Fasching - Verb or Lifestyle?
Created | Updated Feb 24, 2003
Fashingist
On the 11 of November, at 11 am (11 minutes past, to be precise) 9 minutes after the British have finished their two minutes silence to commemorate the end of WWI, Germans begin Fasching. No, not a verb, though an excusable mistake to make:
Ah, Benito, vot are you doing?
Just fasching around as usual, Mr. H.
Fasching, the Germans would have you believe, can be loosely translated as Carnival. This is, however incorrect and is to give the misleading impression that it is something exotic. More exact would be The Time of the Year when The Germans Try to make out they're Wild and Crazy Guys, honest guv´nor!
The first time I visited a "Sitzung" as they are called, I cannot deny referring to it as "An Experience". The local town hall, a stage at one end and row upon row of long tables, arranged perpendicularly to the stage with bench-type seating. And with hardly a bum space between, the locals, dressed in token circus clown wacky accessories shouting "Alaaf! Alaaf! Alaaf!". Light up bow ties, garish braces, feathered hats and glitter wigs jumped out at you as you entered the hall. More surprisingly, especially as one used to the politically-correcter-than-thou Brighton, was the number of black faces. Blacked up faces. A la Al Jolson, complete with racially correct white rings. Comedy bones-through-nose. Jovial black curly wigs. Sidesplitting 3 foot plastic spears.
Looking around, I began to feel more at home upon seeing the large number of gay men among the audience. Little leather caps with chains on them, leather trousers and white muscle T-shirts. Only the shoes were incongruous; Birkenstock sandals and socks. Now I don't mean to suggest that Gay Men don't wear Birkenstocks but the majority of those I have met have more style than to wear them with socks when dressed up as one of the Village People. It turned out that this was the German fancy dress for a Hell's Angel. The moustaches, reminiscent of the Freddie Mercury Barrow-boy look of his hey-day, were purely coincidental and in vogue among the businessmen and farmers alike.
The proceedings started not so much with a bang as an oompah. The brass band kicked into a jolly polka and I knew I had made a big mistake. Not only in coming to the little celebration but in having left my cosy little Right on Brighton in the first place. I curled up in a corner upstairs and sulked into my Poll-tax march leather jacket. My reason for being there was in fact twofold: My German (then) Girlfriend and her dancing Troupe.
The evening consisted of one long speech after another and, among the audience, one long beer after the next. This is a vain attempt at reaching a higher state of drunkenness where you can find the humour reputed to be lurking somewhere in the aforementioned speeches. These are punctuated by great "Tada tada tadas" from the brass section. The reason for this is clear: It is to tell those not yet drunk enough to find a pair of over-sized spectacles absolutely hysterical when to laugh and therefore not to miss even a single moment of the fun. The speeches are broken up by "Volksmusik" (Oompah to you and me) and local fame-hungry dance groups, who learned their steps from Pan's People back in the late 70´s. The emotion in the audience exuded a feeling of "Am I having fun yet".
It was around 11pm that I decided that I was no longer cool. I had unknowingly walked into the snout of a beast of extreme uncoolness and was now being slowly eaten alive for it was then that she came out onto the stage. They were not size-ist, in fact when it came to accepting all builds, they could have headed the waist-relations board. They pranced, minced and bounced around the stage to the sound of "Music is my First Love" (extended version) for a full 12 minutes and came off to rapturous applause from a by now paralytic audience who had finally decided that if it was going to be an awful evening they might as well enjoy it.
We left around midnight and I am told a great time was had by all. I don't intend going ever again for fear of being disappointed.
So that is Fasching. It will all be over for Lent and that jovial drunk you shared an unjoke with last week will be elbowing you out of the way to the free seat on the train on Monday morning.
Alaaf! Alaaf! I really need Alaaf!
Tada tada tada!
Chairman Mei
On the 11 of November, at 11 am (11 minutes past, to be precise) 9 minutes after the British have finished their two minutes silence to commemorate the end of WWI, Germans begin Fasching. No, not a verb, though an excusable mistake to make:
Ah, Benito, vot are you doing?
Just fasching around as usual, Mr. H.
Fasching, the Germans would have you believe, can be loosely translated as Carnival. This is, however incorrect and is to give the misleading impression that it is something exotic. More exact would be The Time of the Year when The Germans Try to make out they're Wild and Crazy Guys, honest guv´nor!
The first time I visited a "Sitzung" as they are called, I cannot deny referring to it as "An Experience". The local town hall, a stage at one end and row upon row of long tables, arranged perpendicularly to the stage with bench-type seating. And with hardly a bum space between, the locals, dressed in token circus clown wacky accessories shouting "Alaaf! Alaaf! Alaaf!". Light up bow ties, garish braces, feathered hats and glitter wigs jumped out at you as you entered the hall. More surprisingly, especially as one used to the politically-correcter-than-thou Brighton, was the number of black faces. Blacked up faces. A la Al Jolson, complete with racially correct white rings. Comedy bones-through-nose. Jovial black curly wigs. Sidesplitting 3 foot plastic spears.
Looking around, I began to feel more at home upon seeing the large number of gay men among the audience. Little leather caps with chains on them, leather trousers and white muscle T-shirts. Only the shoes were incongruous; Birkenstock sandals and socks. Now I don't mean to suggest that Gay Men don't wear Birkenstocks but the majority of those I have met have more style than to wear them with socks when dressed up as one of the Village People. It turned out that this was the German fancy dress for a Hell's Angel. The moustaches, reminiscent of the Freddie Mercury Barrow-boy look of his hey-day, were purely coincidental and in vogue among the businessmen and farmers alike.
The proceedings started not so much with a bang as an oompah. The brass band kicked into a jolly polka and I knew I had made a big mistake. Not only in coming to the little celebration but in having left my cosy little Right on Brighton in the first place. I curled up in a corner upstairs and sulked into my Poll-tax march leather jacket. My reason for being there was in fact twofold: My German (then) Girlfriend and her dancing Troupe.
The evening consisted of one long speech after another and, among the audience, one long beer after the next. This is a vain attempt at reaching a higher state of drunkenness where you can find the humour reputed to be lurking somewhere in the aforementioned speeches. These are punctuated by great "Tada tada tadas" from the brass section. The reason for this is clear: It is to tell those not yet drunk enough to find a pair of over-sized spectacles absolutely hysterical when to laugh and therefore not to miss even a single moment of the fun. The speeches are broken up by "Volksmusik" (Oompah to you and me) and local fame-hungry dance groups, who learned their steps from Pan's People back in the late 70´s. The emotion in the audience exuded a feeling of "Am I having fun yet".
It was around 11pm that I decided that I was no longer cool. I had unknowingly walked into the snout of a beast of extreme uncoolness and was now being slowly eaten alive for it was then that she came out onto the stage. They were not size-ist, in fact when it came to accepting all builds, they could have headed the waist-relations board. They pranced, minced and bounced around the stage to the sound of "Music is my First Love" (extended version) for a full 12 minutes and came off to rapturous applause from a by now paralytic audience who had finally decided that if it was going to be an awful evening they might as well enjoy it.
We left around midnight and I am told a great time was had by all. I don't intend going ever again for fear of being disappointed.
So that is Fasching. It will all be over for Lent and that jovial drunk you shared an unjoke with last week will be elbowing you out of the way to the free seat on the train on Monday morning.
Alaaf! Alaaf! I really need Alaaf!
Tada tada tada!
Chairman Mei
