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in march of 2003, i was lucky enough as to be invited by ralph & brigitte to visit basel's fasnacht festivities.  comprising three days of parading and celebration, and dating back many hundreds of years, it's loosely tied to the christian lenten traditions, like carnevals around the world; it doesn't begin to do it justice to think of it in those terms, though: fasnacht really has its own character, and flavors which can vary widely from region to region, i'm told.  the basler fasnacht is full of a sense of community and local pride, and also of military history, and it's considered the fasnacht in switzerland.

the original invitation was just for the first day, for the start of the festival and to see some of the parade (which is properly referred to as cortège).  now, let me tell you a bit about morgestraich, the official start of the festival.  it's always on a monday, and it's always at 4 am.  there's a large open square in the center of town, and people begin to converge there a couple hours beforehand; by the time 4 am rolls around, the square and many streets around are filled with people.  suddenly, at the crack of 4, all the lights in town go out, and there are hundreds upon hundreds of people in costumes with candle lanterns on their heads marching and playing drum and fife music and pulling internally illuminated "floats" through the square - these people and things weren't there a minute ago!  they seem to appear from nowhere; the effect is thrilling and magical and moving, so much so that i'm having goosebumps now, writing about it and remembering.  it was amazing, an experience for which i'm deeply indebted to ralph and brigitte, and which i'll never forget as long as i live.

the parading and festivities will go on day and night, unabated, for the next three days.  eventually, after the deeply traditional morgestraich, the drum-and-fifers are complemented by other groups playing "gugge-musik"; the music and costumes associated with this contingent are more like typical carnevals elsewhere, to the dismay of some traditionalists.

happily, when they saw how much i loved the whole thing, brigitte & ralph invited me to stay for the whole thing.  unfortunately, i had an appointment on the middle of the three days, but i was able to get monday and wednesday in.  after an absolutely perfect monday and tuesday, it rained a bit on wednesday, but that didn't dampen the revelers' spirits in the least.

the "floats" and costumes address a wide range of themes, from local social and political issues to football to swiss-isms (one float was - bizarrely, i thought - dedicated to scooby-doo); really anything, but it's all done tastefully and tongue-in-cheek.  this year, with the world political situation as it is, the usa was the target of some poignant lampooning:

one aspect of the experience which really struck me was that there was no apparent organization to the festivities; at morgestraich, for example, there were no barricades, no police in evidence, nothing - yet everything went according to plan; thousands of people congregating in one place, and no problems at all.  the participants in fasnacht themselves are both large groups and also private individuals who just feel like participating.  if you want to parade, by all means do so!  which is where the last part of my story (as well as the legend of gelbendil, and the photos you really want to see) comes in...

as it turns out, ralph's family, being dyed-in-the-wool baslers, have been participating in fasnacht themselves for many years.  both ralph and his father play the fife!  every year, they all get in costume and march through town playing traditional fasnacht music.  as it just so happened, they had a reserve costume which fit me, and so i was inducted - as a first time fasnacht participant, i was made to wear a sign on my back which i was told had the connotation of "student driver."

our party consisted of ralph's parents ruth and roland (two of the finest people i've met, who not only generously extended the hospitality of their home but also fed me like a king); their friends gisela and dieter; ralph's close friend craig (he, too, plays the fife - and travels from his home in the u.k. to basel every year for fasnacht) as well as his son jonathon; brigitte and ralph; and myself.  and so it was that we merry nine dressed ourselves in costume and went about basel marching and fifing quite literally to beat the band.  i quickly discovered that it's very thirsty work; each 15 minutes or so of marching apparently requires a substantial recuperative respite at one of the city's many fine restorative establishments; indeed, our routes curiously seemed to carry us from one watering hole to the next in measured increments...

what?  oh, yes, that.  there's no getting around it, i suppose.  all right, then: the costume which they found for me (my favorite part was the bells!) was generally yellow, and crowned by an enormous, curving, bananalike protuberance, which inspired someone to remark that i looked like a giant yellow dildo.  someone didn't understand what that meant, so it got translated: er sieht wie einen gelben dildo aus.  the final madness was perpetrated by myself: having just read (and seen) the "lord of the rings" stories, "gelben dildo" immediately conjured a vision of an imaginary, brave-yet-perhaps-slightly-effeminate elven warrior called "gelbendil," and i foolishly said so.  well, that was it; after the laughter had subsided to the point where people were able to speak coherently again, it was decided that from this day forward and for all time i would be known at fasnacht as "gelbendil," The Yellow Dildo.

(from rear to front, left to right: ralph's parents roland and ruth, their friends gisela and dieter, ralph's friend craig and ralph, myself and brigitte.  not shown: craig's son jonathon, who took the pictures.  [also a first-time fasnacht celebrant, he was made to wear a sign on his back reading "caution: low-flying haggis."]  all other photos by ralph, and used by permission.)