München - Day 1

Today Tobs and I left for Munich to check out the ISPO fair and the city as well. We made reservations in a hostel, because everything otherwise available is simply not affordable. Also we decided to drive down here, since it was more efficient for this trip. 

The day began pretty relaxed. I woke up at an appropriate eight o'clock and got up an hour later to start my day. It's crazy, but I need überlong in the morning to get working. Also I like lying around in the morning when I know that there's no hurry to the day. Sometimes I even set the alarm to extra early just to have another hour to fall asleep again. Sometimes it pays off, because those morning naps are when the dreams are the liveliest. So the first task was getting up, the second task was packing. 

Packing is always fun, too. It mentally prepares me for the trip. In order to decide on the right amount of clothes and stuff, you have to try and predict the whole trip in advance. The fun part is, that you're not prepared, when later anything unpredicted happens. So in addition to the basics I usually pack a little more than I really need. 

Around noon I called Tobs and we decided to meet up in Brühl. On my way to the train station I got a cup of coffee that tasted like sweet sunshine. It's always the same coffee from the same store, but today it was better somehow. The twenty minute train ride I filled with reading the book that I bought for the trip, 'Ruhm' by Daniel Kehlmann, a young German author. I've already read some short stories and a novel that he wrote, all good stuff, I think.

I got off at the station and saw Tobs pulling up on the parking lot. He hadn't finished packing so we drove back to the crib and met Lea, Tobs's eight year old niece, who told us everything about her collection of football trading cards. Amazing how kids can be so enthusiastic about things that we later label with 'less important stuff'. She talked about her cards and trading maneuvers as if she was a stock broker. She reminded me of our collection of Knight Rider audio tapes back in the days.

Soon after that our trip bagan and our first stop was the Lidl supermarket at the end of town. We bought  much less than expected: some chocolate, some chesecake and some mint dragees only. We paid, packed the goods and thought about getting another cup of coffee when Tobs dicovered that the chesecake isn't plain, but fruity flavoured. Not sure I like that, but why not try something new, right? Then we filled up the car at the next gas station and finally got on the road. 

We pretty much spent all day in the car, listening to Blumentopf (because München is where they're from), nodding to the beat and remembering the words. It's crazy to hear songs you listened to ten years ago, felt like I was sitting in a Skoda time mashine. For dinner we got some burgers and something funny happened. When I eagerly unwrapped my Chilly Chese Burger, I looked at the unhealthy goodness and found myself surprised. My burger had two top pieces of bread. Not with an extra one, but with another top instead of a bottom piece.

I felt like 오대수, who was captured in a shabby hotel room for fifteen years without even knowing why. One day, he finds three chopsticks to his daily meal of fried dumplings. He keeps the extra one and uses it to carve his way through a brick wall. Looking at my top bottom piece of sesame sprinkled burger bread I asked myself what I could do with it. I couldn't think of anything better than flipping it upside down to see if it made any difference. And it didn't.

We arrived at around ten, found our hostel and checked in. The lady at the counter was visibly stressed out, but she was fairly nice to us. After checking out the room, we decided to go out for a drink and went to a place called Blumen Bar. Super tight place, if only the music was less electronic. We had a few overprized drinks, small talked with a couple of people and finally called it a day.