Gent

St. Bathe's Church with the Adoration of the Mystic Lamb

Working on the Dutch assignment

Courtyard outside Gravensteen

Belfry Tower

Three towers from the top of Gravensteen

Chase and I at Gravensteen

Wrestling Professor Forni's sons (Its amazing how many 4 and 5 year olds I can fend off)

View through the arrow slits

Gravensteen roof

Gravensteen Castle

Walk along the river

Belfry Tower

Hello all! Wow is it Sunday already? I just realized today that I hadn’t written a blog for last week yet – when I started formulating ideas for this week’s blog. I guess last week was boring! Or it just didn’t fill me with a captivating story for you all to partake in. Nonetheless, for the sake of tradition I suppose I can relay to you this past week’s events.

The past week has been relatively simple for me, basically evolving around my exhaustion from staying up late to watch the Yankees games – if they would just win already my life would be easier. Especially with all those extra inning games, they’re killing me. I sit up watching the blips on mlb.com and silently cheering or jeering (both my roommates are asleep at this point) whatever the website’s “gameday” setting tells me – celebrating the trials and tribulations of my favorite sports franchise based on one line blips about the games action. Perhaps that is why the past week appears to be one big foggy dream for me when I try to recall stories. What did I do? Let’s see.

It’s an odd thing being an American abroad especially when it comes to relaying my feeling about baseball. In the land of “futbol” very little is heard about other sports. Martin stares and mocks me openly as I sit up watching the website, cheering or cursing at each pitch. It’s a hard expression to relay. I’ve tried explaining to him how each pitch is important, each out means something, each strike is vital, but he just nods along at me in agreement – the evident sign that what I’m trying to tell him is going right over his head. On the plus side, I think I’ve at least convinced him that the Yankees should be his favorite team – to which he nodded.

The past week had two major highlights: our trip to Gent and our Unit dinner. Last Saturday, the gang headed out to the city of Gent for the day. The trip started out being very entertaining and teetered off as the day went on.

We began our trip by taking a trolley from the train station up to see the world renowned Gent Altarpiece or the Adoration of the Mystic Lamb. This twelve paneled masterpiece, started in 1426 by Hubert van Eyck, and finished by his brother Jan in 1432, has been the center of a lot of controversy over the course of Belgian history. Belgium, being neutral in about every large European engagement for the past 300 years, has naturally been victimized by every large European power from the Spanish to the French to the Germans. During all of that victimization, the Gent altarpiece has seen a lot of different places, at some times being divided among the victorious parties and other times being moved as a whole. Some of the highlights of its interesting history are in 1566, it was hidden in the St. Bathes Belfry during the protestant revolts throughout Europe to prevent any damage being done to the work. In 1792, it was taken by Napoleon’s soldiers to Paris. In 1816, several pieces of the alterpiece were sold to the King of Prussia. Then in 1920, all of the panels were united in Belgium as a result of the Treaty of Versailles – only to be again taken by the Nazi party in 1940 to a castle in Bavaria, upon Hitler’s orders. Then finally in 1946, it was recovered by American troops and returned to Gent where is has remained for the past half century. Today it resides behind bulletproof class in a temperature controlled room in the Villa Chapel, and is visited by millions of visitors each year.

After visiting the Mystic Lamb, we headed over to the Gravensteen castle. The castle was the highlight from my last trip to Gent so I remembered it vividly. The castle, in its current form and architecture was built in 1180 by Philip of Alsace. It was modeled after the crusader’s castles the count encountered while he participated in the Second Crusade. It was really built as a model of power in the city, but also served defensive purposes. Over the course of its history, Gravensteen has had a number of different roles from its 1300’s use as a courthouse and prison to its 1800’s uses as a cotton plant where it interior was allowed to deteriorate and foundations became week. Then in 1885, the castle was set to be demolished as a part of city reconstruction. However, the city government bought out the construction company and remodeled it to its original settings to be a symbol of the city as it entered into the tourism age. Therefore, though the foundations are 900 years old, the remodeling is only a little over 100 years old.

