Football's coming HOAM

After last year's confidence followed by a swift heartbreak...everything was (almost) forgotten for this year's Champions League final against Borussia Dortmund! And FCB had won the Bundesliga with over 25 points from these very same opponents, so the trophy was in the bag, right? Right?! Anyway, I managed to achieve something that I couldn't last year - I got tickets to watch the game at the Allianz Arena! The match wasn't being played there (it was at Wembley), but they would show the match on the arena's large screens and we could act as though we were at the match proper.

My companion for the match - Jara from Mehico, who isn't actually that interested in football

The Arena!

The trophy!

Woohoo!

And they're off!

Believe it or not, watching it in the stadium did kind of make you feel like you actually were there. Particularly the reaction of the crowd when a goal was scored

Like when this guy took off his shirt, even though it was like..10C

Or when this guy let off a flare. I'll admit to leaping to my feet with my bier in hand and accidentally giving someone a bierdusche (beer shower).

Before I threw the bier over someone.

Best of all, we won!!! So we furiously got out of seats to try to make it back to the city in order to join the celebrations!

But took some time out for celebratory shots outside the stadium, which was lit up in red because Bayern were playing (it's blue when 1860 play and white for the national team)

And then, I don't know...I guess the best way to describe the celebrations is that Munich lost its rag.

Despite it being a great party, the problem with these spontaneous parties a lack of access to getting drinks and an even more dire lack of access to the toilets. I was dancing at an u-bahn station when Jara pointed out that at the wall behind us, 4 guys were lined up because the world is their urinal. Despite that, I look forward to celebrating when the bus makes its way down Leopoldstr.!

JAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Birthday Cakes

 Another year older, another day of making the apartment smell like cake :D To celebrate my birthday this year, I decided to make cupcakes - they're easily made, easily transported, and easily eaten. Unfortunately I went a little overboard and ended up making 3 different type of cupcakes meaning that with 36 cakes, I ended up making a panic trip to the airport in search of an airtight container to hold them

Oooh yeah. The un-iced ones were ginger, the ones with nuts on top were hazelnut/nutella, and the last one was choc-banana.

The one complaint I had was not making Australian War Cookies (aka, Anzacs).

Comfort food craving

Maybe it was the absence of Spu, maybe it was thinking I needed leafy greens, maybe it was thinking that the neck cut of pork was looking pretty good, but I made some garlic kangkong and char siu pork on rice for me to eat this long weekend.

And it was mighty tasty!

Bon Jovi Concert

Several months ago, Ruben asked if a bunch of us wanted to go to the Bon Jovi concert. I remembered mentioning that it was 6 months away but as he pointed out - Bon Jovi is one of those acts, like U2, George Michael, or Madonna, that when given the opportunity to see them, they should be seen! Also, this would be our first trip into the 1972 Olympiastadion so hey, two birds!

The multi-generational crowd. We saw family groups wearing t-shirts from different tours.

Why yes, the stage was shaped like a vintage car.

Like George Michael, that guy just opens his mouth and sound comes out. Also, he hasn't aged in like...20 years.

The light show was pretty impressive, or at least, I was impressed. 

In addition to having the screen behind the car actually fit out to make it look like a car,

they had lights that I'd associate more with dance music!

Being a densely populated city, Munich has a sound curfew. This meant that the band started playing quite early in my opinion, probably around 8pm when the sun was still up. They played for THREE HOURS. I WAS IMPRESSED!!! At the third encore, I was also a little "How much longer are they going to play?!" Anyway, for people who are unsure, Ruben and I were in agreement - the band played a good mix of their classics and not too many songs that we didn't know. Here's the setlist (with credit to this site)

That's What the Water Made Me

You Give Love a Bad Name

Born to Be My Baby

Raise Your Hands

Runaway

Lost Highway

It's My Life

Because We Can

What About Now

We Got It Goin' On

Keep the Faith

(You Want to) Make a Memory

Bed of Roses

When We Were Beautiful

Captain Crash & the Beauty Queen From Mars

We Weren't Born to Follow

I'll Sleep When I'm Dead

Bad Medicine

Encore 1

Dry County

Wanted Dead or Alive

Have a Nice Day

Livin' On A Prayer

Encore 2

In These Arms

Someday I'll be Saturday Night

Always

These Days

Encore 3

I Love This Town

Return of the Spu.

Spu has actually been wandering around Eastern Europe (well, Germany, Poland, and Russia) for the last few weeks. With me so conveniently located, Spu was flying in and out of Munich and upon his arrival back from his journeys, requested that we eat Asian food. Well, his exact words were that he really needed vegetables and food that wasn't meat, potatoes, cabbage, or the like. Pooey recommended that we go back to Kushi-Tei so off we went.

We shared set menus C and D because they had a variety of vegetables, seafood and meats. Spu is so happy to have his asparagus skewers.

Yakitori. Also, I should grill zucchini more often.

California roll side

When Spu ate his prawn, he actually said something along the lines of, "I miss seafood that's not fish sooooo much...."

And some beef and shiitake skwers.

The next day while on a tour of Berchtesgaden (where it snowed despite being May), Spu actually looked up a viet restaurant he wanted to check out.

Spu with his mixed Viet meats, vegetables and rice.

