The Events of Thursday, July 14, 2011
    The tall stalks of the cornfield made a lovely green blur through my train car window. Though the train itself made plenty of noise outside, inside it was quiet, too quiet. The thing that made this train journey into Munich so odd was the fact that it was completely quiet. No one talked or even whispered. Well, that is, except for the Taylors. For us, the silence was almost as unbearable as the loudest sound in the world would be. Most of our fellow passengers were elderly. Staring silently straight ahead or out the window, they all swayed in unison as we jostled over the tracks.
    We disembarked eleven stops later. Ben first took us to see the Frauenkirche, the main cathedral in Munich. It was mostly destroyed by bombers in World War II, but the Allies saved the two church towers as landmarks. This allowed them to level most of the rest of Munich. Walking a few blocks farther, we found ourselves in the middle of Marienplatz, or Mary’s Square. The reason for the name was in the center of the square, a statue of the Virgin Mary. She is covered with pure gold and has stood on top of this monument since 1638. Below her are four cherubs fighting off the four great enemies of civilization. One cherub is fighting off a dragon representing hunger. Another cherub is fighting off disease; a chicken-lizard looking animal, which some thought to be the cause of the Black Death or plague. After the people of Munich discovered that these chicken-lizards did not exist, they came up with the idea that the plague came from cats. So, they had a huge cat-killing spree. But, as we now know, the real cause of the plague was carried by rats. Without cats, the rat population boomed, resulting in an even higher number of deaths. Finally, they discovered that the plague was carried by rats, so they imported cats from Italy.
    The third cherub was fighting a lion representing war, and the last cherub was fighting off a snake representing heresy, and in particular, Protestantism. This was the main cause for the building of this monument. If you recall, at the top of the monument is a statue of the Virgin Mary. Bavaria is a very Catholic state and right in the center of all of that is Munich. In medieval times, they built a wall around their city to protect it against the Protestants. At that time, the main opponent was the Swedes. They were the Norseman coming down to expand their Protestant kingdom.
    When the Swedes arrived outside of Munich, they stepped over the wall that was still in the process of being built, but instead of destroying the city, they were charmed by this delightful town and only requested a certain amount of gold. The people of Munich gave all the gold they had, but even so, it was not enough. So, they brought all they had to the Swedes and told them that they did not have enough gold, but would they instead take some of the excess liquid gold, also known as beer? The Swedes said yes and the town was saved. In thanks for sparing the city, the people of Bavaria came together and erected this monument.
    We waited beneath Mary’s Column so that we could hear and see the Glockenspiel go off at noon. The Glockenspiel was on the New Town Hall, a great Neo-Gothic structure taking up the majority of the square. The Old Town Hall was destroyed in World War II by Allied bombers, but the New Town Hall was somehow saved. So, after the war, Munich decided to rebuild their town center as it originally was, instead of turning it into a modern city, like how Frankfurt was rebuilt. When they rebuilt the Old Town Hall, it looked exactly as it first did in medieval times, and they even kept the same name. So, now the Old Town Hall is newer than the New Town Hall!
    At noon, we listened to the bells tolling all over town, some louder than others, and then, a little after noon, the Glockenspiel began to play. You could see numerous bells at the very top of the tower, and they played several Bavarian folk songs. Then, after some mechanical clicks, the little wooden people in the Glockenspiel came to life. There were two different stories in the tower’s figurines.
    The first story was of the celebration of the Duke and Duchesses’ wedding. In honor of the union, there was a great feast with dancing, jugglers, entertainment, and jousting. The jousters pass each other in a circle. The first time they both miss. But, the second time, the Bavarian knight knocks the Austrian knight backwards, and the first story comes to an end.
    The second story is of the end of the Plague in Munich. Everyone was afraid to come out of their houses, for fear that they might catch the deathly disease. The first people in Munich to come out were the coopers. They discovered that the plague was over. But how would they inform all the people of Munich that they could come out now? They couldn’t go door-to-door, there were too many people and they couldn’t write letters to everyone, for not everyone knew how to read.
    No, what the coopers did to tell the people of Munich that all was well was a form of interpretive dance. Later, on our walking tour, the guide, Virginia, taught us how to do this dance. You put your right hand on top of your head, put your right foot on the inside of your left leg and spin in a clockwise circle. The little wooden characters on the Glockenspiel twirled in circles under arches of leaves. The last part of the noon Glockenspiel show is a golden owl that hoots for five minutes straight. We missed this last part, and, as we learned later on the tour, we didn’t miss much.
