Stift Melk, Stadt Melk

During my family's time in Austria, I decided to take them to the Melk Abbey, one of the most magnificent extant Baroque monasteries in the world, and home to an order of Benedictine monks, as well as a high school. A friend of mine taught there in 2010-2011.

The town of Melk is about 45 km northwest of Amstetten, and (candidly) the nicer of the two cities, though  

Amstetten is the larger city (about 20,000 inhabitants to Melk's roughly 5,000). Melk was also a satellite site of the Mauthausen concentration camp during WWII. Surprisingly, it was spared from destruction during the war; most likely because it does not lie on a direct train line to Vienna, unlike Amstetten (which was destroyed - and why it's uglier).

St. Colomon is a patron saint of the Melk Abbey. His story is quite interesting. A Scottish pilgrim on his way to the Holy Land, Colomon was arrested in Austria, and, knowing no German, had no defense. He was hanged as a spy. According to the Abbey, he is patron to foreigners living or traveling in a strange land, cloven-hoofed animals, and can be invoked for girls of marriageable age looking for a husband, as well as those suffering from gout. St. Colomon is one of those all-purpose saints, it seems - and a cautionary tale as to why travelers should learn the language of their adopted country!

Here are some photos of the abbey and its surrounds: 

built 1718

relics of St. Colomon

model of the monastery

view of the city of Melk

Wonder Years Never Cease...

Vienna is full of American ex-pats, and they all seem to love it here. The city has been a melting pot for generations, and there is more diversity in this city than any other central European capital, I'd wager - even Berlin. This is good and bad.

There are several wonderful influences from the eastern European cultures and the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Palatschinken is one - despite its name, the dish is vegetarian friendly (they're basically pancakes. The name is derived from Latin): 

Palatschinken

Other culinary delicacies, not unique to the Wiener Küche, have come to symbolize Austria - grace à empirical conquest (Schnitzel, for example, has Venetian origins) - and for those who insist all things Austrian are indeed Austrian, I suggest taking a look at contemporary Austria's charming yet less well-to-do neighbors. They most certainly would have a different story to tell.

Herein lies the problem: though Austria has been a melting pot since Habsburg times, it seems that, after a generation or two, no Serbian or Slovakian wishes to remember they had ever been anything other than Austrian. This reinforces the unfortunate aspects of of a closed society that still permeate the Austrian mentality: Austrian, good; Other, bad. This is oversimplification for effect, but I don't seen anything wrong with that.

The coolest thing about Austria is not its culture, which is not all that unique when considering the German-speaking world as a whole, but its topography and climate: the Alps. It's a well-known criticism that mountain people are a little kooky, with the reputation of being hicks, but, still, lovable - how else can you explain my 15-year-old students' love for John Denver? (Outside of Vienna, what part of Austria isn't  "Country Roads"?)

This brings me to an Austro-American comparison: we North Americans, too, have a melting pot - many would say the USA is the original melting pot...I don't know about that. (May I, for instance, bring up Ancient Rome?) We, too, seem to promote integration or segregation  - or did, up until the 1960s and the Civil Rights movements. 

In many ways, the United States lives in a fantasy world of past glories and triumphs, i.e. the end of World War II, the 1950s, when we helped Europe rebuild, we gained the reputation of being the world's policemen, and America was - in one way or another - the greatest country on Earth. Despite blatant evidence to the contrary, I'm afraid plenty of Americans still feel this way.

Maybe it's just me, but I feel like it's a lot of hype over nothing to remember the glory days of yore. I would rather live in the present. What's past is past, and now more than ever, the world is changing at a fantastically rapid pace, practically from day to day. For the sake of each nation's collective psychic well-being, I hope my host country and home country both come to their senses, and stop playing the "Remember When?" game, like a couple of nursing home dandies.

Captain Corelli's Mandolin

This novel, by Louis de Bernieres is charming, funny, and one of those novels that, though brilliant, knows of its own brilliance and aims for accolades while reaching mediocrity.

I picked up Captain Corelli's Mandolin from the shelf in my room, because it was there. I'd heard of the movie, and seen an excerpt in one of the students' books in school. I figured I might as well give it a try, since the World War II theme is ever-popular (and often present) in conversations I seem to be having - with others and myself. Plus, I've been contemplating writing my own historical novel. So far it's been without success, but the thought still surfaces now and then.

The story takes place just before the outbreak of World War II on the Greek island of Cephallonia, where the locals live as their ancestors did one hundred years prior, simple lives without electricity or running water. A love story emerges, that of the local doctor's daughter, Pelagia, and the young fisherman Mandras.

