The friend of Northern Cyprus shares its Daily News of Life and Times around the world
By Ralph Kratzer
The association The Foreign Residents in the TRNC (TFR), which now has members from 26 different nations, had celebrated its first authentic Bavarian Oktoberfest in Northern Cyprus last year. Because it then was a well accepted and successful event, it was clear to the members of the Board that this event should be an integral part of the year´s planning (to remember the first beer fest and get some background information about the original event in Munich – click here!).
So, again a lot of time and effort was invested to organize an even better TFR-Oktoberfest this year.
The treasurer of the club, Horst Gutowski, and the events manager “Brad” Bradley, as well as a handful of volunteers made it possible that more than 140 participants of the party found an authentic beer tent ambiance for a boozy evening in the lovingly decorated garden of the Acmenya restaurant in Alsancak.
Soon after the first guests had arrived the original Munich Hofbräuhaus beer flowed in amounts out of the tap.
The meal offered could not have been more faithful to the original food at the Bavarian beer fest. There, the most consumed delicacy is half a chicken from the grill with a fresh pretzel. Thus, it was also for the Oktoberfest in Northern Cyprus. A variation of salads as a side dish was again prepared this year by the Food Lodge Bakery in Catalköy.
The attempt to organize a musician from Bavaria for the evening unfortunately failed because the one booked decided, at short notice, for health reasons not to embark on the long journey to North Cyprus. But the alternative in form of a DJ turned out to be the better solution in the end, because this one offered later in the evening – after he had started with original Oktoberfest music – a great blend of pop, oldies and dance music, so that the dance floor was soon crowded with guests in a lively mood.
In between “Brad” Bradley entertained people with funny parlour games, such as “who can
hold a full 1-litre stein longest with the outstretched arm?” or “who can hammer a nail into a wooden block with the fewest strokes?” For the ladies, he was ready with a quiz question: “how many litres of beer had been drunk at this year’s Oktoberfest in Munich?” The answers ranged from a few hundred liters (good joke!) up to hundreds of millions. Tatiana, a young party guest from Kazakhstan was ready with the right answer: 7,5 million litres!
Again it was well after midnight when the last guests left the witty festival and found their way home, tired but happy and certainly with the ulterior motive of coming again next year…
P.S. As guest of honour the TFR welcomed this year the German Ambassador in Cyprus, H.E. Mr. Nikolai von Schoepff, accompanied by his lovely wife, who came privately and, as a born Bavarian, clearly enjoyed the evening as all other guests.
To view the original post and more pictures in a slideshow – click here!
By Ralph Kratzer
The original Oktoberfest is the world’s largest funfair held annually in Munich, Bavaria, Germany. It is a 16-day festival running from late September to the first weekend in October with more than six million people from around the world attending the event every year.
It was first held on 12th October 1810 on the occasion of the marriage of Crown Prince Ludwig, later to become King Ludwig I, with Princess Therese of Saxonia-Hildburghausen. The citizens of Munich were invited to attend the festivities held on the fields in front of the city gates to celebrate the happy royal event. The fields were named Theresienwiese
(“Theresa’s meadow”) in honor of the Crown Princess, and have kept that name ever since, although the locals have since abbreviated the name simply to the“Wiesn”.
Over the past 204 years, the Oktoberfest was cancelled only 24 times due to cholera epidemics and war.
Other cities across the world also holdOktoberfest celebrations, modeled after the original Munich event. View the Top 10 Oktoberfests worldwide bei clicking here!
Thanks to the club The Foreign Residents in the TRNC (TFR) now also North Cyprus has its own Oktoberfest.
Members of the association and the TFR committee neither spared expenses nor effort to organize a unique event, which was accepted by more than 150 participants.
The large garden of the Acmenya Restaurant in Alsancak was lovingly decorated with original material from Bavaria, several barrels of real Munich beer from the world-famous Hofbräuhaus had been attained (I will not tell how !!!) and Sonja and Latifa, owners of The Food Lodge Bakery and Bistro, Catalköy, had prepared Bavarian food specialities to care for the physical welfare of the large number of participants.
Some guests took the oppotunity to appear in more or less authentic Bavarian outfits. I saw guests from different countries of origin, such as United Kingdom, Sweden, Finland, Norway, Ireland, North Cyprus, Belarus and of course Germany. Even some Bavarians were present, I´ve heard!
All participants of the beerfest were in a good mood, there were lively conversations at every table, the Hofbräuhaus beer obviously tasted very well, because in the end, none of the barrels should have been left over and the last guests, who didn´t want to go home until after midnight, had to change back to local Efes beer. But this tastes also quite well as we all know!
