>about the
>Love Parade
>Wander in Fuessen
11:49 – I am on a very crowded train, on our way to Fuessen. We couldn’t find a seat so I just sat down in some reserved ones and to my luck the righteous owners did not show up!
Now that I have time, let me write about yesterday and the entire Love Parade experience.
We got out the subway and we could already hear some beats from the street above through the subway station ceiling. We emerged from the dark hole into a mass of people. There was a little “pre-love” party going on in the square. We walked down the street a little past all the floats getting ready for the parade. We walked all the way down to the Angel in the center of the giant traffic circle where I bought dome overpriced food and Redbull. While eating my lunch I had fun checking out all the completely interesting people. At about 1:15 I found a phone booth and gave Audrey a ring. I wanted to call her when the parade was actually underway, but she had to leave early in the morning. As I was dialing her number some dudes climbed up on top of the booth and their clambering momentarily disconnected the phone and so I had to re-dial. I was chatting with my girlfriend in Berlin in phone booth with two dancing Germans on top.
After, I returned to Jade who was talking with two guys who just sat down nest to her. I talked to one of them for a while. He told me about how it is every European’s dream to see America at least once in their lifetime’s, just to experience the real American culture for themselves. He asked me if it was the same for Americans coming to Europe and told him it totally is; he couldn’t believe it. So I thought that was pretty interesting. It is weird, some people I have an extremely difficult time talking to in German, but some I don’t even have to think about my language. With this dude it was like that, I didn’t have to think about my next word at all.
He was a nasty looking guy though. He had some gross stuff in the corners of his mouth. When he repeatedly offered us drinks from his unmarked liquor bottle Jade and I figured it was time to move on, besides the Parade was about to start. Let me now explain about the Parade and the experience as a whole:
First, WHAT IT IS NOT:
· It is not a gay parade, nor is it directly related to gays in anyway.
· It is not about sex, drugs, or alcohol
· It is not related to any political or religious and most importantly and commercial organization.
Simply, what it is is a parade of semi trucks, each loaded with massive speakers, a DJ, and a group of dancers. There were 45 of the floats in all and they parade through the biggest street in Berlin, Strasse des 17 Juni, a 3 mile street surrounded by the famous Tiergarten Park and at the center is one of the worlds hugest traffic circles with the huge victory angel towering height about. A train of floats begins at each end of the street at 2pm taking about 4 hours to reach the other end, each blaring thumping techno music. Approximately 800,000 people attended this years parade, which is significantly less than the past few years that had attendance well over 1 million.
And so, it becomes what could be the world’s biggest annual party with what seems like the whole city is dancing in the streets. (Well, not really since many of the participants come from other parts of Germany, Europe, and the world.)
What it is about:
It’s about love, peace, destroying stereotypes, forgetting about racism and every other form of hate. Everyone gets together in the streets, forgets about their anger and their hate and they dance together to the music of their common language. Amongst all the madness I heard almost no rude comments and certainly no violence, which would almost be expected in such crazy crowds anywhere else. And the people do go crazy; let me try to list the crazy things I saw. (There was so much stuff, it is hard to remember.)
- The main food was German pretzels or baguette sandwiches and the main drinks for sale were Redbulls, with or without vodka.
- Lots and lots of men in skirts. Long skirts and short skirts, many with their asses poking out a little
- Many people wearing things, but sagging their pants at the same time like Americans. (Men did this too of course.)
- The fashion of the year seemed to be leg warmers. Many people had them, but I don’t think I saw two of the same.
- Outrageously tall shoes, some over a foot tall.
- A woman in a leather get up (like sexual leather) with her breast hanging out, just laying on the lawn. She looked like she was 40 though.
Oh! That reminds me. I saw a whole lot of skin yesterday, male and female, but it wasn’t that big of a deal at all. For example, at End fest, the annual rock show in Seattle, if a woman goes topless every man tries to fondle her, at the Love Parade it wasn’t like that. It was just like, “oh, there is someone’s natural skin, that is nice.”
- Every hair style imaginable, and more
- A guy with tampons hanging from his earrings
- People dancing everywhere, including on the top of phone booths, street signs, and street lights.
- Many piercings; one man’s ear had a rod pierced through his ear the long way. The piercing must have been an inch long.
- Many guys showing off their midriffs.
- Mouthpieces designed to make huffing aerosol cans easier.
- Lots of beer, wine, champagne, and other alcohol. Some of the floats were even shaking up bottles of champagne and squirting them on the crowds.
- Men and women in only their socks and underwear.
- Many crazy costumes. Often a group of people or a couple would dress to match each other.
- Lots of helicopters and blimps
- A dress made of CDs
- Everyone had a whistle, serious. Everyone blowing them at random. 800,000 people blaring their whistles is something else.
- People in body paint
- Crazy hats, one made of plastic cups, it was about 4 feet wide and looked like a giant golf ball.
