Vienna Blog

Odds and Ends

2009-09-12T16:55:00.001-07:00

German Word of the Day

08/02: meistens- mostly
08/04: wahrscheinlich: probably
08/07: beantworten: to answer
08/10: Autobahn- highway
08/14: bei dir- at your place
08/18: offen- frank
08/20: gesund- healthy
08/27: Fussball- soccer

Schonberg music
Kammersymphonie op. 9
After listening to Schonberg’s music, I have decided that I do not like it very much. There is way too much going on and I have no idea what I am listening to. It really just sounds like a bunch of clashing noises put together. I also cannot really make out any melody. I just may not be used to listening to this type of Expressionist music. I played piano for eleven years of my life and I mainly focused on classical music, so maybe I have developed a somewhat of a biased ear and have a particular sound aesthetic.

CNN international
CNN international is pretty similar to CNN in the United States. They broadcast a lot of the same shows that they do in America, for instance: Situation Room, Anderson 360, and Larry King Live. The only difference really is that they show the weather from more places and they have weekly special shows on different regions of the word, like Marketplace Middle East. I personally like it better because as I am interested in what is going on in America, I also like the get a glimpse of what life is like in other parts of the world, specifically ones that I am not familiar with. I also noticed that CNN international shows more sports coverage that CNN in America does.

Bratislava vs Vienna
Some of my classmates and I took a day trip to Bratislava. We made a mistake and went on a Monday and basically everything was closed. However, it was interesting to see the differences between Vienna and Bratislava, especially relating to Bratislava’s long communist past. It was interesting to see the post-Communist era buildings juxtaposed to the ones built during the Communist era, there is really a large difference. Bratislava has done quite a nice job cleaning up their city and ridding it off Communist style buildings, to a more appealing and opening look. However, I found that there was not much to do or see there. Since they split with the Czech Republic, they have been trying to forge their own culture, since Prague was probably the dominant city, Bratislava does not have much to offer. I am glad I visited Bratislava, but I can say for sure that I will not visit it again and it was not because I did not enjoy myself just that there is nothing pulling me back there.

Protestant vs Catholic Art in the Kunsthistorisches Museum

2009-09-02T10:56:00.000-07:00

Protestant Artphoto: courtesy of google images
Pieter Aertsen was famous for his still-life pieces. He often drew still-life paintings in the foreground and very discretely in the background would place a religious element. These were not meant for churches; however, they were meant to be placed into the homes of believers. The Protestant faith emphasized salvation through the book, so it was not necessary for artists to be creating great murals and frescoes in churches anymore; people could worship in the comfort of their own home. The reason for the discrete religious elements was at the time people were not given as much religious freedom and so they had to be secretive about which religious elements were being displayed in their homes.photo: courtesy of google images
Rembrandt is a very famous Protestant artist, comparing his works to those of Catholic artist one can see the great differences between Catholic and Protestant art. His pieces are very modest, use very little color, and our very solemn. In the Kunsthistorisches, most of his works that are displayed are portraits and not religious images. Rembrandt painted many portraits for in the Protestant world there was no need for pompous, grandiose paintings of Christ to glorify their religion. They relied on their faith and direct relationship to God to gain salvation, unlike the Catholic faith that uses many other means in order to get in the good graces of God to reach salvation.
Catholic Artphoto: courtesy of google images
Raphael is a Catholic artist and the work of Catholic painters is generally centered around the Holy Family. They always paint images of Mary and Jesus and do not really veer far off that idea. The lighting in this painting is done purposefully to show the perfection and holiness of the Family. The use of blue also shows the Catholics dedication to their faith. Blue is the most expensive to paint with, even more expensive that gold and silver. Blue is expensive because it is hard to come by and has to be imported from Afgahnistan. The artists willingness to use blue shows their devotion to their art. Usually artists are commissioned to paint certain paintings for churches, these churches are willing to shell out the big money in order to include blue in the paintings that are to adorn their churches. This shows the Catholics willingness and need to use other means besides the script to gain salvation.photo: courtesy of google images
Rubens is the quintessential Catholic artist. He always paints dramatic images to glorify Catholicism. This specific painting shows St. Ignacius performing a miracle on the obviously demonized woman. Exorcisms of this sort are very common in Catholicism. The exorcisms were done to remove demons from people and were done in public to prove the power of God through priests and saints. This painting is also characteristic of Catholic Baroque art. It is over the top glamorous and grandiose in order to display the power and importance of the Catholic church. Using powerful images such as this is very effective in scaring and brain-washing people into believing that they are not worthy and need the help of Catholicsm, priests, saints, and exorcisms to help them reach salvation.

NY Times

2009-09-02T10:09:00.001-07:00

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2009/08/24/world/international-us-iran-nuclear.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=IAEA&st=cse

After visiting the UN in Vienna and receiving a lecture from a member of the IAEA, this article has a lot more relevance and is of more pertinent interest to me. I, somehow, feel connected to what the IAEA is doing and I understand more of what the agency is asking from Iran.
The UN and international community in general has been having problems with Iran’s uranium enriching process, Iran has been suspect to be creating weapons from their enriched uranium (mostly because Iran has refused the IAEA to inspect its nuclear technology). Iran has been part of the NPT (Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty), as a member you must agree not to use enriched uranium to create nuclear weapons. Iran has been in compliance with the treating until recent years, in which it has failed to meet certain IAEA inspections.
This article is mainly about how Iran will comply with IAEA and US demands to inspections and upholding the NPT. The IAEA is currently in Iran doing inspections on Arak, their heavy water reactor site. The point of the IAEA is not to see through disarmament of nations with nuclear weapons; however, the goals of the IAEA are to make sure that nuclear technology is used for peaceful purposes. The IAEA works with countries and does inspections to see that enriched uranium is not used to make weapons and offers consultations to nations that are part of the IAEA to practice peaceful uses of nuclear technology.
In Iran, the IAEA is inspecting its nuclear reactor sites to make sure that the enriched uranium is not used for weapons. Tehran insists that it is using the nuclear technology for electricity and not for weapons like the international community thinks. The West is still very skeptical of what is going on in Iran. Hopefully, the findings of the IAEA will ease the tension between the West and Iran.
The IAEA is essentially a powerless agency since even if it did find that Iran was using their enriched uranium for weapons, the IAEA has no power or jurisdiction to make Iran stop. They can only strongly advise against it. The disarmament or prevention of nuclear weapon production will have to be done either through diplomatic means by other nations, mostly likely the West, or if diplomatic means do not work it will probably end in violence and the eschewal and issuance of more sanctions on Iran from the international community. This could have many negative consequences, just as Germany got ousted after World War I, this could build up to the creation of devastating effects.
Furthermore, the recent controversial elections in Iran have resulted in even more apprehension of meeting diplomatic compromises between the West and Iran. The US, Britain, France, and Germany are urging fellow Security Council nations: Russia and China to place sanctions on Iran and pressure them to stop their uranium enrichment program. Hopefully these sanctions will be effective and violence will not have to be resorted to. Due to the IAEA’s inability to police and carry out consequences for noncompliance, this may turn into a crisis between nations instead of an episode to safeguard the international community.

Mozart and Don Giovanni

2009-09-02T09:06:00.000-07:00

Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus (Gottlieb) Mozart was born in 1756 in Salzburg to Leopold and Anna Mozart. His father, Leopold, was a very talented violin master of the archbishop of Salzburg. However, soon after his birth, Mozart would out perform is father in every musical aspect. He was considered a wunderkind, or child prodigy, and wrote his first piece of music at the age of 5. In A Life in Letters, it is very apparent that Leopold is very envious or jealous of his son because Leopold would teach Mozart, however everything that Mozart would surpass everything that Leopold taught him. As a result of his envy, Leopold stopped composing and working musically all together. Within that same year, he would start touring and playing his own original works. At the time, there was no public marketplace for music and it was difficult for Mozart to make money, thus he relied on a patron to pay him for creations of symphonies, orchestras, and operas. In order to scramble for patronage, he moved out of Salzburg to Vienna in 1781, where there is a greater interest and need for music due to its residence of the Habsburg monarchy. He receives minor patronage by the Habsburgs, but most of his patronage and income came from the nobility and aristocrats of Vienna. Mozart was also very devoted and involved with the Free Masons and became an official member in 1784.
Don Giovanni
Mozart split his time between writing music compositions and operas. We were fortunate enough to watch one of Mozart’s operas, Don Giovanni. Don Giovanni is an opera about a womanizer, who tries to get with all the women around him; however, he is wanted for murdering the Commendatore, Donna Anna’s father. In the process of trying to conceal his identity to keep from being avenged by Donna Anna’s fiancé, Don Ottavio, Don Giovanni tries to get with all kinds of women: servants, single women, taken women, anyone he can get his hands on. He even goes as far as to dress up as his servant, Leporello, to get with Zerlina’s servant. Through all of his womanizing and murderous ways, he makes many enemies who want him dead and has to do a lot of appeasing and convincing to keep his life. None of the people who want him dead can successfully kill him, but strangely in the end, Don Giovanni gets dragged down into hell by the statue of the Commendatore.
I felt that the version of the opera we saw was very different from that of the original by Mozart. The Don Giovanni we saw was a modern interpretation of the original. The same value, idea, and synopsis of the story are carried out, but in a very different way it is in the original. The original is set in an Italian city and the modern version it is set in a hotel. It was very interesting to hear the 18th century opera music being sung on hotel set in modern day wardrobe; however it was nice to see that in the scene in which Don Giovanni throws a ballroom party for Zerlina and Masetto, they are all dressed appropriate to the time period of the original piece. The modern adaptation also got sort of strange in the end, when the director used his poetic license to carry out the end of the play. I will admit that the original libretto is strange and very unrealistic when the statue of the Commendatore drags Don Giovanni into hell with him; however, the scene in which Don Giovanni grows old and dines with a bunch of mannequins and loses his mind before he is eventually slashed to death in a glass box was even more unrealistic. It was hard for me to draw parallels between the two versions of the opera in that instance. All in all the opera was a great experience. It was fun to be able to dress up and enjoy something considered to be very “high society.” I read in the Lonely Planet guide that the Viennese are very proper and concerned with their status and thus always jump at the chance to present themselves in a very aristocratic manner. However, even though I thought the people at the opera dressed nice, it was not anything exceptional. In fact I thought, as a whole, our group was dressed in a more presentable manner than most of the Viennese. Also paying 5.50 Euro for a tiny glass of champagne was a bit ridiculous. The opera was a very bourgeois event and the people who come out almost remind me of the attitudes of those Ringstrasse barons that felt the need to act in an aristocratic manner in order to prove their wealth and status.

