Biosciences Bonn: Alaaf Karneval

Alaaf studying abroad; I’ve learned so many new things like how to sprechen German, how to travel across the city via public transport, how to eat McDonalds 5 days of the week, how to sleep for 2 hours a night and still function, and how to Differential Equations. AHHHHH. Lemme tell ya. DiffEq is the love of my life. It’s always there for me, and DiffEq always brings me a new problem. It’s quite an exciting relationship! So it’s the week before Karneval, which is an annual festival in Germany where everyone from kids to teenagers to adults to the elderly will dress up in costumes and party from dawn until dusk! ß YES, I CAN CONFIRM! It runs from November 11^th at 11:11AM and lasts until Ash Wednesday, but the big weekend is the one right before Ash Wednesday. Most if not all of the students in the Biosciences program are out on the hunt for a Karneval outfit, the engineers have their first differential equations test coming up on Thursday, and I’m still trying to plan my Spring Break! Yeah, there’s a lot on our plates! So fast-forward to Thursday because this was my week……….

Sunday: Study, Classes, Study, Dinner, Study, Sleep (2-3 Hours)

Monday: Study, Classes, Dinner, Study, Sleep (3-4 Hours)

Tuesday: Study, Classes, Dinner, still stuDYING, Sleep (0 Hours)

Wednesday: Study, Classes, Dinner, Study, Sleep (0 Hours)

Thursday: Study, Classes, Dinner, Study Sleep (5 Hours)

