Thursday, October 22, 2015

The Mods Take Munchen - Day 5

Saturday, Oct 3

Today was rough. Beyond rough. I will need to sleep about a week in order to recover from the wild fiesta that was last night. But I survived. (Barely, but I did.) And in a few weeks, when I am telling stories about my wild time in Munich, I'll be grateful I didn't sleep. Dana was right - I can sleep when I get home. (And that I will, my friends. That. I. Will.)

Anyway, today was not only rough because I was hungover as shit, but there were 8 zillion people walking around the streets, as it was the last weekend of the festival, and it was almost 80 degrees, which seems beautiful, but is not ideal weather to be fighting crowds and lugging around 100 pounds of luggage. I tried to go to the Oktoberfest site but actually began to have a panic attack. AHHH! Too many people. Too much stimulation. Too much. I saw things that no human should ever see - I saw a young woman who looked like her spine had been removed. She couldn't stand up, even with her friends holding her up. One of the guys threw her over his shoulder to reveal her thonged behind, her dirndl up over her back. And as they tried to make it to the exit, she proceeded to vomit down his back. WTF!?! I was like, NO this is too much! I fled (as quickly as I could through a crowd that moved like molassas) to do a little more shopping and then back to the Sheraton to get by bags and head to the train station.

I won't bore you with the details, but I will just say that I don't understand why getting to and from any airport to the center of any city has to be so hellish. Navigating a train station where NO ONE spoke English and I had to buy my ticket (that was never even checked/collected) from a kiosk that only read in German, was seriously so stressful. I didn't even know if I was on the right train. I had to go alllllll the way to the airport, just to catch a shuttle to take me a half hour BACK towards the city in order to get to my "airport" hotel. Airport hotel, my ass. Anyway, I said I wouldn't bore you, but clearly, I am a little traumatized and am not yet over it.

Veeeeeerrry long story short, my hotel was beautiful and comfortable and awesome after a long day of travel. I had an amazing and very authentic last Munich meal (hooray for delicious Wiener schnitzel. I think I'll miss you most.) I went back to my room to settle into some solid and well earned Netflix time and some room service dessert. Because tomorrow, I go home, so I better whoop it up while I can.

God bless you!
All 8 zillion people heading into the festival. I attempted to go in for 3 seconds and immediately made a U-turn.
Hello panic attack.

Abort! Abort!
Hotel restaurant dinner. 
Yum, yum, and yum. One last schnitzel (but no more beer... EVER!)

Chocolate souffle and Sense8. Perfect end to a (nearly) perfect trip.





Friday, October 9, 2015

The Mods Take Munchen - Day 4

Friday, Oct 2

Just when you think it can't get any crazier, it does. It actually does. I was pretty convinced that after a serious, full day of drinking, that I would never drink again. Lo and behold, I was wrong. (Thank you, Dana.)

Thankfully we were all on board with a LATE wakeup -(EVERYTHING HUUUUURTS!) We rolled as slow as any person could roll out of bed, to head to Marionplatz for some brunch, sightseeing and shopping. We found the cutest little christmas shop with the cutest staff ever. I wanted to give them all of my money just because they were so kind! We bought souvenirs, chocolate, and chestnuts and grabbed a cab back to hotel for a nap! (Sleep is goooood!)

Brunch at the open air market. Everything look simultaneously AMAZING AND GROSS - thank you hangover. 


Me and Dana in Marionplatz! Sunny and beautiful! 




After a necessary battery recharge, we put our dirndls back on (and let me be perfectly honest, they REEKED of stale beer and funky fresh grossness! but that's what Febreeze is for!) and headed back to Oktoberfest!

The view from our hotel room. Seriously, we could throw a rock and hit the Oktoberfest festival! 

My favorite picture of the trip! God I love her.
My cousin is the BEST, most awesome party animal, travel buddy, gal pal that I know!











We went over to enjoy the festival's food and activities since yesterday we spent the day only in the tent. But seeing as it was a Friday night of the last weekend of Oktoberfest, it was insanely packed! We with six of us (Liza, Dana, Bianca, Gary, Brendan, and me) but since it was SO crowded it was nearly impossible to get into a tent. Liza, Bianca, and Gary decided to leave, leaving it actually a little easier to wiggle our way in. So after a little wait, we finally were permitted in, but without a table to sit at, we just milled around the tent and found ourselves a little corner and it ended up being a perfect spot. Thursday was great because our whole group was there, but Friday was BANANAS! It was so crowded and the music was amazing and everyone was singing. It was a lot more rowdy than the Thursday crowd, and that's really saying something! I told Dana before we went into the tent, "I'll go, but I am not drinking." And guess what, like the devil on my shoulder, Dana said, "Just have one. It's your last night in Munich! It's our last night at Oktoberfest! C'MON!" And so we drank.

