The restaurant at Kunst Haus Wien
St. Stephen's Cathedral, Vienna
A Hunterwasser designed apartmet building, Vienna
Hoffburg Palace, Vienna
Loren challenging a statue to a duel in Vienna
Dear all (specifically Annie-pants),
I must send my sincerest apologies for being really bad about updating zou all as to my whereabouts. Time just seems to fly and it is actually pretty hard to find an hour in the day to sit down at an Internet cafe, catch up on all of my emails, and write. Anyhow, we are in Sarajevo today- got in early this morning after taking a 10 hour night train from Zagreb. We lucked out because the train was not a sleeper train (don't ask me why) but it was not very full so Loren and I spread out sleeping bags out after a lovely dinner of bread, cheese, and bananas and fell (sort of) to sleep for most of the trip. It was fine except for when passport officers and the conductor would just swing the door open to check our papers. They definitely DO NOT knock. A little scary.
Well, after arriving in Sarajevo we took a taxi (not New York prices!) to our guesthouse, the nicest, cutest place we have stayed so far. We have been staying in mostly budget hotels and some hostels but this place is not expensive, run by the most wonderful family with a very cute Dalmatian. When we got in at 6, the woman who runs the guesthouse was outside to greet us, brought us downstairs where we sat on comfy couches as she prepared a breakfast of fresh fruit, 2 kinds of yogurt, lots of fresh bread, tea, and eggs. And fresh OJ, not the watered down kind that we have been having for the past week. It was AWESOME to say the least.
So to catch you up on where I´ve been since I last wrote: we went to Vienna for 3 days, an amazing and very "green" city with tons of parks. It is a huge city, something like 124 square miles, making Manhattan look quite minute. Vienna also has this amazing system where people can rent bikes all over the city from these bike racks where they are locked and then return the bikes to their final destinations. It makes so much sense! The bikes each have big baskets so people can do all of their grocery shopping and then get close to home and drop off the bike at the nearest stand. There are also specific sidewalks next to the walkers sidewalks that are meant just for bikes. The whole system is pretty incredible and encourages a huge amount of people to live in a more eco- friendly way. Quite inspiring. Mayor Bloomberg could learn a thing or two.
In Vienna we also did some amazing cathedral and museum visiting. I won´t bore you with all of the gory details but my favorite place was a museum called Kunst Haus Wien, a building designed by and holding the art of Hunterwasser, a self described eco- artist whose work is really colorful, bright, kind of psychedelic. The building is the exact opposite of "modern"- all different shapes and colors on the inside and out. The floor is even is curved and bumpy. As I remember, Hunterwasser said, "the straight line is God-less" and its prettz obvious he felt that way when you see his work.
After Vienna, we took the train to Graz, a small but good sized city almost 3 hours South of Vienna. It was a beautiful city, ranked as having the highest quality of life out of any city in the world. It is clear why: you have all of the convenience of being in a city without the stress, traffic, and crazy hustle and bustle. It was almost calming. Also, lots of beautiful Austro-Hungarian architecture, including a beautiful old fort in the mountains and some really new modern architecture, like an underwater restaurant in the middle of their river shaped like a mussel. No joke, and its blue. Graz, it must be mentioned, is also the hometown of Arnold Schwarzenegger, who some locals seemed to like, some not so much.
Then, we were off to the Julian Alps in Slovenia where we visited three towns and staid in one called Bohinj, right on this beautiful lake. We did lots of swimming and biking (which I must say I am getting to be quite the expert at). After 3 relaxing days, we were itching to keep moving and took the train to Zagreb, Croatia, where we spent the night. Zagreb was how I had always pictured "Eastern Europe"- kind of depressed. Many of the old Austro- Hungarian buildings had an entire layer of paint peeled off of them. There was graffiti on every single building and lots of apartment blocs from the late 80s/ early 90s scattered throughout town. Additionally, there were very few people in town. It felt very empty but there were lots of cafes and vendors open, waiting for business. it made me very sad. There were some beautiful parts of course, some really pretty parks and old buildings. It is important, I think, to see a place like that before going to Dubrovnik and assuming that all of Croatia is a bustling, busy tourist town.
Now in Sarajevo. It is hard to believe there was such a terrible war here about 10 years ago, as the city has such a wonderful feel to it. At the same time, there are many reminders and remnants of the war that I have seen in just one day- hollow buildings, signs that have marks that bullets went through, and, of course, the faces of all of the people here. All I can think is: how did that person survive such violence? How old were they? Did people our age have any way of going to school? Not questions I would ever ask people, as I feel that, for the most part, people move on from crisis by letting go and trying to forget a lot of it. For me, looking a the elderly is always hardest, thinking about how much they lost, both in terms of material possessions, an occupation, and, most importantly, friends and family.
I have been really encouraged to read a lot of this history. It is hard to get my head around all of it but being here opens my eyes to how little I know!
Anyhow, off to enjoy the night in Sarajevo- warm and still sunny.
Lots of love and promises to write soon (and add pictures),
Katherine
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