Busójárás 2011

This weekend Daniel, Iago and I travelled to the Hungarian town of Mohács to celebrate Busójárás 2011.  It is something that I had been looking forward to seeing for a long time, and it was absolutely fantastic!

Busójárás is an annual festival which features a horde of scary masked monsters who are known as busó. Each year, the busó parade through the town to scare away Winter. They wear frightening wooden masks adorned with devilish painted smiles and pointy horns, and they are clothed in massive shaggy sheepskin coats. Many of the busó also carry fierce weapons or have noisy clanging bells tied around their waists to assist in their scaremongering.  This year approximately 800 busó participated in the parade.

Prior to the big parade, Daniel and I spent some time wandering around Mohács checking out the awesome market that lined both sides of the main street. Unlike many other markets that we have encountered over here, the Busójárás market was full of lots of authentic handmade items, usually crafted by the same people who were selling them and we both had a lot of fun talking to the craftsmen about their products. Some were even kind enough to let us pose with their creations. I'm not sure why but there seem to be an awful lot of weapons for sale at markets in Hungary. In keeping with this tradition, many of the stalls in Mohács featured axes, clubs, whips, swords,  mini cannons, crossbows, toy guns and rifles for children, daggers, mauls, etc. Quite disturbing!

While Daniel seemed pretty keen to buy some kind of weapon, we eventually conceeded that Australia's import laws probably wouldn't allow it, so we consoled ourselves by buying our own busó mask instead. It was made by the wife of one of the stallholders, and while it's pretty cool, it paled in comparison to the mask that Daniel is wearing in this photo (left). This enormous mask actually has four sides, each one boasting its own unique face and set of horns. It was made over fifty years ago and seemed to be stallholder's pride and joy. 

Another highlight of Busójárás is the big bonfire that takes place after the main parade. While we didn't end up sticking around to see it lit, the massive pile of sticks was pretty awe-inpiring in itself. We have been told that a later part of Busójárás involves burning a coffin that featured in the main parade. I assume that the coffin is supposed to contain the remains of Winter (as it had been scared to death by the antics of the busó). But really, who knows?

Anyway, Busójárás was all very awesome and definitely worth the six hour trip to Mohács from Máriapócs. Today's return journey home was also rather exciting as our GPS device decided that it would be a good idea to send us across the extremely fast-flowing Danube River via ferry.

Check out the official Busójárás website for more cool pictures (only in Hungarian though, sorry!)

- Amanda