Whenever we were in the city center, most streets had some sort of drum or brass band playing. The squares had big groups with their homemade themed carts playing music and dancing, and there was a parade every day.
I think, officially, Carnaval started on Sunday the 7th but we were told that people actually started celebrating Friday night - and yes, that means they party from Friday to Tuesday. We took a walk around on Saturday night to see, and there were already bands and people out in their costumes.
From what I can tell, as a total outsider, the next three days were all about dressing up, drinking, dancing and singing in the streets. It was a really unique thing, especially with all the costumes. Everywhere you went there was someone dressed up like something (including us!). It was really fun.
We went to the first parade on Sunday. It started near the station and went into the Vrijthof square but we just picked a spot near the station and watched for a while. Have I mentioned how amazing the costumes were? Obviously those were my favourite part. I have tons of pictures, but here are a couple. There's a link at the bottom of this post to see more (for those who don't use Facebook).
I cannot get over those wings! They were definitely the best we saw.
The colours and makeup on these guys is very representative of the majority of the costumes we saw.
This drumming group was fantastic! They sounded incredible and their costumes were ridiculously awesome.
We didn't venture out the first night, but the next day we headed out to see what the city center was like during the day. It was definitely a lot emptier than I expected, but it was also around 4pm so that's not too surprising.
There were still large groups and their instruments everywhere.
And we also wanted to see 't Mooswief (the vegetable wife). She's a giant doll that gets hoisted on a pole in the Vrijthof to mark that it's Carnaval time.
This is my very limited knowledge about what she represents and why she's a Carnaval figure (it was difficult to find any information online in English, and Google translate can only help so much):
't Mooswief is a representation of the women who used to sell at the Maastricht markets, selling their vegetables once a week, around 80 years ago.
As for why she's a Carnaval figure, I'm a bit confused. I was under the impression that Carnaval had something to do with Lent - party hard before you give up whatever you're going to give up - but I also read that it's about celebrating the lengthening of the days and the ability to grow and harvest crops again.
This second reason explains 't Mooswief as a symbol of fertility and the fruit of the land. My knowledge comes from the Google translation of this website: http://www.mestreechtersteerke.nl/pagmooswief.htm
Either way, she presides over the square and as long as she's up people are supposed to be in their costumes and partying. And they were!
We ventured out into the square that night as well, to see what it's like during actual party hours, and it was definitely more of a party.
Yesterday we mostly abandoned Carnaval. It was cold and it rained all day. But we both wanted to see 't Mooswief come down; at 11:55pm on the last day of Carnaval she is lowered down and that marks the end.
There were some mini-fireworks which surrounded her in a red haze and then she was lowered down.
Apparently it's hugely emotional and people cry. We did actually see one person cry, but otherwise it seemed like people were still partying.
I think we definitely lost out on a lot of the emotion and tradition of Carnaval, not having grown up with it, but it was still a really unique experience.
More photos here:
https://goo.gl/photos/ErQaghN6oXpUp99z7
No comments:
Post a Comment