As you walk through the little square outside Gravensteen, the giant fortress stands out like a massive rock amongst modern buildings. Its brown stones, and medieval architecture aren’t enough to call it breathtaking, but the beauty in the building lies in its history not necessarily in the design. Along the back side of the castle, the river snakes along the edge of the wall. Throughout the interior there are dark, narrow hallways that lead to the various parts of the current museum. Inside the museum, suits of armor and weapons, polished and shining, make up a majority of the main halls. With everything from giant ornate swords, to primitive guns and cross bows, the museum has a wide variety of artifacts. One of the highlights is the torture room, which is full of in-depth descriptions and diagrams of various torture methods done to prisoners. From the top of the roof, the guard tower of the castle looks out over the city. We happened to catch it on an interesting day when clouds adorned the east and sunshine broke through in the west. However, the most beautiful of the views was the three spires, of St. Bathes, the Belfry, and St. Nicholas’ towers. These monuments, jut out from the regular skyline, and are evident from the top of the castle.

From there, we spent the next two hours doing a Dutch assignment, yes, our Dutch professor met us in Gent to deal out an assignment that we had to complete in two hours and return to her. Though it was annoying and bothersome, the assignment did allow us to see more of the city. To lighten our spirits at the end of the day, a majority of the group grabbed a brew at a local beer house that offered over 100 beers.

The second highlight of the week was our unit dinner at Professor Forni’s house. The Nachbahrhuis is divided into 6 different sections or units. My unit, number 1 (for obvious reasons) is comprised of my three man room, and 4 other girls’ rooms. Together, the seven of us headed over to Dr. Forni’s house for a home cooked meal. This experience gives us, and Professor Froni and her husband, a chance to get to know the group a little better. We enjoyed pasta with pesto (good, but not as good as moms), salad, and chili! I had never had chili before, but seeing as how it is one of the more American things to eat, I decided to dabble in the meal – and it was worth it. The homemade chili was done by Professor Forni’s father, who is in town for the month with Professor Forni’s mother visiting Belgium, and was fantastic. Then we topped off the evening with some apple pie (my favorite) and had ourselves an nigh. It was enjoyable to go out and get a nice, free, home-cooked meal and to catch up with most the members in our unit.

All in all, we had a relatively quiet week. Though yesterday, we traveled to Flander’s Field and Iepers to see historic WWI locations – so my next blog should be entertaining and a little bit more enriching that this last one. See you all next week!

This is a Beautiful Place

Daytime view of the Leuven Stadhuis

Erin, Matt, and Tim grilling


Outdoor ping pong



Group gathered enjoying a meal

Ping pong earlier in the week

“Two roads diverged in the woods, and I – I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference.” These words, taken from Robert Frost’s “Road Not Taken,” rolled, as many thoughts do when I head out on a long bike ride, through my mind as I trudged slowly up a long gradual hill on Ginger – my appropriately named bright orange bicycle.

There were storm clouds overhead and I was speckled with a couple of small, cold drops as I darted out of 80 Schapenstraat and headed into the center of the city on Saturday afternoon. I was in pursuit of a dart board, which Matt and I have been looking to purchase in order to save us some money from not having to go out to a bar just to play a game. However, on Saturday afternoons, the city of Leuven is as dead as a doornail (I don’t know what that means it’s an expression I picked up from my father). Anyway, the shops were closed and the city was quiet – a dart board was not to be found – and having already been out, I decided to take a bit of a bike ride.

I headed down Schapenstraat and onto the cobblestone, the rattling of my old, used bike echoing off of the stone buildings that surrounded me. I hooked a left at the road to the Stadhuis and headed away from the spire city center and north out of the city – in the distance there was sunshine, and I figured I might as well head toward that. The road was busy with traffic coming in both directions and a red path, outlined in dotted white lines, guided me. As I raced the darkening clouds, which began to drizzle when I started my climb on the aforementioned hill, I was brought to those words by Robert Frost.

