Best Keep Secrets of Austria - Spring Comes in Phases

"The little windflower, 

whose just opened eye is blue as the spring heaven it gazes at."

William C. Bryant

Antonio Vivaldi - "The Right of Spring - Allegro"

Growing up in Australia, the seasons we learnt about didn't quite apply as explained in the textbooks with the information borrowed from the English school system. Unless you were in Tasmania and the cooler areas of the country, the four seasons were not obvious. We kept the four seasons, in reverse from the Northern Hemisphere by date, despite the fact that the weather failed to shape up to the labels. Depending where you were in the Antipodes, there could be more than four seasons in a year and the variations in temperature could be subtle or extreme.

In Austria, the seasons are very much as I learnt, even though they don’t happen all at once, or by date, there are obviously four of them. In the “wild” and uncultivated areas, spring occurs slowly and in phases. There can also be a variance throughout the country, when it commences. It starts in the valleys and the sheltered places and slowly moves upwards, with the thaw, into the mountains. The cultivated gardens found in country and urban areas are different story of spring.

The Circus is Coming to Town!

  
Logo courtesy of Roncalli 

"The attraction of the virtuoso for the public
 is very like that of the circus for the crowd. 
There is always the hope that something dangerous will happen."

Claude Debussy 

Julius Fucik - "Entry Of The Gladiators"

I haven't been to the circus since I was a kid. I am not sure whether my Dad took me that last time. I know I was with him the first time I saw a circus. Dad always arranged tickets through one of the clubs he where he was a member. That last time he may have organised a group of tickets for friends with kids. My baby sister and I may have gone with them Most of the Dads would go the club and wait it out until the show was finished. Each year he would arrange for us to go to these summer events, while the clubs still offered them.

This was when we lived in Australia. In those days, it was a thrill for kids to go to the circus, as it was a rarity in the cities and the country. A once a year chance, for something “exotic” besides the shows, regattas and rodeos, to found annually in the country towns and the big city. The circuses generally had exotic animals that shouldn’t have been performing in captivity, kept in always sad and sometimes bad conditions. Reflecting on it now, I can only imagine the stress and sadness these animals must have endured, to delight and make us human kids, as well as the human adults, smile, laugh or gawk in awe, at their performances.

Best Keep Secrets of Austria – The Secret of the Giant Leporidae

 
 
 
 
 

Albrecht Dürer's "Young Hare" 1503

Image: Wikipedia

"What beauty is, I know not, 
though it adheres to many things.."

Albrecht Dürer 

Simon & Garfunkel - Bright Eyes

I was wandering through Vienna during the middle of July, while heading towards the Burggarten on a photographic mission (more on that in a number of future blog essays). I decided to go along a side street of the State Opera House, when my eyes caught sight of something totally unexpected. Sitting on top of the most famous Bitzinger Würstelstand, located below the Albertina Museum and across from the Opera house was a supersized green bunny.

Austrians like to enjoy themselves with some rather strong or numerous enlightening liquids and some have been known to see some odd things. Being stone cold sober and spying this ginormous green bunny was a surprise, and delight, to me. I couldn’t help taking a few shots of the bunny sitting in all his elegance on top of this famous Würstelstand.

Confessions #02: That 4th of July 1994 Cup of Coffee

 
 
"Our culture runs on coffee and gasoline, 
the first often tasting like the second."

Edward Abbey 

Frank Sinatra - "The Coffee Song"

Yes, yet another confession, with a variety of more in the offing. Confession is good for the soul, they say and the truth will free you! Yesterday it was paperwork, today something totally different to confess. From the title and picture you have already gleaned it has to do with coffee.

The Beatles sang the number “Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band” from their album of the same name, released in 1967. The first two lines of that number were, “It was twenty years ago today, Sgt. Pepper taught the band to play”. Well today I have been contemplating the tune's first two lines with mediocre words of my own, “It was twenty years ago today, that I gave coffee drinking away!” Yes, twenty years ago today. The 4th of July 1994, was my last cup of coffee, two full decades ago.

Best Kept Secrets of Austria - Summer Harvest Stalls

"One must ask children and birds 
how cherries and strawberries taste."

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 

The Beatles - Strawberry Fields Forever

Around about the beginning of May each year, on my way to and from work, or just into the city, I start to watch for my favourite summer season fruit, vegetables and berry stall. This is generally a large table located on the lower level of the Tram Junction at the U-Bahn station at Schottentor. I have been doing this since my first summer in Vienna, which was way back in 2006.

The first offerings of the season are generally strawberries, and strangely small bunches of Lily of the Valley. Maybe this has to do with the fact that here they are called Maiglöckchen (May Bells) and/or they are a nice Mother’s Day present. This year the Lily of the Valley was missing. They had sprouted and bloomed way back in March. The strawberries on the other hand have arrived just on schedule.

Nuts in May

"I'm tired of high policy talks. 

I want to focus on nuts and bolts."

Dave Freudenthal 

Edward Ka-Spel - Nuts in May

Well not the nuts of the old nursery rhyme, but rather nuts that go with bolts. Currently, Gersthof where I live, is going through a massive tram line maintenance process. Believe it or not, and this is not very girly, I am finding it fascinating. Whenever I pass the works with my camera, I take the time gathering some photographs.  

I have been experimenting with some rather arty shots, “gathering” these arty ones of nuts with their bolts. Not something that would be usually classed as beautiful, I found these ones strangely attractive in their collected form. All thrown together in a box, waiting to be used or recycled back into the track work, where they would then perform their designated function. 

Best Keep Secrets of Austria - Introducing artwalk18

"Without poets, without artists,

men would soon weary of nature's monotony."

Guillaume Apollinaire

Escape The Fate - Picture Perfect

A further tale of adventure from Austria, the land without the Kangaroos. I have recently been musing about why people choose to visit this small country. For this article, I decide to ask Google the simple little question “why do people visit Austria?” Interestingly auto select tried to convince me that I wanted Australia, the land with the Kangaroos, but I wasn't going to play that little Google game. I stumbled across 2 blog/webpages that both provided me with a list of ten and five reasons respectively:

a. The Shearing Blog:
1. Classical Music; 2. The Austrian Alps; 3. Architecture; 4. "The Sound of Music";  5.Food; 6. Drinks; 7. Weather; 8. Railways; 9. Dancing; 10. Yodelling

b.  Nomadical Sabbatical:
1. Yodelling; 2. Mountains; 3. Classical Music; 4.Architecture; 5.Food & Drink

Eurovision 2014: And the winner is...

Rise Like A Phoenix 
2014 Eurovision Song Contest winning number
YouTube Channel - Conchita Wurst

 Conchita Wurst - My Heart Will Go On 

YouTube Channel - Alienhomeful

" Tolerance is giving to every other human being every right that you claim for yourself."
Robert Green Ingersoll 

Conchita Wurst - Unbreakable

Austria (the country without Kangaroos). Thank you Conchita Wurst, who represent ed the country at the Eurovision Song Contest. The song, though not brilliant, was better than many of the others presented, having a message that was powerful and clear for everyone who listened to the lyrics. 

After watching the Contest program with friends last night, I had originally decided on a very different and perhaps more amusing essay to celebrate Austria’s first win since 1966. I was going to base it on a remark from one of the friend about it being a “James Bond” song. I have changed my mind since then.