When you think you'll be in Vienna...

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So many thoughts and new impressions in my head and heart! In the past six days I was in Slovakia, Austria, the Czech Republic and Belgium. I travelled. I worked. I spent time with my Czech friend Klara who I had not seen for three years. It was amazing.

On Friday morning I hung in a chair on the Schiphol Airport close to Amsterdam, waiting for a plane to take me to Slovakia from where I would be transferred to Vienna (my gratitude to SkyEurope, the air company that allows me to do such things for incredible prices). After I almost managed to miss my flight (not because I arrived at the airport late, but because I was too busy spacing out before departure), I eventually ended up – on time – in the bus to Vienna where Klara would be waiting for me. There I sat, not knowing what to expect. I had not seen her in three years, and we had only known each other shortly while I lived in the Czech Republic. However, our friendship had been strong from the beginning on. I remember how we went to the swimming pool together some weeks after my arrival in Olomouc. It was on a Saturday morning and it seemed like we had been going to the swimming pool together for years already.

Sometimes, when you think you go for a weekend in Vienna, it all turns out to be very different – it does, for example, turn into a weekend in the Czech Republic… I met Klara at the Erdberg metro station, a typical desolate metro station, where she waited for me together with her sister Vera and her little cousin Frantiscek. That was the first surprise. I first got my chance to eat cake in Vienna and do some window-shopping, but then it was time to leave for the Czech Republic. I knew beforehand that we would go to the Czech Republic, because Klara wanted to cast her vote in the parliamentary elections. I fully support individuals, especially my friends, exercising their democratic duties. So, hey, if my friend needs to vote in the Czech Republic, sure I’ll come along. Little did I know, however, that I would also attend the birthday celebration of a Czech Babi (Klara’s grandmother), sleep next to the not-even-one-year-old Frantiscek, participate in a Czech family’s life on the country side, visit the local zoo and pick flowers in the fields. But I did. Klara and I both had colds to recover from so we hung around while it rained outside. I ate too much cake. We chatted and talked in the ways that had been familiar to us three years ago. I observed the family life in which I was included for the weekend. We wrapped up presents. I watched Klara, who is super talented at handicrafts, making several very cute bags in very short time spans and together we fantasized a complete brand around it. The bags you can see on the pictures here and there; the brand name I am not going to tell you, because we might be crazy enough to really use it one day!

Sunday late afternoon we got into the car again to make our way back to Vienna. The ‘road trip to Vienna’ was one of these magical moments that expose the beauties of life in full force and strokes of silence. I found back the principal feelings of my life in the Czech Republic, where I lived one of the best episodes of my current lifetime. The countryside roads between Uhercice and Vienna took us away from time and place, creating the endlessness of space open for poetry to float and rays of sunlight to be a touch of magic on earth. I loved the entire journey, in the extraordinary company of Klara – the air in the car filled with mutual understanding for both the spoken words and the silences, the way it was in the life I lived in the Czech city:

Belonging

It was a long journey down the road
To finally come home,
There were the river goes
Winking to snow-covered trees,
At the edge of medieval walls
Protecting the city, beauty full

And I make love to her
Like she does to me
From sun to sand
From snow to stone
I breathe her rhythm and her air
Freshness on my face

Every day again, she lays her secrets
In my hands, and I cherish
Silent spirits, keeping me company
In places, I never knew of
Stars looking down on my

As I go home
Where I belong

Poetic prose dedicated to the city of Olomouc,
8 February 2003

The last day of my little holiday we spent in Vienna, the city of big buildings, long avenues and statues full of force. We had, however, not realized that it was Pfingsten and in a good Christian country like Austria that means that you’ll only see pagans in the street on such a holy day, pagans like Klara and me, yes. So there we were in a Vienna with the shops and market were closed (while they were our main targets of the day). So instead we ‘travelled’ to Latin America for tea, coffee and chocolate, and later on we had lunch in Japan. In between we walked through Vienna, leisurely walking without determined destinations to places where we would never arrive. Clouds in the sky, some sun, some rain. The elegance of a woman in kimono. The elegance of a woman carved in stone. The joy of two young women in a rare moment of calm in Vienna. Beauty full.