Rainy Salzburg

Saturday, May 25

This morning was not promising, weather-wise. Rainy, and stinkin' cold. 

We bundled, piled onto the bus, and made off for Salzbug. 

On the bus, I listened to the soundtrack to "The Sound of Music."  Cheesy, but appropriate. Hearing the musical peak of "climb every mountain"as we were driving past the snowy peaks of the alps was quite an experience.  

We separated into two groups and met our tourguides outside Mirabel Gardens.  We explored the gardens, in which we enjoyed the landscaping, wedding photos, and extraordinarily high amount of Asian tour groups. Our tourguide showed us an early opera stage, Mozart's "Magic Flute" house (where he composed the opera), and explained the significant statues surrounding the fountains.

Fun fact: the fountain in this picture is the fountain around which the Maria and the von Trapp children run in "The Sound of Music!"

After Mirabel gardens, we wandered towards the fortress, passing through a shopping district. We passed Mozart's birthhouse and one of Mozart's apartments.

We walked across a cool bridge that had padlocks around the links all over the place.  Apparently this is a new tradition, started in the last couple years. Supposedly, couples write their names and the date on a lock, lock the padlock to the bridge, and throw the key into the river. That way, love lasts forever.  Hooray!

Look, Mozart's organ!

We explored the cathedral where Mozart was baptised and played organ every sunday, through a big square in the middle of the city, and through the graveyard where Mozart's family is buried.

Can you tell Salzburg likes Mozart?  I thought the publicity stunt was bad in Vienna, but it actually makes sense there; Salzburg claims Mozart as their own now, but certainly didn't when he was alive. 

After our walking tour, the two groups met up again to climb up to the fortress. This was no easy feat, let me tell you.  We were huffing and puffing all the way; our feelings ranged anywhere from "I'm actually dying" to "at least I'm not as cold."  What an experience.  At the ticket both, all 60 of us linked up on the 45 degree incline, attempting to prevent other tourists from shoving their way past our group and cutting in line.  Again, what an experience.  After receiving our tickets, we climbed the rest of the way up the hill and explored the fortress.  The view was beautiful, if dizzying.

Photo op!

We spent some time up on top of Salzburg, conversing with another (smaller) group of college students from Lee University in Tennessee who were travelling through Germany.

Coming down the hill, we stopped to see the Nonnberg Abbey, one of the oldest women's convents in Austria.  Also, the place where the nuns in "Sound of Music" detained the Nazi soldiers from following the escaping family.

We stopped for gourmet soft pretzels from a very busy stand.


Abigail, Rebekah and I had a brief lunch at the Cafe Tomaselli, which is supposedly where Mozart had his coffee in the morning.  Whether this is true, I have no idea, but I can say for certain that their desserts are delicious.

After lunch, everyone again piled into the bus where we headed for Germany.


We visited a Nazi Documentation center, located near Hitler's "Eagle's nest."  The documentation center was very well put together, with heavily detailed information.  The exhibit covered everything from the movements that began and evolved into the Nazi regime, the impact of the changes on different people groups, first-hand pictures and accounts, and more.  The museum was powerful and moving.

After a surprisingly short bus ride back to Hallein, we were served a lovely warm dinner.  Our group o 6 (Jessica, Abigial, Meredith, Allison, Audrey and I) had splendid dinner conversation, where we learned a lot about each other and laughed a lot.   The conversation continued after dinner in one of our hotel rooms, where we were joined by Boyu.   What a great group of ladies - we learned a lot about each other and ourselves, and had a lovely time.

We went out for drinks for Audrey's birthday too - the hotel has a Mexican restaurant in the basement, so we all got fruity drinks to celebrate.  Happy b-day, Audrey!

Bonus!  

Pictures with Mozart. 

Abigail (left)

Kelsey (right)

Psyched for Salzburg

Friday, May 24 (Day 18)

Today was jam-packed, crazy, and involved an outrageous amount of running.

We woke up and rushed out (met alicia, cleaning lady), and moved quickly - we had an icky-sicky housemate that we wanted to get to the institute as soon as we could.  We made it, and everything was fine, but somewhere in the phone call  where I explained "My housemates and I are at Karlsplatz, and [insert name here] is sick" they interpreted "All four housemates are dying from explosive vomiting, and have somehow made it all the way to district 1 together."  So reconciling the two was interesting.