    Ben led us next to Viktualien Markt. This is the most expensive area in Munich to live, because every day farmers from all over Bavaria set up hundreds of stalls to sell fresh produce. We wandered through the tents. Daddy purchased some fat, juicy, green grapes, and we made our way to the only beer garden in Bavaria owned by the government. We ate lunch under the shade of huge chestnut trees and watched the locals drinking great steins of golden beer, eating juicy sausages, and sending sickening clouds of smoke at us from all directions.
    In the center of the square was a maypole. While in England a maypole may bring to mind spring and dancing around the decorated pole with colorful ribbons, in Germany it is much more macho and complex. If a bachelor is interested in a pretty Bavarian girl or just wants some beer, this is what he does. First, he goes out and chops down the tallest tree he can find. Then, he drags the tree to his house, shaves off the branches, leaves, and bark, and adorns it with paint and other ornaments of décor. The decorations should be a reflection of the bachelor. Then, during the night, he takes the Maypole to the home of the one he loves and plants it in the middle of her front yard. The next morning, the girl comes out, and, hopefully, the first thing she sees is the maypole. The first thing that she has to do is try to figure out who made it for her. Once she discovers who it is, she makes a decision. If she returns his love, she will start to dance around the maypole. If she thinks that the guy is a jerk, she goes into the house and returns with a case of beer to put at the base of the pole. So, there you have it, the secret to get either a pretty Bavarian girl or a lot of beer.
    After our meal, we wandered back through the colorful stalls of Viktualien Markt to Marienplatz. Here we joined a waiting group of English-speaking tourists for a free historical city tour of Munich. Our guide, Virginia introduced herself to our gathered group of tourists from America, Great Britain, Australia, India, and Mexico. Originally from Germany, her family moved to Florida when she was eleven. Recently, she returned alone to her homeland and is now studying to be a cardiothoracic surgeon. In Germany, she only has to pay two percent of what she would have to pay to go to college in the U.S.!
    We started our three-hour-long tour in Marienplatz, and she began her spiel of history that ranged from medieval times to the present day. Since it was three hours of history being thrown our way, I will try only to mention what we found most interesting and incorporate what we learned into what was significant to our day.
    Besides lots of beer talk, most of the stories Virginia shared were about Hitler and Munich’s role in his rise to power and in World War II. Hitler knew that to earn the people’s respect, he needed to branch out his campaign further than just Berlin. He started in a beer hall. His “beer hall putsch”, as Virginia called it, started when three men met to discuss how Germany’s government was doing. They met in a regular beer hall in Munich. Somehow, Hitler found out and his troops surrounded the building, so that no one could exit … alive.
    At gunpoint Hitler forced the men into a private room and began to try to convince them to join his world revolution. The men would not submit, and an angry Hitler went out into the beer hall a few hours later. The population in the beer hall had grown to a considerable size, so Hitler took this opportunity to further his popularity. As he climbed up on a chair, the men threw beer steins and pretzels at him, but Hitler was a very powerful and emotional speaker and soon the booing was quieted and the people began to cheer.
    Hitler finished his speech and the peoples’ cheers were deafening. He went into the room where the three men were kept hostage and closed the door very slowly, so they could hear the people’s applause. He gave the men two choices – join his revolution or, with his last four bullets, he would murder them and then commit suicide. They finally submitted and Hitler left them under the supervision of a Nazi sympathizer from Munich. However, this man was a friend of the three captives and they tricked him into letting them go home to get their uniforms. They never returned.
    Hitler’s campaign in Munich soon led to a Revolutionary March. It began with Hitler and five other Nazis marching up a long street in Munich. (We stood on that very street as Virginia told us the story). By the time the Nazis reached the end of the street, behind them were 4000 other Nazi supporters and in front of them, a police barricade. Before anyone knew what was happening, someone fired the fatal shot and there were 19 fatalities – 14 Nazis, 4 policemen, and one innocent bystander (a waiter at a nearby beer hall).
    Hitler’s bodyguard pinned Hitler to the ground and ended up with eleven bullets in his back, but miraculously survived. Hitler managed to escape from his bodyguard and ran like a little coward to a Nazi doctor. The doctor popped Hitler’s dislocated shoulder back into place. Hitler promptly held the doctor at gunpoint until he could steal his ambulance and roared off to hide in one of his friends’ cellars. He was found here some days later and was arrested. However, all the judges at his trial were Nazis and he got the minimum punishment of five years. During this time he lived in a private apartment, writing his book, Mein Kampf (My Struggle), and furthering his popularity.
