Yet another aging rockstarEvery town has a claim to fame. Charlottetown: Birthplace of Confederation. Fredericton: Home of a lot of trees, poets and Harvest Jazz and Blues. Moncton: The tidal bore/snore. Saint John: Weirdest street layout I've ever seen.
Kitchener-Waterloo, having a solid German community, has Oktoberfest, an annual week-long party of beer, sausages and polka. Oktoberfest organizers hasten to point out the parade and other cultural events that make it so much more than a boozefest, but this is like talking about the light fixtures while a massive sot of an elephant staggers around the room in lederhosen.
Our neighbour Rudy, a devoted Oktoberfest volunteer, scored free tickets for Brian, Sarah, Shauna and I to attend Oktoberfest celebrations at the Queensmount arena on Saturday night, where none other than The Canadian King of Polka, Walter Ostanek, was playing. Despite the presence of His Highness, I was a bit torn at first, as the Canadiens and Leafs were playing that night. But I'm quite glad I chose to attend the concert. Any one with hockey sense knew the Canadiens were going to win, anyway.
We arrived at 8pm and the arena was already very crowded. I expected a mostly older crowd because of the polka, and was surprised to find that almost everybody was around my age. Two points reveal the silliness of my assumption: 1) lots of beer=lots of young people, and 2) nobody, regardless of age, actually comes out for the polka. Nor is this an event people enjoy for its refined ambience; row upon row of undecorated picnic tables surrounded by beer ticket vendors, sausage stands and more or less serve-yourself bars creates a no-nonsense drink-and-then-drink-some-more atmosphere. So drink we did.
Sometime around my second beer the band started up. Walter Ostanek's band is just as old as The Rolling Stones, but much less driven to dance, wiggle or strut. Mr. Ostanek---somehow I can't help but call him Mister...he looks like he might live two doors down, and you'd wave and say 'Hi, Mr. Ostanek! Your lawn's looking really good!' Whereas I would never call Mick Jagger 'Mr. Jagger' and if he was my neighbour I'd try to get invited to his parties---anyway, Mr. Ostanek sits in a chair and tickles the keys of his accordion with a big smile, big glasses and plenty of avuncularity. His bandmates, all decked out in the same yellow shirts, play along in a sedate but jolly fashion. Most of the time the music trundles along to the walking bass beat, kind of like the same sotty elephant hopping back and forth from one leg to the next...hmm, I'm not sure if that image works...it's hard to give a visual representation to the sound of music and, technically, elephants can't jump, so they probably can't hop, either. Whatever, you've probably heard snippets of polka before, you know what I'm talking about. One thing I did discover about polka, though, is that there are only five songs. And each one has some sort of nonsensical line, such as 'Ziggy zaggy, ziggy zaggy, oi oi oi!' that is shouted out repeatedly as an encouragement to drink. This is done over and over at increasing speed until all the drunks are shouting 'Zeezahzeez---OI OI!'
If one of the songs doesn't have a ziggy-zaggy part, then it must involve the bird dance. After plowing through five beers, our table finally got up the gumption to move to the front of the stage for some dancin'. Naturally it was bird dance time. If you don't know how to do this complex and subtle number, here are the rudimentary steps (rich and digressive variations occur according to culture and locale, of course):
1) Hold up your hands and pretend they are two ducks talking at the same time.
2) Pretend you are simultaneously scratching your armpits and trying to pump your smell about the room by beating your elbows against your sides.
3) Wiggle your ass toward the floor, but don't fall down, drunkface.
4 The next part is the hardest, and I think I should let Brother Maynard give the directions:
'First shalt thou raise up the Holy Hands. Then, shalt thou clap to three. No more. No less. Three shalt be the number thou shalt clap, and the number of the clapping shall be three. Four shalt thou not clap, nor either clap thou two, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out. Once the number three, being the third number, be reached, then, beginnest thou thy talking ducks routine once more until the band, being repetitive in My sight, shall snuff it.'
(Brother Maynard is also very well-versed in the procedures for using the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch.)
In my state I believe I did stumble from steps 1 to 3 on occasion. Brother Maynard would not be impressed. But never did I fall down, despite all the spilled beer making the concrete floor quite slippery.
We stuck around just long enough for the arrival of Uncle Hans, the rotund, orange-headed mascot dressed in traditional Bavarian garb. (They take his arrival quite seriously; a security guy actually held me back from impeding his path as I left the washroom...apparently in today's political climate even Uncle Hans must be protected from his enemies.) Then we staggered out into the cold night as the band played on and on and on and on and on and on and on and...
The four of us capped off the night with a raucous trip to Sobey's, a 1am barbecue of sausages and half of Goodfellas. We watched the fellas that are good, not barbecued them.
All in all a grand Bavarian time. Shauna may tell you a different story, having seen it all through sober eyes, branded with a big 'Designated Driver' sticker on her shirt.
Ziggy zaggy, ziggy zaggy, oi oi oi!
Kitchener-Waterloo, having a solid German community, has Oktoberfest, an annual week-long party of beer, sausages and polka. Oktoberfest organizers hasten to point out the parade and other cultural events that make it so much more than a boozefest, but this is like talking about the light fixtures while a massive sot of an elephant staggers around the room in lederhosen.
