Carnival Time Part I: The Buso Kit

Post Prelude:
I love carnival. I love the idea of a time when all life’s normal rules are suspended: a vacation from order, from responsibility, from accountability, from moderation.

We spent this carnival in Mohács, Hungary, home of the Busojárás carnival. Busojárás originally came here with the Slavic Sokacs people, and has roots in ancient Slavic paganism. But unlike other Slavic carnivals, Busojárás does not feature animal masks. Here and only here the masks (“busos”) are humans with horns, wooly hair all over, and no self-control.

The Buso Checklist:




Mask. Of course the mask. Unlike other carnival masks, these are never mass-produced—each wooden Buso mask is different.

Our friend Tamasz's grandfather made these masks, which his crew Boros Kolo still uses. (Their group’s name is a pun on fave Hungarian drink “wine and cola,” using the word “kolo,” the official dance of carnival). This is him before “suiting up” for carnival, with the very first mask his grandfather made for him.

Many Mohács men still make their own masks. Although even many natives don’t realize it, every part of the mask—from the horns to the color to the shape of the eyes—is symbolic…but more about that later. Ideally, a Buso never takes off his mask.


Wine. Check. Our Boros Kolo friends told us that the government actually gives them free wine for the duration of carnival.


Cowbells and noisemakers. Used to a) announce the busos’ approach, b) ward off the evil spirits of winter and death, and c) raise the roof. The wooden Buso-Horn—for those who can actually sound it—sounds like a plastic football rally trumpet.


Women’s stockings under traditional Sokacs mens’ underwear. This local in-joke harkens back to the time when almost no one went masked. Centuries ago, before carnival was a tourist attraction, most Sokacs revelers crossdressed: the men dressed up as women and vice versa.

These womens’ stockings are a reminder of that tradition, which still survives among a few serious Mohács partiers.


Hay-stuffed trousers. Theoretically a buso should be totally anonymous, free to do whatever (and whoever) without fear of recognition. Stuffing hay down your pants keeps your wife from Where’s-Waldoing your legs.


Chilis and paprikas and other plant life. old pagan decorations, reminders of the return of life in the spring.


Pitchforks, paddles, cannons, maces and donuts. There’s an added layer to carnival in Mohács: remembrance of the Hungarian defeat at the Battle of Mohács (1526). This defeat opened the door to the Turkish invasion of Buda and Turkish domination of Central Hungary. Memories are long and bitter here; the battle is an essential part of the town’s identity. There’s a “pretty legend” that Busos scared the Turkish occupiers away from Mohács. One dark and stormy night (the story goes), local people hiding in the wilderness of Mohács Island donned terrifying masks, crossed the river in boats, and frightened the Turks away. To commemorate this victory, the Busos paddle across the Danube from Mohács Island every Carnival Sunday.


The donuts on the Busos’ horns are symbolic Turkish heads. Mmmm...symbolism...

The funny thing is that Mohács wasn’t settled until after the Turks were long gone. Many Mohács residents confessed to us that the legend probably wasn’t true. One drunk Buso told us the “real” Buso connection with Mohács Island: once upon a time—before anyone lived on the island, before dad’s car—young couples used to go there to get it on.

Still, the story of the Terrified Turks lives on. The Busos carry weapons to drive away the Turks—and by extension, winter, death and oppression.

The idea of Busos socking it to The Man survives in other ways, too. Here’s a poster of a buso beating up Hungarian PM Gyurcsany:



Staffs. Many people told us that these are just for decoration, but some staffs hint at a more universal symbolism (modest readers avert your eyes):



Water-Carrier. This is a yoke with hooks to hang water buckets from. In the old days, when the Busos used to go door to door bringing good luck to houses, they carried this with them. If a buso entered a house and handed the water-carrier to a young lady, it meant one of his masked brothers wanted to marry her.


Baby buso. When a buso carries a buso doll, it means he has a baby boy and is asking for the community’s blessing. It can also mean that the buso is married and hoping for a child. Our friend Árpád just became the proud father of his first child, a baby boy, three weeks ago:

In the Maskmaker's Workshop

On Carnival Monday, I interviewed maskmaker Englert Antal in his Mohács workshop. Since Antal only speaks Hungarian, his lovely director/actress/storyteller wife translated into French for him. I’m not even close to fluent in French, so I was amazed that I understood as much as I did.

