Neu Donau (New Danube)

With a few weeks left in Vienna and finally some sunny weather (after a month of rain and clouds), exams have come into season, and so, like any good exchange student, I've shoved my notes into a broken desk and donned my swimsuit for days in the sunshine along the Neu Donau. A canal carved from the dreamy azure river set to music composed so perfectly by Strauss. A flood control from the waterway that stretches into many European capitols I've visited this semester: Vienna, Budapest, Belgrade. The Danube. It is a wonderful place to enjoy summer. My friends and I have had our fair share of picnics and beach towel talks on the grassy bank. We've swam across, waving at the small sail boats that drift passed us, had algae fights, and the girls have floated in the five-pointed star fish formation. One or two of us may have jumped off the pedestrian bridge--after checking with the locals to know where to land of course.

I think my favorite thing about the Donau is the diversity. With a nearby mosque, there are plenty of women covered head to toe with at least three generations of their families gathered for immense barbecues sitting quite nearby a solitary topless woman lying prone and immersed in a good book. There are young people, old people, bikers, swimmers, dogs, and babies. The last time I was there, I got to see a fit older man roller-blading with Nordic walking sticks in his underwear. I'm pretty sure he was a wizard.

Vienna: an overview

There are a few things in life that I find necessary for happiness: access to good food, something to pique my curiosity, and people who laugh at my jokes. Fortunately enough for me, Vienna is three for three. It is an extraordinary city--it never takes long to get across town, the architecture is exquisite, and the weather is quite good. I have the liberty of a small kitchen which does its job, despite the electric burners, and complete lack of an oven. The cafes are as numerous as the stars, each with an infinite amount of calories temptingly wrapped up into parcels of pastries, chocolate, and cream. Up the street a ways is a Turkish market which provides me with fresh produce, sold to me by smiling men, fresh dates (the fruit, Dad), and a segue to all the other memories of peddler markets of past. But, what really makes Vienna incredible is the people I've become friends with. To list them by nationality reads like a bad joke or a NATO meeting: 3 Belgians, 4 Frenchies, and the smallest half Taiwanese-American I've ever met.

Together we take full advantage of our embarrassingly easy semester abroad. We have picnics that last until midnight, complete with tea candles and imported fromage. We "suit up" for 5 Euro tickets at the opera or the ballet. We attend outdoor concerts hosted by the city, pass out roses to strangers (http://www.projektxchange.at/), and teach each other the colloquial phrases of our native tongues then translate them to French (Let's bounce = rebondissons). We pass notes in class, go running together, and have movie nights. We have sleepovers, study groups, and swap clothes. We travel together to nearby cities for the long weekends and tease each other when our ethnic stereotypes come true.

A huge decision of whether you like a place is based very little on the landscape and the sights, but more about the experiences you have and the people you meet. I know this blog has been long on the descriptions of places and short on character development. So here is a list of major players (we're already planning a reunion).

Simon: My travelling partner, a Belgian studying agriculture who often relays tidbits of random knowledge. Best adventure together so far was the time we scaled Mount Lovćen in Kotor, Montenegro in the rain. On the way down we broke into an abandoned 14th century chapel (boarded up to keep out the sheep) and had a Brie, baguette, and trail mix picnic while soaking wet.

Tine: The most chill Belgian chick I know. With a voice that holds so much wisdom in its slow tempo, a closet that contains a funky/rocker wardrobe, and entire bag full of games, Tine is awesome.

Valerie: the final Belgian. She and Tine study food science at the same university as Simon. Very welcoming and always twice as prepared as she needs to be, Valerie offers the assertive logic dimension to our group. She never crosses a road, unless the walking sign is on. Most importantly, she is the only one of us that has an oven in Vienna.

Oriol: Only half French. The other half is Catalan--a fact he will point out with a typical Mediterranean temperament and usually accompanied with a hair flip. He loves Barca (Barcelona football team), sleeps most of the day, dances like a fiend, and has the most expressive eyebrows I've ever seen. Fits the classic bachelor behavior.

Louis: A Parisian with a halo of crazy curls, topped with a hat that would better fit a 10 year-old boy. He's a thinker, lover of the arts, an adventurer. We get into philosophical conversations but he never takes himself too seriously.

Clotilde: was the first person I met from the group. For me, she fills my idea of a modern French woman. She keeps a sultry accent, a mastery of English and German, and this Euro-businesswoman self-confidence. To complete the look, she rocks some black leather, ankle-length, heeled boots.