Creeping slowly up the never ending hill, one creaking peddle-turn after another, my mind began to race. I pondered over Mr. Frosts intentions when writing his poem. Did he actually walk through the woods to come up with the idea for his poem? Or was it just his creative intuition that brought him to the image? How would I know if I was taking the right road? Would I ever come to that point where I could reflect and see the points in my life where the road divided and decisions were made? Could I, as the poem implies, look back on my decisions and, good or bad, be satisfied with the routes I took? And as my mind raced, and I burrowed myself so deep in my own thought that I blocked out the world around me, I looked up and had one single question: “Where the hell am I?”

No literally. Where the hell was I? I was sitting in sunshine, warmer than when I had departed from the huis – whether that was from the pedaling or the bright orange sun that had suddenly appeared, I couldn’t decide. The hills around me, decorated in corn stalks and dotted with autumn leaved trees, told me I was no longer in the city. The cobblestone road which I had begun on gave way to a much larger paved road, possibly a highway. I had wandered into the beautiful rolling hills of the Belgian countryside and frequented the Flemish farmland (say that 5 times fast). The hill which I had been climbing was much longer that I expected, but I was now on much more level ground, sitting and pedaling slowly. I was definitely no longer in the Leuven. In fact, according to the sign at the intersection I had just reached, I was about 4 km outside of the city. Instead of going back, I continued on, straight as an arrow.

I passed through a small Belgian strip mall and continued on. After climbing another hill of significant height, I stopped and looked back over my shoulder and found myself with a beautiful vantage point over the city. The sun was shining on the spires and steeples of the city, and the looming clouds had begun to disappear. And I sat there, taking in the world around me – it hit me.

Now don’t get me wrong, I recognize that Robert Frost is a man of more intellect, intelligence and ability than me, and I love his poem which serves as inspiration to me. However, I came to one revelation about the words of one of my favorite poems – it didn’t tell the story of the other road. Now I realized the symbolism involved and the intention of Mr. Frost’s words, but in terms of traveling, in that very literal sense, there are things to be discovered on both paths. Therefore, if I were able to apply an appendage to “The Road Not Take,” for students traveling abroad, I would add, that if you have the chance, go to a place long enough to take both roads.

That is what this experience in this foreign land has meant to me so far. That was my realization. That is the beauty of the Leuven program. The ability to call Leuven home for long enough to understand how it works, eats, sleeps, and breathes. Being comfortable enough to go on a bike ride with no map, no intentions, and no idea where I’m headed. Even if the road is busy and trodden, adventures still lie down it. And the best of experiences often sneak up on you when you’re not even expecting it. That bike ride, though short and uneventful, brought me to the reality of the situation I am in and the luck and fortune I have to be here. It’s not hard to see how philosophers and theologians come here to Leuven to study in the mastery of their field, there is something very relaxing and mind consuming about this quaint Belgian city. Its quiet nature and beauty brings you deep into your own thoughts, delving into your own thoughts.

As I headed back toward the city, past the “Leuven 4km” sign, I could see the skyline now entirely engulfed in the sunshine that was warming my back. The hills which I had struggled to climb moments earlier, now powered me back into the heart of the city. As the wind whipped my face, bringing cool air deep into my lungs, and the “seashell noise” drowned out the rattling the chains on my bike, my mind was cleared of everything except for one final though – “This is a beautiful place.”



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Hallo! (That’s Dutch for “hello”) I hope you enjoyed this week’s blog. I didn’t have any tales or stories or trips for this week because this past week and weekend was a lazy one for most of the Loyola crew and me. With the traveling and the expenses of Munich the weekend before, I decided to take this past weekend easy, and just enjoy Leuven a little.

