Oktoberfest

I went to Oktoberfest yesterday. I wasn't all that pumped about it, really, but I would have felt ridiculous if I hadn't gone at all. People come from all over the world to come to this, and I live literally a mile away. So I went with two vague acquaintances to see what all the hubbub was about. The hubbub, I now know, is about drinking. Of course I knew that Oktoberfest revolved around drinking, but I assumed that there would be the pretense that something else was going on (this is what happens at Mardi Gras, or at weddings). But in true German fashion they don't beat around the bush, and Oktoberfest is really no more than a million tables at which people sit and drink beer. Sure, there are funny clothes and oom-pa-pa bands, but those are all over the place in Germany anyway. Also after around 9 PM the oom-pa-pa music is replaced by techno music.

The drinking, though, is taken very seriously. You can only buy drinks in one-liter containers, and only special Oktoberfest beer is served. I've since learned that this beer contains much more alcohol than normal beer (7% or so). Drinking one of these liters is roughly equivalent, then, to drinking a bottle of wine. But if someone said to you, "Let's go and sit at a table and we'll each drink four bottles of wine and then go on a slide and then almost fall into the train tracks" you would say, "No thank you." But this is, really, all that Oktoberfest is.

What makes it especially deadly is that each drink doesn't seem like a bottle of wine; it seems like one beer. So you don't really notice what you are doing. I've had to use context clues and photographic evidence to piece together the last few hours of the evening. The only thing I'm completely certain of is that I arrived home without losing my wallet, and at some point I must have fallen because I have a big bruise on my hip. Actually I must have fallen twice, because I remember one uncatastrophic fall. We went on this huge slide, and to get to the top you're supposed to step onto this speedy conveyor belt that, theoretically, zips you up. If everyone had been of sound mind, and/or we had been boxes instead of people, this would have worked OK. In reality, it was much slower than stairs because every single person immediately fell down and many of them didn't seem that interested in getting back up again.

So the drinking part of Oktoberfest is dangerous and kind of banal, but the relatively unsung cuisine is much better: the best part of Oktoberfest is probably the pretzels. I love pretzels of all shapes and sizes, and Oktoberfest has the biggest and most delicious pretzels I have ever seen. They are literally about 18 inches across. In keeping with the reductio ad absurdum nature of Oktoberfest, all of the beer snacks are incredibly salty. One guy was selling huge platters of tasteless radishes absolutely covered in salt; this was a short step away from simply paying someone to pour salt down your throat. It was amazing.

Also these two extras from Joe Dirt were at Oktoberfest, which was nice.