just...WOW.

Turns out, this city really knows how to throw a giant street festival. Yesterday was the culmination of the Sechseläuten/Sächsilüüte, a fairly upper-crust holiday invented in the early 1900s to give Zurich's guilds something to do. In a nutshell, the male guild members ride and parade through town, giving the womenfolk and commoners a chance to cheer for them. If this sounds a bit sour, that's because it is: the portion of Zurich's inhabitants who are NOT in guilds (i.e., just about everyone) appears to be fairly bitter about the existence of this holiday. Although this was the first year that women were allowed in the parade, so...yaaay? Obviously, it's a fairly politicized holiday which celebrates the hoity-toities and alienates the working stiffs, which is all the more ironic, because the name of the holiday (which includes the German word for "six") is derived from the chiming of the bells at 6:00 PM in spring...which is when the working class finally gets to have time after work that's still daylight. It's all a bit confusing, but at least it's a good party.

The parade was interesting, for all of its costumes and wigs and horses and flower-throwing and (sometimes indecipherable) floats, but the best part was the exploding snowman at the end. They build a giant framework of small bits of wood and top it with a snowman effigy whose head is full of fireworks, then light the whole thing on fire and wait for the head to explode. If it goes quickly, summer will be long and warm; if not, short and cool. It's like the groundhog, but with dudes riding around a massive bonfire on horseback. I know it's a super-elitist holiday, but THAT... WAS... AWESOME. (FYI, this year's time was just over nine minutes, and apparently, that's relatively quick. Hooray, nice summer!) Sadly, I mistakenly sacrificed our prime snowman viewing for a better view of the parade, so I apologize sincerely for the crappy nature of my bonfire photos and video. LESSON LEARNED FOR NEXT YEAR: forget the parade, watch the GIANT FIRE.

Anyway. Back to the start. Naturally, I took LOADS of photos, most of which are not great, but at least they're in a vaguely chronological order, starting with the big street party upon which we accidentally stumbled this weekend while Mike's friend Greg Rhoads was in town.

Rowing crew on the river

Guild costumes apparently range from sheik garb...

...to fancy-schmancy vests, frilly cuffs, and tails...

...to medieval garb...

...to traditional Swiss gear...

...to Scarlet O'Hara...

...to tanner's aprons, and SO many other crazy things!

But anyway. There were at least 3 marching bands, all playing together.

...in the middle of this square, which was PACKED with guild members in fancy dress, and lots of other people who (like us!) were just there to see what was going on. 

Apparently, there was an actual BALL later, which you could only attend if you were A) a guild member or someone invited by one; and B) you were wearing historical dress. Also apparently, this was just the pre-party (one of many) before the big festival and parade yesterday. For which they closed stores early, shut down Bellevueplatz (which is a fairly large transportation hub) to all traffic, brought in a bunch of food, drink, and candy vendors, and set up the snowman effigy.

Mike said he thought it was maybe 40 feet tall.

Bellevueplatz looked like this IN EVERY DIRECTION.

The parade: no shortage of marching bands...

 

...weird little floats...

...guys on horseback...

...HUGE medieval-looking machinery...

...and all with the snowman burning in the background.

He started like this.

The flames were a little slow, but then REALLY picked up in the middle.

And then...THIS!!* (How I always end up next to shrieking children, I'll never know.)

Exploding snowman head! With crazy people on horseback riding around the base.

So. The festival started off as the wealthy, conservative, "establishment" holiday, but then, once the parade was over, the men in wigs gone, and the horses all stabled...out come the picnic blankets, tiny hibachi grills, and SAUSAGES. Apparently, within the last 10 years, someone in the working class decided to start grilling brats over the post-exploding-snowman bonfire, and now it's a giant, anti-establishment, weenie roast after-party. Yahoooo! As our Swiss friend Tom--who's never seen the parade or snowman, out of sheer bitterness--put it, "Now we roast our sausages over your sacred fire." This kind of crazy rebellion is a very recent phenomenon, and would have been unheard of twenty years ago, but now the plaza around the fire is PACKED with insane people who are willing to risk life and limb (or at least severe burns to said limbs) to get a shovelful of coals for their grills. Or, in our case, our patch of gravel. 

Mmmmmmmm, brats!

Niccolas and Tom, grillmasters at work.

This is how far we were from the fire, and also how far Mike and Tom had to weave their way through the crowd with our coals BALANCED ON A SHOVEL.

Coals, round two.

The spiral ones were ENTIRELY DELICIOUS. Thanks, Tom!!

This is the dirtiest I've ever seen the streets of Zurich. Honestly, it looked like the aftermath of a riot...this photo doesn't do it justice.

Bonfire, roughly 5 hours after exploding snowman. This thing is NOT getting smaller!

These are the signs (in Bellevueplatz, here) that usually have bus and tram schedules on them, but not today! Happy Sechseläuten, suckers! No tram for you!

And on that note, happy Sechseläuten, everyone. What a fantastic way to spend an afternoon. Sincerest thanks to Tom, who brought the shovel, extra brats, and the grillin' sticks to the party. Next year we'll know to skip the parade, watch the snowman explode, and bring a picnic blanket. Wooooo!

*I have no clue what the video quality is of this clip, 'cause I had to rotate it in iMovie, so if it's terrible, I'll post the original (which is, sadly, sideways) tomorrow.