Some of the highlights from the week are pretty simple. This week, Matt and I discovered that the Nachbahrhuis owns a ping pong table, and have since been playing some pretty intense games. We also discovered the aura that the “pinging” and “ponging” of a plastic ball on a wooden table creates. Without hesitation, every time we began a round or a 7-game series, we attract a crowd to the common room to either watch or want to join in. However, we don’t mind the competition and the games, especially because it helps to bring the group together. Especialy because some of the Italians are really good at doubles - so we've had some fun matches. The other day we had up to 5 or 6 country representatives gathered into the common room enjoying the game. From Slovenia to Italy to the good ole' USA everybody got a game or two in.

In addition, this Wednesday, October 14, the Loyola crew celebrated Geen Nederlands Woensdag (No Dutch Wednesday) on what we hope to be an annual tradition. Last week, Ines, our Dutch teacher, informed us that she would be absent from class this Wednesday and unable to teach, but that we would tack an extra half hour on a couple of our 2 hour Monday classes to make up for the time. In passing, I made a joke that we should celebrate the day off as a holiday.

Thus the celebration was born. For Matt and I, Dutch is our only class on Wednesdays, so to have it off, meant a whole day free for the two of us. At first the holiday was just a joke about Matt and I sunbathing in the courtyard at 10am, drinking Stella’s and taunting people as they pass on their way to class. However, slowly the No Dutch Wednesday’s anticipation grew to the point where I realized: we actually have to plan something because people are expecting us to. So I was loaned the grill from Christel and went out and bought some charcoal and we made it into a BBQ. We moved the ping pong table outdoors, and despite the cold weather, attracted a descent crowd for our Wednesday party. It turned out to be a pretty good time that I was glad that I was able to contribute to the group bonding experience.

There are a couple of pictures above of No Dutch Wednesday part and the city, though on my long bike ride that I so vividly gripped you with earlier, I forgot my camera, so hopefully my words will do it justice. I hope you enjoyed it! See you next week!

Dachau

"Work will set you free"

The "shower" rooms

The electric fence with the guard tower

The parade ground

The crematorium

The main entrance from the interior

Memorial wall

Crematorium

Monument

View from outside the fence looking in

Crematorium

Plaque honoring the American liberators

View from the outside

The gate again

The eerie feeling of human suffering hit me as soon as I stepped off onto the platform. Whether it was carried in by the flock of tourists also exiting the train – anticipating what they were about to experience – or whether it exuded from the place itself, I’m not sure. It could have just been my own intuition mentally preparing me. Whatever the reason, Dachau never really felt right to me from the very beginning.

My anxiousness was confirmed as I wandered out of the tunnel in the train station and into the sunlight. Directly off to the right, on a plaque right next to the train station, stood the first memorial to the thousands of people that died there between 1933 and 1945. Suddenly I realized why I had felt that eerie depression as soon as we arrived – we were walking through the same station that the Dachau Concentration Camp prisoners did almost 70 years ago. As we boarded the bus for the 15 minute ride to the camp, we rode the same path that the prisoners were marched through. The prisoners were paraded down the street respectfully as a sign of good faith – the brutality didn’t begin until they were safely inside the walls.

On the Sunday morning of our trip to Munich, the group and I headed about 10 miles north of the city to the little town of Dachau. We didn’t come to the small village to see back country Germany or to experience German travel. We came, as hundreds other tourists a day do, to see firsthand the reality and brutality of the German Nazi regime during WWII.

Dachau was the first, and by that standard, the model for all of the concentration camps throughout Europe. Opened in 1933, Dachau was originally an old ammunitions factory that had since left the small struggling town. In the beginning, the families of Dachau supported the idea of an internment camp, believing that the influx of soldiers in the small town would bring in more revenue. The first prisoners were political prisoners that rivaled Hitler. With Munich being the place where Hitler got his start, it was fitting that Dachau would be the first place he organized a concentration camp.

