New Orleans Mardi Gras: Beads, masks, floats & an extravaganza like no other

Known for its spectacular parades, floats, marching bands, throws, and King cake, Mardi Gras is the biggest celebration in New Orleans.

In New Orleans for the Mardi Gras, I, surely, wasn’t ready for the mad ride and ceaseless exhilaration. Think 250 million beads being tossed around randomly. Edible underwear as souvenirs. Men in tutu wearing beaded brassieres over their frayed tees. Women with embellished coconuts, gigantic feather headgears, and even tiny dustbins tucked in their wigged bouffants. Ear-shattering music in street corners. A group of Marie Antoinettes dressed in her signature uncomfortable hoop skirts. A lithe woman in crocodile mask and a wagging scaly tail dangling out of her sequinned leggings. A beer called Huge Ass poured in the tankard shaped like a lady’s derriere. Thousands of people yelling Throw Me Something, Mister, begging float riders and balcony huggers to throw beads, doubloons, stuffed plush throws, beer koozies, footballs, plastic cups, homemade trinkets, and toy. Even coconuts and goblets. And the much-needed toilet papers that can come in handy in a Fleur de Pee.

The first recorded Mardi Gras parade in New Orleans took place on February 24, 1857.(Preeti Verma Lal)

Members of the Maria Antoinette Club at the Greasing of the Poles in Royal Sonesta New Orleans.(Preeti Verma Lal)

A woman greasing the poles with Vaseline.(Preeti Verma Lal)

The extravaganza of Mardi Gras:

Lost in the purple-green-yellow-wearing madding crowd of humans and dogs, I surely hadn’t learnt my lessons. I knew not the art of catching a throw listed by Vincent Spear in his 1969 pamphlet, Techniques of Mardi Gras Throw-Catching; or, How to Ruin a $50 Sport Coat to Catch a 10¢ Necklace. Or, how to Power Pee and hover to urinate as listed in an erudite pee-website that teaches revellers the best ways to pee during the Mardi Gras - I had listened to the local artist Benny Grunch’s hilarious lyrical no-bathroom take on Ain’t No Place to Pee on Mardi Gras Day. I neither knew how to rent a balcony for the best viewing spot in town. Nor stratagem to keep drunken revellers from climbing a pole.

To know more about the spectacular floats, visit Mardi Gras World.(Preeti Verma Lal)

“Use Vaseline. Grease the Poles.” A stranger spewed drunken dope. “It works,” the Vaseline propounder insisted. I didn’t but the Royal Sonesta New Orleans knows the goodness of Vaseline. Greasing the Poles, the hotel’s annual event, began as a practical means of preventing overzealous revellers from climbing the hotel’s support poles to their tony balconies. Over the years, greasing has transformed into a celebrity-studded, music-filled spectacle that marks the official kickoff to Mardi Gras weekend.

Vue Orleans is the best place to know more about the history of Mardi Gras & see a few ‘throw’ artefacts.(Preeti Verma Lal)

In New Orleans, greasing isn’t dreary. Three women in barely-there outfits and HaSizzle, the King of Bounce in a not-so-pretty velvety cape were competing for the sought-after title of 2025 Greasing Champion. They picked huge jars of Vaseline to grease. Grease more. And man, they greased the pole coquettishly to the accompaniment of the crowd’s orchestra of lustful oohs & aahs. The woman in lime green won - she wiped the Vaseline off her hands and waved her still-greasy hands.

A Mardi Gras Masque Bal hosted by Kevin Kelly, owner of Houmas House and Gardens.(Preeti Verma Lal)

Swathed in the New Orleans Mardi Gras madness, I forgot to peep into history and etymology. The first recorded Mardi Gras parade in New Orleans took place on February 24, 1857, that was led by the Mistick Krewe of Comus, a secret society of New Orleans businessmen. Mardi Gras is literally ‘fat Tuesday’ in French, alluding to the last day of feasting before the fast of Lent. The official slogan of the Mardi Gras for Mardi Gras is Laissez les bons temps roule (Let the good times roll). The throwing of trinkets and treats predates the Carnival itself. The ancient Romans distributed whips made of goat hide to the merry crowds at the conclusion of Lupercalia, the early forerunner to the Carnival celebration we know today. One of the earliest surviving examples of ‘throwing’ in new Orleans are Japanese mercury glass beads, made during World War II, and the early 20th century marked the arrival of painted walnuts and, later, painted coconuts from the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure.

The early 20th century marked the arrival of painted walnuts and, later, painted coconuts from the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure. These two coconuts are displayed in Vue Orleans.(Preeti Verma Lal)

During the Mardi Gras, finding an inch amidst the revellers can be quite a feat. I edged, nudged, jostled the costumed revellers to find this Mardi Gars’ Rex (king) - Howell Crosby and Queen Tatum Reiss. Or, Shaquille O'Neal who reigned as Bacchus LVI. I couldn’t. I meandered through the posse of men coaxing feathered-women to throw beaded brassieres and edible underwear to find the spectacular floats. I walked inside Mardi Gras World, the largest float designing and building facility in the world where more than 80% of the floats that journey down New Orleans' streets during the Carnival season are designed and built. Begun in 1947 by float designer and builder Blaine Kern, Mardi Gras World is a colossal warehouse filled with floats. Everything is oversized. Everything colourful. Everything styrofoam. From Elvis Presley to King Kong, Cleopatra with cheetahs, Yoda, peacocks and pirates, to leggy women and dancing men. So big is Mardi Gras World that it is difficult to believe that the history of Kern Studios dates back to 1932, when the first mule-drawn float was built on the back of a garbage wagon. Also read | Mardi Gras countdown begins: New Orleans kicks off carnival season with streetcar rides and festive parades

Mardi Gras ends on Fat Tuesday, a day before the beginning to Lent in Christian tradition.(Preeti Verma Lal)

That night, it was my turn to sit on the green narrow benches of the Grandstand Viewing Access at Gallier Hall to watch the floats led by New Orleans’s iconic brass bands to walk down Lafayette Street. In the milling crowd, the trumpets, trombones, saxophones and sousaphones added funk to the roar of the uptown flock. In the dark night, the Krewe of Endymion, one of the largest parades in New Orleans strutted by. Founded in 1966 and named after Endymion from Greek mythology, it is one of only three Super Krewes (using floats and celebrity Grand Marshals) during Mardi Gras. What an extravaganza!

New Orleans Mardi Gras is now a $1 billion industry.(Preeti Verma Lal)

Two days before Fat Tuesday, I had a slim chance of being on the Bacchus Float with Shaquille O Neal reigning as its celebrity monarch. The Krewe of Bacchus has arranged a 48-inch wide and about 8 feet tall throne for the 7-ft tall o’Neal. Shaq will throw the best throws - around 250,000 doubloons embossed with his face, and 1,000 basketballs. Bacchus, Shaq and I at the New Orleans Mardi Gras? I surely wasn’t ready for this, either.