THINGS TO DO IN MÜ: 5 - 11 MAY

This week in Munich is going to be HUGE. Five (!) festivals kick-off, the Frühlingsfest continues with a great program, and there are enough events to get every geeky culture vulture's heart beat faster! Naturally we are especially looking forward to the opening night of the 100-Word-Pilgrimage at Platform on Thursday, after weeks of hard work by Anna and her fellow artists and helpers. Come along and say hi!

All week:
FUNFAIR CONTINUES: The 50th Frühlingsfest is still on. Apart from beer, fried chicken and funfair rides, there are some highlights in the program. Don't miss the musical fireworks on Friday (10PM) and the street artists' competition on Sunday (11AM).
 
Monday, 5 May:
FREE CONCERT: The US folk rock trio The Sweet Remains play the Amerika Haus tonight at 8PM. All three band members are songwriters playing different instruments and used to be solo artists until a chance meeting in 2008. The gig is free, so why not give it a go?

Wednesday, 7 May:
FESTIVAL I - DOCUMENTARY FILM: The international documentary film festival DOK.fest kicks off tonight at the HFF and will continue until Wednesday next week. The festival is a must for all film lovers - 135 films in the official selection, specials, retrospectives, open air screenings, a Best-of-Oscar series, a framework programme with concerts and exhibitions - it's just WOW. 

 
FESTIVAL II - MUSIC THEATRE: The Münchner Biennale is another international festival kicking off today. This one should not be missed by fans of classical music, opera and experimental musical theatre. Check out the programme here.

Thursday, 8 May:
BIG OPENING NIGHT: It's the big opening night of the 100 Word Pilgrimage at Platform! Come and see the results of several weeks of hard work and artistic creativity, meet the wonderful international artist team and enjoy a live performance by the fantastic 8-string-guitarist Alexander Vynograd. Check out Anna's recent blog post to learn more about the project, subscribe and share the event on Facebook. The exhibition will run until Monday.

FESTIVAL III - SCI-FI FILM: As a kind of an antipole to the DOK.fest, a new film festival premieres in Munich tonight: Munich's first Science Fiction Festival "ALL über ALL". The festival venue is the KiM-Kino in the Einstein Kulturzentrum. The programme sounds absolutely amazing: classics such as Georges Melies' "A Journey to the Moon" (1902, with live piano accompaniment) and the director's cut of Terry Gilliam's "Brazil" (1985), local productions such as the Bavarian trash sci-fi horror "Zombies from Outer Space" (2012), a Stanislaw Lem Special on Saturday, an afternoon programme for children, interesting guests, talks, drinks and live music. Sounds like a hell of a start - the only downside being that you probably need to speak Germany to fully enjoy it. Check out the full programme here. Dressing up is encouraged, aliens enjoy free entry.

FESTIVAL IV - CONTEMPORARY DANCE: The festivals keep coming. Admittedly, Relations: Tanz is quite a small one. Still, if you are an admirer of contemporary dance theatre, you probably shouldn't miss it. Three different shows will run at Kammerspiele / Spielhalle: Sketches / Notebook from on 8th, 9th and 10th of May, Non stop on 14th and 15th of May and finally For love on 18th and 19th of May. Tickets are quite affordable for theatre (19€), especially if you are a student (8€).

GET YOUR HANDS DIRTY: If you are not in the mood for cultural events and would rather get your hands dirty - no problem! Bring your broken stuff to Repair Café at WerkBox3, or get your bikes ready for summer at the BikeKitchen at MackWerk.

Friday, 9 May:
FESTIVAL V - LIVE MUSIC: The weekend begins with another festival start, and this one we are quite excited about. The team of Hauskonzerte has been pampering us with "Munich's finest live sessions" since 2010, and now they are organising a festival! "Deeper Down" is supposed to be a week full of gigs, arts, table tennis, beer, BBQ and Bill Murray - quite a promise! The list of participating bands and artists is impressive:  Tiny Ruins, Ian Fisher, Diane Cluck, Leif Vollebekk, Rosalie und Wanda, Town of Saints, Muup Mumu and De'Borah. As always with Hauskonzerte, to find out where and how you can join, you need to send an email to the organisers. Be quick, places are limited!

Saturday, 10 May:
FIVE FESTIVALS: Just to make it clear - all of the five festivals described above run through the weekend, and in most cases into the next week. So check out what's on tonight at DOK.fest (don't miss the free open-air-screenings if weather allows!), Biennale, ALL über ALL, Relations: Tanz and Deeper Down!

ROCK THE KITCHEN: Here's an alternative to eating out in a restaurant: Cookasa. Whatasa? Exactly our first thoughts. So, here is the idea: 6-8 people are randomly thrown together. They build three teams, each team being responsible for one dish. They shop, get to a kitchen, where they meet their hosts, and start cooking. The costs for the ingredients are shared, as is the food and the fun. Sounds pretty simple and ingenious. What's more, the ingredients for tonight's big simultaneous Cookasa party in Munich come at no cost at all, thanks to a collaboration with Foodsharing. Register here and rock the kitchen!