In class, we had 2 presentations jammed into an hour, and then left for a field trip!  Wolfgang ushered us out of the classroom, down the 2 flights of stairs, and through the city to get to the next subway station over.  I wish I had filmed this entire endeavor, because it was very entertaining.  Imagine 11 college students lightly jogging through the crowded streets of the 1st district trying to keep up with a curly-headed organ professor. The thought is entertaining on it's own, but factor in the last 3 minutes when we thought we'd miss the train, and Riesinger broke into spurts of jogging. We made it just in time, but it was a close call.  A hilarious close call.

Our field trip was to the Central Cemetery, one of the biggest cemeteries in Europe.  The only one bigger is in Hamburg, Germany. The cemetery holds 3 million - with room to grow.  It's still very much in use; we saw a funeral procession as we walked through the cemetery this morning.

A word about Austrians and death - very different perspective than our views on death in America.  In Austria, death is a part of life, and they don't think of it as depressing at all.  People venture to cemeteries on the weekends to have picnics and visit the graves of their relatives quite frequently. So, visiting this cemetery was not at all a somber occasion - we got to see the tombs of people who were greatly admired.

Johannes Brahms

Franz Schubert

Ludwig van Beethoven

Arnold Schonberg

We also ventured into the beautiful church they have at the cemetery.  They don't use this church as much for funerals anymore, except for really big-deal people. It was really beautiful inside.

We left the cemetery after exploring the church, navigating the subway on our own (Wolfgang left us), and stopping at Billa to grab super quick lunches.  We all loaded onto the bus, and left for Salzburg 20 minutes later!

About an hour into the trip, we stopped to see Melk Abbey.  The abbey is the home of Benedictine monks, and has been running for over 900 years.

The building is very cool.  We had a very intelligent and darling tourguide, who took us through the museum portion of the abbey.  Tourism is one of the most lucrative operations that the monks have these days, which allows them to continue to support themselves independently (along with other forms of income and donations).

The museum has different rooms all in different colors, which signify distinct aspects of the Benedictine tradition.  One of the coolest things for me was the handwritten book the Benedictine creed, which is on display here. Very cool.

They also have many treasures, some still used in religious ceremonies, and some preserved.

Lots of cool things to see.

Model of Melk Abbey

We saw one of the rooms where they used to feed the guests who stayed at the abbey, around the time of Maria Teresia.  Those three windows at the top of this picture were where the orchestra played.

View from the balcony of the abbey.  Beautiful!

Girlies after the tour. 

We also got to tour the library of the abbey, which was extensive.  No pictures allowed :( but I can assure you, it was incredible.  Many of the books were re-bound to match the decor of the library, as per the custom of the Baroque period.  They have reading rooms where anyone can come and stay for a time.  They also have scrolls from the works of academics who were involved in the monastery at some point  - including one from the Dalai Lama!



We also got to see the chapel of the monastery.  It was incredibly ornate, with tons of gold, ornaments, and treasures. There were several different altars for different saints, which was interesting.  The space was certainly incredible, but too ornamented for my taste.

After the church, we explored the gardens of the abbey, and took more pictures of the view before piling again into the bus.

On the drive to Hallein, the town where we would be staying the two next nights, there was absolutely beautiful scenery to enjoy.  Rolling hills leading up to peaks of the Alps, fields with flowers and waving grasses, houses with animals in the gardens, everything.

For me, nothing could have enhanced this experience more than listening to Mumford & Sons.  It was a really wonderful thing.


We also drove past a significant landmark - we saw the church where Maria and Georg were married in "The Sound of Music!"  It's a gorgeous church, and a dramatic sight to see from the road, part of a town tucked in between the mountains.  We reached Hallein soon after, and enjoyed a fabulous, filling dinner.  A small group of us were tucked into a smaller dining room, which allowed us to have quality dinner conversation, covering everything from hidden talents to pokemon tournament attire.

After dinner we explored the chilly, rainy town, enjoying ice cream and live performers on the square.

Ancient and Not-so-ancient history

Thursday, May 23 (Day 17)

Today was a cool day - not jam-packed, but full to the brim.  Unfortunately, I only took three pictures - each is in the museum, each is something gross, and each was taken with the express intent to freak out boyfriend.  So clearly, priorities were a little off today, as far as pictures go.

