North Baltimore

. Hampden's premiere attraction, bringing in suburbanites all throughout December, is the Miracle on 34th Street in Hampden—an out of control Christmas decorations bonanza, all just on one block of 34th. Strands of lights are strewn across the street from house to house, plastic and inflatable reindeer wander the lawns, and the glare from the displays turns the night sky orange. Over the top or not, it really is magical and worth whatever difficulty you have in getting here. Traffic around this block in December approaches a stasis, in which cars may approach or leave, but the ones in the center may not ever move.

Baby New Years

New Years viewed through the warped lens of Baltimore's funkiest neighborhood approaches the bizarre in a way that any John Waters fan would recognize. The lights are still up on 34th St, and the block is packed with people waiting to see the ball drop and the "appearance" of Baby New Years. The ball is a lighted ball that someone somehow rigged up with a garage door opener to fall down a lamppost at midnight; "Baby New Years" is a large forty-something mustachioed man wearing nothing but a bonnet and a diaper, who comes out of his house to thunderous applause at the dawn of the new year.

honfest

along 36th St the Avenue. 14-15 July 2009. Hampden's big neighborhood celebration, which grew over the past fourteen years from a little pageant created by a few eccentrics on a lark to a major city festival that draws even international visitors. The "hon" is a certain local style of lady that developed in the early 1960s, featuring dresses with flamboyant prints, very large and brightly colored horn-rimmed glasses, spandex pants, leopard pants, heavy eye-shadow, and as-tall-as-possible beehive hairdos. If you have seen Hairspray in any of its incarnations, you know what the Baltimore hon looks like. The name itself comes from a shortening of "honey," used as a friendly way of saying "mam." This widespread usage reportedly came from desegregation, when white Baltimoreans wanted to evade calling black men and women a more formal "sir" and "mam." Today, Honfest is full of hons in full costume or just their everyday hon look, and features two main events—the crowning of "Miss Hon," success in which depends on your look, and your participation in the second event—the Running of the Hons. If you want to be a hon for the day, fret not, you can get your makeup and beehive do right on site during the festivities.