MUNICH.

---

Well I´ve been in Munich for two full days now and it is an awesome place. I´ve had two great days, and for the first time on this trip, I haven´t really minded getting back into a big city. Usually we miss the country and the sea, but not this time. After arriving here on Monday, we went out walking. It was pretty late in the day, so we decided to just go; instead of making a plan and a destination. So we took the U-Bahn and S-Bahn (subway lines) to Marienplaty and went from there. The streets around there are wide, cobblestoned, and what you call Fussganger - car-free. We saw some pretty cool shops, but they were mostly closing around then, so we made our way back to a place we´d seen called Thai Tai.

Asian restaurants in Europe are all called things like Thai Tai or Chin Chin.

So we sat down at a table just outside on the sidewalk and ordered some food. I had a Weissbier and Kathleena ordered a Radler, which tasted just like beery 7-UP. We later learned that they´re mixed with lemonade, but at the time we thought that the Germans had magically brewed a beer that tastes like Sprite. We were about halfway through our meal when some company arrived.

Buzzing up on a tiny scooter came a very odd couple indeed - the first was a pouchy-faced 200 kilo man in a red floral shirt and big baggy jeans. He had a short haircut. The second was a slight, delicate-featured Cambodian man about five foot tall, in a halfway unbuttoned white shirt. Hmm. After a little while they were joined by a thin man with greying hair, glasses and a pierced ear.

I was looking at our guidebook, looking rather like a tourist I suppose, when the big guy asked,

"Do you have any questions? We are locals here."

And thus began a two or maybe three hour conversation we had. Turns out they were floral arrangers, gay floral arrangers. The large one, we´ll call him Gustav, did most of the talking. He and Lukas (the Cambodian, though he´d lived in Germany all his life except for two years in Canada) actually been through Canada pretty recently, staying in Vancouver, in a five star hotel, though Gustav was on welfare. Anyway we talked about all kinds of things, Germany´s history, what we should do the next day, the gay scene here, etc. At length we left for our hostel.

The next morning, we got up kind of late, I think we were out by eleven. We were planning on going to the English garden for a picnic brunch, and we did that. But on the way we were intercepted by a photographer, who was looking for pictures to illustrate the recent heat in the city. (It´s been mid thirties here, when it´s not cloudy.) So he had us splash around in a fountain. "Und more laughing und more fun...ja! Gut! Wis the water! More laughing..."

He said it was going to be in the paper the next day, but it turned out that it wasn´t. After a long exploration through the English Garden (it´s huge! the biggest inner city park in Europe. Huge fields cut with two rivers, and scattered and rimmed with trees so that you can´t really even tell you´re in the city.), we settled in at the beer garden there, and split a Maß (the ß stands for 2 S´s, thus Mass=Maß) of beer. A Maß is an enormous stein of beer, one litre´s worth. It seems colder in the big mug, and the head is about an inch and a half tall. It´s awesome.

Biergartens are a traditional German thing - a lot of tables arranged in a green setting like a park, where you can get huge mugs of beer and salty food. We got half a chicken, some potatoes and a salad, and it was pretty expensive, but the experience was worth it I think. Towering above us in the English garden was Chineser Turm, a Chinese Pagoda they´ve built out of wood there. Very nice. Afterwards we were a bit sleepy though and laid in the park for a long while. Then we headed back to the hostel for a little rest, before going back to the English Garden for dinner. We had another half chicken, some beer and some buns, trying to cheap out and average out the expensive lunch. There were people playing football (not soccer!) and near us were some older guys playing Frisbee. They kept going in and out of these bushes, one at a time. Later we smelled pot, only for the second time in Europe. Then we headed back to the hostel for bed. In the room, our roommate Dongzur (from South Korea) showed us a bunch of pictures he´d taken and invited us out for beers the next night. We said cool, and arranged to meet around nine.

The next morning we arose pretty early, and by ten we were at the Deutsches Museum. This is the biggest science and technology museum in the world. They have large exhibits on anything you´d care to name. Chronology, astronomy, chemistry, ceramics, pharmaceutics, glass, technical toys (stuff like lego but better), they had like fifty airplanes in there...I mean we were there for five hours and we could go back today for another five, and the next day, and the next...It was really great, a very inspiring time there. One thing I´ll remember in particular is the industrial process used to make glass. It´s very cool, but I´m not going to get into it now.

Then we were going to go shopping, but decided to stop for a little break beforehand. We got to this streetside bar. They had a TV (muted) showing MTV, so that made Kathleena happy. We smoked some shisha, had a cocktail, and then some "Mexican" food, which was pretty tasty actually. Then we both went to the bathroom (much, much later) and some lady took our table. Damn. So we went back to the hospital, somewhat dispirited. Then we remembered Dongzur. We ended up going out in a big group; me, Kathleena, Oscar and Paul (these two Mexican guys who hadn´t slept in five nights, too much partying to do), and these two Mexican girls with them, Dongzur and a friend of his with an unfortunately unpronouncable name (I tried once and I said his sister´s name. Oops.), and Chingshan, a Chinese guy who´s studying business marketing in London. We went out to Hofbrauhaus, an enormous beer hall.

Everything about the beer hall is perfect. It´s a big, brightly lit space with vaulted ceilings painted with symbols of plenty; pretzels and loaves of bread, wheat and fruit pouring from cornucopia; livestock looking plump and edible; kegs of beer and hops. Above the door, high above, is a framed picture of a stern-looking man with a serious beard, in old-fashioned clothes. He is the brew-house founder, and he looks down at us all in approval. The beer is brought to you in enormous steins by a traditionally garbed, big (not fat), busty, very pretty, very blonde woman who carries nine mugs at once. And the music! It´s woozy, 3/3 timed, sounding like a cross between a march and a waltz. It´s played on tuba, two horns, french horn and accordion, by lederhosen-wearing musicians. It resounds through the space, accompanying the pleasant thunder of clinking mugs, laughter and conversation. Kathleena and I had two Maß´s of beer each. When in Rome. The beer hall is perfect, the perfect place to drink beer. That´s what it´s for! Unfortunately it closes at twelve, and we were all cleared out.

After that was a long stumble back, after a short sojourn at another bar, Burger King in hand. This morning came too soon. Kathleena is still upstairs in bed, nursing a headache. I´m fine - I got rid of the toxins last night, and they aren´t making me sick now. Today we are going to spend the afternoon (I guess, because the morning is fast disappearing) at the Pinakothek der Moderne, a modern art museum with a very important collection. Then maybe we´ll go shopping. Well I´m hungry, till next time.

---