Friday: Consulate Visit & Wandering In The Woods

I found out I can get a "criminal record" document (required by the Austrian government for immigration) from the US consulate. This saves me the hassle of trying to get one from the US by mail or fax.

I took the subway down to the Stadtpark, then looked around until I found the place, on the 4th floor of a nice building. Inside the entrance, two armed civilian guards carrying Glocks, both Austrians. I had to run my backpack and camera bag through an X-ray machine and go through a metal detector. They kept my bags and gave me a reciept for them. No cameras or cellphones inside. But they were friendly, unlike a lot of security people in the US who always seem uptight and sometimes just plain fucking rude.

You go through a thick steel door. There's another armed guy on that side of the door. The guy told me: "Go to window 1." I walked back there and found there were 7 or 8 windows, all plainly numbered, with thick glass partitions.

"I need a criminal record document," I told the lady, an Austrian.

"Fill out this form but don't sign it," she said. "Then give it back to me." It was a simple form---name, date and place of birth, passport number, citizenship (!), address of last residence in the US.

I passed the form back. "Now go to window 3, and pay the fee." At window 3 I was served by a pleasant American lady with only one arm. I paid the $50 fee. "Now take your receipt to window 2 and you'll get your report."

At window 2, there was a pleasant young American guy on the other side of the glass. "I'm your witness for this document," he said. (Evidently, they'd checked my criminal history while I was paying the fee and found none.) "First, please sign here." I signed. "Raise your right hand and swear and affirm the following is true:" And then he said something like, "Do you swear you haven't lied on this form?" or similar. I said, "Yes," and that was that.

But during this process I thought of George Carlin's hilarious routine called "Swearing On The Bible":

Here's another one of these civic customs: swearing on the Bible. Do you understand that shit? They tell you to raise your right hand, place your left hand on the Bible. Does this stuff really matter? Which hand? Does God really give a fuck about details like this? Suppose you put right hand on the Bible, you raise your left hand. Would that count? Or would God say: "Sorry, wrong hand! Try again!" Why does one hand have to be raised? What is the magic in this gesture? This seems like some sort of a primitive voodoo mojo stick. Why not put your left hand on the Bible, let your right hand hang down by your side? That's more natural. Or put it in your pocket. That's what your mother used to say. "Don't put your hands in your pockets!" Does she know something we don't know? Is this hand shit really important? Let's get back to the Bible: America's favorite national theatrical prop. Suppose the Bible they hand you to swear on is upside-down. Or backwards. Or both! And you swear to tell the truth on an upside-down backwards Bible. Would that count? Suppose the Bible they hand you is an old Bible and half the pages are missing. Suppose all they have is a Chinese Bible, in an American court! Or Braille Bible, and you're not blind! Suppose they hand you an upside-down, backwards Chinese Braille Bible with half the pages missing! At what point does all of this stuff just break down and become just a lot of stupid shit that somebody made up? They fucking made it up, folks! It's make-believe!

I took my "I have never been to prison" document and walked out. I have to give credit: the people were friendly and courteous and the whole thing happened really fast. John X likes it smoooothe, and it was.
-----
In the afternoon, B and I drove to a nearby town to take a hike in the woods. It started off being a hot, humid day but by the time we got out there, the sky darkened somewhat and the wind picked up a little, and that kept the humidity at bay.

We wanted to find mushrooms, but we weren't really in a remote area and we figured the locals had probably picked the place clean already. We did find some mushrooms, but they weren't the edible variety.

Sometimes I shoot things just because the colors are, uh, colorful.
We parked near this house before entering the woods.

Mushrooms. According to B, not edible.

I noticed these white flowers in a field with no other white flowers,
but plenty of other colors. Take time to notice the flowers once in a while.

This was the site of a small pond where B's family visited many years ago.
This little boy was feeding the fish, who were going crazy: all you can eat!

On the drive home, we stopped at another small pond where there's a simple restaurant.
Close-up of flowers and in the background, a man walking the shore.

Garlic creme soup. Creamy, and, um, garlicky.

