Hi all,
Thought I would write a little post just about my recent few days away in Munich for the start of Oktoberfest, the biggest beer festival in the world - which strangely starts in September...
It began by waking up at 3.30am, for my mate to drive us to Stansted airport. Why you ask? Because flying from Gatwick to Munich is like £350, whilst if we flew from Stansted to Nuremberg then got the train to Munich - it was £65 for train and flights. God this is very exciting so far right :-/
Anyway, had our first pint at 6am at the airport. Standard...at Stansted (guffaw), all pretty non eventful - got over there, and sailed through customs - very efficient (It's just a fact). Had an hour to kill in Nuremberg, so walked round the centre, and what a lovely place! Very cool old buildings and like a castle of sorts... and an Irish bar. Always a fucking Irish bar.
Got on the train, which is an hour to Munich, and what a train!! Was amazing - had like adjustable flap headrest things, footrests, and a bar on the carriage! Very cool. We put a half full bottle of water on the floor at the start of the journey, and by the end it had still stayed upright! That's how gentle the train ride was, very impressive.
Anyway to Munich we arrived, and now the fun sort of begins. My friend and myself got there about 4 hours before our other mate arrived, with the 4th arriving the next day (for his 30th). We had a nice wander around the city, which is also pretty cool. Lovely architecture, old feel as didn't get rebuilt like Berlin, and a great atmosphere.
We did what any 'Brits Abroad' should do, found a bar with a 'hot' barmaid and got 2 Stein's. If you don't know, a Stein is a litre of beer, about 2 pints. You feel tiny when holding one, birds - you'll probably need two hands, but you'll look laddish.
In hindsight, the barmaid was not at all fit. In fact she was horrifically ropey. I let my mate pick, as he's obsessed with being able to perve on women, as has a GF (look but don't touch motto). She was Asian which is why he liked her. Fake tits, and about 50. But still she was pleasant enough and we tucked into some typical Munich cuisine of Sausage, warm potato salad and Sauerkraut . Sauerkraut is horrid over here as we do it weirdly, but there it's really tasty, think it's basically pickled shredded cabbage, and it's great. We had a bit of chat, and a really weird question arose from my mate (he's a bit...I dunno, odd in regards to his opinions.) He said - what's worse, texting an ex or sleeping with someone. I obviously said the latter, and he immediately said I was wrong, and it was the former, because it shows there is still feelings and he couldn't take that. I laughed, perhaps a touch too hysterically as he got very defensive and said he consulted "some people" who all agreed with him. I have a nagging feeling those he consulted had all cheated. He refused to accept my point, and it was just a bit odd. I'm fairly sure if I ran the same 'test' most would surely agree that sleeping with someone was alot worse?! I'd be interested to hear some thoughts on that.
We wandered a bit more and found this amazingly large 'hall' and no it's not the world famous one, that comes later, but just some random one in a park - and inside it was half old school benches and beers type, the other half a fancy cocktail bar but in this HUGE open space. It was quality. Obviously we sat at the bar, and drank Stein's as the classy 'Brits Abroad' we are!
Our mate got in a bit after, met for a beer then went to the hotel. Oh yeah the hotel we booked was a bit cheaper than others we looked at - but it was incredibly nice, except it was SO FAR AWAY. 30 Euro taxi ride later and we arrived. We got some Champers as my mate is obsessed, toasted, drank, listened to 50 Cent on his laptop, and headed out into the night.
We got the taxi driver to take us to a nice decent bar.... he took us to... AN IRISH PUB!! Why when I go abroad would I want to go to a fucking Irish pub?!! I know I don't exactly come across as a cultural hub, but I seriously would prefer something local and not what I could find in every fucking town in the world. Anyway, got in, got a drink, had a laugh, then inexplicably my mate was a moron - bought another bottle of champagne (if he reads this he might kill me), drank about a mouth full then declared he was "bored" and wanted to leave right away. We gave the bottle to a tramp, as no one in the pub would want such a drink, and rather than head on to the next place, he in fact got in a sulk and said everything was boring... so we went home. He went to bed and I got a Chinese with the guy I'd travelled over with. Was very romantic, 2 lads, quite drunk, drinking beers and smashing back a Chow Mein.
If you're still with me, thanks, I wish I was more to the point, I ramble way too much. Anyway next day, woke up, did some boring stuff, got lunch (more Sausage and potatoes and Sauerkraut for me, why change a winning formula!).
We then headed to the place we'd been looking most forward to, the Hofbräuhaus (the Hof from now on) which is basically Munich's permanent beer hall. It's pretty famous and is absolutely HUGE. You go in and just have to find yourself a bench - it's all big benches and huge tables, then you get served by waiters who essentially look out for beerless folk. You drink Stein's (Pussy drinks are available) and can eat some fairly awesome food if you want.
My friend had stated he thought it best we didn't get too drunk to meet the 4th friend at about 8pm at the station, as it was his bday and we were going to some club called Pasha later. We agreed.... but I mean the Hof just has this amazing atmosphere which makes me not really want to leave. Ever.
