Linzer Weekend

A few weekends ago, I went to Linz for the weekend to catch up with some old friends from Amstetten, and accompany Jake in meeting some of his distant relatives in Bad Ischl. It was an interesting experience.

First, on Friday, I went to a whiskey convention (my first) at the Arcotel convention center with several other teaching assistants in Linz, which, I'll be honest, I didn't really enjoy. I'm definitely more of a wine gal, so the whiskey - even the good stuff - was lost on me. I'd like to try new things, and I did end up enjoying some of the Scotches they had on sample, but I don't know the  first thing about a good whiskey. And, predictably, my taste runs expensive. After an afternoon of sampling, I guess for now I'll stick with wine.

There was also a wine convention (festival?) in Linz at the mall on Saturday. I would have liked to stay and go through the different wines, like we did with the whiskey, but we had to get to Bad Ischl. Seems either the hangovers were too much to plunge in, or I'm the only wino in the bunch. Anyway, I stayed long enough to get a couple of bottles of wine, which will certainly go up on Wine Snobbery on a Budget.

Jen, Jake and I went to a pottery class at the Volkshochschule. That was possibly the most fun of the weekend. I hadn't worked with clay since elementary school, and I had never thrown anything on a wheel before. I tried, but my technique needs lots of improvement. I didn't make anything except blobs that fell apart on the wheel, so I stuck with hand molding, and made this person:

I call it "Napping Nude #1" !

And there were other, finished pieces that had already been fired and glazed. They looked pretty good. A lot of creativity running around Linz! Jen did some great stuff, and this one guy made a fountain.

Saturday saw us taking the train to Bad Ischl to meet Jake's relatives his mother found through genealogical research. I think it's wonderful to have found them, and to share all of this family history, but I couldn't help but feel, though he and Eleonora, the woman we met, share a common ancestor four generations back (her grandfather and his great-grandfather were brothers), having coffee with them, family tree spread across the small round marble cafe table, reinforced the fact that they were still strangers despite this connection.

To be honest, I've never really cared much for genealogy, though it is amazing the facts you can dig up by following someone's family line. I guess to me the interesting part would be not who is related to whom, but more the stories you could find from learning about people in the past - your past. Or your present. I doubt I will ever meet Eleonora again, but it was curious to see how a life can be altered by one person moving to a new country. It makes me wonder how globalization will change immigration.

 Here are photos of Bad Ischl:

view from the train

Bad Ischl is famous for being a spa/resort town, the one in fact where the empress Sophie (mother of Franz Joseph I) came to get infertility treatments...they must have worked, since she conceived Franz Joseph. It was also a favorite of Franz Joseph's wife, Sisi. Though, she did take any excuse for a vacation. The Kursalons (spa centers) are still being run and going strong, though they're quite pricey for being given in such a famous place.

downtown

very famous "Trinkhaus"

I will curb my ranting for some beautiful scenery, namely the river Ischl:

And back to Linz: this is the house Johannes Kelper (the father of modern astronomy) lived in:

And the Marienkirche (practically every town in Austria has one):

And a beautifully blossoming tree in the courtyard of the Standesamt:

Farm der Tiere u. Tierisch gut

Trying to get some more exciting posts up here...the thing perhaps, is that I feel my social life is not spectacularly interesting...

This takes me back to about two weeks ago. The students in the 3rd form recently read Animal Farm and the play came to Amstetten - which means I got to see it!

I forgot how much I completely LOVE Animal Farm, seeing as I haven't read it since high school. But it is still one of my favorites. It's more...what shall I say? Satirical than 1984. I mean, it's less hit-you-over-the-head with doom and gloom and the destruction of modern civilization, etc. And plus, animals improve everything.


The acting troupe that put on Farm der Tiere was from Salzburg. And I must commend them on their great show: three actors, no set, no costumes - except that the three of them were each wearing white painters' pants and used the occasional prop to signify a character change - for example, Napoleon had sunglasses, Boxer had rolled-up sleeves, etc. There was a lot of physical humor, and some crudeness (like, one of the actors grabbed his crotch at one point...)  but, hey. They're playing animals. What do you want?

And then, later that week, I was invited to Klaus and Ilsa's choral concert. I went with one of the English teachers, Gabi, her friend, and her friend's parents. The audience was (unsurprisingly) mostly older people. And, now that they know I also sing, they're trying to get me to join the church choir. Well...they suggested I go to the practices. Which I am planning to do, as soon as I figure out when they practice. It's just a little confusing.

