Passau Tourism
Growing up with the Hustle and Bustle of Festivities
It is the penultimate day at the Dult and Armin Beer opens the flaps of the cheese stall. It is morning and still quiet. In the course of the day, there will be a lot of excitement here in the lane with the food stalls. Armin Beer is used to it. „I don't know it any other way, and I've grown up with it from an early age," the 36-year-old says. His family has been running food stalls in Passau for over five decades. He has been at the Dult since he was a baby. "I was pushed into the stall in a stroller," Armin Beer says. The noise has never bothered him: "I've always been able to sleep well, preferably to brass band music."
Together with his mother Gabriele and the sales team, Armin Beer is one of the long-established vendors at the Dult in Passau. His parents once started with a small shop selling sausages in the Bahnhofstraße. Later, the Beers concentrated on the market and festival business. The cheese stall at the Maidult and Herbstdult, the sausage stall at the Christmas market: the Beer family is always there.
When he was 15 years old, he worked properly for the first time. Armin Beer recounts: "I salted the pretzels." He remembers the first fairs he worked through completely, the exhaustion afterwards, and the anticipation of the next time. Armin Beer actually works in mechanical engineering. He takes vacation time for the festivals.
Armin Beer unpacks a quarter of a wheel of cheese on the counter. A whole loaf weighs between 80 and 100 kilos. The pretzel dough will be delivered later on, from the local baker. They are then only freshly baked in the stall for the customers to enjoy when they are still warm-smelling and delicious. "My father was the first vendor to purchase such a pretzel oven," Armin Beer says.
On this penultimate day of festivities in Passau, Armin Beer's bones are already aching from the many hours of selling. "It's exhausting, but nice," he says. He is happy about his regular customers. He has memorized many faces over the years. And has sometimes observed how a couple has found each other at the Dult. "You can see someone passing by, first alone and then as a couple," he says. And sometimes sharing cheese and pretzels at his stall. But what he finds the most beautiful: if they come back one or many years later, together with their children.
You can meet the cheese stall of the Beer family at the Passau Maidult and Herbstdult: www.passauer-dult.de
