More photos of the schloss and the Meierhof

Someone requested more photos of the schloss and the Meierhof and the places I hang out.  So without further ado!
The Bierstube, the gym, some more library detail shots, and some people.  Oh not to mention the flamingos.  No, they aren't in a zoo.  And the used to belong to Max Reinhardt.  Okay not THESE ones, but they are descendents of the original flock.  It's so bizarre.  Right next to the pigs on the farm there are these huge pink birds.

 We take our table tennis seriously around here.

 Adam is pretty good too.

 Larry insisted on going to the bierstube.

 Dinner in the White room with Andrea, Adam and Darren.

 The masks of comedy and tragedy in the library.  Like signing it Max was here!  And in fact one of the masks(the one on the left) is Max.

 Some cool ceiling art.

 The courtyard of the Meierhof at night

 The fitness center

Library news

I haven't written much about the library and my efforts there.  I got permission last week to hold a book sale.  So far I have made about 25 Euros.  Better than nothing at all. 
And I finished cleaning the downstairs shelves and the shifting.  I'm so proud!  Trust me the shelves are cleaner than they have been in YEARS. 
Now you could eat off those shelves.  But it's not recommended. 
I took before and after photos of the shelves I was cleaning....judge for yourself.
The wood still isn't shiny, but it is clean.

The shifting on the bottom floor is all done as well.  I actually have extra room on the last shelves.  I was almost positive I would have to shift up for some things.  It's great, cause that gives me more room for the oversize section I created as well.
It was a project I really wanted to do and it looks great. 

Dachau

Last Tuesday I went with the ISP and some of the other interns to Dachau in Germany. It's one of the concentration camps left over from the Nazis.
It was intense.  It's very sad and in some ways chilling.  I was prepared for the sadness and intensity because I have been to Terezin, but it never gets easier.
Dachau felt removed from the horror than Terezin, maybe because the barracks had been torn down and then rebuilt.  It's larger than I expected, but not large. 
That I think is the worse part.  So many people in such small spaces. 

There are really no words to describe it.  I don't know if the photos do it justice either....

Schloss Hellbrun

My second part of Easter Monday was going to the Schloss Hellbrun.  It's on the outskirts of the city and is a wonderful 'pleasure palace'.  That's what the tour said.  It was built in the 1600's by one of the Prince-Archbishops of Salzburg.

It's best known for the gardens and the water fountains.  The Archbishop was a patron of the arts and had spent some time in Italy as a child.  So the palace is quite lavish.   And the gardens are beautiful.  I think it would be a wonderful place to go and just have a picnic and spend some time there.  I really liked the water parterre.

But what the schloss is Really known for is the Trick fountains.  As well as being a patron of the arts the Archbishop was a practical joker.  He had a full water garden built to the side of the palace for his guests.  If you go you are warned....

There are a few interesting entertainments all run by water power.  And in good working order after 400 years. 
I was fascinated by the way the builders hid the spouts in some of the fountains and got soaked while indulging my curiosity at the end....:(
But it's all spring water and apparently holy water.  So, now I'm clean and lucky according to the legend.  And overall it's fun.  If you can't laugh at yourself what's the point?  

Zoo day aka that dog's got guts, just no brains

I went to the Salzburg Zoo today.  It was Easter Monday here and most things were closed, including the seminar offices.  So many people took advantage of it.  I've been wanting to get to the zoo for a while now and the weather was great.  I love zoos. This one is small, but interesting.  The primate areas were different than in any place I've seen.

The lions don't have a lot of room in the outside enclosure, and if they get one good rockslide, it's good-bye to the bears, but it's a decent zoo.

I liked the monkey/lemur enclosures and what they did.  There is a partition, but I think it's more for the humans than the monkeys cause it's about waist high and the pond filled with Amazonian fish(thinking piranhas) isn't huge.  A good, determined monkey could swing over it.  Anyway it's much more up close and personal with the South American monkeys, than say in the Bronx Zoo.

I did wonder how many monkeys tried the escape route over the piranha pool, but they seemed very happy with the room service, so maybe none.