However, Madras enlists once the war begins. He wants to be a hero and prove himself to Pelagia. During his absence, she loses her love for him because he does not reply to her letters (he is illiterate) and once he returns, she wants nothing to do with him. He joins the communists and holes up in the mountains with the ELAS.

Meanwhile, Mussolini's troops roll into town. Heading them is Capatian Corelli, a consummate musician. He plays the mandolin, and would like to become a professional in an orchestra after the war. He meets Pelagia, and the two fall in love, slowly but deeply.

Trouble brews in 1943. The Germans demand Italy turn Greece over to them, and the Italians refuse. A massacre ensuses, and Corelli escapes. Pelagia knows he must flee - this is best, the only way for them all to survive. Years (and I'm talking years) later, Corelli and Pelagia are reunited. Happily ever after, it seems.

The novel is expansive, over 400 pages, and spans several decades, focusing for the most part on the 1930s and 1940s and the occupation of Cephallonia by the Italians. It is ultimately a love story that incorporates war, music, a critique of antiquity versus modernity, and the idea that, according to de Bernieres, "history ought to be made up of the stories of ordinary people only."

This idea, though noble, seems to be the reason novels exist; histories are for the victorious politicians and memoirs are for the famous. As a historical novel, Captain Corelli's Mandolini did its duty. I enjoyed every bit of the gripping, gory, thrilling and romantic story. I found the characters human; I could relate to them, I could love them and worry about them and want the best for them. But, it must be said: I knew it was made up.  That neither changed my feelings about the novel, nor did it prompt me to dismiss everything I'd ever heard about World War II. It did make me think that there is more to history than what meets the eye in the average text. For that, I'm glad I read it.

But, frankly, the ending sucked. I'll have to watch the movie to see if they changed it to be more "Hollywood." I which case, I might just change my mind about the book's ending...

Famous Austrians XI: Heinrich Harrer

I will admit that Seven Years in Tibet was my favorite movie as a little girl, and - here's the admission - mostly because Brad Pitt played the main character.


I will also admit that, since Brad Pitt plays Austrian mountaineer Heinrich Harrer in the film, Seven Years in Tibet is also one of the reasons I was ever interested in coming to Austria in the first place. That and mountaineering, of course.


Harrer himself was interesting enough, however. Born in Hüttenberg (in Carinthia) in 1912, and attended Karl-Franzens-Universität in Graz. He almost participated in the 1936 Winter Olympics, until the Austrian athletes boycotted (Austrians would boycott skiing?!?). He became famous as a young man for climbing the North Face of the Eiger in Switzerland (also known as the White Spider) which had actually been banned for climbing by the Swiss government due to the deaths of several earlier climbers. Something not so nice about Harrer is that, immediately following the Anschluss, he joined the SS. In later interviews, including his biography, he apologized for this, chalking it up to youthful indiscretion. 


While on a trip to India in 1939, Harrer and his mountain crew decided to climb Nanga Parbat but World War II was declared in September and, being in British territory, and the crew (as German citizens) was arrested and thrown into an internment camp near Bombay. In 1944, Harrer and others escaped dressed as British soldiers and headed for Tibet.


During his exile in Tibet, Harrer worked as a translator, eventually meeting the Dalai Lama (then aged about 12) and became his English and Geography tutor. They made films together, the Dalai Lama learned how to ice skate, and they remained friends until Harrer's death in 2006. 


In 1952, Harrer returned to Austria and wrote the book Seven Years in Tibet based on his experiences. He continued his mountaineering adventures, traveling to each of the continents in turn. As well as being an explorer and writer, he was also a photographer and documentary filmmaker. Many of his photographs and films are at the Harrer Museum in Hüttenberg. Hopefully I'll make it there before I leave Austria! I've never been to Carinthia, actually...it might be fun!

Harrer and the Dalai Lama

Brown Babies: Deutschlands verlorene Kinder

Another interesting program on the ARTE channel (from the same source as the potty special), this one dealing with the so-called Mischungskinder, children who were the offspring of African American G.I.s stationed in Germany and German women after World War II. The program follows four different people who were placed in orphanages by their German mothers and adopted by black American families in the 1950s.

As part of the documentary, these people (three women and one man) in search of their biological heritage, and with that, their identities,travel back to Germany to discover these aspects of themselves. Two of the mothers have already died at the time of filming, but the two alive got to meet their daughters, and one, currently living in the United States with her more "acceptable" white husband, gave an on-camera interview.

The mothers, all women around my own grandmother's age, coming of age in Nazi Germany, were of course products of their time and culture. Yes, this was still the time in the South when a white man and a black man could not eat their sandwiches at the same lunch counter, had to drink from separate water fountains, use separate restrooms. African-Americans were treated not only as second-class citizens, but were terrorized in their own home towns and just had to bear it. In fact, Hitler once said off hand (probably off the record, too) that he got the idea of Jewish segregation from the American model of segregation. Separate but equal? Not exactly.