The concert was titled "Tierisch Gut" which referred to the choice of songs. All of them were about animals, with poems or stories about animals in between the songs. Many of the pieces were baroque, and performed a cappella. Very interesting.

One of the poems selected was...mildly amusing. About the love life of a wild boar named Horst. Who falls in love with another pig named Vanessa. And takes her out for a movie and ice cream. My one concern is this: who would name a pig Vanessa? Pigs should be named things like Tinkerbell. Or Roxy. Or not named at all if they are destined to be eaten. But then again, once named, a pig has a certain power over its captors - think Wilbur in Charlotte's Web or Babe. 


And, well, I felt vindicated when Gabi leaned over and whispered to me, "Vanessa? Would it have killed them to change the name?"

The Flight: Chi-Town => Dublin

I took off from Chicago yesterday, and going through security, I saw this little Asian man with three cases of Jack Daniels from the duty free shops. All I can say is, if you're going to splurge in the duty-free shops (and get your money's worth out of it being duty-free), you might as well do it with Jack Daniel's. I'm sure the guy's some high-powered Japanese/Korean/Chinese businessman who needs copious amounts of whiskey to give as company presents, etc. But still~ that's a lot of booze!

So, in O'Hare, waiting to board, I sat across from this big, loud Irish family. The daughter was sitting directly across from me, a little hefty, with sort of typical Irish coloring (dark hair, blue eyes, freckles) and wearing this big black down puffer jacket making her look twice as big as she actually is. In light of my joint writing adventure with Callie, The Fat American (inquire if you dare!) I thought about a companion piece to be published in France, which could be titled, L'Irlandaise Grande and set in Chicago. Well, then again, maybe not. I just really like the title.

Once I got on the plane, this American woman who had been standing behind me for much of the check-in/security/boarding says to me, "I love your hair." And then her husband says, "As we say here, it's like a woolly lamb." Was this supposed to be complimentary? Where is "here"? Chicago? The US? Did they think I'm Irish? Anyway, they were the average middle-aged couple going on some sort of vacation to the rolling hills of Ireland, possibly pandering to some sort of idealized version of Gaelic tradition, and discretely reminiscent family histories (i.e. that great-great-uncle Seamus came into New York harbor in 1892 from County Cork with nary a possession in the world but the shirt on his back - the only thing he *didn't* drink away in the taverns of Kanturk). Not that I'm a cynic, or that I don't wish them a good time. Nothing of that sort.

My choice of in-flight movie was Clash of the Titans. I was debating between that and Remember Me with Robert Pattinson but considering the bizarre dream I had about going to summer camp and being bitten...don't really need to go into that...I decided that I would watch action-flick rather than romantic-flick because I would be almost guaranteed to fall asleep through romantic drivel. Plus, I've been wanting to see the new Clash. And, all I have to say is: Sam Worthington is definitely the new "it" boy for action-adventure, ever since Avatar was so huge! He kind of reminds me of a Bruce Willis type - but Australian and better looking. I ended up falling asleep during that one anyway. Very disappointed there was no mechanical owl. Also, Liam Neeson ain't no Lawrence Olivier (even old man Olivier) and Ralph Fiennes is obviously being type-cast as the evil snake-like villain ever since he played Voldemort - or maybe he will just do anything if the price is right. I am also including The Reader in this type-casting thing. He was really mean to Kate Winslet's pseudo-sociopath ex-Nazi, which I thinkis saying something.

Once I got to Dublin, I got through security, and as I put my shoes back on, this little old man in a plaid jacket came up to me and asked for help finding his gate. On the ticket, he was pointing to the time the flight took off, so I figured maybe he was not familiar with flying? Or English? So, I told him to check his flight number and destination on the screens that are all around the airport, and that the gate is only listed on one of those monitors...because the airplanes normally don't know which gate they're flying into until they actually get to the airport. Well, the last I saw of him, he was standing in front of the screen checking it out, so hopefully he got to where he was going.




Looking for my own gate, I realized there was still 2 hours to go before I could board, so I went to have breakfast at this Starbucks-type place. All the workers have dialects of which I am ignorant and we are mutually unintelligible. I have to point to what I want, and they have to point to what I owe on the cash register. I really didn't think I'd have to deal with this until I got to France. So much for not having to worry about a language barrier in another English-speaking country!

<-- This is what I ordered. Egg & Mushroom sandwich that was really gross & weird. Complete w/brown sauce.