Oktoberfest!
On our first 3 day weekend of the year, 21 of us decided to make the trek up to Munich, Germany to visit Oktoberfest. 18 of us got sleeper compartments for the train that left Florence at 9:45pm on Thursday night, after everyone had finished classes for the week. In my couchette was Alex, Mara, Kaycie, Courtney, and West. We all had an amazing time as we were right next door to the other two Pepperdine couchettes. We played games and told stories for way too long, and were a bit too loud too late. After that we all went to bed, only to wake up at 6:15 the next morning, as the train reached Munich at 6:30. The groups of 6 or so split up and went their own ways at this point. West had a friend of a friend in Munich, whom he had called earlier, so he picked us up at the train station after we had got a quick bite to eat, and took us to his flat. It was amazing. We had the whole upper floor of an apartment building to ourselves. I was planning on spending the night in the train station as we were in Munich for Oktoberfest which meant that staying at a hotel or hostel would have been pretty much impossible. There were 5 rooms that we had for our use, including a kitchen and yoga studio. After dropping off our stuff and freshening up a bit, we walked over to the Mercedes building. It was some sort of mix between a dealership and a museum. There was every type of Mercedes and Smart car imaginable. We got to get inside 100,000 euro plus cars and see how they worked, we got to get inside Smart cars, which are actually pretty roomy from the inside. It was a great way to start the day, and something that one typically wouldn’t do when in Munich for such a short period of time.
(Me inside the quite roomy soccer model of the Smart Cars)
(Alex and Courtney playing on some of the Yoga equipment in our house)After touring the place, we walked back in the direction of the flat and called Marcus (West’s connection and a local), so he came over and gave us a tour of Munich in his BMW which was awesome. Compared to Italy, Munich was very, very clean and well organized. It was something like a cross between a typical European city and American city. We saw the BMW equivalent to the Mercedes building we had visited, saw a palace, saw the soccer stadium, and then headed to the city center. There, Marcus walked us around the pedestrian shopping zones and we had a Bavarian lunch at an amazing restaurant in the city center. I had bratwurst and sauerkraut with a beer. It was so amazing, and the portions were huge. After the quite long yet enjoyable lunch, we decided to head over to the Oktoberfest. We still had the car, so Marcus drove us as close to the festival as he could and then dropped us off. From there, we walked about two blocks amidst crowds of people before coming to the entrance of Oktoberfest. We stopped took pictures of the entry, and then headed into the crowded mini-city that is Oktoberfest.
(Me, Alex, and West at the entrance to Oktoberfest)After looking around and trying to take in the sight of an amusement park devoted solely to beer, we headed to the Lowenbrau tent in hopes of finding a table. We didn’t have any luck there as it was very crowded and they were not letting anyone inside without a reservation. We then went to the Paulaner tent, where we were able to get inside without too much difficulty. Finding a table was another story. We tried to sit at several empty ones but were immediately kicked out because we did not have a reservation. This was a problem as they only served beer at the tables. We then went to find some people to buy beer for us. Originally we thought we would be able to find Americans the easiest, but it turned out that the Italians were the easiest ones to seek out. The were the loudest, drunkest, and most abundant at the festival. So, we found a group of Italians who ordered us our first liter of beer which was amazing.
(West and Me with our first liter of Paulaner in the tent)We talked with them and got to sit with them while drinking the beer and taking in the atmosphere. There was a band playing in the middle of a huge tent with thousands of people drinking and singing in many different languages. Occasionally we would see someone being rushed outside or hear the sounds of breaking glass, but for the most part, it was the music of the band of the soccer chants of the Italians that provided the noise. West, Alex, and I finished the first liter after about a half hour and took a bit of time before ordering another. I got a huge pretzel to go with this beer as it had been a while since we had eaten, and it was a huge and amazing pretzel. We took longer with these beers as it was our second liter, plus what we had had at lunch.
