Day 83 - Cheap Thrills

We spent a good bit of the morning on line at the Indian Embassy. Once through the line though, the paperwork was relatively simple (two short forms, 86 Euro each, and 2 passport photos). In theory we will have visas at 5PM Monday.

Vienna is a beautiful city. By the time we left the embassy, it was nearly noon, but we spent a little while wandering in the city center oggling buildings. Yesterday we passed by St. Stephens on the outside. Today we went in and looked around the interior. We happened upon an english-speaking tour, and tagged along for as much of as we felt we could without getting caught. The tourguide was very good, and we learned all sorts of interesting symbolism and history about the cathedral. For example, the most famous bell in St. Stephens is made from the bronze of Turkish cannons. During the Ottoman Empire, when Austria defeated cities in Turkey, they would melt down the cannons to make church bells. So a little piece of Istanbul has followed us here!

After visiting St Stephens, we made our way over to Museums Quartier. Museums Quartier is a few city blocks occupied, as ther name implies, entirely by museums. Today we visited the Leopold Museum. It was four floors of early 20th century and late 19th century art, most famously several works by Koloman Moser, Gustav Klimt and Egon Scheile (alot on the Viennese Secession and Wiener Werkstatte). We spent so much energy there that we didn't feel up to visiting another museum. Instead, we walked across the street to the opera house to enquire after a tour (already booked up and way too crowded, another day perhaps) and tickets.

It turns out the Staatsoper has standing room tickets for 2 Euro. They go on sale 80 minutes before the performances, and there are usually plenty available. We are huge theatre and opera buffs and could not believe our good fortune. Granted, the places are way up in the back of the balcony, and it is not allowed to move down into empty seats, but the sightlines aren't all that bad, and the sound quality at that hieght is among the best in the house. There are shows every evening. Tonight we went to Verdi's Simon Boccanegra. Tomorrow is Carmen. Friday and Saturday we will be in Eggenburg, but on Sunday we are going to see Die Zauberflaute. For two Euro a ticket, we can afford opera every night even on our starving artist budget!

If you look really closely on the drop, you can spot the Incredible Hulk by the top right corner...not associated with the design of the show, but hopefully if we take the tour we will get more info on the very unorthodox drop for such a prestigious opera house.

In a way it is good that we are stranded here until Wednesday. There is no way we could have seen and done enough in the two days we had originally planned. We will be so steeped in European culture by the end of this week, I think we will be more ready to face the unknowns of India and beyond!