10.21.08 Invading Wien Day I

With the end of my first block courses, I was cramming 7 weeks worth of marketing material in my head while frantically trying to write a paper about business and politics in Europe.  I had planned a trip to Vienna and Prague the day after my exam with my flight leaving early in the morning from Amsterdam.  Only problem is, there was no train early enough for me to make my flight.  The solution?  Take the last train out of Maastricht and sleep in the airport.

And that's what we did.  Apparently Schiphol is a decent airport to sleep in, but only after you've gone through security.  Unfortunately for us, when we arrived at the airport we still had another 4/5 hours before check in opened.  We slept on the train and then groggily wandered the airport at 2 in the morning.  The arrivals area looks just like a mall with many brand name shops.  Too bad it was the middle of the night or else it would have been a much better wait.  Eventually we found a room that, I'm guessing, is used for taking passport photos and was slightly secluded from the rest of the check in area.  We passed the time by playing cards, eating, telling stupid stories and finally, sleeping.  I couldn't stay awake anymore and I fell asleep while my friend watched our stuff.  Surprisingly it was a pretty good sleep - I must have been exhausted!

We flew to Wien with Sky Europe.  The gate that the flight left from was in a completely different area of the terminal.  I guess it was built just for the low cost carriers because there really wasn't anything beyond the bare necessities. 

The tiny plane we flew on. 

For some reason (I didn't completely understand what they were saying) we weren't able to board for awhile, almost half an hour late.  Then we didn't take off for another hour.  It may have been the weather, but I was too busy sleeping to really notice.  I did notice after we took off how much turbulence affects a smaller plane.  The first half of the flight I was busy clutching the seat out of fear.   That was not fun, but eventually the flight settled down and I went back to sleep.  We finally made it to Wien and we made our way to our hostel. 

Our first stop was to visit the famous Stephansdom (St. Stephen's Cathedral).  By this time I've seen so many churches, they're starting to lose their appeal.  The churches were starting to blur together.  The outside was under restoration, but I think its been like that for ages.  Inside it looks more or less like any other church.  Outside though, the area was surrounded by people trying to entice tourists to attend this concert or that opera or other "cultural" activities tourists want to do while in Vienna.  Some of these people were dressed up in period costumes as well.  Of everywhere I've traveled to so far, this has been the most touristy of them all. 

After exploring the church, we headed to the Mozarthaus Vienna where Mozart lived from 1784 until 1787.  This apartment (on the first floor) is the only one that still exists today.  He lived at this particular house for the longest period of time. 

 
The house from the outside

The museum displays information about Mozart's life and some of his most important works.  It also shows what Mozart's apartment most likely looked like when he lived there.   We were supplied with an audio guide that explained what we were looking at as we wandered and played some of the music they were describing.  I remember getting quite excited seeing a room dedicated to his Requiem.  I had written my extended essay for IB in high school based on this composition among others.  That was pretty cool.

Originally, we were going to meet up with my high school friend who is doing her exchange in Vienna, but due to some unfortunate circumstances we couldn't meet up until later in the week.  She was planning on taking us to try the famous Sacher Torte cake and then to see La Traviata at the Wien State Opera.  Instead, we headed to the opera house and searched for the line for the cheap tickets.  We stumbled across it and before we knew it, we were locked inside.  We didn't have any food on us and the wait was looking to be a long one.  The opera didn't start until 7:30 and we got in line around 5pm. 

The line up for tickets 

Finally we got our tickets and made our way into the theatre.  We ended up getting tickets for 4 euros, standing room on the ground floor.  They had crammed so many people in there it was ridiculous.  There was barely enough room to stand.  Looking back, I think it would have been better to get the standing room tickets that look at the stage from above.  There didn't seem to be that many people there. 

The theatre was really pretty.  It looked almost like a museum. 

The entryway

The final bow

Despite studying it a while back, I only vaguely remembered the story.  Thankfully, they had translators where you can select the language and it will translate the libretto into the language of your choice.  It was a bit difficult reading and watching at the same time, but I got the general understanding of the story.  This was the first time I've ever seen an opera live.  I've been to tons and tons of other musical events and ballets, but never an opera.  I've never really had much of an appreciation for opera, but seeing La Traviata live was really amazing.  And so ended my first day in Wien.

 

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