We're Getting Married !

Part 2: The Stagnight

Stag nights and hen parties seem to be more common in England than in Germany. Paul and I decided to do a small one for Arni as his friends in Bremen didn't seem to have anything planned. The same applies pretty much for Gerlinde's Hen night which was only initiated after Ariane had tried to find out from Gerlinde's friends what they had planned... which unfortunately wasn't much at that stage. Still, both stag and hen night took place on Tuesday, 22nd August 2000.

Arni's Stag Night

I assume Arni knew we would do something, but wasn't quite sure when it would happen. We had spoken on Monday and agreed to meet up on Tuesday to have a drink or something. He probably suspected something to happen then, because this was the first time he was involved in something seemingly spontaneous and unplanned, which, as weddings go, is rare unless it is something the groom is not supposed to know about. Paul stayed at Arni's place anyway and when I arrived and we were about to leave, we told Arni that, unfortunately, he wouldn't be allowed to leave in THAT outfit. That's when the T-Shirt was introduced. We did, however, allow him to wear a Shirt over it for the start. A cab took us to El Mariachi at the lower end of Vor dem Steintor.We had our first cocktail, when we forced Arni to take off the shirt and reveal the T-Shirt. As soon as Stefan Ehlers (his other Bremen friends counldn't make it which they will be remembered for...) had arrived we explained that Arni's task for the night was to get 100 female autographs on his T-Shirt, otherwise he would have to pay for all drinks etc. we would consume that evening. He said another 500 DM wouldn't matter to the huge wedding bill, but we worked hard not to let him get away with that excuse.

A few Nachos and rounds of cocktails later we decided to move on. Although Arni was reluctant we could convince him that the waitresses were quite pretty and he should get his first signatures from them.

Moving on to the next cocktail bar on our way towards Sielwall we had more cocktails and met more girls. Well, to say we met them would be exaggurating. We pushed Arni to get signatures from them and he had very brief chats with them. Some gave him little kisses on the cheek, whishing him luck, others said it was a shame he would get married and there was this one couple of girlfriends who insisted on walking past us several times before we gave in and asked them to sign as well. And so we went, Piano, Littfass, Eimer and several other pubs and bars had the pleasure of our presence. Some of us decided to have food and others decided to be carried some of the way towards Woody's. Actualy, only Arni needed some assistance at some point.

Woody's was packed, of course, and some women decided to make a political issue out of the fact that they wouldn't sign Arni's T-Shirt because they didn't believe in 'The System' and wouldn't want to endorse the idea of signing someone's T-Shirt. We considered telling them, that the signatures would also be used to convince the American President to ban all nuclear weapons but decided that this person should get a life and we should get going to find other people who were not as busy wasting their life not believing in 'The System' while contributing to the wealth of the owners of Woody's.

It didn't look too good for Arni. Signatures were on a low level, around 60 if I remember correctly. But he had not really been working hard enough. Most of the signatures were a direct result of Paul and me spending minutes convincing him that this was his only job that night and he might as well do it.

We did go home at some stage. I think we took a cab ;-) The signatures didn't come up to 100 but we decided to be sports and, although he could have worked harder for them, we gave way. After all, he was the reason we had a good Polterabend and Wedding-Party.

Gerlinde's Hen Night

Ariane will tell the tale of Gerlinde's Hen Night which started at the Schlachte, right along the Weser. Condoms and Feiglinge were sold, silly costumes were worn, not much food was consumed and girls giggled a lot. Soon to be revealed here ;-)