In the morning, the four of us headed over to District 1 at the normal time.
While the others were in class, I worked on my blog and on my journals for class.

Some other music students and I decided to go to the Natural History museum, which we hadn't seen yet.  Christina, Abigail and I walked over (in the chilly air) to check it out.
We enjoyed the small children waiting to go into the museum.
   *Side note about fun Vienna - we see a lot of school trips, especially when going through subway stations and museums.  Usually when the kids are little, like grade-school aged, they all either hold hands, walk in pairs, or all wear something that matches (purple hats, yellow vests, etc). It's always funny to see these groups, and always adorable, and the chaperones always look amused by their little entourages.*

The Natural History museum is 1. huge, and 2. awesome.  Similar to the field museum in Chicago, there are lots of exhibits and lots to see. You could spend days in there, if you looked at everything with the attention it deserves.  To give some perspective, Christina, Abigail and I were there for about 2 hours and saw one wing (of 4).

We first explored the exhibit with rocks from all over the world (and some from outside earth, but we'll get to that later).  This museum has the biggest geological collection of samples in the European continent, so we were busy with that for a long time.  Next, we wandered into the meteor exhibit - they have pieces of meteors that have landed all over the world, of all different sizes.  We saw a piece of one meteor that came from a meteor weighing 47 kilos - over 100 pounds!

The next big thing (literally) were the prehistoric creatures.  You got it, DINOSAURS.

Let me paint a picture for you.  Imagine walking through exhibits at a similar pace as a group of students that look to be about 4-6 years old.  Now imagine the looks on the faces of those kids when they walk into a giant room filled with giant dinosaur skeletons.  Pretty pumped, right?  Well, the three of us pretty much reacted the same way.  Embarrassing, yes, but holy man, dinosaurs are awesome.  There was an animatronic dinosaur there which, needless to say, was pretty great.

We also saw the exhibit with early forms of man, and some of the earliest human cultures. There was a ton of information, but the most interesting things to me were the life-size models created for the exhibit, artifacts and explanations from the times of their existence, and the introspective questions the English translations of the exhibit information offered.  Example: "What is life, if man is not the center of it?  What is man?"

So that was fun.  We rode a streetcar 2 stops back to the institute, because it was cold.  Then several of us met up to go get standing room tickets for a performance in the evening.

We scarfed down lunch, had class, etc.

After class, I booked it home so I could change and drop my backpack.  The 40 minute trip there and back does not allow me room for error or delay, so I was moving fast.  I grabbed some provisions from the Spar on the way home, made a travelling dinner for myself, and started back to the institute again 20 minutes later.

A group of us (Micah, Christina, Laurel, Rebekah, Abigail, Allison, Meredith and I) walked over together to attend the performance of one of Schubert's most famous art songs, "Winterreise."  The piece is a collection of 22 individual songs, which are all part of the same story, but all different.  The separate songs are sung as a series.  Art songs, for those who don't know, are vocal pieces for a solo vocalist and pianist.  Contrary to other vocal pieces, the pianist and the vocalist are essentially equal partners in art songs, especially those by Schubert.

The performance was incredible.  We were in the standing room section, so that part was less fun, but the baritone soloist and pianist were magnificent.  They were easy to watch, and it was easy to connect with both of them.  The soloist sung all 22 songs straight through, with no break. That's really incredible- to sing for 90 minutes with no breaks other than the pauses between movements is something to be commended on its own, but to perform the piece with as much gravity and beauty as this man did is incredible too.  Completely amazing.  They got 6 curtain calls. We were very lucky to be in attendance.

I moved very quickly to public transportation after the performance, in attempts to catch a certain bus.  I RAN from the station, jumped onto the bus, and ran into Rachel and Jared, with whom I got to ride all the way home.  We packed for this weekend when we got home, and  I enjoyed goofing around with my housemates.

To make up for my lack of pictures, please enjoy the stars of famous composers that they have outside the Musikverein.

Götterdämmerung and Goethe

Wednesday, May 22 (Day 16)

I woke up in a panic this morning after realizing that it was already 7:40am and my housemates were leaving in five minutes.  Always fun when you turn off your alarm in your sleep!