Salzburg

2009-09-02T09:02:00.001-07:00

Day 1
We took the train from Wien Westbahnhof at 6:57 AM and headed off to Salzburg. Salzburg is a quaint little town near the border with Germany. It is the birthplace of Mozart and they would not let you forget it. Everything there had some sort of reference to Mozart on it. Vienna is a city that is renowned for its classical music; however, in Salzburg music was part of anything and everything. Even the local bakeries had pretzels in the shape of treble clefs. As a piano player of 12 years, I found it very amusing and quite nostalgic since it brought me back to my piano playing days. All the souvenirs they sold there had something to do with either Mozart or the Sound of Music. The town is a complete tourist city and everything was catered toward tourism. The tours, food, accommodations, and entrance fees there were all very expensive, since they could get away with it.
First off we walked into town and visited some of the sites in town. It was a zoo there were tourists everywhere from all over the world. We walked into the Dom church and there were more people visiting there than there were when I visited Stephansdom. Afterwards, we decided to go on our own Sound of Music tour, since the one provided was so expensive. We were able to do it for 2 Euros instead of the 33 Euros required for Panorama tours. We visited the Hellbrunn, where the famous Pavilion in the movie stands. The Mirabelle Gardens where they sang “Do Re Mi” and “Favorite Things.” We also visited the abbey, where Maria and Mr. Von Trapp got married.
Day 2
We decided that since we were in Salzburg we would have to visit Hitler’s Eagle’s Nest and some salt mines. The tours offered for these two destinations would amount to about 90 Euro, so again we decided to do it ourselves for less than half the price. We took the bus to Berchtesgaden and on the way found a salt mine. The salt mine we visited was definitely a tourist trap, a lot like the subterranean lake we visited on our way back from the Alps. Once we entered we had to wear some ridiculous body suits and ride a minors train into the depths of the mountain. Inside we went on a slide and rode a boat across a salt lake. The boat ride across the salt lake was complete with a cheesy light show and some trippy music. At the end of the boat ride, they allowed us to taste the water of the lake and it was a lot saltier than I thought it would be. After the salt mine, we took the bus across the Austrian-Germany into Germany and eventually into Berchtesgaden Hauptbahnhof and then another bus to the foot of the mountain where the Kehlsteinhaus was located. From the foot of the mountain, we had to take another bus 20 minutes up the mountain and then an elevator to the peak. The peak offered beautiful views very similar to the views we saw while we were in Raxalpe. On the peak there was a cottage, which was Hitler’s Eagle’s Nest. It was a fiftieth birthday present to Hitler. I have to admit it was strange to be at Hitler’s birthday present on my birthday. I was very disappointed because once we got up there, there was really nothing to see besides the views. There was no museum or anything, just a restaurant where they were rude and charged ridiculous prices for the mediocre food. I did wonder about all the effort and manpower needed to create an eagle’s nest so far up a mountain. We went through a lot of trouble to get up there, imagine getting supplies and people up to the peak in order to build a tea house for Hitler, only the best for the Fuhrer I guess. On our way down the mountain, a large tour bus broke down, and we had to wait a while in order for them to clear to the side of the road so that we could pass by, this messed up our transfers to the other two busses back into Salzburg and our train back to Vienna, so we went back to Vienna a lot later than we had wanted to. Even with all that trouble, I am glad we went to visit Hitler’s Eagle’s Nest even though it was pretty anticlimactic because I know I would have regretted it if I was so close and I didn’t visit it.

The Third Man

2009-09-02T09:01:00.001-07:00

The Third Man is a movie made in 1949 that is based in Vienna. The story goes: Harry Lime, a resident of Vienna, invites his friend Holly Martins out to Vienna for work. Upon Holly’s arrival, he discovers that Harry Lime has died. As he tries and investigates his friend Harry’s death, he grows more and more suspicious that Harry’s death was no accident and that he was in fact murdered. Even though Holly is warned by many officials and Harry’s friends to leave town, he does not and is adamant about getting the truth about his friend’s death. Along the way, he falls for Harry’s lover, Anna, and tries to keep her from being sent back to the Russian sector of Vienna (she is Czech). Holly encounters a man on a walk and is convinced that he has run into Harry. Through his investigations, Holly finds out from Calloway, the lead detective, that Harry was involved in penicillin smuggling on the black market. Lime would attain penicillin and dilute the amount, sell it to hospitals, and the hospitals would then distribute these diluted antibiotics to patients with bacterial infections and has staged his own death. Calloway then takes Holly to the hospital to see the effects of the diluted penicillin purchased from Lime. The children are all deformed and have suffered because of the ineffectiveness of the diluted penicillin. After seeing these sick children, Martins decides to help the police lure and capture Lime in exchange for seeing that Anna gets out of Vienna safely. Anna did not want Holly’s help and tried to mess up the capture of Lime, for she still loved him despite his evil doings. In the end, the officials were able to find out that he was using the sewage system to get in and out of the different occupied zones in Vienna and shot and killed him there.
This movie was interesting to watch after familiarizing myself with most of the Vienna sites. Some sites that I recognized from the movie included: Hofburg, Café Mozart, and the Prater. Some common cultural things I saw were: the Strassenbahn, the Emperor Josef statue in the Hofburg, and Gosser beer signs. The movie was very informative historically, in the sense that the viewer was able to see the aftermath of World War II. We could see that a lot of Vienna had been destroyed. It also helped the viewer understand the implications of Vienna being split into five zones. It was also cool to see Martins face the same difficulties as we have. He didn’t speak German and most of the Austrian characters didn’t speak English. There were many instances in the film in which he had to say “I don’t understand you” or “I don’t speak German,” which is something that I have encountered a lot while on this trip. It is sometimes frustrating not being able to understand anyone, yet at the same time refreshing. The language barrier is not so bad, since luckily many of the Viennese speak flawless English. It is also interesting to see the crime and darker side of Vienna. My views of Vienna have been mostly positive, with the exception of the people being a bit rude and snooty, I have never felt unsafe walking around, except for maybe the sketchy drunk people at the Karlsplatz station.

Heeresgeschichtliches Museum

2009-08-29T04:36:00.000-07:00

Heeresgeschichtliches Museum
In the War History Museum, they display various items: weapons, armor, and artifacts throughout the different major wars that Austria and specifically Vienna has been involved in.
17th Century
Vienna was involved in two wars: the 30 years war and the war with the Turks. The 30 Years War lasted from 1618-1648 and was mostly fought in central Europe. It started as a conflict among religious groups, specifically the Catholics and Protestants; however as the war continued on, it really became a war to balance powers in Europe. It was mainly an attempt by the French to make sure that the Habsburgs did not get too powerful, to ensure this the French sided with the Protestant Swedes. The war ended with the leader of the Swedes, Gustavus Adolphus. In the aftermath of the war, it is hard to identify a victor, since all involved parties were greatly hurt by the war, especially economically and no one country became very powerful.
The Ottomans were interested in expanding their empire to the west and wanted to obtain Vienna for its strategic position along the Danube. In July 1683, the Turkish troops marched to the walls of Vienna and laid siege on the city for the second time, led by Kara Mustafa. However thanks to the military might of Prince Eugene of Savoy, Polish troops, and the looming cold winter, the Ottomans were kicked out of Vienna, never to return again. During the period of the second Ottoman siege, there was a lot of fear among the citizens and imperial family in Vienna. They did not know if this siege was ever going to end and had very little understanding of the Ottomans and their military power.photo: courtesy of google images
Albrecht von Wallenstein
Wallenstein was an important general of the 30 Years War. However in 1630 the authorities feared that he was becoming too powerful and they dismissed him from command. He was called back after a short while when the Swedes began to gain strength. In the end, he was suspected of treason and assassinated in 1634.
Battle of Lutzen by Peeter Snayers
The Swedish and German armies are depicted in the background and the Habsburg’s Imperial army is depicted in the foreground. Through this painting, historians can see the conditions of the 30 Years war. The terrible conditions are shown: disease, death, and cramped quarters.
Turkish army dress, weapons
In all of the items displayed in this museum, the Ottomans are depicted in a very barbaric manner. It is true however that the Ottomans used some “outdated” by effective weapons, namely bows and arrows, while the imperial army used gun powder and more advanced weapons.
World War I and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy
When the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, successor to the Habsburg throne, and his wife Sophia were assassinated in Sarajevo in 1914 by a nationalist group, the Black Hand, this ignited a series of events that eventually resulted in World War I. The Habsburg Empire placed the country of Serbia responsible for the death of Franz Ferdinand and waged war on them, however because of a web of complicated alliances it resulted in to a full fledged world war. The Austria-Hungary Empire did not do well in the trench warfare and had difficulties keeping its multinational empire cohesive. In the end, the empire began to dissolve and in November 1918, an armistice agreement was met, which resulted in the collapse of the empire.
Vehicle of Archduke Franz Ferdinand
This is the 4 cylinder, 30 horsepower car that the archduke was shot in. This was the second attempt on his life, he escaped the first one unscathed; however after being shot in Sarajevo, he eventually died, although not instantaneously. The bullet hole is still visible.
Uniform and Chaise
This is the uniform that Franz Ferdinand was shot in. The blood and bullet holes are still visible and also the incision that the doctor had to make into his uniform to remove the bullet. This is the chaise that the archduke spent the remaining moments of his life.

Leopold Museum

2009-08-29T03:15:00.000-07:00

The Leopold Museum contains the collection of the Leopold family, which includes paintings, furniture, vases, and sketches. There are five stories of items on display from their private home. Herr Leopold made a deal with the city of Vienna that if they built him a museum then he would donate his entire art collection for the city to put on display. Herr Leopold is considered an art guru and almost everything he buys turns to gold. For instance, people used to not be big fans of Schiele however because Leopold enjoyed his art Schiele has now become one of the most famous artists in the last century.
photo: courtesy of google images
Gustav Klimt (1862-1918)
Klimt is considered to be one of the Ringstrasse artists. He was born right into the height of the Secessionist movement. Klimt was originally enrolled in the Applied Arts Academy to be a goldsmith; however, after realizing he did not have much interest in being a goldsmith he picked up painting. Klimt was very involved in the construction of the Ringstrasse buildings and leading the Secessionist movement; however a scandal ousted him from his influential position and the Jugenstil group. Klimt was asked to paint three panels in the opening hall for the University of Vienna. Klimt’s panels were refused because they looked quite controversial and they were blurry and would be hard to view on the ceilings. The refusal of the University to accept the panels was a big blow to Klimt and he would be unable to find work for some while, in this time he painted The Kiss, which not only put him back into mainstream art but elevated him to become one of the most influential artists ever. Klimt’s work can be placed into three periods: 1) Ringstrasse period 2) Art Noveau, Jugendstil period 3) Expressionism.
photo: courtesy of google images
Death and Life
Klimt created this in 1910 and thought he was finished with it, but five years later he pulled it out and decided it was not finished and started adding certain touches to it and it is now what we see today hanging in the Leopold museum. Death is portrayed as menacing, sinister, sneaky, and playful. Life is portrayed through many people. The old person is blue, similar to the color of death. The couple in the foreground seem to be mourning and have been touched by death and the man seems to be protecting his woman. The outer ends of “life” are the parts that he added in 1915. These additions helped to close the gap between life and death. Also if you look at the grooves in between life and death, you can see that they fit together. Last, but most important, is the girl, the only person with their eyes open, is the person in which the observer can be pulled into the painting.
Vienna Workshop
The Vienna Workshop is the antithesis of Jugendstil. The two most influential architects and artists that came out of the Vienna Workshop were Adolf Loos and Josef Hoffman. They disliked the Jugendstil style and all its ornamentation and pomp. The Vienna Workshop artists believed in simplicity and thought ornamentation was a crime. They believed that with the use of beautiful material, you would not need decoration. Vienna Workshop artists wanted to take applied arts and incorporate it into the fine arts. They thought that a well-designed chair could be a work of art. Loos thought that the architect should design everything in a building down to the doorknob.
photo: courtesy of google images
Egon Schiele
Schiele was one of Klimt’s greatest admirers and learned a great deal from Klimt. He was an expressionist painter and ushered in the new style of art flawlessly. According to Parsons, he showed “disregard for bourgeois proprieties” (Parsons, 244) and often painted pornographic works that society found very distasteful.photo: courtesy of google images
Dead Mother
Dead Mother is a work that Schiele produced that somewhat prophesized the fate of his wife. The painting features a dead mother carrying her child, which is what happened to Schiele. His wife died carrying his seven-month baby of the Spanish Influenza. This is a strange mysterious characteristic of Schiele’s work. He is often said to have been able to see and feel the future and would paint what he felt.photo: courtesy of google images
The Cardinal and the Nun
This is one of Schiele’s most famous pieces and marked his transition from “self-disgust of many self-portraits to shocking eroticism” (Parsons, 244). The cardinal and the nun both have knobby, weathered, peasant-like feet, which represents that even though religious people are seen to hold a certain moral standard, they are in the end still people and still have desires and needs. The face of the cardinal looks as if he is completely consumed by the beauty of the nun and the face of the nun looks as if she has just been caught. This piece was very ground-breaking for Schiele’s time.

