Franz and Margot are getting married in October. Unfortunately I won't be able to attend---I'll be back in the States. But it's interesting watching these two plan for their life together. Franz tells me this life in a small town is what he's wanted for a long time. A lifelong Vienna native, he's ready to shift gears and move into a quieter and more rewarding life.
Margot is a very nice lady. She has her own massage therapy practice, and also helps her patients with nutritional suggestions, etc. She's a great cook (more on that later) who likes to use fresh, organic ingredients.
Margot's kitchen
Margot is great---easygoing, intelligent, pleasant, and she has a great sense of humor. Several times I told Franz, referring to his relationship with Margot: "You did good, my Austrian brother from another mother!"
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B's family visited Carinthia several times during her childhood. They used to stay on the Keutschacher See, a small lake in this region of nice lakes.
Saturday morning, B wanted to see if she could find the place where they used to stay, and the beach where she swam. The problem is, it's been decades and the place has really changed in the meantime.
We walked along the path that parallels the lake. The weather was better than Friday but still cloudy. We searched and searched but B found no reliable landmarks. "Maybe if we go on the other side and you look back to this shore," I told her.
"We never went over there; that was the nude beach."
But finally she thought she found the place. She took pictures, hoping to compare them with whatever old vacation pics her father may have at home.
We had lunch at a lakeside place. Pretty empty...the weather wasn't threatening but it wasn't optimal, either. I watched the ducks swimming. Those bastards have it made, I thought. Swimming around all day and quacking.
On the other hand, my situation wasn't sucking either.
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We took a drive to Maria Wörth. It's a little town on the famous / touristy Wörthersee, one of Austria's premier lake destinations. It being Saturday, with only a chance of rain, the place was kind of crowded with people looking to see the church there. And you could see the exterior no problem but there was a wedding going on inside, so we stayed out. Just as well. I haven't seen 1/10 of 1% of the churches in Austria, but that's probably more than enough for me. Especially the interiors, which are often so elaborate with decorations, statues, gold, etc. that it looks like an army of pimps exploded in there and got stuck to the walls.
The lake is beautiful, which provides the usual blessing / curse dichotomy: it's a great place to be, but everyone else thinks so, too, so they descend. Fortunately (maybe) the weather forecast kept some of the people at bay, but there were still a few too many of the thronging masses, huddled around the souvenir stands, for my taste. We drove back to the house.
On a sunny day, it's really beautiful
Franz's sister and her boyfriend happened to be in town on vacation. They were there when we got back. Monika and Wolfgang are Viennese but like a lot of Austrians they enjoy outdoor activities----B and W later spent some time in conversation, comparing stories of skiing and ski destinations.
Wolfgang told me one of his friends is a Civil War Re-enactor.
"Ah, he's American?"
"No, he's Austrian---they do the re-enactments here."
WTF?! As if it's not weird enough that Americans like to dress up and pretend to fight the Civil War again, now the Austrians are getting in on it, too? Uh, yes. Yes they are. Photos from their website here.
While we jabbered, Margot was preparing dinner. I went into the kitchen to check things out and ended up slicing some onions for her. What she was making looked really good---put some olive oil in the bottom of a baking dish, put in a cut-up chicken, lay a couple of sliced onions on top, then add some rosemary sprigs. The last ingredient I didn't know, but it looked like diced tomatoes. Bake it until the chicken is done.
She served this with salad, rice, and an avocado soup. The soup was really good---I think just a clear broth with some avocado slices and maybe a bit of onion or garlic in it.
Wonderful dinner with Franz, Margot, Wolfgang, and Monika
Me being the amateur sociologist, and sitting at a table with four native Viennese (Margot is a native Carinthian) I asked: "What's better now about Vienna, and what's worse?"
Everyone agreed the public transportation is a lot better than it was back in the day. As for what's worse, it's all the extra traffic now, compared to 30 or 40 years ago.
Also mentioned, though not necessarily "good" or "bad," was: 1) The sheer number of foreigners living in Vienna now---Wolfgang said in his district, the 10th, there were no foreign-born students in his classes when he was growing up. Now, he said, if you visit his old school, there might be one or two native-born Austrians in each class. 2) Kids used to play in the street. This is a two-edged sword---it's more dangerous, especially now with all the traffic, but kids were outside playing. Now they're inside playing video games or sitting on their asses, or in some insane "organized activity."
For hundreds of thousands of years of human development, kids just played outside. Now they have to go through some kind of fucking program in order to "grow" and "learn."
I think the party broke up about 12:30 or so. We slept well.
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