Annika and I got ready in a flash, and Lilo drove us to the Hietzing tram stop.   We made it to the institute in lots of extra time.

I spent the morning doing homework and updating the blog.

As usual, Abigail and I became ravenous around the same time.  We went to Coffee Day together, where we both had a lovely cup of tea.  I had a big ole sandwich, and Abigail had an "Austrian breakfast."  We met another friend there very briefly, as she was getting food to go.

For class today, Dr. Reisinger took us on a Schubert walking tour.  After a transportation fiasco trying to get all 11 of us to the same place at the same time, we finally got together and set off to see Schubert stuff.

First we rode a tram to Schubert's birth house, which is now a small museum.  He was one of more than 13 children (some died earlier in life), and they lived all together in the small apartment. In the museum, they have pictures of Schubert and his family, as well as some original scores.
Abigail and I basically geeked out the whole way through the museum, especially when we found the score for his Symphony no. 8, the "Unfinished." UNREAL.  We also saw the piano on which he may have learned to play, as well as more pictures of Schubert and his friends, with whom he spent a lot of time and with their help, composed (and published) a lot of his music.

We left the museum and made our way to Schubert's church, where he learned to play organ, performed, conducted, and premiered his first mass.  Besides being breathtakingly beautiful on its own, the church was almost overwhelming. To be in the same space where such great music was created; to see the place where 200 years ago such a great man was developing as a musician - it was incredible. There were gorgeous paintings on the ceiling and walls, showing different biblical events. The church was ornate and incredible. We were blown away.

The organ where Schubert learned to play!!

There was a program outside the church for an upcoming concert, where the orchestra would be performing Mozart's "Magic Flute" and get this: the finished version of Schubert's "Unfinished" symphony - the world premier.  HOLY MAN, THAT'S COOL.  We couldn't get tickets :(









Dr. Reisinger took us around the district a little more, showing us the American Embassy, the house of an opera singer (known for forgetting his lines as soon as he got onto the stage), and a well-known stairway, where we took some glamour shots.

Work that, Jar-bear.

Heading back towards the institute, we walked past another section of the Universität Wien, including the engineering school.  We saw the plaque commemorating where Vivaldi's grave had been; the cemetery was no longer there, but they had a big picture of Vivaldi instead.  Cool cool cool.

Dr. Reisinger left us at this point, instructing us to go to the next street and find Brahms' apartment, and then to go to the Belvedere and find Bruckner's residence.

After wandering around, getting cranky, and getting lost, we did neither of these things.  Yikes.


Back at the institute, which we accidentally found while trying to go to the Belvedere, Abigail and I decided that it was time to buy snacks.  We picked up pastries from Aida (which were absurdly delicious), which cheered us up considerably.

The Staatsoper was showing Wagner's Götterdämmerung (the Ring Cycle) yesterday, so many students from the trip watched from the projector outside in the sunshine.  It's a long, heavy production, so we only made it through the first half before 6:30pm (after starting at 4:30).  It was incredibly well-done and very powerful.  The performers were incredible.

After the show (I was the last Hope student left), I took an early subway home, stopped at a grocery store for snacks, and got home a little after 8pm.   I worked on homework for a while by myself until the other girls showed up, and then we all had a study party together!  It was a fun night.  

Rainy tuesday

Tuesday, May 21 (Day 15)

Today was a calmer morning than others.  We woke up with plenty of time to eat and finish homework.   I enjoyed a nice conversation with my housemate Rachel over my nutella/banana toast.  It was nice.

We headed over to the AAIE for class, since everyone had class at 9:30 today.  Yesterday was a national holiday, and today was a school holiday, so schedules have been a little different lately. In class, Abigail finished her presentation on Schubert, which Reisinger supplemented after the break.

For lunch, Abigail, Jessie, Meredith and I headed over to a place called Maredo, which was "Mexican." We enjoyed the salad bar, as well as meeting up with another one of the classes from our program.  After a confusing day of being over-taught by their professor, he had dropped them at the restaurant and left.  But we all enjoyed the food anyway.

After lunch, Meredith, Abigail and I went to find an old church called Marie am Gestad, which translates to Mary on the Banks. The church used to run along the Danube, and is in beautiful gothic style. We had the church almost to ourselves.



