The big carnival guide

Carnival is largely about pub crawls, costumes, brass bands, and beer. But there are also certain norms and values attached to this ‘fiske’. To keep everything running smoothly and to understand it a bit better, here is a guide. And it's handy for everyone, whether you live in the heart of Tilburg or come from Enschede. This is what you need to know:

1. For carnival, it applies: ‘in the evening a guy, in the morning a guy.‘ Because carnival is a celebration that you celebrate during the day, with a spillover into the evening and afterparties deep into the night. No matter how late you make it, the intention is that the next day around eleven o'clock you put on a clown nose and start partying. Washing down a couple of aspirins with Liebmans is perfectly fine. I speak from experience.

2. And then the afterparties deep into the night, we also call that ‘going on the egg’. So make sure you have enough sausage rolls, eggs, toasties, beer, and Bacardi at home during carnival, before you find yourself with a house full of starving lions, clowns, and soldiers AND an empty fridge. That will go wrong.

3. And then the clothing. In Den Bosch, they wear a kiel in combination with a red-white-yellow scarf.

The men in Bergen op Zoom also wear such a kiel. Women wear large dresses and fur coats. By the way, if they look a bit tired, you should forgive them. These people have already been through four weekends of ‘vastenavend’. The foreplay, as Adeline calls it. Four weekends in a row, three days of tanking, and then that midweek carnival still has to take place. The diehards from the south, those Bergenaren.

In Den Bosch, Bergen op Zoom, and also in Maastricht, the carnival noise is all about large, shapeless suits that completely cover everything. Well, it’s 180 degrees different in Eindhoven. There, the theme ‘sexy’ is the common thread of the outfits. With us, 90 percent of the girls walk around with a bladder infection after carnival.

4. Personally, I find the music a bit sad. I'll list a few titles, then you'll understand why:

• You're a frikandel but a special one – Ferry van de Zaande & Veul Gère
• Joost is differently oriented – Lawine Boys
• Rather too thick in the coffin – Stef Ekkel & René Karst
• Waking up with a beer – Lamme Frans
• Girls – Snollebollekes
• Girls of the Night – Rob Ronalds
• Sex with that bald guy – Lawineboys
• Sweet little bunny – Henk Leeuwis
• Very big cauliflower – André van Duin
• Brabant nights are long – Arie Ribbens

But the intention is that you can sing this song from front to back (and from left to right). That's what carnival is for.

5. Carnival means parades and floats, and associations have been working on that for weeks, what am I saying? MONTHS. So it's a must to go watch, cheer, and wink at Prince Carnival (because he is also there).

After five days of frikandellen and beer, you probably need 46 days of fasting anyway, and that comes in handy. No alcohol, no fatty junk, and no candy. Even more reason to enjoy every second of carnival.

Alaaf.