Reason #806 i love my neighborhood: nobody has to shave their legs to take the kid to a drag show in the park (especially in the rain).

I know, i'm showing off.

Labels: vienna

Not bloody likely, clear. The snow is blowing sideways, blowing my eyes shut and watery, unwrapping scarves, borrowing hats if you're not careful, and the cold is never so bad but the wind, the wind. The wind! How anyone could forge a city in this blasted place, and i think, i know, i say this about everywhere i've ever lived, and sure, they might have been coming from somewhere unimaginable, but the wind.

It's lovely in summer.

It ain't summer.

The airplanes are always cold, i don't know yet what it will be, in america. It will be very, very far.

Labels: vienna

crummy coffee but i am still warmed to my toes. i leave my phone number at the international church, that i have a spare Gitterbett, maybe someone can use it, someone like me with no family in Vienna, maybe they will know someone who would need it, that i live here, nearby, and i feel oddly Christian, in the season, in this season, like that i've inadvertently eaten a fish on a Friday and only realized afterwards.

On Monday the sky will fall, yellow and green. If it is clear i will watch.

Labels: vienna

It was white in Vienna last night, on the sidewalk and the trees and the grass, cars wrapped in cloud with headlights showing the little rushing dancers. I remember driving in snow, the way it comes at you all hypnotic-like, and even now though i am not moving fast it comes in the same way when i look up, appearing out of nothingness, tracing paths that add up to chaos. The treeboughs in the park are thoroughly laden but it's only the first one, this year, this night, so across the street nobody has put up the dachlawine signs yet. Clearly this must mean there is no danger.

Labels: vienna

construction again and some fluorescent yellow vests direct traffic like matadors, flourishing their hands with every lane change. All stop! Now you! And stop again! The traffic is backed up badly on the main road. Some of the billboards have been taken down and there is a vista of holes, of cranes, of diggers and bulldozers, of some massively tall and solid and repeatedly loud machine that hammers holes in the ground. E covers her ears as we go by. Something on the internet said it would rain all week but there's not been a drop, it's always wrong but not enough to bet on so we go with the stroller and raincover, with the little pink umbrella, useless things in the end, i bring a fleece blanket when we go and teach her to say snug as a bug in a rug.

Labels: vienna

a rainy day, stopping often enough but never a lot of time for the street to dry. words on a shirt, words over a sandwich, words between coffee, an easy river. I watch the people go by on the street, raising and lowering umbrellas, hoods, newspaper. The beggars stand up and make their way homewards.

i dream: a boat, blue water, blue sky. i take myself away and breathe sunshine. all of this is just beginning. (all of this is just)

Labels: vienna, writing

a glider, over the city, just below the autumn clouds of morning. So delicate, so slow, and i imagine the pure silence of it. Compare to here on the road, the cars and the trucks and buses and the construction scrapes and hammers, big-man motorcycles with no mufflers, horns and radios and people shouting, and i look up and the glider skims the cumulus underside like a waterbug.

Labels: vienna

Was pushed to this coming weekend from July, to make room for the Euro cup. Europe's largest open air festival, with music and ... all those other things, free. (Maybe we should remember to bring a picnic.) Site. Map. Excerpts:

8 | Wr. Städtische Versicherung / Sicheres Wien - Insel
Samstag&Sonntag 14:00 Uhr Rettungshunde des Arbeiter Samariterbundes, des Roten Kreuzes, der Johanniter und der Österreichischen Rettungshundebrigade Zeigen Wie Sie Leben Retten
Samstag&Sonntag 17:00 Uhr Vorführung der Polizeidiensthunde Wien

9 | Eskimo / Kinderfreunde - Insel
Freitag, 5. Sept. 2008 von 14.00 bis 18.00 Uhr
Samstag, 6. Sept. 2008 von 13.00 bis 18.00 Uhr
Sonntag, 7. Sept. 2008 von 10.00 bis 18.00 Uhr
Samstag 14:00, 15:30 Uhr Kasperltheater - Puppenbühne der Wiener Kinderfreunde
Samstag 14:30 Uhr Showbox - Die Talenteshow mit Jungen Talenten, Präsentiert von Walter Mohl

14 | MTV - Insel
Taglich Von 15:00 - 20:00 Uhr wird täglich zu einem Graffiti Contest