We headed back towards the institute, where we met Jessie again to go to a movie called "The Third Man."  Here's the IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0041959/?ref_=sr_1

The movie was shot in 1949 Vienna, when the city was still somewhat damaged from the war.  It was really cool to see the city where we've spent almost all our time the last couple weeks in a totally different context.  We recognized a lot of the scenery, the buildings, and Orson Welles.  It was a blast for me, as a film buff, to finally see this cool movie, and know the nuances of the setting of the shoots.  Yay!

When the movie was finished, the group of us met up again to go to dinner at a place Dr. Reisinger recommended.  The restaurant was called Melker Stiftskeller, which is loosely connected to the Melk Abbey in Salzburg.  It's in a cellar, which was cool, and had authentic, delicious Viennese food. Almost all of us had roasted pork and bread dumplings, which we couldn't even finish because there was so much food.

After dinner, we came back upstairs to discover that Vienna had given us a monsoon.  We stood awed by the rain for a minute, then tried our darndest to find the nearest U station to take us home.  We talked to a nice older gentleman, who we found out used to organize choir tours from the U.S. to come to Vienna. After asking our poor waitress for directions, we began our soggy trek to the station a couple blocks away.

Audrey and I made our way home, after waiting half an hour for a bus because the U was running slowly.  Had some hot tea, watched Community instead of doing homework, and went to bed late.  

Homesick for Vienna no more

Monday, May 20 (Day 14)

First of all, HAPPY 21ST TO MEREDITH. That is all.

We woke up this morning and got to leave a little later, due to the holiday.
Stupid bus was stinkin' 10 minutes late, and Audrey was sick, and we had to walk all the way down the hill, and we didn't get much breakfast, and Lilo yelled at us, and Rachel's shoes were new, and stuff was dumb for a while. Luckily, there was a wonderfully kind old lady who held the bus for us at a later stop so we didn't have to run all the way to the stop.

We got to the AAIE just as class was about to start.

Our class was lucky enough to enjoy another guest speaker today, Dr. Paul Crabb from the University of Missouri.  I cannot say enough about this man - he was so kind, so enthusiastic, and so sweet.  He is a director of choirs at the University of Missouri, so he's well-versed in music, and good friends with Dr. Reisinger.  It was truly a pleasure to have him in class, to get to talk to him after, and to experience how excited he was for our experience.

After class, we had a super-exciting special event: Dr. Reisinger gave haircuts!  A whole bunch of girls got consultations, and several girls got their hair chopped!  Hopefully lots of pictures to come, but lots of new, exciting looks.  It was a lot of fun, the girls had a lot of courage, and we all look really awesome.

We had a couple free hours, so Allison, Audrey, Abigail, Jessica, Rebekah, Meredith and I went to the Museum Quarter in District 1 to hang out outside in the sun.  We read, worked on homework, and napped.  It was a beautiful, sunny afternoon.

At about 5pm, the music students met outside of the AAIE to head over to Dr. Reisinger's house in District 22.  He and his wife built a BBQ hut in their backyard when they moved in last year, and were interested in having us over for dinner.  We found it without too much trouble.

While the food was still being prepared, we conversed in the living room together, asking Dr. Reisinger questions about his life and about his experience. We then moved into the hut, where we were treated to sausages, pork chops, steaks, roasted corn, potato salad, and more.  It was, needless to say, delicious, and we all ate way too much food.  The company was excellent, the conversation was stimulating, and there were desserts and haircuts to be had.




After dinner at Reisinger's, Abigail and I met up with the other girls for drinks to celebrate Meredith's birthday. We enjoyed the bar and the conversation, and the gelato we got afterwards.  We headed home a little after 11:30pm, and crashed.

Poignant Prague

Sunday, May 19 (Day 13)

This morning we woke up early, grabbed (strange) breakfast, and checked out of our hotel in Prague.  Everyone was moving a little slowly this morning, but we all made it.