Europe, on the whole, got a good reputation for being more liberal and accepting of other cultures when American G.I.s were stationed there during World War I, and to this day it still has somewhat the same reputation. Famous examples are black American expats Josephine Baker and Richard Wright, who settled in Paris. And, according to the documentary, the African-American G.I.s stationed in France and Germany during and after the war were treated better than they had ever been at home. Mostly this had to do with their relative novelty, the fact that there weren't a lot of black people in Europe at the time, and what lady can resist a man in uniform?

Well, unfortunately, the G.I.s (and not just the black ones, all American G.I.s) were expected not to fraternize with the enemy - which Germany still was at the time - and certainly not to pick up German girlfriends. The women who ended up having affairs with black G.I.s (or relationships, or marriage proposals) and subsequently became pregnant, had a double burden: not only was the father gone (in many cases, the U.S. Army purposely relocated the men after finding out about illegitimate children), but her baby was a Mischungskind - a "mixed baby" that stuck out like a sore thumb and ruined the whole Aryan race concept. Many women kept their children and were stigmatized, or gave them up for adoption to lead "normal" lives with German husbands.

In the United States, pamphlets circulated trying to send these "brown babies" to black American families, where they would "fit in better." This was the fate of each of the four people followed. Sometimes they were treated well, sometimes they were treated poorly, but they always knew they were adopted - always knew they didn't belong. Henriette, one of the women who was lucky enough to find her mother alive, visits her frequently in Texas where the old woman lives. Speaking in a thick Bavarian accent, she tells the camera with tears in her eyes, "It was the hardest thing I ever had to do, and maybe the worst mistake of my life." Owing that, it still turned out well for them, thanks mostly to Henriette's interest in genealogy.

It's amazing to think that that was just two or three generations ago. Nowadays mixed-race couples are completely free to get married, have children, and live full and happy lives together, without the social pressures terrorizing them. Of course, there are still differences among individual families, but in most of the Western world, it's easier than it's ever been to love whomever you choose. It's come a bit late for all the "brown babies" but hopefully they can rest knowing not only a bit more about where they come from, but that their grandchildren or great-grandchildren will not be put up for adoption based on the color of their skin.

Famous Austrians V: Hedy Lamarr

Hedy Lamarr

Considered by some to be the most beautiful woman to ever work in Hollywood, Hedy Lamarr led an interesting life. Born Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler in Vienna in 1913, she studied ballet, piano and acting, becoming an actress in Germany as a teenager. In 1933, she starred in the Czech film Ecstasy which was a cinematographic rarity (especially for the 1930s) because it had nude scenes of her in the woods on a horse. The film itself is masterful - not just for the nude scenes (just kidding!) but the story, the long shots portraying longing, ennui...another example of Expressionist art!

Later that same year, the Jewish Hedy married a  purportedly Nazi arms dealer who tried to control her in every way, going so far as to buy all the copies of Ecstasy he could find and destroy them. At some point, she escaped and filed for divorce, from where she made it to Hollywood. In 1938, she starred in Algiers (another one of my faves!) opposite Charles Boyer. Other of her films include Boom Town, Samson and Delilah and My Favorite Spy, to name a few. She had multiple husbands (like many a Hollywood starlet) but most of them were not famous, so they're not really worth mentioning.

Not just a pretty face, Hedy Lamarr was also an inventor. Along with composer George Antheil, she was the co-inventor of frequency hopping, or what is known today as spread-spectrum communication technology, which is basically the technology used in your cell phones, broadban internet, and other wireless communication devices, which is allowing me to write this blog post right now! The original Lamarr(Kiesler)-Antheil technology was developed in 1941-1942 and intended to make radio-guided torpedoes less detectable by enemy forces.

I will skip the unflattering gossip about Hedy Lamarr, such as her shoplifting escapades and the multiple times she sued people like Mel Brooks for infringement of her personality rights (you can learn about it on Wikipedia or other) because I think she was great...and who needs to dwell on the negatives?

Also, for your entertainment pleasures, follow this link to watch Algiers (Pepe le Moko is the inspiration for Pepe le Pew, by the way)! And I am pretty sure the film is in the public domain, so no copyright infringement necessary...

Famous Austrians IV: Fritz Lang

Fritz Lang with monocle

One of my absolute favorite directors, Fritz Lang, is the latest "famous Austrian" to be honored on this blog. Expressionism is one of the art movement I find myself most drawn to, and I closely relate my own artistic output closely to Expressionism.

