Arriving in Vienna

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When I found out that I would have a flight connection in Vienna on my way to Moldova for my new job, I was thrilled. I had lived here in 1981- 82 and had worked here as an au pair girl. I had a pretty good life here and had left with so many good memories. I started making plans to stay a few days and renew good memories.

A short history

I worked with a family doing housework, taking care of the kids, and being an English speaking influence in the family in exchange for room and board and pocket money. In my free time, I took German lessons at a Volksschule (school) and put a lot of effort into enjoying my life as a young woman here. I met other au pair girls and we would go out drinking wine, go to art museums, the theater, sometimes even do the tourist thing and see some of the sights.
There is one friend in particular that has kept up with me all these years. Marianne was an au pair girl who lived in the suburb as me called Baden bei Wien. We didn’t like our au pair families very much and were bonded by our similar situations. We eventually both moved to different families - Marianne to Grinzing and me to the Hillers in Langenzersdorf - but still went out and did things together. After Marianne went home to Norway, we wrote letters for a few years, but then lost contact. About ten years ago, Marianne found me on the internet and we’ve kept up with each other’s lives since then. I asked her if she wanted to join me for a few days in Vienna and the answer was an emphatic “Yes!” and we arranged to share a room and see the sights again.
I also got in touch with the Hillers , my second au pair family, and arranged to meet them.

When I found out that I would have a flight connection in Vienna on my way to my new job, I was thrilled. I had lived here in 1981 - 82 and had worked here as an au pair girl. I had a pretty good life here and had left with so many good memories. I started making plans to stay a few days and renew those memories.



Arriving in Wien

The flight was a mild preview of what I had forgotten about life in Vienna… brotchen (hard rolls) for breakfast, wine for drinking (free on the plane!), and German with a very strong Viennese accent. I arrived fairly early in the morning and was anxious to see Marianne.
Marianne’s flight landed an hour after me and we found each other at the baggage carousels with a big hug. She looked the same as she did 27 years ago. I would have recognized her anywhere.

We got to our hostel around 10:00 AM and found out that our room wouldn’t be ready until 2:00 PM. Rather than wait, I changed clothes, we left our bags at the hostel, and off we went like two kids on a playground. We couldn’t wait to see some of the places where we used hang out. We walked down Mariahilfer Straße to see the shops. I didn’t remember very much of these sites at all, but it was nice to get a light feel for the city. We had a wonderful meal in an outdoor café and talked about the old days and our present lives. So much had changed between us, but I felt we had never left.
After a quick nap back at the hostel we were off again and we went down to Kärtner Straße, the pedestrian zone. We saw the Stephans Dom, which is the big, medieval cathedral in the city center. It was open but only part of it. I lit a candle for Karen, a friend who died July 28th and took in the feel of the cathedral as I had so many years before. I remember I used to be able to go in, smell the incense, and hear the reverberations of the pipe organ through my body or enjoy the quiet in this ancient building. I remembered with a smile a time I went in late at night when no one else was around and someone was playing around on the pipe organ. I heard a very short rendition of “Can’t Buy Me Love” by the Beatles. Fleeting memories like this consumed this visit to Vienna.
Marianne and I just walked around trying to see what we recognized. I realized I had forgotten almost everything. Thank goodness Marianne was there because she remembered it all. Me? I just had little snippets of memory… a conversation, a joke, a person, an event.
It started to rain and we were pretty exhausted so we went back to the hostel and flopped in bed pretty quickly.

Baden bei Wien where we lived long ago

Marianne is much better at getting up and out than I am and we were up and ready to go to Baden bei Wein pretty early (by my standards). Marianne remembered the bus we had to take and had a pretty good idea of how to get around. I started to wonder where my memory left me. Why didn’t I remember this? Truth is, I barely remembered anything about Baden except the house I lived in and a few events there. Living in a German speaking country wasn’t new to me, but living with an ultra-controlling family was, and I think I just didn’t view living there as anything more than a new adventure gone wrong. I didn’t have a great amount of maturity back then and was not equipped to handle the situation or my role in it. I don’t think I noticed my surroundings very much. Now, coming back to the same place, I’m surprised by the beauty and quaintness of the place.
We found the houses where we used to live. I lived up a fairly long hill from Marianne. That was one thing I remembered much better that she did and I was not surprised when we were both winded when we got there. My au pair family was long since gone, but Marianne’s au pair family was still there. We didn’t ring the door bell.
We wandered through the woods to a place called Rudolfshof where we had eaten lunch with Marianne’s mom long ago and had our pictures taken. We both sat with our memories of our lives back then. We tried to tell the guy who took our picture that we were reenacting a picture taking 27 years ago. He didn’t seem as interested as we were. Oh, well, it was important to us!

After coming back from Baden, we went on to eat dinner and then have some wine at one of our favorite haunts - Zwölf Apostlkeller - a dark wine cellar where we would drink wine with groups of friends and have a good time. Marianne ordered ein viertel wein (a quarter liter of wine). I told her I thought that was a lot but she thought it would be just a small glass. When the mug of wine came out we had to laugh. We clinked our glass to the memories and happily went about making a new memory to laugh about, but hopefully not 27 years from now. The wine was very good. I really like Viennese wine and now I wonder how I could have forgotten that. We wobbled back to the hostel without much trouble sleeping that night.

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Photos

I don't travel light...
Moving to a foreign country for two years requires more than the lightweight backpack....

Marinne and me 1981
Rudolfs Hof in Baden bei Wien

Comments

[Marianne]

Vienna 2009
Why haven't I seen this earlier? Haha, good story! Did you really remember as little as you say, I didn't know. Is this really 3 years ago already? Time flies by.... Hope you are fine in Austin. We just came back from Germany, nice trip in both Rhine- and Moselle vallies - and a lot of wine tasting, of course :-)