We found no mushrooms in the woods, but on the way home we stopped at a roadside stand and bought some boletas. 

B sauteed them and served them with boiled potatoes and parsley. I drank a cheap white wine. Delicious.

Thursday: Bureaucracy (But It Could Have Been Worse)

Thursday afternoon, we went down to the offices to submit paperwork for my immigration to Austria.

The office is closed in mid afternoon and reopens at 3:30, so we arrived at 3 to stand in the inevitable line. Sure enough, there were a hundred or more people in line ahead of us.

The office handles all sorts of matters, not just immigration. But there were very few people in line who looked like native Austrians. Most looked like they came from Turkey or Albania or Africa or other places, and we saw more than one woman wearing the traditional Muslim veil and robes. We were lucky in a way because a lot of people are still on vacation----another couple of weeks and it might have been a disaster.

As it was, things went more or less smoothly. They opened the doors. There were windows at a counter, like at the post office. You went to a free window, told them the purpose of your visit, and they gave you a number (No number: no service. No exceptions!) Then you waited in line to take the elevator up to the 5th floor, or walked up there if you were more gung-ho about it.

There, you sat down along with 150 other people and watched a screen. The screen showed your number, and the room you were supposed to go to. When your number came up, you got up and went to the office and began the process.

Our lady was nice, but at first she didn't want to accept the documents until I'd taken my offical language test, which is a few weeks off. But then for some reason she decided she'd start the process based on the fact that we'd informed the testing agency I want to take the test (we had a copy of the form I sent in.)

WOMAN: Photocopy your documents and then bring the copies back to me, please.
US: Where do we photocopy them?
WOMAN: In the waiting area, there are two machines...

There were two machines, but one was kaputt (your vocabulary word for the day), probably due to excessive button-pushing by an army of over-zealous Serbs, Albanians, Ukranians, Turks, or possibly Americans whose stack of documents choked the machine. The surviving machine had a line of people waiting, so we frantically starting digging for coins to feed it, finally finding some. (The trick was not to fuck around when it came your turn, because the line was getting longer and the clock was ticking---the office was about to close for the day.) Ten minutes or so later, we finished, then returned the copied documents and waited among the poor, the tired, and the huddled masses for our number to come up again.

The number came up after ten minutes or so. We went in and saw another woman. She took my fingerprints, then sent us upstairs to pay a fee of 80 Euro. We paid, and took the receipt back downstairs.

WOMAN: Now we need a copy of B's credit report, and proof that John has passed his language test---when that happens---and a statement from the US regarding your criminal record. [or lack thereof, in my case. So far.] And then we will begin to process this case.

And here the woman saved us a big hassle----she told us the US consulate could provide the "criminal record" document. Our research had led us to believe we'd have to get it from my local police department, or the State of Oklahoma, or the Federal government---faxing stuff back and forth, etc. Nope. Go to the consulate and they'll have what we need, said the lady.

I have to say the entire process went more smoothly than we'd expected. Or feared, as the case may be. Of course things haven't really started, as such----we've just delivered most of the papers they needed: certified translations of our marriage documents, my birth certificate, her birth certificate, my passport, her residency papers, etc. When we deliver the other papers, I guess they start the ball rolling. After that, who knows?

The whole thing took a couple of hours, plus many hours of preparation beforehand, mostly by B----researching what they'd need, gathering the stuff, having the English-language papers translated, making phone calls, etc. etc.

It's a hassle moving to any country. Still, I think it's easier here than trying to get a US "green card."

As I told my German-school classmate while we were waiting for our respective trains home after class, a guy from Canada whose sister resides in the US, "Getting a US green card is like trying to break into prison."

He gave a knowing smirk of agreement. Then our trains arrived. He jumped on his, I jumped on mine.

Somehow or another, we're always taking a train (metaphorical or otherwise) some damned place.

I Just Dropped In & Saw What Condition My Condition Was In

Wednesday after German class, I ran an errand near the school. It was a beautiful day, like Spring----temps in the high 70s, sunshine, people dining outside at the many restaurants in the working-class district where the school is...a really enjoyable walk through the district on my way to the subway.

