Resplendent Vienna

I didn't get a chance to write about Vienna until I was two cities away (in Venice actually). Because of this, enough time had passed that I was actually reminiscent about it. We only spent two half days there, and we mostly just walked around, but this was probably the right thing to do here considering that I believe it was the most photogenic city we visited. (You'll have to tell me if you agree after this post and the next one.) Let me recount our visit from the beginning.

Upon leaving Prague, (and I do mean stepping out of our apartment door) it started to rain. And I'm talking, log ride at six flags kind of rain. We unfortunately had a 20 minute walk to the train station to complete. We weighed our options... we could try public transit, but since our apartment was so beautifully located we hadn't had a reason to use it before now and therefor had no idea how it worked. Now, while deciphering bus and tram routes and schedules in the 45 minutes we had left before our train was scheduled to leave seemed like a fun challenge for now expert sight see-ers like me and John, it could also lead to frustrating train missing antics. We weighed in the comical value of such antics as they could be represented in a future blog, but in the end decided that catching the present train was more important than a potential chuckle from future readers such as yourselves. I apologize for our selfishness. Perhaps you can take solace in the fact that we arrived at the train station soaked to the bone, and frankly quite cranky.


Believe it or not, the train ride significantly improved my mood. Rain falling on the countryside is quite pleasent as long as you are not in said countryside. Puddles, fog, and an everchanging lanscape to enjoy each upon. What's not to love? I've always enjoyed rainy days, it's a fondness my father and I both share. I also like telling him this because each time he forgets, and is surprised and happy to find another rain watcher. I hope that again he has forgotten, and that reading this reminds him and makes him smile.
I was sure the rain would end by the time we reached Vienna, (Europe is reasonably sizable, correct?) but no, the rain followed us all the way to our destination train station, and throughout another walk to a different foreign abode. This time we stayed in a hostel. We checked in reasonably quickly, stowed our things, toweled off, and went out to explore. First things first, we were starving. The closest eatery to our hostel was "The Schnitzel Sisters." Having just left Prague, and already missing it, we decided to try it out. They produced an English menu for us, and almost immediately, and without reading the entire menu John decided to order bacon wrapped, cheese stuffed sausages. I promptly told him he was ridiculous, and then went ahead and ordered the chicken cordon bleu. It wasn't until I sat down that I realized we both ordered cheese wrapped in meat, wrapped in meat. Also, mine was breaded and deep fried, so I was more ridiculous.


As we left our dear sisters of schnitzel, it was starting to get dark, and therefore (in my opinion) the most fun time to take pictures. I like it because in daylight it's pretty easy to know how a picture is going to come out before you take it, but at twilight when light is less evenly distributed, you never know what light is going to do to your photo when it is done bouncing around inside your camera. Most of the time you say, "Crap, it is SO much prettier than this picture makes it look." But every once in a while, you say "Wow, this is cool!"

As John and I were about to abandon the cool wet evening, (yes, it was still drizzling) we heard music coming from this ominous looking castle. We stumbled on an outdoor film festival! Tonight's series? Dance! We thought this was quite fortunate because if there were no words at least we would be able to understand everything. (We were wrong by the way.) The first was a modern ballet composition that was really beautiful. There was obviously some kind of story happening, but when John and I compared interpretations, they couldn't have been more different.
The next piece had a short synopsis (in many languages) at the beginning, so we knew we were going to watch a depiction of the life of Christ. The choreographer decided that 'funk' was the most appropriate style of dance for this epic religious narrative, and so we were rewarded with break dancing, slow motion running, and (I kid you not) moon-walking. It was extremely difficult to keep from laughing when Judas was doing the 'Robot'. The rest of the Viennan audience apparently did not see the comedy in it. (Perhaps they were just cranky about the rain ruining their cultural event.) The final act was definitely the most visually interesting, it was a beautifully choreographed ballet-film, complete with costume changes and extremely confusing plot lines. The dancers seemed to be moving so fast, I'm still wondering if they were using less frames per second for effect. As part of the story (which we caught none of) they had a male character (dressed as a female character) on point shoes. I was impressed. I never saw a man do point before. Tell me dancers, is this common? Do males use toe shoes, or was this a unique experience? I am not trying to say that I don't think males have the grace or talent to learn this type of dance, only that I wouldn't think there would be a reason for males to master this technique if they never needed to use it in a ballet. We watched about half of it before we gave up on ever discovering the meaning of the piece and left those silly Viennans to their own interpretations.
After stopping to fight with (and conquer!) the most confusing Austrian hot chocolate machine ever, (was it really asking us how 'chocolaty' we wanted our drink?) we retired to our respective bunk beds excited about the palace we would visit the next day.

