As soon as we arrived in Munich, we tried to follow the city tour, but hunger became overwhelming for me and 5 other ladies in the group, so we set out to find some food. We ended up finding a restaurant that served food from all over the world. As bad as this may have been, I ordered off the American portion of the menu. Honestly, I could've eaten a horse and a chicken burger never sounded so sweet. (This chicken burger ended up being the best-tasting chicken burger I'd ever had. No regrets followed its consumption.)
We left the over-populated restaurant to wander around and do a little random shopping. Now, I've never been to Munich before, but I don't expect that it's this way year-round: every shop we stopped at looked like Christmas shopping on steroids. I don't know how else to describe it. Never have I had to push my body through huge crowds in order to exit a store. Don't even get me started on how crowded H&M was.
Eventually we made our way to the side of town where Oktoberfest was. I could tell we were getting closer from all the ridiculous hats more and more people seemed to be wearing. They had hats that looked like mugs of beer, barrels of beer with spouts, and another that looked like the sorting hat from Harry Potter. I have to admit, there was a part of me that wanted some kind of hat. In addition to the hats, I saw more lederhosen and dirndels than one would at a German Halloween party. It was cold that day--I don't know how those girls did it. Those dresses are cute, but they sure aren't warm!
Eventually I decided that it was time to consume a little beer. I don't like beer, but even I think it'd be an awful shame to be at THE Oktoberfest and not have at least one. We headed for the nearest beer hall and waited in a highly uncomfortable line for about 45 minutes before we got inside. (It wasn't so much a line as a crowd of people heaving forward every time the door opened to allow a couple more people inside.) Once we were inside, I saw what Oktoberfest is supposed to look like. First of all, the hall was much bigger than it looked from the outside. It was very well-decorated (typical Bavarian blue and white dominated the scene), but what was so shocking was what I was expecting all along: the sight of people. There must've been close to 3,000 people crammed in there. Most of these people were standing, not only on their benches, but on top of the tables, swinging around drunkenly as they sang along to American cover songs. We tried to find a place to sit, but we eventually gave up and left. While we searched, however, I found myself in between all of these benches with these thousands of crazy people. At first I was afraid of having beer spilled all over me (everyone was waving their mugs of beer right over my head) but then I honestly felt unsafe. I wasn't sure of what exactly, but I think I was the first one who wanted to leave.
Police and security were everywhere. Earlier in the day we saw 5 fire trucks in a row speeding to some scene we couldn't see. Within the beer hall, I noticed paramedics. I saw the stretcher first, but these medics were actually working. I don't know what happened, but someone was "down" the whole time we were in there. I could still tell after we made our way to the other side of the hall because everyone standing around this person on the floor (with about 5-6 paramedics surrounding him) was looking at him like he just died. I don't think he actually did, but, honestly, I wouldn't be surprised. Things were that crazy.
After we got out of there, we headed to a large stand that was selling beer. This felt much safer--because it was. I went up to the woman working and asked her "Welche Bier ist sussest?" which means "Which beer is the sweetest?" She said "weissbier" (white beer). I had the option of getting it with lemon (sprite maybe?) or coke. I chose the lemon. I don't really like beer, but I wouldn't mind some more of that! They charged 5 Euros for the beer and 3 for the glass. If I brought the glass back, they'd give me my 3 Euros back...but I decided to keep the glass. I don't think they actually wanted you to do this, but I didn't feel like giving back the nice glass from which I drank my first and only beer and the most famous fair in the world. As I type, it sits beside my computer--almost a trophy.
After that beer and some kartoffelsuppe (potato soup), we made our way to the subway to get back to the Hauptbahnhof (head train station). By this point, it was around 9pm. There were so many people flooding into the station, there were security guards at every subway train entrance controlling how many people got onto each train. These sets of trains came about every 30 seconds. People were so nuts--when we finally boarded one, there was a man (I hope he was drunk, otherwise he was just ludicrous) who pushed one of the security guards into the side of the subway train. I just wanted to get back to Salzburg at that point.
When we got to the train station, we had a while till our train was going to leave. This meant that we had time to go to the bathroom. Walking through the train station, I saw the remnants of Oktoberfest. You can tell when one is just sleeping, and when one is completely passed out. Well, I saw people face-down on the sides of walkways in the station, passed out from earlier activities. There were people everywhere, and hardly anyone (who was the least bit conscious) looked as if they were having any fun. (They were probably hung over from starting to drink at 9am.)
Eventually....eventually....we made it back to Salzburg. I was deliriously tired. Everything was funny. I suppose I may as well have been drunk too. My day ended as I dove head-first for my pillow 19 hours since it last laid there. Without a second thought, I was dreaming of foamy beer, dirndels, and how great my boyfriend would look in a pair of lederhosen.
Until next time,
Hillary
1 comment:
Travis in lederhosen? Really?
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