Fear and Loathing at Oktoberfest 2006

Munich during Oktoberfest is a wasted city. Vomit covers the ground and beer practically rains from the sky. You're constantly sandwiched between a loud drunk American pissing himself and some 12-year-old lothario with a dirt-stache and a girl on each arm. Where do they come from and where do they go?

Oktoberfest puts on the facade of good clean fun--all buxom beer wenches and enormous pretzels and lederhosen and giant cookie necklaces and roller coasters--but to see it at night is to see the naked soul of humanity, writhing in pain, beating the ground, and, in dejected despair forsaking God for giving man alcohol.

One has to go a few miles out to Dachau just to remind himself there's still a world outside of this bizarre carnival fantasia of Bavarian sausage.

An illustrative anecdote. Two men are standing beside each other taking photos of a giant spinning beer mug or something. I point one out to my companion because he is wearing a Praha Drinking Team t-shirt. As I am doing so, a third party enters the scene wearing an "OOOOOOooooohhhhh yeeeeeeeaaaaahhhhhh" expression on his face, he grabs the respective crotches of the aforementioned photographers.

But it was fun though!