Antal explained how at many points in history, the buso tradition almost died out. Sometimes it was outlawed by the church; sometimes other carnival activities like balls nearly wiped it out. But the greatest change in the Mohacs carnival, Antal claims, came with the invention of photography and film. “Organizers of films” started journeying to Mohacs to record the Carnival. The buso tradition flourished in the spotlight, but also transformed. The masks became more elaborate, more exotic. The town began to organize exclusively tourist-oriented events. Antal thinks that Mohacs is at the very beginning of a buso renaissance, as busos begin to rediscover the roots of their own carnival. Here’s are some excerpts from our (translated) conversation.

“Everyone is interested in making masks. It is something mystic, something out of the everyday. The work is easy, it’s not hard to learn. The hard thing is to truly understand this festival, why we keep it, why we hold it. It is not hard to make the mask, it is hard to understand the mask, the ideas behind the mask. In Mohacs you will find 17 or 18 different mask makers. They know the mask but they don’t understand the spirituality of the mask. You see these masks, they are not pretty. The mask is not supposed to be pretty, not supposed to be well-made, well-crafted. It is made to have power for the person that wears it.” […]



“Socialism didn’t change the buso tradition because it is a primitive tradition, it has no ideology. It said that men could change their normal personalities. And men always want to change into something else, men always have something they want to escape. The roots of the carnival never changed—it’s something very primitive, very human, the idea of transforming into something else. Other carnivals are about putting on fancy clothes and having a good time. In Mohacs, Carnival is something more—something older, more important.”



"We have two words in Hungarian that illustrate the difference. There’s álarc and maszk. An álarc is a normal mask. You could wear it as a disguise, or as a costume for the theater. It could be for a party, or a decoration for your house. Like the carnival masks from Venice. They are very well-made, and pretty, and original. You put them on to amuse yourself and other people. It is not religious. A maszk is something much more. An álarc changes the outside of the person who wears it; the maszk changes the inside. The purpose of the maszk is to transform the wearer into something else."

(Antal shows me a book of photographs of “primitive” masks, animal masks, cave paintings of men disguised as animals.) “We can say that the animal mask is the origin of the buso mask—like a totem. This is a very old religious idea, taking on an animal spirit, becoming a fusion of man and animal. Of course the question for us here is, why did the form of the mask change in Mohács, why did it become human? The clothes, the instruments stayed the same, but the form of the mask changed when the Sokacs came to this area. I have my theories about this, but no one knows for sure…”

“The mask has power—it gives you power—a power that is a little more than human. If I put on the mask, I have more power, I take the power of the mask into me. By the way, here is another difference between buso masks and other carnival masks. Every man in the world is different, and every buso mask is different. And the buso mask should be connected to the man who wears it, to share his features, share something of his spirit. That’s why I sculpt each mask individually, for a specific person—except of course those masks that are for tourists or museums or something. If I make a mask for a man here, I try to capture a small part of him. “



“The mask is always made of one piece of wood. It’s always a human, always a man. Traditionally the mask is always red, a variation of red. Why? Red symbolizes life—the color of blood. What do the Busos do? They bring the resurgence of life, the rebirth of spring. Red is the color of perpetual rebirth. There aren’t other mask colors—just black and white. You never see a green mask, or an orange mask.”

“The form of the eyes and the mouth are symbolic—it’s the form of the female sex. The horns are masculine. And here you have the duality in the buso—man and woman. The buso wears women’s stockings, men’s pants. This is very old symbolism, very deep, hardly anyone knows it anymore. The gap tooth in the busos’ smile? That’s practical, for drinking or smoking or spitting. You know a buso should never take off his mask.”



“The power in the mask, the transformation of the man in the mask—this is why the buso has always been a man. He is something like a shaman, or like a religious actor in the ancient Greek theater. The shaman is something in between the men and the gods, a link between these two worlds. The buso is something similar. And this is also why children, who cannot understand this, should not be busos. In the past, putting on the buso mask was a rite of passage—there is a moment in life where men put on the mask.”



“But this is not to say that women should not participate, that women have no role. All the traditions of man speak of life, of rebirth, the changes of nature. There isn’t a difference, there’s no difference between men and women in this way. Everyone must participate in renewing the world, in bringing the world back to life. For women the easiest way to participate is to change their sex, to put on men’s clothes... During carnival everyone can do anything they want. Women also can do anything. They don’t have to be a good wife—they can amuse themselves with another man. In the past, during carnival a woman did not have to cook for her husband, she can go where she wants, meet who she wants, spend time with who she wants, do what she wants—but only in a costume. And if she has a child that is not by her husband conceived during this time, no one can question her. “

“What is this tradition really about? For the Sokacs people, you have to understand, a small group, away from their homeland. During this time, you make babies. It doesn’t matter with who. Because what is carnival about after all, what is all this renewal, this fertility, what is life about—it’s about children, not just about spring, but also about life, human life, continuing and renewing. It’s about the continuation, the survival of this tiny group of people, because it’s a such a tiny group, a little minority, separate from other people, they could disappear so easily—and they had to continue their traditions, continue their existence. For them it was a question of survival, not a question of ethics. To survive the past. To fight through the winter. And this is important for all people. “

“In the past this was the question; it’s no longer the question today. But the mask contains its history, hidden inside, it carries its history. The men of today search for this secret, but they don’t know its roots.”

