Germany's Fasching Trumps America's Fat Tuesday. Period.

Last week the German's celebrated the beginning of Lent (or is it, celebrating the end of non-Lent?) with a festival they call Fasching (pronounced fash-ing)... most notably in the form of an official holiday so everyone can enjoy the festivities.  Like the big parade!  Last year I was super mad at myself that I didn't go with Jen.  So this year I was determined to attend.

Megan and Kirsten were my partners in crime.  We called it a "Photoshop Class Assignment" but come on, we just wanted an excuse to go out and have fun with photography!  (Big shout out to Shawna for watching my munchkins... it was WAY too cold for them and Momma was way too distracted by her camera!)

And yes, that's me in crazy green hair.  Between living in Mardi Gras country (beads and boas and all sorts of carnival attire from Mississippi) living in Germany (Fasching season brings a lot of cheap great wigs at Globus!) and my Mom (who sent me a goody package that included mostly Valentine's Day fun but also this fantastic green/purple/yellow headband) I was so totally rockin' a Fasching Costume!  Like, it was kind of embarrassing cause I would notice people looking at me and wonder why - forgetting what crazy gettup was on my head!

That and the fact that I was using a telephoto zoom lens which is really... conspicious.  

But check out these costumes!  Seriously we were just in awe.  And half of these pictures are from people in the crowd, NOT in the parade itself!  It was just so much fun!  Everyone really gets into it. It almost seems like Halloween with how decked out everyone is!

And then there was the Air Force and otherwise American presence (shout out to the Patriots!)... based on these pictures you can almost pretend that I was attending a parade in Massachusetts.  And can we also pretend that the fireman and woman hugging are married?  Cause I have no clue what their relationship is but it warms my heart to think that Mr. Fireman was looking in the crowd for Mrs. Fireman and when he found her he just had to run and hug her... look at those smiles awwwww ;o)

Much candy was thrown.  It was funny actually, cause Megan and Kirsten and I weren't really picking any up (too busy taking pictures and too cold to take our gloves off) so the kids around us quickly realized this and moved in for the kill. Waste not!

Speaking of being cold we almost bailed before the end of the parade.  But we stuck it out... and then laughed on our walk back to Megan's house when we realized that all three of us were secretly hoping one of the others would be the first to say "hey why don't we call it a day?"  None of us wanted to admit to being a pansy but all three of us were frozen solid!  

I'm glad we stayed for the whole thing cause who knows what we would have missed.  I loved the crowds.  People-watching with my camera is always a fantastic experience... but especially during a parade like this in a foreign country! The people!  The lederhosen!  The tutus!  The flags!  The pretzels!  The confetti!  

A few of my favorites from the parade:  the storm troopers were fantastic!  And the shopping cart full of fruit?  A local grocery store had a bunch of carts marching down the street handing out apples and bananas.  The sugar-is-bad-real-food-is-good-hippie in me smiled :o)  That VW bug was FULL of popcorn!  Which they tossed and handed out to people.  And the accordion and djembes were just icing on the cake of an awesome parade!

So there you have it folks!  Mardi Gras Fasching.  Have a wonderful Lenten season and I hope yours started as awesome as mine!