On Thursday morning, we made a group trip across the Rhine to Beuel to watch the Women’s Carnival Parade. We got there, and candy was already scattered all over the roads. Everyone was in a costume; we saw unicorns, sharks, Donald Trumps, pirates, astronauts, pilots, police (fake & real), cows, trees…you name it, we saw it! The parade lasted about 3 hours; I ate too much candy, and this was only the first day of the Karneval weekend. Some of the people that are in the parade were out o get us. Whenever they passed us, they would throw a bunch of candy in the air, and while we were busy trying to catch it, they would throw another set of hard candies full speed at our faces. ANYTHING BUT THE FACE!! After the parade, it was back to studying/cramming for the test that night. Test time! We all laughed the moment we were handed the test because….ya. It was nothing we had been taught or seen before. At least it’s behind us now! I realized that I had gotten 0 sleep in the past 62 hours…………………….so das great. #ENGINEERING. After the exam, the other students in the Biosciences program met up with us. The night was young, and it was Karneval weekend sooooo time to live it up! We made a pitstop at McDonald’s for 20 nuggets before heading over to Carpe Noctem. It was tons of fun and a lot of German Karneval music!! POLKA POLKA POLKA! VON FREITAG AUF MONTAG! Let’s just say that 62 sleepless hours turned into 70 hours J. I think we were out until like 5AM? Maybe? The next day was more of a “rest day.” Apparently the Germans have it all planned out. For Karneval weekend, party hard on Thursday, Saturday, and Monday and recover on Friday and Sunday, so that’s exactly what we did…..at least while the sun was out. At 6 that evening, we met up with some other people and headed over to this party thrown by the fraternity, BAVARIA. It was similar to American frat parties but with German music, which was expected. The party went through the night as well; the night consisted of party fouls, falling down in the middle of the road, tears rolling down cheeks, stumbling home, and much fun. It’s Saturday, and we are headed to KÖLN (Cologne)!!! We had heard from many Germans that Cologne is where it’s at for Karneval, but we had also heard that Cologne was not a good idea for Karneval because there would be close to a million and a half people there. Welp, we decided YOKO (you only Karneval once) and took a train to Karneval. We went with a group of about 8 people……3 of us thought that we were getting off at Köln Hauptbahnhof….for some reason the rest of the group got off at Köln Süd, so YAY! After much confusion and numerous train switches, we met back up at the Cologne Cathedral. Man, Cologne is crazy! Everyone there was dressed up, most people were intoxicated, and everyone was just having a blast! We made our way around Cologne to get to the Ghost Parade that was happening later in the evening. We walked, we ran, we almost missed several trams! We finally made it though; CORRECTION: we made it somewhere with a lot of people. We never actually found the parade….it turns out the person guiding us didn’t actually know where the parade was haha!! Oh my goodness. It’s okay though! We found a massive group of people and mingled there for a little bit. We got back to Bonn around 11 because we didn’t want to get stranded in Cologne for the night. On the way back, we witnessed the funniest thing ever! DISCLAIMER: IT WASN’T THAT FUNNY AT THE TIME, BUT IN RETROSPECT, I’LL NEVER FORGET IT. We got on the train with several other Karneval-ers that were headed back to Bonn. Two guys got on the train at some point; I didn’t think much of it, but all of a sudden, my friends were telling me to move away quickly! I turned around to see one of the guys looking extremely sick and bent over. The next thing I knew, fluids were flying out of his mouth. SPLENDID. Anywho, the train kept moving and liquid kept flowing down the train. We kept an eye on that guy for the rest of the ride in case he had more to expunge from his body. A few stops later, the train was packed with people. There was actually this one guy who had dressed up as a fooßball referee. Of course, he had red and yellow cards with him. I joked with my friends that if puking occurred again by that guy, the referee should throw up the red card (pun intended)!! Well, surprise! He threw up again. Immediately, the referee turned around, and whipped out a red card. He proceeded to yell in German and blow his whistle at the drunk guy. OH MY GOODNESS. What a ride back! When we got back, we made our way to Carpe Noctem again (they make too much money off of us)!! Next day (Sunday)! We had seen numerous parades already, and now, it was time for us to be in a parade!! It was the LiKüRa Parade that ran through the towns of LImericht, KÜdinghoven, and RAmersdorf. We teamed up with an Therapiezentrum and volunteered to assist those with mobility limitations so that they would able to participate in the parade! I had no idea what I had signed up for back in January when I first arrived in Bonn, but I’m glad that I did! As we walked through the parade, we would throw candy everywhere. The kids would yell “Kamelle” as you walked by, the adults would yell “Alaaf” when you passed them, and every single person at the parade had the biggest smile on their faces. I was fortunate enough to have participated in a Karneval parade where everyone cheers for you as you walk by. That in itself was already an amazing experience; to add on top of that though, I was able to give those who were not capable of walking in the parade a chance to be a part of it. That’s not something you get to do everyday; it was truly an experience that I’ll never forget. OH!!! AND I MADE THE BONN LOCAL NEWS!! MAMA I MADE IT!!!!!!!!! I’M FAMOUS! OKAY! LAST BUT NO LEAST DAY! ROSENMONTAG! This is the height of Karneval where the biggest parades take place. This is the day that we were told by many to spend in Cologne. Of course, there was also the warning from many people to not go because of the crazy number of people that would be there, pickpockets, and the inability to get back to Bonn after the parade. We also had two tests and a project due the following week………..after much thought, we decided to go. We left for Cologne at around 7AM because we were told that the trains get so packed that everyone is standing and squished together. Oddly enough, when we got to the train, it was quite empty. We even got seats for ourselves! When we got to Cologne, it actually wasn’t as packed as it was last time; probably because we were there so early. We stumbled around the city for a bit looking for the best place to stand and watch the parade. It didn’t take us too long to find a nice spot; we spoke to one of the officers who were working. She was from Düsseldorf and had studied abroad in the states for a year! The parade lasted about 5-6 hours. We all ate wayyyyyyy too much Haribo! The custom for these parades is that one person in the parade will give another a flower in return for a kiss on the cheek. Some of the floats were throwing flowers, so we got a couple and handed it to the girls around us! The lady officer that we conversed with actually got 15 different flowers by the end of the entire parade! Apparently, OneRepublic was supposed to be the first performer to open up the parade; however, both the lead singers were not feeling well and did not show up to perform for us (SAD FACE L). After the parade, we returned to the AIB and resumed studying for our tests! What a weekend this was!!