Vienna!

Us at the airport 

Today was our first full day in Vienna! We arrived here around 2:30 am Washington time and from there had time to explore the city a little. My group went to a neat little coffee shop next to our hostel and got something to eat and drink. After that we settled into our rooms then went to dinner in an underground restaurant which was pretty cool. Everyone went back to their rooms and crashed after that.

Today we took a tour of the city and got to see St. Stevens church, the Mozart house, where Mozart died, the Palace, and some of what's left of the Roman wall. We learned lots of neat facts and after our two hour tour my group went back to the Beethoven Coffee house that was pointed out on the tour for lunch. We then walked the city for a little while looking in antique shops to kill time before going on a tour of the catacombs of St. Stevens (sorry no pictures from that one). There were lots of coffins in the old part under the church and lots of bones out in the open (more or less) in the newer part that looks older.
I was amazed at how much St. Stevens looks like Notre Dome on the inside, only this one doesn't have all the stained glass windows that is French counter part does. The church is also asymmetrical because they didn't have enough money to finish the north tower the same as the south and so they put a dome top over it and that's where the worlds largest swinging bell is housed. The building is also blackened by fire from around WW2 but it is meant to be all white and they are working on restoring it to that color.

The concert we went to was about Robert and Clara Schumann. The singing was gorgeous and the readings were well placed between the music so that it wasn't too much but it was hard to truly enjoy without being able to understand it.

A cool building we passed on the way to diner

Lueger

Part of the old roman wall

St. Stevens

The palace in the center of Vienna 

A statue commemorating the Holocaust. The gates of hell in the white stone with a tied up Jew. Then the man descending into hell to retrieve them. Then the words with the first words of the Austrian independence stating no matter what people look like or believe everyone is equal.

Mozart house and the place where he died (the house he died doesn't exist anymore)

More of St. Stevens

The other side of the palace with part of the roman wall out front

The dome of the palace

Inside St. Stevens

Some statues we went and found in the park (featuring Aaron's hand)

Dinner

Tour

Statues in the park before our concert

Our first concert 

Vienna Day 1 and 2!

This trip has been an adventure already. The journey here was long so the first thing I started looking for in Vienna was food, of course. I’ve traveled before but in many of the places there hasn’t been a language barrier or I haven’t been affected by it. Me and a couple of other people walked into Mr. Schnitzel, a schnitzel store, having no clue what to order because the menu was in German. One of the workers came up to us and probably asked what we wanted but I’m not completely sure. Courtney and I ended up just nodding and saying we will each take one of whatever he was saying. The food was really good but not what I expected! The language barrier may be difficult but it’s so interesting and you’ll never know what you’re going to get. 

Other than that first experience, we haven’t had many troubles. The day we arrived we were all pretty tired but still had the energy to explore the area surrounding our hostel. Things got even better today when we started our day with a walking tour. It was so interesting learning about St. Stephens Kirche as well as the history of Mozart in the area. The tour also gave us a good idea of where else we want to explore! A couple of us ended up walking around exploring different churches and buildings. The architecture is amazing in Europe. 

We finished the day going to a really well performed recital! We attended the Love Letters of Clara and Robert Schumann. I’m not a music major and I haven’t experienced this type of singing before but the singers and pianist were incredible. I may have been very tired during the performance and since it wasn’t in English, I couldn’t understand anything, but I still really enjoyed it. One thing that was really interesting was that the performers came out to applause four times after the performance. Overall, it’s been a really great two days and I’m still really tired but so excited for what’s to come!

I couldn’t figure out how to get pictures on and I’m too tired right now, so look for them next time! 

Dawn of the Second Day

I had a great first day in Vienna! We flew from Seattle to Frankfurt and then took a short flight from there to Vienna and landed around noon. We had most of the day to ourselves after finding our rooms, so my roommates and I decided to take a walk around the city.

Our first adventure during our walk was trying to figure out the U-Bahn. In theory it shouldn’t have been as hard as it ended up being. The maps were all really clear so we found the stop we wanted to get off at and went to the side of the station that was heading that direction. The issue started when the train finally came. It was during rush hour so we all crowded on and waited for it to leave. After a few minutes of waiting for it to leave, an announcement came on in German and everyone got off and walked to the other side of the station. We followed them and got on the train on the other side. After a few minutes of waiting for this train to leave, another announcement came on and everyone got off the train and walked to the side of the station we were first on. We had several people ask us what was going on but we didn’t speak German so we asked one of the locals. They didn’t know what was going on either. At that point we gave up on the U-Bahn and continued our walk.

After wandering through the city for a little bit longer we ended up finding a beautiful church. It was empty when we walked in so it was totally silent. We stayed in there for a while just taking everything in.

After our walk (which ended up being a little over 4 miles) we met up with the rest of the group for dinner. We ate at Zwölf Apostelkeller which was delicious. They stuck us in one of the lower floors of the restaurant. It was a great restaurant with awesome food.

By 9:00 I was so exhausted and ready for bed. I had been up all day and experienced so much already and loved every second of it. Can't wait for the rest of the trip.

*Visual representation of what I looked like after being awake for 30 hours

Ready for day 2!

New experiences, Enlightenment, and Beer

     This is my first blog, and certainly not my last. It was my first day on the trip, and I did not expect to have something to write about this early on. But, contrary to my first thoughts, my first day was possibly the most important day I will have on this trip. Granted it's one day, but you just have to try and think of all the things I did, and all the things I saw. I didn't go to a concert or an opera, or a tour, or anything really set up by the class, except for the group dinner. But wow, my day was full of experiences.