- An old grandma and her walker
- A group of people all chained together
- 100’s of people passed out in the woods
People resting in the woods. Can
you find Jade? Can you find the 40 year old lady in leather?
- People parading a plastic skeleton hanging from a stick like a pig.
- People with their own love floats, pulling a wagon with a large stereo.
- And so much more. I can’t even remember. I think it was the size, madness, and diversity of the whole thing that was most impressive.
After witnessing yesterday I don’t think any outfit will ever surprise me again.
The men certainly had the best outfits. Most of them back home would be labeled as beyond extraordinarily gay. Since when do you see men wearing short skirt and tight tops on a subway? The men didn’t look gay at all, except for their outfits. And of course they weren’t gay. Most of them were the “tough German” types wearing whatever their hearts desired. The real gay people wore much more modest outfits, like cutoff jeans and a big belt buckle.
There were tons of outfits I would love to copy and wear myself but I am too afraid of being accused of being gay back home.
The shirt I bought yesterday, which prior I though I would feel gay wearing, is in conservative compared to most of what I saw yesterday.
Dang, I just re-read what I just wrote and it doesn’t dot he experience justice at all. Either it can’t be expressed in words or I am a really crappy writer. (Probably both.)
We arrived at the street at about 11am and spent two hours just looking at all the amazing people. I love “people watching” and no better place to do it that the Love Parade. I could have spent days watching.
The first float had an enormous air powered man that was about 30 feet tall. It bowed and swayed, and danced like the crowd. I danced for over and hour to the thump until Jade forced me to go take a break with her in the cool woods. I was extremely antsy as I waited for her to rest and write in her journal a little bit. I couldn’t wait to get back out into the street and start dancing again. I think Jade was getting irritated,
We stayed generally in the same area of the street the entire time, as it was too difficult to move long distances through the crowd. At 6 the last float drifted by, even though the parade was over, the party was just getting started. There were numerous DJ’s set up all over the woods and streets and every discotheque (and there are many large ones in Berlin) was having a huge “love” themed night so that everyone could continues dancing.
Around 7, Jade was wiped and she persuaded me to return to the hostel with her. We enjoyed chickenschnitzel and we were in bed by 11. I would have loved to continue dancing and partying, but a newbie like me to the scene needs to take his craziness in moderation.
Around 6, when the last float went by I though, “what, that is it?” It felt like we had just gotten there and like it was only 5 minutes long, serious. Bet Jade was like, “Erik, we’ve been here 6 hours already, how much longer do you plan on staying here?
I guess I was just having too much fun; I’ll just have to go again someday wearing something cooler than cutoff shorts and a t-shirt.
We have been on the train for 4 hours now, (15:42) over halfway there. The first train was extremely crowded so we sat in a little room and we were joined by a lady and her kid who was listening to his MD player and singing along. It was very cute.
On our second train we got another room but it was very hot, I was sweating like a pig just sitting there. We sat in there two hours and it became too unbearable, so I walked around the train a bit and discovered the rest of the train was much cooler. The AC must have been broken in out car and so we moved. Our new seats are still warm and near some annoying kids, but much better than before. I think I might splurge for an ice cream soon.
17:51 – It has been another typical day on the train; it is pretty hot today too, especially the last train.
The train we are on now has only two cars, so it was very crowded when we first got on in Munich, but lots of people got off at the last stop so now we have space to spread out.
I wanted to write some poems on the train today, but after re-reading the shitty job I did of describing the Love Parade I have decided it is too hot to think, oh well.
18:09 – YES! I see the Alps again. I love Alps, especially after the madness of a big city like Berlin.
21:30 – Fuessen is pretty nice. It is great to be back in the Alps Especially the Bavarian Alps. I feel really at home here, The place where I worked two summers ago at my uncles hotel is really close to here, only about an hours and a half by bus.
We are staying at a really nice B&B, only because we were tired of calling places and it was the first place we found. It is more than I was to spend though, 75$ (35$ each) so we are only staying two nights instead of the 3 that we reserved. It is like luxury staying here compared to the A&O hostel in Berlin, but we are paying double for it.
Our room has a huge bathe, 4 beds, and a huge wooden balcony that I am sitting on now.
The day, Suzanne (It is called Suzanne’s B&B) helped us plan our day for tomorrow when we first arrived today. She was very helpful and speaks perfect English. She said since I know German I should check out the outdoor play going on in town tonight, called the Brandner Casper. It is a Bavarian Fairy tale. She said it is very popular among the local Germans. So I walked into town to see if there were any tickets left, but the play was actually last night. There was however a piano concert going on that I would have loved to go to (it was cheap for students too) but I was too late for it.
I then wandered among the closed shops with a double scoop ice cream. I then walked to the edge of town and bought Jade some McDonalds fries for dinner since she stayed in the room.
"The dudes were dancing atop the phone booth while I was trying to talk to Audrey."