The food from The Food Lodge Bakery and Bistro was widely praised, and here as well there was nearly nothing left over.
After dinner the party went on being lively, there was lots of laughing and dancing.
All in all, a truly successful evening, the organizers were rightly very proud at the end. The Oktoberfest was, in this manner, the first ever in North Cyprus as far as I know.
For a few guests there was not enough original Bavarian folk music played, but I can assure them that even at the real Oktoberfest in Munich, one can not hear only this kind of music any longer!
A big thanks to the TFR, the organizers and all the helpers, and until next Oktoberfest!
By Ralph Kratzer
After having published the successful post “50 facts about Cyprus” from our community sharing partner “North Cyprus Forum” some weeks ago (to remember – click here!) I thought: now is the time to write something about my homeland – Germany. Most of the facts mentioned below come from the internet, some of them may not be complete or perhaps out of date and therefore, I do not suggest to take this post too seriously and to use it as a basis for scientific work! LOL!
The world sees Germany mostly as the country of beer, sausages, and “Oktoberfest”! More sophisticated people say it is the “land of the poets and thinkers”. In fact it is much more than this, eg one of the biggest economies in the world, the origin of the automobile and other great inventions. But I don´t want to bore you just with rational facts.
Only this for an introduction: Germany is a Federal Republic, consisting of 16 states. Every single state has its own parliament, Prime Minister, police force, educational system and so on. The biggest state by area is Bavaria in the south of the Republic.
Germany has more than 82 million inhabitants, including 7.3 million foreign residents (among them 1.7 million Turks).
The Capital is Berlin with 3.4 million citizens. Other cities with a population of more than 1 million are Hamburg in the north, Munich in the south and Cologne just in the middle.
Enough with statistics, now come 50+ more or less funny but interesting facts about Germany:
Germans are the second largest beer consumers in the world, after the Irish (of course!).
Beer is officially considered a food in Bavaria.
Germany is Europe’s largest economy.
The most popular German surname is “Müller”.
Chancellor Angela Merkel has a Barbie doll made after her.
Historically, Germany was known inter alia as the Holy Roman Empire, the Kingdom of Prussia, or the Weimar Republic.
31% of the country has been kept with forests and woodlands, with the State of Hessen having the most.
There are over 300 kinds of bread in Germany.
There are also bread museums.
There are at least 35 dialects of the German language.
The “Wittelsbachs” ruled Bavaria as a monarchy for 738 years.
Munich, Germany´s southernmost big city, is further north than any major US city (excluding Alaska).
German is an official language in 5 nations: Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Luxembourg and Liechtenstein. It is also spoken in Northern Italy and the French provinces of Alsace and Lorraine.
By Ralph Kratzer
On Saturday, 12th October 2013, the Goethe Institute of Cyprus held the German traditional “Oktoberfest” in Nicosia.
The real “Oktoberfest” is the world ‘s most famous German beer festival and usually takes place in Munich annually with millions of visitors.
Nicosia, the capital of Cyprus is still divided into a northern part, the territory of the “Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC)”, there the city is called Lefkoşa, and a southern part, which belongs to the “Republic of Cyprus”, also known as Southern Cyprus.
Between the two halves of the city there has been a UN buffer zone for decades now. In this zone is the building of the Goethe Institute in the immediate neighbourhood of the former luxury hotel “Ledra Palace”, after which the border crossing is named and which is now home to soldiers of the UN.
About 50 members of the TFR wanted to attend the festival.
Horst Gutowski, our Treasurer, organized a large bus which picked up the passengers at 4 different places and took us to the border in Nicosia. Some other members travelled in their private cars.
The passport formalities were promptly done thanks to the effective work of the TRNC border authorities.
Soon all the TFR participants had gathered in the garden of the Goethe Institute, and most of them had also quickly their first beer and snacks in their hands. That should change soon, unfortunately…
One hour after the start of the event, the garden of the institute was packed with guests.
The catering company who were taking care of the physical well-being of the numerous guests regarding food and beverages was clearly overwhelmed. Long queues formed in front of the food counter and the beer-dispensing facility. Then, in between, one of the two beer-taps broke down… for a beer festival a real disaster!
On the list of beverages the price of a pint of beer was shown, but ultimately only plastic cups with 0.4 litres were served for the same price, which many guests were not happy with.
However, for my part I was pleased with the evening… I had interesting conversations with nice table neighbours, made new contacts and had finally had enough beer to take a happy journey home.