Belvedere

2009-08-28T11:45:00.000-07:00

The Belvedere was the Baroque palace of Prince Eugene of Savoy, defeater of the Turks and now is a museum displaying the art collection of the Habsburgs, especially Maria Theresia.
Early 17th Century Art
During the 17th century, the rise of Martin Luther and Protestantism greatly impacted art. Since, there is less of a need for art, Protestant artists need new outlets to make money, before they would pain alters, frescoes, and portraits of the holy family. Because of this, a hierarchy of painting emerges. The most important paintings are historical of biblical or ancient Roman scenes, second there are genre paintings of common life, third are portraits, last there are landscapes and still life paintings. Protestant artists turn to painting portraits in order to make money.
The Imperial Count Mortiz Christian Fries and his Family 1805
In this painting the family is almost portrayed like the holy family, with Mary, Jesus, and Joseph. This style of painting also brings in the viewer through the woman; she is staring out at the observer, making the painting more personable. In this period, only the very rich could afford to have their portraits done.photo: courtesy of google images
Rocky Landscape in the Elbsandsteinegebirge 1822
Landscape paintings become popular in the Renaissance and there popularity have continued to the modern day. This painting by Casper David Friederich captures the mystery of nature. This painting still has religious connotations and signifies are need to get back to God through nature. Furthermore in this period, there is a reversion back to Catholicism and the need to return to the heyday of the Holy Roman Empire. During this time, the English gardens are also preferred to the manicured look of the French gardens. This painting signifies societies movement from reason and French imperialism to passion. Friederich’s works are characterized by his extreme horizon lines; they are either very high or very low, in this particular painting they are very low.photo: courtesy of google images
Reading the Will 1839
The significance of this painting by Danhauser is that it allows us and historians to view common life scenes in the past. Since there were no photographs and we cannot go back in time to observe life in the past, we must turn to art and paintings to conjure of hypotheses of common life dealings. Through pieces like these, we can observe the popular furniture styles and dress. We can also determine daily life dealings: for instance what they did during leisure time, if they had to get water from a well.photo: courtesy of google images
Rudolf von Arthaber with his Children Rudolf, Emilie, Gustav 1837
This painting fits into the Biedermeier period (1815-1848), where there is a retreat to idyllic family life. It is the movement of the middle class. In this painting, the family is obviously emphasized. The father is acting very paternal and fully involved in his three children; however there is an obvious missing piece, the mother. In the Biedermeier period, there is a change in the role of women. Before, women were portrayed in a very lustful way, but now women are portrayed in a much more civilized way and we can see that this family is mourning the missing link in their family because of her intellect through the melancholy feeling of the painting.
Baroque Style
This is the room in the Belvedere where the Austrian state contract was signed in 1955. The style of this room is baroque. Especially in the ceiling, one can see many of the characteristics of the Baroque style. The frescos on the ceiling attempt to fool the eye. The viewer cannot tell how high the ceiling is and it is difficult to tell when sculpture ends and painting begins the visual transition between the two is flawless.
photo: courtesy of google images
The Wounded Man 1866
This painting by Gustave Courbet is an example of art’s transition into impressionism. The techniques used are much more exaggerated. In impressionist art, the artists try and create an illusion between two-dimensional and three-dimensional foregrounds and backgrounds. There is also an exaggeration of brush strokes to make them completely visible to the viewer; however it is not as dramatic here because this cannot be considered an impressionist piece, just one that is at the cusp of the transition into impressionist art. The 19th century also ushers in the people’s desire to sit and contemplate art, thus art pieces become more thought provoking and allow for more interpretation.photo: courtesy of google images
Fishermen on the Seine at Poissy 1882
This piece is the epitome of impressionist art. The father of impressionist art, Monet, painted it. In impressionist art, the paint itself becomes important not only the figures drawn. Impressionist art favors the exaggeration of brush strokes to create blurriness when one is near the piece and clearness when one is far from the piece. This piece is just very relaxing and I can picture someone placing this in their living room by the fireplace so that they could just sit down and enjoy its serenity.
photo: courtesy of google images
The Kiss
This is the main attraction of the Belvedere and maybe all art in Vienna. It is paralleled to the Mona Lisa in its fame and popularity. Klimt did this piece in the middle period of his three art phases and very obviously fits into the Art Noveau and Secessionist style, especially evident in all the gold elements. Here it is obvious that there is a transition from three to two-dimensional art because this piece is done mostly in two dimensions. Klimt painted The Kiss after his university scandal and needed a piece to come out of the hole of disapproval that society had placed on him. Klimt uses very small detailed patterns to separate the man from the women. The women is put together using many tiny little circles of different sizes and the man is put together using many tiny little blocks of different sizes. This painting really put Klimt on track as one of the most influential artists of all time.

Ringstrasse

2009-08-27T09:22:00.001-07:00

History
The end of the Biedermeier age marks the beginning of a new era, with the crowing of Franz Josef, the era of the Ringstrasse. Emperor Franz Josef decided to tear down the medieval city walls and expand the limits of Vienna. This allowed for the building of many structures that now define Vienna. The Ringstrasse period is not only defined by the creation of new Viennese monuments, such as: the Opera House, Parliament, or the University of Vienna; however it is the rise of the upper-middle class in Vienna. These are the newly rich and have made their new fortune through the rise in industry in Vienna. They are often minorities, support liberal political parties, and believe in capitalism through laissez-faire economics. The Ringstrasse barons are known for being insecure because of their newly rich status and try and go above and beyond to prove their newly attained status, thus they try and imitate the aristocratic style and place this same influence on to the new architecture of the Ringstrasse and also into society.

Jugendstil
Jugenstil or Art Noveau is the style that defines the age of the Ringstrasse. This styles most famous advocator in Vienna was Otto Wagner. He was born right into the Ringstrasse period in 1842 and believed that architectural style should mirror its own period. He grew tired of neo-renditions of old styles such as: Renaissance, Baroque, and Classical. He believed that something not practical cannot be beautiful and became well liked not just for his aesthetically pleasing architecture but his innovations and practicality. He was involved in building the Danube Canal that has saved Vienna from many floods that other cities along the Danube have not been so fortunate to get away from. Jugenstil is characterized by its steel, marble, and Mallorca tile. The most notable example in Vienna would be in Karlsplatz where there is a Otto Wagner museum in one of his old Jugendstil Stadtbahn stations. Most of the buildings are white with some green and gilded ornamentations and a specific style of font.

Sites
The Votiv Church was done in the neo-Gothic style to model that of the Stephansdom. Franz Josef built the church as a thanks to the higher power for a surviving an assassination attempt. Parliament was built in neo-Classical style, mirroring Greek society, the world’s first democracy. The Rathaus is done in the neo-Gothic style to symbolize “the free burgher cities of the Flanders in the Middle Ages” (Parsons, 208). The Kunsthistorisches and Naturhistorisches Museums are done in the Renaissance style to represent the revival of arts and sciences. The neue-Hofburg is done in the neo-Baroque style to signify the pomp and absolutist ethos of the empire and rulers of the Habsburgs during the time. The University of Wien was built in the Renaissance style to mirror the rebirth of learning and thought. The Staatoper was built in the Venetian Renaissance style to represent the birthplace of opera and dedication to the arts. Some famous Ringstrasse architect include: “Gottfried Semper, Karl Hasenauer, Theophil von Hansen, Heinrich Ferstel, Friedrich Schmidt, Von Siccardsburg, Van der Null” (Parsons, 208). This movement is associated with the Secesseion and the Secessionist artists are responsible for the construction of the buildings around the Ringstrasse between 1858-1900. However, Adolf Loos and his friends were anti-Secessionist and criticized the Secession artists, architects, and buildings to be decorative and busy. He believed in simplicity and stated that ornamentation should be considered a crime. He also thinks that if one uses beautiful material to build then there would be no use for decoration.

R-Tram
The R-Tram is a yellow tram that takes you around the Ringstrasse to get a view of the most significant and recognizable buildings in Vienna. We got on near our school and started the tour with the bilateral buildings of the Kunsthistorisches and Naturhistorisches Museums and that is where we also ended. I noticed that the person working the tram was very friendly and helpful, something refreshing because since I have been here I have found the Viennese to be pretty unfriendly. He gave us each our own headsets that we could plug into the audio guide, which came in many languages. The technology was done really well. The audio guide was in sync with what we were seeing and also there was a screen where they would display the building the audio guide was talking about so we knew exactly if we were looking at the correct thing. Some noted sites included: Parliament, People’s Park, Burg Theater (Renaissance), Rathaus (neo-Gothic), University of Vienna, Votiv Church (neo-Gothic), Danube Canal, Ring Tower, OPEC headquarters, Schwarzenberg Platz, Hotel Imperial, Charles Church (Baroque), and the Staatoper. I thought the tram tour would be a good way for tourists to get a feel for the city and its architectural style; however, it is quite expensive and I do not know that someone would want to ride it more than once. Furthermore, there are a lot more aesthetically pleasing and “Viennese” styled buildings inside the Ringstrasse that the tour does not cover.

