A Parade Day

Julia and I had a great opportunity to enjoy a taste of Germans culture a couple of days ago. I wish I could have written about it earlier, but with my schooling I am somewhat bogged down at times. Every Monday before “Ash Wednesday”, a ritual observed by the Catholic Church, there is a huge parade and celebration. Everyone I talked to made this parade and event made it sound like it was the craziest thing I would ever see. People dress up in costumes like it is Halloween and pretty much drink all day, I guess it’s a little nuts. In order to go to the city that the parade is held at we had to take a train. While we were waiting for the train, we were surrounded by people in costumes, which made me feel reassured we were going to the right place. The train pulled up and it was already packed with people. There was not one seat available nor was there barely standing room. We were slammed into the train shoulder to shoulder with a bunch of other people who started there day by putting beer in their cereal instead of milk. I think the greatest example I can give you about their drinking is that the straps that are used in the military to hold ammo, were being used to hold mini shots of alcohol. As we stopped by each stop, we could see crowds of people waiting to get on the train. Our train was so full we couldn’t let any of the waiting people on our train. My nose could testify how many people were in the train because of the stench of body odor that permeated. We arrived to Mainz and saw everyone walking toward the big parade. When we arrived I realized it was like every other parade I had ever seen. Bands were marching in single file order while playing songs no one knew, floats were riding by while throwing candy, rubber balls, and yes bread…Germans love bread. After we froze for 30 minutes, we knew that there was another 3 and a half hours left to this parade. Instead of freezing outside and to catch 5 more mini chocolate bars, we decided to watch the rest of the parade from a nice cafe from its second floor admiring people falling all over the ground for little things that were thrown from the different floats in the parade. I love each and every experience I get here even though my last could be experienced at any Fourth of July parade.