Our neighbour Rudy, a devoted Oktoberfest volunteer, scored free tickets for Brian, Sarah, Shauna and I to attend Oktoberfest celebrations at the Queensmount arena on Saturday night, where none other than The Canadian King of Polka, Walter Ostanek, was playing. Despite the presence of His Highness, I was a bit torn at first, as the Canadiens and Leafs were playing that night. But I'm quite glad I chose to attend the concert. Any one with hockey sense knew the Canadiens were going to win, anyway.
We arrived at 8pm and the arena was already very crowded. I expected a mostly older crowd because of the polka, and was surprised to find that almost everybody was around my age. Two points reveal the silliness of my assumption: 1) lots of beer=lots of young people, and 2) nobody, regardless of age, actually comes out for the polka. Nor is this an event people enjoy for its refined ambience; row upon row of undecorated picnic tables surrounded by beer ticket vendors, sausage stands and more or less serve-yourself bars creates a no-nonsense drink-and-then-drink-some-more atmosphere. So drink we did.
Sometime around my second beer the band started up. Walter Ostanek's band is just as old as The Rolling Stones, but much less driven to dance, wiggle or strut. Mr. Ostanek---somehow I can't help but call him Mister...he looks like he might live two doors down, and you'd wave and say 'Hi, Mr. Ostanek! Your lawn's looking really good!' Whereas I would never call Mick Jagger 'Mr. Jagger' and if he was my neighbour I'd try to get invited to his parties---anyway, Mr. Ostanek sits in a chair and tickles the keys of his accordion with a big smile, big glasses and plenty of avuncularity. His bandmates, all decked out in the same yellow shirts, play along in a sedate but jolly fashion. Most of the time the music trundles along to the walking bass beat, kind of like the same sotty elephant hopping back and forth from one leg to the next...hmm, I'm not sure if that image works...it's hard to give a visual representation to the sound of music and, technically, elephants can't jump, so they probably can't hop, either. Whatever, you've probably heard snippets of polka before, you know what I'm talking about. One thing I did discover about polka, though, is that there are only five songs. And each one has some sort of nonsensical line, such as 'Ziggy zaggy, ziggy zaggy, oi oi oi!' that is shouted out repeatedly as an encouragement to drink. This is done over and over at increasing speed until all the drunks are shouting 'Zeezahzeez---OI OI!'
If one of the songs doesn't have a ziggy-zaggy part, then it must involve the bird dance. After plowing through five beers, our table finally got up the gumption to move to the front of the stage for some dancin'. Naturally it was bird dance time. If you don't know how to do this complex and subtle number, here are the rudimentary steps (rich and digressive variations occur according to culture and locale, of course):
1) Hold up your hands and pretend they are two ducks talking at the same time.
2) Pretend you are simultaneously scratching your armpits and trying to pump your smell about the room by beating your elbows against your sides.
3) Wiggle your ass toward the floor, but don't fall down, drunkface.
4 The next part is the hardest, and I think I should let Brother Maynard give the directions:
'First shalt thou raise up the Holy Hands. Then, shalt thou clap to three. No more. No less. Three shalt be the number thou shalt clap, and the number of the clapping shall be three. Four shalt thou not clap, nor either clap thou two, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out. Once the number three, being the third number, be reached, then, beginnest thou thy talking ducks routine once more until the band, being repetitive in My sight, shall snuff it.'
(Brother Maynard is also very well-versed in the procedures for using the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch.)
In my state I believe I did stumble from steps 1 to 3 on occasion. Brother Maynard would not be impressed. But never did I fall down, despite all the spilled beer making the concrete floor quite slippery.
We stuck around just long enough for the arrival of Uncle Hans, the rotund, orange-headed mascot dressed in traditional Bavarian garb. (They take his arrival quite seriously; a security guy actually held me back from impeding his path as I left the washroom...apparently in today's political climate even Uncle Hans must be protected from his enemies.) Then we staggered out into the cold night as the band played on and on and on and on and on and on and on and...
The four of us capped off the night with a raucous trip to Sobey's, a 1am barbecue of sausages and half of Goodfellas. We watched the fellas that are good, not barbecued them.
All in all a grand Bavarian time. Shauna may tell you a different story, having seen it all through sober eyes, branded with a big 'Designated Driver' sticker on her shirt.
Ziggy zaggy, ziggy zaggy, oi oi oi!
2 comments:
I appreciate that you gave me the props I deserve... mad props to the d-d over here! (as my first experience in said capacity, I am suprized how accurate the stereotype is - it's lame-o to the max, yo!)
Hi Shauna,
I am with you on the lame-o bit, as I spent all of my teenage years as the designated driver (I guess I then spent all of my twenties making up for it). Ryan, I have seen Oktoberfest and it is wunderbar. Nothing like having friends thrown in the bar's drunk tank (I kid you not, the bar didn't want to lose patrons or something, because it just threw them into this weird closed-off area until they were sober enough to come drink some more) and then loading said puke-y drunks onto a bus for the hour's ride back to London. And no, for once, I was not said puke-y drunk.
ps-I think they've added letters to the verification words (didn't it used to be only 5 or 6 letters long?). Mine today is 7...
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