Oktoberfest
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We finally found Oktoberfest! I was jumping up and down excitedly, and little frothy mugs of beer with wings were fluttering before my eyes. Well, we didn't have to translate Oktoberfest, but you can look at the sign and see how Leigh and I learned a decent number of German words. Willkommen zum, given a couple seconds of thought, obviously means "Welcome to". There are fun aspects to trying to decipher a language. At least one like German. It's like trying to solve a New York Times crossword puzzle! However, if the characters were different, like in Chinese, Hindi, or Arabic, we would have had no chance.
A picture of Leigh at Oktoberfest. We were there during the later part of Oktoberfest, and it was the middle of the day, so perhaps that's why it wasn't TOO crowded, as you see. Anyway, on the far right, you see a man who apparently forgot to shave. I hate it when that happens.
This is one scary Oktoberfest something. Is it a haunted house? Or a little ride of some sort? I don't know, but I love the little red devil that's holding up the open-mouthed skull of Waldo. Try to find it!
What is the Hippodrom? Maybe we should have taken a look. It looked dazzling enough to take a picture, but we really were only there for the beer.
See in the distance there's a gigantic rotating beer. Well, a fake one, but I saw it advertising Paulaner, my favorite German beer, so I was quite happy to see it. Closer picture later.
They sold huge pretzels for 3 euros each all over Oktoberfest. A euro, mind you, turned out to be worth a buck and a quarter. The pretzels were a necessity, it turns out, to soak up the liters of beer they were peddling.
This decorated horse is being made to feel loved with a tender caress, and a comfy hat.
Lots of the things around Oktoberfest had festive statues. Here are a few of them that seem to get along well.
This statue was friggin huge, and bright orange. It was like.. 4 people high!
This is a guy at the Oktoberfest entrance who just turned a crank all day, making music. I took his picture. He wanted money. I gave him money, and he thanked me swiftly. Music box man, the epitome of German efficiency.
If all horses came with beer, I'd own my own ranch.
I was drunk at the time I took this picture of the German police at Oktoberfest. The police only had a problem with you if you were sober, so I was fine.
Here's a video of a guy who made bird sounds using a little thing he put in his mouth.
And here's a video of a guy painted copper doing some robot dance moves.
Here's a video of a guy selling some toy that he made crawl around his hands.