20 | Arbeitswelt - Insel
Samstag 13:00 Uhr Live-Musik mit Calvados, What the Funk, Blue Zweigelt Blues Band, Capt. Minus und die Mathematiker, Take Off

23 | Kinder - Prater - Insel
Samstag, Sonntag 10:00 Uhr Kinder - Prater

50 | Sonstiges Jet Ski Freestyle Champions
Samstag 14:30 Uhr Freestyle Contest Group A
Samstag 15:30 Uhr Freestyle Contest Group B
Samstag 16:45 Uhr Backflip Contest
Sonntag 13:00 Uhr Final

also, Red Bull Flugtag 21 September. Holy Crazy Festival-Having Europeans, Batman.

Labels: festivities, vienna

but i didn't and i should have, i should have, except my German is not good enough to curse out a construction worker. Nowhere near. And if they were talking to me i could just ignore it anyway, like i always do, even though i should probably say something every single time, assholes, and honestly if i even noticed it any more i would? Is it sad that i am so used to being catcalled that i don't even notice? Fucked up fucking patriarchy, eh? But now you know the Turks have just scored over the Germans - with half the red team missing and the other half hurt - and thinking about it i kind of want them to win. Now. Because walking into work this morning i happened to arrive at the same time as one of the IT guys and he's kind of dark skinned, i think he's Indian or something, and by Indian, i mean subcontinent, with an elegant and many-syllabled name, so, yeah, fairly dark skinned. And they're building a new building at work and they're out paving the patio or some goddamned thing and one of the construction workers yelled at him and his face went dark and he walked faster in and i should have said something. I know which one it was. I think. It probably ruined his day (if, well, he's anything like me) and he's not even Turkish (on top of which, he's quite a nice guy and very helpful with all the IT things, especially for being new). And it might be just because the construction worker is some Aryan douchebag and the Turks are playing Germany tonight (Germany's tied it up, it'll be a decent game then) but i should have said something. And with the surprise and the lack of German skillz it was immediately too late. And what can i say? Du racist fucking schwein, how ... really ... what do you say? I know what i am going to say the next time someone catcalls me: My dog died this morning, Mein Hund ist heute Morgen tod. Immediately humanizing, completely depressing, will make anybody feel like the utter worthless heap of shit they ought to. And maybe i think it is perfect just because there was so much damn country music in Texas and i need something shorter and possibly less, well, snotty than i was drunk the day my Ma got out of prison. But i can't say that for someone else. And, um, when i do notice myself being catcalled, i forget it entirely in that angry red dark. Because i am angry. I want to hurt him. And while i like to think of myself as being nonviolent, there is not a lot of graffiti in Vienna, but a good percentage of what there is is "Kill All Racists" and "Nazis Must Die" and it kind of doesn't offend me at all. Advocating blood like that probably ought to, but nope. That graffiti is earned.

haHa! Apparently one says, greizbiereinbaumholerstein, though i'm spelling it wrong, which means, approximately, or as far as i can make it out, go fuck a hole in a dead tree. Awesome!

Labels: vienna

Aus einem Totenhaus 1.8.2008

La fille du régiment 2.8.2008

Leonard Bernstein dirigiert Bernstein, Gershwin, Sousa, Copland 3.8.2008

Herbert von Karajan: Falstaff 4.8.2008

Giuditta 5.8.2008

Joe Zawinul und Weather Update 6.8.2008

Symphonic Django 6.8.2008

Die Zauberflöte für Kinder 7.8.2008 (das ist meine lieblingest! aber, zu spät)

Labels: festivities, vienna

have i mentioned how i love being in a country with proper health care? I love it. I was ridiculously excited before we came, and remain so, that I get to pay into this system, where everybody can see a doctor when they need to and the prices of prescriptions are so low. LOVE IT. We have had nothing but positive experiences in the universal-health-care model, the government-provided, the socialist, the single-payer gorgeousness. If we were in the States, working, we'd have perfectly acceptable health care, for us, being solidly in the middle class (if not better, depending on your definitions) of wage-earning; the cost to us would be roughly equivalent, with all the copays you have to pay in the US being probably about the same in the end as the higher tax rate here; but there, it would be stinky and exclusive and mean and nasty and profit-oriented-bastardy. Whereas here we get, for pretty much the same price, decent health care for us, and also decent health care for everybody else, and it is awesome.

