The Bombastics an der Ybbs

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And we're back, ladies and gentlemen, here in Barcelona where the sun always shines and the party doesn't start until 2am and almost everyone wears these weird sandals that come from the island Mallorca, and which Mark and I have seriously considered buying more than a few times (the sandals, not the island).

It's an interesting sensation to be here again at the end of our trip. I feel as if I've traveled back in time, and we're really just beginning our trip, but I mysteriously know all the experiences and friends I have to look forward to. Or sometimes it's like I'm looking back on the me that was here 5 weeks ago, a little jealous, but also a little smug. I've been on a boat to Rome. I've hiked through Cinque Terre. I've turned 26 in Poland. I've eaten vegetarian schnitzel in a beautiful home in Waidhofen an der Ybbs, Austria. What do you have to say to that, 5-weeks-ago-me, hmmm?

She says that my flight back to the US is in just 2 days, which means Mark and I have to get the blog up to date NOW or it will never ever happen and I'll feel guilty about it for weeks, repressing the feelings eventually until someone mentions it to me again.

Wow. She knows me exactly as well as I know myself.

So when we left off last, Mark and I had just exited Poland and were headed to Austria, snuggle-crammed together in the back seat of our friends' car. As you might know, we hadn't planned to go there at all. Instead, we thought that after Poland, we would head to Berlin, then Amsterdam, then Paris, then back to Barca. Typical tourist plan, I think. I'm so glad Philipp and Petra presented us with the opportunity to do something different.

snuggle-crammed into the backseat
Outside the castle during our speed-tour of Prague.

Some background: Philipp and Petra do a street show as "Witiwati und Rosa." Dressed in typical Austrian garb, they juggle and do partner acrobatics, and present a grand finale wherein they pass clubs while Philipp rides a tall unicycle and Petra balances on a slack-rope held up by volunteers.

The best thing about street performers, I've discovered, is getting to know them past just what they do in their show.

Petra works as an interior designer, about to go back to school for architecture, and Philipp is a doctor who speaks English, German, Spanish, and Danish. He's also the kind of person who when he says, "Let's do it!" he means, "Let's do it right now, no excuses, why aren't you moving already?" Which is why when I mentioned needing a post office in Brzeg, we spent 30 minutes following him as he asked random Polish citizens, eventually figured out the word for Post Office is "Poczta" (pronounced "Pochta") and found it several yards from where we started.

It's also why when he said that we should come to Waidhofen because we could perform in a festival with them and hike in the mountains and eat his mother's home-cooked meals and go to Adventure Park in the Trees, he didn't mean "Someday." He meant he had already emailed the festival organizer and we already had a spot and here was our confirmation email and his mom already knew we were vegetarians and she was already thinking about delicious traditional Austrian meals that she could modify.

Austria was amazing, mostly because of these two people and the people they introduced us to.

WAIDHOFEN:

We arrived in Waidhofen on Thursday, September 1st, unfolding ourselves out of the car into the cool mountain air. Petra and Philipp live in a lovely (mostly) renovated apartment near the center of the (mostly) small town. Mark mentioned in a previous post that sometimes we call them Mom and Dad. This is not just because we rode in their backseat for 9+ hours. It's also because they absolutely took care of us, whether it was taking us through Prague on a 1 hour rest stop or teaching us about Austria or feeding us delicious food or guiding us to wonderful places.

For example...

The first day, after a delicious breakfast of eggs and eierschwammerl (chanterelle mushrooms bought in an absurd quantity from a roadside stand in Poland) and bread, they showed us around town (which was cute), then took us to Philipp's parents house (also cute) to eat the first of many spectacular meals. We ate so much good food in Austria that we had Philipp and Petra help us make a list of it so we could remember it forever. You, too, will benefit from this list, oh yes, you too. That first lunch, we had nudelauflauf gemuse (noodle casserole with vegetables), zucchini soup, and zucchini cake (it's zucchini season in their garden) and cucumber salad. This gave Mark a chance to practice one of the only German sentence starters he knew: Wir lieben______(We love _______.). In this case, “Wir lieben Zucchini Kuchen (cake).”

Later that day, we performed our show two times in the Shopping Night Festival. It did NOT go well. Bad spots, bad luck, bad audience, bad voodoo. I don't know. Our first show in a new country never goes smoothly. Let's not mention it again.

Breakfast spread.

The next day, we went swimming in a beautifully clear and breathtakingly chilly river, the Ybbs. Happy and sundried, we headed to Philipp's parents' house (again) where we ate vegetarian goulash and more zucchini cake and drank the finest Austrian wine with Philipp's dad (a connoisseur). In the landscaped back yard, we practiced feats of acrobatic skill and juggled with our hosts' friends and played games with some curious neighborhood kids (who thought my attempts at counting to 10 in German were unbelievably hilarious).

Jump!
Fording the Ybbs on the way back to the car.
Passing in two-high. Total success on 2nd try. We're pros.
Our crowd.
Mark's idea of what to do with all the extra adults and kids.

