I arrived in Vienna on a Tuesday and went from the airport to my friend Marikas’ place in the 10th district of town. I met Marike at X-B in Berlin while she was traveling through with her friend Tobi (from Ireland/Canada) this past winter. She is getting her PhD in American Studies and has currently been a TA for an American Queer Studies Class. We had talked about what each other did and I had mentioned that I do performance and it turned out they were looking for something to top off the class (http://homepage.univie.ac.at/astrid.fellner/queertheory.htm). It was a very special occasion that there was a guest performer at the University, especially for a Queer Studies class, since the systems work very differently in Europe compared to the US, so that was really an honor as well. They were really great to work with also and there was another show set up for me at a venue called 'Schikaneder'(http:/ www.schikaneder.at/) in the 3rd District. Both shows were well received and well attended. After both shows we went out in groups to talk and get drinks and the professor of the class was really a fabulous person who has been publishing research papers on gender construction in American culture in the 18th century. So, there was lots of acedamia but people had good ideas and Marike was also really rad about connecting politics to academics and theory. We ate lots of roles and ate Austrian vegan food, looked at old buildings in the ring center, and talked about femininity and gender and sexism and queer politics and cultural differences like US and Austrian political histories and social movements.
On the Saturday that I was there, there was the Vienna Pride where there was quite a few people in traditional Austrian garb, doing their little dances and songs on floats and then later on the main with an ABBA cover band and my absute favorite was the carage drawn by 12 people in Sm garb with bits in their mouths.
Some things in Vienna that I was surprised by were that there were more homeless people, than for example in Berlin, lots more people with tattoos and several times a week your train would be delayed or canceled because people often were trying to comit suicide by jumping in front of the underground trains. I ended up staying with my friend Anna for the last couple days in town at her parents house in the 3rd district. The apartment was really nice with a super old elivator, a shower where you could watch yourself in a full length mirror and was right above a huge market street. I went and got a ton of produce and made a huge dinner for Anna and her friends one night, which was really fun. I did get lost quite a bit in Vienna, but found my way around some how. There is really no control also on public transportation and you don’t really have to pay for it ever which was rad.
I left Vienna the following Monday for Berlin, got in late and it took about 1.5 hours to get back from the airport, did some laundry and met up with some people. In the morning I had to leave all the laundry I had done and then went to catch the train to the airport after trying to burn a film I had. It was a not quite day of craziness. Thankfully at the airport I met up with someone I recognized from the queer scene/queeruption and we sat together on the plane. Then there was queer festival Copenhagen…
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