Republic of Kugelmugel | Vienna, Austria | Atlas Obscura

As we are travelling once again to dear old Vienna, home to countless generations of Tischlers (or so I'm told), for what feels like the fourth time, I have actually taken pains this time to research the city and see what's there that we may have missed.

The Austrians don't disappoint.

Firstly, in the medieval church, St Stefan's Dom, they have 11,000 plague victims in the basement, the bones of whom it was the job of criminals to clean of rotting flesh.
As an added bonus, they have the royal Hapsburg (the ruling royal family including Marie-Antoinette's family) crypts and various jars of their organs - some of which recently leaked and created such a stench that no-one would consider going downstairs to deal with the situation for days.
Cripes, what a bunch of babies. It's only 300 year old bowel juice!
Truly...some people.


And to think that the last 6 times I've entered that magnificent building, I've walked straight over all these gems.

But also, I discovered am amusement park that boasts 4-5 ghost trains and a rotor!Put that on the list.

And then I found out that there is a Viennese guy who built himself a sphere for a house, got in a monster fight with the government about it (buildings are very much either square or rectangular in Vienna), declared his sphere a republic in, no less, in 1984, and then refused to pay tax, printed his own stamps and narrowly avoided going to a rectangular prison by allowing the to move his spherical micro-nation to Prater which is the park that contains the amusement park.

Outside his sphere he has a "scheisse list" (shit list) of people who thwarted his attempts to declare independence and who tried to send him to prison. You can imagine this type of unreasonable fascist I'm sure. If you cannot, simply get up and have a quick peep in the mirror.

I've never seen a barbed wire protected sphere dwelling in the shadow of a roller coaster before, so I'm pencilling in Monday 28th September to round off (get it?) my education.

Stay tuned, I shall be blogging my new and improved arse off throughout Europe and I ain't gonna be polite, nuther.

Oh, and if you're wondering, his republic is called KugelMugel, so, it will probably come as no surprise to you that his address is listed as:

Number 2 Antifaschismusplatz, Prater
Vienna
Austria




Republic of Kugelmugel | Vienna, Austria | Atlas Obscura

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Monkey on my back -Take 2

I posted this blog a couple of weeks ago, but have since discovered footage of the very monkey in question, so am re-posting it with the clip.

Isn't he beautiful?

Special thanks to Woody Guthrie for writing the perfect song for my monkey some 50 years ago.

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I'm currently taking Ginkgo. And lots of it.

A common use for Ginkgo is as a memory tonic - I'm taking it for other reasons, so the memory thing is more like a side effect for me.

Oh the things that I'm remembering and the connections I am making!

Jesus wept, it's too much.

But one thing I remembered today while busily preparing a nasty tasting herb mix for someone was a moment of time from last December while we were in dear old Wien.

HellBoy had been outrageously sick - to the point where we had to phone a doctor on Xmas day to do a home visit to our hotel.
The doctor was somewhat of an alarmist and suggested that he needed a spinal tap to rule out viral meningitis.
In return, Jeff suggested that he should GGF.

We were refunded for all those un-Godly expenses just this week, which is probably what has put this period of time into my head.

So, after cancelling the Polish leg of the tour due to whatever it was that wasn't viral meningitis, we holed up in Vienna for 4 extra days - hardly any punishment, I can assure you.

On the third day, he rose again, and we took him only as far as the Museum of Torture, and then, because it was down hill from there, into a 5 story Austrian Aquarium of sorts.

One section of this place is a tropical enclosure (indoors) - anything tropical is a big deal over there.
There was a wooden walkway surrounded by tropical trees and bushes, strange birds flying free, turtles, fish, frogs, lizards and so forth.

But also there were monkeys.
Lots of little fuzzy monkeys.

Having been away from home for 2 weeks by this stage, I was seriously cat deprived and in need of some lovin'.
I was shamelessly gazing at these little critters and imagining how similar they might feel to a kitty cat.
How heavy, how warm, how cuddly.
I think my eyes welled up with tears and rolled back in my head a little bit.
But that's OK, the monkey who was looking back intently at me was down with that.

