Chocolate and Music

Hello friends! I just have time for a quick post. On friday I went on a walking tour of Stephansdom, and the Jewish quarter. Stephansdom was beautifull. It was great to see all of the art, and the stone work and such. We also climbed the tower and saw a great view of Vienna. It was very picturesque, especially with the snow-covered roofs. After some shopping and dessert-eating, my friends and I then made our way to the Jewish quarter. This is a really quaint part of town. There's something that feels very old-world and calm about it. We saw the Anker Clock, and the Ruprechtskirche, and a Jewish synagogue. This particular synagogue still has to be guarded by armed police, due to hate crimes and violence. Yikes! It has been burned, looted, and the like as recently as the 80's. On Saturday, I went to Naschmarkt with Emily. Yay! We meandered through the stalls of the weekly fleamarket, where we saw all sorts of porcelain boxes, scarves, silver, glass, fur coats, antiques, and chandeliers, of course. Britain then joined us for lunch. We had giant Kebabs. They were so big! We struggled to eat them, but somehow managed :). That night I went to the opera!! Yayhoo!!! We saw Un ballo in maschera by Verdi. We got stehplatz (standing room) tickets. This was quite the adventure to say the least. The Staatsoper, where the opera was performed, is the most famous opera house in Vienna. That being the case, we stood in line for hours to get our tickets. It was so worth it though! I somehow ended up right in the front and in the center, so I had a great view! Can't beat that for four Euros! The opera was really fun. The music was absolutely beautiful. Naturally, I thought the singing was fabulous, but the orchestra was so great too! They were perfectly in sync with the conductor, who looked like he was dancing through the whole show. The plot of this particular opera I was not particularly thrilled with. However, this could have been because I didn't exactly know the synopsis beforehand, and then was trying to go off of German subtitles. You know, it happens. Today I went to church in German. I was really pleased with how much I understood! It was great to go to church in a foreign country in another language and still know what was going on. I also ate delicious chocolate this week! I bought some Mozart chocolate the other day, and I had a bite of Britain's chocolate hazelnut bar. Yum! Here are some pictures from the past few days:

Britain and I waiting for our opera tickets
Inside the Staatsoper

A holocaust memorial outside my house. This is where the Gestapo house used to be, before it was bombed. The engraving at the top (niemals vergessen) means never forget.

A delicious Viennesse pastry! I eat pastries pretty much every day, and it is glorious.