I am a little bit smug about it. Sorry.

Labels: health, vienna

It snowed here and somebody in the park made a snowman and by the time i took the dogs out for their evening walk most of the snow had melted but the snowman was still mostly there, though toppled over, and the dogs were very suspicious of it as i'm not entirely sure they've seen a half-melted snowman before, so we went over to it, slowly and suspiciously, and they sniffed at it and then it was fine. But it snowed! Lots! And the dogs are silly and fun.

Also there was a zombie flash mob on mariahilferstrasse on saturday but all the zombie flash mobs i have seen or heard of happened in places where it was warm, yeah? And the idea of getting possible blood stains on my winter coat - since it was, what, four degrees out - not so appealing. Hopefully they'll have another one in summer.

And the christmas markets have started.

Labels: dogs, festivities, vienna

why recycling is so easy in this country. And cute.

Labels: media, vienna

really. Really really. it was odd: most of the time, people learn we are american (i say "from near chicago" as texas and new york are places that people have opinions about, where chicago is less controversial) and they say, oh that's great, i'm from iran, let's be best friends. Or i don't speak a word of english, but it is wonderful that you are having a baby, so here have some more noodles. Or something to that effect - people have been very welcoming. this was the first time that we were really laid into for being americans at all, like there is something i can do about where i was born at this point. That we should all just go home. Crazed french lesbians did not apply this to themselves leaving a country that is obviously just as foreign to them; and eventually the waiter came out and told them to please shut up.

also, Rhine valley most picturesque place ever. and, Gimp photo editor kind of handy, but a bit unneccessarily cumbersome for just this: anyone know where MS Office Picture Manager went when i got a new hard drive and reinstalled both windows and office? Annoyed.

Labels: expat, vienna

so yesterday i am in the drugstore. i am being hit on by a young black man who i wasn't rude enough to make not follow me in, though i sort of hoped he wouldn't. we are the only customers. Really i should get hemorrhoid cream (which theoretically, being pregnant, i will need sooner or later, though at this point, it's all pretty much later on average, i guess, though sooner for me in terms of Time Remaining) or super-powerful dandruff shampoo (which i'm not allowed to use anyway, i checked, and there are nasty things in it, but still, and plus, i had two delicious pieces of california roll last night, which i am allowed to eat seeing as how they include (1) cooked (2) imitation crab sticks, and they were incredible even though i think they used actual pickles insted of cucumber but i am so starved for sushi i SO DON'T CARE) or something really awful to not be hit on, but i am lazy and get dog treats instead of thinking about it, which doesn't work and he keeps hitting on me. Young black man has a plastic bag with beer in it; i have a giant (GIANT) and very lumpy purse. The cashier is very rude to him and accuses him of stealing things. Cashier is not having a particularly bad day; she's as nice to me and my broken-ass German as she always is.

today i am in the same drugstore. same cashier. Not being hit on (though, clearly, i am an utter MILF). i am the only customer again. Still with a giant purse into which i could easily toss half the store. not only does the cashier not come out from the little windowless office to watch me poke through the shelves aimlessly, she mentions that there is cheaper toilet paper on sale in the other aisle when i go to check out (we'll see if it's scratchy/absorbent/et c), and i have to point out that she forgot to ring up my eye pencil after watching me run around with the thing in my hand to get the other bag of toilet paper.

Labels: people, vienna

from M:

If you want a quick google maps tour of the neighborhood, go to maps.google.com and type "kleistgasse wien austria." switch to hybrid or satellite and zoom in as far as you can - the arrows in the wrong spot, but whatever.

Drag S, and youll see our park. The blue thing is a swimming pool for kids, S of that is the railrod tracks, and if you follow them to where they disappear to the SW, youll see a rectangular concrete place. The city has two concrete ping-pong tables here:) S of that (SSW) is a largish building, its a nice little restaurant/cafe...we take the dogs there every once in a while and sit and watch people and munch on pretty good food. If you follow the path from the restaurant WSW youll come to a big street (actually a big bus/train station). On the S side of the path, just adjacent to the street are two of the fenced in dog zones where we take the dogs (you can barely see the line that divides it in half).

Follow the big rd N until you run into another big street (more park on the right side, its really nice). Cross the big street and on the right side is palace Belvedere, which is pretty magnificent (there are pictures of it on liz's blog linked somewhere).