What's that? You want a preview? OK, I'm feeling generous:

Dali, Dancing, & Nazis in Prague

After our evening with the Czechs, the men were significantly exhausted. (Dare I say hung over? They might contest that.) I however, felt surprisingly better than I did the day before. (I guess beer and Sudafed was good idea after all, take that Surgeon General!) I was up, showered and dressed by 9:00 AM. I told the men that I was going to the internet cafe to write up a blog post, and that if they decided to go anywhere before I got back that they should just come and get me. (It was literally a block away.) When I got to the square, I found out that the place didn't open until 10. Bummer. But was it really a bummer? The square was already bustling with people, and actually, "What's this? A parade? No, it's actually an international folk dance festival!" People traveled from all over to show off their cultural dance moves. What about the US? How do you think we were represented? Moonwalk? No. (Good guess though, it woud have been quite fitting considering that the number of times I've heard "Billie Jean" this summer is fast approching the Dyson number for 2.) More guesses? Don't forget Hawaii is a part of the US too!

For some reason that I can only loosely explain, when I saw all of these different people dancing joyfully in the streets (cheesy music and all), I started to cry. I mean it, I'm talking some serious tears. I guess I went a little soft seeing people from all different nations being happy and united by something as simple as music. It's the idealist in me... the Utopian, she got a little emotional.
I watched for an hour as various groups preformed their numbers. I don't have any good pictures of this... you know... due to the crying and all.

I crossed the square a little before 10 to see the astronomical clock do 'it's thing' that it does every hour, on the hour, all day starting at 9 AM. After watching the 15 second 'show,' I've decided that the only reason it exisits is so tourists have a reason to stare at the clock for any length of time. If you just saw the clock (there's a picture of it in my previous blog entry) you'd say, "What a beautiful clock!" and promptly move on after snapping a picture. But folks, that thing is 'F'-ing complicated! (Image ripped from wikipedia.) You can't appreciate it without standing there and trying to figure out how it works for a while, and the only reason you would ever try to do that is if you were killing time while standing in your 'prime spot' for viewing a 'show' of sorts. My advice, skip the show... it's exactly like a giant coo-coo clock, only with apostles instead of birds. It might be more interesting if the apostles actually made 'coo-coo' noises. I should suggest that to the Czechs... with their dark humor record, they might actually consider it.

Finally, the internet cafe was open and I took a break from experiencing life to reflect on it. Reflection takes longer than one would expect, and I almost fainted when I looked at the time. 11:30!? How did that happen? Then I started to worry because I knew we were supposed to meet our Czech friends at 1:00 for lunch, and I REALLY wanted to go to the Dali exhibit before then. Did the guys forget where the internet cafe was? Had they looking for me? I practically ran back to the apartment... our last full day in Prague and I was wasting it in the cafe! I was going to have to do some apologizing.

Three locked doors, and three flights of stairs later, I was standing in the middle of the living room looking down in amazement at John and Frank's respective beds... each still occupied! I went to sleep at the same time as them, (Midnight maybe?) and here they were four hours after I started my day... halfway through their twelfth hour of sleep! Here's where I got a little bossy.... "WAKE UP!!! You need to get ready so we can go to the Museum! How long will it take you both to shower?! If we leave in more than 20 minutes, the Dali exhibit (while small) won't be worth the crowns!" I have to give them credit, they sprang into action. John even ignored the shower queue and went first for a change. I felt sort of bad in retrospect because I could have just as easily went to the museum on my own and given them a little more time to start their day, (really does anyone deserve to be awakened like that when they are on vacation?) but I was just so surprised to find them still asleep, and was mad at myself for rushing in the internet cafe because I was worried about holding THEM up.

Twenty minutes later we were out the door and at the Dali exhibit. (I can say this because our beautifully located apartment was literally 2 blocks from the museum.) Let me say, Dali was a crazy SOB. And I'm not just talking about his artwork, I mean seriously, look at this guy!