HellBoy was still in the octopus section down the hall and YogaBoy and I were leaning over the wooden railing, watching 2 monkeys groom each other.
Yoga Boy was comparing them to Indian monkeys that lived outside his ashram in Rishikesh.

As he did so, I felt a little kerrrrplop on my back.

I knew instantly what it was -it felt just like my cat Cec used to feel when she would jump onto my shoulders uninvited.

But Cec never picked through my hair looking for fleas...while I was awake anyway.
God knows what goes on when I'm asleep. TWSS
I rarely have fleas - maybe that's why.

As it was winter in Vienna, and owing to the fact that they exasperatingly had no coat room facilities, I was wearing my bulky, hooded, fur lined jacket- thus shielding my delightful parasitic friend from my brother.

I straightened up a little, looked YogaBoy appealingly in the eyes and said,

"Adrian, if I asked you to, would you help me get a monkey off my back?"

He looked at me intently, a flicker of concern passing across his otherwise happy brow.

"Yes, of course."

His response didn't surprise me at all.
Adrian's good like that. Whatever he has, even if it's only honesty, he'll give it to you.

So, I turned 45 degrees to my right, thus revealing my adorable yet preoccupied passenger who was still assisting me by picking through my hair lovingly.

He stayed still for the exclamations, but disembarked once the laughter began in earnest.

Even though I'd so completely enjoyed the encounter and the warm tactile moment we'd shared, my arms ached to hold him and cuddle him like I do Alice or Poppy when I change the linen each week.

I think back to that and genuinely believe that he felt my longing for a cat-like cuddle and extended to me what he thought was a viable option.

A split second after he'd left, HellBoy arrived, and quickly became devastated to discover that he'd missed the whole thing.
And that's a pity, because Jeff's a big fan of the monkey in general.

Never mind.

Anyway, hooray for Viennese monkeys and hooray for Ginkgo.

Sim loses it in Vienna.

Sometimes I snort when I laugh.

But I find that funny, and then I laugh even more, so that cancels it out.

Occasionally I have a day where I laugh at everything, usually this happens after something has struck me as funny in the morning.
No-one can predict it and no-one can avoid it.

But I must say that it is often animal related.
That's why we keep cats.

Anyway, I had a day like that in Vienna.

It began with the discovery of the shit shelf in the hotel toilet and eventually culminated with a very cold little dog walking through the courtyard of the Hofberg Palace.

Let's just say it was so cold here that two layers of thermals, wool stockings, various jumpers and a thick winter jacket felt as though they afforded me all the protection of a Lowe's singlet.

As I laughed, my tears were so cold that I had to lean forward so that they'd fall on the pavement.
They snap froze as they hit the 200 year old stones.

This poor little doggie was moving his fuzzy little feets as fast as he possibly could, in order to escape the cold. They were just a blur.
I think what really got me was the sound of the horses hooves clopping in the background which seemed as though they were coming from the dog.

HellBoy was kind enough to film my dignity reducing debacle so that I could share it with you all.
Not that anyone who reads this would be surprised.

BTW If I could name this dog, he would be called Gunther.
But I suspect it's real name would more likely be either, Mitzi or Fritz, which seems a pity.

Anyway, I've lost it in worse places than the Viennese Imperial Palace before and I regret nothing.

LOL

Hands up who's surprised that we're now going to both Hong Kong and Vienna?

My hand would be up but I'm typing.

LOL @ me.

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh those Russians.

For one reason or another, I just had to fossick through our holiday footage.

Mid fossick, I happened upon a clip Jeff had titled "Ruski with 20 kilo camera."

A title like that is always going to interest me more than something like "Historical monument", "Beautiful scenery" or "800 year old painting."

I know I shouldn't be proud of that but I don't know what to do about it.

Please enjoy and bear in mind that our video camera fits in the palm of my hand.

Ohhhhhhhh, those Russians...

Cool hat though.

For anyone who's interested, it's Vienna - prolly out the front of the Kunt Historisch Museum.
But that's a blog for another day, innit.

