Advertisement
Published: August 22nd 2008
Edit Blog Post
Thursday, 8/21
In class we discussed the fall of the Habsburgs. WWI was the end of the Austrian Monarchy, and the later leaders of Austria were of various Socialist affiliations. We discussed the reparations placed on Austria, and I can't seem to wrap my mind around the rationality behind doing that. Maybe I don't understand our current war with Iraq, but it does not appear to me that when the war concludes we are planning on demanding that Iraq compensate us for the pain they have caused our nation. It seems to me like people will be happy enough to just have it over with. Upon finishing class, Roshni and I headed over to the Natural History musuem. Roshni is a BioSci major, so we had to go fulfill our science interested amidst all this art and history. The Natural History Musuem is identical to the Art History Musuem, and the two face each other as mirror reflections. The Austrians are really into symmetry I guess. We walked in to see the biggest amethyst I have ever seen. There was a whole wing of the building dedicated to minerals, so I was really excited. I could understand some of the labels,
Vienna 525
one of 4 rooms full of rocks despite being in German. That is one of the more fortunate things in science, the lingo is a bit more universal. I walked up and down rows of displays looking at some of the most amazing rocks. I can't even fathom the circumstances under which some of these crystals grew! There were so many rocks I even got sick of looking at them! I like rocks that show scrapes from glaciers, movement along fault lines, and deformation of crystals, and pretty minerals show less evidence of earth movement. There was a room full of meteorites, which was pretty interesting, but the room itself was about 10 degrees hotter than those previous, so it was making me sleepy and uncomfortable. The last display was a 3-D thing of the earth which I could have stared at for a lot longer if it weren't so hot, and I had a place to sit without other tourists elbowing me out of the way. We left the rock wing to go look at the microscope room and the animals. There was a lot of dumb stuff to look at under the microscopes, and it was primarily little kids taking their turns. I have spent
a lot of time in biology labs looking at squirming things on a slide so it doesn't really peak my interest these days. The cooler part of the room was the display of microscopes dating from the 1600's to today. It is interesting to see the development of microscope technology starting from such a long time ago, and seeing that there isn't much that has really changed in the structure of a microscope. It's interesting to think that there hasn't been a ton of improvement in hundreds of years on that particular device. We then headed to the marine life exhibit, and I found an example of something that I always find funny. Some words in the English language don't make much sense, but you see them translated literally into German. For example, a slimy sea critter called a "sea cucumber" in English is referred to in German as a "seegerken" which is a literal translation of the phrase. At the zoo the prairie dogs were called "prairie hunds". I enjoy observing the borrowing of phrases from one language to another. We looked at tons of exhibits on fish, sharks, frogs, snakes and birds, before we both decided it was
Vienna 541
sunfish! just for you mom! coffee time. The cafe had these mystery dessert options that looked like chocolate sauce in a cup. I had never seen or heard of anything similar before, so Roshni and I decided to order them. I got the chocolate-orange-cinnamon variety and Roshni ordered the chocolate mint though she got the white chocolate instead. It was like a pudding with a richer taste and a thinner consistency. Not a great idea to eat on an upset stomach, but I wasn't too worried. We spent our last minutes looking at the live exhibits in the lobby, which included turtles, lizards, fish, snakes and bugs. As an assignment our class has a list of things we need to see on our own time, and Roshni and I had both not seen St. Charles Cathedral yet, so we headed in that direction. Other classmates said they really enjoyed it, but Roshni and I weren't overly impressed. The architecture made the church resemble a mosque, and its only interesting feature was the panorama view. To see the panorama view, you had to take an elevator up a few stories and a staircase up the rest into the topmost dome. From the dome (which was unbelievably
Vienna 545
my chocolate dessert hot) you could get a panoramic view of the city. The staircase had a big warning sign saying "maximum 10 people" though there was no one counting. Typical Austrians. I'm sure there were about 25 people on the stairs at any given time. The church had a museum, so we climbed more stairs to check it out. It turned out to be a modern art exhibit, featuring the kind of art that makes you think "I can paint a canvas white too... how is that art?". The exhibit did have nice big couches though so we took a break and rested on them. Feeling satisfied with the day, Roshni and I headed home with the intention of taking an hour or so break before dinner. When we arrived back to our dorm, everyone was ready to go down the the Rathaus for dinner. Roshni and I took 5 minutes to get ready and went with the group. I had chicken tikka masala again, which was delicious, and we decided to go out on the town when we were done eating. At one bar I got a drink called the "Harry Potter" for some reason still unknown to me. It wasn't
Vienna 548
the panorama view that good, but I guess I did feel a bit more magical when I was done. We hung out at a hookah bar, and Roshni and I called it a night soon after so we could get home before the U-bahn closed.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.143s; Tpl: 0.015s; cc: 9; qc: 45; dbt: 0.0713s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb