Vienna

The bus ride coming to Vienna wasn't the most pleasant one, I didn't get much sleep but hey at least I got to where I needed to be. With the sun rising, I was quite ready to tackle this day though my circumstances would beg to differ. I had noticed that the simcard I bought in Poland wasn't working at all, this was a huge problem as I had no idea how to reach my hostel from my bus stop nor did I have any Euros on me at that time as I had just arrived from Poland which had a different currency so I couldn't take any public transportation unless I found a currency exchange but it was still too early. With some feelings of dread, I got off the bus a bit lost, to my surprise there were also some people who were as lost as I am. One of them, a big scruffy guy was trying to figure out if he was in the right place, I gave his tickets a look and told him that he had to take another connecting bus to get to his location which was already paid for in his ticket, I redirected him to the correct bus stop. Next was an African man who also asked me for directions, which was pretty funny cuz I was just as lost as he was. He needed to get to the Nigerian embassy, now I had no idea where that was but I do know we need to find some place with wifi. I learned that his name was Vincent and as we walked a couple of meters, I found a free wi-fi connection, just my luck! I helped Vincent use Google Maps and told him to screenshot and not close the app so it would just stay there, we went our separate ways afterwards as I booked an Uber to my hostel. The driver asked me to put on a mask and I did and we had some small talks about Japan. I got to my hostel and once again I had no wi-fi and was having a hard time entering the front door as it was locked. I paced around back and forth to the bakery nearby as it had free wi-fi. I tried contacting the owner several times and I was finally able to get a hold of him and he told me to go upstairs. How dumb of me really, the upstairs one had a pin where I could put in my code and was finally able to check in and leave my belongings. I took a nice shower and set off, still very tired and sleepy but my friend Mareike was waiting for me.

The walk was very pleasant, being surrounded by the amazing architecture of Vienna, it's wide streets and musicians scurrying about made me feel really happy that I was here. I wasn't really sure where Mareike was hanging about and I got a little worried if I was keeping her waiting for too long as I didn't have wi-fi to confirm her location. She had also just gotten to Vienna as well to start her Master's degree so it was a new city for both of us though maybe not so different for her as she did come from Germany (judging from personal experience, I'd say Vienna is so much more beautiful than Berlin, however). We went around the various tourist attractions littered around the town's center such as Hofburg, the Vienna State Opera house, Rathaus, St. Charles Church and St. Stephen's Cathedral. All of them were amazing architectural feats. St. Charles Church had an amazing water reflection photo op while St. Stephen's gothic style was something new for me. I also grabbed breakfast as well as exchanged money at a place with a not so good rate. The clerk was Filipino, I noted.

We had lunch outdoors, it was autumn and there were children playing outside. I was a bit chilly, I finally got to order schnitzels. Much to my dismay, it wasn't anything special at all just a fried pork chop. Afterwards, we went to two different Hundertwasserhaus, a whacky and artsy designed building by a famous architect. We then went to the park to chill for a bit, a lot of children were on these scooter things and trying to go up these skateboard rings. We went to a grocery to try and buy another simcard. To end the day, we went to the Museum of Sound which was a visual and audio interactive museum. There wasn't much people there and it was actually really fun to go around and try the various exhibitions and to get to know the famous musicians of Austria such as Beethoven.

We went to her dorm afterwards so that we could set up my simcard and no surprise it still wasn't working. We decided to try one more time to go to a nearby mall to try and get it fixed. We took the metro going there and the clerk tried but it wasn't really going to work out. We went to have dinner instead, big burgers which were my treat and we talked about dreams and lucid dreaming. I walked her back to the station and walked the way back to my hostel which was actually very close.

When I entered, I heard the familiar language of Japanese so I popped in the lounge room to say hi and went back inside my room to end the day.Read more