The Aalst Carnival Parade "It's Too Much!"

I was excited to see the Carnival Parade in the Belgian town of Aalst, it is another UNESCO recognized event on the list of intangible cultural heritage.  We hopped in our car and headed about 30 minutes north of Brussels.  We found a parking spot and parked next to a Dutch family.  I said something to them about being excited to see the parade and the man laughed a bit and said, "It's too much"...a very accurate description!

It was all in Dutch so many of the political jokes went right over our heads, but much of it looked like something right out of Oompa Loompa Land in Charlie & the Chocolate Factory.  The floats & costumes were super elaborate! 

Here are some photos...

The Prince of Carnival!

Greg thought if you had to pick a float, this would be a good one to be on..the even could just sit!

Lots of bathroom humor!

This guy carried the outhouse with him through the whole parade. There was a delay so his helper was giving him a few minutes to rest his rig.  I think he should make friends with the beer float people for next year!

Speaking of bathrooms, I'm not sure I've ever posted this, but this is a very common site in Europe, an outdoor urinal...allows 4 guys to go at once..lucky I found it not in use when I passed it!

Kind of ruining my image of Iron Man!!

I walked down by the reviewing stand for a few minutes!

Cool clock near the old square!

Each of these guys had a dog, no idea why!

Another of the Belgian Giants...this one got sprayed with silly string!

This little cutie stood next to us to watch for a bit, I think she came off a float!

He reminded me of Peter O'Toole in Club Paradise..one of my favorite movies!

From Club Paradise!

This one was super cool when they shot confetti everywhere!

Awesome costumes on spectators alike, I liked the lampshade people!

Cute kids!

I had to curate my pictures for this one carefully, as there were some that Greg told me a could not put on the blog...if you want the crazy ones, I will fill you in offline!  We saw some things that would never fly in the US.  We also missed the float that doesn't work anywhere. It made headlines around the world...here are some articles!

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/08/world/europe/belgium-carnival-anti-semitism.html


http://www.flanderstoday.eu/unesco-condemns-aalst-carnival-anti-semitic-representations

Clearly the Dutch guy was right, "It is too much!"  However, I'm happy we got to experience it!