My bun cha gio and bo. Mmmm

 But eventually, there reached a point where there were simply some German/Bavarian foods that Spu needed to eat before venturing back to Melbs. We had German tapas one night where I criminally forgot to take any photos, but I'm sure I'll go back there and will have more opportunities for photos.

Also, Spu finally got a Spanferkel haxn (suckling pig pork knuckle). While he was carving into it, you could hear the crackling crackle!

I had lamb fillets with beans and 'taters.

So bai Spu! And thanks for the FCB shirt and the tub of ice cream you left in my freezer!!!

Mia san Meister!

Dahveed and I decided to go out and do something that doesn't exist in Melbs and something he never did while in Alicante/Barcelona/Madrid - we went to see FC Bayern Munich present the Bundesliga trophy to adoring fans in Marienplatz. The team requested that we rock up in tracht and that FREE BIER would be available! SOLD!!!

As you might be able to tell from the sky, it was a pretty shitty day. 

This meant I chose not to rock up in my dirndl and even though we came relatively late, there was still enough space to get a view of the Rathaus balcony. The bad news is that we were still too late to get the free bier.

Although because everyone is so damn tall, this was my actual view. 

Some guys struggled to hang the FCB flag from a flagpole on their balcony. I could have used that position.

Success!

These enterprising people also got a pretty nifty location!

It was a pretty interesting experience. FCB were playing a match at the Allianz Arena and then they were going to take a bus down Leopoldstr. and make their way to the Marienhof and then Marienplatz. This took HOURS. We ended up standing in Marienplatz for over 3 hours. During this time, a 'comedian' entertained the crowd by singing popular songs with words substituted to reflect different players - and the crowd sang along! Dahveed and I looked at each other and whispered, "This is a bit weird..."

I was too short to see it, but this giant screen here showed us the progress of the team on their journey to the Rathaus.

And everyone, such as this security guy got their cameras and phones ready.

HOORAY!!!

Although, my photos are so blurry, I can't really make out who some of the players are. 

I think this was Alaba.

I know this is Neuer

I think the guy in the front in the dark grey jacker is Mueller

And the blond leaning over the balcony is Tymoschuk

The players return the photo taking

BIERDUSCHE!!!!

And finally, Jupp with the Bundeliga shield. 

Despite the cold (and it did get quite cold once the sun set), it was a fun experience. I don't think I'll do it again though - but we've agreed that if Bayern win the Champions League, we'll go to Leopoldstr and cheer there. 

Sunshine!

Today was a public holiday and...holy frijoles, it was WARM!!! Like, 21C and sunny! So I did what many other vitamin D-deprived northern hemisphere people do and put on a swimsuit, went to a park and lay there in the sun!

Evidence.

But seriously, I met a girl that day (friend of a friend in the park) and she was telling me how when she lived in Melbs, she NEVER did this either because, despite being part-black, SHE BURNED IN THE AUSTRALIAN SUN. We even sat there trying to explain the painful feeling of the sun in Melbs compared to the sun in Munch. 

And then I sent that photo to Pooey who asked how warm it was, and her reply was, "Pffft, it was 25C today."

The Final Fruehlingsfest Weekend Experience

So yeah, somehow I ended up going to Fruehlingsfest again. I think I'm on track to beat my bierfest spending from last year.

On Saturday, I ended up in the Hippodrome with Swisschris, Martine, Tall Steve and Tall Sev. In there, we experienced...

A guy playing a KEYBOARD GUITAR

BROTZEIT PLATTER. Mmm, radishes and obatzda...

DESSERT PLATTER. Damn I love kaiserschmarrn...

We were seated by some Suedtirolean guys...

So this was my view if I looked directly up.

I wasn't planning on going on Sunday, but when I messaged Nestor to find out what he was up to, he said he was going again! Even though he was there on Saturday! And when I asked if he was serious, he said, "Well, how many days can you go to the last day of Fruehlingfest? Only once a year!" I couldn't fight that logic.

But I got my first quarkballchen of the year!

And we saw this girl playing a saxophone while hanging upside down from the shoulders of one of the band! This alone was worth so much win and summed up the fortnight. 

White tiger energy drink

Markus came to me at work and said that if we went to the Mensa (cafeteria), we could get...A FREE BOTTLE OF ENERGY DRINK!!! And like a pair of good scientists, we got our bottles. 

I've only had energy drink a few times - let's face it, I did my PhD without drinking coffee - I don't need energy drink! - but I've always noted its artificially sweet flavour. White tiger also has that flavour but unlike redbull or whatever, it's mixed in a kind of milky-yoghurty mixture, a bit like yakult. Now, I like yakult....but this was fucking disgusting. 

Monolingual agony

Two things have become readily apparent to me since living in Europe, surrounded by multi-lingual Europeans. While I am pretty good at picking up languages and am constantly encouraged by friends of various nationalities to speak with them...I...I just can't! And it's really terrible! I'll sit there and listen to various friends switch between English, German, Spanish, or Italian and while I can generally understand (which is pretty funny for my Spanish friends), I wish I could speak with them! I'm not usually that quiet!!!

Okay, it's not so bad for me - I was once pretty much fluent in French and I have noticed that understanding German is definitely much easier, but I was out at a street party and an Austrian guy spoke to me in French, then German, before we just left it at English because it was easiest :(