It was 3:00 in the morning and my alarm was ringing. I'm not going to lie, it's really hard to get out of a warm bed that early in order to sit on a train for five hours. But I did. When I got to the train station, about half of the group was already there (one girl was already completely wasted from the party she had just left) and we had to wait outside because the train station doors didn't open until 4:00. It was fun. And cold.
Most of us were able to sleep on the train (well, except for the drunk girl, who was busy throwing up, and the three guys who decided to start drinking then) and the ride went pretty quickly. We got to Münich around 10:00 and headed to Oktoberfest, which was set just outside of the city. I slipped and fell on a tomato. It was pretty classic.
Oktoberfest is a lot like a state fair or a carnival. Except for the 12 or 14 giant buildings dedicated to beer, they have the same rides and games and all that fun stuff. So our group picked a tent and got in line to wait. Well, someone bumped me really hard and then said 'Sorry.' It took me a second, but I finally figured out that Sorry is not actually German, so I turned around and started talking to the girl behind me.
She seemed pretty nice, and at one point commented on my RA sweatshirt, saying that she too was an RA. We were in line for another half hour or so, and after a while it was really warm, so I took off my sweatshirt, and I was wearing an Alpha Gam shirt under it. Turns out that this girl is an Alpha Gam too. After we commented on how small the world was, she said that she hadn't been as active with Alpha Gam lately because she had a position in her Community Service Fraternity. APO. Which I'm also in. And we both went to the National Convention in Louisville last January. It was way cool.
Anyway, we finally got into the building, only to find that there was (predictably) no where to sit and an incredible amount of smoke everywhere. So Ericka, Nick, Alex and I decided not to stay too long. It was really cool to be there, but we wanted to see the rest of Oktoberfest and Münich as well.
Between Oktoberfest and exploring Münich, we probably walked around for around eight hours. It's a really nice city - pretty clean and things were easy to find. The food was really good too, and they had giant pretzels (I was soo happy). But we couldn't leave Münich until 8:30 because of our group tickets. So we went to see Ratatouille in German. It was so much fun, and movies for kids are right about at my German level. Well... they're still ahead of me, but these were some pretty expressive rats, so we had a pretty good idea of what was going on.
Overall, Münich was really fun. The five hour ride home with all the loud drunk people, not so much, but it averaged out to be a really good day. Walking around with Ericka, Nick and Alex was great, and it will be so much fun to go to Barcelona with them. Quite smashing. And I don't just mean all the beer bottles that broke on the train.
Exchange Rates:
$1= €.70
€1= $1.41
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