March 6: Attended an exhibition in the International University by an Iranian artist, Mehrdad Sadri, who came to Vienna in 1985 and has been granted honorary Austrian citizenship, whatever that means. His pictures are very monochromatic, modernistic, with some nudity so I don’t think he is a conservative Muslim. The IU president made the introductions, a local government official spoke, and a music professor played some piano pieces which he felt reflected the paintings’ themes. There must have been 200-300 people there.
March 7:
March 8: Went to the vegetarian restaurant and had misosuppe with noodles and vegetables. Mary had the curry plate and I ordered a somosa (sp)—like a ball of bread filled with curried flavored stuffing and bits of vegetables. Had kräpfen for dessert. A very busy class day. There are distinct differences of opinion between the secularists and the Muslims—so far no blows have occurred.
March 9: Woke up to another blizzard!
March 10: Walked over to Berggasse and visited the Freud museum. In some ways it was the least visitor friendly. You had to buzz the bell to get in the main door and then you walked up to the second floor where his Vienna apartment was and had to buzz again before a person came to the door to let you in. There are really only three rooms that are similar to how they were when Freud lived there. The rest of the apartment was used for a gift shop, painting exhibition, and library. I debated whether the $7 per person entry fee was worth it. However, you did get a good feel for Freud’s family life. There was also an interesting video that showed old film clips. I think the museum gave you a good feel for his life and life before World War II in Vienna until he had to flee the Nazis. All of his sisters perished in the concentration camps. Later we went inside the Votivkirche. Stopped at a neighborhood restaurant which supposedly is a cheaper version of Figlműller’s. It was cheaper and the serving size for the wienerschnitzel was just as big. It was crowded with locals, some of whom brought their dogs in with them.
March 11: Went shopping to have food for Sunday. At 1PM a bus was leaving from the International University for a faculty dinner in Bratislavia, Slovakia. I think around 18 faculty went (some with spouses). We were headed to an Armenian restaurant at a shopping mall in Bratislavia. After the bus driver stretched a 1 hour trip into 2 hours (he didn’t know where he was going), we finally reached a “shopping palace” – it did not look like much on the outside, but when we went in, it was as modern as any US shopping mall. Every store imaginable was there. We went into a large department store with supermarket and bought some dumpling mix. We were trying to use up our Slovak crowns, but really didn’t see a lot of goods we wanted or couldn’t buy in the US. Finally went into a toy store and found some lovely wooden puzzles and lovely porcelain dolls (about $4 each). From there we joined everyone at the restaurant. We were given our meal options (individuals were supposed to pay for their own drinks). We watched as a “dot-the-i, cross-the-t” German who works at an international organization “took over” trying to organize how the waitress took the food orders! I don’t know the Armenian names for what we ate, but it was good. The meat was a grilled pork chop kind of cut. Sat across from a Czech who also teaches international relations and we had a really interesting conversation about his work many years ago as an interpreter for the US embassy.
March 12: Snowed overnight again with maybe an inch or two on the sidewalks as we went to church. Had our Turkish friend over for a late lunch.
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