Experiential Blog Two

0. 2. Pay special attention to the buildings and landscape in Vienna. Notice the layout of the town you are living in and the places where you go for entertainment. Notice how people interact in these locations.

•   Describe the buildings and landscape.

•   Compare it to what you expected to see.

•   Explain what conclusions you come to about how the buildings and landscape influence or reflect what you are learning about the culture. Explain what cultural insights you learn from this critique.

  We lived in a newer part of the city but did most of our touring in the old city.  The hostel was in a sketchy area of the city where the Flowers of the Evening bloomed along the streets just south of the hostel.  The cafes were dark, and the guests wore leather and slashed tshirts.  Never the less, it was still pretty quiet.  Even the rough edges of Vienna are restrained.  In the middle of town, there was a quiet but energetic bustle in the shiny gift shops, Armani, Hermes, and Bulgari shops topped by Baroque windows on the second floors.  Even the tourists were restrained.  There were little garden spaces sprinkled throughout,and at Karlsplatz there is a fountain that had big bean bags on the lip of the fountain where one could take one's ease.  The elegance of the palaces, the lovely streets with places to sedately dine, perhaps, might influence people to behave a little more relaxed and politely.  But drunken louts and impoverished, disillusioned people still have places in this center of culture.  One of the young ladies in our group notices that none of the people on the crowd are Wearing short shorts, Daisy Dukes! As it were, but then suddenly we see this woman in 6 inch stilleto shoes, a tiny white transparent dress, and, I tell you just because it was visible, a white thong. She did not appear to be a person from Vienna, or at least her parents were not from this town.  Her brazen display seemed to be in harsh contrast to her surroundings.  

  But what did I expect to see? Well the first time I came to Vienna, I ended up in a hotel room out by Praterstern with a view of a construction site.  I was so tired I didn't care, but I was still sad.  Rats, I thought, the myth was a lie.  But then I got out and looked around, and I found little tastes of the myth, and that was enough.  There is politeness and elegance enough. I loved sitting in the Naschmarkt, eating spargle and drinking white wine while the rain poured down. I had a moment in the myth.

  I imagine growing up so close to the 17th century, having the past so up front.  There is certainly a feeling that the grip of the past is stong.  So I wonder about innovation.  We passed the university of Vienna and I wondered how their innovation courses are taught.  I thought it was poignant that the Freud Museum/home was almost empty.  Freud, the past, is present, but it is a shell.  The Hofburg is full of history, but the windows are closed.  The Schoenbrunn is full of tourists in the buildings, and the gardens are a public park.  So there is a mythic core that remains strong, but modernity rubs at the edges.  I imagine that for a Viennese young person, it would be great to get out of Vienna but I also imagine that they come back and appreciate it more.  My cultural insight is that location is important because beauty helps a person relax. Relaxed people have more energy to be kind.  

  Since I am stuck on a training time on my hands, I want to continue this reflection as we move from the plains of Austriia into the hills of the Czech Republic.  Our train winds throu forests and hills with little towns clinging to the sides.  The rives have lovely wooden houses , and the little towns have bristly colored houses and towering orange and yellow apartment buildings.  The timber lots have huge piles of logs and peeling warehouses.  Then we are  back into the woods.  there are little ruins of stone houses tucked into the forest and silver grafitti in the tunnels, but only at the edge.  Darkneses still has some power here.  This train trip really emphasizes the feeling of moving into the hinter lands.  Prague is a sophisticated city, indeed, but you have to take a winding path through the woods to get to this city.  Of we arrived in Vienna on an airplane into a shiny modern airport.  We arrive in Prague by.going through the woods.