The hills are alive in Salzburg

I had about five hours to explore the birthplace of Mozart and the setting of The Sound of Music. The movie was actually filmed in Salzburg, so I’d be able to place what I saw in the movie in real life... My destination was the Salzburg Fortress, the home of Archbishops for 10 centuries. I locked up my bags in a locker (which later would be problematic) and headed to the city. The area was as majestic as I thought it would be. Spires, domed basilicas, and mansions graced the skyline. A river ran through the center, dividing the city into new and old. There was a town square filled with carts and grass as green as I’ve ever seen it. I walked down the streets, passing a few pubs along the way when I ended up in my first and only Sound of Music scene... where Uncle Max ran into Herr Heller and the children to ask where Capt. Von Trapp was.


Anyway, I made it up the cable car to the fortress where we were were greeted with an incredible view of the Austrian Alps.. I then toured the fortress, the state rooms where the archbishops had guests and some museum stuff. I was walking through history, except it got disrupted by a group of 250 marching band students from Shaker, Ohio, who were touring at the same time. Yeah - I know I used to be one of these kids, but it was annoying... I got over it, finished the tour and walked back through the town..


A few hours later, it was time to leave-- I looked for my ticket to retrieve my backpack, but WHOOPS - I couldn’t find the damn thing. Had to call security, they had to open a few lockers and thank god they were able to retrieve it before my train left. Now, I am on a 1 hour and 45 minute journey to Schladming for a ski adventure in the alps. While I’m typing, I’m glancing out of the window to take a peek of the amazing scenery outside the window.. Snow capped mountains, winding train tracks through tunnels, passing small Austrian villages over babbling brooks. I’m pinching myself as we speak. The train broke down for half an hour, but I think we’re on our way again.. hoping to arrive at my hotel in the mountain village at 8:30 PM. I can’t wait to hit the slopes tomorrow!

Wien and Wine

At 9:00 AM the next morning, we were on our way through Austria to my next destination, Salzburg. Everyone was feeling surprisingly good after a night with a bit of the local drink. On our way, we’d have to make a stop at a winery to buy a few bottles for their parents for Easter.

About an hour into the drive, we turn off the road and make our journey to this winery. We get to this tiny village covered in green grass and cobblestone streets. It was out of a storybook. We arrived at the winery housed in a structure built in the 15th century.. It was amazing. The wine dude must have been lonely or something, because he gave us this impromptu talk (in German, so I didn’t understand a thing) about the history of the winery and some other things (I had no idea what they were saying). I had to purchase a bottle because it was sooo cool that I was in the middle of nowhere in Austria at a winery - one of those moments I don’t think I’ll ever forget. I felt like I was in some kind of european movie that takes place the countryside - it was THAT picturesque.

So what was a few bottles turned out to be 8 CASES of wine being delivered to our car. I asked them how long it would last - they laughed and said as they thought it would be a year, it often lasts only 6 months and they have to make another run to this village to pick it up. I love Europeans and their ability to enjoy the good life - good wine, good talk, good friends. I wish we were more like that in the US.

We were again on our way and talked the entire hour and a half that was left in the journey. I learned that people from Bavaria distance themselves from the rest of Germany and think they’re an entirely different race! We talked about our stereotypes of both cultures and enjoyed a few laughs. We ended up in Salzburg around 1 PM. We exchanged numbers with a possibility that I would join them again in their town (about an hour from Munich in Bavaria) on Saturday.

An excellent Viennese Adventure

After a few days spending time with my friend and his wife, I was ready to begin adventuring on my own. I love spending time with people you know and are close with, but you get to meet so many new people by being solo.. also they wanted to go to McDonald’s and I was NOT having that!

So I left for a small bar down the street from the hotel that I had passed a few times before. It looked lively and quintessentially Viennese - exactly what I was looking for. I wanted to have a big glass of beer, a local delicacy, and have a great rest before leaving to Salzburg the next day. What was going to happen at that restaurant was not what I had ordered for the evening.

I was catching up with my parents on the way when I was sat down at a table next to two English speakers. After I finished the call, I leaned over and asked where they were from... Vancouver! We got to talking and also brought in a German couple at the next table. We drank more, they kept buying shots, and well, you can imagine how the night ended.