The next day, hiking in the mountains, hangin' with some cows, and drinking delicious white beer in mountain refuge restaurants near the peak (giving Mark another opportunity to practice: Wir lieben Weissbier. Also, for some reason at this point, he learned to say “Mein Kopf ist gross” or “My head is big”). After hiking, Mom cooked us dinner of semmelknodel (bread dumplings) in eierschwammerl sauce, finishing with tiramisu, and Dad set up the movie Pumping Iron for us to watch, because he said it was “part of our culture.” (Pumping Iron is a documentary about Arnold Schwarzenegger and other body builders in the 1970's.)

More Austrian friends.

And the last day, delicious palatschinken (crepes) with an array of jams, all made by various moms. Since it was raining, our Adventure Park in the Trees plan was canceled, but instead we played the card game Dominion that Philipp had taught us the day before. Mark and I lost two games in a row to a dangerously caffeinated Philipp.

Before we caught the train to Vienna, we went one last time to eat lunch at Philipp's parents'. This time: kurbiscrèmesuppe (pumpkin soup) topped with toasted pumpkin seeds (also from the garden), breaded zucchini cutlets (vegetarian schnitzel!), and potato arugula salad. With the one remaining schnitzel, Philipp made us a to-go sandwich and packed us a train lunch complete with cookies and a napkin. We safely stowed it in Mark's backpack, along with homemade mothers' jam.

Lunch!

Packed lunch!

Sad goodbyes to our adopted mom and dad at the train station, and then we were off into the wide world, alone and scared....

Until Philipp's sister, Barbara met us at the train station in Vienna and welcomed us into her home and fed us bread and cheeses and kept us wonderful company for the next 5 days until she walked us to the train station again to see us off. And this is why we love Austria.

VIENNA:

In Vienna, things happened (as they tend to do).

Thing #1: We downloaded an audio-guide to Vienna (called "Your friend in Vienna!") for my iPod and wandered around the city listening to our friend tell us stories about famous buildings and people and mispronounce words like "marriage" ("marry-age"). With her in the lead, we visited the beautiful St. Steven's chapel and drank coffee at Cafe Hawelka, a Viennese coffee house famous as a hangout for poets and artists. And us. Booyakasha.

Espresso and melange and Klimt.

Thing #2: We practiced handstands in a park overlooking the Danube (that's right, the blue one).

Thing #3: We toured Schonbrunn Palace and surrounding grounds, summer home to the 17th-20th century Hapsburgs. Best things about this place? There's a maze built out of hedges and a glockenspiel you can dance on.

Mark hangs at the palace.
On the platform in the middle of the maze.

Thing #4: Our first night at dinner, Barbara's friend Ingrid came over. Barbara works with elderly patients in a nursing home, and Ingrid works at a neurological hospital for people of all ages with psychological diseases. After hearing about our street show, Ingrid invited us to come perform for the patients on Thursday afternoon. Never ones to shy away from totally bizarre opportunities, we agreed. Thursday afternoon, we performed our show the first time for a non-street audience, and it was a huge hit. After the show, we hung out and ate cake (another opportunity for "Wir lieben Kuchen") and showed the younger kids tricks they could do with one club. Some kids were happy just throwing and dropping the club over and over. One kid did every trick Mark showed him to total perfection, all while wearing a jaunty backwards baseball cap. At the end, Ingrid gave us a box of chocolate. All in all, it was a pretty awesome experience.

Thing #5: We toured a crypt underneath a church where the conditions are such that bodies naturally became mummified (picture bodies so well preserved you can see smooth cheeks and silken ruffles of their dresses). We were the only English-speaking members of the tour, so after giving a long speech in German to the rest, the guide would turn to us and say it again in English. It was half embarrassing and half like having our own personal tour guide.

Things #6-Whatever: We wandered through the Hofburg under the threat of rain and were introduced to the wild artist Egon Schiele in the Leopold Museum and posed with bizarre naked sculptures by the Danube and watched the Circus Roncalli tent go up in front of the Rathaus (Vienna City Hall) and walked through the Prater, Vienna's amusement park, and most wonderfully of all ate lovely meals with Barbara (and sometimes her boyfriend Florian) in her apartment talking about culture and language and why no one in Austria has ever seen The Sound of Music. It was a little sad to fly to Barcelona, wondering who would make us breakfast and tell us what part of town to visit and pack us typical Austrian treats...

Weird naked statues....and Mark!

Freak show statues at the Prater...and Mark!

All our stuff plus us plus Barbara crammed somehow into the tiniest elevator in Austria.

But we pulled through somehow, and now I'm here again in the Yellow Nest Hostel. It's 11pm and the spacious lounge area is filling up with people revving up to go out partying again. Mark is watching the movie Sherlock Holmes in an otherwise empty cinema room and I'm furiously typing in the corner.

We know how to party.

See you on the Stateside!