Coline: Mon petit chat (my little cat). A shy French girl. Concerned, warm, and enthusiastic. We share secrets and ride the night bus home together. When something is really funny, this big burst of laughter escapes her, which makes the funny incident, funnier. We'll be friends for a long time.

Sylvia: A perpetually cheerful vegetarian who grew up in Taiwan and moved to the States when she was 14. Sylvia is responsible for procuring a lot of the group's enthusiasm and provides quality entertainment with some stories of home, demonstrations of free-style running, and complete naiveté in the kitchen.

Janneke: My lovely Dutch roommate. Getting her masters degree in Greek and Latin (and Hebrew), she knows about six languages, which still impresses me. We cook together, combine our laundry, and have those sweet bedtime talks about our days.

Croatia

Honey in bottles of hues changing with the sunlight.

Too many graveyards.

Lavender wrapped in soft purple tulle, tied with a violet ribbon.

Waves of perms in the donated trams.

Where are the young people? Do they hide during the day? Do they sleep?

Nuns with thick glasses carry olive branches.

Easter sells fresh flowers. Leave them for the dead, place them at the altar.

Hills made steeper with grocery bags stop the old in their tracks.

I watch them trapped mid-step in time like the fruit in their liqueur bottles.

Market Day in Jajce

Traveling alone can take some getting used to. For me, it took about 3 days. I went thought the phases of feeling completely isolated, then thinking about the people who care for me, then thinking about a certain person who used to care for me but now doesn't talk to me, then reverting back to beloved friends and family who are so far away, then getting upset that my solitary adventures had become me moping around--a viscous cycle that broke like a fever the morning of my second day in Jajce. I awoke with a blue sky in a room that was cold enough to keep me fully-clothed--hat included--under three blankets. I redressed as quickly as possible (not brave enough to attempt a shower), locked my door, and set out in search of the mid-week market, which was indecently easy to find as it was happening right across the street.

Round-faced men with turned-down noses too large for their faces and dark hair stood solidly in earth colored clothing beside decade-old truck beds filled with burlap sacks holding coarse grain. If you were not buying in bulk, you moved along the gravel packed ground. Rows of stalls selling hand-knitted socks, cheap rubber galoshes, instruments of house-cleaning, and Chinese manufactured clothing. Behind the stalls were men and women young and old. In a town that was still separated ethnically (Bosniak=Bosnian muslims and Bosnian Croats=Catholics who were indistinguishable to my foreign eyes), the weekly market brought people back together. Bow-legged old men in woolen jackets with black berets centered on their heads, pulled down enough to creat a comical look with the tab sometimes pointing straight up, walk carefully in small groups. Old country women squatting with their hands crossed in front of small bags of beans and handfuls of onions. I marvel at how they in that position, how and different their lives must be compared to mine. They look up at me expectantly, curiously, and defiantly--their wrinkled faces look me over in chorus and say, "we're not sure who you are, or where you come from, but as you can see we've brought our hard work to market, take advantage of it."

With this being communicated, they turn their kercheifed heqads back to one another, and I walk on. There are smiling women selling clumps of spring spinach, imported oranges, and the range of roots and fruits between. I point and reach for what I want and they obligingly follow me around with thionk plastic bags then resume their position behind the stand and weigh out my prouduce on old scales with counterweights of varying shapes, sizes, and luster. A man on crutches brushes past me, his one pant-leg pinned up past his knee. I wonder whether it was a result from a landmine (land mines were a common weapon in the Yugolslavic War and still remain scattered around the Bosnian countryside). Another man, this one with missing teeth, sells me half a dozen brown eggs from a plastic bucket. My final purches comes from two older ladies. It is the key to every meal, well to my every meal. Cheese. In this case, its fresh milk cheese; white and slightly sour in taste, the soft lump has been pressed into a circular mold, domed on top. They offer a slice to taste, then later a portion to buy.

I make my way back across the street to a freezing kitchen, where I create a farm fresh brunch that would rival my grandmother's in tastiness and Claire's in healthiness.

