Early BirdsSunday Morning in Vienna

"Sometimes
the early bird
gets frozen stiff."
"Say it ain't so, Sweetie!"

Image and Text © by Merisi

Land of Big Sky and SnowWestern Austria in WinterMerisi's Viennese Escapes

Big Sky
Where snow and horizon meet

or so you think,
until you reach the top
of a hill and more mountains
remind you that the horizon's further still

and you turn around
and walk back into the village,

its beautiful Bregenzerwald farmhouses
with wood shingle sidings

and rows of windows
with wooden shutters
offering a warm embrace

Looking at these traditional buildings
you would not expect that
Vorarlberg - home to the Bregenzerwald Region -
is the European center of modern architecture,
would you?
Well, traveling through the region
will offer you stunning examples of both
traditional and modern architecture.
Its beauty took my breath away.

Photographs & Text © by Merisi

Here are links about the Bregenzerwald Region and its architecture:
o> Bregenzerwald in Vorarlberg
"Famous for its contemporary architecture, throughout Vorarlberg's Bregenzerwald classic wooden buildings are preserved, yet also enhanced, in bold modern form."
o> network of architecture guided tours
by architects, architectural historians and writers
In a previous post, you'll find an example of modern architecture in Vorarlberg:
o> Women's Museum in Hittsau
o> Book review: Sustainable Architecture in Vorarlberg by Ulrich Dangel
o> Austria Travel Info: Vorarlberg

On the 256th Anniversary of theBirth of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
was born on the 27th of January in 1756.
Today marks the 256th anniversary of his birth.
The following are my thoughts and images
from a visit in 2009 to his memorial
at St. Marx cemetery.

A wreath of roses and spring flowers
had been laid at the foot
of the grave stone marker,
and a white candle was burning nearby.

It has been snowing in Vienna, all week.
I imagined little Wolferl
being born on a day like this:
A heavy snow storm in the early morning hours,
with the clouds parting at noon,
allowing for a few minutes of sunshine
to caress the face of the newborn genius.

A bouquet of pale yellow roses
had been left by another Mozart loving soul.
They were frozen stiff,
as if to enshrine their beauty forever.
It warmed my heart thinking that someone
had come out all the way,
walked up the long hill,
maybe in a snow storm as I did,
to offer this token of love.

Another friend
had brought a single rose,

gently posing it
on the angel's pedestal.

A red rose kissed
by the winter morning's sun.

An angel,
keeping watch,
pensively,
cloaked in sunlight.

256 years,
so many years full of music, his music,
source of untold delights and
unimaginable moments of sheer joy.

Somewhere in these hallowed grounds,
Wolfgang Amadeus was laid to rest,
yet his music is with us, to this day.
Music of the spheres
brought down to earth,
not by celestial bodies,
but by a human genius.

The wreath,
a gift by Pension Mozart.

Photographed in January 2009
at Vienna's St. Marx Cemetery
First published in 2009

Cathedral of St. NicholasVienna in Winter

Cathedral of St. Nicholas in Vienna
Russian Orthodox Church
Diocese of Vienna and Austria
of the Patriarchate of Moscow

St. Nicholas Cathedral
I had an appointment in the Third District
and was half an hour early, so I decided to walk
from Stadtpark up along the tracks of the S-Bahn
towards the Rennbahn entrance of the Belvedere,
and this was the sight I encountered
about halfway up the tracks.

St. Nicholas Cathedral
Looking up from one of the access ramps
to the S-Bahn Rennweg station.
Almost high noon and a brilliant winter sun
illuminated the cathedral against the blue sky.
I felt as if in a Russian fairytale.
Photographed 25 January 2012
© by Merisi

As far west as you can go in AustriaBregenzerwald Region in VorarlbergMerisi's Viennese Escapes

Walk in the Sky
Schwarzenberg
Bregenzerwald Region
Vorarlberg

Women's Museum
Frauenmuseum Hittisau
Bregenzerwald Region

Glazed Quail Breast
with Duck Liver on Fennel
and Pomegranate Compote
Das Schiff
Restaurant Romantik Hotel
Hittisau
Bregenzerwald Region

Apple Strudel in the Snow
Restaurant Cafe Alpenblick
Sulzberg
Bregenzerwald Region

Sunset
Mountains painted gold
near Sulzberg
Bregenzerwald Region
Vorarlberg

Photographed
17 January 2011
in the Bregenzerwald Region
Vorarlberg, Austria
Images and Text
© by Merisi

Tulips in the MorningViennese Moments

Will there really be a "Morning"?
Is there such a thing as "Day"?
Could I see it from the mountains
If I were as tall as they?


Has it feet like Water lilies?
Has it feathers like a Bird?
Is it brought from famous countries
Of which I have never heard?
Oh some Scholar! Oh some Sailor!
Oh some Wise Men from the skies!
Please to tell a little Pilgrim
Where the place called "Morning" lies!

Emily Dickinson

Tulips on my Windowsill
22 January 2012
Images © Merisi

Chairade at the Belvedere

Red Chair
Point of view
Center right or center left?

Side Entrance
of the Upper Belvedere

*

charade
1. (Group Games / Games, other than specified)
an episode or act in the game of charades
2. Chiefly Brit an absurd act; travesty

Photographed 23 January 2011
Copyright by Merisi
Repost

Coffee, Anyone?Café Diglas

Café Diglas
Wollzeile

Photographed
Wednesday evening,
with the Golden Hour's light
flooding in through
tall windows and
bathing the interior
in its glow

Café Diglas
is my one of
my favorite Kaffeehäuser

Smokefree,
great coffee,
fantastic food,
what more could one
wish for?
Grumpy waiters?
Oh well,
they'd have to hire actors
to perform that feat,
Diglas waiters
have friendliness in their genes,
they couldn't be grumpy
even if they wanted to!

What more
could one wish for?
Better pictures,
for once,
to really do this jewel justice,
but then, who am I
to reveal all its glory
when you can go there
and see for yourself?
Images and Text © by Merisi
Repost

Vienna's Café SperlCoffee, anyone?

"Here there is nothing
I have taken from you

so I begin with memory
as old songs do

in this café
against the night

in this villa refrain
where we collect the fragment

no longer near us
to make ourselves whole ... "

Quoted from
"Midnight Dinner at the Vesta Lunch"
The Cinnamon Peeler
Selected Poems by Michael Ondaatje
Published by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.
New York 1991

Photographed at Café Sperl
Gumpendorfer Straße 11-13
1060 Vienna

You would like to linger?
No problem, we are in Vienna,
aren't we?

Click on the title
or any of the images
and a charming Viennese waiter will appear
and you will be served another
cup of coffee!
Enjoy! :-)
Photographed and first published in August 2009
Images and Text © by Merisi

Cooking as an Act of LoveBabette's Viennese Feast

Visual Delectations
Isn't this the kind of
writing on the wall
we all love?

Chocolate Quince Tartelette
with your coffee?

I said yes
to sinful gluttony -
and, oh, what rapture!

Morsel after morsel
transporting me

on the wings
of a perfectly composed
rhapsody of flavours
to the higher spheres
of sweet nirvana

"... a triumphant sunburst
of sensual and spiritual delight -
a supreme banquet
harmonizing body and soul ... "
David Denby in "Heaven on Earth" *
in the New York Magazine,
in March 1988, about the movie
"Babette's Feast" *
*) Click for the entire article
and a clip of the movie

Photographed at
Babette's Spice and Books for Cooks
Schleifmühlgasse 17
4th District
images and own text © by Merisi
Repost