"Slow down, you crazy child you're so ambitious for a juvenille...."
I think I built it up a little too much in my head. After listening to the Billy Joel song for so many years, I may have romanticized Vienna a bit.
Although it was a neat city with lots of old buildings with copper domes and pretty views, I think it would have been better in the summer. But I did have a great time, and my class was really fun and we all got along very well considering all the things we went through (15 hour train rides, oy ve)
Getting there and home was an adventure in itself. There, we got on the first train at 2:30pm and arrived in Vienna at 8:45 am. Ouch. We were on a sleeper car for most of the night, however not much sleeping went on due to extreme uncomfortableness of the cabin. 6 beds in the size of an average bathroom is not condusive to a good night's sleep.
So we got there and went to Haydn's birth house a little outside the city. Random fact #1: ME AND HAYDN HAVE THE SAME BIRTHDAY. sweeeeeet. Only he's a little bit older.
Then we went to a castle in another town outside the city. This is where Haydn worked so we went on a tour of that house too.
Next day we went on a tour of Mozart's house (seeing a pattern here...?) Then the next day we went to Beethoven and Schubert's houses..... it got a little old. Not to mention, most of the things were not authentic. At the end of our Beethoven tour, the guide said "We're not sure if he actually lived here, but this is the area and what kind of apartment he would have lived in."... Seriously? Not to mention she was a total bimbo. She knew about as much about Beethoven as I did. But our professor thought she was a disaster too, so it was funny watching his reactions. And then during the tour, my friend Steve turns to me and whispers "Just think everything she's saying as if she were talking about the dog..." From then on it was quite entertaining :)
Our hostel was decent, but the cool part was that it looked out over Vienna. Absolutely gorgeous, especially at night.
On the last night we had dinner at a nice restaurant, with bottomless wine and authentic Austrian food. It was a good time. The accordion player was an added bonus. That was for sure the best part of the trip. I really liked our group, and since there were only 25 of us we were all able to get a lot closer. Now when I see them at the Chateau we actually have things to talk about and it's not just "Oh, you're in my music class..."
That was pretty much the extent of Vienna.
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