Even though it's technically September, this weekend was the first installation of the Oktoberfest festival in Munich. Apparently this is a traditional cultural event, but it has become overrun with tourists over the past decade. Some Chicagoans may go as far as to suggest that it is the Lollapalooza of the EU... Too much? Never.
In all seriousness, though, I didn't run into too many Germans while at this fest of Oktober. I'm sure they were milling about and being German and local, but as an American tourist, I found myself fraternizing with other Westernized visitors. My newfound pals hailed from Australia and New Zealand, with some from the UK, Brazil, Austria (almost Germany?!), and a girl from this place called "New York", which I've heard of before, but I thought it was split up after the second World War? I didn't ask her about it, though. Nobody wants to seem ignorant!!
There was one German acquaintance, though we did not meet in a beer tent. For reasons that are irrelevant to this story, I traveled most of the nine hours from Luxembourg to Munich solo. The bad thing about traveling alone is it is much easier to get lost and/or attacked, but the good thing is you meet some pretty cool people when traveling alone. Luckily, Sebastian (new German friend) fell into the second category (some pretty cool people).
Let's set the scene: I'm on a connecting train, going from Koblanz to Mannheim, aka two random German towns that are neither Luxembourg or Munich, aka I really don't know where I am. This happens frequently here, and while it's awesome, it's also exhausting. As soon as I board the train, I sit my tired self down in a random seat. According to my ticket, I have one reserved but I had no idea where it is and my bag keeps hitting people on the arm, leg, face, etc. while I walk down the aisle, so I sit.
As soon as my butt hits the chair, a young blond gentleman appears and points to the seat next to mine, asking if it's "free". I nod yes and he sits. This is the awkward point of the foreign country encounter where I want to be friendly, but I'm not sure if the person speaks English or not, so instead we sit in an uncomfortable silence and I hate myself for functioning so poorly in the social sphere. I stared out the window while he fiddled with his laptop and headphones. Ah, youth.
I was gathering up the nerve to ask nameless German boy where he was going when he turned to me asked me if I spoke English. Success!! I told him that I did, indeed. He smiled and then proceeded to ask me the last question I had ever expected from someone next to me on the train.
"Do you know Californication?"
The TV show? Yes.
*holds out headphone* "Do you want to watch it with me?"
What? Yes. "What's your name?"
"I'm Sebastian."
"Natalie"
"Nice to meet you" (handshake) (headphone exchange) (proceed to watch Californication together like old friends)
Excuse me, what? I'll just let the weirdness of that sink in for a minute. However, when it happened, it wasn't weird at all. It was strangely natural, like we had been watching scandalous TV together for years.
Between episodes, Sebastian and I learned a lot about each other. He lives in Mannheim but goes to school in Koblanz, which he described as underwhelming. He showed me all the different wine country regions on a map, and we discussed politics (German and American) and the environment. So scholarly. It really was great fun. He was my only German friend all weekend, though.
Here are some more mundane moments from my long journey to/through Munich, taken from the notes in my phone:
1. epiphany while eating smoked salmon and egg sandwich (2.50 euro): I love honey mustard like WOW I really love it. I knew that I liked it but DANG every time it is involved in my sandwich I almost cry out of pure joy. Mustard, je t'aime (three heart emojis)
2. train from Mannheim to Munich bathroom has LITERALLY BLOOD EVERYWHERE I AM GOING TO DIE
3. T-Shirt: "Totes Amazeballs"
4. Crazy Frog playing in cafe but once again it DOES NOT FIT THE MOOD AT ALL
5. get on the wrong train LOLOLOL classic. There is some sort of maroon-shirted convention going on here and I DO NOT LIKE IT not to worry the correct train is right behind me #blessed
I kinda wish I made some of those notes up but I did not. That is indeed how I think.
Of the things that I said I would definitely NOT be doing over the course of this semester, Oktoberfest and camping at Oktoberfest were at the top of the list. Needless to say, after a nine-hour journey with delayed trains and a thief vending machine that stole my money but gave me no crackers, I was less than thrilled to arrive at my campsite. It was midnight and I was prepared for the worst.
I should not have been worried. The campsite was a great lil joint. It was run by Stoke Travel, which is basically a troupe of Australian volunteers that have way too much wanderlust in their blood and want to party in different countries. They were hilarious, loud, insane, and ran a dang good campsite. I won't even get into details but let me just tell you those Aussies are insane.