Jajce

Set upon a hill, I look across with awestruck eyes at a town that could fit the description in so many novels. I wonder whether I could describe it differently or even capture it with words at all. A river and time carved out a soft enough valley for people to stack red roofed white houses on top one another until ascending slope brought the climb to a standstill. 600 years of fortress ruins split the town into two unequal sections; the ramparts stretch brokenly to the meeting of two rivers which together spill unadulterated onto rocks far below. There's a patch of vivid green flatness on the other side spotted with haystacks. A football field turned to mud lays like an unseemly birthmark and carries the voices of young men. In addition to the neat houses, blocks of apartments--multi-storied and complete with washlines and echoes of children--are also cupped by the mountains. Both have wood piles, stacked just so; both show the bullet holes of the war that passed through in my lifetime. Passed though, but didn't pass, as bombed out buildings with their windows boarded shut and graveyards overfilled with dates of the early '90s remind me. I sit above the one for Muslims now, next to new heaps of earth. The stark white headstones are not as even as those in Arlington, but the memorials point upward as a final reminder of peace.

Napolju pada kisha ali ja u to ne verujem

The Vrbas in a melted teal frenzy swirled heavily creating white-capped eddys around tree trunk on flooded banks. The touched trees weeped new leaves of spring in reply. The delicate yellow-green crescents unfurled a contrast that suited the deep magenta of the upturned magnolia blossoms on the nearby street. From my solitary vantage point on a 16th century castle ruin, I could easily see that spring had arrived in Banja Luka as softly as the rain. It was hard to hold back the tears being alone with my thoughts in the cold drizzle of Bosnia. In an effort to manage my overwhelming feelings that spanned the range of serene liberty to heartbreak, I read and reread the Serbian saying on the back of the map. "It is raining outside, but I do not believe that it is."

Budapest

Wind wind wind. Wind, so strong it stopped me in my tracks, caught unprepared my unbuttoned jacket whipped behind me, like a rug pulled out from underfoot. Budapest, next to a turn in the Danube, was behind the Iron Curtain, but the fallen status could offer no more protection in 2010 than it had offered decades before. The people’s faces in Hungary, I’m sure, fell much sooner. Their demeanors were not the hard lines of people who had fought too hard for too long, neither were they etched with unspeakable grief. They were like the buildings. Cold and unseeing. Dreary concrete constructions from the outside with very few windows but a broken gate with many locks. From the inner courtyard you could look below ornate moldings and walk on intricately tiled floors, you could see that the inner walls were painted pastels grayed with time, but you had to get inside first. Things were private here.

In Pest, there were a great many people without homes. They laid side by side in the metro stations, or the pedestrian underpasses. Cardboard and beards. They sat ironically under statues memorializing the greatness of their country or they stood ironically selling bright cheerful balloons. They made their privacy with layers. Layers of clothes, layers of personalities, some had locked themselves from their minds. Too many locks.

The bus we had taken on Friday afternoon had left us tired. Our wanderings around the city in search of a place to stay had left us hungry. We took a break inside a coffee shop that had slot machines which blinked constantly with colors. Few people spoke English. Communication with them was performed rather than spoken. There was lots of pointing. Mostly we just talked with ourselves. We walked around Buda in the morning, to the top of the hill. Laughing, taking lots of pictures we covered the main sights until our feet couldn’t hold us up. Randomly we ate at a cheap Indian restaurant. Pale Hungarian women wrapped in saris gracefully served us on cheap metal dishes. The next stop was the baths; Budapest’s location on a fault line put to good use.

The famed hot springs were housed in a mansion with more pools than rooms—every temperature and shape imaginable, some scented, some full of people, some had fountains, some marked with lanes, some outside. The courtyard housed two half spheres with hot jets of water pouring from the bottom of two different, yet equally sensual, statues. One was a goose tweaking a woman’s nipple. There were stairs on the curved part where fit Europeans lounged—their ears getting cold in the 50 degree weather. Speedos abounded. A pair of older men played chess, the plastic board on a thick cement railing. It was a sight that made you laugh internally with the wonderment of it all. Relaxing, joking, people watching it was in every sense enjoyable. It felt good to be floating free.

It felt good until a man touched my leg. I glimpsed instantly into reality before shrugging it off as an accident in a pool full of people. I went back to lounging, keeping an eye on the good-looking man whose hand had brushed my thigh. The four travelers who made up our group entered a whirlpool where we were spun around with the current, racing each other and avoiding the elderly. My leg was touched again, too my surprise the same man as before was next to me. I told my friends and we joked about it. The third time it happened, I knew it was not an accident. The man became ugly in my eyes. I moved to a different area of the pool with my friends, we sat away from other people and talked about our plans for the next day. The man with short dark hair and a small blue speedo swam near. I moved further away and he quickly swum past grabbing my butt. The joking stopped in our group as I announced that I was going to take action.