PS Such a pity Jeff stopped filming when he did because two frames later, James Bond parasailed down and took this guy out.

Head full of gravel.

Rolling over last night, I became aware that I was still actively planning our next Euro trip while sleeping.
I suspected as much, but now have concrete evidence, hence the gravel in my head.

Around about 3am, I was pitting the elegant virtue of Vienna against Leipzig and Trieste.
The battle wasn't all that pretty either.

Never mind.

Anyway, I thought that spitting it out might prevent Potsdam taking on Venice tonight, thus sparing my muddle from confusing the Earth's energy any further.

Three weeks of course has become five, and various magnificent cities have been auditioned, only to be cast aside due to reasons I can no longer pretend to guess at.
No Dubrovnik, no Oslo, no Northern Lights or fjords, no Split, no Heidelberg, no Amsterdam (boo), no Cologne.

OK, poor darling Hong Kong bought the farm this trip because it can be stinking hot October and I have to dodge hot weather.
Plus we're out of time.

We can easily duck across to Hong Kong for a week next year.
Also because I discovered that I can take sleeping pills and bomb myself for several hours during long haul flights, thus making the Asian stopover less necessary.
HellBoy informs me that after about three Temaze, I can sleep with my head on my knees.

hmmm

Paris disqualified itself by being self important, smelly and full of pretentious fuckwits on cheesey romantic weekends.
In fact, Paris can bite me on the fuzz.

Just yesterday, both London (my fault) and Venice (Jeff's fault) made it back into the mix.

By 9:36 this morning, I had to place an urgent phone call, almost waking HellBoy up, to tell him to start mentally preparing for Vienna yet again.

"OK. Good."

Any other response would have surprised me from him.

Should I call him tomorrow and tell him I'd like to collect space shells on Mars, he'd give me the green light without missing a beat.
He knows how much I like shells.

Well, in case I haven't told you, we decided that we'd bring our next Euro jaunt forward a year or so to coincide with Dad's trip.
Jeff's brother, wife and daughter have also decided to join us.

But not for the whole thing.
They are keen to go to Paris and EuroDisney and to Italy.
We are not.

Mickey Mouse + Paris = SIMONE HELL.

Plus, Italian culture is too dominated by Christianity to hold my attention.
Poor Jesus is almost as over exposed in Italy as Mozart is in Austria.
At least Mozart was real though.
And he has chocolates named after him rather than wars.

We all but sprinted through the Italian Renaissance section in the Louvre earlier this year.
I remember hearing HellBoy say,

"Oh fuck me, not this guy again," while looking at some crucifixion pic or other.

Anyway, Italy...I gotta tell ya, it's enough with the Jesus already.
Talk about monomania.
I'm trying to imagine my reaction to the Vatican City, better known as JesusDisney.
Quite probably the only place that would let Paris off the hook for being the cuntiest city.

We are having a total of three nights alone(!) after spending time with Tone and Line in Berlin and then are going to re-trace the Tischler and Planinc family footsteps with Dad and Viv through sleepy Slovenia.
After that we meet up with Greg, Giulia and Yasmin in Venice.

At this stage, the itinerary is:


Germany
Berlin/Potsdam(4 nights with Tone)
Leipzig (1 night)
Dresden (2 nights)

Slovenia (meet Dad)
Celje (1 night) = birth town
Vitanje (2 nights) = home town
Ljubljana (2 nights)
Bled (2 nights)

Italy (meet Greg and Gules and Yazzie)
Venice (2 nights)

Austria
Vienna (3 nights)
Salzburg (3 nights)

Germany
Munich (5 nights) incl trips to Rothenberg and Inglostadt

UK
London (4 nights) - return visit to Lizzie's underpants.

Yes.
I think I feel better with that stored somewhere.
It'll be interesting to see how much it changes before I make final bookings.

So, this time next year, we'll be in Celje.

Of course, my only real concern is that Souths will take this opportunity to make the finals and force a very ugly decision on me.
Those bastards.