“After that bear, we’re going through”

I love this quote from our ‘girls weekend’ and 2009 Viareggio carnival adventure in Italy (near Pisa).  It sums up the scene perfectly as we pressed our way through a crowd of clowns, smurfs, ‘toilet paper rolls’, ‘French maids’, ‘mafia gangsters’ and some very real looking ‘Jack Sparrow’ pirates.  (Impressive – Italian men don’t need to work very hard to look the part – they got the looks AND they don’t mind eye make-up!)  

“Why are there so many furry animals (e.g. a bear, leopard, lion, giraffe…), smoking?!” a friend mused sipping her beer in a plastic cup leaning against a stand selling speciality carnival wafer-like sweets and popcorn. This was just the first night. Little did we know what to expect the next day…

It turns out floats are big business in Viareggio.  The people of Viareggio build huge paper-mâché puppets and floats in hangar-like buildings by the sea, often taking a full year to bring these enormous floats to fruition. Many of the figures satirise public and political figures and are paraded through the streets on set days during the month under the watchful eye of Viareggio’s carnival mascot, Burlamacco. The floats carry a few hundred people in costume dancing and singing to loud Italian carnival songs in the shadow of huge moving, animated puppets – eyeballs rolling, bones rattling, gorilla arms reaching towards the crowd… (People inside the floats manoeuvre the weights to prevent the puppets from toppling over.)

We learned carnival is also a licence to play practical jokes.  This includes throwing confetti (think of us wading through confetti snow when the parade was over), the fun of spraying silly string and tagging unassuming people with shaving cream. (errr… I know nothing about a group of rowdy teenagers targeting my black wool coat but luckily my friends were well prepared and had tissue ready to remove the trace…)

It would not be Italy without the delight of fabulous Italian food for virtually nothing.  Grilled sea bass, fresh octopus salad, spaghetti vongole… several bottles of montepulciano Tuscan wine and prosecco of course!  

You can’t help but take secret pleasure and satisfaction in seeing the usually chic, fashion-conscious Italians look absolutely ridiculous.  The Venetian carnival seems much more civilized, but not in Viareggio.  The pink and purple hair and clown-like hats had an amusing resemblance to German carnival in Cologne.  If you looked really carefully, the Gucci, Armani and Prada sunglasses were still there…

My favourite part of the weekend? It’s hard to say.  Taking in the scene with good friends, actively participating in the revelry around us through the eyes of our carnival masks and enjoying the laughs made it well worth the journey.

Oh yes, and there was that wink and mint thrown to me by a very handsome ‘Jack Sparrow’ Johnny Depp-like pirate who caught my eye from a float… Viva il Carnevale di Viareggio, Viva Italia!