Dana took us on a walking tour of the Jewish Quarter in Prague.
*Editor's note: this blog will be more sparse with pictures, because I didn't take pictures of most of the Jewish Quarter tour.  I wanted to preserve the reverence of the places we visited, and respect the history that had necessitated their existence, and chose not to take pictures.*

The first place we got to explore was called the Pinkas Synagogue.  The most interesting thing about this old synagogue is that as a testament to the people who had been killed in a specific transition camp (another version of concentration camps) there were hundreds of thousands of name written on the wall.  They recorded the first and last names of the victims, as well as the birth dates, death dates, and date they entered the camp.  It was very moving to go through several rooms in the synagogue completely filled from floor to ceiling with these names.  Upstairs in the synagogue, they have a collection of drawings and art projects done by the children in the camps. Many of the pieces reflect memories of home, but many of them depict scenes they witnessed at the camps, or things the camps have made them believe or remember. This was a tough section through which to walk - partly because so many tourists were packed in there you couldn't move without basically hugging another tourist, but mostly because the content was so grim.

Connected to the Pinkas Synagogue is a large Jewish cemetery, in which over 20,000 Jewish people were buried. There are close to 12,000 grave markers and tombstones, but thousands more bodies are buried in the yard as well.  People leave small stones on the graves as a sign of respect.  (*This is a Jewish tradition that dates back to the time of Moses; when going through the dessert, it was nearly impossible to find anything other than sand or rocks and stones to use for graves, so instead of leaving flowers, people left small stones.*)

We also got to go through the Spanish Synagogue, which in addition to housing pictures, artifacts, and information about the Jewish history in Prague, is a beautiful building and serves as a performance space for many concerts.

After the Spanish Synagogue, Meredith, Audrey, Allison and I explored the city a little bit more.  We wandered through the Old Town square, where there were street performers, stands, and people to watch.  We stopped for lunch at a pizza place off from the square a little bit, which was delicious.

After lunch, the four of us stopped in the square and listened to a band play in the middle of the sunshine-y square.  It was a beautiful, warm day, and we enjoyed the music very much.  We actually bought a CD, and are looking forward to listening to it.  They were very charismatic and very friendly (and very talented!). 

We shopped in some souvenir stores, had drinks at a cafe, and caught the bus for the 5 hour ride back to Vienna. 

Full, rich day!  

Trdelnik, Alice, and Prague

Editor's note: Apparently I did this journal when I was rather exhausted, so it does not contain much intellectual content. Please bear with me :)

Saturday, May 18 (Day 12)

This morning I woke up startled by an alarming dream. However, I fell back to sleep for a bit after.

We had an odd breakfast in Prague, which offered hot dogs and rice besides the other food.

After breakfast, we began our bus tour, since it was pouring rain. Many of us fell asleep (quickly). When we got downtown, we began walking, since the rain had finally stopped. 

Dana took us through the city, showing us cathedrals, bridges, towers and more. Dana is very knowledgeable and very sweet. I enjoy her tours very much.

(*Impressed by this writing style and attention to detail? I am.*)

Editor's note: We saw the "Astromical Clock" on the side of the church.  At the top of every hour, the windows on top open and show the 12 apostles of Christ, and a trumpet player plays from the very top of the tower! We also took a group photo outside the symphony hall, and Abigail and I took pictures with Dvorak.

We had lunch on a boat today. The meal began with everyone doing a shot, and ended with people falling asleep at the tables listening to Dana and escaping from the cold, rainy air outside. The lochs in Prague were interesting, but boring to sit through.

When we returned to shore, Audrey, Meredith, Allison and I set off to explore the city. We walked across the Charles Bridge, enjoying the street performers, and got ice cream. We bought tickets for a blacklight show, pastries from a very old, well-established stand, and souveniers. We also climbed to the top of the tower and could see a beautiful view of Prague. 

*Editor's note: The pastries were called “Trdleník”, and are rolled around a rolling pin and covered in cinnamon sugar. They look essentially like round bracelets that you eat! Totally delicious, especially when they're hot out of the oven.*

For dinner, the four of us and Rebeka found an outdoor restaurant. I had a daiquiri for the first time with Audrey and Meredith, which we enjoyed very much.

The show was definitely a cool experience. It was called “Aspects of Alice,” which basically told the story of Alice after wonderland. There was no speaking, only music and acting. It featured the main woman, Alice, who interacted with a magician (who I think she later married?), two clowns, two giant white beings, and various spinning buildings. It was very strange, very surreal, and very well-done.

We made our way back to the hotel again after show, and stopped for dessert and drinks at a nearby bar. Then we came back and went to bed!