In Beer We Trust

Up close with the Glockenspiel. Top scene: the joust in which Bavaria defeats France. Bottom scene: a wedding dance.
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I looked all over Munich and narry a building, plaque, or publication had this written on it.  A grievous error, if you ask me.  Beer is as much at the heart of this city as it is in the gullets of its citizens and many visitors.  When the Opera House caught fire, it was saved by a makeshift bucket brigade using beer since the water had frozen over.  St. Peter's Church was almost completely rebuilt, and all financing came from the proprietor at the Wiesen who promised the reconstruction if people drank at his pavilion.  The Nazi party might even owe its existence to beer.  It was in the famous beer hall, Hofbrauhaus, where a young Austrian persuaded people to sign his political plan after several rounds of free beer.

One of the cherubs defending St. Mary's Column.
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There are many great beers unique to Munich, but drinking them is best left to late afternoons or early evenings in a biergarten in the company of good people.  This frees the earlier hours to ingest the tasty history of Bavaria.  Yet again, I began my urban experience with a free walking tour conducted by New Europe Tours.  My half-Kiwi, half-Scots tour guide had a wealth of information, including the earlier beer facts I spouted off, and knew exactly how to present it.  At the New Town Hall and Glockenspiel he competed for attention with odd facts and witty humor, all at matching volume of the incessant melody.  In the Frauenkirche, the city's most famous church and landmark, he lowered the decibel level and modified his tone to convey due respect.  And at the memorials to Kristallnacht or the Beer Hall Putsch, he sincerely revealed both the barbarism and heroism of humanity.

To live this past requires above all an open mind and a steel trap.

My knowledgeable and entertaining tour guide, Adam.
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I had just enough time after the tour to catch the U-bahn to Olympiazentrum.  No, I wasn't headed to the Olympic site.  Not yet.  Instead, I was bound for the complex just opposite the park:  BMW Welt.  Like the VW Autostadt in Wolfsburg, the Welt (World) was a showroom, learning point, and activity centre all-in-one.  Unlike its counterpart, BMW gave tours of the manufacturing plant, my playarea.  From raw steel to final diagnostics test, we were led through the various areas of the multi-tiered, continuous assembly line.  I have no photos to share, as they are still considered sensitive areas, but I will briefly describe what impressed this nerdy engineer.  It takes just 52 hours from start to finish to build one complete car.  Nearly all normally disposable items are now recyclable or reusable.  Due to the number and timing of the in-process checks, a final product (i.e. the car) is never scrapped.  And as automation continues to increase, the workforce never downsizes.  Employees are retrained and relocated but not replaced.

The Frauenkirche, the city's most recognized symbol.
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The following day, I took my first trip outside the city.  My destination was a little village with a big reputation.  It is a site I believe should be on everyone's itinerary while in Germany - the Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial Site.  I enjoyed my guide on the free walking tour so much that I joined his group for this visit.  Before entering the camp he promised us he would not be funny, but he would be sincere and passionate, for some of his information would be from his relative who survived until liberation.  As we began I asked myself, "How does one see the past?"  With photos of the foundations where barracks once stood?  By imagining the smell eminating from the heap of the dead yet to be burned in the crematorium?  Or with tears of joy as the videos played and skeletal prisoners greeted their liberators?  The answer cannot be given without being here.  This place holds too much memory and requires strong spirit, because even now it has the power to take it away if one lets it.  To live this past requires all the senses but above all an open mind and a steel trap.  To live it is to learn, to absorb, and then to lock it away.

I believe it is the tower on the right that reaches 100m while its twin only sees the view from 99.
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To lift the necessary weight Dachau placed on my shoulders, I needed a happy place.  "The Happiest Place on Earth" is, of course the Magical Kingdom in Anaheim, California, but that was both too far and too great a contrast.  However Bavaria's kingdom does have something similar to offer - the castle which Disney has used in its famous logo, Neuschwanstein.  The eccentric Ludwig II, often called 'Mad King Ludwig', planned to build four castles before his odd, unsolved death at 40, but this is his most celebrated.  Unfortunately for us, it was never finished, but the grandeur of what was completed, the throne room (sans throne), king's bedchamber, and music hall, to name a few, is truly fantastic.  Disappointingly, photographs were forbidden as everything from the ornate mosaic floor to the delicate wood carvings and elaborate paintings were original.  Ludwig wished to live in fantasy, and his favorite fantasies spawned from Richard Wagner's operas.  The themes of the rooms and even the castle itself was dedicated to the king's close friend, who sadly never saw any of it before he died.

The long hall of penitence.
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My last day in Munich was glory with sunshine.  I celebrated the weather on the paths of Olympic Park and in the grassy fields of the city's most popular greenbelt, Englischer Garten.  However, my final activity was hardly active at all.  I paid homage to the city of eternal beer by sitting in a biergarten with a weissbier in one hand, a brezel in the other, and a friend across the table.  In two weeks time, there won't be space to enjoy this simple pleasure as the city hosts one of the largest parties in the world, Oktoberfest (or Wiesen).  The sizable population of 1.5 million will more than quadruple as people from all continents learn what good beer is and how to drink it properly.  And over all this merriment and festivity will be the city's unofficial motto: In Beer We Trust [You Will Have a Good Time].