i’m a dumb tourist

Vienna, unlike Budapest, was super low key. This was partly because my travelling companion was less energetic (but no less fun) than the previous (which was nice after an eventful but draining four days in Hungary), and partly due to the nature of the city. There was less binge-drinking and more wine-sipping, less hopping bars and more hopping art galleries. After a bus from the Budapest that literally cost less than it does to go from my house to Charles de Gaulle Airport (#blessup), I met up with Jacqueline, another friend from UBC. Austria was classy and delicious. I’ll talk about the delicious first, because pretty much my main impetus of travelling anywhere is to eat local cuisine. While we did ingest many things, the most notable items are as follows:

• Sacher torte, allegedly the world’s most famous chocolate cake. This is a chocolate cake with apricot jam in the middle and topped with chocolate ganache, apparently invented in like the 1800s or something. This cake is such a big deal that the Sacher Hotel, its originator, copywrited the name “Sacher Torte”, so all the other bakeries in Vienna that carry it have to call it that. When we went to try the original, the menu was essentially a small novel describing the history and how big a deal it is, so we were pretty hyped up about tasting it. When it arrived though, we were sorely disappointed. What was supposed to be a rich, moist, delicious cake so mind-blowing that royalty and other rich people would literally travel to Vienna specifically to eat it, turned out to be dry, mediocre, less than underwhelming, and, it goes without saying, unreasonably overpriced. Verdict: 3/10.
• This was a bustling food market full of the most wonderful surprises. Jacqueline and I spent the better part of a morning walking up and down the aisle, basking in glow of beautiful, shining produce, pretending to be interested making purchases at stalls handing out samples, and taking in the delightful smells of the market’s offerings. We ended up purchasing some of the most delicious falafel I’ve had all trip, a beautifully flaky croissant, two different kinds of baklava, and most importantly, a truffle-studded hunk of gouda that made all of my wildest dreams come true. Verdict: 10/10.
• Wiener. Schnitzel. The restaurant we went to was a little out of the way from the main downtown area, but was well worth the trek. When we arrived, we were ushered into a smoke-filled room (it’s so gross that in Europe people smoke inside restaurants) and seated at a table that we shared with another party – the place was packed. The menu was in the shape of a giant beer mug and boasted unbelievably low prices. We ordered, and were delivered two piping hot plates piled high with more food than any person should be reasonably expected to consume. This was no dry, breaded cardboard you could be served at lesser establishments. This was no soggy, greasy, overcrusted meat. This, my friends, was golden brown, perfectly juicy perfection. Verdict: 11/10. I know that’s not a real rating. Shut up, this is my blog and I can do what I want.

As for the classy part, we spent a lot of time wandering museums, including a contemporary art museum exhibiting the highly disturbing “Body, Psyche, Taboo” involving a lot of blood, genitalia, dead animals, and other mystery fluids (I DARE YOU TO GOOGLE IT), palaces (which were much more pleasant and boasted stunning views), the parliament building (half of which was bombed during WWII and rebuilt afterwards), and gardens (which were plentiful and beautiful). We also managed to meet up with Jerry and his friend again, as well as Natalie – because even in Europe, I can never get away from Sauder.

So remember the time I almost got scammed at the airport because I am a dumb tourist? Well it was bound to happen again at some point, and it looked like Vienna was the place. Vienna, as you are probably aware, is one of the cultural capitals of the world. We had really wanted to see a show at the Vienna State Opera House, but had unfortunately neglected to do any sort of planning for the trip. Fate punished us by selling out anything we were in town for long before we thought to look up tickets. Thus, when we were approached by a strange troupe of men in costumes outside the St. Peter’s Cathedral, we actually listened to them explain that there would be a beautiful classical music concert occurring the following night. We were hesitant, as you should be when strange men approach you on the street and try to sell you things, but our desire to actually experience a concert in the birthplace of so many classical masters got the better of us. So we shelled out more euros than we should have, and bought tickets to see this show. It was so weird. The music was nice and the musicians skilled, but the programme had the most random mix of random pieces by random composers. All in all, it wasn’t awful, but it was far from worth the money we had paid.

Luckily, this wasn’t our only musical experience in Vienna. After our tour of the Opera House, we ran into more costumed men (as if we hadn’t learned our lesson yet) who were desperately scalping ticket’s for that night’s ballet at prices three times above what the tickets were worth. After more careful consideration and a good twenty minutes of negotiating, we caved and bought a pair. Thank goodness we did. The seats, though pricey, gave us an excellent view of the stage on which we witnessed the most beautiful, emotional rendition of Tchaikovsky’s Onegin I have ever seen. So our success rate was 50/50 – one of the risks we took was a bust, and the other more than paid off.

No regrets, though. If I hadn’t said yes to the first, I probably wouldn’t have said yes to the second, either. Life is about taking risks and making mistakes and experiencing things and learning from them, right? I’ve started to really come to terms with what a privilege exchange is. I mean, I always knew it, but I don’t think I really understood it. I will never again, at least for the foreseeable future, have the opportunity to take a half-year hiatus from real life to travel responsibility-free. It took some getting used to to spend money as freely as I do now, but I never want to look back and regret not having done something or tried something because I didn’t want to spend so much. I have to recognize my incredible privilege to be able to live like this, because I know I will be able to make it back in due time, and I’ve worked hard to ensure that. Having grown up frugal (many of you know this story), the amount that I’m spending still makes me a little uncomfortable, but so long as I’m not being completely irresponsible, the experiences are so, so worth it.