Letting Go

Perhaps because Lent is no longer so austere as it used to be, the European Catholic tradition of carnival time --a brief spasm of bacchanalian indulgence that ends abruptly on Ash Wednesday--has virtually died out in Italy, France and even in Southern Germany. Munich's once-orgiastic Fasching, for instance, has dwindled to a single parade and a few tame costume balls. One area where the annual urge to let it all hang out is as strong as ever is the Rhineland with its century-old tradition of blowing off steam as a form of political expression. Last week TIME Correspondent Chris Byron joined the Rhineland revelers and sent this report:

A half-naked woman in a red wig leaped wildly down the streets. Behind her marched a brass band with a mounted cannon; it fired candy at a crowd of more than 1 million people who lined Cologne's thoroughfares for the 151st annual carnival parade on the Monday before Lent. Parading or gawking, nearly everyone was in costume, and sidewalks were thronged with people dressed up as pirates, ducks and even gasoline pumps. One woman wore a full-length black body stocking--with two holes snipped out to expose her nipples. Several frowning, grumpy men sported greasepaint mustaches and sheets over their heads: die Araber seemed to symbolize the Rhinelanders' anxiety about the energy shortage's impact on the economic future of their country.

In most of the Rhineland's larger towns and cities, carnival began gaining momentum in early January, as an occasional woman ventured out wearing a red or green fright wig. Then, on the Thursday before Ash Wednesday, normal life came to a halt, as Rhinelanders abandoned themselves to what they called "die fallen Tage " (the crazy days).

Shrieking Laughter. In the Bundestag building in Bonn, mobs of frenzied women raced through the corridors cutting off the neckties of male deputies in a symbolic castration proclaiming the traditional theme of "the day women rule." Similar scenes occurred in other government and business offices all over Bonn. In Beuel, a working-class suburb of the capital, women stormed the town hall, using a borrowed circus elephant to drive a wedge through the crowds.

To escape the tumult, many government officials and businessmen did not bother to come to work. West German President Gustav Heinemann loaded several bundles of documents in his car and drove off to his country house. When one Bonn burgher called information to get the emergency number of the municipal hospital, the answer was a gale of shrieking laughter.

During the week before Ash Wednesday in Cologne, couples dressed only in bathrobes were frequently seen dining at fashionable restaurants. Others necked unashamedly in the streets. The city's early-morning hours were often disturbed by beery revelers dressed in animal skins and horned helmets marching through the streets, singing drinking songs and playing band instruments. Thousands attended one or several of Cologne's 54 costume balls (admission ranging from $2 to $12). There married couples have traditionally separated, each partner seeking his or her own fun. Rhineland courts usually reject adultery committed during carnival as grounds for divorce. It is all part of Germany's annual equivalent to the collective primal scream.

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