Parents' visit (Part 2 of Two) and the week before London, which just got canceled... :(

Sonntag 21 November: Today my parents and I met and went to church at Augustinerkirche. It was really beautiful, (but it was kind of long and we kind of ended up checking out a little early.) Then we went to McDonalds (tradition). After lunch we went to the Albertina. May I just say, the Albertina is my favorite museum in Vienna now! My dad bought me a semester admission so I can go again and again and again! The main exhibits right now are the Michaelangelo drawings exhibit and the Picasso peace exhibit. Both of them were really awesome. The Michaelangelo exhibit kind of made me think of watching someone practice. The Picasso exhibit was amazing too. I've seen a lot of Picassos before, but it was really cool to see them in the context of the exhibit all grouped together. But the most amazing thing was the last exhibit we went to. It was an exhibit of works by William Kentridge. Who's that? That's what I thought too, but it was so amazing!!! There were arts of all sorts of mediums and there was this whole part with film and these films that accompanied an opera about a nose by Shostakovich and then there was this another animated part accompanying the Magic Flute. It was just so amazing and cool!!! I'm going to go back and spend a lot of time there. After the Albertina we went to the Secession to see the Beethoven frieze. That was one of the things my dad really wanted to do so I was really glad we got to. Unfortunately there was nothing else on exhibit at the secession, but it was still cool to see the frieze again. After that we went to my apartment and made dinner, then headed out to the Christmas markt at Maria Theresiaplatz in between the Natural History Museum and the Kunsthistorische Museum. They had some pretty good stuff. We got glühwein this time and they played the Run DMC Christmas song, which was pretty awesome. After that we went to Museums Quartier and did some "curling" it was kind of like a bowling game on ice. It was really fun! I wasn't very good at it, but my mom was amazing! She won for sure! Then we went to the photo booth and took pictures like we did when I was little! What an awesome day!!!

So there's the room where the Beethoven frieze is, no photos allowed, but they didn't say anything about outside...

Museums Quartier! It's so festive! Look at the projections on the Leopold Museum!

The Christmas Markt at Maria Theresiaplatz

Nikola and Krampus!

Some bells at the Christmas markt.

Photoautomat! We found it!!!

My dad curling

My turn.

Now my mom's turn!

Montag 22 November: Guess what today was? It was another awesome day! We woke up early and my parents and I went to get breakfast at Anker. Then we went to the Hundertwasser house and then the Kunsthaus. We just went on the outside of the Hundertwasserhaus and walked around, but it was really cool! It was awesome how he made the cobbled stone ground kind of like terrain. Then there were all these cool colors and designs all over. I liked it. Then at the Kunsthaus we saw exhibits of Hundertwasser and Renè Burri. I don't know why Hundertwasser isn't more famous. His work was so amazing! There were a lot of different styles and mediums too, and all of them were really different, but you could tell they had been done by the same person. Some of my favorite pieces were the screen printed ones. The inside of the museum was really awesome too. The floor was really creaky in parts and I'm pretty sure it was on purpose. Then there were also these trees that would grow out of these inlays in the windows and grow out the window. It was really cool. The Renè Burri exhibit was interesting too. He was a photographer and he photographed all sorts of people ranging from Picasso, Maria Callas and Che Guavara. We had to kind of cut the Kunsthaus visit short so I could go to a rehearsal (that was canceled once I got to school). After my class we went to the Palmenhaus and got chocolate cake and of course the Palmenhaustorte! YUMMY! Then I went back to school for another rehearsal, which was also canceled. Things like this used to make me mad, but now all I can do about them is laugh. That just meant we had time to go to the Naschmarkt and look at scarves then go to my apartment and make dinner. Then I had a rehearsal at Barbara's house at night and I think my parents went to the Christmas markt at the Rathaus. After my coaching we met at cafe Phil. We got hazel nut hot chocolates and I worked on some homework.

The outside of the Hundertwasserhaus.

Fountain outside of the Hundertwasserhaus, the inside has mosaics of the zodiac signs.

The other side + my mom and dad.

The terrain of the sidewalk.

Outside of the Kunsthaus down the street.

One of the trees that grows out the window.

Inside the Kunsthaus, there were so many plants there, it was so nice.

Dienstag 23 November: I went to German and then met my parents and the Kunsthistorisches Museum to tell them stuff I've learned in class. The museum is so big we didn't have time to go through the whole thing before I had to leave for class, so they stayed and finished looking at everything and I left early to go to class. After class and before my last class we went to the Frida Kahlo exhibit near the Freyung. It was really awesome. She was so interesting. There was so much to her life. The exhibit was amazing it seemed like it was almost her entire collection! We learned about Kahlo in my Spanish class in high school and every piece that we studied was in the exhibit!! There was also a portion of the exhibit that showed photos of Kahlo and her family, some were taken by her father. That was really interesting especially after seeing so many self portraits and then to see how she appeared outside of her own perceptions. After the Kahlo exhibit I had to go to class and then another coaching at Barbara's house. I think my parents went to Cafe Sperl that night.

Mitwoch 24 November: So today after my first class it was time for our weekly Art and Architecture tour. This week we went to the Leopold Museum. My parents met us there. So did Marisa's parents and Kristin's family was visiting so they came too. It was really fun because when my dad was studying abroad here he had the same professor that I have for this class! We learned all about Klimt's "Death and Life" (which is my new favorite Klimt). We learned about the University paintings/scandal of Klimt. We also learned about the Vienna Workshop and then moved on to Schiele. We learned more about him and Wally and their tragic story. We also learned this interesting story about when he and Wally moved to the town where his mother grew up and they would walk around with two friends, one of which painted her face white and another that walked around like a marionette. I wish I could have seen that. After the tour we walked around the museum a little bit. The Leopold Museum is a private collection, can you believe that? We also saw Picasso's, Warhol's and Pollock's. It's an amazing collection. After that I had rehearsals and music performance workshop, my favorite part of the week. Afterward we celebrated sushi Wednesday and got sushi! Then it was off to Phil to work on some homework again.

