A Tale of Two Cities: Berlin and Vienna: Vienna: Museums, Parks, and Theater Continued

After spring break, I settled back into my life in Vienna, including immediately needing to get over another cold. I’ve honestly been sick more times this semester than in the past several years combined. It’s a bit frustrating at times, but I’ve managed to push through each of my bouts of illness. Also frustrating was having my wallet stolen at the beginning of May, but thankfully, with time, money, and some work, everything was replaceable.

One of the best things about Vienna has been seeing the flowers bloom as spring arrives. Especially wonderful were the blooming lilacs. Lilacs are my favorite scent and immediately remind me of home and family, since I have a lilac bush back home. Smelling the lilacs was like a scent of home in Austria, simultaneously wonderful and a bit sad since it made me a little homesick.

Another flower highlight is the rose garden in the Volkspark. There is every imaginable variety of rose in the garden, and our professor was completely on the mark when she described the roses as spectacular.

For class, we’ve continued to visit more museums. Highlights include Belvedere, the summer palace of Prince Eugene of Savoy, who served as a very successful military general for the Hapsburgs. It’s currently an art museum with art from a variety of art periods, including Gustav Klimt’s Der Kuss.

Source: http://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Datei:Gustav_Klimt_016.jpg&filetimestamp=20120409065933

Here are some shots of the palace itself.

Near Belevedere is Schwarzenburgplatz, which has this cool sculpture. According to our professor, it is composed of people interconnected with each other, although I just see cool geometric shapes. Regardless, I like it. In an interesting juxtaposition, behind the sculpture are a fountain (It’s great to walk through the square when it’s warm because of the mist) and the Soviet War Memorial.

We also visited the Heeresgeschichtliches Museum, Vienna's military history museum. Although not the most interesting thing for me, seeing the car/clothes in which Franz Ferdinand was killed (subsequently leading to the start of World War I) and the flamboyant Hungarian military uniforms, including turquoise ostrich feathers an leopard skin capes, were cool to see.

I also finally visited Stephansdom and I was surprised to find that it was one of the most beautiful things I've seen in Vienna. The day I was there, long colored plastic sheets were covering the windows (really similar to lighting gels), creating some absolutely beautiful light patters on the wall. Forget the Gothic style church architecture and the Baroque altars, the play of color and light on the wall was the amazing part. In places, the way the blues played on the ceiling made it look like the sky, as if it were enchanted like the Great Hall at Hogwarts.

Speaking of lighting, I’ve continued to be unimpressed by the lighting and yet impressed by the other elements of the theater we’ve seen. The worst experience was definitely a long production of Faust in which I spent much of the performance wondering whether I would faint from dehydration, while a highlight was Verrücktes Blut, a play based on a French film about a teacher taking her diverse group of underachieving students hostage. The play was good, but more impressive was seeing the French film La journee de la jupe (Skirt Day). I’ll just say it’s been a long time since a movie has made me cry. I highly recommend it.

However, the best play I've seen was Cate Blanchett and her theatre company's production of Big and Small. Although the scenes didn’t exactly connect together well, each scene was fantastic individually and the play was both funny and full of important themes. Most of all, Cate Blanchett is an amazing actress. I knew she was a great from her films, but seeing her perform on stage was a pleasure.

I also took a tour with my class of the Burgtheater, Vienna’s largest theatre where we’ve seen a number of shows. It was great to see the behind the scenes aspects of the theatre and the Burgtheater is impressive. There is a huge revolving stage, a 17m tall understage storage area, and 120 fly lines. However, the most fascinating part of the Burgtheater and theater here in general is how the entire scenery is changed on a daily basis. I can’t imagine working in a theater where the entire set needs to be rebuilt every day.