The couple from Vancouver were quite dysfunctional - around 40-45 years old, she was a fitness instructor (stunning!) and he a very wealthy contractor. I think he got lonely or something and flew her out to meet him in Vienna after he spent two weeks in Prague and Venice solo (he was bragging about the girls he ‘met’ while he was there). After like an hour, she started bad-mouthing him to us and later we found out that he was doing the same (I noted to the German couple that I was pleased they were from Vancouver and not Americans!). Anyways, we all went back to my hotel and had drinks at the bar when we were met by a group of rowdy Greeks -- young and old. It was 1:00 AM when I was dancing some kind of Greek dance with someone’s grandmother. We were singing, dancing, laughing about the dysfunctional Canuks - a perfect way to end a great two days in Vienna. I found out that the German couple was leaving at 9:00 AM the next day and passing through Salzburg, my next stop. They invited me to drive with them - and I was psyched to save 40 euros.

Palacio Hierro :)

The next day, we woke up early and had a breakfast filled with -- you guessed it-- PORK. Pork everywhere in central Europe. We made our way back to St. Stephens to climb up the 386 stairs to the top of the spire where we got an incredible look of Vienna. There were a number of downtown clusters with tall buildings as well as old fancy structures as well. It was a hard climb, but I needed to work off the insane amounts of bacon I ate - especially the guilt (well not so much) I felt with it being passover.


We then went to the Schamburg Palace - the summer palace where the Hasburgs lived for centuries. Being the history buff that I am, it was the highlight of my day. We went inside the residence of the palace to look at the ornate rooms, including the private study and meeting room of the last Emperor - Franz II. I was stricken with how humble and hard working he was before he died during WWI. We also learned about his wife, Sisy, who is a legend in Austria and Germany. Story was that she was forced to marry Franz when she was 16 and resented it her entire life. He absolutely adored her and longed to see her, but she travelled extensively throughout the world and was never home. She was also anorexic. Anyways, when she was 61 years old, she was stabbed and killed by an Italian anarchist and died. Franz was devastated.

We finished walking around the palace grounds and headed back into the city. Our afternoon was capped with a visit to the national history museum, billed one of the best collections of fine art in the world... We saw some very interesting art from famous painters and artifacts from Greece and Egypt.

A quick glance at the Danube River (absolutely filthy whose walls were FILLED with Graffiti) and back to the hotel for a rest.

Wein, Weiner Schnitzel, and Music

The four and a half hour ride from Prague to Vienna was a fun, but relatively uneventful trip through a time machine of a nation’s communist past. Every city had an industrial and communal look - tall gray apartment complexes, standard architecture, and little character. After getting my head bit off by the Czech girl working in the cafe car for not having change, we arrived in Wein (Vienna in Germany) - and everything stale and communist turned to beautiful, eccentric, classic, and cool.


We dropped our things off at a great hotel and began our walk through the city. Literally building after building after building had this incredible classical look to it. Big with molding, statues, and carving into the buildings. We could not believe how many of these we saw as we walked into town. In town, we were surprised by how expensive things were, but stopped for a frankfurter. I had a beer, my travel companions had coke and water. Believe it or not, my beer was cheaper than their beverages.


We did a walking tour, stopping at St. Stephen’s Cathedral, the music hall, museum quarter, the spanish horse stables, Parliament, the national library, national museum, and the Rathaus (City Hall). I could not believe how many beautiful buildings there were. We went for dinner at a pretty classy restaurant underneath City Hall - I had my first weiner schnitzel. Jair had the Goulash. We walked back through the majestic city and went for an early sleep. I was so freggin tired.

We were trying to book a ticket to the philharmonic but there were a few problems, it was expensive, I only had jeans, and the only ones that were available were the touristy ones and not the Vienna Boys Choir or the Vienna symphony. So we decided not to do it.

The other side of Prague

More work on Sunday - but we got out at 12:00 and it was time to explore the interesting Jewish life in Prague. The museum was very unique, a collection of buildings that was formerly the Jewish Ghetto of Prague. Before 1850, the Jews of Prague faced oppression and were forced to live in the area that was no more than 10 blocks, tiny in a city with small streets and alleyways. Because of this, the size of the population dimished and by 1850, there were about 100,000 living in the city. At that time, the restrictions were lifted and the community began to flourish. Buildings were demolished and new fancy apartments were built. New synagogues were build on the site of old ones. The Ghetto transformed into a beautiful area of Prague and still is to this day. Unfortuantely, the Nazis invaded Czechslovakia and the majority of the population was put to death during the war. Today, there are only about 6,000 Jews still living in the city.


