Saturday, 21st October.
Munich

I spent today sightseeing around Munich. I ran into Keith the Canadian in the afternoon, and we cruised around together for the remainder of the day. After we had seen the Glockenspiel atop the Altes Rathaus do its thing, we wandered around the streets looking for something to do while it was still light. We were near the Hofbrauhaus, squatting down, intently studying our guidebooks, when a mulleted, moustachioed local squatted down beside us.

An aside: when I studied German in high school, our textbooks were filled with people that looked like this guy. He was wearing denim jeans and jacket, think they might have been acid wash at that, his hair was just past collar length, parted in the middle, a brush-like moustache, and he looked like he enjoyed his bier and wurst.

We had something resembling a conversation, and we found out that his name was Kris. He told us the score of the derby match between 1860 Munich and Bayern Munich. I asked him which team he supported, and he sadly replied the he was an 1860 supporter. Sad, because his team had been done like a dog's dinner by the Bayern Munich boys. But he was drunk enough to have soon forgotten the afternoon's tragic events, and he started singing us some of 1860's terrace songs.

One tuneless rendition later, he invited us to join him and some friends at the Hofbrauhaus for a bier. Keith and I figured it would be a bit of a laugh, so we accepted. We entered the Hofbrauhaus first, thinking it best not to be associated with a bunch of huge Germans who were absolutely plastered, only to find that security decided that our new friends were too drunk to be allowed in. Whatever made them think that? They could walk fairly well! Their speech wasn't too slurred! We went out the side door, but they'd disappeared (how can a group of large, drunk Germans disappear like that?) so we returned to the hostel to get ready for a night out.

And where were we going out? The bloody Hofbrauhaus of course! The night was still young when we arrived. It took us ages to find a seat. We eventually found a spot next to two young German couples, an American and his friend who was from somewhere you know I really can't remember but it doesn't matter because he left after a short while.

The atmosphere was lively, the band was playing, the people were singing, crashing their glasses together, "Prost"-ing left right and centre; it was a sea of smiles.

The German blokes on our table were making fun of my German. Bah! At least I was having a go! The girl next to me said that I had a good accent. Maybe she couldn't think of anything else nice to say!

A pair of Scots sat opposite us - Paul and Jane. Paul was a "trolly dolly" - his term for an air steward. Quite a multinational table we had! And both Paul and Jane speak Spanish! Why did I mention that? I don't know!

And the band played something resembling Waltzing Matilda. I had a bash at singing the words as we know them, but there weren't enough verses and there were too many choruses. After my stunningly piss-poor effort (doing Australia proud) I managed to convince Keith to sing "O Canada". He took piss-poor to a new level.

Our food took ages to arrive - the cooker had blown up apparently. Better than the cook blowing up, if you ask me! I left the sauerkraut on my plate. I fart enough as it is.

Now anyone who's visited Germany recently will have heard this song:

Heeeeeeeeeeeeey baby!
(ooh...ahh!)
I wanna knoooooooooow if you'll be my girl
Eins zwei drei vier funf sechs sieben acht!

I will be quite happy if I don't hear it again for quite some time.

(Written in my diary next to this day are two words: "brewers droop". I'm sure it doesn't refer to me, why would I have written it down?)

When things were winding down at the Hofbrauhaus I went off with the Scots in search of an Irish pub. (An Australian and two Scots go looking for an Irish pub in Munich...) Eventually we found one (after Jane got hit by a bicycle) and it was run by a few Indians. Good grief.