At the N end of Belvedere is the street Rennweg. Some Austrian once remarked that "The Balkans begin at Rennweg". If you follow it NW you get lost in the inner city. Follow SE until you get to a large intersection. Rennweg continues sort of on the N side (this intersection is Fasangasse, and if you followed the cross street S, youd get to our favorite italian place). Our favorite grocery store is just a little ways further down Rennweg, S side, a big grey bldg just past a wide side street. If you now head directly S, youre back at our apt.

Now, follow the Rd in front of our park to the E (this rd is the gurtel, it circles around the whole inner city and is fairly famous as being the "red light" street, though theres only 1 brothel I can think of where we usually walk). Follow the Rd as it curves to the S and then head NE on the cross st. The big green area is not a park, but a place that will be developed, but they apparently will begin development next year (which theyve said every year for like 10 now i guess). Follow this Rd until you get to the X intersection. If you go straight W from the center of this intersection, youll see a parking lot. The shiny bldg just to the SE is Intercell, where liz works. The bldg opposite the parking lot is the unviersity, and the GMI is like the second bldg NE of the university. The walk to and from work is just over 15 minutes.

Labels: internet, vienna

is the number of larger-than-life completely naked people on billboards that i pass daily, one way, on my seventeen-minute walk to work. This is an actual number, not an exaggeration. I counted. And i walk slow: so seventeen minutes of walk is not very far. Most of them are in ads for either depilatory creams or "The Art of Seduction, from Warhol to Schiele," the upcoming installation at the Church of the Minorities - which i'm assuming no longer offers traditional services, but i'd have to check to be sure. One of them is a waist-up ad for a musical. This is not counting the following: cartoons, smaller than life-size ads for porn cinemas, Nelly Furtado's nipples, ads for Nabokov: The Opera, models on beds wearing very little other than shoes, people with ice cream bikinis, Softcore Porn Fest Vienna, giant blown-up derrieres (there's one ad campaign that is just a GIANT ASS, with a hand grabbing it, blown up so big you could actually count the hairs, and while i really which they'd airbrush that shit, we haven't quite figured out what it's for yet), people advertising clothing in various states of undress (which, okay, is just like Abercrombie and Fitch, but still!), naked dancers at ArtForArt (since the ads for naked dancers i've seen on the walk home, but they were on the side of a truck and are therefore not on a daily basis), and i'm sure i'm forgetting some.

it takes some getting used to. And i think it still catches my attention more than the natives', who are preacclimatized. The dancers were my favorite. The GIANT ASS is my least favorite: i think it's because of the hairs.

(This, from someone who has used (1) moving to fuzzy, fuzzy Europe and (2) "eventually it'll get hard to reach, now, right?" as "excuses" for not shaving my legs. we're going canoeing next week: we'll see how it goes with that, eh?)

Labels: media, vienna

i just got mommy tracked. it is not quite as bad as being fired - but close. that thing where the coyote runs off the cliff and then hangs in the air for a second, and it looks at you, and it didn't want this? it's a long way to fall.

and, on going back to work afterwards: if i don't go back, the Austrian government pays me for staying home and out of the workforce, and i get free health insurance, and don't have to find day care. and when i asked about it at the day care nearby, just to see, they thought i was kidding. They thought i was kidding. Go back? So soon? No, no, they prefer to take kids when they are 3. Years.

it has never occurred to me not to go back.

wait, what decade am i in?

Labels: baby, vienna, work

Eurospar.

dude, it's like a real supermarket in here. it's got to be, like, several hundred square feet!

They have paper towels. SCORE.

is it? it can't be. we've been disappointed repeatedly. But maybe. It does say soft, i think. At home: my god, white bread. guys, life just got so (oooooooooooooo) much better. because i will cut you is not something i look for in baked goods.

also, i don't care what people say about the hundred mile diet: sometimes a woman needs an avocado. That's all.

Labels: expat, vienna

more vienna photos. featured: Hofburg, the Gloriette at Schonbrunn (because, meanies, they don't let you take pictures inside and it's full of cameras now), more ruins, driving through Germany.

Labels: vienna

*not very factual on motorcycles either

:anmut: :annika: :chin: :dooce: :ewok mama: :food: :little frog school: :lj: :longform: :low odysseys: :natalya: :rich: :salon: :slate: :this is how: :unique yn:



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