Austria, 1985, Part 2

[Sgt. HSA]

To continue…

So we arrive at this school in early July, get settled in our rooms, and head downstairs for our first meal of the summer in Salzburg. Enter the kitchen, and oh my, the women cooking the food all appear to be 300 pound babushka refugees from eastern europe somewhere. Not a good sign. Get up to where they’re actually serving the ‘food’, and it gets worse. It looked like a bunch of random ingredients thrown into a blender and set on ‘frappe’. Well, ya gotta eat, so I grabbed a bowl and a few semmeln (small hard rolls, which they had delivered in every day and weren’t bad) and we sat down to chow.

Jesus.

I guess I’d been spoiled by my mom’s cooking all my life, because I literally couldn’t swallow this stuff; it was like puke in a bowl. So I say to my 2 friends:

Me: “There’s no way I’m going to eat this shit for 2 months”

They: “Don’t have much of a choice dude, there aren’t a lot of other options”

Me: “The fuck there aren’t. I’m going on a hunger strike; from here on out my diet consists of semmeln and beer”

They: “I give you 2 days, you’ll be sucking up whatever slop they serve up”

Me: “Challenge accepted”

So I go next door to the Nah & Frisch (sort of a mini-market) and buy as much beer as I can carry and bring it up to my room. I’ll show them; I got a cast iron stomach.

Day 1 was no problem; I had a constant low buzz going, felt great, life is good.

Day 2 was pretty much the same, as was day 3.

Day 4 I noticed my stomach starting to rumble in a not-so-good way. Felt not so good, but not bad enough that I couldn’t get hammered at night like I did every night.

Day 5 I started making a lot of trips to the can during class (yeah, remember, I was going to SCHOOL at this place). Still, I stuck to my diet, figuring I didn’t feel great, but at least I was drunk.

Day 6 Add in stomach pains to previous ailments.

Day 7 Stomach getting worse, but damn it, I’m hanging in there.

Day 8 The dam breaks. We go out for beer after class, and after about 8 half liters of Stiegl we head back, and I take a nap. I wake up with the worst headache and acid stomach I’ve ever experienced; it was like someone filled my belly with acid. I can barely move, but I get out of bed and head down to dinner.

Friends: “Dude, we got your semmeln for you”

Me: “What’s for dinner ?”

Them: “Say what ? Are you folding ?”

Me: “I’m gonna fucking die if I don’t eat something else, no matter how vile it is”.

And that was my first experience with mind over matter; choking down whatever they put out for us to eat. I found as long as I had beer to wash it down with, it was doable.

Next installment, part 3: Road trip to Germany

[Borracho]

God I am really starting to miss Salzburg... Anyway, if you had gone to the U of R's program our director was a guy in full blown midlife crisis, he was 40 and married to a 25 year old that he'd left his wife for when she was his student... Nuff said. Anyway, he was an all around rogue with no qualifications, his party at years end on campus put all but the most evil intended frat parties to shame. Anyway, he bought our kegs and although he skipped our pentulimate (sic) event, the 5 liter club, only a few of us did, and among the half dozen or so was me and his wife. It was bizarre staggering back home with a gal that was only slightly out of my sights, but whom was going home to someone nearly my dad's age. Anyway, the Augustiner is a good place to get drunk, though the lack of music and dancing sucks. What the hell did those monks do when they drank all that good beer?

Borracho

[Sgt. HSA]

God I am really starting to miss Salzburg... Anyway, if you had gone to the U of R's program our director was a guy in full blown midlife crisis, he was 40 and married to a 25 year old that he'd left his wife for when she was his student... Nuff said. Anyway, he was an all around rogue with no qualifications, his party at years end on campus put all but the most evil intended frat parties to shame. Anyway, he bought our kegs and although he skipped our pentulimate (sic) event, the 5 liter club, only a few of us did, and among the half dozen or so was me and his wife. It was bizarre staggering back home with a gal that was only slightly out of my sights, but whom was going home to someone nearly my dad's age. Anyway, the Augustiner is a good place to get drunk, though the lack of music and dancing sucks. What the hell did those monks do when they drank all that good beer?

Borracho

I really miss the Stieglkeller

[Borracho]

Yo HSA,

I hadn't had a Stigel beer in centuries and I drove down to Liquor Mar in Boulder last summer and bought one. I was totally amazed at how good it was. I was still a an unrefined beer snob when I was in Salzburg in '82-85, but I never thought of Stiegl as anything impressive. There were two beer, I'm not sure both were Austrian, back then that kicked ass. One was Austrian for sure, it was Schwechater, the other was Weizen Gold. Gosser Dark was pretty killer too. Geez, I feel like some guy in a Samurian moviw with about 20 arrows sticking out of him, where are the survivors of those party blows!?!

Borracho

[Sgt. HSA]

Yo HSA,

I hadn't had a Stigel beer in centuries and I drove down to Liquor Mar in Boulder last summer and bought one. I was totally amazed at how good it was. I was still a an unrefined beer snob when I was in Salzburg in '82-85, but I never thought of Stiegl as anything impressive. There were two beer, I'm not sure both were Austrian, back then that kicked ass. One was Austrian for sure, it was Schwechater, the other was Weizen Gold. Gosser Dark was pretty killer too. Geez, I feel like some guy in a Samurian moviw with about 20 arrows sticking out of him, where are the survivors of those party blows!?!

Borracho

I'd sell my firstborn (no, not really, you get the point) for a Stiegl right now.

I love that you've ben to all the places I used to haunt there. Kepp looking for future installments, the best stuff is yet to come.

[Borracho]

Believe it or not, those Stiegl kegs back in the early 80s had wooden taps. We had a big party once during the semester, I can't remember where or why, but I was the keg engineer for my frat and of course took a professional interest in keg operations, it looked like something from the middle ages. The beer was awesome though and I had a hell of a good time. I think it must have been around Xmas time, I seem to have a few sneaking memories coming back...

Borracho

[Sgt. HSA]

Believe it or not, those Stiegl kegs back in the early 80s had wooden taps. We had a big party once during the semester, I can't remember where or why, but I was the keg engineer for my frat and of course took a professional interest in keg operations, it looked like something from the middle ages. The beer was awesome though and I had a hell of a good time. I think it must have been around Xmas time, I seem to have a few sneaking memories coming back...

Borracho

They did !! That keg of Stiegl we got back then had a wooden tap, it took me quite a few minutes to figure out.

I didn't know they were shipping Stiegl out of AU; not like I can get it here anyway, but I'd love to get my hands on some.

[Borracho]

HSA:

To the best of my knowledge there are only two Autrian beers that can be found in the US, with any regularity anyway. One of them is Stiegl, but it is VERY hard to find. I don't know where you are located, but I've seen it in LA, in Chicago and in Denver, I could name stores in the last two, but I haven't been to Chicago in a really long time. The other is Gosser. It is a very differnt beer, and frankly their good beer is the Dunkel, and so its nowhere like Stiegl. A great beer though. The only other Austrian beer's I've tried and liked were Schechater, in my opinion the best one at the time, and Weizen Gold, a Krystalklar. Both very tasty, but not like Stiegl...

Borracho