2/26/2003. Residents of Nice take to the streets...

A battle raged in the streets of Nice on the sunny Côte d'Azur last weekend--a battle of flowers! The Bataille des Fleurs is the Niçoise way of opening the Mardi Gras festivities...but it's repeated twice more during the following week, just for good measure.


Like the New Orleans Mardi Gras parade, the battle of flowers has floats (chars). But these floats are huge, intricate, rolling floral fantasies, constructed of literally tons of fresh flowers. And instead of pelting onlookers with plastic beads, as is done in New Orleans, the beautiful girls (and a few gorgeous men) on the floats pelt their adoring audience with blossoms.











Each float rides into battle with heaps of artillery--literally, mountains of freshly cut golden yellow mimosa blossoms and carnations, both fragrant. There are free flowers for all, as cartloads of honey-scented mimosa branches are all over the place. "Servez-vous!, encouraged an official when I plunged my nose into one of them.






However, unlike the New Orleans Mardi Gras parade, the crowd at the Nice Bataille des Fleurs is well-behaved, remaining obediently behind the barricades. Drinking is put off until 'aperos', the aperitifs that are the French equivalent of our happy hour. But like all such events, this one has a queen. One truly feels appropriate addressing her as 'Your Highness' since she is wearing a sort of magical, rolling dress that makes her seem about 25 feet tall. But queenliness doesn't keep our Reine des Fleurs from joining in battle with everyone else. She has an assistant who keeps her supplied with flowers with which to pelt her subjects from on high.



Meanwhile, Denis was having the time of his life. He had been given a press pass (as my assistant!), and he was loving all the privileges granted the press in France. "Policemen are smiling at me!" he nearly shouted in excitement. But it got better. Since he had the camera, the gorgeous girls on every float were smiling at him too. I don't want to tell you how many of those I had to sort through as I selected the photos for this postcard. And needless to say, I deleted the waist-down shot he took of a very shapely derrière in a sequined miniskirt! Yes, Denis got a little carried away with his press pass...

But back to serious journalism, the kind that's worthy of a press pass. The Bataille des Fleurs was created in 1876 and took place along the seaside Promenade des Anglais, just as it does today. Originally conceived as a spectacle for European tourists of the period and consisting of a simple exchange of flowers, it evolved into today's complex spectacle. Its purpose also evolved from a mere tourist spectacle into a celebration in honor of Nice's local fresh flower producers and the producers of blossoms for the perfume industry in the surrounding area.

The flower-bedecked chars are stunningly beautiful. We're not talking just carnations and chrysanthemums here, but a rich and stunning variety of orchids, roses, gerberas, lilies, callas, snapdragons, anemones, and almost every other hothouse flower you can think of. Each of the 20 floats requires between 4,000 and 5,000 fresh flower stems. Artificial is not allowed. Two or three models ride each float, throwing around 60 pounds of blossoms into the audience a piece. When you consider that the Bataille des Fleurs is enacted three times during the first week of Mardi Gras, this adds up to lots of flowers!



Like any good Mardi Gras spectacle, the Bataille des Fleurs includes humor as well as glamour. A group of about 8 of these 'pot-heads' strolled sedately down the parade way as if they were walking home from church. Their cunning head gear revealed several tiny holes peirced over each eye which, invisible at a distance of over 10 feet, allowed the inhabitants of the pots to see. Much wilder were what I'm going to call the "Butt Sisters", whose hugely overstuffed hips reminded me of a skit during the old days of Saturday Night Live. They teetered down the street in enormous platform shoes and made ludicrously sexy moves on the audience.



Contingents from 20 different nations participated as well, including an incredible battalion from Belgium on increasingly higher stilts, ranging toward 25 feet tall for the men in the back. Many northern Italian groups were there (the Italian frontier is less than an hour away) in traditional dress, children marching solemnly with their elders.

All participants--folklorical, funny, or glamorous--had one thing in common: they smiled happily and threw flowers to the onlookers. When supplies of this gentle 'ammo' began to be exhausted, to the delight of the audience, the float riders started dismantling the floats. Toward the end, onlookers were requisitioning certain blossoms (some of which would have cost 20 euros in a florist's shop. I saw one pretty girl smilingly point to flower after flower in the lavish arrangement behind her, until she got the one that an onlooker was gesturing toward. She plucked it out, and threw it to her well-wisher.

Watching all this gentle fun, I turned to Denis and said, "This is really the "old Europe," isn't it?" And we acknowledged we both felt proud to be a part of it, as we watched thousands of people disperse toward their homes, their arms laden with huge bouquets of flowers.

For information on the date of next year's Bataille des Fleurs and other Carnaval festivities in Nice, go to www.nicecarnaval.com and www.nicetourisme.com, or email to info@nicecarnaval.com or communication@nicetourisme.com. Bleacher seats cost 20 euros per person, and may be reserved by mail or Internet after November 1 of 2003 for the festivities of 2004.

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