Aberrant: In the Beginning - A Day at Oktoberfest

[Katalyst]

Yes, the hedonistic Munich-based beer festival is rowdy, raucous and raunchy. The kind of hazy place where tourists and proud Bavarians stagger together to clink steins of amber lager and eat mountains of oversized food: entire Bavarian chickens, wurstl sausages, gigantic pickles and massive pretzels. Above all, they drink beer: one-litre mugs at a time, known in Germany as maþ (pronounced "mass") and Smith and me planned on drinking quite a few.

Upon entering the Oktoberfest grounds, you are first met by fair rides. Spinning, whirling, gravity-defying, Vomit-inducing rides. Next comes music: faint at first, that slowly builds into a cacophony of accordions, horned instruments and boisterous cheering. These were the drinking songs my best friend Smith and I would never quite understand, but would grow to love during our 48-hour stint at the festival.

What the heck, we thought; we'll just take a look inside the first drinking tent we see. And so, we shrugged and gingerly stepped into Hofbrauhaus, destined not to emerge until midnight. The "tent" was not really a tent at all, but a semi-permanent structure that houses: 9,000 beer-drinking merrymakers. Some, we could tell, had been there since the 9 a.m. bell, blankly staring out from under their pointy grey souvenir hats, swaying gently under their own weight with tilted, half-full steins in their hands.

The crowds people can be heard singing various tune’s. A particular German song is the most dominate. "Ein Prozit. Ein Prozit. Der Geme . . . something . . . something . . . keit," singers trailed off as they sang along to the most popular drinking song, and raised their overflowing steins in the air. Then a barrage of misplaced American songs followed: New York, New York, Take Me Home, Country Roads and Hey! Baby.

,,

A barmaid wearing a traditional bust-popping dirndl walked by our section. Why not grab, "Ein maþ bitte?" When she returned, she was bear-hugging 10 steins, each weighing at least two kilos--though legend has it, the festival record is 18. She slammed them down on the table with vigor and started collecting the money before moving on to the next table.

A couple of steins later, we were caught up in the circus atmosphere, singing along with the songs and cheering our neighbors’: "Eins, zwei, g'suffa!" (One, two, cheers!) The freindly atmosphere was thrilling to the both of us. I had never seen anything like what I saw that night. It was to bad that we were only able to be there for one night.