Austria!

No, I'm not in Austria at the moment. But I just got home a few days ago. It was a 10 hour trip by train, and featured a snowy stop in Strasbourg. My luggage was just a big pack and a (nice, Austrian) plastic shopping bag containing a hat with a feather in it, and I had spent the entire morning sitting in a train, so I went for a long walk around the city. It was very Northern, and reminded me as much of German cities as of French ones. And I discovered a farmer's market, where I bought Moroccan Clementines.

The trip itself, though: I could take forever to talk about it, but in reality, it was much too short: a little under two weeks in Austria. I started out meeting T-- in Vienna. She flew in from Kyiv (or Kiev, it depends). Luckily, this did not mean that we had to go to McDonald's. But it was funny- she commented on all the smiling people, and also, I think, on how clean the place was. Although, honestly, Vienna is kind of ridiculously clean, even for the West. We went to the Opera, and before you were let into a stall, a cleaning lady went in first, to, er, clean it off. (Well, that was the creepiest extreme, but it really was a very clean and pleasant city).

T-- and I went to see an opera neither of us had ever heard of. In Vienna, you can get in line about two hours before the show, and get standing room tickets for 4 Euros (4 Euros! For an opera! In Vienna!). We did that, and in the line behind us, we met an American who was wandering aimlessly (couch-surfing, actually) across Europe. So, he entertained us with his adventures - how couch surfers met him in back alleys and how he snuck into the the Edinborough New Year's party . . . And he told us that to him, Vienna was just a big city, like any other, at least, it didn't seem very remarkable after all the other big cities he's been to. Which I don't agree with very much, but it's an interesting point.

We got the tickets, and went to mark our spots. I was expecting something like a big pit area, like what I've heard of how Shakespeare plays were seen in London. Instead, it was very . . . German . . . and organized. (Sorry. I can't help it. Austria to me is a very German country. The food portions are HUGE, people are organized, places are clean. The American in me is explaining that it's still wrong to stereotype.) At any rate. After we got our tickets, we were lined up behind the doors leading into the theater. And it was very important that we were lined up in pairs. There were doors at either side of the theater, actually, and two sepparate lines. And only after a while, maybe 10-20 minutes, were the doors in front of us actually opened, and we were let inside. And then the whole pair thing completely broke down, and we squeezed through the doors, and merged with the line on the other side of the theater.

We went down some steps, and on either side of us were these aisles, about the width of a skinny European person, marked off by rails. That way, you could lean forward of backward, and still be standing. And in front of you, you also had a little screen, that would eventually show you the translation of what they were singing, in the language of your choice. Very high-tech. Anyway. You had to mark you spot, by tying a scarf or paper napkin or something to your spot, and then you could leave for an hour or so. Odd as it seams, this worked pretty well.

Clearly, while waiting for a brilliant cultural experience, the thing to do is to run to Starbucks, and grab a gingerbread latte. Actually, I grabbed the latte, while T-- grabbed, literally, half a large greasy pizza from a street vender down the block. And apparently, this was just one slice.

For the record, T-- showed amazing eating ability on this trip. I don't think we managed to find one descend, normal sized portion on this entire trip, but as I was barely able to finish all the meat on my plate, T-- would still be miraculously able to steal from my plate. She claims it's because she runs. I think she was storing up Western food to last her the next year in Ukraine. (For the record, we are both fans of Ukrainian food. But that's all their is in Ukraine, so it's understandable to want to stock up on variety).

So, after such an elegant dinner, we entered the high society of men dressed in black, and women in identical fur coats. Brown is in style this year, by the way. It was a good opera, and the singing is beautiful- it definitely lives up to its reputation. But standing for that long, with nothing to support you, is very tiring. During the intermission I inelegantly commandeered a pair of chairs, and if we hadn't found any, I'm sure we would have just sat on in the middle of the floor, and let the ladies in mink trip over us.

There were a pair of Russian girls who wanted these chairs, but wound up sitting at the next table, and I talked to them a little. Actually, the number of Russian-speaking people in Vienna was pretty incredible. There were some everywhere we turned. It wasn't quite as incredible as the number of Russians in the next place we went, but that's for another post.

In fact, it's getting late-ish, so there will be more posts about Vienna, and about other Austrian places, later. Tomorrow, probably. This was just my story of Cultural Enlightenment in Vienna.