Time Flies
At the beginning of November I was busy with midterms, my how time flies as I'm now thinking about final papers!
The weekend of the 10-12ish my friend Laura came from Madrid, where she is studying, and it was a wonderful excuse to do touristy things. I showed her around the city showing off what knowledge I've gained from Vienna Past and Present. We saw the expressionist exhibit at the Leopold museum which was pretty good, went to the Naschmarkt where I finally tried what is allegedly the best kebab. But I actually like the kebab right at the Oper stop on Karntnerstrasse better. Saw the Secession museum including some truly strange contemporary exhibits, a whole bunch of video exhibits which were particularly weird involved cameras recording people nodding off, driving in endless circles around rotaries, etc. There was also a work that consisted of 4 cardboard boxes sitting on the floor. I actually moved a box before I realized it was supposed to be art.
Friday night we went to the little local restaurant in my district that cousin Peter had taken my family to 2 years ago. Nobody speaks much English. Well we go and sit in the back room with 2 couples and a table full of about 15 drunk middle aged men. The couples soon left leaving us alone as objects of many stares. This one guy in particular kept turning around to face us. He wished us a good meal in poor English when our food came (mmmm spezial cordone blu with peperoni cheese and onions inside my schnitzel!) Eventually, as we kept trying to avoid looking at the guys and giggling at eachother, he asked where we were from, and upon finding out Laura was from California the guys all ruminated for a while. Then he turns around and proclaims, again in English, that Arnold Schwarzenegger will be president in a year or two. Laura and I crack up and I tried to explain, first in English and then in broken German ("He was not in Amerika birthday" - I learned the word for born the next time I had German class!), that this was simply not possible, but as I didn't exactly know the words for "constitutional ammendment" we failed and the man concluded that he would be president in three or four years. (I didn't even get into the fact that that would be the middle of somebody's term). All in all quite amusing, Laura and I couldn't eat sometimes for the amount of giggling we were doing. That night we also explored the clubs on the Gurtel which despite their proximity to my apartment I hadn't yet been to. I immediately regretted my tardiness as the atmosphere, in these cave-like dens under the Gurtel (belt) train tracks was really cool.
We went to Otello Saturday and I loved it. The music was incredible and dramatic and gorgeous and the singers were great. The production was done with no period's dress at all - not the 1500s, not modern, just black trench coats, cloaks, and dresses, and a few white dresses. In a stark comparison to Lohengrin, Otello's production showed how well the simple theme could work, allowing imagination to take hold and not distracting from the actual music.
And this past weekend I went to Budapest with half my Lit class (the professor is Hungarian). Got in friday and it was, we found out Sat, the annual trash day for the district we were in. This means that there were piles of furniture, clothing, papers, gross looking undidentifiable stuff, every few feet on the sidewalks, and people picking through the piles, loading up their bikes and old Soviet-era cars. We ate in a cafeteria, which I guess was very student of us, but their lack of English led to me getting some interesting dishes when I'd just been trying to ask if they matched the signs above (not necessarily was the conclusion). Never order first in a situation like this. Anyway Saturday we wandered around and found, on recommendation of an odd guy at our very very nice cheap hostel, the Museum of Terror. Housed in the former office building of both the Arrow Cross (Hungarian Nazi party) and later communists it goes through the nearly half-century of oppression. Although only a few of the video displays were subtitled, there were plenty of other visuals and each room had a page-long description to pick up. I have practically a book from the museum's pamphlets, the latter half of which I didn't read because we started running out of time. It was really an interesting place though. Our prof gave us a tour of the castle and a sizeable helping of Hungarian history that afternoon and then took us to a local pub where I had a delicious veal peprikagoulasch or something of the sort. The next day I went to hero's square and the castle and peaked through the zoo's fence, saw parlament, then climbed the citadell and returned to Vienna. It was pretty grey though warm while I was there and I wasn't a huge fan of the city.
I've realized I have only a month left in Vienna. I made a list of things I want to do before I leave - mainly museums that I'll regret not going to even if I feel museumed-out now. I'm making an effort to do things in between classes instead of just hanging out, and there's tons of restaurants I've been meaning to try. Meanwhile (probably for the better so long as I have mail/skype) my internet has been fussy and it's been hard to load my usual routine of websites at home.
I visited the christmas market in front of the Rathaus this evening. It is huge and a mixture of stalls selling ornaments, candles, little nativity figures, cookies, chocolates, hot wine and other punsches, chestnut roasting shacks, etc. Little sheds that sell baked goods and hot wine and punsches have also sprung up around the first district where restaurants used to have their outdoor seating areas. Sadly some of the prettiest things are painted glass ball ornaments that would never make it home, especially given how much luggage I will have. I haven't yet bought anything (well besides a truffle) because I promised myself I would wait and see what was around the city before buying something and finding something better or a better deal elsewhere.
