Saturday night we went to the 3rd annual Rincón Oktoberfest held in the downtown plaza of Rincón sponsored primarily by Das Alpen restaurant. They had a variety of different beers and German food available as well as live music. There was quite a gathering in spite of the huge rainpour that afternoon and early evening.

We are definitely the “new kids” here because we really didn’t know very many people yet. But we talked with a few of our acquaintances and wandered around a bit. At one point Britton went to go get us beers and I just stood on the corner and people-watched.

That is until people started coming up to me and asking me questions, both in Spanish and in English. At first I thought it was just random until they kept coming around. I was near a speaker and so it was a bit difficult also to hear what they were saying. “¿Dónde se venden los bra-garble-garble?” “¿Cómo?” I asked. “Los bratwursts,” she replied. “Ahh, creo que están allí con las cervezas.” I answered helpfully.

Or another asked “Where are the raffle tickets?” And when I looked at her quizzically and shrugged because I had no idea that they even were doing a raffle, she mistook my expression for not understanding English and she started talking LOUDER at me and mumbled to herself but loud enough for me to hear…”Agh, what is the Spanish word for raffle?” And I answered “rifa”? And then she looked at me like I was playing with her. So I said in all earnestness, “When you find out, let me know!” Still others asked me the name of the band and how much the beers were.

When Britton returned with the beers I told him that everyone was asking me all sorts of questions and he said, “Well that’s because you look like you work here!” I suppose when you go to an Oktoberfest with braids and stand on the busiest corner alone you should sort of expect it. I suppose so -ha.