Beer and Kissing in Germany
Avoiding kidnapping by sheer dumb luck
In the spring of 2011, at the age of 22 and newly graduated from engineering, I traveled through Germany for six weeks. Most of my classmates had trips planned, either backpacking in Europe, RV’ing through the American West, or other similar adventures.
I had just finished a junior-level German course as an elective, plus have family in Germany, so figured I would travel there instead of the more typical European destinations (Rome, London, etc). At the time, one could buy a country-wide rail pass relatively cheaply (especially as a foreigner/student), and it covered unlimited travel between cities. All you had to do was write in the starting and ending destinations and the dates. Apart from spending some time with family, and a trip to Prague with a girlfriend, I was on my own!
After a redeye flight to Frankfurt, I stayed with my aunt for a few days. We had breakfast at the airport, then headed into town. That first day was tough, due to jetlag. The next day we met one of my cousins, who was living in Germany on a work visa from Namibia. She was slightly older than me, working in a fashion store in downtown Frankfurt and therefore totally cool. She let me use her employee discount to buy a pair of funky green pants that I wore for many years afterward.
From Frankfurt, I flew to Hamburg to spend a week with my uncle and his family. They live in a beautiful tree-filled neighborhood, in the pastor’s home of a church with lovely gardens. We spent the week touring Hamburg and the surrounding area, visiting castles, the city center, and sightseeing.
It was fun playing LEGOs with my young cousins and listening to my uncle telling stories of Obaas, the maternal grandfather I barely knew. It’s uncanny how similar my brother and my uncle are — in their physical appearance, mannerisms, and outlook on life. Especially considering they first met when my brother was already an adult!
From Hamburg, I took the train to Bremen, where I spent a dreary morning walking around in the drizzle trying to sightsee. I was excited to be on my own and had left the hostel too early, so the shops were still closed. I had booked a private room at the hostel, easing into the experience — no shared dorms yet! But I was lonely. The hours can be long while traveling alone and in poor weather.
From Bremen, I went on to Köln, home of the Cologne Cathedral, and Kölsch, a light crisp beer served in skinny glasses. After a tour of the gothic cathedral, I checked out a Biergarten and enjoyed chatting with some locals, putting my German to good use.
Later at the hostel, I met an older guy — a New Zealander — who convinced me to join him at a hole-in-the-wall bar nearby. I say older; he may have been 30, or he may have been 40, my memory is rather fuzzy on this but certainly, to a 22-year-old, someone in their mid-thirties seemed old.
He wore a black leather motorcycle jacket. I’m not sure why others from the hostel common room didn’t join us, perhaps they had other plans. After keeping me plied with Kölsch, we went for a walk down by the riverfront. Germany has open alcohol laws so we took beers from the bar to go. We ended up on a park bench making out, overlooking the Kölner Dom on the other side of the Rhein. I had a boyfriend at home in Canada, someone I was only dating to prove a point, but that’s a story for another time. He cried when I left for Germany and gave me his high school class ring, but that didn’t stop me from hooking up with a random guy I had just met. I was not a good person at that phase in my life.
Later that night, I woke up in a hostel bed- but not my own- and FREAKED OUT. I had no idea where I was, how I had gotten there, or where my stuff was, including my bag with my passport, camera, and phone (such as it was in 2011).
What a total idiot! Two American guys woke up and managed to decipher through my tears and hiccups that I was lost. They took me down to reception, who confirmed my room and bed number, then took me to my bed in one of the women’s dorms. I was in the right hostel at least, and not lying facedown in a gutter somewhere. They then had to go back up to the men’s dorm to find my bag, which turned out was right next to the bed I had been placed in, and then brought it back to me. Passport, cash, everything in its place.
Turns out all those beers in the deceptively small glasses had caught up with me. My Kiwi hook-up, not knowing which was my bed, had deposited me in his and gone back out to the city. Those Americans were both very tall and rather heavy-set. I was probably rude to them earlier in the day, because I was cute and they were not, but they were not only very kind to me but rescued me from my stupidity in a potentially very bad situation.
I was properly repentant the next day and vowed to never do something so irresponsible as losing my passport in a foreign country again, even if only temporarily. I spent the day hungover, on a Rhein river cruise, listening to a group of American frat boys loudly debating the Stanley Cup finals. “What could be dumber than discussing hockey, in Germany, on this glorious spring day?” I thought to myself as I tried to nap under my hat, with my bag as a pillow. (Irony lost at the time)
From Köln, I made my way back to Rudelheim, where my aunt lives. My vivacious & laughter-filled aunt has always been a favorite and has traveled to all the far-off places we lived over the years. If hunger strikes, she’ll produce a bag of Haribo gummies from the depths of her purse, to tide us over until the next meal or Kaffeeklatsch (German tradition of afternoon cake and coffee). We spent the next week traveling in her red Fiat 500 along the Romantische Strasse. It got to the point where I thought I would vomit if I saw any more gorgeous cathedrals.