The following moments could be surmised as momentous and surreal without actually being entirely momentous or completely surreal. Standing wet in a bikini, I was too angry to be cold. Speaking English to a fully-clothed guard, pointing out the man, hearing them speak Hungarian to one another, hearing the apparently drunk man’s excuse. Me announcing loudly with more pointing (so those who weren’t within earshot or couldn’t understand the language) could understand that this man was acting inappropriately. This was not the first time I had been sexually harassed, but it was the first time I had confronted the man. The fact that I was skimpily dressed in winter while doing so, added an element of humor, of the idea of equality. I was woman, hear me roar.

Sex Session = Secession [Gallery]

It started with a pair of humping turtles. Well, actually it started about an hour before when I met a fellow West Virginian and asked her whether she liked to go the Secession gallery with me. But in hindsight, our adventure began with two ceramic reptiles getting it on, on top of a counter. The gallery was supposed to show Art Nouveau, like Klimt, but all we could see in the dim light were red walls and black leather. I figured it was some sort of trendy nightclub where the Viennese could mingle among the art. We were told to go down the corridor and a flight of stairs to get to the exhibit. We began what became the most interesting walk of my time in Europe.

The dim lighting continued with tassels separating the cloak room to the hallway. Off to the left was a small orange room with plush walls, a mirror, and a bed taking up the entire space. On the bed was a box of tissues. Strange, guess this was progressive art.

The next room we passed had two large double beds and above them was a large plasma screen playing a very explicit porno. More boxes of tissues.

It dawned on me, a creeping realism of what sort of building we had just entered. I whisper to Amanda, who was still in her church clothes that I think we just paid 5 Euros to get into a sex club. Sure enough, the handout I was given by the severe Austrian receptionist explains that we had entered Element 6 a swingers (and noncommercial) sex club. After saying this out loud, still staring at the captivating fingering that was going on above our heads, I became very conscious of the man who checked our tickets. Did he know that we had made a mistake or was he expecting us to….you know?

Amanda looked at me with large frightened eyes and said we should leave. I had the same thought, I wouldn’t want to encounter anybody, but at the same time I was very curious. Just how far done the rabbit hole should we go? I told her we should see what else there was, after all, we hadn’t gone downstairs.

We passed another bedroom with tissue boxes, this time the walls had holes where eyes and genitalia could peep through. We passed a hot tub and finally went down the stairs. Passed a sauna, a small basement-like room held an assortment of lawn furniture and plastic trees. The trees and other plastic flora enclosed mattresses on the floor covered in red velvet adorned with more tissue boxes. It was after we got over the jungle fever that we looked up to the famous frieze lining the top section of the walls. The gold paint and naked women of Klimt.

There were several other people milling about the room. Amanda and I were unsure as to whether they knew they had purchased tickets to a sex club. Whether they were here for Klimts or clits or both. A striking blonde stood in the center speaking in English. We learned that the artist who earned 4 months of exhibition time at the gallery had sold it to an adult entertainer who had turned it into a functioning sex club. An artistic expression of the most progressive sort.

Coffee House Rules

With a cold gust of wind and a heavy pull on an old door, we left the empty street for a hazy coffee house. The fresh air in our lungs was instantly replaced that of smoke. Usually, I would be offended, but in the coffee house with old wooden chairs and cloth covered couches, it seemed more than appropriate. We sat at a small round table at the middle of the room, quietly staring. Posters covered an entire wall, they ranged from huge tapestry-like announcements of new museum exhibitions, to small print-outs informing the artistic audience of the next gig. The rest of the walls consisted of a bar, a full window that overlooked the street, and a more subdued wall with well-spaced framed art. This was my first coffee house in Vienna; it reminded me of a book I had read a long time ago. This was where the Radicals, rebels to Vienna’s formal and classical schools of thought, had fled to. It was here they discussed their philosophies, played chess, debated whether Hitler was good for Austria or not. The waiter came and went dressed in a tuxedo that seemed lavishly out of place, even on principal—the Radicals were against capitalism and embraced the socialist ideal of equality.

