In the Southern, Catholic South of the Netherlands, carnival is celebrated with reckless abandon. This is a fact we have now become well aware of after spending our first Dutch carnival season in our tiny, tiny city center apartment just blocks away from the main pub street. Carnival started on Thursday night and is finally starting to quiet down now that Lent has arrived. Thank God for Lent! For the last 5 days, people have been up to all hours dressed in brightly colored costumes, drinking to excess and taking traditional bands with them wherever they go. These bands frequently stopped to play at the pub that is just outside our bedroom window…. sometimes until 4 in the morning. Needless to say, we’ve gotten very little sleep.

Since we currently live "below the rivers," (the region which celebrates Carnival) we figured that we should actively take part in some of the festivities rather than just watching the events from our living room window. We met up with our friend, Kari on Saturday afternoon with a plan to head into town to find a place to take in the parade. We found a good spot right on the parade route but we soon realized that we were unprepared. Almost everyone had with them a packet of confetti and some silly string. While waiting for the parade to start these items found their way into the middle of the road making quite a festive atmosphere. (Mark got silly stringed a few times. I wonder why he is a stand out target for the kids??) The parade itself was pretty average, but what we loved it anyway! There were lots of big trucks with banners and after awhile you wonder exactly what kind of entertainment it's supposed to be. I call it advertising. The least they could do is have someone on the back of the truck throwing candy!!

Later in the evening, the three of us headed out into the overwhelming crowds to take in some of the pub atmosphere. In many of the pubs on the main pub street in Eindhoven, there is a wall with all these little boxes that people can rent for a year. As it turns out they are a sort of "piggy bank." All year they stay locked... but when you're around the pub on a Friday or Saturday night you throw a few Euros into your box. Then when carnival time rolls around, the boxes are unlocked and you have money to buy drinks for the whole carnival period. (At least that's the theory!!) And drink for the whole carnival period they do! It goes on all day and all night… for 5 days!!!