From Wurzburg, I took the train to Dresden. I went to the opera and sat next to a middle-aged couple from Seattle who invited me out to dinner the following evening. We met at a place that had Medieval Times vibes — waitresses in costume, turkey legs, that kind of thing. Germany for Americans, I’m sure. They were sweet though; it was nice of them to adopt me for an evening. They might’ve had a daughter my age. They invited me to look them up if I was ever in the Pacific North West, but I have yet to make it to Seattle.
I arrived in Erfurt in time for Männertag, also known as Vatertag (Man’s Day or Father’s Day). I spent the morning walking around the cathedral grounds and the medieval city center and relaxing by the riverside.
After lunch, I left the hostel with the idea of renting a bike and checking out the scenery. A group of about six young German men with a wagon full of beer greeted me and cajoled me into joining them on their walk. Männertag, they explained, was a day for men to drink & walk through the “Wald” and celebrate being fathers.
Seemed like a made-up holiday to me, and none of them looked old enough to be fathers besides. Maik & Eik were their ringleaders. I couldn’t believe my ears when they introduced themselves; I had to explain why it was so funny that they were named after a brand of candy. They seemed thrilled to have a German-speaking Canadian girl join them on their man’s day outing.
I have no idea what possessed me to go with them. It wasn’t like me to go off with strangers.
But they seemed sweet, and there were many other groups of people out and about. We walked through the streets of Erfurt — past Soviet-era apartment blocks, singing, talking, and working our way through the wagon of beers. Maik and Eik taught me the difference between “teilen” (to split) and “tauschen” (to swap), with beer examples, and subsequent verb conjugations.
Towards the edge of town, we walked along a gravel road by the river and I really, really had to pee. I’d been holding it as long as possible, but there were no restrooms or public facilities in sight. Finally, we passed a patch of greenery, so I disappeared to do my business. Ah, sweet relief! Followed shortly thereafter by an itching sensation all over my legs and a rapidly appearing rash. The boys laughed and laughed — my first experience with Brennnessel (stinging nettles).
We continued walking on a paved trail through the forest, with farm fields nearby and the city below. I kept asking when we were going to get to the “wald”, misunderstanding it for “wild” and expecting, perhaps Algonquin level of wilderness and not the urban-rural border we were hiking through. Which is in part even worse — I was willing to go into the remote wilderness with these boys I just met? What on earth was I thinking?
We meandered our way through the afternoon, and I returned to the hostel in the early evening with Maik and Eik’s phone numbers written in Sharpie on my legs (but went to bed early and didn’t kiss anyone despite all the day drinking).
The next day I rented the bicycle I had intended to the previous day and did the whole Wald loop again, surprised that it only took me about an hour. I kept in touch with Maik via Facebook for a few years. He sent me a picture of his newborn son when he finally did become a father.
From Erfurt, I traveled to Prague, where I met a girlfriend from school. She had also been traveling alone through Europe, which is surprising, considering her conservative Pakistani parents. I don’t think she told them she was alone for most of her trip, aside from meeting me in Prague and another friend in Rome. I guess I wasn’t the only foolhardy one.
Prague is an incredibly beautiful city — the castle on the hilltop, the bridges, monuments, and wide plazas, but I was footsore and had castle fatigue. We ate a mediocre, over-priced meal on the main tourist stretch where the waiter was overly aggressive. We took a bus way across town to what was supposed to be a huge techno hall, but it was Sunday night and the main dance area was closed, leaving only a small, empty-ish bar in the basement. The pilsners were ludicrously cheap though, something like 50 cents each.
From Prague to Berlin, where my friend stayed with me for a day or two before moving on to her next destination. We went on a pubcrawl organized by a local tourism company. The techno club at the end of that tour was more populated than the one in Prague, even if a large portion of the crowd was tourists from the pubcrawl. We danced with some cute American guys, who ended up taking the same 5 am (!!) train back with us to the neighborhood of our hostel. I vaguely recall kissing one of them but nothing more than that. Strike two for sweetheart at home.
Back to Frankfurt, then back home for graduation, and moved to a new town to start my new job. I dumped my boyfriend about a month later, leaving out the details of my trip. He didn’t take it well and mailed me back all the stuff I had given him in our six-month relationship. I heartlessly threw it all in the trash. For a while we still crossed paths — he later moved to the same town and briefly dated not one but TWO of my girlfriends. Probably in retaliation, but since neither of those relationships lasted long, I wasn’t too concerned.
Would I be brave enough now to backpack alone through Europe? Probably not; I’m too comfortable with the day-to-day life, the routine & amenities of home. My German is rusty as heck. Travel pushes you out of your comfort zone, and mine is pretty cozy. Would I be smarter about it, and not get myself into dumb, borderline kidnapping situations? I’d like to think so. I’d be safer, but just a teensy bit more boring.