    Later, Goebbels the Nazi spin doctor, Hitler’s propaganda man, took this story and turned it around to benefit Nazi purposes. He told the public that Hitler did not run like a coward down the road, but saw a little blonde-haired, blue-eyed girl at the end of a road. He ran down the road, picked her up in a protective embrace, and rushed to a doctor. The doctor assured Hitler that the little girl was fine, but Hitler would hear nothing of it and drove the ambulance himself to the nearest hospital. What a touching story. The public believed it and Hitler’s popularity grew.
    Goebbels used everything in that fatal event as propaganda. He even erected a plaque to honor the 19 men who died. But, five of them were not even Nazis! However, the spin doctor said that the waiter was really a Nazi at heart and the four policemen were climbing over the barrier to join the Nazis in their fight and were shot by their fellow policemen. But, the four policemen had wounds in the front of their bodies. So, that meant that they turned around to announce to their colleagues that they were joining the Nazi party, while climbing over the barricade backwards? The public believed this ridiculous story, and Hitler’s popularity continued to grow.
    If you passed this plaque, you had to salute it in the Hitler style. Two Nazi soldiers stood there to make sure you did. If you did not, you were taken aside, your name was recorded, you were beaten publicly, and then sent to Dachau “re-education” camp. To avoid the plaque, some ran down a street that became known as Dodging Alley. However, they soon posted a guard here as well and you were taken aside, your name was recorded, you were beaten publicly, and then sent to Dachau “re-education” camp. Today, a golden line runs down the street as a memorial to those who took Dodging Alley.
    Returning to more positive history in Bavaria, we went to stand in front of the Royal Residence. The most infamous character to live here was King Ludwig I. There were plenty of reasons why he was so notorious with the German people, but the main reason was that he was a womanizer. Before he got married he had slept with over two thousand different women! He would pick a girl out in the evening, and the next morning he would have her picture painted so that he didn’t make that fatal mistake of sleeping with her twice.
    There is actually a hall in his residence called the Hall of Beauties, where 50 paintings of the most beautiful women King Ludwig slept with are displayed. Once he did get married, he forced his wife, Theresa, to walk down that hall every morning in order to remind her how lucky she was to have him for a permanent husband.
    However, King Ludwig I is famous and loved all over Germany and the world for one thing. As a wedding gift to his bride he bought her a huge field. Theresa must have been disappointed, because he soon added the fact that it was to be named after her. However, poor Theresa must have gotten frustrated with her bridegroom, for he added on top of that that the field would be used to host a huge party in honor of their holy union. This was to be the first Oktoberfest. In those times however, they drank wine instead of beer and were probably much more responsible drinkers than people are today.
    Just last year, during Oktoberfest, the population of Munich grew by nine million! That’s a lot of tourists! Virginia quizzed us on which nationality is best represented at the Oktoberfest. It is the Aussies. In fact, the Australians had a notorious habit that coincides with the Oktoberfest season. What are the two things you don’t want to lose when you are traveling abroad? First, your passport, so what do you think is the most common type of passport to be lost? Australian. It is actually a game among Bavarian girls to see who can collect the most Australian passports. The winner gets a huge keg of beer all to herself, of course. There would be hundreds of Aussies catching trains to Berlin to reach the Australian embassy there, as there is not one in Munich.  However, it is illegal in Germany for foreigners to travel without a passport. So, the Australian government installed a temporary embassy in Munich just for during the Oktoberfest. 
    The second thing that you don’t want to lose when you are traveling abroad is your children. And just last year at the end of the first night, there were eighteen kids missing. It wasn’t the fact that the children had strayed from their parents, no, the parents were so drunk that they forgot they had reproduced! So, there were eighteen children waiting at Lost and Found for their drunken parents to pick them up at the end of the night. However, the parents didn’t show up and the poor kids had to spend the night there! 
    Caitlin’s favorite part of the tour was when we went on “Shickey-Mickey and Boozy-Boozy Street”. This street is where the wealthiest Munich residents live. The shickey-mickeys are the ones who try to show off their outrageous and ridiculous fashion statements despite their age or size. I shall allow you to use your imagination for that. They are also called boozy-boozies because of how they greet each other with not just one but with two kisses on both cheeks. (The German word for kiss is boozy).
    Our last stop on the tour was in St. Peter’s Square. St. Peter’s Church is the oldest church in Munich. It has been rebuilt four times in its history, but the old churches have never been completely destroyed. Just to show us how dry German humor is, Virginia told us the St. Peter’s joke. Why are there eight different clocks on the tower of St. Peter’s? So, that eight different people can tell what time it is at the same time! No one knows why there actually are eight clocks on the tower, two on each face. Our tour was finally finished and we thanked Virginia, tipped her, and asked her for directions to the English Gardens.