We walked into the cemetery and a few synagogues. It was striking, because the synagogues were lines with gold and beautiful walls of artwork. It was the first time I saw a jewish religious house that looked like a cathedral. We made a few other stops, including the Jewish cemetery that contained headstones from the 16th century, and a few museums. A return to the restaurant we ate at the first night to try a Czech pot roast, a local delicacy.

I liked Prague a lot. It was a beautiful city full of old buildings and lights, but I have to say that the people were not nice... and because I live in the city with the nicest people in the world, I’m spoiled and expect that. They did not want to help you if you asked on the street, small talk was not accepted, and the waiters were just not willing to communicate and would get angry. I don’t know if it had something to do with communism, but I was so disappointed that they were so blase about communicating with us...and most of them spoke English.

On being Czech

Saturday was a work day -- so not much going on, except for an interesting conversation I had with someone who was very fluent in Czech history. The story is that my great grandfather came to New York on a ship from what was then Czechslovakia. On this trip, he met my great grandmother. He was from the countryside and she was from Prague. They did not understand each other well as they both spoke a different dialect of Czech. A few years ago, my dad and I spoke with someone from the region - he had told us that he was not from Czech regions, but from Ruthinia, an area bordering the Ukraine in the east that was part of Slovakia and the Ukraine at different times. Well, speaking to this teacher, he backed up those assumptions. Because of our language (mixed with Yiddish), the type of religion the family practiced, and our family’s last name, he said that it was most likely we were Ruthinian, who live in what is now western Ukraine, an area that is very dangerous because it is an entry point to the EU - a place with tons of smuggling and is one of the poorest regions in Europe. I don’t have enough information to distinguish my grandmother and grandfather - but it was a start and a good feeling that I knew more about where my family was from.

If Walls Could Talk in Prague...

It was a unique medieval city with a progressive introduction-to-the-west like attitude that was gleaming from its walls. It was a city populated with people and a culture I knew little about, except for its star hockey players and the what little I learned from my dad and grandmother. The city was quaint and eclectic. The cobblestone corridors of the old town were narrow and the walls were gray and cold. Yet there was something about the city that was bursting out of the cavernous halls. I know that communism was ended 20 years ago, but there was something about this clash of totalitarianism, monarchy, and democracy that made it interesting.


I left on the 8:00 PM flight from Mexico City on Air France, my first time on the airline and my first time on a 777. I was very excited and was surprised to see personal video players with on demand video. HOWEVER, I was pissed that before we took off, the flight attendants sprayed insecticide on everyone! As a newly minted Mexican resident, I was quite offended, but to be honest, it made sense that I was flying Air FRANCE. The flight was relatively uneventful, with a 30 minute walk gate-to-gate through De Gaulle airport to transfer to my Czech Airlines flight. Along the way, I spotted my personal hell - a tiny room with an occupancy of about 10 filled with about 20 smokers puffing away before their next flights. My flight from Paris to Prague was quick - I had a warm Czech beer on the way and touched down at 5:00 PM.

That night, I met a few colleagues for dinner. My meal was delicious - meat dumplings. We also had a ham appetizer which was funny because it came with two slabs of butter that I could have SWARED looked like cheese.. Three people at the table took a bite out of it and had to spit it out finding out what it really was. One of the people at the dinner was a curriculum director working in a NYC school and living on the Upper West Side. We got to talking and decided to take a stroll the following day.

Breakfast was PORK, PORK, and more PORK.. Sausages, bacon, you name it, they have it. Now being fond of the meat, I was pretty happy, but it wasn’t the most kosher of breakfasts. We left on the Metro (which was relatively clean) and headed out to the main square. With no destination in mind, we just walked around the city, looking at the architecture, and admiring the feeling of quaintness... Everything was in walking distance. There were a ton of tourists, which surprised me, but I paid no attention. We must have went into 6 beautiful Catholic churches with ornate statues and paintings. A few more hours of walking around town, it was time to stop at the Easter market for something to eat. We ordered the Czech Kielbasa and Prague ham... the Kielbasa was absolutely amazing.. but I think so far, I ate about 1/4 of a pig.


Friday evening was the highlight of the visit. We were invited to the Lobokowitz Palace for dinner with the “price” of the Czech Republic. To make a really long story short, the family was royalty for many years, but were kicked out when the Nazis took power and had all their possessions confiscated during communism. After the Velvet Revolution, William Lobokowitz came back to the country to collect the possessions his family lost, including the palace located in the Prague Castle Complex, tons of artwork, and other collections, including Beethoven’s original copy of one of his most famous works. It was a great evening.