Right? This particular exhibit combined photos of the artist with his sketches, paintings, sculptures, and pottery. Did you know Dali was a potter? His plates had the same crazy ass designs on them. Can you imagine eating off of this hairy rotting clock?

Honestly though, had they sold duplicates in the gift shop, I would have seriously considered purchasing a few for my brother. Alas, they did not. (Sorry Jus.) I really enjoyed looking at his work. Did you also know that Dali painted Abraham Lincoln?



















Well... sort of anyway.



I really enjoyed the exhibit, and was really satisfied that we saw the whole thing in an hour. I mean don't get me wrong, Dali's artwork is so interesting because there seems to be about a million ways to interpret everything he does, and because of this I could have spent a whole day there and written several posts on what I saw. (I am especially intrigued by his frequent usage of shuffleboard stick shaped support devices.) It's just that we had friends to meet and dumplings to eat!

We met Mark and Aaron a little to the east of old town and they took us to an extremely cheap place to eat lunch. It wasn't a touristy place and so they had to read the menu to us again. Frank and I each got the schnitzel again, and John did this time as well. (I guess he learned his lesson. :) )





The rest of the day was pretty relaxing, we did some sightseeing, stopped for coffee, did some more wandering around, and had some gelato. Feeling especially laid back the men even suffered through a few souveneir purchases. One thing that we toured that was different that usual was the Jewish Quarter of Prague. There were a few things there that were particularly interesting for me. The first was this old graveyard:



Isn't it strange that the gravestones are all practically on top of each other? And doesn't the ground look like it's swelling? I was very curious about these characteristics, so I did a little research. It turns out that when the graveyard got full, they just added more dirt, and piled on more graves. When they did this, they just moved all of the old headstones up to the top layer. There are actually 12 full layers of graves. This is the oldest Jewish cemetery in Europe (operational from 1439-1787) because the Nazis made a point to destroy all Jewish cemeteries they came across. Prague happens to be the only capital in Europe that escaped bombing in WWII, and this is the reason this cemetery still exists.

The other was more of an emotional event.



Each name written here belongs to a person who was murdered in the holocaust. Next to each name is a date of birth, and a date of last known location. It fills an entire temple. It's very overwhelming. It's very important to see... perhaps it's more accurate to say that it's an important thing to experience.

OK, but it's time to stop being all emotional. (I know I know, in the beginning of the post I'm crying and now I'm preaching to you about the holocaust.) By the evening, we were quite exhausted, and this being our last night in Prague we decided to spend it at the bar. (You probably guessed that already though.)

The last thing we did in Prague before turning in was walk over to the Charles Bridge for some gelato. While Frank and John caught up on Notre Dame football, I played with some of the exposure settings on my camera. I liked how this one turned out.

Goodbye for now Prague, I am sure I'll be for a visit sometime soon!

Czech please!

Ah Prague... I love you.



Winding city streets, schnitzel, dumplings, and (very) cheap beer; what's not to enjoy? Ever since Julia first described it to me I've wanted to go. Ever since my father came home raving after (accidentally) watching the world cup in the main square, I've been intrigued. (If you knew how my Dad is about sports, you'd understand.) Ever since my grandfather taught me how to say, "Pojď sem a dej mi pusu" which is the one phrase he knew in Czech, I figured it was an important part of my heritage. (Don't ask me how he came to learn this phrase... I doubt very much it was so he might one day ask his granddaughter for a kiss on the cheek.)
Praha did not let me down.

As you may recall, I was stick fighting off something fierce and was on a bunch of drugs, but I wasn't going to let that stop me from seeing the astronomical clock, the Charles Bridge, and especially any beer gardens we might come across. (It was a good thing John brought cold medicine that wasn't in it's original packaging... I don't need some preachy label telling me I can't have alcohol with my drugs, I'm in Prague dammit! No label probably means it's OK to have a beer, or two, or three right?)

John's friend Frank from undergrad who is currently also living in Genevea, (working on the particle accelerator like everyone else) decided on a whim to come an stay with us in our lavish apartment. (OK, it took a bit of arm twisting, and I'm told TWO all-nighters on his part, but he made it alright?) In the morning there was much strolling, picture taking, and shopping, but once Frank got there, we made a bee-line for the beer gardens. I liked this. Our temporary "landlord" (also conveniently named Frank) suggested that we go to a pace that was just north of the old city on the other side of the bridge. It's a good thing he told us, because we never would have found this place on our own, and it was AWESOME.

