Rosemontag Rheda 2011

Well I made it through to the end, the day of the processions  is here! Rosemontag, when all the great carnival committees through out the world gather to show off their floats, dancers and costumes, Rio, Venise, Cologne, Maiz, Rheda, what did you say? Where the hell is Rheda, well may you ask, it is situated on the river Ems just a little south of Gütersloh in the federal state of Nord-Rhein-Westphalia. Now that you have got your bearings you may be able to find your way there next year.

The day started off quite early about 00:01 I know it normally does, but it could be, that as it is carnival weekend I may have missed it. We had arranged to meet for breakfast, Anja (the landlords wife of my local) said 10:00, I remember that through the grey veil of my recollection from the evening before, I had said what! I will be out of the fight before the bell has rung, no.no 11:00, the parade doesn't start until 13:00. At 15 mins past 11 my mobile rung, yep it was Berni, my old footy mate and Anjas husband, "where are you", to which I replied "talking to you on the telephone". To which he replied, I know that you silly man (or words to that effect), why arn't you here? I said well as you said 10:00 and I said 11:00 I have decided to split the difference and come at 10:30. I had actually been searching high and low for the final touches to my carnival costume since 09:00 but at last I found it, my hip flask! I mean you can't go out half dressed on Rosemontag.

Berni had as usual put on his normal fabulous spread, cold meats, sausages, Hackepeter (raw spiced pork mince), cheeses and jams. There is always a big pot of scrambled eggs. coffee and tea for those that wanted it. He always says you can't drink on an empty stomach and by the size of his, he must do a lot of both.

That done I realised I had forgotten my sack, this contains all of the minatures that I have accumulated over the past yeat. These I give to anyone that is daft enough to put their hand in my sack (shut it, you filthy minded rabble), they get what comes out and they cannot put it back. There are some foul tasting drinks in that sack I can tell you!! A quick dash back home to get it and off we jolly well go. When I got back there was a 0,4l of my poison, Bitburger just being finished. So cheers, the first of the day, I think. We sat and chatted about the footy and other things of national and international importance, some one did mention Gadaffi, but this was quenched straight away as no one knew what team he played for, never mind what position.

Anja then dropped the bomb shell, she said you are looking after us this afternoon, Berni is looking after the pub and you are looking after us, US!!! said I, yes "US" my sister is coming along as well. Now if I may explain a little, Berni and I have been mates ever since I arrived in Rheda in April 1994, now that is 17 years ago and he has never missed a Rosemontag parade either on a float or watching by the road side. I looked across at him and he averted his gaze, HE HAD BEEN SPAMMED. I felt the blood draining from my face, I nonchalently said to Anja, Oh that will be nice. We going to Doktor platz? No we are going down to the main road across from the fire station. Now for those of you that don't know Rheda I shall explain, Doktor Platz is in the centre of Rheda, it has an opticians, a hotel, a bank, but better still 3 pubs and also the festival tent is there and all of the stands and the music and well the girls. I will orientieer you a little further the main road is just that, the fire station, a bakers and a bike shop and not a pub in sight. I HAD BEEN SPAMMED.

I needed a couple of beers to start off, thank goodness that I had found my hip flask.

At 13:00 we set off down the road, I stopped every now and again to offer any passing lady to have a feel in my sack, I don't know why my two accompanying ladies kept telling my to shut up??

We had to cross the Ringstrasse, this is the street where all of the floats form up, as they had just started to move off to travel their circular route through Rheda prior to going along the Hauptstrasse (thats the one with the Fire brigade, the bakers and the bike shop and nowt else) on its way to the other half of Rheda-Wiedenbrück. We had to wait for the tail to pass the head of the procession, it took a while so we chatted with some other revelers, had a couple of swigs from my flask, passed my sack around and commented that this was the best weather that we had ever had for Rosemontag (I didn't remind them that it is also the latest in the year that it had been for over 80 years and that it would be another 80 before we will see it again so late).

I took a few photographs of the floats and foot groups and the music groups.



the music corp of the local Prince




don't know where these pretty maidens came from









even our disabled school got a political swipe in about the swine flue


















We then walked the 500 mtrs to the Haupstrasse to take up our position outside of the bakers, I ask you, I would normally be drinking a pils from one of the stands in Doktor Platz with my footy mates instead of chaperoning 2 middle aged woman. WE waited with a couple of other lads that had attached themselves to us, so we had a couple of swigs from my hip flask and they had a couple of minatures from my sack, it was getting low by now and there was some terrible stuff left in that sack.

At last the head of the Rosemontag parade appeared being led by the police car, now I must tell you Rosemontag brings out the best in everyone, even the police. He had a bag ogf sweets and was also throwing them out of the window. This was followed by the head of the Rosemontag committee (who I used to have a regular run in each year when we had our own float).

Then they came, each one greeted with a great Helau, helau! handfuls of sweets, flowers and even prepacked frikadellen, thrown with gay abonden..

a field of early sunflowers

the balloon has landed

The Burgermeister and the rest of the criminals

Nowt underneath????

Blau Funken

Where did she, he, it come from!!!

a load of penny whistles clowning around

This is not the real carnival prince, this is the Schutzen pair

A swinging group

The greeks even got a mention, though I think they would rather not have

Cap'n Jack Sparra



The Green Funken dancing girls not dancing











Well clothed Altstadter



Our local Bio-farm doing a bit of complaining about Dioxin



Romans, Friends lend me an Euro



Yep you've guessed the Red funken

The end was coming in sight with the main float of the prince and princess, their magnificent coach drawn by four prancing white horses, all made out of sterepore!

So  that was it for another year now lets get down to business!!!

Right girls, we going to Doktor platz for a drink? They looked me straight in the eyes and without batting an eye lid said Nooooooooo, we are going back to the pub, I thought Smith YOU HAVE BEEN SPAMMED!

So we returned to Berni and his then empty pub, as he is well off the carnival circuit, he had been all alone for the last 2 hours and I had been without a beer.

I managed to weedle beer out of someone and Gadaffi was happy with his Harem of two.

Never mind, the pub slowly but surely started to fill as the revelers returned from town and before you knew it life took a turn for the better, as it normally does after a few beers. I even managed a dance or three.


And that really is it for another 4 seasons.