Also known as, Crazy Swiss Holiday. There are many reasons why this was our favorite (if not first attendance) of many interesting holiday traditions here in Switzerland. Basically, this is our equivalent of Punxsutawney Phil, except everyone from the entire state shows up & he gets lit on fire! This is a two-day event here in Zurich. And, we attended (inadvertently) Sunday & Monday. Sunday, we were simply on our way home from brunch with our friends, when the tram stopped running & we had to get out and walk. We had no idea what had descended upon Zurich at the time, but we were certainly in for a treat. This was the only reason we got close up pictures of the intact Böögg, aka snowman.
On Sunday the festivities include a children parade & a bunch of men dressed in traditional guild garb (think of guilds sort of like our modern day unions). Except now their main function in Switzerland consists of things good ole' boys like to do such as drink, and I assume they must do a LoT of this to take themselves seriously in the silly clothes that they wear, and the guild symbols they carry (do you think axes would fly in a US parade??), all while walking, often with their children, around a constant parade route that takes up almost the entire downtown Zurich area. OMG. The great part about this is we have not even begun to touch the heart of the insanity.
The Böögg burning takes place on Monday, promptly at 6pm. This is a canton holiday (only people living in the Zurich canton) get a half day off work. Of course, E&Y employees are often too busy to take half days for odd foreign holidays, so Joe got home after 5 & we booked it downtown to get there before the ceremonial lighting. We had to follow the parade route on our walk to the Böögg burning site, which was littered with huge landmines. Horses here do not wear poop bags. Now, let me be the first one to state; I am not a fan of the poop bag, but I have never been experienced the alternative until Monday, so I have officially altered my status on the poop bag, they serve a crucial societal role and everyone parade horse should have one surgically sewn on their butt. The problem was people were not phased by the poop. We even saw a woman roll her stroller through a giant pile. All this is irrelevant compared to THE event. When the kindling under the Böögg was first lit, it seemed like the burning may turn out to be a long event which would indicate a cold, rainy winter. This concerned me, of course. But, once the bottom of the Böögg caught, he went up pretty fast. Turns out the Böögg is lined with some sort of explosive that makes a loud pop as it burns. And, when the head explodes, there is a particularly loud boom. I believe we had an average burn time which would indicate a pleasant summer, not too hot, not too cool, and average sunshine. If anyone feels inclined to read more about this craziness, Wikipedia gives a good description.
We topped off the evening (which was also our anniversary --- way to honor us so well Zurich!) with dinner at a restaurant from our book, Tao's. The space was beautiful, but the food did not deliver for the price tag. If we were paying for our 40+ franc entrees outright, I believe we may have considered stealthily sneaking away into the crowded night, sans paying. Although the uber-honest Swiss would probably haul us away to jail for something as mundane as that....so we shall remain the upstanding citizens you all know & love.
No comments:
Post a Comment