Historisches Museum der Stadt Wien

2009-08-26T14:02:00.001-07:00

The Historisches Museum der Stadt Wien takes you through the history of Vienna starting from the pre-historic era up to the modern day. The museum is mainly full of art and some artifacts. It displays the art and society of Vienna through different time periods so you can see Vienna’s transition to its current culture.
1. Roman Empire: Settlements in Vienna have dated back to 40,000 B.C. However, the first notable period of Viennese history starts with the Roman Empire, when Vienna was known as Vindobona. Vindobona was an important part of the Roman Empire because it was a port city along the Danube. It was situated in what is now the first district of Vienna and in the Hofburg, you can see some of the ruins from this period.
2. Medieval Vienna 1100-1400: Vienna was relatively small and relied on wine-making during this time for survival; however, it became more of a force to be reckoned with when the Babenbergs chose to reside in Vienna and began the construction of St. Stephens church, now one of the most visited sites in Vienna. Vienna gained even more importance when the Habsburgs took up rule of Austria in the late 1200s, this attracted many to move into the city. The arrival of new residents continued to increase, resulting in the expansion of Vienna and the creation of suburbs.
3. 16th century: Vienna in the 16th century is associated with a lot of instability, including the dissolution of Hungarian rule and war with the Ottomans. Vienna fell to the Turks for 3 weeks and afterwards fear struck the Viennese and Habsburgs, thus causing them to change Vienna into a more fortified city. This period is also accompanied by the spread of Protestantism through the rise of Martin Luther. The Habsburg a strictly Catholic ruling family started to offer more tolerance and opening up to the idea of Protestantism, but not for long.
4. 17th century: Vienna in the 17th century is characterized by the Counter-Reformation. The tolerance towards Protestants had ended and the Habsburgs Catholicized all of Vienna, making it arguably more Catholic than before. In order to show the prestige and superiority of Catholics, Vienna entered the Baroque art period. The Baroque style is associated with opulence, grandeur, and lavishness. It features a lot of gilded elements, rich colors, and amazing frescoes. Notable Baroque structures commissioned in this time include: Karlskirche, upper and lower Belvedere.
5. 18th century: The 18th century is the period of city growth and expansion and social reform. Vienna had multiplied in size and many new suburbs had sprung up around outside the town center. There was a change in the structure of society from feudalism to bourgeois. This transformation was caused by the social reforms that characterize this period: abolition of torture, death penalty, mandatory primary education, increased religious tolerance, and opening of public parks and hospitals.
6. Biedermeier Period: Biedermeier was a character that was featured in a Munich periodical, he was known to be a family man of “modest ambitions and sober pleasures” (Parsons, 195). This period started with the Congress of Vienna in 1815 and ends with the Revolution of 1848, which ushers in the Ringstrasse era. The Biedermeier period is brought about by the Enlightenment period, in which the middle class or bourgeoisie becomes aware of its political disempowerment. Biedermeier is most closely associated with architecture, interior décor, and art of the middle class. This oppression and censorship was brought about by Ferdinand who was determined to thwart democratic and liberal ideas from emerging. The Biedermeier period is the trend of the middle class turning inward toward family, private life, and domesticity. Houses were small, modest, and painted in Schonbrunn gold. The interior of these houses were adorned with porcelain collections and paintings of landscapes or life in the countryside. A characteristic of the Biedermeier period is clutter and gemutlichkeit, or coziness with a claustrophobic connotation. It was a solely bourgeois movement.
7. 1848 Revolution: The continually repressed middle and lower classes of Vienna rose up against the government that resulted in the Revolution of 1848. The revolution was led mainly by student groups, who demanded freedom of speech. The guards were only marginally successful in containing the violence because Emperor Ferdinand had to move to Innsbruck for safety. In the end, however, the Imperial Troops prevailed and surrounded Vienna, resulting in the executions of many revolters. Emperor Ferdinand’s unpopularity led him to abdicate in favor of his nephew Franz Josef at the end of 1848.
8. Age of Franz Josef: Franz Josef rule from 1848-1916 and ushered in an era of transformation for Vienna. With Franz Josef came the knocking down of the city walls leading to the Era of the Ringstrasse and the rise of an upper middle class. These people made their money through the rise of industry in Austria and were often bankers or factory owners. The rise of industry resulted in the fall of the former middle class (Biedermeier), they became very resentful of the Ringstrasse barons, who were mainly immigrants or Jews, and wanted to bring back the “real Austria,” free of immigrants.

A Visit to the UN

2009-08-26T14:01:00.002-07:00

A Visit to the UN

Background on the UN
The UN was created in 1945 as a result of World War II, originally it had 51 member countries and now there are 192 member countries. The point of the creation of the UN was to avoid another world war. After two world wars in 30 years, the international community decided it was time to put together an agent in order to allow for diplomatic negotiations instead of violence. The UN has five official languages: Spanish, Russian, French, English, Chinese and Arabic; and the two main languages are French and English. UN interpreters have to speak a minimum of three or four languages fluency, which must include either English or French. English and French are used as the main languages for interpretation, if a mistake is made through either English or French than the other interpreters for the three remaining languages will also make a mistake in their interpretations. Interpreters are only allowed to work 30 minutes at a time and up to 3 hours a day, since it is such a high stress job. The headquarters of the UN is in New York and there are three additional locations in: Vienna, Geneva, and Nairobi. Each location focuses on a different diplomatic arena. New York focuses on politics. Geneva focuses on human rights. Vienna focuses on security with an emphasis in nuclear energy. Lastly, Nairobi focuses on the environment. The Vienna UN contains many different agencies and divisions in order to insure safety in the international community, such as: UNOID (United Nations Office on Industrial Development), UNOOSA (United Nations Office on Outer-space Affairs), UNODC (United Nations Office on Drugs and Crimes), and IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency).

IAEA
The IAEA was created as a response to the Atoms for Peace initiative. The main goal of the IAEA is all for the safe and secure use of nuclear technology. The need for the IAEA arose from the Manhattan Project, which resulted in the explosion of two atomic bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War II. The existence of nuclear weapons led to the Cold War, in which the United States and the Soviet Union had a nuclear arms race, resulting in the need for an international diplomatic agency to ensure the safe and secure use of nuclear technology. The job of the IAEA is to make sure that uranium ore that is mined is not made to materials that can be used for weapons. However, the IAEA is not involved in disarmament, especially nuclear weapons. It relies on budgetary and extra-budgetary contributions to distribute its services. Budgetary contributions are based on member states payments based on the size of their economy. Extra-budgetary contributions are made by member states to fund projects that they may be interested in. The IAEA’s main role is to monitor fissile material. Member states are split into two categories: NWs (nuclear weapon states) are states that have exploded a nuclear device befor January 1967 and includes: USA, Russia, UK, France, and China. These countries are not subject to IAEA inspections. The second category is the NNWs (non nuclear weapon states) are states that have pledged not to develop or acquire nuclear weapons and must allow IAEA inspections. The incentive for NNW states to join the IAEA is that members of the IAEA will help the country to develop nuclear technology for peaceful purposes. The mission of the IAEA can be summed up in 3 pillars: 1) safeguards and verification 2) safety and security 3) science and technology. The first pillar focuses on international accounting to ensure that fissile material is only used for peaceful purposes. The second pillar focuses on safe use of nuclear technology. The third pillar focuses on help and advice with peaceful applications of nuclear technology.

UNODC
The UNODC’s focus is to help member states deal with issues of crime, drugs, and terrorism; unlike the IAEA, the UNODC is a part of the UN. At any one time the UNODC works on 250 projects and works with an annual budget of 100 million US dollars. The UNODC is based on 3 conventions. First, drugs are bad. The use and production of drugs must be controlled and necessary measures must be taken to ensure this. Second, substances should only be used under prescription according to their recognized medical use or for medical research. Third, the drug abuse is the illicit use of drugs, which is based on an assessment of health risks and not on moral judgment. The UNODC also oversees the INCB (International Narcotics Control Board). The INCB is a semi-judicial function to monitor compliance to being a member state of the UNODC. The INCB provides legal and technical assistance to member states. For instance, they help survey the amount of poppy and coca production and help with socioeconomic situations. They also provide and improve the capacities of member state governments to stop the trafficking of drugs. The main point is to reduce the supply and demand of drugs.

Questions:
1. The IAEA preaches nuclear disarmament, do you plan on enforcing this for all nations? This was answered. The IAEA does not involve itself with disarmament of nations especially of nuclear weapons, its job is to make sure enriched uranium is not used to make weapons.
2. What is the main goal of the UNODC? This was answered. The main goal of the UNODC is to help member states deal with issues of crime, drugs, terrorist, and trafficking.
3. What diplomatic methods do you plan on using to stop drug trafficking? This was not really discussed. Our lecture was focused on early prevention methods of drug use through installing an educational program in schools.
4. What drugs are most commonly trafficked and which create the highest revenue? This was also not really discussed; however, I did find a poster that mapped out the proportion of use of each substance: cannabis, cocaine, methamphetamines, and opiates in each region of the world. The percentages differ from region to region. The most commonly used drug in the North American region is cannabis.
5. How does the IAEA feel about nuclear energy? This was answered. The IAEA supports the use of nuclear energy for its efficiency; however, they believe that not all nations have the resources and capacity to instill this type of technology.
6. Is the UN looking for more efficient or alternative ways to dispose of nuclear waste? This was not discussed. The lecture was more focused on the NPT and the prevention of proliferation of nuclear weapons and establishing knowledge for the good uses of nuclear technology.

Mauthausen Concentration Camp

2009-08-26T14:01:00.001-07:00

Background
Mauthausen is a city a couple hours outside of Vienna. It is the site of one of the Nazi’s several concentration camps across central and eastern Europe. The building started in 1938 and lasted until 1941. Initially, local carpenters built the first structures on Mauthausen, two barracks and a barbed wire fence. From then on out, the construction of the camp was done by the prisoners. Its operation lasted from 1938 until 1945, when the camp was liberated. Mauthausen had a death rate of about 50%. Estimates say around 300,000 people worked at there and around 150,000 died there. Either they were murdered, starved to death, or worked to death. The history of Mauthausen can be divided into 4 periods. The first period, 1938-1941, was the building of the camp. The second period started in 1941-1942, was quarry work done by the prisoners. The third period started in 1943, was work in factories for weapons and ammunition. The fourth period started in 1944 when the Nazis decided to close all death camps and the prisoners from the death camps were transported to Mauthausen and other concentration camps across Europe.
The point of the concentration camps was to kill people by hard labor. Once prisoners entered the camp they were told by the guards that the gate they entered from was the way in and the chimney of the crematorium was their way out. In early years the biggest group of prisoners were the political prisoners; however, the demographics were varied and included: gypsies, criminals, homosexuals, Jews, and Soviet POWs. Originally, Mauthausen was opened for men; however, with the closing of the extermination camps in eastern Europe, women started to flood in.
Arrival at Mauthausen
First the prisoners arrived in the railway station for Mauthausen. The carts that they rode in were usually used for cattle transport. After arrival, the prisoners would have to march up the hill for about 6 kilometers to reach the camp. They would be asked to line up facing the “wailing wall” and would be asked to stand there for hours or days. Often the SS would beat them or release the dogs on the prisoners. Sometimes during the cold winter months they would spray cold water onto the prisoners. The SS had one goal and that was to make the prisoners’ lives hell by breaking them in a mental way. After the wailing wall, the prisoners would be taken to the shower. Before showering they would be shaven with blunt razor blades that would leave open sores and the prisoners would be bleeding during their shower. Then the prisoners would line up at roll call, get their uniforms, and move into quarantine. In quarantine, the prisoners would be split up into different labor tasks. The strong would be asked to work in the quarries. After the quarantine, the prisoners would be moved into their barracks.
Life at Mauthausen
A typical day at Mauthausen started at 445 AM in the summer and 515AM in the winter. The prisoners would have 30 minutes to wake up, make their bed, wash themselves, dress, and live up for roll call. Breakfast and dinner were eaten at roll call and would consist of around 600-1000 calories and lunch was eaten at the job site, most likely at the quarry. The prisoners would work 11-12 hrs a day and 6 days a week. On Sunday, their “day off” they were required to gymnastics. The SS would give them very difficult physical challenges in order to separate the strong from the weak. Many times the prisoners would die during their gymnastics training. There were three official punishments at Mauthausen. There was the bunker or the camp prison, where misbehaving prisoners were sent to be tortured. The second form of punishment was standing on the roll call ground for extended periods of time often being beaten, mauled by dogs, or sprayed with cold water. The last official punishment was being beat by a whip or wooden stick 25 times. The prisoner would have to count each whipping until 25. If they counted incorrectly, the beatings would start from zero. Many times the prisoners were whipped so hard their kidneys would start to bleed.
Gas Chambers
Executions of most prisoners at Mauthausen were done through the gas chamber. The gas used to kill the prisoners was Cyclone B. This gas removes the oxygen from blood and takes about 20-30 minutes to kill the prisoners. The gas chamber would require 4-5 hours to clean after each round of gassing. Around 100 prisoners could be crammed into the gas chamber at once to be gassed. The prisoners were always lied to and were told that they were going to take a shower. The gas chamber at Mauthausen was done being built in 1942 and was used from then until the camp’s liberation in 1945. In this time, 5,000 prisoners died because of the gas chamber. Before the prisoners were sent into the chamber, the ones with gold teeth were marked so that they could be easily identified once they died. The SS would then pick out the marked prisoners and remove their gold teeth from their mouths. They obtained about 50 pounds of gold teeth.

