Carnival Time

The English term carnival typically means food, games, and rides! Here in Holland, "carnival" is just like the American holiday Halloween (which they do not have here). Carnival is a festive season which occurs immediately before Lent; the main events are usually during February. Since Easter is much later this year, Carnival took place the first Sunday in March. Carnival typically involves a public celebration or parade which is a combination of a circus, costumes and a public street party. The dressing up marks an overturning of daily life. Carnival is a festival traditionally held in Roman Catholic and, to a lesser extent, Eastern Orthodox societies. Protestant areas usually do not have carnival celebrations or have modified traditions. However, anyone wiling to take part in the event are welcome. This year we decided to see what it was all about. Weeks leading up to the event flyers filled our mailbox advertising the event. It really made us miss home and our favorite holiday Halloween.



Although this celebration takes place in almost every town and there is a very big celebration in the city of Arnhem we decided to stay in our little town of Elden for the celebration this year. The afternoon started with a small community parade which went right past our house.



Just like home!!




Our neighbor and his mini-cooper with some good dutch tunes booming!! (and that is our house in the background)



A decorated dump truck with the Carnival prince and princess of the town and people throwing candy. ("werkverkeer" is on all vehicles here that are similar to state worker vehicles you see in the U.S.)




Look.....I got smarties! Well they are called snipits here and are half the size of what you see in the U.S.


Houses and businesses in our town are all decorated.





















Young and old.....everyone dresses up. Since we didn't really know what to expect we did not dress up this year. We plan to next year though. On the right, they are "voetbal", soccer balls in case you can't tell. ALso, Mama is the flower and baby is the bumblebee.



















Our good friends the Ambting family: Theo, Esther, Anne-Marie and Matthijs (haha, sorry Esther I HAD to post it!!)



Matthijs and Doug's favorite float in the parade.









The party moves inside the local restaurant for dancing, singing and drunk people!! You buy chips that you then use to get food or a beer. One chip gets you one beer. We liked how they carried the beer around in these trays to people.









The dutch are VERY tall. But this guy on the right wearing the #44 shirt is the tallest guy we have ever seen. I think he must be 7 ft. tall. He makes the other tall dutch people look tiny!!



As we were leaving, we just had to take a picture of this costume!!