On Oct. 5, Lewis & Clark’s German Club held an Oktoberfest celebration. Oktoberfest is a 16-day festival of German traditions that began as a commemoration of the royal wedding between the the Crown Prince of Bavaria and Princess Therese von Sachsen-Hildburghausen. It began on Oct. 12, 1810, and is still celebrated all over the world today.
Oktoberfest starts in September to take advantage of the warmer weather and continues into October, from which the festival gets its name. The city of Munich, originally a small village, now holds the world’s largest Oktoberfest celebration, where five to seven million people come together to celebrate each year.
Maggie Martin ’25 studied abroad in Munich and actively participated in the local Oktoberfest.
“It’s like a carnival or a big state fair basically… music is such a large part of it and how it is configured in a bunch of different tents. Tents are also used as a status symbol, with music being the epicenter,” Martin said.
The German Club’s Oktoberfest lasted one day and was full of food, music, crafts and games. Unfortunately, due to a lack of funding and German culture at LC, the college’s approach was more consolidated to compensate for resources.
“We don’t have nearly as much people, we do not have nearly as much funding, obviously, so it’s like we really had to condense it all, with also the resources we have, and the little money that we also are working with to make it something that is sort of similar,” Martin said.
To bring a taste of bustling environment to LC, German Club hosted their Oktoberfest in Miller 211. Traditional German music filled the room, where attendees could play games and craft, making cardboard gingerbread hearts, a tradition of love during Oktoberfest. The club also provided traditional German snacks such as brezel (pretzels), and their adaptation of bier (beer).
Beer is a large part of German culture and Oktoberfest; however, to compensate for the cultural differences in drinking age, the alcoholic beverage was replaced by Spezi, which is a German soda that is a mix of cola and orange soda, as well as Apfelschorle, which is a sparkling apple juice similar to cider. Members of the German Club wore traditional tracht, dirndl and lederhosen in celebration of Oktoberfest.
Piero Zanes ’27 shared his experiences participating in LC’s Oktoberfest. Although he was not involved last year, the club’s events urged him to participate this year.
“It’s a lot of fun, there’s a lot to do, the games are fun, we played Kahoot which was fun. They’re doing arts and crafts, and there’s lots of good food. It’s fun,” said Zanes.
At the event, the room was full of people enjoying the food and games set up by the club. There were a total of three game stations placed around the room. One game was played by throwing a tennis ball at a stack of cups. Another, “Masskrugstemmen,” required the player to throw a ping pong ball into a pint glass while someone held the glass. The last game, called “bierdeckelfangen,” is very popular in Germany. Bierdeckelfangen is a competition where the goal is to flip coasters from the table and catch them in one hand, adding coasters each round to make flipping the stack more difficult. Whoever can flip and catch the most coasters wins.
While the turnout for this year’s Oktoberfest in Miller was not as impressive as that of Munich’s, the club got around 20 RSVPs. Oktoberfest is a fun way to come together and celebrate German tradition at LC. It is an annual event, so if you missed it this year, a similar event will be held next October. Until then, bis dann.
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