Alpine Adventure

2009-08-19T10:03:00.001-07:00

After a brief stop in Eisenstadt, we continued our journey up to the Austrian Alps, Raxalpe to be exact. The countryside of Austria is very beautiful. It is full of green grass adorning rolling hills and little white and brown cottages spread throughout. There are some rivers running through the picturesque green hills. We drove to our gondola in order to take it up to where our hostel was located. Our hostel was a stereotypical “alpine-looking” building. The views from our hostel were incredible Nothing can describe the landscape of the Austrian Alps, it was gorgeous and I was very ecstatic to have the chance to see all this beauty.
The first night we had an amazing dinner. I had the pancake soup, then Kiley and I shared the Imperial Nonsense and Wienerschnitzel. The Wienerschnitzel is a traditional Viennese dish, in which a veal cutlet is pounded, battered, and fried. It was very delicious and can be found all over Vienna and Austria. Imperial Nonsense is just that because it is basically cut up pancake dipped in apricot jam for dinner. In the states, we are not used to eating sweet dishes for a dinner main course; however it ended up being just delicious. The night ended with me just getting to know my fellow programmers a lot better.
The next morning we woke up early to start our hike. It was very cold in the morning; however, after a bit of hiking it got pretty hot and I was glad that I did not bring a big jacket otherwise I would have had to carry it around. I can tell that the Austrian Alps are a very popular place to go hiking because the system is very well laid out. The trails are very clearly defined and there is a gravel path to follow, making it almost impossible to get lost. There are also a series of small cottages along the way to the summit, where you can stop get some food, a drink, and use the restroom. These cottages usually sell traditional Austrian dishes, such as: pancake soup, dumplings, sauerkraut, and apple strudel.
We took a very difficult path to get to the second resting cottage. It was full of ups, downs, and lots of slippery mud. It was all worth it because we were walking along side the mountain so we got to see the beautiful views of the mountain range and all the highs and lows in between mountains. The hike was very refreshing and it was nice to get some fresh air and be surrounded by nature and beautiful panoramas. We made it to the second cottage and had some lunch to refuel then headed back for our hostel. On the way back we took the simpler route, it was so much more leisurely and we were able to just stroll back down to our hostel. It was nice to take the other way back because the views were of the inside of the mountain. So we got to see a lot of beautiful wild flowers and grass, instead of views of far reaching mountains. The views on the trail on the way back were more immediate.
We made it back to our hostel and blogged for a bit then we had dinner. Kiley and I shared the sauerkraut with pork and the vegetable dumplings. I did not much enjoy the sauerkraut with pork, the sauerkraut was very overpowering and there were really only a few pieces of pork inside. Luckily, the vegetable dumplings were delicious. They were potato dumplings with corn, peas, carrots inside and fried.
The trip to the Austrian Alps was a much-needed break from the bustling city of Vienna. It was nice to get away from all the commotion, get back to nature and breath the fresh air of the Alps. This was definitely a very enjoyable mini-trip that I would definitely want to take again.

Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial

2009-08-18T09:35:00.000-07:00

photo: courtesy of google images
Just 20 minutes outside of Munich, lies one of Germany’s darkest places: Dachau Concentration Camp, where prisoners, Jews, homosexuals, and Russians were subjected to inhuman amounts of work, physical, and psychological torture. The entrance is an iron gate with the words: Arbeit macht frei, on it, meaning “work will set you free.” These words were deceitful, for it made the prisoners believe that the more and harder they worked the sooner they would be set free; however, that was not the case. The harder they worked in the terrible conditions they were given, with little amounts of food, meant that the harder they worked the weaker they became and when they became too weak to work they would be sent to the death camps. They truly had no way out once they entered into Dachau, the only way out was death. After entering the gate, one can see that the Nazis created an environment of desolation and hopelessness for its prisoners. It is completely barren with gravel walkways and white buildings. Just inside the fence there is a small border of grass called “no man’s land” if any prisoner was seen on the grass, they would be considered to be trying to escape and would be shot from one of the guard towers.
Often times the SS would play sick games with the prisoners, for example: all prisoners were required to wear a cap at all times. The guards would take off the prisoner’s cap and throw it into no man’s land, then tell them to go get it. If they ignored the guard’s orders they will be severely punished and if they go into no man’s land they will get shot. The SS would often play disgusting games such as this in which the prisoners could not win.
Another sick rule they made was: all the prisoners were issued uniforms that had pockets and anyone who placed their hands inside their pockets would be shot. In the winter, temperatures would often reach -10 C and the prisoners had to wear these thin uniforms and work long days outside without gloves on, so an inherent and natural warming technique would be to put their hands in their pockets; however, if they did they would get shot. So one would think, why even put pockets in their uniforms if they were not allowed to use them?
The death toll estimates at Dachau are about 60-70,000, which is low considering they did not account for Jewish or Soviet deaths from 1943-1935, at the height of the camp’s operation. Dachau was the first concentration camp of the Nazi regime and prisoners were sent here to work on armament for the Nazi forces. Dachau was opened in 1933 and started receiving 2,000 prisoners yearly. It capacity was for about 2,000 prisoners; however at the height of its operation it had around 200,000 prisoners working well over its maximum capacity.
Once prisoners reached Dachau, they would have to register and check in where they were treated poorly and beat by screaming SS officers. They would then have to strip naked and get all the hair on their body shaved off; however, the instrument used to shave off their hair was not gentle and would basically just rip off the hair right out of their skin, leaving open sores. Then they were required to take a shower in an alcoholic liquid to remove their impurities from their body, with the open sores from their hair being ripped out made it very painful.
After the shower they were then rushed to pick their uniform. The prisoners were not given any time to pick sizes, if they did not get their uniforms quickly enough they would be punished and beat. So the prisoners would just grab whatever they could, often choosing pants that were too big and shirts that were too small. They would then get punished and beat for not picking a uniform that fit. The uniforms were very thin and each prisoner would receive a triangle of a different color to indicate their status in the camp. Red meant political prisoners, green meant habitual criminals, blue meant foreign forced laborers (mostly Soviets), pink meant homosexuals, purple meant Jehovah’s Witnesses, black meant mentally retarded, and handicapped, and brown meant gypsies. An inverted yellow triangle behind any of these meant that you were a Jew, which made no sense because Jehovah’s witnesses could also be Jews. A bar above the triangle signifies repeat offenders. A target meant that you had once tried to escape and the target would be placed right above your heart so the SS would know where to shoot and kill you. An outlined black triangle above a yellow one meant that you were an Aryan man who had sex with a Jewish woman and a yellow triangle on top of a black triangle meant that you were a Aryan woman who had sex with a Jewish man, thus denigrating the Aryan race.

There were three forms of punishment in the concentration camp system, called the three Bs: Beam, Box, and Bunker. The Beam was a beam attached between two columns, here misbehaving prisoners would be hung by their hands until many of their bones broke and they could not work for 2 weeks or sometimes they would never be able to work again. The box was a box in which the prisoner would receive whippings: 25 by two people (so 50 in total). The SS guards would often times make prisoners of different ethnic backgrounds whip each other, in order to ignite a hatred among ethnicities and create more animosity inside the concentration camp. Finally, the bunker, the most inhuman form of punishment, is a long building with around 60 rooms in which misbehaving prisoners would be sent for solitary confinement. They would receive one meal every three days and have no human contact whatsoever, this was considered the better circumstance. The other bunker room was a tiny room, not high enough to fully stand in and completely dark. The sound proofing inside the bunker was very bad and late into the night, prisoners would be able to hear guards getting another prisoner and taking him outside to be shot. The Nazis had a system in which they had to send a punishment approval to Berlin and have it confirmed before they could punish any prisoner. This meant that prisoners would often have to wait weeks before they were punished. The prisoners have said that the waiting time was more torturous, not knowing when they were finally going to get punished killed them, and were actually relieved when they finally got punished. While touring the bunkers, there is an incident described in which an SS killed one of the prisoners; however, they staged it and made it look as if the prisoner had killed himself.
The operation of Dachau can be split into 3 different stages. The 3 stages are identified by the population of Dachau at the time. In the first stage, each barrack held around 200 prisoners. In the second stage, each barrack held around 600 people. Finally in the third stage, each barrack held around 2,000 people. The barracks were originally only meant to hold around 200 people and in the third stage the conditions got so cramped that people would die because they got smashed in their sleep. They had a small bathroom and feces and urine would be everywhere. Their dining area was so small and they would often have to fight over very tiny portions of meals. The conditions were truly unimaginable.
On the site of Dachau there are two crematoriums. The first one was built because it was becoming too difficult to dispose of the bodies since there were so many. The second one was built because it was becoming too difficult to cremate the amount of bodies they had in a timely fashion. The second crematorium is adjacent to a gas chamber, where the Nazis made prisoners think that they were taking a shower, instead they were getting gassed. They even put sick jokes on the wall stating, don’t forget to wash your hands, making them think that they were actually taking a shower.
The most notable memorial inside the concentration camp, is a statue of a prisoner who has been freed with his hands in his pockets. Accounts from survivors of Dachau stated that they most liberating feeling was to finally be able to put their hands inside their pockets and not have to constantly worry and remember that they were not allowed to put their hands inside their pocket. It is amazing that something so simple could be so meaningful.
“It won’t do to pretend that we can evoke the physical reality of the camps as they were when they functioned” (Kluger, 68). The entire time I was in the memorial I felt sick to my stomach. I have learned a lot about the Holocaust and the horrible treatment of Jews; however, being at the site where so many people were mistreated, tortured, and died really brings it home. I think to more fully understand the extent of the suffering and genocide, people must visit these memorials in order to remember those that have lost their lives and to let something like this happen again; however, there have been countless genocides similar to the Holocaust even after it happened, like in Rwanda, Cambodia, Yugoslavia, and now Darfur. Hopefully a visit here will help all to remember “nie wieder” (never again).