The weekend of the 10-12ish my friend Laura came from Madrid, where she is studying, and it was a wonderful excuse to do touristy things. I showed her around the city showing off what knowledge I've gained from Vienna Past and Present. We saw the expressionist exhibit at the Leopold museum which was pretty good, went to the Naschmarkt where I finally tried what is allegedly the best kebab. But I actually like the kebab right at the Oper stop on Karntnerstrasse better. Saw the Secession museum including some truly strange contemporary exhibits, a whole bunch of video exhibits which were particularly weird involved cameras recording people nodding off, driving in endless circles around rotaries, etc. There was also a work that consisted of 4 cardboard boxes sitting on the floor. I actually moved a box before I realized it was supposed to be art.
Friday night we went to the little local restaurant in my district that cousin Peter had taken my family to 2 years ago. Nobody speaks much English. Well we go and sit in the back room with 2 couples and a table full of about 15 drunk middle aged men. The couples soon left leaving us alone as objects of many stares. This one guy in particular kept turning around to face us. He wished us a good meal in poor English when our food came (mmmm spezial cordone blu with peperoni cheese and onions inside my schnitzel!) Eventually, as we kept trying to avoid looking at the guys and giggling at eachother, he asked where we were from, and upon finding out Laura was from California the guys all ruminated for a while. Then he turns around and proclaims, again in English, that Arnold Schwarzenegger will be president in a year or two. Laura and I crack up and I tried to explain, first in English and then in broken German ("He was not in Amerika birthday" - I learned the word for born the next time I had German class!), that this was simply not possible, but as I didn't exactly know the words for "constitutional ammendment" we failed and the man concluded that he would be president in three or four years. (I didn't even get into the fact that that would be the middle of somebody's term). All in all quite amusing, Laura and I couldn't eat sometimes for the amount of giggling we were doing. That night we also explored the clubs on the Gurtel which despite their proximity to my apartment I hadn't yet been to. I immediately regretted my tardiness as the atmosphere, in these cave-like dens under the Gurtel (belt) train tracks was really cool.
We went to Otello Saturday and I loved it. The music was incredible and dramatic and gorgeous and the singers were great. The production was done with no period's dress at all - not the 1500s, not modern, just black trench coats, cloaks, and dresses, and a few white dresses. In a stark comparison to Lohengrin, Otello's production showed how well the simple theme could work, allowing imagination to take hold and not distracting from the actual music.
And this past weekend I went to Budapest with half my Lit class (the professor is Hungarian). Got in friday and it was, we found out Sat, the annual trash day for the district we were in. This means that there were piles of furniture, clothing, papers, gross looking undidentifiable stuff, every few feet on the sidewalks, and people picking through the piles, loading up their bikes and old Soviet-era cars. We ate in a cafeteria, which I guess was very student of us, but their lack of English led to me getting some interesting dishes when I'd just been trying to ask if they matched the signs above (not necessarily was the conclusion). Never order first in a situation like this. Anyway Saturday we wandered around and found, on recommendation of an odd guy at our very very nice cheap hostel, the Museum of Terror. Housed in the former office building of both the Arrow Cross (Hungarian Nazi party) and later communists it goes through the nearly half-century of oppression. Although only a few of the video displays were subtitled, there were plenty of other visuals and each room had a page-long description to pick up. I have practically a book from the museum's pamphlets, the latter half of which I didn't read because we started running out of time. It was really an interesting place though. Our prof gave us a tour of the castle and a sizeable helping of Hungarian history that afternoon and then took us to a local pub where I had a delicious veal peprikagoulasch or something of the sort. The next day I went to hero's square and the castle and peaked through the zoo's fence, saw parlament, then climbed the citadell and returned to Vienna. It was pretty grey though warm while I was there and I wasn't a huge fan of the city.
I've realized I have only a month left in Vienna. I made a list of things I want to do before I leave - mainly museums that I'll regret not going to even if I feel museumed-out now. I'm making an effort to do things in between classes instead of just hanging out, and there's tons of restaurants I've been meaning to try. Meanwhile (probably for the better so long as I have mail/skype) my internet has been fussy and it's been hard to load my usual routine of websites at home.
I visited the christmas market in front of the Rathaus this evening. It is huge and a mixture of stalls selling ornaments, candles, little nativity figures, cookies, chocolates, hot wine and other punsches, chestnut roasting shacks, etc. Little sheds that sell baked goods and hot wine and punsches have also sprung up around the first district where restaurants used to have their outdoor seating areas. Sadly some of the prettiest things are painted glass ball ornaments that would never make it home, especially given how much luggage I will have. I haven't yet bought anything (well besides a truffle) because I promised myself I would wait and see what was around the city before buying something and finding something better or a better deal elsewhere.
posted by trude at
7:59 PM
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