(Me with my giant pretzel and second liter of beer)
(Courtney, Me, West, and Alex with our beers)
(A look at about half of the tent. The band is on the platform in the upper-right hand corner)We talked to the Italians, sang some and just really enjoyed ourselves for about four hours total in that tent. I finished the second liter first, and shortly after that, West and Alex toasted to their last drinks of their liters, but never got to take them as their toast shattered their very heavy and sturdy steins. Marcus had told us that it was nearly impossible to break the steins, so we thought them breaking theirs was pretty cool. After that, we went outside and looked for a bratwurst stand to get some dinner at. We found one without any difficulty and had the best bratwurst of my life while watching all the lights come on at the park and watching people in all different states of sobriety, or lack of. It was only about 8:00, but since we got up early after an night without much sleep, we decided to head back home. We stopped by the cathedral in Munich on the way, and from there, West, Alex, Mara, and Kaycie took the subway back to the house while Courtney and I walked. It turned out to be about a twenty minute walk which was not bad at all. We all made it back to the house and went to bed not too long after that.
I was the first to get up the next morning, so I read some Italian as I have a ton still to do, and then went out to find some breakfast. I walked around the corner to a pastry store and noticed that there was a very long line of Germans waiting there, so I decided to check it out. I got a pastry that was amazing, went to the grocery store for some milk and water and then headed back home to find the others just getting up. After everyone got ready I took them back to the pastry store and then we were off to the city center to have a look around. We walked around the center much more today, taking in churches, monuments and a ton of shops up until lunch time.
(A church with belltower in Munich's city center)Then we headed back to Oktoberfest, which was even more crowded today than it had been last night. We got another bratwurst for lunch and then West, Alex and I went off to the Lowenbrau tent while the girls headed home to look around the area of our house and have a more peaceful afternoon. Us guys found some Italians sitting out on the patio of the tent and got a beer with them. We drank about 3/4 of it with them and then walked out with the rest and headed back home, each with our own steins. Before I went, pretty much everyone had told me that it was fun for several hours but not at all after that. I didn’t find this true. I loved every second of it, sure it was crowded and I did see a ton of people throw up all over the place, but it was a lot of fun, and remarkably peaceful considering all the alcohol and different nationalities present. Like I said, the Italians were by far the loudest and most abundant, in fact, I’m pretty sure I heard and spoke more Italian this weekend that I heard German.
(A look down the river and a park that runs alongside it)
(Alex, West, Courtney and me infront of the river.)We left Oktoberfest and met up with the girls and then called Marcus. We met him and his boss, Christian at a bar around the corner for a goodbye drink which turned into another amazing meal. Christian is apparently some sort of big shot in Munich as he knew everyone in this bar and we got amazing treatment. We had a meal of every kind of meat imaginable and rice with more beer. We talked to Marcus and Christian, told them our stories from the weekend and tried to convey how thankful we were to them for helping us out as much as they did. Partly because of them, we had the best weekend at Oktoberfest hands down. After dinner, Marcus drove us to the station and we got on the incredibly crowded train back to Florence. We didn’t reserve a couchette for this ride, so we were in seats, and what was even better, we were split up into a group of 4 and a group of two. Courtney and I sat in the section of 2 while the others were in the next car over. I slept about an hour right away, but was awake for the rest of the 9 hour trip. It was fun to see a bit of the countryside as we traveled through Germany, Switzerland, and then Italy. It would have been more fun had it been light, but it was enjoyable nonetheless.
We all got back to Florence without incident at about 9am this morning and hurried off to Café Liberta to get our breakfast. We stayed there until 10, eating all we wanted and then some before heading back to the villa to shower and tell the tale of our amazing weekend.
More pictures are coming... I forgot about my camera on the train here, the battery was out on the way back, so I've got to wait to get some from others. Before too long, I'll make a post with a bunch of random pictures that I've left out.
posted by Daniel Williams @ 04:16
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