Vienna Waits For You

WARNING: This blog post (and the ones to follow about my travels) may be farr too long.

Last Thursday night Jessie Jacobson and I got on a plane at Fumincino airport and headed off for the land of crisp apple strudel, schnitzel, and silver white winters that melt into springs - otherwise known as Austria! A few weeks ago when the two of us met up for dinner we decided on a whim to head to Austria on a weekend that both of us happened to have free. I am so beyond happy that we made the decision to go. Austria was so much more than I could have ever expected it to be. The food was wonderful, the people were friendly, the sights and sounds were breathtaking. What more could a girl ask for?

Upon arriving in the city center and finding our hostel, The Wombat (highly recommend it!) Jessie and I went out for our first meal in Austria. The guy at the front desk sent us to a small restaurant around the corner that was named after Mozart, who might as well be considered Vienna's patron saint because it seems like everything has a name that has to do with him. The second we left the hostel we see this HUGE Croc store. Yes, I am talking about the "too ugly for words" shoes that have infiltrated campers and the lives of badly dressed people everywhere. Jessie and I got such a kick out of it, because who would have thought that there would be a store devoted to them in the middle of Vienna?

And I digress... We had the most amazing meal. We both had schnitzel, french fries, enough ketchup to last a life time, and this incredible beer that was essentially mixed with lemonade called a Radler. I never thought that I would EVER refer to a beer being incredible, but both of us really enjoyed it. After sitting a wonderfully long time in our tiny far too intimate booth we walked the few blocks back to the hostel to head to bed. When we walked into our room we found 4 Koreans that barely spoke a word of English (and we spoke not a single word of Korean between us). At least we were planning on going straight to bed, if not, making conversation would have been just a bit difficult.

The next morning we woke up early to head to the Vienna Museumsquartier. We were told that at 60 square km, it is one of the largest art districts in the world. On our walk down the main street, Mariahilferstr, we noticed that something weird was going on. It was 10:00 in the morning and nothing seemed to be open besides the little grocery store where we picked up the most wonderful fruit, and no one was out and walking around. The two of us just chalked it up to the Austrians being lazy, but later we came to find out that it was their bank holiday. Good timing on our part... But, at least the museums were open! We decided to go to the Museum Moderner Kunst (MUMOK) first. Some of the art was quite odd, but on the whole I enjoyed most of what we saw. The main exhibit was called China: Facing Reality. Some of the art was really strange, but a lot of it was very though provoking and gave insight into the daily tug-of-war that the Chinese go through resulting from capitalism and communism. On the bottom floor we were able to see some really fabulous and famous art work, including some Andy Worhal and Love: Black and White Rising (that was done for Martin Luther King Jr.).

From the MUMOK, Jessie and I decided to delve into our Jewish roots by heading to the Judisches Museum. We easily figure out what metro (or as it is called there - The U) stop that we had to get off at, but from there we had a few issues. At first we went the wrong way out of the U station and wound up wandering around "one of Vienna's most treasured symbols," the Stephansdom until we finally figured out the right direction to go. Then, somehow Jessie and I managed to walk right past the sign that pointed us in the right direction of the museum. shows how good we are with maps and street names that we can't read or pronounce.

We finally found the museum and were greeted by a warm building and free entrance. The museum was small, but interesting. There were these strange, but cool holograms that told the history of Jewish culture and history around the world and in Vienna. We also discovered a room the showcased Jewish culture for small children. This included fun things such as yarmulkes with cartoon characters and the aleph bet done in legos. By far, though, the best part of the museum was the special exhibit that they were having about Jewish women and there role in Vienna in the past, as well as their role currently and in the future. This picture of me is pretty horrible, but we couldn't take it again for fear of getting yelled at. Yet, the question is a good one, and I think that we all know the answer for it!

We left the museum incredibly hungry from our morning of walking around. An incredibly nice guy from the museum walked us down the street to another traditional Austrian restaurant. The food there was also great! Jessie and I had goulash, which might as well have been called brisket. Yummy! The atmosphere in the was I guess what I would have called "very Austrian." Everyone in there seemed to be a local, which essentially meant that we had fond ourselves some good food! At the end of the meal, we decided to treat ourselves to apple strudel and fell in love with it before we even took our first bite.

By this time it was getting late in the afternoon and Jessie and I needed to get ourselves back to the hostel so that we could pick up our bags and head to Salzburg.