Because Lang is so often associated with Berlin, having worked for UFA during the Weimar era before leaving Europe for Hollywood, it is unsurprising that many might mistake him for being German. On the contrary, Fritz Lang was born and grew up in Vienna, born to a Catholic father and Jewish mother, and attended the Technische Universität, studying art and civil engineering.

My obsession with silent film began with Lang: Metropolis, The Testament of Dr. Mabuse, M and Die Niebelungen, to name a few. Also his talkies: Lilliom staring Charles Boyer (another fave - made while Lang was in France after fleeing Nazi Germany), Hangmen also Die, and Clash by Night with Marilyn Monroe.

Although many "film critics" consider much of his stuff to be simple, moralistic film noir, I don't really give a damn. His films are stunning visual masterpieces that can be simply enjoyed, or analyzed to bits...the choice is yours, and I have mine. 

Plus, what fashion sense (see photo)! 

900 Jahre Amstetten

This year, Amstetten is turning 900 - kind of amazing, huh?

photo courtesy of meinbezirk.at

The town has begun to celebrate in May, with posters displayed all around the downtown area, espeically the Hauptplatz. Other festivites include: a farmer's market in, a tractor pull (I feel like I'm back in Wisconsin!) and live bands on the weekend. One ice cream shop even has as "Mostviertel" flavor, which I have not tried.

Amstetten has been populated since prehistoric times, through the Roman settlement of the Danube (at one point, a fort dedicated to Jupiter stood in the area); Schloss Ulmerfeld, erected in 995, lies at about a 15 minute bus ride from Amstetten, and was at one point considered the seat of Amstetten...back when the ruling body came out of Passau. Amstetten was first known as "Passauer Markt Amstetten" in 1111, the date at which Amstetten was "founded."

The town was protected by the bishop of Passau during the Ottoman-Habsburg wars, but nevertheless razed twice, once in 1509 and again in 1529, and basically abandoned from 1542. Later, a hospital was founded (around 1660). I am not sure if this is the same hospital that exists in the town now, and sometimes serves as doctor-training/residency facilities. If it is, I'm sure it's not the same building.

Amstetten wasn't much more than a market until 1858, when the Empress-Elisabeth-Rail was put into operation. That meant a direct train route from Vienna to Linz (currently still running, thank God) and easy access to other larger cities, including Salzburg, Munich, Budapest, etc. Also used by the Nazis, which unfortunately led to the bombing of Amstetten by the Russians. Which ruined most of the cool architecture. I, for one, continue to be outraged. In fact, another unfortunate news case for the city (after just getting over Frtizl, really!), Hitler was, up until very recently a citizen of honor in Amstetten, due mostly to oversight by past and present mayors and city council members. He is no longer.

Today, roughly 23,000 people live in Bezirk Amstetten (including the surrounding towns of Preinsbach, Allersdorf, Eisenreindornach, Greinsfurth,Viehdorf, Neufurth, Boxhofen, Ulmerfeld, and Pittersberg). The town of Amstetten has a population of circa 13,000.

Memoiren eines mittelmäßigen Schülers

A book loaned to me by one of the teachers at the HAK, Memoiren eines mittelmäßigen Schülers (tr: Memoirs of an Average Student), is a semi-autobiographical and historical journey by German writer Alexander Spoerl.

I enjoyed the book very much. The style is easy to get into. The writing is simple and informative - almost conversational. The story begins as Jakob van Tast waits in the hospital for his son to be born. The time is late 40's or early 50's. Jakob, with nothing else to do, returns to his own childhood within the narrative. This story takes us from a little boy behaving badly to a young man (uninterested, not finding his niche) desiring to be free of school, to a young man working as an apprentice in Berlin, to a young man drafted into Hitler's army. Later, through each of these adventures, and frames of mind, we come to recognize the whole man who has formed from these fragments of persona. At the end, Jakob not only discovers the birth of his daughter (an ironic view of men and their perception of their offspring as an extension of themselves?) but reunites with (i.e. sees) an old teacher of his from the Gymnasium, who has completely forgotten who he is. Only "average" students are rarely remembered by teachers, sorry to say. We remember the excellent ones and the terrible ones - with behavior problems - most of all, especially after 20, 30 or 40 years...

I loved the irony. I loved the honesty. I loved that Spoerl made no bones about Hitler, the Third Reich and all that bullshit in 1950, no less, right after the war! Jakob falls in love with a Jewish girl, has an affair with the wife of an officer while in the army...things that make for a juicy story. And yet, that's not the point. Jakob's growth as a human being is of importance, not the juicy details of plot, but his existential qualities. It reminded me of Camus. Without all of that freaky-weird imagery.