As we arrived at the memorial site, we got off the bus and headed up a gravel road toward the entrance. Step by step, taking the same route the prisoners took. Slowly that feeling of despair I described earlier turned into a borderline nauseating sensation that hung with me throughout the rest of my tour in the camp. “Arbeit macht frei” – was entwined into the steel frame of the gate which swung slowly open as each tourist entered. “Work will set you free” – is the translation from German – it was one last bit of hope for the prisoners that walked through the passage. In reality, it was a sick joke and a mind game. The Nazi's intentionally gave prisoners hope - to them there's nothing more satisfying than crushed optimism. Of course the creaking gate with the letters above it was only the beginning of the cruel treatment that the Nazi soldiers played on prisoners.

Despite the warm autumn sun, and virtually no overcast, human suffering and pain hung over the camp like a darkening storm cloud. You could sense it, still feel it, as you walked into the camp. My mind was pulled back and forth the entire day between a need to learn and see, and a desire to see no more. It’s amazing how adept human beings are to the emotions and feelings of a place. How I could still sense the universal suffering of this hell on earth. If I could sit here 70 years later and still get that feeling in the pit of my stomach, it made me wonder how the Nazi soldiers could do it. How could they see what they saw every day? If what I was feeling was a universal human emotion, were those Nazi soldiers even still human?

By the end I was emotionally and mentally exhausted. It was something I had never felt before. A reality I knew so much about, but one that I had almost no desire to see up close. I knew what happened there. I had read about what the soldiers did, how the prisoners were treated, the quarters, the guards, the crematorium, the killing, the pictures – I knew it all. But I had never really felt it like I did on that early October morning.

I walked around the camp and saw all of the major buildings, the barracks, the offices, the crematorium, the parade grounds. I watched videos of older gentlemen telling stories of the horrors they undertook. I viewed black and white photographs from American journalists first on the site. I heard soldiers’ accounts of what they first encountered when liberating the camp. It almost seemed unreal, and that it happened just over half a century ago, just seemed too close. Though I’m a generation or two away from the actual experience, it still seems mind boggling to me that something like this could happen at that time period.

What really got to me was the museum on the grounds. That’s where the reality of the entire situation set in. I saw pictures and videos and pieces of artwork done years later by prisoners, describing the perfection of torture, the scientific experiments that doctors performed on prisoners, the games the guards would play with human life. The work was meant to humiliate and dehumanize the prisoners, such as carrying piles of dirt at full speed back and forth from one pile to another, then back again.

The terror, that’s what the Nazi’s perfected. The meaningless extinguishment of human life was what terrorized the people of the camp. It brought a whole new meaning to what Machiavelli preached centuries earlier. They started with the circulation of rumors, about the torture, tales too horrifying to believe. The whole purpose of it was to completely annihilate any type of interior opposition to the Nazi regime. As a result of this phobia by the end of the war, 200,000 prisoners had passed through the camp, and when the camp was liberated it held 32,000 people – though it was only designed to hold 6,000. Overall there were roughly 31,000 recorded deaths, with an estimated 4 or 5 thousand more suicides.

What scared me the most wasn't to think about what it would have been like to be a prisoner, but what if I were in Germany at that time. What would I have done? The terror that the Nazi’s instilled in the world they occupied is immeasurable, and if the situation came down to me or the next guy, where would I draw the line? What scared me about this realization isn’t that I said I would have tortured a man to resist being tortured, but that I didn’t have an answer that immediately came to me. That I had to think about it, even if I knew what was right, but still couldn’t just do it, that’s what hit me. Or more importantly would I believe in what I was doing? I’d like to think not. There was a story of the commanding officers in charge of the concentration camp going on trial for the deaths of thousands of people. And when he was asked to defend himself, he said, “I didn’t kill people. I killed Jews.” What a scary reality it is that a man’s mind could be warped so much to believe that. To believe in what he was doing and to internally justify it. These types of thoughts sprinted in and out of my consciousness as I wandered the camp aimlessly.

