Kulmbach beerfest, or, I just had the one beer

On Tuesday night, Brittany, two of her friends, Katie and Melanie, and I drove to Kulmbach for my first beerfest. Katie and Mel's husbands are also deployed at the moment. Brittany wore her dirndl, as did her friend Katie. I'd assumed that dirndls and lederhosen were the Americanized stereotype of German attire, but at least half of the crowd at Kulmbach were rocking the traditional getup.

I don't know what I was expecting, but I didn't expect a giant tent with a band playing, and hundreds of people standing on the benches singing and clapping along. The noise was incredible. Sorry for the poor-quality photo, but at least it conveys the size of the tent.


I had a liter of beer--that was one stein of beer (although it bears noting that the word stein is an English neologism; it means "stone" in German). Not only was it an enormous mug of beer, but German beer has a higher alcohol content than American beers (or so I was told). I went to the fest thinking I'd have several beers over the course of the evening. Yeah, I had one and it was more than enough. We all got dinner from the food carts surrounding the fest test--mostly bratwurst in rolls with french fries, but there were other food options as well. I got my bratwurst with curry sauce: "currywurst."

The four Germans sitting next to us as we ate and drank didn't speak very much English, and we didn't speak much German, but that didn't stop them from attempting to converse. They were two couples, and in between "Prosts!" they asked us why we were in Germany. Katie, the best German speaker of the four of us (she's been here a year and a half), gestured to we four and said, "Mann ist Soldat," which means "Husband is a soldier." I leaned over and said, "Nein mann. Nein mann! Prost!"

Servers were offering small trays of some kind of white wavy item, and Mel got me some so I could see what it was. Turns out it was peeled, salted radish. I did not like it, but Brittany did!


We walked around and inside the fest tent, amid the deafening crowd singing along with the music. The songs were usually traditional German folk songs, with some popular songs as well. Dessert to follow (my delicious chocolate-dipped banana not shown).