"Critical Mass München" written by Joe on estrip.org

08/14/16 01:31 - ID#60589

Critical Mass München

We were finishing dinner at this decent Indian/vegetarian restaurant called Kiss, on Landwehrstraße near our hotel. All of a sudden, a group of 50+ cyclists ride by the restaurant. So we ran as fast as we could to go get the bikes we rented a block away.

Somehow we managed to catch up with the ride. It turns out since it was the last Friday of the month, it was critical mass! I forget that it's a thing since Buffalo doesn't have one.

The ride had a lot of cycle cops and cars following along which was weird, but for the most part the police were cool.

We rode all around Münchens center. Even though it was a fraction of the city we got to see way more than we ever would have otherwise.

The first stop we saw was the Oktoberfest grounds. They're empty in the summer but you can see how huge they are from the steps of the Munich Hall of Fame.

While we were up on the steps, a guy who worked at a bakery brought a cart of pretzels, doughnuts, sandwiches and cookies out for everyone. He was promoting his campaign to distribute wasted food.

The ride kept going around the city, and eventually it got weird with the police. They brought us through the English Gardens, which were packed. All the people in the park freaked out because they thought something was wrong. At this point we peeled off. Still a fun ride.

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08/14/16 12:32 - ID#60584

Last night in Leipzig

Our last night in Leipzig, (e:paul) slept. (e:terry) and I walked around the old city, the south end, across the river to Plagwitz, it seemed like everywhere.

For future reference (e:paul) and (e:terry)'s favorite restaurant Kartoffelhaus Nr. 1 has a location here.

The Bayerischer Bahnhof, which was the second biggest train station in Leipzig but now with the Leipzig city tunnel is a brewery and S-Bahn station.

(e:paul) and (e:terry) getting our daily cro-bag sandwiches in the train station.

Is it possible to be in love with a city? Because if so I fell in love with Leipzig.
Maybe it's just because we were on vacation but I don't think I'll ever find a more beautiful and functional city.

The night we left I actually had a dream that I cried about us leaving. Meta.

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08/14/16 12:06 - ID#60583

Leipzig Rathaus

The old city hall of Leipzig is now their history museum. It covers at least 1000+ years of history. We couldn't see any more than half of it in the 3+ hours we were there.

They really like their dragon slaughter ;(

A satanic dragon vomiting Lutherans out of his butt dragon. This was on a painting to show catholic teachings.

A map of the city. Leipzig was known for it's trade fairs because it was one of the few cities in the middle ages permitted to have multiple markets.

The old city hall chambers.

A model of the old city

The armor of a Leipzig soldier

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08/14/16 12:03 - ID#60582

Botanical Gardens Leipzig

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08/14/16 12:00 - ID#60581

Raves and the best falafel

After the botanical gardens we rode over to the Ms. Hippy shop so (e:paul) could get some more zimmerman hosen. I ended up getting one pair, but I had a minor breakdown over how many pairs we got (something like 7).

On the same street these girls had hours of non-stop 90s kareoke. Ugh.

I did calm down a little when we had the best falafel known to man next door. It was 4 euro and had fried halloumi in it. I could eat this every day. In fact we went here at least three times.

You can get it at

Olive Tree
Karl-Liebknecht-Straße 40
04107 Leipzig

(e:terry) looks happy after eating a falafel

So now that we were all full we went out to rave.

Leipzig is a city that's well known for it's electronic music. We went to two raves while we were there.

The first one was in this old warehouse in Plagwitz. I can't remember or find the street it was on but it was mostly old brick warehouses. I found a name on my google history, elipmanoke, but who knows if that is right.

The rave had three different DJ's including one outside. It wasn't even too smoky. You also got free erdnuss flips. And there were plenty of people who were friendly and just hung out and talked in the outside patio.

The second rave was maybe two nights later, in an old factory. The space was called "Institure fuer Zunkunft" or the Institure for the Future. It ran from 12am to noon, and you couldn't take any pictures inside. It was super dusty but the music was good.

Here's what Leipzig's new Rathaus looks like at 6am.

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08/14/16 11:55 - ID#60580

Völkerschlachtdenkmal

We rode our bikes through some of the eastern park over to the Voelkerschlactdenkmal, or Monument to the Battle of the Nations. The monument commemorates the defeat of Napolean which happened near Leipzig and was built between 1898-1913.