Munchen

2009-08-18T08:08:00.001-07:00

After a night at the opera and a mini adventure to Gaga’s Romanian bar, Kiley and I woke up at 5 AM for our weekend trip to Munich. We left the Westbahnhof and changed trains in Salzburg, then headed off to Munich. The European railway system is so convenient and efficient, one cal literally travel all over Europe just by taking the train. Its super easy and we ran into no difficulties despite not speaking German.
We arrived in Munich at around noon at the Hauptbahnhof or main station. It was massive and a lot like a miniature airport. There were souvenir shops and many fast dining options. There were about 30 platforms where trains arrived from all over Germany and Europe. After arriving, we headed out for lunch and I soon saw that Germany had as many if not more Kebap and Doner stands than Vienna.
After lunch we checked in our 40-person room at Jaeger’s (Hunter’s) Hostel. This was my first hostel experience and it was pretty horrific. Imagine 20 bunk beds 40 travelers in a small room sharing 2 bathrooms, not to mention there was a 40-person room next door and their bathrooms were not working, so they had to come and use our bathroom. I probably took the fastest shower of my life in the most crowded, uncomfortable, and un-private bathroom. I’m glad we did stay there because we met many travelers from all over: New Zealand, Austrilia, Portugal, England, and even someone who goes to UC Davis.
After checking in, we headed to the Olympic Stadium, which they converted to an amazing park and carnival much like the Prater and Donau Insel rolled into one. The different stadiums were all built in a strange, but cool wave0like look. Each of the different buildings: the main stadium, track and field arena, and swimming pool surrounded a lake with many walking and biking paths and beautiful green grass. We tired to find the apartments of the athletes where the 12 Israelis were murdered during the Munich Olympics, but were unable to do so.
Afterwards we headed to the Hofbrauhaus in Marienplatz, the center of town, the most famous, traditional, and touristy beer hall and garden in Munich and maybe all of Bavaria. It is only proper that we visit because the Bavarians love their beer. It is an integral part of their history and culture. The Hofbrauhaus has about 400 years worth of history. It was founded in 1589, just 73 years after Duke Wilhelm IV of Bavaria, created a brewing order of Bavaria, in which only four things were allowed to be put into beer: water, hops, barley, and yeast. The Bavarians are not allowed to put any preservatives or unnatural items into their beer, perhaps that is why its so good. They hold this standard to their beers even until today. Originally the Hofbrauhaus was only for the nobility and aristocrats, until 1828 when King Ludwig I declared the Hofbrauhaus a public beerhall.
Today the Hfbrauhaus features men dressed in Lederhosen and women in beer maid outfits. It is an enormous beer hall of 11,000 square meters and many rows of benches and tables. They serve 6 beers all in 1 L glasses: Hofbrau Dunkel, Hofbrau Original, Munchner Weisse, Radler, Dunkles Radler, and Russ’n. They also serve a selection of traditional Bavarian eats: sauerkraut, bratwurst, weisswurst, spatzel, and pretzels. It was a good experience to drink beer and eat a pretzel among locals and many tourists, listening to the traditional Bavarian music and old men siging drinking songs.
After visiting the Hofbrauhaus, we went to the English Gardens for a beer garden experience, by the Chineses Tower. Surrounded by trees and green grass there is a tower made of wood and straw that does not look Chinese at all, called the Chinese Tower. There are people playing traditional Bavarian music dressed in Lederhosen and hundreds of people drinking beers and eating wursts outside. This place seemed less toursity and more a local place to hangout, meet a friend, and grab a beer.
After the English Gardens, we returned to the hostel and talked to fellow travelers to end our first day in Munich.

Eisenstadt

2009-08-18T07:50:00.001-07:00

Eisenstadt is a little city a few hours outside of Vienna. It is famed for being the residence of the Esterhazy family. This members of this aristocratic family were close friends of the Habsburgs and ruled over the Eisenstadt area. Eisenstadt is also famous for being the final resting place of Joseph Haydn, the famous classical music composer and father of the quartet.
To understand the Esterhazys, Haydn, and their relation to Eisenstadt better, we visited a museum in Eisenstadt called the Haydn Explosiv. This was a very strange museum that tried way too hard to mix the modern with the classical. The carpet was colorful and full of different patterns: stripes, polka dots, and diagnal stripes. The wallpaper was periwinkle with strange colored portraits of the Esterhazys. To be honest, it looked like Tim Burton threw up in there. The employees at the Haydn Explosiv were also very strict and would not let us take any photos of their precious wallpaper and strange carpet. It was all just very bizarre.
One of the most famous members of the Esterhazy’s is Paul II. He was part of the Order of the Golden Fleece. He worked part time as an envoy in Naples, there he fell in love with music and had hopes to renew an orchestra for his family. After the Count of Mortzen, the original patron of Haydn and his music, fell into some economic troubles, Paul II picked right where Mortzen left off and employed Haydn to renew his orchestra. After a year of working together, Paul II passed away.
Nikolas I, younger brother of Paul II, was the next to lead the Esterhazy family. He lived a gorgeous lifestyle and was famous for his lavish festivals. He was known as the lover of splendor and in the Haydn Explosiv museum the columns in front of his portrait are gilded to signify his opulence. Nikolas I was the patron for Haydn for the longest, 28 years.
The last of the Esterhazys to work with Haydn was Nikolas II. He did not understand the opulent lifestyle of his grandfather Nikolas I. Perhaps he was influenced by the Enlightenment for his reign was in the 1800s at the height of the Enlightenment period. During the Enlightenment, there is rise in the sense of reason, free-thinking, and practicality. In order to economize, Nikolas II dismissed the orchestra.
Nikolas II’s rule can be compared to that of Josef II of the Habsburgs. He was a very practical, not wasteful ruler. He closed the contemplative order, forbade lavish funerals, and he even went so far as to introduce the reusable coffins. He was for enlightenment and absolutism. Josef II imposed top-down reforms and that is probably why his reforms were not lasting even though they were revolutionary.
Franz Josef Haydn was born in Austria in the early 1700s and was most famous for his music composing. He had been very musically talented since he was a young boy. As a boy, he sang in the world renowned Vienna Boys Choir until his voice became too low. After being dismissed from the Vienna Boys Choir, Haydn had a difficult time getting on his feet. The next 10 years were difficult for him. He earned money by giving piano lessons and playing music on the street. Afterwards, he became the music director for the Count of Mortzen and after having some financial troubles was recommended to Paul II of the Esterhazys. He worked for the Esterhazys for nearly 30 years. His works were always a big hit and soon became famous all over Europe. At the beginning of his career with the Esterhazys, he was considered lucky to be under the patronage of the Esterhazy family; however, after a few years the sentiments changed and the Esterhazys were said to be lucky to have Haydn compose for them. His music is still revered and appreciated even today and Haydn’s name will always be sinonmous with great classical musical and melodic symphonies. “He has left us at least two truly magnificent choral works, the Nelson Mass and an oratorio, The Creation” (Parsons 181).

Schonbrunn

2009-08-10T22:36:00.001-07:00

Today we visited the Schonbrunn, which was the Habsburgs pleasure palace starting from the 17th century. It was destroyed during the Second Turkish Siege on Vienna. The Turkish siege lasted for 2 months in 1683. The Ottomans eventually retreated in September 1683 after taking over Vienna in July. The Ottomans wanted to overtake Vienna due to its strategic location on the Danube and in Central Europe, also because it was the residence of the most influential empire in all of Europe, the Habsburgs. However, the Turks left before the fall of winter due to the cold. This was very helpful for Leopold I, king at the time, because it helped him to rally the people behind him and Catholicism, somewhat like a crusade against the Muslim Turks (Beller, 71).
Since its destruction, Maria Theresia had it remodeled in Rococo style. The Schonbrunn greatly represents the outwardly lavish and opulent lifestyle the Habsburgs lived. The palace is painted with a rich gold color, called Schonbrunn geld, to represent wealth and stature. The gardens in the back of the palace are of the Neo-Classical, French style with a very geometric and manicured look. The garden contains a large fountain with great Ancient Greek like statues and there is a great gloriet built on top of a hill with magnificent views. The Schonnbrunn garden is complete with its very own zoo, containing many exotic animals. This zoo was here even during Maria Theresia’s time. Just as in Vienna: A Cultural History, Parsons writes about the Habsburgs obsession with the exotic and used their wealth to obtain foreign objects to woo their subjects, for instance: their obsessions with elephants.
At the start of the tour of the inside of the Schonbrunn, you start by observing Franz Josef’s quarters. He was a very practical and hardworking king. His rooms were very simple and practical. There were very few displays of lavishness or splendor. Fran Josef was said to have started working before five in the morning, even having breakfast and lunch served to him at his desk. He was a family man, with pictures of his wife Sisi and children adorning his study and desk.
His wife, Sisi; however, was not as frugal or practical. All of her rooms were decorated lavishly with silk walls, gold thread, and many opulent chandeliers hanging from the ceiling. It is said that Sisi did not adore Franz Josef the way he adored her. She would often be out of Vienna traveling and would never join the family for dinner so that she could keep her slendor figure. This demonstrates the need of the Habsburgs to keep up with outward appearances. This is especially evident in the rooms in which they receive guests. For instance the Great Gallery, where they held balls, receptions, and banquets was an enormous 40 meter long room with amazing detailed frescoes on the ceiling and hanging from it two large, decadent, gilded chandeliers.
The Schonbrunn is mostly decorated with paintings either of family, landscapes, or royal processions. For instance, there are three rooms, the Rosa Rooms, dedicated just for the art of Joseph Rosa. He painted scenes from the Habsburgs ancestral seat in Aargau, Switzerland. In the Children’s Room, the walls are adorned with portraits of all eleven of Maria Theresia’s daughters. Also, in the Hall of Ceremonies there is a painting of a wedding with 98 carriages following the wedding processions. This also shows the wasteful opulence of the habsburgs. It is very unnecessary to display their riches in such a way. I believe that the Habsburgs should show their status to some extent; however, it is not very necessary to overdo it in the way that they do. Like I said before, there are better places the money can go, especially into social reform and ensuring that their subjects live a better and more prosperous life.