Spent some time communing with the big cats.  They had everything but a leopard.  Well they had a SNOW leopard(2 in fact) which is my favorite big cat, but no African leopard.  It's odd they had a cougar and a lynx.  Well, the lynx is a Eurasian subspecies, but the cougar/puma/mountain lion is a North American big cat.  They had 2 jaguars as well.  I felt sorry for them.  Jaguars are not known for their love of noise and people.  And they were right up front on display.  I could tell one of the cats was a bit skittish and you could barely see him/her until some of the crowds moved along.  Then I got this shot of it.  Not bad, I thought.

I then wandered over to the lion house.  My first thought was: Oh my God that lion has a Mohawk!  Apparently the male lion is balding or something, because it has a tuft of mane sticking straight up.   And I also thought that the lion was blonder than normal, but that was probably because it's from the Namibia, South African region than I normally see.  The sign said southwestern...

 I watched the lions for the most time.  I was on the second level which has a great view of the whole enclosure and I wasn't there for more than a few minutes and the lion got up, and was a bit agitated.  I didn't do anything honest!  So for the next 45 minutes or so he stalked around the pen roaring at people, charging at the fence and generally asserting himself.
The lioness was calmer.  She only got up once and was staring at the lion house.  Maybe they were pissed that the pigs next door(I think they were warthogs) got fed first.  Either that or they were thinking hmmm, looking good.
Then as the lion was generally entertaining the crowds a guy and his dog came up next to me.  Dogs go to the zoo here.  2 euros, and they even have rest stops with water bowls and leash hangers.  It's very cool.  Anyway the dog got one look or sniff of the lions and went NUTS.  Barked and growled and jumped on the glass enclosure.  Wouldn't be quiet or sit down.  It was all the funnier since the dog couldn't have been more than 15 pounds.  It didn't think major killer cat.  Just CAT.

Gotta admire the dog's guts thinking he could take on this cat.

To market, to market.

While I didn't buy a fat pig(jiggity jig)  I did do some shopping at the Green Market on Saturday.  Since Easter dinner at the schloss is shredded pancakes with plum sauce(a traditional Austrian dish) no one was terribly thrilled about that.  I offered to cook, and Andrea offered her place and kitchen as the venue.

It's asparagus season here in Austria.  And asparagus always says to me, spring!  So I figured asparagus and mushroom risotto with prosciutto wrapped asparagus, bread and cheese and whatever else appealed to the interns for dinner.  It's also strawberry season here, so I picked up some fresh Austrian strawberries and blueberries for dessert.  There is also chocolate from Zotter in town.  http://www.zotter.at/

I love going to markets.  It's a little like the Borough Market in London, but smaller of course.  There are food stands selling sausage, bread, those yummy pretzels, and of course beer.  But there's also flowers, cheese, meat, vegetables(obviously) and bakery items.  I also saw a honey guy with everything from honey to beeswax candles.  That I have to go back and browse.  But I hit the different stalls and got asparagus(3 bunches!), Portabello mushrooms, strawberries, blueberries, 2 kinds of cheese, and the aforementioned prosciutto(San Daniele in case you were wondering)  Oh, and the bread.  Got a baguette deal.  I was kicking myself for getting it at the market, when I could SHOULD have gone to the Bakery at St. Peter's.  It's the oldest in Salzburg and you get bread from a log fired oven.  By the time I finished in the market the bakery was closed.  Ah, well...

The others contributed appetizers and whatever else they fancied.  Should be a good party.  Watch for photos!

I also found the Salzburg salt store!  After all this place is known for their salt.  That's what Salz means in German.  Actually Salzburg means Salt Castle.  Another place I have to go into and browse and buy. I was very excited about it.
Happy Easter everyone!

Palm Sunday

I finally went to Mass in the Dom, the cathedral here in Salzburg.  It was Palm Sunday Mass, and very interesting.
The tradition here is to bring Palmbuschen to Mass and have them blessed for the garden later on. Palmbuschen are plants put together on long sticks and decorated with ribbons.  They are very pretty and festive.  See?

The Mass doesn't change much from language to language, but I was not sure exactly what they were saying.  Part of it was the language, and part was the first half of Mass was a lot of chanting by the choir. 

