MIFFLIN... In Munich

Mifflin in Madison this year is on May 1st which means those of us abroad will be unable to attend. Fortunately for us, Munich holds this "little" party each year called Springfest. I think everyone who went will agree with me that Springfest more than compensated for our need to day drink and get silly. No worries though, to those who are concerned that I paid to go to another country to drink, I did in fact go siteseeing and get the cultural experience as well :)


Thursday April 15th: Our flight out of Pisa on Friday left at 7am which meant that in order to get to the aiport early enough for check-in and security we would need to hop on the 3:30am transfer bus to Pisa. Thursday I was all about going to bed at 10pm and getting a few hours of sleep in but when 12am rolled around and I still had not showered or packed I knew getting some Zzz's in was not going to be an option. Oh well, at least I passed out on the bus for a good hour and twenty mintues.


Friday: We arrived at the airport around 5am and we were worried about the VOLCANO that erupted in Iceland. Several flights had already been cancelled and we hoped that would not be the case for us as well. Fortunatley we boarded, took off, and upon landing were informed we got the last flight out to Munich. Lucky Ducks. Ryanair being the terrible company that they are flew us into Memmington which is not quite the closest aiport. They claim its "West Munich" but as put best by a comment on the ryanair website "While Memmington is west of Munich, so is London and New York" So we had to take another 2 hour bus. But we got there and it was still before noon. The first thing on our agenda was a free walking tour! Our Guides name was Claudia and she talked way to much but it was good to see the city. Almost everything we saw had something to do with Hitler or WWII and we learned that while everything in the city looks old its all really just a replica of what the city use to look like before it was destroyed in the war. Intresting eh? When the tour was over we met up with Rachel and Molly! We met at the Hopra House which we learned all about on our tour. It use to be a beer hall which only men were allowed in. Orginally there were no bathrooms so people would have to go outside pee but that got very inconvienant once you had found a table and had a drink so they created troughs that ran under the tables. Then each person had a stick that would guide thier pee into gutters... nasty. Lucky that aspect of the place was gone. We all got a couple liters of beer and after a quick stop to SUBWAY for some sandies we headed to the festival! It was like a playground for adults. While there were children there, the merry-go-round had a bar on it and towards the late afternoon everyone had disappeared into the beer tents.

BEER TENT

These tents were MASSIVE filled with tons of people haveing a good time. You sit where ever there is room so you are forced to meet new people. We ran into about a million Wisconsin kids which made it feel that much more like Mifflin. We all just danced, sang, and drank until the tents closed and then went to bed!

A tower we saw on our tour. The bottom three windows go to a room in which Hitler dined in the night he planned "Kristallnacht" the night of broken glass in which hundreds of Jewish business were broken into and destoryed

Saturday: We woke up around 9:30 and headed to Dachau which is about 45 min away from the city. We went with a relatively large group of kids and we all got these phone things that when you press numbers tell you about what you are looking at. It was a very strange and disturbing experience. It was hard to believe that so many terrible things had happened where we were walking. We saw everything from the barracks to the gas chambers to the crematoriums and the shooting ranges. There are also a few memorials built representing the different groups of people that were detained at the camp. I am glad I had the chance to check it out but it was very sad.

"Work sets you free" - the Gate to Dachau

After the camp we planned on taking a nap before heading to the festival but on our train ride home we were informed that our plane home had been cancelled! Drama drama drama. We learned that one of the trip planning companies would be ordering another bus to get all the stranded travelers home. It was 100 euros to get on the bus which seemed a bit outrageous but condsidering there really was no other option we signed up as soon as possible to save our spot. All airports would be shut down until at least wednesday and we had class we had to attenend on Monday... so that wouldn't work. There was also a train we could have taken but that was even more money (160 euro) and you had to sit in the isle. No you did not have an isle seat you were acutally sitting in the walk way... sounds comfy. Once we figured things out though, Emily, Sarah and I headed to the beer tents. I got a huge pretzel! We sat at a table with these three men, two of which were Chezch and the other Russain. The youngest was 25 while the other two where definitly in thier 40's if not much older. They all worked together and kept complimenting us on our beautiful teeth. Ha I guess Europeans just dont have the same kind of dentistry as we do in America. After chatting for a while with them they bought us more beer and shots! They also bought us roses and Emily got a hat out of the deal, it was a lot of fun. Then we left to go meet up with Molly, Rachel and Laura again and on the way I purchased a GIANT cookie that no one is really sure what it said but supposidly is said something along the lines of "I love you to the stars" everyone I asked though kind of chuckled first though so who knows.

My Giant Pretzel and Pretty big beer (I thought the glasses were so pretty ha)

We went on some of the rides and one of them we rode 4 or 5 times! It was so much fun. At first it looks kind of lame but soon you starting getting whipped around upside down and at the very ended there is this big line of water spouts shooting 20 feet in the air. The seats lock and you slowly move closer and closer lying parallel to the ground, the water just inches away from completly soaking you. A lot of people would splash the person sitting next to them but luckily I didn't get to wet. I had to hold my hair back though or it would for sure had gone in the water. Overall it was an amazing night.

Aww Deeg's and my big cookie

Sunday: We had to be out of the Hostel by 10 so we put our stuff in storage and while other people went to places like the BMW factory and some English gardens, Sarah and I went back to the fair grounds for one last time. We got super long hotdogs for brunch and there was some sort of old car parade going on that we watched for a while. Then we went to the tents and had a mug of beer that took us almost 45 mintues to finish, I think we were beer-ed out at that point. We went on a few more rides, had a drink on the merry-go-round since we still had not done so and then headed to the busses which left at 2:30pm. The bus ride was more than 8 hours long and we finally arrived back in florence around 11pm. I offically hate busses, but even if i knew that I would end up having to take a bus home before I went on the trip I would do it again. I really really like munich!