The coolest part about the campsite was that it gave the group of us that was staying there an opportunity to meet other young travelers, which is something that doesn't always happen on the weekend trips. The highlight of these encounters was a group of five men from New Zealand who had been traveling around Europe in a blue van named Denise for the past five months. Actually, it was only three of them in the van, and they intermittently met up with the other two for festivals and such. They were characters, let me tell ya.
I should not have been worried. The campsite was a great lil joint. It was run by Stoke Travel, which is basically a troupe of Australian volunteers that have way too much wanderlust in their blood and want to party in different countries. They were hilarious, loud, insane, and ran a dang good campsite. I won't even get into details but let me just tell you those Aussies are insane.
The coolest part about the campsite was that it gave the group of us that was staying there an opportunity to meet other young travelers, which is something that doesn't always happen on the weekend trips. The highlight of these encounters was a group of five men from New Zealand who had been traveling around Europe in a blue van named Denise for the past five months. Actually, it was only three of them in the van, and they intermittently met up with the other two for festivals and such. They were characters, let me tell ya.
Saturday was our only day of Oktoberfest (praise). As weekend warriors, we have become masters of sleeping on trains and staying awake all weekend, in order to capture experiences in the most efficient manner. After riding the bus to Oktoberfest with our New Zealand friends (there was one named Oliver who said he was a doctor. I was ready to propose but by Sunday morning I had changed my mind. It would have been a good story though), we were ready to go. However, the ANNOYING TOURISTS get to the tents so so early and we found ourselves without a seat even though it was only 9 am. Maybe it was 10. Either way, nothing gets served until 12 soooooo... I was annoyed. It was like Black Friday, but for beer.
We departed the tent, found a small, circular bar on a rotating axis, like a merry-go-round, and ordered coffee and free tap water and just sat. It was great. A dream, if you will. Actually, we may have dreamed it. We tried to return to the same location around 3 pm and could not find it anywhere. We suspect some sort of room of requirement activity.
The afternoon consisted of lots of carbs, both drinkable and edible. It was exhausting but well worth it. We sat outside of the original beer tent with some nice mellow Austrians and observed the tables around us, which were not nice or mellow. There were about twenty rowdy Italian men and twenty other dad-aged German men all yelling loudly and cheering for the waitress, Liza. She was great, though, you have to admit. Those ladies carry ten beers at a time, and they're heavy as heck! You could definitely do an at-home arm workout with two liters alone.
After a long afternoon of rowdy Italians and three-dollar bottles of water, we found ourselves sitting in a little baby field right outside the festival. The field was the place to be. There was a man playing soothing melodies on his guitar, a cop making out with his girlfriend, multiple tourists urinating on trees, and this man asleep in a stroller. It was truly a sight to behold.
We departed the tent, found a small, circular bar on a rotating axis, like a merry-go-round, and ordered coffee and free tap water and just sat. It was great. A dream, if you will. Actually, we may have dreamed it. We tried to return to the same location around 3 pm and could not find it anywhere. We suspect some sort of room of requirement activity.
The afternoon consisted of lots of carbs, both drinkable and edible. It was exhausting but well worth it. We sat outside of the original beer tent with some nice mellow Austrians and observed the tables around us, which were not nice or mellow. There were about twenty rowdy Italian men and twenty other dad-aged German men all yelling loudly and cheering for the waitress, Liza. She was great, though, you have to admit. Those ladies carry ten beers at a time, and they're heavy as heck! You could definitely do an at-home arm workout with two liters alone.
After a long afternoon of rowdy Italians and three-dollar bottles of water, we found ourselves sitting in a little baby field right outside the festival. The field was the place to be. There was a man playing soothing melodies on his guitar, a cop making out with his girlfriend, multiple tourists urinating on trees, and this man asleep in a stroller. It was truly a sight to behold.
After having traveled on my own for three weekends now, I've come to the conclusion that the people that we meet on our trips are what make them so memorable. Sure, we see a lot of cool stuff, and eat some good food (or bad food - looking at you, Kebab), but the things that we remember the most involve people. The people that we meet and hit it off with, or the ones that help us when we're wandering around the train station with tears in our eyes, or hit on us at the bar. The people that rent us boats, the people that take our pictures, that sleep next to us in tents, that split our checks because they know we're Americans...those are what make traveling the world so dang cool. I kind of knew this already, but it's funny that it took a weekend of camping with buckwild Australians to realize it fully. I can't wait for what's to come. Here's to new friends in new places. See ya soon!