Postcard no 7 Arrival in Vienna

Categories: austria, postcards

Date: 30 October 2007 22:17:36

When I arrived in Vienna for the first time on Tuesday, 20 September 1983 at around 9 a.m., I left the station and saw two signposts - one to Budapest and one to Prague and felt that I had arrived at the edge of the world. And in a way, I had. Vienna is only approximately 30 miles from the Hungarian border which at the time was the Iron Curtain. This time, (25th September 2007 at around 3.30 p.m.) I looked out for the two signposts - and there they were - but that brick wall feeling was not repeated. Back then, I shouldered my rucksack, picked up my guitar and bag and trudged off to find a youth hostel. This time, I hopped in a taxi and announced the name of my hotel. I was quite excited about this hotel because it was located right in the centre of the city and I'd got a reasonable deal on it through a web site. The taxi driver was clearly not a candidate for the equivalent of the London Knowledge.

Me: Well-known hotel on very central street please.
Driver: Which street is that, sorry?
Me: Very central street, just by the Stefansdom, bang in the centre of the old city.
Driver: Umm, I'm not sure where it is.
Me: Well, drive towards the Stefansdom and I may be able to remember how to find it and direct you.
[A few minutes later]
Driver: What house number is the hotel?
Me: Number 3 [Thinks ungraciously: if you don't know where the street is, I can't see how the number is going to locate it any more easily.]

As we drove along, I realised that I was experiencing a completely new view of Vienna. Back then, I never travelled round Vienna by car and knew it from walking and public transport routes - you don't get to see much from an underground train and it dawned on me that perhaps I didn't know the city as well as I had thought.

If you ever go to Vienna and have a burning urge to have your hair cut, you could do worse than go to the Gumpendorferstraße. I knew the Art Nouveau-style station of that name but could not recall ever having walked down the street. It seems to be *the* street for hairdressers. Dozens of them.

Contrary to expectations, the taxi driver pulled into the correct street. I paid him the princely sum of 7 euros (bargain compared to over-priced Britain) and I waltzed into the hotel where none other than Franz Kafka and Max Brod had stayed - about 100 years ago. (I wonder if Kafka would have written a blog?)