A few half liters later (don't worry, I was conservative) we were drunk in the city and looking for schnitzel. We decided to walk a little further north and were chatting loudly about such and such, (OK, OK, I was the one chatting loudly.) when a man with a Czech accent turned around and said quite suddenly, "Where are you from?" That's it. There wasn't even an introduction. We didn't even know they were listening. We stopped short, and he said, "It's just that your accent is very familiar." I proudly answered, "New York!" He went on to say that he had a friend from NYC that was in an orchestra (The Prague Orchestra? I forget.) with whom he had spent two exciting weeks of travel. My accent reminded him of this.
This my friends, is probably the first time anyone, anywhere has thought of a New York accent as endearing.

Our new friend's name was Mark, and his friend's name was Aaron. (I am not sure if these names were 'Americanized' for our benefit, but perhaps if they read this they can tell us.) We asked them where we could get some dinner, and they brought us to a local place 'off the beaten path.' Because we were out of tourist town, they needed to do all of the ordering for us. I couldn't read any word besides schnitzel and pivo (beer) but in retrospect that was probably ok, because that was what I ordered anyways. Only John suffered from some (arguably) poor ordering choices, but it was not without ample warning from our Czech friends.


First John ordered what the Czechs kept referring to as "Pig tails." Mark and Aaron said that it was a ton of meat, and should be sharred between at least two people if someone were thinking of getting it. John ignored this suggestion because (he told me later) he usually cut the "number of servings" in half when purchasing food from safeway. Besides, he justified, European meals were small in general, and "pig tails?" those cute little curly things? How much meat could be on them anyway? Right. Can you see where this is going?
When the "pig tails" came out, I saw absolutely no resemblance to what one thinks of when they picture a pig's tail. Instead John had in front of him the fattiest slab of gray mystery meat I have ever seen, and (you guessed it) it was bigger than his head. Regretfully, I have no pictures of this. (I know, I have no idea what I was thinking.)

John said it was delicious, but suggested we get a defibrillator ready because he predicted he would suffer no less than three heart attacks by dessert. He probably ate a good 2/3 of it before asking Frank (the friend not the landlord) for some help. Even then full of schnitzel and dumplings, he was up for the challenge.

After dinner, we went to a local bar. It was here that John made is second ordering mistake. He noticed in addition to the beers, there was something he could order called "grog." Now I must admit that the name does sound like something a warrior Dwarf might order in Dungeons and Dragons, and therefor pretty bad ass (or BA-dass as my cousin Cory would say), but I also know better than to order something a local warns me he's never tried and can't quite describe. John was feeling a bit more adventurous, and so he ordered the grog. (Plus ten experience points for John!)

It turns out that grog is not something a dwarf would order, and actually you are probably much more likely to find an elf (or maybe a fairy?) ordering grog. It was a shot of something brandy-like mixed with hot water and sugar, and served in a glass identical to the one my mother used to use when she had other ladies over for tea and lady fingers. Also, by the by, perhaps youve already predicted this, grog is NOT delicious. I would much rather have my mother's tea and lady fingers.

Even though John has a really hard time leaving any sort of alcoholic beverage undrunk, (just wait until I tell you about the "Maximators" in a few more posts!) I think he was secretly happy when they (quite literally) turned the lights out on us after telling us 6 times (in Czech) that they were closing. (Our Czech guys failed to translate that one for us.) I hope he doesn't have bad dreams about the inch of undrinkable liquid sitting in the bottom of that lonely lady finger glass.

We walked back to our apartment (the boys may have staggered) and parted ways with the Czechs, but promised to meet them for lunch the next day. I went up stairs and promptly passed out from the effects of cold medicine and three (OK, four) beers, but learned the next day that poor John's Pig Tails and grog kept him up a while. Luckily, his stomach eventually won the fight and there was no porcelain praying, but I still wouldn't run out and order grog soaked pig tails any time soon.

By the way, Mark and Aaron, who are starting their own hostel business, said our apartment was a real steal! Yay for not being swindled!