My chair in the center was conveniently facing a table that seated people who were made to be written about. The first couple was sitting next to each other drinking coffee. They were in love. Two very strong, artificial blonde Aryan men, whispering and smiling, touching each other on their shoulders, legs, necks. After they had gone another couple replaced them. This time it was older tattooed woman, wearing thick red lipstick and her partner in crime sporting a great handlebar mustache that formed a giant square arc around his mouth. He was wearing a great leather vest. The two that would look right at place straddling a Harley, were instead eating delicate pastries and mulling over a newspaper. The third and final character was, undoubtedly, the most Viennese. A hefty old man wearing a V-neck sweater and a newspaper boy cap. He sat down and ordered a snack of anchovies on buttered bread along with a coffee, his top lip hidden under the most ideal white mustache. He spent considerable time packing and lighting a wooden pipe which was clenched between his graying teeth. Upon lighting it to his satisfaction, he then strolled around the room puffing the scent of sweet tobacco like a one-man train. We left Café Hawelka long after the smell of his pipe had dissipated.

Chopin Dessert

Walking into the Music Hall was like stepping into a Napoleon, but instead of the rich layers of cream and pastry the building layered dessert of gold and wood. Everything gleamed. We stood and attempted to digest it all. Carved women looking eternally voluptuous held up the balconies. In the center of the stage, a magnificent black piano demanded our attention. The audience consisted of heavy fur coats and pearls. An older generation was sitting elegantly in the seats, while the young ones who only had 6 Euros to spare were standing in the back. It was warm and close in the room, a perfect medium for Chopin. I drifted as the music began. I thought about the Count of Monte Cristo, how he must have looked in a room not to different from this. I thought about the dresses and the highly-styled hair the women used to have. A loud note would call me back to the concert. But then the music would make me think about people, emotions, places, and I would be off again. Fans circulated slowly, hung carefully from painted ceilings, as if they were stirring honey. Mixing the shimmering gold and people’s thoughts.

Bratislava

Empty trees and red tiles on a few roofs broke the monotony of heavy whiteness that connected air and earth.

Classic buildings complete with white molding and dark wood accents adjacent to those of a severely square concrete description.

A government initiative had begun painting the cement blocks. Out of the ashes of communism rose Caribbean-colored buildings.

They stood out, but not as much as the fluorescent signs advertising the sex shops.

We climbed the winding stairs to the castle that overshadowed the icy Danube.

The path smelled like snow and cigars. The covered cobblestones held the scent and the trampled footsteps of those that had gone before.

From the top, I could see back in time. A bustling city criss-crossed with tram lines, a river heavy with trade, the ruling Hapsburgs.

Wandering back down, the years went back and forth. New restaurant, old opera house, new tram, old tram, McDonalds.

The people could be from both times. Old coats, heads down, white beards or high heels, dyed hair, four-door sedans.

A woman with a baby carriage was standing outside the main church. We brushed through the door to look inside. It was crowded with people standing in the back, a reminder I was not in England. We left when they fell to their knees on a Wednesday morning. The woman with the child knelt on the cold stone outside, her orange jacket stuck to the eyes that weren’t there for ashes.

Leaving London

It was like my birth, like the foggy blades of grass in the morning. It was morning, and I was wet, but not at all surprised. London has never been held in high esteem, for me, weather-wise. I needed a printer to get my boarding pass, so my last day in the Great Smoke turned from a simple affair of a bus ride to a train station into an urban safari. I was both explorer and pack mule…during morning rush hour. After fifteen minutes of walking like a spawning salmon against the current of business suits and black umbrellas, I was surprised my eyes hadn’t been gouged out. As I reached the end of my patience and ability to haul my bags, which were getting heavier with each minute in the rain, I glanced into a travel agency that hadn’t yet opened. A young man’s face was illuminated by a computer screen in a dark room. Okay, I thought, please be a Good Samaritan. I knocked and caught my breath. He came to the door. I began to gush like some overzealous fountain—asking for the favor, some sort of explanation, apologies. I attempted to look needy, but attractive. In actuality, I’m sure I came across as desperate and crazy. My plastered to my head with rain, a strange mix of clothes that didn’t make it into my suitcase, sweat trickling its way down the small of my back, my low rise jeans slunk to an indecently level beneath my hips.

This was an adventure. As I was gratefully printing out my pass, I came to the conclusion that in order to make the more miserable situations bearable, I must look at everything as an adventure. And when you’re carrying 4/5 of your weight in luggage, things are bound to be more interesting.