Danube, Stephansdom, Schatzkammer

2009-08-09T13:27:00.001-07:00

We started the day taking a bike trip along the Danube. We went to the Prater (an amusement park) to rent bikes and biked across a bridge onto Donau Insel. Since so many of the Viennese citizens bike, the city is very biking friendly. There are bike lanes everywhere and bicycle riders even have their own stoplight apart from pedestrians and cars. This is very different from America, where bikers just have a small little piece of road to ride on and making left turns is very difficult. The bridge even had a pedestrian and biking zone on the lower level. Once we got to Donau Insel, there were many walking and biking trails. Again, I saw many Turkish people barbecuing and enjoying picnics. Also on the way to the island, there were many graffiti signs of the PKK, a Kurdish Nationalist party in Turkey, which made me infer that most of the Turks here are actually Kurds who may have been oppressed by the Sunni majority. Along the biking path there were a lot of picnic tables and places where you could get down into the water. Closer to the bridge there were many bars and places to rent paddle boats and other fun water toys. The Donau Insel is actually a man made island and has proved to be a big hit with the Viennese. It is a lot like going into the countryside without getting out of the city. Today it was too cold to jump into the water, but I would definitely like to swim into the water soon.
After biking along the Danube, we headed back into Central Vienna to visit the Stephansdom. Since previously it was really crowded and I was unable to visit some of the sites. We visited the catacombs and the north tower. The catacombs were quite interesting and unique, I had never seen anything like it. The catacombs are a series of crypts and vaults beneath the gothic Stephansdom. Again, the icon of Jesus being crucified is omnipresent, on various walls through out the catacombs. The catacombs start with a vault specifically dedicated to high-ranking church officials. Here they have actually tombs and they are stacked about 9 to a wall (3x3). After the first crypt the other crypts are the final resting places of the hoi polloi. At first they would place the people and their coffins in here and stack them one by one; however, the smell became so strong and unbearable that people could smell the rotting carcasses from the Stephansplatz and also inside the church. During the plague, so many people were dying in Vienna that they did not have enough time to build coffins or give proper funeral processions for those who had died, that they just dug a hole in the Stephansplatz and would dump bodies into the catacombs of the church. Looking into the vault, you can see a lot of deteriorating bones. I had never seen so many bones in my life, it was quite a sight. The catacombs eventually began to reek and reach maximum capacity, so as punishment to prisoners, they had to clean the deceased bones and stack them to allow for optimal storage. In this crypt, the bones were neatly stacked with a skull for about every 100 bones. It seems that during the Middle Ages, prisoners had no social or civil rights. Nowadays in America, it would be considered cruel and unusual punishment to make felons clean and stack bones of the deceased.
After visiting the Stephansdom, we visited the Schatzkammer or the Imperial Treasury. The Schatzkammer is a museum located in the Hofburg and houses the jewels and valuable possessions of the Habsburg emperors and empresses. Among the gilded and precious jewel adorned items, the notable ones are: the Imperial Crown of Austria and the Holy Roman Empire, the Coronation mantle of the Holy Roman Empire, the Order of the Golden Fleece necklace, and the largest Emerald in the world. This truly shows the opulence of the Habsburgs. In my opinion, these items are completely unnecessary and all the ceremonial processions that the royalty have to go through are completely superfluous. I understand that the monarchy had to display some sort of grandiose; however, it is at the expense of their hardworking people that they were able to receive these wonderful items and they did not make much of an effort to see that all their people were living above poverty. This money could have been better used to benefit society, especially since most of the items displayed at the Schatzkammer was just for looking at or only used once. Seeing all that the Habsburgs have has really shown me that they are very wasteful and harmful to the economy for their people.

First Weekend

2009-08-08T16:42:00.001-07:00

The Naschmarkt is a huge outdoor market covered by awning. In the entrance near the Opera house, there are two rows of restaurant, serving all different types of cuisine: Asian, Austrian, Mediteranean, and Turkish (to name a few). After traveling further down, they offer a lot of fresh produce. There were many stands that sold fresh vegetables, fruit, meat and nuts. There were also stands that sold freshly made ravioli, tortellini, pickled vegetables, sun-dried tomatoes, and olives. I noticed that most of the salesmen were Turkish and I even found a few stores that sold Turkish Delight. It reminded me a lot of the Spice Market and Grand Bazaar in Istanbul. It was interesting to see that most of the stands sold the same thing. There were over 40 stands selling the same exact thing. I wonder how they make money, the competition must be very high since everyone is selling the same thing. Since it was Saturday, the Naschmarkt also puts on a flea market. It was full of a bunch of antiques and used goods.
Kaisergruft is the final resting place of many of the Habsburgs. Originally called the Capuchin Monastery, it was commissioned by Empress Anna to be her final resting place along with her husband Emperor Matthias. Since Ferdinand III, the Kaisergruft has become the burial place for the Habsburgs. Among the bodies buried in the vaults, 12 are emperors and 17 are empresses. Some famous Habsburgs that are buried here include: Leopold I, Karl VI, Sisi, Maria Theresa, Joseph I, and Franz Joseph I. Along with the emperors and empresses buried here, their family members are also buried here. The tombs are made of metal and have very intricate designs on the surface. Inside the vault, Jesus being crucified is an omnipresent idol, whether carved onto the tombs themselves or hanging on the surfaces of the walls. It is very easy to tell who the important figure’s tombs are, they are very extravagant, large, and have intricate carvings decorating the surface. The most magnificent vault in the building belongs to Maria Theresa. It is very obvious that her tomb is the oversized metal coffin in the direct center of the vault. Her remains are surrounded by Joseph I and Franz I. There are also some very small coffins, which I suspect may have belonged to babies who have passed away. Vienna a Cultural History states that the Kaisergruft was the burial place for only the Habsburg family. There decadent lifestyles were also carried into the afterlife where the coffins decorations and extra adornments could help one to determine the status of the specific person. For instance “coffins draped in black velvet and gold brocade signified that the occupants were rulers or their spouses, while red velvet and silver brocade were for the archdukes, archduchesses and their immediate families” (Parsons, 72).
After visiting the Kaisergruft, we visited the Beethoven house. Since it is not in central Vienna, our guidebook did not have very explicit directions on how to get there. So we proceeded to ask some people we saw on the street, however it did not seem that anyone knew that this attraction existed. We went all over town and checked the maps at the bus stops and finally found Probusgasse 6, where Beethoven’s house was. It was a modest little cottage with two stories and a courtyard in the middle. The actual museum was very small and did not have much besides some two original papers written by Beethoven. That was when I realized why no one knew where this supposed Beethoven’s house was because it is not much of an attraction (it did not even get its own section in the guidebook it was just mentioned in passing). After paying the entrance fee, I entered the house and read an information wall that said something on the lines of: recent research has placed doubts on the fact that this was actually Beethoven’s house, but it give us a good idea of what a house in the 1800s may have looked like. I was a bit disappointed that I had searched so long for a house that may or may not have belonged to Beethoven. Nevertheless, it was nice to get out of the immediate city and see the sights. We actually ran across a Heuliger that used to be Beethoven’s house and an apartment that Albert Einstein once lived in.

Kunsthistoriches Museum

2009-08-07T18:04:00.001-07:00

The Kunsthistoriches Museum is a museum that predominantly displays the art from the upper Belvedere collection, which was opened by Maria Theresia. The museum features many famous works of art from the Gothic, Renaissance, and Baroque art periods. The building the museum is located in is part of the Hofburg. It is one of two identical buildings facing one another, part of a bilateral system. The other building now houses the Natural History Museum. The two buildings are built in a Neo-Renaissance style.
Carnival is considered the period after Christmas and before Easter and Lent is the period after Easter in which people would have to engage in fasting. Many historians used Bruegel’s painting in order to look at the daily life of the 16th century. During the reformation there is a tightening of moral screws and people become more and more conservative. It is interesting to see how indulgent the people were and then how very conservative they became.
Other interesting works by Bruegel on display at the Kunsthistoriches Museum include: Gloomy Day, The Return of the Herd, and Hunters in the Snow. Each of these three paintings conveys one of the four seasons. Gloomy Day represents spring, The Return of the Herd represents autumn, and Hunters in the Snow represents winter; the summer representation: Haymaking is on display in Prague. These season paintings are revolutionary because they demonstrate the period after the Reformation in which there is a shift from religious paintings to one of daily life scenes and landscapes.
Catholic and Protestant paintings differ in many areas. Because the Protestant faith preaches a “sola scriptura” ideology; it follows the idea that you don’t need to do anything for salvation and will receive salvation by grace alone. However, the Catholic faith incorporates the use of rosaries, saints, pilgrimages, and confessions to reach salvation. Because of the differences in ideology, the Protestant art does not focus at all on saints, but the Catholic art does. Furthermore, a lot of the Catholic art features visions of the Virgin Mary and demonstrates other Catholic practices, such as public Catholic exorcisms. An interesting feature of Catholic art is that after the Counter-Reformation saints have to have visions of the Virgin Mary as part of the painting. In these paintings, the Virgin Mary is usually featured very discretely as a triangle near the top of the painting.
The more interesting paintings of the museum are the portraits of the Habsburg. The most interesting of course is the portrait of Charles II. It is very evident that “you, happy Austria, marry” the Habsburgs had married into many royal families in order to acquire lands and kingdoms, instead of waging many wars. The portrait of Charles II very clearly shows the consequences of interbreeding between royal families. He is very pale, has a large nose, plump lips, and an enormous under-bite.
It was cool to actually see the differences between the different art periods that we had talked about in class. Before, when I visited art museums, such as the Louvre or the Prado, I could not really enjoy it because I had no knowledge or appreciation for art. But even just learning some basic characteristics of art styles and the history behind how they came to be and how they evolved, whether it is through religious movements or imperial influences, has really helped me to appreciate and enjoy looking at art. I can appreciate the hard work the artist put into his painting and I can also appreciate the history behind the art form used. This makes visits to art museums a lot more enjoyable.

Klosterneuberg

2009-08-06T14:55:00.001-07:00

Klosterneuburg is the site of an Augustinian monastery built in the 1100s. It was commissioned by Leopold III, a Babenberg, who later was canonized a saint. The story goes that Leopold and Agnes, his beloved wife, were riding their horses, when her veil flew off her head. Nine years later, while Leopold was hunting in the woods he found her veil and saw a vision of the Virgin Mary, who asked him to build her a church on the site in her honor.
In the early 1700s after Charles VI lost during the Spanish Succession, he felt the need to show the Habsburgs power and decided to make Klosterneuburg the Escorial of Austria. He wanted to build his own escorial because he lost the Spanish one. However he died seven years after they started construction. The construction stopped once he died 7 years later because his daughter Maria Theresia had other more important diplomatic issues to deal with than to see the building of this church go through. Its interesting to see because the church is unfinished you can see the way they were going about building the church. The new visitor’s entrance to the monastery is only partially finished. You can see that they were beginning to smooth out the sides of the walls and cover the brick with a more aesthetically pleasing covering.
Now, Klosterneuburg is the monastery for Augustinian canons, this did not happen until about 20 years after the church had been commissioned. This monastery has over 900 years of Augustinian history. The Augustinian canons are a monastic order that follow the teachings of St. Augustine. The process to become a canon is as follows: one can approach the order and will become a novice, after a year as a novice the chapter meets to determine if the novice can continue on. If the novice receives the chapter’s approval, he will take his simple vows for three years. After three years, the chapter will meet once again to determine if they would like to keep him for life. If admitted, he will take his solemn vows and becomes a member of the monastery for life. The process the chapter follows for voting on a novice is one that is seen in many organizations. The chapter members have black balls and white balls and will place white balls if they think the novice should pass. If the novice has more white balls then black balls, then he can move on to take his simple vows. The same process is implemented to go from taking simple vows to solemn vows. Currently there are 46 members in the Klosterneuburg monastery and the median age of its members is going down.
Klosterneuburg is also the site of one of Austria’s biggest and oldest wine estates, dating back nearly 900 years and consisting of 275 acres. The cellars are Baroque cellars dating back 270 years. The grapes are from all different areas in Austria. Each grape has a different soil and microclimate that is most conducive to its growth and taste. These grapes are then brought to Klosterneuburg where they are stomped, fermented, bottled, and shipped out for sale. The close location of the Danube made it easy in the past to ship the wines to various Bavarian monasteries. The cellars are very cool and conducive to the fermentation process. In order to tell if the conditions are good, they can check the types of mold growing inside the cellar. Black mold means that the conditions are good; however, once white mold starts to grow than the conditions inside the cellar are too humid. Every year they ship out about 600,000 bottles of wine.
After visiting the monastery of Klosterneuburg, we went to Heuriger or a wine tavern, where they serve young wines. Here you can order wines and some small tapas like dishes. It was a lot of fun to get to know everyone on the trip better over a nice glass of wine in a beautiful garden setting. I preferred the white wine to the red wine and I tried some of the traditional Austrian dishes, which were very delicious.