A couple of long subway rides later I was visiting B's sister R at her place. Unfortunately she wasn't feeling too well so our visit was a bit subdued and shorter than planned, but it was nice seeing her anyhow.

But now I had time on my hands. What to do? I thought: I'm going to visit Thomas The Bookbinder.

Thomas describes some of the art he created

So, another couple of subway rides later, I walked into his shop.

Usually he's alone in there, but this time he had another visitor, a tall, thin guy about 65 with a neatly trimmed silver beard and long silver hair hanging down from under his cap. Thomas said to his friend (in German): "Hey, here's the mailman from America!"

The friend, F, greeted me with a gentle handshake. Both guys were smoking, and I noticed F's fingers were stained light brown from years of holding burning cigarettes. Thomas offered me coffee, then went in the back to prepare a cup.

I spent a few minutes getting to know F, who turned out to be a retired stonecutter---as in, he operated equipment that sliced huge slabs of granite into gravestone-sized pieces. 

I think I mentioned in previous posts that Thomas' tiny shop is a throwback to a different era----the machines he uses in his trade are hand-operated, built like tanks, and some are very old...in fact, when he came back with the coffee, talk turned to his "newest" machine, a huge papercutter he recently acquired. It's only 30 years old. We spoke a mixture of German and English, and I kind of startled myself by being able to say what was on my mind mostly in German.

ME: That's a sturdy-looking machine, Thomas...

F: Thomas is in love with the machine.
ME: I can see why---it looks like a quality piece of equipment, built to last a couple hundred years...

F: No, I mean he is in love with it, like it is a woman. It is all he talks about! "My papercutter, my papercutter..." When we are not here, I think he sleeps next to it at night. Perhaps he makes love to it.

THOMAS [animatedly]: My machine would never accept someone like me as it's lover. But look at the quality! The company went out of business and I got the machine for a good price and---

...and he went on for several minutes about the beautiful, sturdy, precise, elegant, etc. papercutter, which looks a bit like a large table saw (without the saw blade sticking up) with a six-foot long lever on one side, like papercutters you see in offices (only this one weighs about 800 pounds and the blade is razor fuckin' sharp---to show me, Thomas sliced the edge of a piece of paper, making a thin strip about half a millimeter wide. Precision. Or, it would easily amputate a leg if you wanted it to.)

I envy Thomas his work life. He enjoys his work and only does as much of it as he wants to, not more. His shop is open Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 2 PM (or so) to whenever the hell he wants to stop----usually only a few hours. F and Thomas have been friends for a long time. And like old friends will do, there's a lot of teasing going on between them.

ME: Thanks for the coffee....but you guys were visiting together. Maybe I'm interrupting your work...
F: He has only worked thirty minutes all day, and then we started visiting! It is no problem!
THOMAS: No, ja, why should I work more than that? I'm having coffee and a cigarette. Hey, let me show you something...

He removed a CD from a beautiful paper sleeve. Turns out he'd made the sleeves and played on the CD, a limited edition of 500 hand-signed copies. He put the CD in the player and skipped ahead to track 8, which featured Thomas on what he called a flute---but he showed me the thing and it was about four feet long and looked like the tube was made out of thick-walled copper tubing.

The cut was described as a blues number but to me it had more of a jazz feeling to it, with a bass, electric guitar, drums, and Thomas on his giant flute. Actually pretty good music...

THOMAS: So how can I do things like this CD, or my other projects of art, when I would have to work all the time?
F: Yes, I think people work too much. What is the point of it? If you have enough to eat and smoke----
ME: Yeah, no shit. Thomas, you're lucky, doing this work that involves creativity and craftsmanship, in your own place with no boss standing over your shoulder...
F: Yes, and it is my job to come here to make sure he does not work too many hours. I do this by making him give me coffee...
ME: When I move to Vienna, maybe I can be the apprentice here. I'll sweep the floor and run some errands and that kind of shit, and maybe you can teach me rudimentary bookbinding.
THOMAS: First, I have to see your sweeping skills. F, where is the broom? FIND IT!
F: John, if you are his apprentice, then he will only work thirty minutes a week. It is a bad idea.

