munchen... or "munich" as us americans say...

"Munich" roughly means "near the monks"...back in the day Monks were the only inhabitants in the whole area so everyone just referred to it as "that place where the monks live!" andddddd the monks brewed beer! beer used to be a part of every meal. it was basically a food group!

i was a little disappointed in the city. i was hoping for charm, beauty, and gnome paraphernalia, and cuckoo clocks on every street corner and i didnt get much of that. BUT i did learn alot about the city and enjoyed what we did:

we went on a FREE TOUR of the city! this company offers tours of a handful of europes most-visited cities which we thought was too-good-to-be-true until our tour guide suggested we tip him... we were surprised, but tipped him because he was so knowledgable about the city, and overall a fairly decent guide... we found out later that the guides work off of tips only and have to the company 2.50 E per tourist (our guide didnt tell us this... if wed known at the time we wouldve given him more!), so if you ever go on a tour, tip the guide at least 5 bucks...

munich has a alot of dark history due to Hilter's rise to power and WW2, and the city cannot forget... read this article and this article...


on a lighter note!!! there are "beer gardens" EVERYWHERE!! a beer garden basically is a restaurant that has long wooden tables and benches that everyone sits at together, lots of beer, and lots of yummy (but gluten-filled) food

 

this is a picture of us about to embark on a "beer tour"... we went to a handful of different beer gardens and.... that was all. clearly, i thought it was lame because i cant drink beer. they did have a selection of wine, but they were not delicious.

below is a 'MAYPOLE'.... they are all over munich, but i'm not sure what the significance is ha!

 

this is the GLOCKENSPIEL

more on the trip later!