We were firstly joined on our 8 man table by these 4 old people (ALL types come to Oktoberfest) who were great fun and taught me how to drink a Stein like a G, by doing some weird trick to picking it up, then they got replaced by an Ozzy legend and his 'friend' from Seattle. There was more to that than they were letting on, and I think as the day progressed we tried finding out more. We then had these 2 guys from Amsterdam. One looks SO shady and the other was this huge, ripped, ginger guy. Turns out the shady one is basically a 'pimp' even though he doesn't like the term, he prefers to say that he simply owns 2 houses where he lets girls live with him, has a no drug policy (apart from weed obviously) - to make him feel better I just said perhaps it's better he looks after them than them being on the streets, homeless, raped and taking drugs... a real mood lifting move by me! The big one was a hero, good banter and I think we arm wrestled him at some point, it seemed apt. Then the Ozzy guy/Seattle girl left and were replaced by 3 girls from another table who had some creep asking them weird questions (do you want to taste my dumplings, whilst winkink) - the ginger told him to do one, and we had a proper laugh with them. The girl told me she was tri-sexual. Yep you read that write, Tri-Sexual. She does boys, girls, and trans gender - I think that's what she said, I was quite drunk by then and had plenty of banter - she was from Canada so I made her say "About" alot.
The time came where we had to leave for the station, and we invited them to Pasha, in fact we worked out we invited EVERYONE who was at our table to Pasha, the latter few seeming very keen in fact. We left, walked to the station and met the mate - happy birthday etc, then another 30 Euro cab to the hotel to change - then straight back out - we suggested the fancy bar we'd been to, since it wasn't the other friends idea he deemed it "shit" despite never having gone there, and just made us go straight to the club, so we were the first ones there. Great.
Anyway picked up after a bit, but the music was horrific, this club is fairly "posh" in that Bayern Munich players often go there apparently. Anyway I think the day's events had caught up to us, and we all started leaving around 1, but all separately for some reason, I got chatting to some big bloke in the table next to us who said he was a celeb and a millionaire, and gave me loads of his expensive Moet. It was a bit strange, and he supported Chelsea. I then decided it was time to leave. Got a taxi home, but realised I had no money, so had to make him drop me at a cashpoint where he shouted abuse and threats if I ran off - top bantz
Finally we get to our last day, Oktoberfest day! We woke up fairly hungover, and once 2 mates declared they wouldn't wear Lederhosen, I got in my budget ones - and found out it looked like I was in an AWFUL porn film. They were basically PVC. The German in our group who'd been to Oktoberfest a few times had said he'd never seen such a bad pair of Lederhosen in his life. I eventually opted to rip them up, and tried the others but they were too small, I looked like a hunchback. So I got into normal clothes, leaving just 1 of us in Lederhosen. As we left the hotel it looked like the 3 of us were taking our 'special' friend out for a daytrip and he'd put on his favourite costumer, it was hilarious. Anyway we got there, and my god that Oktoberfest itself is so big! They erect loads of these temporary beer halls, like the Hof, as well as tonnes of rides like a carnival or something. I dunno how many people were there, but it was more than any festival I've been to, perhaps like 300k? I dunno, more? It did mean that getting into a beer tent was very difficult, mostly because we had gone on the 1st official day that Oktoberfest had started! We were hungover, tired, and it was really warm - we walked around for the best part of an hour, saw everything but could not get anywhere. So we decided to find somewhere to get a beer just outside, regroup, then launch an assault later. We came across a pizza place down the road - could see all the crowds coming and going, and got some Steins. Lederhosen Lad said he was at "7%" so in fact decided to go home! The 3 of us remaining actually then said we'll go to a pub to watch the football.
YES THAT'S RIGHT
We went to Oktoberfest, the biggest beer festival in the world, AND COULD NOT GET A BEER. We LITERALLY couldn't manage to arrange a piss up in a brewery! It's so tragic that we've embraced it. What a failure.
Anyway rest of the trip was fun, watched Bayern absolutely destroy Shalke 4-0 away (2nd biggest league rivals) - went back to the Hof and met some characters but not worth discussing, went back to the hotel - and my mate and myself had a rather deep conversation. It's quite uncharacteristic of us to do such a thing, as whilst I quite like a deep chat sometimes it's not something I think they really think about, or care to do, perhaps it show's weakness or something. No idea, anyway was very interesting and we touched on my illness (I've never spoken 'publically' about that before, it's pretty much gone by now, but I always thought it would come across attention seeking - but people say you should speak out, perhaps I will soon, when I feel I can talk about it adequately to provide advice to others...we'll see) and it was very nice actually.
Woke up at 5am to head back to Blighty, flying with Ryan Air was fairly painless - except that they gave me some randomers boarding pass which I hadn't really checked, causing some banter at the gate when boarding the flight, but it was fine - drove back from Stansted and basically slept for the next few days.
All I can say is Oktoberfest is cool, but Munich is AMAZING, the whole city was buzzing for the festival - so just because we weren't in that part - didn't mean I felt we missed out - the Hof was never anything other than totally packed, and the same with every bar and pub we visited. I'd love to go back and tackle the festival properly with some better planning and going perhaps 2 weeks in when it dies down slightly (as opposed to 5 hour queue's), and that is my advice to you as well. Other than that it was an excellent trip!
Sorry if this was more boring than usual - it was all true and whilst some incredibly hilarious moments at the time, it's hard to convert into text!