Karlskirche

2009-08-05T11:57:00.001-07:00

A visit to the Karlskirche museum really helped me to somewhat define the look of the Baroque style. The outside of the church was very similar to that of the Belvedere, also in Baroque, and the inside was very ornate. There were amazing murals of angels, saints, and priests covering the entire ceiling, which was very massive. You could even take the stairs up closer to the ceiling to see the amazing frescoes more closely, since they were restoring many of them. Up close you could not tell the characteristic of “tricking the eye” from the Baroque; however, when you were standing on the ground floor of the church looking up, you could see the illusions of angels following you and I could not really get a feel of how high the ceiling was or when structure ended and painting began. The inside of the church was adorned in a rich, deep red marble and gilded altars all over. It seems that a lot of the Baroque style is used to show off the grandness and the power of the Habsburg and the superiority of Catholicism, especially during the Reformation period. For instance, in the Belvedere the guesthouse, upper Belvedere, is an amazing structure set on top a hill outside the center of Vienna with gorgeous views of the city. The entrance to the guesthouse is a long pathway fit with an artificial pond, which mirrors the image of the Belvedere, this follows the Baroque styles tending towards the use of mirrors and reflections to create illusions.
It seems that this over the top “peacocking” could be a way to legitimize the Habsburg empire. Unlike the French to the west and the Ottomans to the east, the Habsburg did not engage themselves in great battles or wars in order to gain land and subjects; however, they created marriage alliances overseen by Maximilian I (Beller 41). The marriage between his son, Philip, and Juana of Castile helped to ensure the Habsburg line in Spain, which probably also led to the Habsburg allegiance to Catholicism.
After the rise of Protestantism and the conversion of many great European powers to Protestantism, the Habsburg still remained Catholic, while countries to the north and immediately west were becoming Protestant. This led to a power struggle between the Protestants and Catholics, resulting in the 30 Years war, which lasted from 1618 until 1648. This was initially a war between the Catholic Habsburgs and the Protestant Swedes; however, as the war progressed it turned from a religious war to a strategic war. The French were worried of the rising powers of the Habsburgs and in an effort to preserve the balance of powers in Europe, they, even though Catholic, joined the side of the Protestant Swedes to fight against the Habsburgs. In the end, the Catholics prevailed, after the death on battlefield of the Swedish King, Gustavos Adolphus.

Stephansdom

2009-08-04T13:07:00.001-07:00

Today I visited one of the most famous attractions in Vienna and maybe all of Austria, the Stephansdom. On my previous visit to Vienna, I had visited this cathedral and on both occasions the cathedral has been packed, but today it was worse than the last time. Because of the rain, almost all tourists sought refuge inside, instead of taking pictures from the outside. It was interesting to see the differences between the St. Stephens and the Votivkirche. I remember Dr. O talking about how many tourists mistake the Votivkirche for the Stephansdom and I can see how that could be a common mistake. They are a lot alike and with an untrained eye such as mine, it is very difficult to tell the difference between Neo-gothic and Gothic styles, hopefully after this trip I will be more well-versed in detecting the features of certain art forms and styles. The building of this church started in 1147, during the Middle Ages and different renovations and additions have been made throughout the following two centuries. I wanted to go up the bell tower in order to see the view of Vienna; however, the weather was very bad today and it was raining and cloudy, so I have decided to come back on another day to see the view along with the catacombs.
Back to news about my adapter blowing, I went on another mission to find an adapter today and finally after many stores I was able to find what I was looking for. I did, however, find that the people working at Cosmos, an electronic store, to be ever so unhelpful. They were sort of rude and were unwilling to help me, maybe it was because I was unable to speak to them in German. I then visited two other big chain electronic stores and was still unable to find an adapter to go from American to European. Finally on the way back to the apartment, I found a very small appliances store that sold everything from water filters to televisions. I thought it was strange that the big chain stores that would parallel Fry’s in America did not sell something as simple as an adapter. Back to the customer service, they were very slow and would just take their time with the customers ahead even if they saw that there was a very long line. I think maybe the sense of efficiency and time management is just as much of a priority here than it is back in the states. That carries into an observation I have made. Austrians and maybe Europeans in general really value their leisure time. For instance, some girls and I wanted to go out to eat so we checked in our Lonely Planet book to look for suggestions. We spent about half an hour trying to choose a place and then finding out how to get there. When we finally got there, we discovered that the restaurant has gone on summer vacation and has been closed since the middle of July and will not re-open until the end of August. It is interesting to see how their lives are not driven by the economy and consumers, how it is in America. Also for all meals they like to take their time and the waiters never bother you with the check until you ask for it. I am still not used to that yet and have found myself sitting and chatting for a very long time and still not receiving the bill, then I will remember that we have to ask for it first. It is nice that they value their company and leisure time so much and take things slowly.

Day 1

2009-08-03T12:37:00.000-07:00

August 3, 2009

Today started my second full day in Vienna. After doing the reading, I was a little bit disoriented by all the rulers, tribes, and empires that have rolled through and ruled Austria. It was nice to watch a video on the Hapsburg and receive a more concise and focused view of the great ruling family of Austria. I remembered that when I went to Spain a few years ago I visited and saw many of the Hapsburgs buried in Madrid and always never understood why. Now, it makes sense since during the time of Charles V, the Hapsburg ruled over the Spanish empire also since Philip of Burgundy married Juana of Castile allowing Charles V and Ferdinand of Austria to inherit parts of the Spanish empire. Also another tie I found with Spain and Austria is the Hundertwasser House. It reminded me a lot of the Gaudi buildings that I saw in Barcelona, similar style and innovation with lots of colors and no straight lines.

It was also interesting to see the Belvedere (beautiful view, with truly beautiful views) palace of Eugene of Savoy, defeater of the Turks. I have previously taken a class on the modern history of Turkey, so I am familiar with the events that occurred during the late Ottoman empire and the beginning of the Turkish republic; however, I am not as well informed about how the Ottomans acquired such a vast empire and where they won or lost important lands. It will be interesting to learn about the Ottomans from the perspective of the Hapsburg dynasty. I also found it hilarious when Dr. O told us about how the Turkish embassy in Vienna is right next to the summer palace of Eugene, the defeater of the Turks, even more ironic is that their embassy is actually on Prinz-Eugenstrasse. Speaking on a tangent off of the Ottomans, I have noticed that there are a lot of Turks here in Vienna. Doner and kebap cafes are just as prevalent as biergartens and wienerschnitzel stands. I know that the Turks immigrated in vast numbers to Germany during their industrial boom when the Germans needed cheap labor and the Turkish economy was suffering; however, I was not expecting to see so many Turks here in Vienna. I wonder why Turks have immigrated to Vienna.
A great thing about this trip is being able to learn history and be able to see it. This travel study program has made it very possible to make the history we learn to be tangible. For instance, today in class we talked about the Babenbergs, the Austrian rulers that preceded the Hapsburg, and then this afternoon we drove by the church of Klosterneurburg where Leopold, a Babenberg, built a church where he had found his wife’s veil that had been lost almost a decade before. It was also interesting to be able to tie the images and busts seen in the Hofburg to the Hapsburg we talked about in class today.
In the Lonely Planet guidebook and just from others’ experiences, I have found that the Viennese are known to be rude or proud people; however, I do not really find this the case. Today, I was out looking for a converter and I walked into this electronic store and since I only speak a little bit of German it was difficult to communicate with the clerk. Instead of sending me away, he got all the employees in the shop to try and help me with the problem. When that didn’t work, he got onto Yahoo! Translator and typed in what he said in German and translated it into English. It was a genius idea and I found it very nice that he would go through so much trouble to help me. Furthermore, I was able to practice the little German that I know in the cell phone shope when I was trying to get a SIM card. The shop owner told me that he as really happy that he was able to practice his English and I would be able to practice my German. I have made a really good connection with all the people I have at least attempted to speak my poor German with. They have always been very gracious and willing to help me, which makes me really happy that I did decide to go through the trouble to take German classes before coming on this trip (even though I only know a tiny bit it’s been very helpful).

2009-08-02T07:43:00.000-07:00

First full day in Vienna The day started out with the entire group meeting for the first time in the lobby of our housing complex. We headed toward our classroom, which is the Austro-American Institute. This building was from the 1890s and is right across the street from the famed Operstaat. It’s amazing that we have an opportunity to look right outside the window of our classroom and see such rich history and beautiful architecture. The Austro-American institute was originally created for cultural exchanges in Austria and was created and endorsed by many famous Austrians, such as: Strauss and Freud’s daughter. Nowadays it is used predominantly as a center for learning English for Austrians of all ages, even many companies send their employees here to learn English in order to internationalize their companies’ customers. In the summer it is mainly used as a classroom for foreign exchange programs, like ours. There are many notable landmarks just a couple blocks from our classroom, including the Albertina, Hofburg, and a memorial for 600 Austrians who died during a WWII bombing of an apartment complex.
The Hofburg is the palace of the Hapsburgs. The Hapsburgs family ruled the region from 1278-1918. The Hapsburgs finally ended their rule in 1918 due to the fall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire at the end of WWI. However, their legacy lives through their incredible palace. The enormity of the palace is due to the fact that each generation of Hapsburgs would build another addition to the palace. Furthermore, each generation would build the new section based off of the popular architectural style of the period, so the entire Hofburg is a collection of buildings in many different styles from Renaissance to Baroque to Neoclassical. Also many of the styles of the buildings in Vienna are based off of the function of a certain building. For instance if the style was Neo-gothic one can assume the building would be used for some civic affairs. Now many of the buildings of the Hofburg are used as museums housing many of the Hapsburg treasures and a library of important and rare works.