Germany - Munich - Dirndls and Ledenhosen and Bier, Achtung!

Short version:



We drank a lot of beer.

Long version:

We passed a quiet time on our train to Munich, in silent contemplation of the challenge that lay ahead: Oktoberfest. Little did we know at that time just how grand the challenge would be... upon joining the rest of our party (Trevor, Bronwyn, Chad, Ryan, Taylor and Greg), we were informed of the goal: 8 people, 4 days, 100L of beer. We scoffed but committed to try our best.

Our first beer excursion was to Hofbrauhaus, the famous biergarten located in downtown Munich, where we had our first introduction to the Bavarian norms of beerdrinking. A full litre of 6.5 per cent alcohol specially brewed Oktoberfest beer (1 of 6 official beers) is plunked down before your eyes by a dirndl-sporting bar wench, who then slides a fat crackled pork knuckle (don't look for the vegetables, they have fled the city) almost onto your lap to accompany your drink, while in the background, the lederhosen-clad oompah bandmen warm up the crowd with a rousing rendition of the beer drinking anthem of Munich, Ein Prosit, which has the entire hall standing on the benches hollering along and clanking litres together, beer sloshing everywhere.



(Also, please note the complete normalcy of running around town in the traditional costumes of lederhosen and dirndls. No one even bats an eyelash, since more than half of any crowd you encounter is thusly attired. Note: it is not cheap fashion, with dirndls running about 100 Euros, and lederhosen at 200 Euros.)

We scored ourselves a table at the prestigious Augustiner beer tent on the Oktoberfest grounds at Theresienwiese and spent 9am-4pm on a nice Friday afternoon blowing second hand smoke out of our faces, consuming 3+ litres of Augustiner and multiple hendls (chicken roasted on a spit), pretending to know the words to Ein Prosit, which went from being played once every few hours to every twenty minutes in the afternoon, making friends with Germans who didn't speak English, participating in dance-a-long songs involves a swimming motion kind of like a German YMCA song, and generally enjoying ourselves. We had one casualty in our ranks, who bowed out for the rest of the afternoon after getting sick but rallied and rejoined us for late dinner and drinks that night (yes, beer was consistently consumed over the four days, and not just at the beer tents of the Oktoberfest fair grounds).



We did sneak a little culture into our visit. We did the free walking tour of Munich (nowhere near as good as the one in Berlin!), learning about a range of history of the city, from Hitler's failed effort to take Munich and the Nazi resistance movement to the stealing of the airport's May Pole by the local police to embarrass airport security. We also went to a soccer game between Paderborn and Munich, where we were suitably impressed with the range of cheering chants and routines of all the fans.



At one point, they were shouting something in German that sounded a lot like "She needs a washcloth!", which is probably not an accurate translation. My favourite is when the two sides of the stadium alternated shouting the same thing in German at each other. I think it was the equivalent of "You suck!", "No, YOU suck!".

Final tally was between 75-80L of beer for the whole group. Beer champions Chad and Trevor had at least 15L each. Margaux pulled off more than 5L and I managed 6.5L. All in all, we had a blast, but we were definitely were ready to give our livers a little breathing space in Budapest!

Our organizer and beer champ Chad also made a commemorative video of our adventures (3 parts).