The Spring Festival

On Monday and the day before, Zurich had it's Spring Festival. On Sunday there was a children's parade. The children were dressed up in costumes from different periods ranging from the Renaissance to the 1920s. My favorite was during the time when Napoleon ruled. They wore wigs (top right) and one girl was caried in a sedan chair. I thought that was funny. Another group had a maypole (bottom right) and they went around it when the parade stopped. After that came kids dressed in world costumes. I noticed there was a Peru group, with real llamas. There were also a Thai group, whose costumes reminded me of the Khmers' wear. The parade ended with the winterman, which foretold the advent the next day.

Yesterday, there was another parade by the guilds of Zurich. The winterman was on a huge stack of wood, which was set on fire. The winterman was packed with explosives, and while it was engulfed in an inferno men on horseback galloped around it while burning debris came down. Acording to this website it took 12 minutes and 9 seconds for the winterman's head to fall off. This supposedly tells how good the summer will be. I saw this in 1998, but I was too young to remember it.