As I finished my touring and walked back out of the Concentration camp, I happened to glance up and catch sight of the plaque that was on one of the walls of the main entrances – honoring the American troops that liberated the camps. A slight gleam of patriotism broke up my feelings of nausea and despair. When I got home, curious about the experiences of these soldiers, I did some research on their experiences upon finding the camp.

There are stories, actually court cases, that later never were investigated by General Patton, about what American soldiers did when they first entered into the camp (and if you’re curious just Google “Dachau” and a number of different accounts come up) of Dachau. Some of them were so horrified by what they saw – the human suffering, the piled up bodies, the crematorium, the scientific experiments, the train cars full of people being evacuated – that they lined up already surrendered German soldiers and shot them down. One soldier’s account claimed that his fellow soldier mowed down 20 Nazi’s with his machine gun before he was wrestled down by his fellow countrymen.

“The massacre at Dachau” is the name they gave to those solider's reactions. That doesn't quite seem fitting based on what went on inside the camp before they even arrived. But after seeing what I saw at the Concentration camp, my mind ran to what would I have done? What if I was the first one on sight and witnessed what they saw? I cannot condone their actions – because in reality they shot hundreds of soldiers who were under orders whether they believed it or not, and most of the men in charge of the decision making process had already fled – but I also cannot imagine what it must have been like for these 17, 18, 19 year-olds walking into a camp full of walking skeletons.

Again, similar to my experience with Normandy, I have a fond appreciation for what was asked of these soldiers’ day in and day out. Guys my age and younger called to a foreign land that they knew little about to fight a war whose reality they knew even less about. It may seem odd, but over the past month and a half, traveling to WWII sights in Europe, has made me more appreciative of what my grandparents’ generation of American soldiers went through. What was asked of them by their country, and what they were forced to endure for the cause of the greater good. Ironically enough, it took me a trip to a foreign land, to greater appreciate what is right back at home.

In conclusion, sorry that I didn’t really have a witty story to tell for this one, and I’ve struggled to write this article purely over the idea that words and pictures can’t possibly do it justice. I mainly separated it from the rest of my tale about my escapades through Germany because I couldn’t in my right mind justify putting the stories side by side.

And I don’t hope to fully reflect the attitude and mindset I had when visiting the concentration camp, because to be honest, it left me speechless. My goal in this writing was to try and bring you as close as I can with my entire experience while visiting the camp. What I saw, what I felt, what I thought, how my mind raced. I know that some of my thoughts are a little scattered brained and that this hasn’t been my most fluent article ever written, but I hope to at least have reflected to you some of my experience of what it was like to visit Dachau. My hope is that by reflecting my feelings and emotions vividly and graphically that, in some minor small way, I can pay a little tribute to all those who suffered so greatly.

Munich or Mecca?

Opening gate to Oktoberfest

Sun set

Sun setting over Oktoberfest

Inside One of the Beer Tents

St. PAuls looking over Oktoberfest

City hall in Munich

Liam and Thibaut grilling for Thibaut's birthday

"The Tent" where we spent our nights in Munich

Me and Matt

The loyola group with a fresh round of brews

One of the beer wenches proudly sporting 12 beers



View of the city from St. Peter's Tower

Inside one of the beer tents

First things first: I’d like to wish a happy belated birthday to Ali and a happy upcoming birthday to Marc! Sorry I couldn’t be home for your birthday, but yeah, you know, I’m here. Oh yeah, your presents are in the mail, they’re fancy and expensive, so they might take a while to get there, but just keep looking in the mail. If they don’t get there I have the receipts here someplace. I guess you’ll just have to trust me that they’re in the mail. ; )

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As we walked out onto the platform, backpacks bulging at the zippers, the crisp Belgian autumn air greeted us. And as the sun set in the distance behind the Golden Horn Emblem that sits atop the Stella Brewery with the faint smell of sweet bread (the smell of beer being brewed) teasing our nostrils, I looked up at the darkening sky and couldn’t help but think about how many other college kids were doing the same thing we were – on a pilgrimage to Mecca. Oh I’m sorry did I say Mecca? I meant Munich – the site of the annual German celebration of Oktoberfest. I don’t know how I mistook the two.

