Books and geekery
I just started reading In Search of Vienna by Henriette Mandl, which is a book of walking tours through Vienna’s 1st district (the city center). I actually got from the teachers at one of my schools at the end of the year last year. I think it was from the Stockerau teachers, and the Laa ones gave me a book of traditional Austrian fairy tales in English, which I read before I left. ANYWAY. I feel slightly ashamed that I can’t remember which book came from whom, but regardless, this book was a very good choice for me. Sure, I know Vienna pretty well by now, and the individual places she mentions might not be new to me, BUT the author is Austrian and has included all of the legends and anecdotes that correspond to the traditional places - stories that for the most part haven’t made it into most tour books. SO PERFECT FOR ME. So far I’ve read 5 of the 6 tours she wrote, and I’ve already had a ton of geek-out moments - mainly when she provided more information than I remember Toni giving us during our weekly tours through Vienna when I was studying abroad in 2007. And THEN on Saturday Emily and I walked through a fair portion of the 1st district, and I got to spew knowledge at Emily, while trying to remember which details and stories of brothel fights matched which squares in town. Love love love.
Oh, and at the Pumpkin Festival the other weekend, I found a book called Die deutschen Kaiser (The German Emperors) for a mere 1 Euro! Awesome! It starts with Charlemagne, continues on with the Holy Roman Empire, Habsburgs and Hohenzollerns, and ends with Kaiser Wilhelm I and II. So…except for the really German parts, I am hoping it will be both informative AND enjoyable. And definitely a challenge, since it’s over 500 pages of small print in German. Gah. I also found a German-language world atlas from the early-mid 1930’s, but since it was totally interwar, before any particularly interesting Hitlerian territorial changes were made, I let Emily have it. Maybe that was a mistake, but at least she’ll enjoy it.
Oh, and at the Pumpkin Festival the other weekend, I found a book called Die deutschen Kaiser (The German Emperors) for a mere 1 Euro! Awesome! It starts with Charlemagne, continues on with the Holy Roman Empire, Habsburgs and Hohenzollerns, and ends with Kaiser Wilhelm I and II. So…except for the really German parts, I am hoping it will be both informative AND enjoyable. And definitely a challenge, since it’s over 500 pages of small print in German. Gah. I also found a German-language world atlas from the early-mid 1930’s, but since it was totally interwar, before any particularly interesting Hitlerian territorial changes were made, I let Emily have it. Maybe that was a mistake, but at least she’ll enjoy it.