Glad everyone seemed to enjoy the report. Just remembered a couple of random things. It seems it's impossible to get everything down in a post all at once....
The wooden pub/brewery tables in Dusseldorf and Koln were notable because they were all the same. They weren't finished - no oil/stain/polyurethane, etc - and most seemed to be freshly sanded. Thus the coasters seemed to serve a dual purpose: the waiters kept track of how many you had by putting a pencil mark on the coaster and they actually did serve to protect the unfinished surface. Around here all the tables are finished and coasters are rarely used. We found this odd for establishments where the patrons do tend to spill...
When we did arrive in Munich we had been up for about 24h straight. The beer tasted good but boy did we get tired after a few litres of the stuff. While we were at the Hofbrauhaus beer garden I managed to make a bit of a spectacle of myself. Not only are there waitresses everywhere, but there are also vendors walking around selling sandwiches, sausages, etc from big boxes suspended on a strap over their shoulders. After simply holding up my hand and shaking my head no for the first few, the beer encouraged me to use the little bit of German I learned just for the trip. Upon seeing yet another headed my way, I held up my hand and in a loud voice said "Ich habe kein hunger." [I'm not hungry.] In hindsight, a simple "Nein, danke" would have sufficed. Anyway, the vendor takes the hint and buggers off but the young couple at the next table start giggling at me, which causes me to start laughing because I probably sounded like a complete moron. They made a point of saying a cheerful "Tchuss" [bye] when they left so I guess I couldn't have made that big a fool out of myself.
Also at Oktoberfest, a group of older men sat at the table behind us and we eventually heard them talking about us (at least we assume so because we heard "Canada.") After that one of them eventually asked if we were Canadian, so we replied that we were (in German, mind you), and then they asked if we were from Montreal. This was the first of 4 times we were asked if we from Montreal while we were in Europe. Now normally this is a huge insult to us western Canadians but we knew they didn't know that so we just told them that we were from Alberta - Edmonton. They seemed to know where that was, which greatly impressed us ["West?" "Ja!"].
A little after this we decided to get a giant pretzel but we had no idea if they were actually called pretzels or not. Our little German phrase book didn't have them in it either, so we asked this same group what they were called. They immediately called a waitress over and told her to bring us one, which we greatly appreciated. Unfortunately we still didn't know their proper German name.
The security guards at the Oktoberfest pavilions are generally quite humourless and very business-like, but even they enjoyed the occasional beer whilst on duty. We got a big kick out of that.
Teams of 5-10 people are a common sight at Oktoberfest. The matching shirts give them away. The organizational skills this requires, especially of a bunch of inebriated individuals, is impressive. And even though I don't speak Italian, I got the drift of one young Italian gentleman's wording on the back of his shirt.....It involved him doing something vulgar to my mother, and I definitely understood that. Some phrases are universal.
From our observations, there are precisely three people in Europe that don't smoke.
In German elevators, 0 = lobby/main floor, and -1 = basement. I found that very amusing. Almost as amusing as the little sign you hang on your hotel room's doorknob to request that your room be cleaned. In German they read "Bitte Zimmer Aufraumen." Now "bitte" is please, "zimmer" is room, and although I don't exactly know what "Aufraumen" means, I can't help but notice that it contains "Frau" which, naturally, is woman. I really got a kick out of "Please make up room now" appearing just under what I translate to be "Please womanize the room."
The taxi drivers in Europe are completely insane. Fun, but insane.
A lot of young Canadians work in Amsterdam. Sort of like how Banff here in Canada contains a lot of young Australians.
The homeless in Europe are way more polite than the homeless here in Canada. Actually the homeless here border on being muggers with the manner they approach people.
...That's all I can remember for now. I know once I hit "Add Reply" I'll think of something I've missed.... <_<