Sunday, 11 May:
FIVE FESTIVALS: And once again, for those of you jumping straight to the day: Check out what's on tonight at DOK.fest (don't miss the free open-air-screenings if weather allows!), Biennale, ALL über ALL, Relations: Tanz and Deeper Down! And visit the 100 Word Pilgrimage at Platform!

 

Munich, Ostbahnhof

THINGS TO DO IN MÜ: 25 NOVEMBER - 1 DECEMBER

Two months have past since the birth of this blog, and we continue our quest of discovering Munich's arts & culture beyond the mainstream. Yet, if it wasn't for other wonderful and inspiring Munich bloggers such as Rachel, the mucbook team or the guys from MunichOpenMinded, we would not even not know where to start. So check out the blog roll we added below on the right, where we assembled some of Munich's most essential and most beautiful arts & culture blog sites, and be inspired!

We are having a lot of fun with this blog, and as long as it stays so, we will continue. So far, our audience is quite small, and we do not really have the means of widening it. But who cares? YOU are here, and that's what matters! You don't even need to like us on Facebook, subscribe to our email feed or share our posts via Google+, or generally tell the world that you found this amazing blog! Just come back whenever you like, you'll find the doors open.

Enough said, here's some action for the last week of November!

Monday, 25 November:
PURA VIDA GYPSY PUNK: To be honest, we were not really impressed by the Arctic Monkeys in Zenith a few weeks ago. In general, we are not very frequent concert goers, and there are others who can tell you a lot more about Munich's vivid music scene. However, there are some gigs that we just cannot miss, and tonight is one of them.  Gogol Bordello is playing Tonhalle at 8PM, and this is Pura Vida indeed! Tickets are still available at about 30EUR. Dancing your feet off is guaranteed!

FELTING: If you've always wanted to learn how to felt, here is your best chance. There will be a free Christmas needle felting workshop at Siebenmachen at 7pm! There are still free tickets available here.

Tuesday, 26 November:
THINK & DRINK: This one unfortunately is only for our German speaking readers, yet we could not ignore it. Cafe Luitpold will be transformed into a philosophical salon tonight, and actors and professors of sociology and economy will discuss "Karl Marx, the bourgeoisie and the 99%", while the audience will drink and think. 8PM, entrance is free, booking advised.      

Wednesday, 27 November:
THEATRE PARCOURS: A co-production of the SPIELART theatre festival, Münchner Kammerspiele and about a dozen theatres from all over the world, SITUATION ROOMS is a "simultaneous video walk" for 20 spectators, constructing a globalised world of governors and refugees. 20 tickets are quickly gone, despite 3 to 4 shows per day until end of November, and you can no longer book any tickets online. However, apparently for almost every show there are tickets left at the box office, so just turn up and try your luck. 

Thursday, 28 November:
TALKING DIGITAL: "It's like Discovery Channel with beer" - that's the motto of the Nerd Nite, a series of talks of nerdy enthusiasts that has been going on since 2009. This time the Nerd Nite (from 8.15pm) is integrated into the Zündfunk Netzkongress 42 (from 12pm), a congress that will discuss our digital past, present and future at the Volkstheater. You can get tickets for the congress and the Nerd Nite here. The topics of the Nerd Nite this time: cryptography, computer games, zombies and existentialism.

MUSIC LOVERS: If you prefer great live music to nerdy talks, this one's for you: Kafe Kult is hosting two fantastic bands tonight at 9PM, the experimental indie band Beißpony from Munich and the "queer feminist trio" Lovers from Portland. Here are the details of the event.

Friday, 29 November:
CREATIVE NETWORKING: Creative Mornings are hosting another talk, this time Maximilian Heitsch will be talking about courage. Max is a founder of the Aaber Award, an independent exhibition platform for Munich's young artists, in which Anna had the pleasure of participating this year (you can read more about it in her blog). Max is very young, energetic and inspiring, we highly recommend this event and feel sad that we won't be able to attend this time. It's free, but be sure to register first thing on Monday, as tickets go away quickly.

Saturday, 30 November:
CULT FILM: Some films run for a day, some for a month, some are so popular that they run for as long as a year, but this one is extraordinary: For more than 35 years "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" is screened at Museum Lichtspiele each Friday and Saturday at 11pm. There is even a theme-decorated cinema hall! Sounds like one for the Guiness book of Records? Well, it's in there already.

Sunday, 1 December:
X-MAKERS: Another exciting event by the organisers of Make Munich: XMake Munich. The tickets are just 5€ and there will be plenty of exciting talks, workshops, music, food and other things throughout the day, from 10am until 6pm, Arcisstr. 21, 5th floor. All you nerds and creatives, don't miss out! Anna will be offering a soft circuit workshop on Christmas cards with flickering lights,  accompanied by two wonderful friends from London, one of them a real wearables pro who actually got her into this business!