So we left around 11:00 and, while Brendan tapped out, Dana and I went back to Augsteiner Brauhaus for dinner (but the kitchen was closed by the time we got there! NOOOO!) and we sat at a table with three American guys named Casey, Jared, and Dan. We ended up getting along so well and having a couple of drinks with them, that we all decided to hang together for the night.
After speaking with our friend Liz who was hanging at her hotel bar, we all walked down to the Marriott bar to grab a few drinks with Liz and John.

Then... things got crazy. Let's just preface this by saying that Dana was schedule to leave for the airport at 6am. Yeah. We rolled in after a night of dance clubbing at Pasha and Gecko (what up T-Swift!) at 5:30AM, just in time to throw Dana's shit in her suitcase and shove her in the airport van.

I, however, crawled back to bed and didn't see daylight until about noon. Now THAT was one crazy night. Whew.

The Mods Take Munchen - Day 3

Thursday, Oct 1

Hangovers are the worst. Especially when the only thing on the docket for the day is drinking your face off for like 12 hours. Yup, we arrived to the tent at 10:30am and left around 11pm. It was straight up insane. We first sat upstairs where our two tables were reserved. Our lovely waiter, Thomas, took good care of us bringing us all of our beer and food like some sort of beautiful angel. (He probably saw the pile of money we put in the middle of the table for tips!)Btw, those steins are SO heavy! My record was five and I was pretty impressed with that, but some of these guys were holding 7, 8, even 10, stacking them upon one another. It was like a circus trick! Our seating was from 10-2:30 and then another seating/wave of people would be arriving at 4:00. Thomas was awesome enough to hook us up with his friend Max who was waiting tables on the floor near the band. Max, for a small bribe, kicked out two entire tables (back to back) of drunkards to make room for our group of 16 people! YAY MAX! The rest of the night was spent standing on tables drinking and dancing and chanting in true German fashion! At some point we lost our friend John (more on that later) then wehad J.P. fall and split his eye brow open and he was bleeding from the face for a ridicuous amount of time. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves, but all you need to know was that we were in that tent drinking from 10am-11pm and then went out to another bar. WTF? I don't think I'm cut out for this!








Beers and tip money! Shit is gettin' real.

Prost!

Just one blurry mess of a photo to show you what it looks like from inside the belly of the beast! 
Preppin' my party trick! (Those two on the end are full of water, so I wasn't cheating!
It's just hard to convince people to hand over their full beers if there is a fair chance that you're going to drop'em all.)
Like a pro!
Some true Oktoberfest craziness!  
Totally sober. ;)

On a side note, I saw the most beautiful man I've ever seen in my real life, on the table next to ours. I mentioned (like an idiot), "Holy cow guys, I kinda love that guy over there," which translated to Alicia throwing large chunks of soft pretzel at him and telling him how much I love him. So I leapt over to his table to apoigize and thankfully for all of us, he didn't speak a lick of English. I went back to the table and said, "Oh, bummer, he said he's gay!" And then they left him alone. Phew. We were later joined by a German guy and his female friend Melinda and guess what, his name was Kevin Costner. Trust me, I checked his ID! So now I can say that I drank like a loon at Oktoberfest in Germany with Kevin Costner! Kevin also told us that we were clinking our beers incorrectly and showed me the proper German way to do it, which resulted in the stein shattering in my hand! I looked at him and was like, "WTF? You set me up!" And he just stared back in awe. He looked at me and said that he's only seen that happen like once in his life, it happen like 1 in every 1000 beers. Guess I don't know my own strength or I should play the lotto!
      Finally, after a sold 13 hours of drinking we left the tent and went to Augusteiner Brauhaus for schnitzel and cheese and you guessed it, more beer! Ugh, I'm pretty sure I have more beer in my system than I do blood. That can't be good.


The Mods Take Munchen - Day 2

Wednesday, September 30, 2015:

I packed up my belongings nice and early and grabbed a cab to the Sheraton in Munich Central to meet up with Jenny and Ryan by 9am. After much deliberation, I decided to join Jenny and Ryan for a tour of Dachau's concentration camp. I have taught my classes about the Holocaust ever since I started teaching a decade ago through both The Diary of Anne Frank and Night by Ellie Wiesel. I wanted to go to experience the history, but I also knew that it would be emotionally very difficult to be in such a hallowed place. I went back and forth and finally decided that I would go.
We walked the 10 minute walk to Munich's central train station to meet our tour guide, Gordon, an Irish ex-pat. We grabbed a small breakfast while he gathered the group together and hopped on a train to head 40 minutes outside of the city.
    All I can say is that it was a haunting and captivating experience. Gordon did a magnificent job of balancing the horror of it with the celebratory spirit of the survivors. He articulated so well a beautiful balance between the sadness and devastation and the celebration of the bravery of all of those who lost their lives and all who survived. He knew so much that I literally could have listened to him talk forever. I have a few pictures below, but it was hard to photograph. I felt like it was disrespectful. So I took some for the purpose of remembrance, but I certainly didn't want it to feel like I was snapping pictures at Disney World.