“The man in the mask makes contact with the world of the spirit, and brings it into our world, to renew life, to bring the world back to life. And our rules, our laws, they are only little, human laws. The spirit is too big for them. Life is bigger. So we forget rules during this time. The busos today feel that during these three days they are something more than they are in normal life—that there are no rules for them—this is the secret of the carnival’s survival. Men always have the same wish to live. That is why the carnival can never be forbidden, because the wish exists.”

Carnival Time Part II: Do a Little Dance

Post Prelude:
I love carnival. I love the idea of a time when all life’s normal rules are suspended: a vacation from order, from responsibility, from accountability, from moderation.

We spent this carnival in Mohács, Hungary, home of the Busojárás carnival. Busojárás originally came here with the Slavic Sokacs people, and has roots in ancient Slavic paganism. But unlike other Slavic carnivals, Busojárás does not feature animal masks. Here and only here the masks (“busos”) are humans with horns, wooly hair all over, and no self-control.


Do a Little Dance, Make a Little Love, Get Down Tonight
The busos are an embodiment of life-force, of spring, of fertility. So they’re given free reign to grab any girl—or guy, or buso—and hug them, grab them, try to kiss them, etc. You often see them come up on either side of some dishy girl and grind on her while their cow-bells clang. It sounds creepy but it’s totally charming; never aggressive, and always welcome. They steer clear of girls who look cranky, and aren’t above grabbing guys or grandmothers either.




Of course music and dance are part and parcel of the festival. Everyone dances the kolo, a Sokacs circle dance. These musicians—apparently Mohács’ most in-demand—were at every carnival event we went to.

The guy on the extreme right proposed to me after I managed to pick out the “super-duper” kolo on his guitar.


Once only Sokacs men could be Busos. That rule was forgotten long ago; today everyone in the city wants to be a Buso. There are tons of masked kids—to the dismay of those who take the buso tradition seriously and see it as a rite of passage for young men. I even saw a couple girls and one old woman suited up as Busos.



Other Troublemakers
Other girls have their own traditional costumes and their own masks—and almost as much freedom as Busos. One girl pointed her cane straight at Rick’s crotch and chased him!


Boys who would rather chase girls than kiss them have another costume; the jankele. Jankeles dress up in rags and chase men and women around the streets with flour-filled socks. Apparently this figure is based on a real person, a famously cranky Jewish leather merchant who lived in Mohács during the 19th century.


Carnival Time
On the big tourist day, Carnival Sunday, Busos parade from Kolo Square to the main square by the church. There’s the sinking of the Carnival coffin and a bonfire at night, where a strawman is burned on top of the giant bonfire. Busos and locals and tourists join hands to dance kolo in a circle around the fire.



By Carnival Monday, the tourists are long gone. We spent the morning with maskmaker Englebert Antal (more on him later) and the afternoon following a group of busos as they went door to door in Kolo Ter. Once, Busos used a plow a bit of a farmer’s field and bury a bit of cinder for a good crop. Then they headed to the stable and hit the farmer’s animals to “protect them from illness.” None of the houses in Kolo Ter have animals or fields anymore, but the door-to-door tradition was recently revived. At each house where they stopped, the busos were offered hot wine, palinka, homemade donuts, cookies and other sweets. The busos danced kolo.

Sometimes they plowed a little bit, sometimes they horsed around and destroyed the lawn furniture.




Carnival Tuesday is strictly for locals.

The whole town turns out—this time with 90% less tourists and 250% more booze. The busos show off for each other, not the cameras.

The guys from Boros Kolo had reached their apex of goodwill towards man. Here’s what happened when they played the old “try this garlic-chili pepper palinka” trick on Rick.



We wanted to stay for the final bonfire, the burning of the carnival coffin, the official end of winter—but our bus left just as the fire was lit. I slept exhausted as we drove the frozen backroads back to Budapest, dreaming of spring spreading silently over the dark fields.