It's a 300 ft concrete and granite monument, that you can climb up to the very top in. I've never seen anything more impressive, especially built before 1900. The views from the top are incredible. When I was climbing the twisted narrow staircase to the lookout platform, I was almost dizzy.

It's obviously from a terrible time of nationalism, especially leading up to WWI but you have to give the construction props.

A nearby Russian church gaudily covered in gold.

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08/14/16 10:40 - ID#60579

Night out in Leipzig

After our day out riding around Leipzig, we decided to go out. We tried some of the gay bars - once again suprisingly small and empty. One was a sports bar cafe called Cafe Apart, but the second one, Havana was a lot better. We met two guys named Marcus and Mathias (I now believe every man in Germany has one of these two names). They were two music students who lived in Leipzig, and were playing in Bachfest.

We hung out at the one bar for a while, and I really got to practice my German. It's easier when you've had a couple beers.

Later we took our bikes over to another bar called Flower Power. I don't think any bars there have a closing time, but this one was most popular from 4am-12pm. It seemed kind of like the Pink, if people at the pink were crazy enough to stay 8 hours.

When we left it was pouring outside. We said bye to our friends and tried to race an S-Bahn station. I was so tired I couldn't even figure out the right tickets to buy while the trains kept coming. At this point we were just soaked so we kept riding through the rain.

When we got back to the hotel it was something like 7am.

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08/12/16 02:34 - ID#60577

Bernd das Brot

The first night in Leipzig we were relaxing and watching TV. I discovered my new favorite German celebrity after Ladykracher.

His name is Bernd and he is a curmudgenly loaf of bread. Every night on the children's channel Kika, he has a clip that loops from 9pm - 6 am. They almost always involve a disembodied voice with a robot arm, making him do something he hates, in an empty white room. i love Bernd.

The first episode I saw was "Social Media", where he's forced to join a social media site.

My favorite line is when the robot asks him to post something and he says "Wenn ich posten will, werd ich Breiftraeger" (If I wanted to post something, I'd be a postman".

And they say Gemans are humorless.

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08/09/16 12:04 - ID#60572

Tschuss Hamburg, Hallo Leipzig

The next day we left Hamburg. Once again we didn't know where we were going or staying but we decided we'd figure it out on the train east.

Other random things about Hamburg:

Everywhere is very smoky
Every gay bar has a maze inside
It's impossible to find public recycling bins
It's the most diverse city I've seen besides Toronto

We took the ICE between Hamburg and Berlin. 300km/h and the train nerd in me pretty much died. It was amazing. I can't remember exactly but I think we were in an ICE 3.

We considered stopping in Berlin on the way there, but it looked too big when we were coming in. I'm sure it's awesome but maybe another time. When we got out of the train in the Berlin Hauptbahnhof, we had 60 seconds to decide, and got in the InterCity train to Leipzig. I'm glad we did.

The country side is covered in windmills and solar panels.

We got into the Leipzig Hauptbahnhof in the afternoon. It's huge. It turns out it's the biggest train station in Europe.

Leipzig was an East German city only 26 years ago but it's full tilt capitalism in the train station now. There is a three story mall, and in the front is a KFC, Pizza Hut, McDonalds and a Burger King. You can never escape fast food, depressing.

We didn't have a place to stay so we walked around the altstadt for a while, right across from the train station. Most of the streets are bikes and pedestrians only, and the buildings are awesome. It's a weird mix
of 300+ year old buildings and a few modern DDR buildings.

We walked around forever trying to figure out where to stay. We ended up staying 2.5km away from the center in the Nordic hotel which was really cheap. Not before overeating pierogies at a restaurant called Wodkeria.

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08/08/16 11:56 - ID#60571

Red Light Reeperbahn

After the afternoon at the Miniatur Wunderland we started heading back towards Altona. While we were doing that we walked down the Reeperbahn which is the red light district.

Have you ever hear a promoter outside a five story pink building offer you freshly washed escorts? Because we did. We even could all share for the same price!

The street was commercial in the craziest way. Everything was a sex shop, or a bar or a club. The old-time Hamburger the night before told us this is where tourists and British bachelor parties come to throw up.

I think Terry and had some 11% elephant beers that night but thankfully we didn't throw up. (or enter a brothel)

One of the gay streets between the Hauptbahnhof and St. Pauli, where the Reeperbahn is.

We ended up in a couple gay bars again. I can't remember how but we met a Polish guy named Marcus from Leipzig, his German friend and another girl who joined us at a couple bars. It was a pretty crazy night for a Wednesday.