It says, "Never Again" in five different languages. 
The barracks had been torn down in the 60s,
but they frame out where they once stood to demonstrate their size and magnitude. 


The original crematorium is still standing at Dachau. It is beyond horrifying.
"To honor the dead, and to warn the living."
After what turned out to be, one of the most moving experiences that I could remember, we headed back to the city center and went back to the hotel to relax a little bit before we were to meet up with the rest of the crew and head to dinner. In the meantime, LJ MADE IT! (LJ is my cousin, who was on the fence about coming pretty much up until THE DAY he left. What a trooper. He literally flew in for less than 40 hours and then went home!)

First official cousin 'Prost!" in the hotel bar before going to dinner!
Testing my strength. This is only two steins, and I was convinced that was ALL I COULD HOLD. Well, you'll see, I guess all the beer I drank made me stronger because I manage 5 later in the trip!

We headed to another bar and sat with some guys from Manchester, UK and almost got kicked out for singing the MU song too loudly (Oh, crazy rowdy brits, how I love thee!). We finished up there and went to meet the crew at the Hofbrauhaus for beer and dinner. I ordered speitzel and it was AMAZINGLY magical - cheezy noodle mush - a wild delight. Then after sufficient partying there, we went to another bar - and this is where it gets hazy. Long story short, partied a little to hard knowing that all I was going to be doing the next day was drinking again ALLL DAY LONG. I was definitely gonna feel it in the morning.

The Mods Take Munchen - Day 1

After a whirlwind of teaching this morning and packing the car with all of my stuff, my dad came to pick me up at the college where I teach so that he could drive me to the airport for my redeye flight to Munich with a connection through Heathrow. I'm afraid to go through Heathrow, because I just may scrap my whole plan of going to Oktoberfest, hop on the tube, and hide somewhere in London (probably Borough Market because I'd have shelter and I wouldn't starve! Mushroom pate for every meal for the rest of my liiiiiiiiife!!!) and never go home. 

At the wine bar at PHL.
::SIGH::The way everyone should fly - DRUNK! 

On the plane on my way to Europe and a little tipsy!
Does like get any better than this!??

Sunrise at Heathrow. I actually feel like my soul has reattached to my body.
Only to leave it behind again. (I'm only being a little melodramatic.)
While in Heathrow, of course I stopped at Fortnam and Mason just to admire all of the pretty things and talk myself out of buying a teabox that I WANT SOOO BADLY, but decided it was too expensive and too cumbersome to carry with me for the whole trip. I guess, I'll have to come back for it another time!
Found my Lufthansa shuttle into the city.
Thank god, my luggage is too damn heavy to traipse it around any further.

I'm greeted at the Marriott with beer and a soft pretzel. Mind you, it's 10am.
Yeah, it's gonna be a good trip.
 So I decide that even though all I want to do is sleep forever, I get dressed (very bundled up, it's windy and cold!) and go for a walk - no a sojourn of about 7 miles. I didn't even know where I was going, just walking around and it was beautiful. Funny story, before leaving the hotel, I asked the concierge if it was a relatively safe area to be walking around by myself. And with the most indignant face/voice a man could muster he practically shouted, "MISS, MUNICH IS THE SAFEST CITY IN THE WORLD!" Really? Umm... based on...??  Well, he certainly believed it so who was I to argue, so off I went!

Home away from home!
They sell exactly the same stuff as home, only like three months later!
(Of course, I had to check!)
50(ish) ft sculture of a very large stalking figure. Odd, but cool.


Back to being a selfie pro!
Actually, a man on a bike stopped to ask if he wanted me to have him take it of me.
What?! How nice! 

MY FIRST (OFFICIAL) GERMAN BEER at the Unversity's Hofbrauhaus! And it was well earned.
I went on a wild excursion and hadn't eaten all day!

DEEEEEELICIOUS!


Btw, this little flat bread pizza might have been the most delicious thing I ate while in Germany!
Couldn't tell you what's on it, only that I dream about it nightly! 

After my tasty beer and snack, I decided to walk home and try to get some sleep before meeting up with Jenny and Ryan (some of Dana's friends who were also coming into Munich earlier than the rest of the crew). Nighty night!