Mardi Gras . Fat Tuesday. The last day of carnival, or the day before Lent, depending wether you’re a Christian or a Pagan.
My parents were sitting on the fence, so when I was a kid we celebrated it as Pancake Day, then gave up maple syrup for Lent.….
Mexico 1988. Carnival time in Veracruz. There’s a Mariachi band on one side of me and a Cuban Steel band on the other, there are vultures in the dustbins and women stripping on the tabletops.
I’m staying in a hotel full of transvestite prostitutes, and the man next to me keeps passing me a bottle of industrial strength tequila. On one side of the square they’re burning an effigy of the devil made of black plastic rubbish sacks, on the other an endless procession of floats streams past, carrying men, women and children in fishnet tights and sequinned leotards.
For a moment I wonder what the hell I’m doing here …… then I remember ….. I take another swig of the industrial tequila and go out dancing with the Cuban steel band.
Ballydavid 1999. Carnival time in West Kerry. Too many pints of Guinness with the Mackerel Band. When did I learn the words to The Wild Irish Rover?
Daisy comes home from school with a cross of ash on her forehead and tells me she’s giving up penny sweets for Lent. Maybe.
2004. Where shall I go this year. I’ve tried Biarritz and San Sebastian. Rio or Trinidad? Or shall I drive up to the pig carnival in Pau, where men dress as women and women dress as priests. They wear necklaces of sausages and roast suckling pig in the streets.
Mardi Gras. Dance in the streets, drink too much wine, eat too many sausages. Put on a mask and make sure you have something to give up for Lent.…..