Carnival revelers spites economic crisis

In the article titled "Carnival revelers spites economic crisis" the tradition of the fifth season is discussed. The article shows that tradition prevails even through economic hardships. A carnival is held in Germany's largest state of North Rhine-Westphalia to celebrate the "fifth season." This season begins November 11 and reaches it biggest point during the pre-lent period between Shrove Thursday and Fat Tuesday. This celebration was not affected by the economic crisis. The "Rosentmontag" which occurs the Monday before lent draws a crowd of a million. During this parade 150 tons of sweets are thrown out to the crowd. Many crowd members feared that this amount would suffer due to the expensiveness of it, but was not to be let down. These fun festivities come to an end on Ash Wednesday. Many hotels and shops benefit from this social time of the year.
I thought this article was very interesting. The German tradition is very similar to that carried out in the United States. Like in Germany one central state holds these festivities that many travel to take part in. Mardi Gras and the Fuentfte Jahreszeit both include lent, fat Tuesday, and ash Wednesday. I was amazed with the amount of sweets passed out during the "Rosenmontag." I found the picture in this article to be neat and very similar to those taken during Mardi Gras. Tying economic crisis into this article was a good way to make consumers aware of the crisis. It is amazing how no matter how hard of a time a nation is having they can come together for silly things like a carnival.
This article by Sabina Casagrande and Sarah Steffen can be found at: http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,5232457,00.html