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Can anyone give me some info on Carnivale in Germany. I think it's held in different cities throughout Germany during February. Any web sites or recommendations appreciated!

It's held in many cities in the Rhineland and in other parts of Germany as well. Cologne and Mainz are perhaps the best known places to celebrate. This year, it's from 2/22-28 in Cologne. Here's a good desctiption of the event. www.munichfound.com/new.cfm?news_ID=574 If you know German, go to www.koeln.de and click on the clown.

Carnivale, Karneval(e), Fasching, Fastnacht, Fas(se)nacht - - a lot of different expressions for the "last fling" before Lent throughout Deutschsprachige regions - - can be a month or more and take on many different faces depending on where you would like to experience it. Fasching is close to a religion in Bavaria, where it is often called "fifth season" and spans 5 or 6 weeks. Start with this web page for a good overview - - www.whatsgoingon.com/coolest/place/20001124 - - here's an excerpt from the description there: "Munich is especially famous for going all out in its pre-Lent festivities. In Bavaria, they call it Fasching, and the partying starts on January 7th, the day after the Catholic holiday of Epiphany. You have until February 27th to get a load of the Faschingstreiben (festivities) including costume parties, parades and dancing in the streets." Thee is no shortage of observing the festivities in at least the following places (in alphabetic order): Aachen Basel (Switzerland) Berlin Bremen Cologne Dusseldorf Mainz Of these, a few merit the following comments: Basel - - Switzerland seems to celebrate later than all the other Carnival/Mardi Gras festivities worldwide - - March 5-7 - - but with great fanfare, perhaps in other Swiss locations as well. For an overview, see www.fasnacht.ch (in German only). Berlin - - this is apparently a new "first" - - Karnevalsumzug - - which last appeared in Berlin in 1961. I don't even know for sure what an "umzug" is (dictionary translates as "move"), but a map on the following website leads me to believe that it must be a parade (especially since that would make sense from other cities' celebrations) - - www.karnevals-zug-berlin.de - - once again in German only. Bremen - - a relatively new phenomenon, this is the 15th annual Bremer Karneval, and will concentrate (as in previous years?) on the Samba/Brazilian angle of the holiday(s). Observed February 9, 16/17 and 24, the website http://tunix.is-bremen.de/~samba/karneval (note: no "www") gives a fairly easy to follow overview of what's going on. Cologne - - probably the second biggest after Munich/Bavaria - - Cologne has not only one but TWO museums devoted to Karneval - - the Kölner Karnevals-Museum and the Museum Kölner Karnevalsorden ("Karneval Medals"). You can get some info on either at www.cologneweb.com - - click on Karneval or Museen. Dusseldorf - - Karneval may be big here, but I can't find much current info on this year's festivities on line. Curiously, Dusseldorf hosts (the world's only?) convention of "Karneval industry vendors" (makers of floats, masks, costumes?) in the summer - - listed on the dusseldorf Messe website - - www.messe-duesseldorf.de/de/2001/carnevale - - as the "Internationale Fachausstellung für Karneval, Fastnacht und Fasching", June 8-10, 2001 Mainz - - also a very big deal, though I must confess, I cannot make much sense of the www.mainzer-fastnacht.de website. The two biggest websites for this information (and more) seem to be http://www.infotech.tu-chemnitz.de/~...worldwide.html and www.karneval.org Best wishes, Rex

The German word is Karneval and if you can read German, a web-search will show a lot of websites. Sorry, I couldn't find anything in English. The big Karneval cities are at the Rhine (Duesseldorf, Cologne, Mainz) and Munich celebrates Fasching. The southern part of Germany and the north of Switzerland also celebrates Fastnacht or Fasching (interesting but differently from the cities at the Rhine). The protestant parts of Germany aren't really interested. If you go to http://www.koeln.de and click at the bottom of the page on Karnevals-Special, you get an overview of the activities in Cologne, a lot of links, pictures etc. To take Cologne (similar to Duesseldorf and Mainz), Karneval starts officially at 11:11, 11.11. In fact little happens until Weiberfastnacht (a Thursday) which is this year at February 22nd. This is the start of the street carneval which goes on until Tuesday. Wednesday the 28th (Aschermittwoch) everything is over. The big day of celebration is the Monday (Rosenmontag). Karneval has different faces. There is the official carneval of the carneval clubs. They have their own costumes, organize the parades and have balls during the carneval time where groups play music, cheerleaders dance and some people tell jokes. They are often sold out, so you will have problems to visit them if you are interested. Then there is the children carneval since children love to go in costume and sweets are thrown during the parades. And then there is the street carneval which is celebrated by most people which means that you look at the parades and afterwards you go to a party or into a pub. Staying sober doesn't help to get into the carneval mood. At Weiberfastnacht (celebrated in Cologne and Bonn, I'm not sure about the rest), the women storm the city hall and take over the power in the city from the major. Traditionally the women have the right to cut the ties worn by males. While most shops, banks and offices are open, you have office parties in many places and work often ends early. The official part is normally over around noon and the celebration moves to the pubs or the balls. Friday is comparable quiet. Saturday and Sunday, you will have full pubs, a lot of organized parties in clubs and the local parades in villages or the city quarters. There are also specialities like the ghost parade in Cologne when people dress up as ghosts in the evening and walk the street. The big day is monday (Rosenmontag). It's the time of the big parade from around 11 in the morning to 3 in the afternoon after which the people move to other places to celebrate. Tuesday is quiet (hangover) and wednesday it's over. In Cologne, a puppet is burned on tuesday evening which carries all sins committed in Karneval, so you can attend church with a good conscience on wednesday. My description sounds a little bit lame but in fact it's a great party. The individual events are okay but the great thing is that literally a whole region gets into party mood at the same time and lives it out. The atmosphere is loud, drunken, and happy. For pubs, carneval is the greatest buisiness of the whole year and there is no place which isn't full. So if you like parties, carneval at the Rhine is a great place to be.

I hadn't read Russ' and Rex' posts before posting mine and I would like to add a comment: Basel: I've never been there but I have heard good things about it. It's very traditional and starts very early in the morning. For all I know, it's a real experience. Berlin and Bremen: They aren't carneval cities. For them it's a festival instead of THE FESTIVAL. I would go somewehere else. Munich has something of a carneval tradition but it's in no way the capital of carneval in Germany. If you are there on Fasching, it's fun to visit the balls but I wouldn't visit Munich for the carneval. The big three are Duesseldorf, Cologne and Mainz. In Cologne, about 10,000 people participate in the parade on monday and I guess that several hundred thousand are watching it on the streets. It's really another dimension in comparison to Munich. I found a link with an English description of the events: http://www.munichfound.com/new.cfm?News_ID=573

To the top, for Vic - - in response to a thread (essentially identical) re-started on 1/17/01 - - during the "new interface" debacle.