There are all of these large windows in the Leopold among all the paintings. Like the scenery around the museum is also on exhibit.

Schiele and Wally. So tragic. The painting of Wally was proclaimed as stolen from WWII, but Leopold bought it back for millions of dollars so she could be reunited with Egon once again.

Donnerstag 25 November: Today is Thanksgiving. That means that I have a German test... I met my parents at this breakfast place near my apartment that's a musli bar. We went there and I studied a little bit. After German I skipped my other class so we could spend the rest of the day together. Today's events after German included the upper and lower Belvedere, then the Christmas markt at the Belvedere, followed by Chinese food for lunch, then grocery shopping at the Naschmarkt for dinner and then a shopping trip for me and mommy. After that we went back to the apartment and I made my sweet potato casserole for my parents and Emily. Three of my roommates went out of the country for the weekend, Elizabeth ate before and Katie went to the IES Thanksgiving dinner. We had our casserole, my mom made pumpkin pie and we bought one of those cream filled tube things again, haha, this time it was a little bit less messy. I should have taken more pictures of Thanksgiving! I just realized I didn't really write about the Belvedere, but you can kind of refer to my last entry about the Belvedere. The one thing that's different is the Valie Export exhibit. I still don't really know what to think of the whole thing. There was one room that had these tubes that light bulbs were mechanically dipped into. Then there was another room that had a ton of tv's on their sides showing a pedal from a sewing machine going up and down on each screen. The exhibits were like that. I think I liked it, but I'm not even really sure...

The upper Belvedere

The lower Belvedere with a sculpture from the Valie Export exhibit.

Walking up to the upper Belvedere.

Some of the garden in front of the Upper Belvedere.

Eating Chinese food for lunch! Yay Thanksgiving!

Chinese food.

Freitag 26 November: Today was a nice day where we slept a little bit longer than normal, I didn't have German and we got coffee and apfelstreudel and did some leisurely shopping. For lunch we went and got some Wiener schnitzel, definitely a necessary meal to eat in Vienna. And in the afternoon it was opera time. The opera: Handel's "Alcina". We got in line for Stehplatz at 4, the show started at 7. After getting our standing room seats and marking our territory, we went to eat Käsekraners for dinner (or as my mom called them "crazy caners") then we went and stood through a four hour opera. It was amazing though! The sets, the costumes, the singing! It was all so amazing. I'm so glad my parents got to see it. It was their last night and they had to fly out at 7, which meant that they had to leave for the airport just a little after 4 am, which therefore meant that we were all going to stay up all night to make sure we didn't miss saying goodbye or missing flights. We went to their hotel and went to the fitness center, watched some BBC, packed bags, made sandwhiches. It was a party let me tell you and the at 4 we left for Landstraße so I could drop them off at the S7. It was really sad, but I was actually too tired to be sad. Then I went home and went to bed around 5:30 am. Ah! What a week!

Waiting in line for the Stehplatz

Sitting down during the intermission.

The view of the theater from sitting down. We needed a break!

I forgot to say, tonight was the first snowfall! Karlskirche in the snow!

Samstag 27 and Sonntag 28 November: These two days, literally all I did was write papers and do homework. Yay Vienna... But I got a bunch of big things out of the way in preparation to be free of work in London this coming weekend!

Montag 29 November: Today was basically the usual. Wake up, practice, class, practice, more canceled rehearsals, more homework.

Dienstag 30 November: Kind of the same old. Again, plus late night coaching. Again.

Mitwoch 1 December: Today was our last Art and Architecture field trip. We went to Karlskirche and the Wien Museum. We got to go up into the dome of Karlskirche, which was really cool. It was interesting to examine the architectural painting up close. Then we learned about how fake marble is made and how to tell the difference. If you touch fake marble it will get warm, if you touch real marble it stays cold. At the Wien Museum we looked at Biedermeier paintings, which are kind of boring. Then we looked at some more Klimts and Schieles. Then of course it was sushi Wednesday for dinner, topped off with a ton of homework.

Inside of the dome

More of the dome plus the scaffold.

The very very top of the dome.

The view from the top.

Donnerstag 2 December: So today was the day of tons of rehearsals and coachings, followed by a performance of our Brahms clarinet quintet at Barbara's studio recital. After the recital she took us all out for drinks and dinner, it was so awesome! We had so much fun! Then I had to go home and do all of my homework slash book bus stuff for getting to and from the airport tomorrow for London! That was frustrating, for two hours I tried to figure this out and accidentally bought the wrong tickets! Then we had to use the cancellation as a credit and buy new tickets through the same company that were twice as much as the originals. I was in tears, it was three in the morning and I still had to do my homework.

Freitag 3 December: So today I woke up and felt terrible. So I decided to stay home until 2 when I had to go work on a German project. (My coaching today was canceled since we did a good job last night, yay!) That was when we found out our flight to London was canceled!!! It was so sad. We got a refund for the flight, but not for the bus!! ARGH! The other girls got a refund for their hostel, but it was still really really sad. We had an awesome roommate dinner though that Katie made. Appetizers provided by Marisa, drinks by Elizabeth. It was great. Photos to follow later.