Living Life With Passion & Purpose!
Seeing the big Jägermeister logo on the side of the bus made me smile right away. I was already a huge fan — I’d even scored a bottle with Dorte and her family just a few weeks earlier — so spotting that classic stag-and-cross ad felt like a perfect little sign that the day was going to be a good one.
This was the view from high up in Eric’s building in the former athletes’ village from the 1972 Olympics. From his window we could see the apartment blocks, the Olympic Village and the iconic tent-roofed stadium in the distance.
Then Eric pointed out the buildings where members of Black September had taken Israeli athletes hostage during the 1972 Games. Eleven Israeli athletes and coaches were ultimately killed. I was embarrassed to admit that I had never even heard of the Munich massacre until that afternoon. Standing there with Eric, looking directly at where it happened, made the history immediate and real in a way no textbook ever could.
The attack fundamentally changed security at the Olympic Games. What had been intended as the relaxed “Games of peace and joy” became a turning point, with future Olympics adopting dramatically increased security around athletes and Olympic venues.
Eric took me inside the swimming complex, which was still very much alive and being used by the people of Munich. It was packed that afternoon. Standing there looking up at the Olympic diving platforms, I was struck by just how high they really were — suddenly I had the same kind of respect for those divers that I’d felt for the ski jumpers in Lillehammer.
When we came out of the swimming hall I noticed the lights were on in the Olympic Stadium. Eric said it was used all the time — it could have been for a local soccer game or even a concert. Seeing the big floodlights blazing and the stadium still alive more than twenty years after the Games made the whole Olympic Park feel like it never really shut down.
Eric told me the building was designed to look like a four-cylinder engine — and once you know that, you can’t unsee it. Standing there at night with the traffic streaking past and the round BMW logo glowing on top, the whole tower really did look like a giant engine block rising out of the Olympic Park. It was a cool piece of architecture.
This is the famous Hofbräuhaus am Platzl, Munich’s oldest and most legendary beer hall. It was originally built in 1589 by Bavarian Duke Maximilian I as an extension of the royal brewery, and the general public was first admitted in 1828 by King Ludwig I. Almost the entire building was destroyed in World War II bombings and carefully rebuilt afterward.
Eric brought me here for dinner, wouldn’t let me pay for a single thing, and we drank our beers by the liter while an Oompah band played. I had an absolute blast — Wiener schnitzel, bratwurst, and more beer than I could count.
Classic Bavarian Weisswurst served the traditional way — floating in hot water — with a big soft pretzel and sweet mustard.
Eric grabbed my camera and took this picture of me. I was holding a Maß (pronounced roughly “mahs”) — the traditional Bavarian one-liter beer mug that is the standard serving size at the Hofbräuhaus and every real Munich beer hall. Big smile, big liter of beer, and one of the best nights of the whole trip, all thanks to one of the friendliest South Africans I’d ever met.
The Blaskapelle Reinhold kept the Hofbräuhaus rocking with accordion, brass, Lederhosen, dirndls and pure Bavarian beer-hall energy. The live bands played throughout the day and evening, and Eric and I sat right in the middle of it with our Maßs while the whole place sang, stomped and celebrated.
The long tables at the Hofbräuhaus are meant to be shared — no reservations in the main hall, you just sit down with whoever’s there. Eric and I ended up with this rowdy, laughing group of Japanese tourists who were clearly having the time of their lives. They might have been having even more fun than I was!
One of the Japanese guys from our shared table got pulled up on stage to “conduct” the Blaskapelle Reinhold. He grabbed the baton and really got into it while the band kept the Oompah going strong. I jumped into full concert-photographer mode, moving around for a better angle while he had his moment in the spotlight. When his big performance ended, the regular maestro stepped back up and took command again.
After the guest conductor wrapped up and the real band took back over, I grabbed a couple of fresh ones and went full two-fisted mode with these absolute units. Pure Hofbräuhaus victory pose!
Months later when I finally developed the film, this shot of me and my new friend came out completely out of focus. I had handed my camera to one of the drunk Japanese tourists at our table, thinking he would do a great job — and instead the auto-focus, which was designed to focus on whatever was in the middle of the frame, chose the back wall instead of us. Classic pre-smartphone heartbreak. Doh!
