By Alyssa Ramos
When we got to Munich the first thing we wanted to do besides run to the nearest clothing store and buy wool coats was go to the famous beer garden, the Hofbrauhaus. After layering up in cheap but trendy blazers and scarves from H&M, and falling in love with the store for the first time since they didn’t exist in the U.S. yet, we set out in the gray, grim, and ice cold weather to find the liter mugs of beer.
It was surprisingly harder than we thought to find a massive beer hall…actually, it was like a freaking treasure hunt now that I think about it. We had to turn down several creepy streets and alleyways made of cool and slippery wobblestone, and I think the only way we found it was because we saw a sign on a door underneath a narrow archway with a beer mug and an arrow pointing to the left. As we got closer we could hear the the bustling of a large crowd of voices, similar to what you would hear in a…could it be?! A beer hall!
We shuffled inside like the confused little tourists we were and found a spot on one of the long rows of wooden tables and benches that would fit our group (there were about ten of us). Our server was a classic dressed beer maiden, complete with the wide brown skirt, white off the shoulder top, and suspenders, but more like one of the fat older ones, not the cute little blonde pigtailed ones you see during Halloween. She also was not a fan of us and had no patience for us trying to decipher what the hell the beers on the menu were. We were finally able to relay that we wanted “the lightest beer in one of the big cups”, which was of course very American of us to get the lightest beer in freaking Germany, but whatever.
We were very excited about our giant mugs of beer that took two hands to even drink, and were feeling very German, so decided we should be doing one of the little chants they do in the movies when they swing the beers around then slam them on the table and chug. I saw a group of young guys at the table next to us in German futbol jerseys who looked like they were already quite pissed and rambunctious, so Chelsea (aka Gypsy Baby) and I approached the riley group and attempted asking about it. It took a while to get them to focus and stop taking pictures with us, but finally they spit it out…literally…they were so drunk that spit was flying all over the place when they spoke. It went a little something like,
“En munchen shtet, en Hofrauhaus, uns, twas, sofas!” slam beer down then chug and cry.
We did it all together, and it was SO COOL! But as highly entertaining as it was to us, it was not amusing at all to our cranky beer maiden who informed us that it was also strictly forbidden to chant inside the beer hall. Well fine party pooper. Yeah right, we did one more chant (it’s so much fun we couldn’t help it) before she came stomping over and threatened to kick us out if we did it again. Strike one: chanting and slamming giant beer mugs on the table.
We were almost done with our second liter mugs of beer when beer maiden informed us of another preposterous rule of the Hofbrauhaus…there’s a 3 beer maximum. I can see why this rule exists…the beer is somehow stronger in Germany and well… 3 liters of beer is a lot for hundred pound people, but that’s just because I’m sober and reflecting right now, when she told us this when we were two beers deep and wasted, we had other thoughts. Like stealing the beer mugs. To be fair, they were ridiculously over priced in the souvenir shop and we partially thought that if there were less beer mugs on the table we could order more than three beers. So Gypsy Baby shoved about four giant mugs in her gypsy bag with no hesitation.
We didn’t get caught stealing the mugs, but our attempt to convince beer maiden that we only had two and not three failed miserably and we ended up getting kicked out for trying to get more than three giant beers. But we weren’t about to let one grumpy frumpy beer maid ruin our good time…we walked out the front door went around the corner and walked right back in the side door to the outside beer garden, nestling ourselves in a corner table that was clear out of the view of our last one. The outdoor garden was actually really spectacular, it had plush green grass and whimsical little trees strung together with tea lights. All of the tables were full with both tourists and locals, and I think there was a band playing somewhere with authentic German beer-gardeny tunes. At one point we found a giant guy wearing a fake viking hat with fake ginger pigtails which I confiscated, not that he even remembered having it because he was probably on beer number ten..
When it started getting darker, it also started getting colder, and despite the four liters of beer we had each drank, we were still freezing to death. We snuck back inside and found a booth near the front, still worried about getting caught by our first beer maiden. The guys in our group had left us…or gotten lost, so it was just us four girls, still trying to guzzle down more beer. It wasn’t long before three drunk German men shoved themselves into the booth with us…just in time for my mom to call me from Florida. It wasn’t long before the beer-goggle cute guy across from me snatched my phone and insisted on speaking to my mom…
“Allo? Hi! I am sitting here at the Hofbrauhaus with your daughter, I’m going to marry her and come back to the U.S. ok?” (insert German accent).
Yeah, I had about enough of that, I snatched the phone back to inform my mom that we were close to being blacked out and just met some German dudes, and stole a bunch of beer mugs for souvenirs.
“Aw, well it sounds like you’re having fun! I’ll let you get back to your beers!” She said sweetly. “Thanksh mom, I lubv yew.”
That was the end of our first beer hall experience, but was followed by another crazy night a tequila bar where hot shirtless men dance on the bar and light it on fire, whom we thought it was a good idea to go out into rural Munich with after that on our own, and then a trip to Heidelsburg, the first German college town where we proceeded to act like the college kids we were and have a drinking contest with the boys, they had to drink a “boot” and we had to each drink a liter. We all won.
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