Many of my friends have warned me. That it will be difficult for me to integrate in Bavaria. Not just because of the language, which has as much in common with Arabic as leather pants have with a kaftan. My core problem will be that there is a full glass of beer waiting to be drunk on almost every Bavarian table at some point.
As is well known, I didn’t let myself be kept away from Bavaria. And because as a child, long before I fled, I was smitten with FC Bayern, so I knew: Franck Ribéry was also warmly welcomed in Munich. The fans still love him to this day. He is also a Muslim – according to reports, he also never drinks alcohol. Like me. Small difference: My football skills are not quite as pronounced.
In seven years here in Munich I have fallen in love with many things: traditional costumes, brass band music, Allgäu cheese, Upper Bavarian dialect. Every year it all culminated at the Oktoberfest. And this is where a new Bayern player comes into the picture. More precisely: In the annual pre-Wiesn photo. Newcomer Sadio Mané, left winger, also in the picture. Like everyone in the FC Bayern Oktoberfest costume. Only: as the only one without a wheat beer glass. So he and his non-existent drink became a topic in the city two weeks before the start of the Wiesn.
Quite a few media took up this, Mané’s refusal was discussed, found to be okay or criticized. That kept me busy because the topic has accompanied me since my arrival in Bavaria.
When it’s really hot, it’s off to the Isar. Float in the water, chat with friends and enjoy life. There are always beer crates in the flowing water of the Isar. The longer you sit there, the more often you hear these words: Weißbier, Helles, Radler, Tegernseer, Gustl. These were the first German terms I learned in Munich. Like a beer worshiper’s prayer wheel. In Syrian we say: They sing like they’re in a mill – and I don’t understand anything about their food.
The question keeps coming up: “Mohamad, do you drink aa a Hoibe?” I have remained steadfast to this day. It’s just part of me that it’s not part of me: alcohol. Even if some here are convinced that beer has little to do with alcohol. The term basic food then falls. Already enormous, this enthusiastic conviction. And so in such moments I always try not to look like the broken tomato on the edge of the vegetable box. And with a trick.
I pour myself an apple spritzer with lots of foam, it looks deceptively like beer. Some waiters cooperate by not giving you away. (Although non-alcoholic beer was an option, the taste never really blew me away.) Sometimes my trick is seen through and eyed in the beer vapor. In Bavaria, beer always gets involved somehow, just like tea in Syria.
I’m a Muslim, that’s one reason for my abstinence. So I’m allowed to smoke, but I refuse that as well. For the second reason: the health of the body. Without knowing him personally, I could imagine that the professional athlete and Muslim Mané has similar motives. And yet he obviously does one thing very differently from me.
I deliberately avoid pointing out that I don’t drink alcohol. For example with the apple spritzer trick. I don’t want to be seen as a killjoy. With the Oktoberfest photo of Bayern, I asked myself why I’m actually doing it this way. The one with the trick. Maybe Mane is right. One does not have to submit to every idiosyncrasy as long as one leaves it to the idiosyncratic. In any case, his teammates grinned into the camera on the Wiesn photo as ever. And with all that: A real Bayern fan doesn’t care what a striker drinks as long as he doesn’t forget his target water.