As you can already probably tell from the pictures above, this weekend, me and 18 of my fellow Loyola compatriots, headed out to Munich, Germany to take in the wonder and awe of the last weekend of Oktoberfest. Oktoberfest began as a celebration of the wedding of the Crown Prince, who later became King Ludwig I, with Princess Therese of Sachsen-Hildburghausen, in October of 1810. The locals enjoyed the wedding festivities so much that they decided to have it again the preceding year. Slowly, the festival became an annual event, and grew larger as other holidays were incorporated into what has now become a month-long celebration.

Today, with its liter-sized beer mugs and giant rectangular tents packed to capacity with German bands leading German drinking songs, Oktoberfest is a Mecca for college students around the world. This year, the city of Munich received over 7 million pilgrims over the course of the month – 18 of which were from our Loyola group.

Opting to take the cheaper of the two flights, Matt, Jenn, Nick, and I, headed out to Munich late Friday night. We arrived in Munich by 10:30, and reached “The Tent” – our outdoor camp group hostel, which brought me back to Cub Scout camping in the fifth grade – by 1am. Sure as the sun rises (and when the sun actually was rising), we were up again by 7am, to head over to Oktoberfest.

It was an odd phenomenon watching the sunrise over a city as I headed toward a drinking event. Though I figured with daylight savings and different time zones, some place in the world, it was an appropriate time to be drinking, so why not now in Munich? The sky reddened as we walked from the tram stop toward the fair grounds, and as we approach the sign the read “Willkommen Zum Oktoberfest,” the sun peaked over the tip of the Ferris wheel in the background. The festival was a ghost town, vending stands boarded up, lights off, rides stopped, and no action – except people walking. In the distance, the spire from St. Johns guided in the increasing amount of people approaching the tents. Surprisingly we weren’t the only ones to brave the cool German morning. The rules of Oktoberfest are you get a beer as long as you’re at a table, and if you can’t get one reserved, its first come first serve. By 7:45am we were packed into a crowd of people like sardines in front of the Haufbrau beer tent – I stood (uncomfortably) admiring how many people were as crazy (or dumb) as we were.

Then it happened. Whistles blowing – German shouting – a police officer perched atop a picnic table, flailing his arms in all directions. And the crowd began flowing, picking up momentum and speed – the doors were open. But not the doors we were standing in front of, they had opened up the back doors of the tent in some half-hearted attempt at crowd control, what it really did was create a frenzy. We rushed, and by rush I mean sprinted (Why? Because everyone else was running) toward the door and burst into the cavernous canvas tent that was to be our saloon for the next couple of hours.

Scrambling quick, we found a table big enough for the whole group and sat down taking in the environment around us. “Oktoberfest is like Disneyland, but with beer,” Morgan exclaimed as we watched the chaos of people scrambling for tables unfold. Chants began and ended like a high school football game – everyone taking part in a scream or a table pound as the clock ticked closer toward 9am (drinking time). And then with a roar of the crowd, beer wenches carrying up to 9 or 10, liter-sized glasses poured out of back rooms – posing for pictures to show off their accomplished beer hold skills. Slopping down the 8-Euro beers with a grin, the wenches were off to deliver the next round of bucket-sized beers to their next round of early-morning drinkers.

It’s amazing how friendly people are at a massive drinking event. The only thing I admired more than that was the diversity of the people present. Over the course of the day, I’m pretty sure I had a conversation or two with people from every continent. I met Americans and Canadians almost every place I went. I spoke with a guy from India who had the bottom bunk of our bunk beds at “The Tent.” I got a beer with some Australians in a beer garden. I lamented with several folk from Hong Kong while I was crammed against the door and stuck in line outside the beer tent (see Lessons Learned the Hard Way below). I talked with a local about how he lives his life with the city so crowded through the whole month. A guy from the Congo let me cut in front of him on line to the bathroom. And I shared a laugh with a guy from Brazil when his friend shattered a beer stein. Of course I suppose I may have been friendlier that usual also.