It was nice , but I just wish the Dom was warmer.  It's soooo cold in that church. And the decor was not warming.  Lots of beautiful stucco, but white and black, so it feels colder.
 I figured out quickly why the rest of the people were still wearing jackets...

The music was amazing, especially since the Dom holds about 50,000 people and there wasn't any mikes or speakers I could see.  Well, they did keep an eye(ear?) out for those things in the 16th century, so it makes sense.
You could hear them all the way to the back of the nave.   It was worth it.  Besides I like going to Mass, especially in new places.

Troubleshooting tech

Officially I have responsibility for the schloss library and the Vilar center in the Meierhof.  I don't spend a lot of time in the Meierhof part of the library, except to shelve the materials and do the journals and papers.  I have to change that, but there's so much to do in the schloss that it's hard to make time to get over here in the daytime.

I was being a bit lazy this afternoon and didn't want to hike back up the stairs to my room to check e-mail so I decided to use the computers in the Vilar center.

I'm glad I did, cause those babies need some serious TLC.  I started running disc clean-ups and de-fragmentation scans.  Man, that took forever and while the de-fragmentation is done the disc clean-ups are not.  The compression of files slowed them down to the point of inactivity.  To top it all off 2 of the machines kept freezing so I literally had to pull the plugs to restart them.  I'll have to figure it out.

The least we could do is provide up to date speedy machines for session people and the hotel guests here.  Hopefully the basic care will speed them up a little.  Even if it doesn't it certainly can't hurt them.

I'm planning on finishing the clean-up in the morning and maybe run a virus scan on all the machines too.  As well as do the same thing on the 4 workstations in the library, and of course the office workstation.  And on a personal note I have run clean-up and de frag scans on the laptop, just in case.  It's in much better shape than those!

Monchsberg

I was determined to do something touristy today.  I was going to go to the Mozart Geburtshaus, and I did go past it meaning to go in, but there was this long line, snaking down the stairs into the lobby.  So I passed. 

I ended up walking along the Monschberg, which is the hill overlooking the city.  There are great trails and views as well as remnants of the old city walls. 
The Monchsberg, which means Monk's Hill in German,  is the major feature in Salzburg.  It's where the Festung is, the city walls, and where they built the Modern Museum of Art in the late 20th century. 
But back to the hiking.  It was nice.  A bit chilly up there, but the sun was out and there were sheltered spots.  I walked a lot more than I planned.  Up stairs, around walls, through tunnels and over the town.

It's also a great way to get a new perspective on the city.  From some of the viewpoints you can see how small Salzburg really is.

Everyone likes mail, don't they?

At the end of last week I discovered that my theory of everyone likes getting mail was blown all the pieces.   I can't believe I didn't post about it when it happened!
Anyway there I was minding my own business happily(sort of) cataloging law books and I kept kicking something.  That was annoying, so after a few times I had to find out what.  There's a box under my desk just far enough away to be almost invisible, but close enough to get in my way.
Anyone who knows me knows I have to find out what it is and why it's stashed under a desk.  In a rarely used office.
So I crawl under the desk and it's unopened.  Oh.  Well, that's odd.  But it could be old Seminar literature or something.  So I dig out the Swiss Army knife to slice and dice the packaging.  While I'm tearing into it I notice the postmark.  2006.  July 2006 to be exact.  Uh-oh.  That can't be good.  It was shipped to us from Long Island almost 5 years ago and the contents are still a mystery.  Well, I was right and wrong.  It wasn't good for me and my to do list, but it was a good thing that I found them.
The books were the long lost Society for Urban Planning donations.  I don't remember the full name of the organization but we call it SCUPAD.
They had been donated to the library with the expectations that they would have their own shelf in a prominent spot, but the shipped books had never been found.
Why not I wonder, since they were only shoved under a desk?!  In a rarely used office! So there was much rejoicing in the higher ranks here, since SCUPAD is meeting in the beginning of May and want to see their shelf finished.  I had to catalog all the books and add special bookplates for them.
Sometimes that New England work ethic really gets in the way.