Street Fests

Of all the cultural differences between the states and Germany there are many that I actually enjoy. For one, I love the fact that there is assigned seating in movie theatres. I thought this was a silly thing until going to a crowded showing and instead of rushing about to get a good seat you could take your time, get your goodies and stroll to your seat. Not having to fight with a bunch of teenagers who run, push and shove in line to get a seat is so nice.

The second thing is the street fest. K’town has one every year over Memorial Day weekend. It’s usually meant to celebrate spring (or the beginning of summer) for them and just happens to fall over our Memorial Day. I went to the fest on Friday with Miss A’s brother, his wife and her mom who is on holiday for 2 weeks.

I love these fests. They are similar to a county fair but quite different as well. You have your midway with games, you have your food tents and of course you have the rides (which are cheesy sometimes but some are complete puke-nators). What’s different is that amongst all these rides, food stands and games are the Beir Gartens. Open containers are not against the law here. In fact I stood promptly at 1900 under the arch waiting for my friends to show. After about ten minutes I gave them a call. They were 5 minutes away and still needed to park. This translated to about another 20 minutes especially to find parking. So what did I do? Yep, I went to the nearest beir garten ordered a pils and walked back to my spot under the arch. Other folks started to gather as well, waiting for friends and family to arrive. A small mass of people all with beers, most smoking a cigarette waited and drank patiently on the sidewalk at the corner .

So once they arrived, the night was a small version of a pub crawl. We went from food tent to beir garten to shopping stand through out the entire evening. You just carry your glass with you (after paying a deposit) and travel on to the next place. They fill your glass for you or will of course give you a new one (after paying another deposit – dirty glass is fine with me thank you). We watched fireworks being shot off outside one tent later in the night. Trying to be a sweetheart, one of the beer maidens quietly told Miss A’s brother not to get caught with those beer steins outside of the tent. She didn’t want him in trouble, it was really sweet of her to hand the steins to us through the open window of the tent. Beer maidens here aren’t always young pretty things – it’s usually a cute little old lady that makes you want to call her “grandma” and ask for a big hug and a cookie.

Over all it was a nice evening. I think we left around midnight stuffed with brautwuersts, beer, ice cream, bretzels and I had roasted cashews as a treat to take home with me. I really enjoyed the company and had a great time. Only two improvements could have made my night better

1) Having the hubby there (yep, that's a given)

2) Dancing and singing with Krip’ie in the main beer tent like we did the year before. Krip’ie and I were the only Americans singing German drinking songs while standing on the table arm in arm with other complete strangers. I think we were the only ones that knew the words.