Needless to say, I enjoyed the rest of Saturday. We spent most of the day at the beer tents and beer gardens, and traveled back to “The Tent” – our campgrounds – to get some much needed nap time midway through the day. From there, the group headed back out to dinner and to see some of the city at night. After our nighttime touring had commenced, Matt and I headed back to Oktoberfest to admire the lights of the festival in the moonlight. By nightfall we weren’t able to get back into the already overflowing tents, but we did admire the scene inside from the window – it looked like the wide angle shots of “Beer Fest” the movie. After a little frustration from the festival, we headed back to the campgrounds where we joined in the giant bonfire celebrations that had already begun. Finally, tired and dragging, we collapsed into the bunks at the Tent and got some sleep.

Sunday brought a day of touring for the group. We first visit Dachau and the concentration camp (see next blog). Then we headed back into Munich to walk around the city. While half of the group grabbed dinner, Nick, Toni and I decided to try and see some of the city sites during the daytime. We trekked over to St. Peter’s church, signified by its dual clock bell tower. For 1 Euro, we climbed the tower and beheld the beauty of the city from above. From the top of the tower, we could see all of the major sights of the city from the Frauenkirche (the famous Cathedral symbol of the city) to the Alps in the distance. We also could hear the music and the sights of the Oktoberfest festival from the top of the tower.

After climbing down the tower, a task the narrow worn, winding steps made more difficult, we walked over to the Frauenkirche, then to the Theatinerkirche – a golden painted church built in the 17th century. From there, we caught sight of a Lego carnival that was also in town this weekend. We watched for a couple of minutes as they took down the 10 meter high Lego tower that had been built the day before. The city was beautiful around sundown and the warm weather lightened our spirits.

At this point the group divided again. Those headed back on the early flight headed back to Leuven. However, for the select four of us – the four original pilgrims – our adventure wasn’t over quite yet. We headed back to Oktoberfest, just to enjoy the less crowded scene. We were able to poke our heads in and out of a couple of the beer tents and see the environment that was going on inside. The music and festivities in each tent were specified for each of the different beers that sponsored them. Some had giant platforms in the center with a German band jeering on the crowd. Others had elaborate decorations and streamers hanging from the ceiling. Some had a second level which overshadowed the interior. Either way, the intention of each of the tents was quite clear – to celebrate the final night of the festival.

We enjoyed walking around, but unfortunately, we had to carry our bags around all day and were harassed at every tent entrance to have them inspected. Tired of the incessant need to empty our clothes, Matt, Nick, Jenn and I, headed over to one of the beer gardens near by and enjoyed a more relaxed beer while playing some cards. After perusing the city for a couple of hours we headed over to the airport – our free hostel for the evening. And as we arrived and looked around a little bit, I had an answer to my question in the beginning about how many college students were in the same predicament we were – as almost every bench around us where we set up camp for the night, was also taken by a college kid. After this experience, I’m convinced that every college student strapped for cash should spend one night in an airport. Though it was my first time, it probably won’t be the last. At approximately 9 am Monday morning, we boarded a plane back to Leuven, where we were able to get some necessary rest before our first round of classes. And just like that Oktoberfest joined a long list of memories we have been compiling.

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Lessons Learned the Hard Way:

3. If you happen to be in Munich, during Oktoberfest, in a beer tent, at about 10:45am, with a table and a liter beer in your hand, bobbing your head along to the music and enjoying the overall atmosphere, and you happen to wander through the tent, and into a reserved section that is being cleared out, and you get pushed outside, and in turn get kicked out of the beer tent, that has a no reentry policy, even though your friends, clothes, and bag are inside, the jacked, bald-headed, neck tattooed, guy with the earpiece in, security guard, is not your friend, nor will he allow you back in unless you have two X chromosomes. Lesson Learned.