    We rode the tram there and at the entrance to the park, we stopped. When they built the bridge we were standing on, over the river, it caused the water to gush and then hit a concrete block and form the wave. The water’s fast current continues quite a ways downstream. On this wave, there were five young men in sleek black wetsuits, surfing on worn boards. Since the wave is always there, they hop into the river from the shore. Doing all sorts of tricks, they go back and forth across the surface of the wave until, eventually, they fall off the other side of the wave or jump off to give another person a chance to surf.
    We watched them, munching on granola bars, for a half hour and then hopped back on the train to go to Theaterinkirche, another famous Munich church. The outside façade is bright yellow and decorated in swirly Rococo. Going in, it felt like we were going into the cleanest, largest, and whitest Rococo styled bathtub in the world. It was almost blindingly white. The only variation was the swirls and twirls decorating the walls, columns, and doors. There was a service going on, so we couldn’t take any pictures. Instead, we walked quietly out and caught the bus to the Hofbräuhaus.
    This famous beer hall was first founded in 1589 by Duke Wilhelm. It was soon so popular that they had to move to a larger building, where it is located today. However, there was one problem with this new abode. When you drink a lot of beer, you have to go to the bathroom. The problem was that in order to relieve yourself, you had to go outside and go in the ditch in the street that still exists today. And if you went outside, you took the risk of losing your seat and your beer. So, an intelligent German decided to do something about it … and installed a ditch in the beer hall itself.
    However, other people complained about being splattered, so everyone had to warn their neighbors before unbuttoning the flap on their lederhosen. The stench must have been overpowering. At the end of every evening, the attendants (the only women allowed in the beerhall) rang two bells. The first bell meant that no more beer was being sold and the second was to tell the drunks to scram. After the second bell, the attendants stood at one end of the hall and tipped over barrels of water, cleaning the floor and sobering up the drunks. Nowadays, there is a men’s and women’s restroom. In the men’s there is a great silver dish called the “vominator”, for those who have consumed too much beer.
    Daddy led the way into the Hofbräuhaus. Behind the thick wooden doors, we were soon engulfed in a thunderous rumble, clanging silverware and dinnerware, shouts, cheers, and music. A Bavarian oompa band performed their music in this warm, cozy hall. Over certain tables hung iron family shields. As we had learned earlier on our tour, these signs honored the regulars. However, being a “regular” was more than it would appear. First, one must arrive dressed in lederhosen or a dirndl. One must come at least four times every week, all year long for at least twelve years. And lastly, it is imperative to be a favorite among the waiters and waitresses.
    It was virtually impossible to find a vacant table, but after visiting the restrooms (the ladies’ didn’t have a “vominator”), we exited to find a tall table in a crowded hall further from the entrance. Our mini hall was served by two waiters, bustling this way and that, fulfilling every customer’s requests. We ordered and were talking about home and absently flipping the coasters when the drinks came. Daddy ordered the Hofbräu Original beer which was described as tingling and pure refreshment. The rest of us shared two liter-steins of Coca-Cola! Abby took great pride in ordering “ein mass of Coke”. We had a lot of fun clinking our steins together and sipping from the overflowing steins.
    Soon on our table were two Bockwursts (smoked sausage) served with homemade potato salad for Abby and Caitlin; an Original Hofbräuhaus sausage platter (Viennese and pork sausages and pfälzer sausage on a bed of sauerkraut) for Mommy; and for Ben, a baked Bavarian meatloaf with homemade potato salad (the meatloaf tasted like the inside of a sausage). Daddy had marinated beef Munich-style with pretzel dumplings and I had roast Bavarian pork in natural gravy with two potato dumplings. We had five delicious, warm, and salty pretzels as well.
    Everything was spectacularly delicious and very filling. Even so, we ordered three different desserts to share, so we could sample Munich’s dessert cuisine. The Munich Dampfnudel was a fluffy, dry, sweet yeast dumpling with homemade, warm vanilla sauce. Mommy especially enjoyed the homemade chocolate mousse with fruit sauce despite the fact that they mixed fruit and chocolate together! And the Hofbräuhaus Kaiserchmarrn tasted like doughy pieces of French toast with raisins, coated in sugar and was dipped in cool, creamy applesauce.
    We left the beer hall feeling cozy and brimming with food, drink, and good cheer. Outside, the world was cold and it rained as we made our way, still rosy-cheeked, to the train station. The ride home was just as mysteriously quiet as the ride into Munich this morning. Yet thinking back to the temperate, comforting noise of the beer hall atmosphere, I realized how different people can be just by adding beer, family, friends, comfort, and warmth to a situation.