Germany sound like a cool and hip place to visit. In fact a positive den of drink, drugs and vice.
This is drunkblogging at its finest. By the simple trick of feeding the text into (probably) Babelfish, running it through five languages and letting it pop out back in a form of scrambled literary English, it has achieved what no other site has ever done. It has made Germany a must see. One American friend I showed it to immediately said:
“Everyone — get in the car! We’re going to Germany dammit!”
As for me, I am inspired. I plan to move into a foppish castle at the earliest opportunity.
I also intend to store the following phrases for future use:
- where every crossway offers free-flowing beer up the wazoo
- though this is rattling rare
- be delighted with the long opportunities for fleshly activities
- whether for meliorate or worse
Well German anarchists wouldn’t be disorganised, would they? Doesn’t matter whether they’re right wing nazis or left wing anarchists. Germans need proper infrastructure and shops selling suitable riot equipment… molotov cocktails and stones to throw at the police….
A long running theme in our office is about the relative superiority of British versus German childrens TV programming. We Brits all remember Blue Peter, while the Germans wax lyrical about Die Sendung mit der Maus.
But which nation’s programming is most likely to help kids to grow up as happy, well-balanced socially integrated adults?
So I decided to have a look back at some of the old public service programmes aimed at educating the next generation…
First exhibit, ladies and gentlemen, is Blue Peter. Note the subliminal messages for British children:
it is big and clever to do stunts on your bike
you too can aspire to become Evil Knieval
if you’re going to do motocross on muddy terrain, it’s really sensible to wear white trousers
Second exhibit, is Die Sendung mit der Maus. Note the subliminal messages for German children:
if you’re going to have a crap job you might as well go the whole hog and sing out of tune too
the most aspirational heroes are those who do the dirtiest work cheerfully
and you get to wear trendy gear… in a sort of Guatanamo Bay chic kind of way….
Is it any wonder that both nations have different types of social problem?
