So geht es in Deutschland

I had been looking forward to writing this blog post all weekend, but now that I have actually sat down to do it, I don't even know where to begin.

Courtney, Becky, Sara and I left for Munich early Friday morning. It was a little surreal because I had sort of secretly been planning this trip inside my head for like 3 and a half years... since the time I was in Munich with 3HS, CHA & our VONDERFUL tour guide, Silke. As incredible as that trip was, it doesn't even hold a candle to the experience we had this weekend at the largest festival in the world: Oktoberfest.

We had to transfer flights in Zurich (which is a little counterproductive, if you know your geography) but it was officially the shortest layover ever. Maybe 15 minutes, tops. I have no idea how we made the second flight because in Europe they don't let you off at gates and you have to go through security a second time. But, we successfully made it to the "Ambient Hotel Colina," where we met up with Meg, Meg, & Charisee (more Gburgers) and set off for Theresienwiese, where the party was. We had to take a bus to a subway to get there, which might have been confusing if there weren't millions of other people headed the same direction as us. The rule for finding our way became "FOLLOW THE LEDERHOSEN!"

We followed the crowd off the subway and up an escalator.. and there we were! Oktoberfest! It was so overwhelming. Our entrance was right by all the rides & carnival games and it immediately reminded me a little of the Jersey shore..... times 4 million. We wandered around a little bit and found the row of enormous beer tents and a sea of lederhosen. I have never been so proud to be half German. When I was little I never liked being German because I associated it with sauerkraut and WW2. I have completely changed my mind. I was flattered every time someone came up to me and started speaking to me in German. I even burst out singing Schnitzelbank at one point. Suddenly, my most embarrassing family tradition seemed like the coolest thing ever.

Our night really began when the frantic search for seats ended with some CREEPY Turkish guys making room at their table. We ordered some of those giant beers and the most delicious chicken I have ever had & camped out for a while. The one guy claimed that his name was Michael Jackson, another was Antonio Banderas... and then this one guy was clearly like 50 some years old and I don't think I ever heard him speak, but he was slowly but surely falling in love with Sara. She was visibly uncomfortable, but we were all laughing way too hard to do anything about it. The night went on in a similar fashion. We met some guys from South Africa, I had a full blown conversation en espanol with a Mexican named Eduardo, Courtney tried to steal someone's suspenders, and Becky somehow befriended "Red head Ted," the most beautiful British ginger I have ever seen. Not that I have seen many. We had to call it a night eventually though, because the plan was to get up bright & early to get in line.

We had a "free" breakfast at the hotel in the morning. (I'm putting it in quotes because the hotel itself was actually really expensive. Sara and I shared a single bed... which actually led to her sleeping on the floor, spooning with the mini fridge... but that's a different story.) At any rate, this breakfast was sooo good. Yeah, I know. Oktoberfest is supposed to be about the beer, but I think the food was really my favorite part. At one point we had something called kasespatzle & it was AMAZING. I never thought I would like German food.

Anyway, we got to the tents really early, and it was STILL hard to find seats. We ended up in the back of one of the Paulaner tents with a group of Italian boys celebrating their friend's 19th birthday. They were hilarious, but after a while we kind of decided we didn't want to spend Oktoberfest with Italians, so we set off to find some German people. But first, we had a photoshoot with a man passed out under a tree, ate some sort of sausages, and Becky and I bought these ridiculous hats ... the ultimate impulse. I immediately regretted it, but by the end of the day she had me convinced that they were a great purchase.

German-hunting was pretty successful. Our next stop was the Hacker-festzwelkdfheeujjaIdon'tknow, something tent. It was there that we found our favorite new friends: Felix, something that sounded like Vilko, Dominik, Michael, Reiner and Gabriel... among others. I think Gabriel was our favorite because he was SO drunk & was referring to himself as "Gabriel, the Earth Angel." One of the girls corrected him and said, "Don't you mean arch angel?" No no no... EARTH ANGEL. Oookkkayy Gabriel, whatever you say. Dominik was telling this long-winded story about how he is bi-sexual, but Michael was saying that he was full of it. Meanwhile, Reiner kept stealing my new headband because he liked the bow. They were all mostly 18 and 19, and we couldn't believe how young they were because they looked like they were in their mid-twenties. I think all the smoking that Europeans do makes them age faster. We probably shaved a few years off our lives just sitting with the chain-smokers all night, but they were too funny to leave.

We did take a break at one point, and Sara, Vilko, Felix and I were going to go on a ride... but that kind of failed because I somehow got seperated from them in the sea of people, and none of us had a phone because it's really expensive to use our Danish phones in other countries. (Just as the anonymous one who drunk dialed her mom on Friday night...) Fortunately, we all knew to meet back at the tent, so no harm, no foul.

People started to crash at the end of the night. Courtney even took a little power nap at the table. The guys were drinking what we THOUGHT was dark beer, but was actually half a mug full of Jagermeister. Nasty surprise when I asked if I could try it. I don't know where they got the energy from, but they wanted to go clubbing after the tent closed. The girls, on the other hand, opted for ice cream, chocolate covered waffles, and our hotel rooms. The Megs and Charisee had an early flight & the rest of us wanted to actually see the city a little bit in the morning. So we said Auf Wiedersehen & got on the bus.

Sunday was gorgeous, so we packed up our stuff and wandered around Munich for a little while. It's seriously one of my favorite cities... second to Copenhagen, of course. We didn't have a lot of time, but we saw the Glockenspiel and that church with the 2 tower-looking things (I don't know what it's called) as well as the McDonalds where 40 of us high school kids plus Ormsby made a bathroom stop on the way back from the Hofbrauhaus a few years ago.

Then, we got on the RIGHT train to the airport (almost had a huge mistake there) and boarded what was for some reason the scariest flight of my life. We were supposed to be flying Swiss Air, but they put us on some dinky little airline that I had never heard of, and I don't know why but I just had a weird feeling about it. I think Becky and I were literally the ONLY ones panicking on the plane, but when we took off it just did NOT feel like we were at the right velocity to get completely into the air. The plane was low, turbulent, and kind of sideways for a while. I feel like I've flown enough to know when something's off... but we survived, obviously. The next flight was much smoother but we once again had about 15 minutes in the Zurich airport.

I got home close to 9:00 last night, and when Daniel and Jonathan asked me how it was, I just stared at them blankly for a little while, searching for the words to describe it. There really aren't any. I'm reviewing what I wrote in this blog and realizing that I did not do it justice at all. There are so many litte hilarious stories ... some more blog appropriate than others ... but if you want to know JUST ASK because of course I'm willing to tell. I feel like I could talk about this weekend forever!

Ummm P.S. the whole thing cost us like $700, which makes me really want to cry... but something I've been realizing is that you can't put a price on experiences like this. I am having such an incredible time over here :) I just really better hide my wallet from myself until our travel break. IRELAND!