Same But Different

The world never ceases to amaze me. International technology designers have come together to agree on the shape and size of USB ports. The computer companies agree the manufacturers of external gadgetry agree, everyone agrees. They are all the same.

Their also appears to an international agreement about the size and shape of batteries. Whilst the agreement is inclusive of a wide range of battery sizes and differences in the amount of power they contain, there is still universal acceptance of these differences.

Airlines have also managed to agree on the size and shape of boarding passes and the basic information they must contain. A Qantas boarding pass fits into the scanning system for FinAir.

Visa, I would never leave home without it because again amazingly it works in every country, even countries that have a GDP lower than my personal credit limit.

Coke can get its brand, packaging and flavour the same all around the world. The consistency of MacDonalds although slightly alarming is also reassuring. When in a country where it is important to learn the word “testicle” just in case it appears on a menu it is comforting to know that $10 of fat and sugar is in the shape of a burger and fries. Supersized of course.

What amazes me most though is that despite all of this consistency we cannot agree on electrical sockets. I carried three different adaptors on my recent holiday, only to discover I was one short. How hard can it be to agree on the number and shape of a few holes in the wall.

While I am on the subject it was most disconcerting to discover “Vienna” is really spelt “Wien”. When did the English speaking world decide that Austrians were not clever enough to either spell or pronounce the name of their capital correctly? Who are we to decide that what the name really needed was an extra n and a? And who is to say that we have these letters spare that we can be giving them away so freely?

Surely if it is “Wien” then that is what the whole world should call it? There are plenty of other cities that suffer this same challenge. I do not mean mispronunciations like Americanised “MelbORne” or “UStralia” I mean changing the name to something similar but completely different.

Also why do Europeans change their computer keyboards, swapping the positions of the “z” and the “y”? Perhaps they are just getting us back for the whole Vienna/Wien debarcle.

Oh the humaitz!

A Right Royal Pain

My grandmother describes cold weather movement similes; most frequently nippy or brisk. If that is the case then Austrian winters are like an Olympic sprinter. Gloves designed for Australian winters are only suitable for indoors when visiting the Continent. Australian beanies are no better.

It is so cold in Austrian winters, and as I will discover later on my journeys in other areas of Europe, that I would not be at all surprised if maternity wards at the end of each summer/beginning Autumns were closed.

The weather causes a lot of shrinkage, even inside thermals. Getting ready for a shower I scared myself when catching a glimpse of my mangina in the mirror. Most alarming was that I had not tucked anything between my legs! How a man stays “upright” in such chilled conditions is unimaginable – even having seen the beauty of their women?

It could be argued that sex is of course a great way to keep warm in such extreme conditions. Exercise and sharing body warmth are both proven ways of staving off the cold. Emperor Joseph proved this to be true siring eleven children.

Making this reproductive feat all the more impressive his wife was originally his cousin and she did not love him. Throughout the duration of their marriage his wife acquired her own apartment within the palace, earned her own income and spent her life travelling abroad leaving the Emperor to hear of her whereabouts through the press.

Despite his own intestinal marriage - traditionally the way of English royalty and Tasmanians the Austrian Empire expanded its territories through marriages not war. Maria Antionette, wife of Napolean was the favourite daughter of Joseph. Of course she did not enjoy the same favour in France where she was ultimately beheaded. This marriage did not acquire new land for Austria it did however prevent losing some land.

Other marriages expanded the Austrian borders into Hungary and Bulgaria and saw it gain favour with the British Empire. Whilst Joseph was busy earning the favours with the marriages of his children the Empress was gaining favour of her own, mainly with Bulgarian aristocracy and royals. The death of one Bulgarian prince reportedly caused her much personal grief. Now if only New Idea was in existence then to record the lurid details and saucy photographs of their affair.

The Austrian Imperial family, in its history also played a part in bringing down the Roman Empire, a marriage here a divorce there. Either way you know the Romans blamed it on the in-laws.

Mozart played for the Empress in her private suite, her court, within Schloss Schönbrunn. A grand palace which once housed over 1600 people with opulent interior design and extensive grounds including Europe’s first zoo and a guard tower from which one can see all of Vienna.

Mozart first performed to the royal court at the age of six. At the age of six I had not yet mastered the building of a Lego car good enough to show my own mother let alone compose and perform arias to royal houses.

Embarrassingly I injured my foot within the palace. The balls of the big and little toes on both feet, nothing specific just general soreness and tenderness. Just from walking around the palace and its grounds. Not even extreme power walking, more of a meandering wander. In the last four years I have trekked the Namibian desert and South African savannah and climbed the Inca trail in Peru. I do not own a car so travel everywhere within my home city on foot, all without incident. I spend a lazy afternoon strolling through a palace and am left lame for days.