The shop is small, maybe the floor space of a good sized bedroom, with a loft above for storage of paper and equipment, built by Thomas. I noticed he's always barefoot...

I thought: this must have been what it was like when cities were filled with mom-and-pop businesses, (not vapid multi-national big-box retailers of bullshit) where friends could just drop by once in a while and shoot the shit with the proprietor, have a smoke, have a cup of coffee, talk about the world...

An old woman walked in with a book.

WOMAN: This is the book I mentioned earlier.
THOMAS: Yah, OK! I see. All right, what color for the cover?
WOMAN: Well, what colors can we choose from...?
THOMAS: Red, green, blue, green, orange, black of course---

They jabbered about this for a few minutes, then with that done, the four of us stood around talking, like it was the village post office. The old woman turned her attention to F and started talking to him.

THOMAS: John! Let me give you a close look at my papercutter.

So we went over there and he showed me the thing in great detail, showed me where you oil the moving parts, lifted the heavy but perfectly balanced lever that holds the blade...

...then he showed me his back room, where he has a shower and sink and countertop and rudimentary cooking equipment. That way "If I want to lock the doors and work until midnight I can, and then clean up or cook dinner or even sleep here if I am heavily involved in a project."

After about fifteen minutes, we went back to the old lady and F. The old lady left with a friendly goodbye and F's eyes widened and he exhaled deeply, exasperated.

F: Yes, I thought she would never stop talking to me!
ME: What was she talking about?
F: What was she NOT talking about?!
THOMAS: I knew this would happen. So I left F to take care of my customer's psychological needs.
F: And for that I should have one more cup of coffee.
ME: But that's the beauty of it, that we all have time to talk to each other and listen. Everyone else is so fucking busy all the time. Maybe the old lady is lonely and it made her feel good to talk to you.
F: Next time I will feel good, because she will listen to me talk for fifteen minutes about my cat, and also my hemheroids.
ME: Better her than us.

I spent two hours with these guys, laughing and bullshitting and philosophising and talking music and painting and culture and the madness of the modern world, which neither Thomas or F takes at all seriously.  Finally I said: "I'm gonna say goodbye for now, fellas..."

THOMAS: Come again. Bring your broom! (laughter from Thomas and F.)

I left the place thinking of all the unusual people I've met in my life, some of whom have become good friends, and how lucky we are that eccentric and free-spirited people walk among us.

But it seems they're getting harder and harder to find, somehow...
-----
I got home and B said:

"We've been invited to join R and M at Kino am Dach (Movies on the Roof). We meet them at 8:30 and the movie starts at 9." I was tired from my long day but I wanted to meet R, who is a professor and his wife M, who works for the UN.So I made a quick supper for myself and tried to gather some energy.

The main library in Vienna.
The round thing at the top is a restaurant; dine indoors or out.
Behind the restaurant is where we saw the film under the stars.
The pyramid-like structure is pretty impressive.

Here's a view from the top.
As you approach the edge you don't see the steps until you're close;

it looks like you're approaching an unprotected edge of a roof with a sheer drop.

We met them at the restaurant, had a quick drink, then sat down for the film---Jim Jarmusch's NIGHT ON EARTH. It was in the original languages, (English, French, Italian, and Finnish) with German subtitles. The film consists of five stories involving taxi drivers, set in Los Angeles, New York, Rome, Paris, and Helsinki. 

So I understood the first two segments, but the last three required some reading of subtitles in German, about 40% of which I understood. I'd seen the film before (with English subtitles for the foreign parts) so I knew what was going on. Good film. My favorite sequence was the one set in Rome, where Roberto Benigni causes his passenger, a priest, to drop dead from a heart attack due to Benigni's constant jabbering about his sexual conquests.

It was a warm night, and even in the middle of town with all its light pollution, you could look up and see the stars.