Getting in the mood for some debauchery

There’s a little beer festival going on in the city — over thata way, I think.

Lotsa people come from all over the world & it’s an incredible boon to our local community.

It’s the done thing by the locals to whinge about ‘all those tourists’ and ‘the Oktoberfest isn’t what it used to be’.

Yet they know that the city benefits in a myriad of ways from these couple of weeks in September & early October.

It’s a weird burden, though, because at heart the #Wiesn, which means ‘field’ in German, used to be a Volksfest — & now?

It’s what seems like one of the world’s biggest drunks. More beer consumed, and exceptionally good beer to be fair, and more whole chickens and massive oversized pretzels than one could shake a proverbial stick at.

More more more…every year they quickly analyse how many people were here during these few weeks & then they compare it to other years.

If you have a few days of rain during the Oktoberfest, people round here start saying things like:

‘Well, nobody goes there when it’s this wet. Looks like it’s going to be a bad year financially for the Wies’n.’

Or?

Other things like:

‘What d’you expect? You can’t keep growing indefinitely? It’s mathematically impossible. One year, it’s got to be worse – not better.

But then the sun ☀️ comes out from behind the clouds, and those same locals who’d said they weren’t going this year – even before the grey, rainy days – those same folk get their dirndl on, or lace up those funny traditional shoes that’re only worn when he pulls on his Lederhosen.

They make their way to the Wies’n, where they had that marriage of the royalty all those centuries ago.

That’s how this started, by the way.

Some royal from here married some other royal, I think she might’ve originally been Polish, but I can never remember such things.

It wasn’t the debauchery & bacchanalia that it is today. Sure, there might’ve been some excess & certainly the monks, for which the city ‘Muenchen’ was originally named, enjoyed their fair share of barley & hops, but it just wasn’t the piss up that it’s become in the early 21st century.

So, back to now. What I doing?

Well, the sun is shining, I’ve got the morning off, my Lederhosen are somewhere here. Under a pile of writing projects I’ve been juggling, I think. I know I saw them somewhere.

My friends who’ve said they wouldn’t be caught dead at the Oktoberfest and had not been there in years? Those are the same people who I might run into today.

They, like me, wondered last week if they’d even go there this year.

It’s always the same, really expensive food and drink and tonnes of overly inebriated arses. There are so many reasons not to go, but…

The weather’s nice. We’re in the Bavarian capital on a gorgeous, perfect day. Let’s suit up in the traditional garb, let’s remember what we’re here for & go celebrate what’s beautiful about humanity.

To all those completely wasted people I’ll encounter today:

If you’re a visitor, welcome. Thanks for bringing your business to our Weltdorf. Tell your friends & we’ll make even more beer & cook plenty more chickens for next year. Come on! You’ve got to experience it at some point, don’t you.

Oktoberfest, baby. It’s what’s for supper.

If you’re a local, though? If you’re one of us, you’ll be back at your desk bright & shiny tomorrow.

That’s a German thing, by the way.

If you had the energy to stay up late carousing? You have the energy to make it into work in the morning.

No exceptions.

You were there with your boss there last night, after all. You went to the disco afterwards, and only made it home long enough to shower & put on a different shirt.

Doesn’t matter how hungover you are or how bad you feel. If you could party, you can work. It’s a German thing, you probably understand.

Oh, but you know what I just remembered: it’s Saturday. No need for all of that.

Suddenly, you feel better than you expected. There you are. Hitching up your Lederhosen. Getting in the mood for some above mentioned debauchery.

Have fun out there.

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