      After a long 10 hour flight, my classmates and I were blessed with another hour long flight. Fast forward another hour and I'm sitting in the hostel we are staying at for the whole "school-week", thinking to myself about the overwhelming possibilities and opportunities. My roommates for the week are Tomick, Carl, and Konner. After a quick lunch at a basic little coffee shop, that consisted of a pizza and two red bulls, my roommates and I decided to go on an adventure, or get lost, whichever you prefer to call it.

      During a 4 mile walk before dinner, we saw A LOT of things. At one point we passed a shop selling old German pistols (very cheap by the way if anyone is interested), not much farther the smell of fresh bread led us to a bakery. The greatest experience on this walk, by far was coming across just one of the many churches in the city, Rudolph's Church. This moment I shared with my roommates was an amazing moment. The doors were open when we walked up to see the quality of art outside the building, and I urged my roommates to journey in with me. Going inside was quite possibly one of the most enlightening moments of my life. The church was completely empty except for one woman who I assume was praying, it was in German so I'm not really sure. Not only was the church empty, it was also completely dark besides the little light that shined in from the outdoors, and a few candles. The smallest bump on a pew would echo through the building, it was that silent. I could hear each step we took, and each breath I took as I continued to be amazed at what I was seeing. We were alone, but it felt so... Honestly, I can't really explain what I felt or what the experience was like.

     Moving away from that experience, we took a good little trip to the subway. I'm going to talk about this because it was a hilariously ironic, considering it was our first day. With this in mind, I'd like to talk about how the train broke, as we were getting on it. We were unbelievably confused already, as everything was in German, so when the announcement was made that the train was closed due to technical difficulties, it was not something we understood. This was especially true when the German-speaking locals were also confused. There's not much more to that story except that it's a funny little story to tell. What's a trip to a foreign country without having issues with their transportation system?

    This blog will probably be my longest, as there's so much to take in. The day ended with a fantastic dinner at a local but well-known beer garden, that was based three stories underground. As it was a beer garden, surprise surprise, beer was consumed, responsibly of course. I'm pretty sure I was given a basic beer, as I just said: "Bier Bitte" which translates to, "Beer Please". But a basic beer in Austria seemed to do the trick, as I tasted a fantastic drink, that complimented my breaded Schnitzel and potato salad. Finally, I walked home and passed out pretty quickly, most likely from the fact that we had been up for around 24 hours. All I can say about this first day is it was amazing and definitely set a standard for the whole trip. WOW

- Aaron Ristau, Biertrinker

   

Januar-7/8-1-2018

Today in Vienna, I realized all the difference the continent makes when it comes to the grand cities is the aura of the plac d you go. In the United States, most of every important landmark and site is powerful because of its sheer vastness and size, we marvel at how far humanity has come. In Europe today, there was the new, but the truly magnificent sites were the old cathedrals and halls. While any site in the US was at least 4x it’s size, the unseeable gravity of the areas more than made up for the gap. The only analogy I could think of is that the US is a strong, massive oak tree, you marvel at its strength and size. But the EU is the old, gnarled blackthorn, small and wicked with a power unseen. For a first day, not bad. I can’t wait for the rest of the trip.

Think of This as a Training Exercise...

Thought it has been just a day, it has been over 30 hours of no sleep on my part of this trip, so in my world view it has been 4 different days of different activity going on. (Note: I am actually writing this on no sleep because I want to remember what I thought when I first got here with no interruptions from rest.)

For those who don’t know me, I love looking at graffiti. I love the colors it gives cities, and I also appreciate the amount of skill it took to get the art there. While I didn’t get the best shot of this mural, I thought it was beautiful and I wanted to share it. (displayed below). Throughout this course I will have many pictures of the street art because that is the part that makes cities like Vienna breathe with life.

There has actually been a lot of interesting happenings since I have been here in the short 30 hours it has been. Luggage was lost, check in to the hostel was delayed, and Paige Balut and I went on an adventure of sorts just to try to get working phone SIM cards for emergencies on this study away. This was especially hard for me because: 1) I don’t do well in conversations with strangers 2) I ESPECIALLY don’t do well in conversations with salespeople and 3) I don’t know a single word in German. Everything was against me at this point. Well, we tried anyway.We went in and *thankfully* the salesperson was able to speak English so that made one thing on the list of problems vanish for me. We got the sim cards into our respective phones and left. Should have been easy. Well, good thing I'm here because it wasn't. We weren't even able to contact each other.

So we went back. Poor salesperson, trying to explain to us how to activate our phones even though he probably told us how the first time and we just did realize what was going on. But SUCCESS! We got phone calls from each other! We’re in the clear!

Nope.

Then we weren’t able to receive messages from others like Dr. Powell, who has an international plan so he should be able to, so Paige and I went back again. Thankfully it was a different person at the front of the store so it made it a little less embarrassing (at least for me anyhow).

After figuring that out, we explored a bit and then headed to dinner, which the way there was a good practice run on the subway system here, which does take skill to be able to know what to do or how to get where, so I had an experience.

This all isn’t saying that I am not having fun, I am enjoying every minute here in Vienna, and I am excited for the month that is to come from this exciting adventure. Just a long hectic take already taking me to high stress situations on a daily basis.

To sum up my first day I will use the wise words of Guy-Sensei from the popular show, Naruto:

“Think of it as a training exercise Lee” (or in this case… me). Today was my training day for Europe, and I'm excited for tomorrow.