Hello from Vienna!

Hallo aus Wien! Looking back on the past few days here in Vienna, it’s incredible how much we have done in such a short amount of time. Our first day here, we got a walking tour of the city. Stop number one was St. Stephen’s Cathedral. The massive building is hard to miss, and it is one of the most important places in Vienna. Today, a smaller group of us went to tour the catacombs of St. Stephen’s Cathedral, and I saw the final resting places of some of the most important people in Viennese history, including members of the Habsburg family. Members of the Habsburg family were embalmed and had their organs placed in separate containers. Another member of the tour group heard this, turned to our group and said, “the Habsburgs were very weird people” and I can’t say that I disagree.

The colorful roof tiles are one of the things that makes St. Stephen's Cathedral so remarkable

Speaking of the Habsburgs, we went on a guided tour of Schӧnbrunn palace, summer home of the Habsburg family. This place was massive! There are 1,441 rooms in total, and we only saw 40. The Habsburgs were one of the most important royal families in Austria. They had a lot of money, and they were not afraid to show it off. In their palace, rooms were decorated with gold trim, which was not solid gold, but gold flaked. The purpose of this was to show off their wealth in the hopes of dissuading enemies from attacking, because if the Habsburgs had this much money for their home, who knew how much money they had for their army. There were several tricks like these that the Habsburgs used, my favorite being the Porcelain room. The family claimed that the entire room was made out of porcelain, and it looked like it was as well. However, there were only two items that were made of pure porcelain; the chandelier and the clock. Everything else was simply painted to look porcelain. Despite not having solid gold trim and completely porcelain rooms, the Habsburgs had a LOT of money. We visited the Kunsthistorisches museum, and after our guided tour we wandered around for a couple of hours after. Towards the end of the visit, I was completely overwhelmed at the sheer number of items that were on display. I don’t have an exact number, but I do know that the museum only had approximately 3% of the Habsburg collection on display, and I’m pretty sure that I didn’t see the entire museum collection.

The best picture of the Kunsthistoriches museum I could get

After spending months anticipating this trip, the first musical performance we saw exceeded my expectations to such a degree that I was astounded. Entering the Vienna State Opera House for the first time was incredible, and the performance was absolutely breathtaking. The Vienna state ballet company performed Onegin, a heartbreaking tale that was full of elegance and emotion. Of course, the orchestra was amazing. There was one moment where the principal bassoon was playing a solo, and she went from playing loud and bold to playing some of the softest melody I have ever heard, capturing the attention of everyone in the audience. Everything about the performance was phenomenal, from the choreography to the conducting, and it was truly a once in a lifetime experience. 

A picture of the stage before Onegin started