Day 7 – first full day in the Muttiland

OK, apparently I have to correct something I said yesterday. (II won’t trawl for typos just yet, though.) It’s true the building we’re in has hireable offices as well as 3 or four bedrooms. However, the building is scheduled to be demolished. I don’t see a need to do so. While it’s not a hotel in the sense of Ibis, Holiday Inn or other chains, it seems to be in perfectly good condition. (Possibly points off fro not having a lift.) So we assume the land-owners want to. build something taller. Meanwhile, it’s friendly, has an outside bar with a food-truck, as well as every popular indoors bar. So I hope execution is stayed.

Despite doing almost nothing active yesterday, we were both drained. I eventually surfaced around 11 to find Elly had just gone for coffee at a nearby café. (OK, maybe another point against the Honolulu – they don’t serve breakfast.) We moved across the street for Elly to get the solid part of her breakfast, and for me to try to remember they sold a vegan nuggets Brötchen. (My blood sugar forbade eating. My lack of memory prevents me remembering what plans we have made within 5 seconds of agreeing them.)

The first ‘thing’ was for me to ‘collect’ the local Rathaus (or Gemeindeamt), and guide Elly to the Stadtarchiv. (We don’t have tasks for these collections – I just want to get a feel for how hyperlocal government is funded from seeing the state of its buildings, and given Elly’s love of the Amsterdam Stadsarchief, I have the addresses of such places for all our planned stops.

Some notes on Vorarlberg local democracy and government. Firstly, Bregenz is on this list of Vorarlberg’s cities and parishes (Gemeinden), so I’m not quite sure what the label Bezirk means in this case. (In general, Austria is divided into Länder [states], which are then subdivided into Bezirke [counties], which themselves are divided into Gemeinden [municipalities or civil parishes]. NB I have no idea which powers are associated with the different levels.)

Secondly, Vorarlberg is experimenting with citizens’ councils. According to this website

The state of Vorarlberg in Austria is a pioneer in establishing citizens’ councils and involving the population in policy-making and planning, especially at local level. Citizens’ councils are involved in planning and allocation of resources according to the method of “dynamic facilitation”. 

So I really want to look into whether there is tension between such ‘direct’ democracy and traditional representative democracy, and how to resolve such tensions if they exist. But not here and not now!

Back to today’s plot: I’d seen this exhibition was on at the Kunsthaus, and was inspired to do some actual culture! (Remember, I normally thing that culture is either what the powers that be let you get away with or what grows beneath my toenails.) OK, I admit I was intrigued by the title: does the artist wish some bloke was gay and so wasn’t attracted to her, or some woman who she fancied was gay so they could be more than friends? Well, this exhibition didn’t answer either of these. I don’t have anything like enough German or understanding of ART to even understand what it asked – if anything. I did really enjoy the infinite feelings of the scaffolding piece below. Something like a static and not quite so malicious cousin to the hammers in The Wall. Or maybe it’s just the repetitive simplicity.

After lunch, time for more culture! In this case the Vorarlberg museum. I was hoping for a potted history of how the state came to be, but got both more and less. The museum asked ‘well, how should the past be represented and what should we do with our collection, because we can’t show it all? Here’s our idea: 27 themes from the 27 letters of the alphabet’. (They include the Turkish S-cedilla.) So no ‘this is what happened’ but ‘here are some stools, here are some caps, here are some toys. Here is what we know about them. Make your own history.’

Then there was an exhibition (aimed mostly at children) or Bregenz’ roman past, followed by an amusing (for me) piece on Vorarlberg Blasmusik (brass band music) – apparently still very important. I wonder what the curators will think of my response to their question – see the photos below.

So after getting more than enough culture to write it with a K (as in KEECH), we went back to the hotel’s bar to get a drink and figure out eating plans. It was spitting when we arrived, but we had a conversation with some women who were interested in my t-shirt. (I was wearing a Napier ‘pride’ shirt.) We talked about whether the Nazis are in the past, the good news from the UK and France elections. And then it started raining – our fault for bringing Scottish weather, I joked. See my Tweet or Elly’s Facebook for video.

Two beers was enough, so we retired to watch yesterday’s TdF highlights and plan eating. Yay, veganburger and fries at Miles Diner, followed by today’s TdF highlights and writing this turgidity. Here’s the closing thought for today, from the diner. Tschuss!

Day 8: one of the best days

So today, despite starting off overcast and a bit damp, was fab. After a very late lie, we dragged ourselves to the Pfänderbahn, a cable car leading up a hill behind Bregenz. We were not optimistic we’d see much through the mist, and certainly not when we were almost last on to the car. However, at the top the cloud wan’t bad, and the animals were fun. (I’m generally not a fan of zoos that capture animals from vastly different climates for humans to goggle at, but the animals here were all native to this area, and didn’t seem to be maltreated, at least not to my ignorant eyes.) Of course the Wildschweine were the best. (See the movie in this tweet.)

While we’ve been near the Bodensee before, we’ve never (as far as I recall) been on the water. So I suggested this as an afternoon activity. We had to wait to 16:30 to get a boat, so decided to go just one stop to Lindau (cyclemeter amp). (The boats go to many destinations along the north and south banks.) Elly saw that Lindau has a library museum in its Alte Rathaus, so that was our thing to do on this island.

We both thought the museum was amazing – it has books from centuries ago, including a genuine copy of Newton’s Principia. This had Elly bouncing and me grinning like a loon! There were also genuine Keplers, a Bernoulli and others from he dawn of real science. it appears the collection was just there, unprotected, until about 12 years ago. Then these priceless items were discovered, and the collection was put behind safety glass. The books can still be accessed, I believe, presumably if you have a really good reason. Photography was understandably not permitted, but there are some postcards in the gallery below.

back in Bregenze, we ate again at the Wirtshaus am See (red lentil curry and chips for me, fish duo for Elly), and came back to the Honolulu to crash. I’m very please I saw the waitress to whom I’d mentioned this map of German dialects, so I could email her a link. (Last night she said that even though she is from Bregenz, she has difficulty understanding people from within the Bregenzerwald.) Speaking of the hotel, have I mentioned it also has a bar and food-wagon, or that our room is named after a famous local cheese-maker?