My apologies for the tardiness of this post; we are now in Berlin, but adequate time to describe one special night in Vienna has eluded me until now.
Vienna is known for nothing if not its classical music. Though few composers were actually born in the city or even in Austria, something in the air (or the sausage) has encouraged musical genius, as exemplifed in works by such artists as Beethoven, Mozart, Haydn and Strauss. Therefore, I had early on expressed an interest in attending a concert while in the city, provided we could find reasonably-priced tickets. As luck would have it, there was a concert happening the night before we were leaving. Actually, several concerts. After we turned down one eager ticket seller at the doors of St. Stephen´s cathedral and decided not to spend the money, we were approached by another go-getter flogging tickets, this time offering better seats, a lower price AND two free glasses of champagne, just for us. To boot, this concert had ballet to accompany the various classical pieces performed by the Vienna Imperial Orchestra (sounds impressive, no?), and was to take place in “one of the most beautiful theatres in Vienna.” So we dropped 45 €, acknowledging the fact that sometimes you need to shell out the money for experience sake.
After a mostly unsuccessful attempt to shed our tourist-grunge style (I put on make-up for the first time in a looong time), we rushed to the theatre, as I was petrified of showing up late and being judged by all the Viennese cultural elite who would no doubt be in attendance. Luckily, we arrived just in time to have a young man in a bad tuxedo show us our place in the school-gymnasium-turned-faux-Baroque-architecture-theatre, featuring a minature stage on which the dancers were to… dance? The performance was a bit behind schedule, so the other attendees — who had a strange penchant for wearing khakis, sporting cameras and speaking English — did not even notice when our wobbly wooden school gym chairs squeaked a little bit past showtime.
It was at that point that Luke turned to me and asked what I thought of the magic beans that we had been sold. After a solid two months of proclaiming ourselves smart travelers (NOT tourists) and turning our noses at all the tacky shit happily eaten up by all the stupid tourists, we got suckered into the sub-par, manufactured, campy, evil twin of what we thought we were buying, a show that is regurgitated every night of hte week, especially for touristic delight. (It is at this point that I should point out that since Luke was essentially dragged along to this, this “we” means me).
As the “MC” (doesn´t every orchestra performance have comic relief?) cracked jokes in English and threw prizes in to the crowd; as the 2 (two) ballerinas attempted to dance on a stage the size of a small kitchen; as the orchestra played predictable (though admittedly beautiful) selections; and as the touristy tourists loved every touristic minute of it, I tried to ignore the voice in my head asking how I could have fallen for the scam. Even the champagne wasn´t good, given that it tastes quite bitter while drunk alongside every one else who had it thrown into the deal, just for them.
So in case there is any doubt, this particular experience goes into the NOT RECOMMENDED pile, alongside the London Eye and taking a 12-hour Scottish highlands bus tour the night after a serious bender.
—Wendy
