A LONG WAY FROM MANY PLACES

A Pint of Faith to Get By

All you can think is: “The Romans were. They knew how to build roads. Straight ones. These streets must lead somewhere?”

To a Lindt chocolate shop. There are three in Old Vienna, the city’s historic First District. Possibly six. Poor suggestions for a pre-arranged rendezvous.

And you wander this ersatz grid painfully aware that other tourists have it figured and know the way to wherever they’re going. You end up on Stephansplatz, lost amid a gently stampeding crowd. Your wallet in front pocket, hand on, your purse is clutched to your tummy like a football. The staggeringly gorgeous and fussily ornate gothic cathedral, its craftsmanship divinely inspired, looms over cartoony Asian girls with pink pigtail hair and white miniskirts and go-go boots, shooting frames of selfies. Stephansdom is cosplay backdrop scrim, solid as it may be. Barefooted vagrants, slumped on the plaza’s cobbles, somnolent against walls, beg. There is a substantial dollop of human shit and one discarded sock in the lee of the church (also begging from visitors although “seeking donations” might be more dignified parlance as the clergy has a nicer house than all the homeless combined). The revolting pile is a tad too close to a street food vendor’s operation for some tastes.

You must turn away from it all. Look up in another direction. Marring the architecture of the Hapsburg dynasty are signs: HERMES, DIOR, LOUIS VUITTON. And signs of times, ROLEX and PATEK PHILIPPE: You never actually own a Patek Philippe. You merely look after it for the next generation. Fuck off. Everywhere, blissed out shoppers suffering from a birth defect – devoid of that crucial self-awareness gene – stop ABRUPTLY! anywhere to photograph the designer logo on their gusseted, rope-handled paper bags. Gauche and tacky social media and MasterCard credit to their shallowness. A swampy nadir.

You’ve got to shoulder your way away from it all. There’s not enough air. There’s not enough space. You hurry down a side street that may or may not lead you elsewhere. You encounter an armed Austrian soldier, warm in winter kit, forest camouflage, guarding what? A museum and Holocaust memorial on Judenplatz. You pause. The computations take a second. You think: “Still?” But you already know the answer: “Always.” And then you have your Vicktor Frankl moment: “Why?”

The Stephansdom spire is the wayfarer’s compass needle. But like a magician’s trick, it has disappeared from the ashen sky. Poof! Just like that. You’re desperate to return to your hotel for a break, to scour away your disgust and despair. You turn this way and that. After a few more wrong turns you find yourself lost yet again but standing outside an Irish pub. A perfectly adequate Plan B refuge. And you smile because a theorem has been proved: Anywhere you go in the rich world, there will be an Irish pub. Ipso facto slainte. Depend on it.

You’ve no idea who Molly Darcy is, was or if she even ever existed. But right now, she’s the woman of your dreams. She’s open for business. There’s a short stack of international editions of The New York Times, yesterday’s papers of peculiar dimension, but so what. There’s a New York Yankees banner on the wall and a New York Rangers pennant too. Curious. There’s no Smithwick’s on tap, but a pint of Kilkenny will do.

All you can think is: “It’s been a shitty morning, but the rest of the day, the rest of the holiday, need not be this way.” The music inside Molly Darcy is soothing. Strictly Memphis and Detroit, Stax/Volt and Motown-Tamla, not the usual Emerald Isle-themed Spotify list as much as you may appreciate Van Morrison. Marvin Gaye is singing “What’s Going On?” and you wonder if the whole wide world has maybe just been having a shitty morning of late. It’s coming on Christmas and the only minor miracle on offer is that it won’t fall on a Monday this year. Faint hope flickers.

Dispatches from the Crooked 9 has been your most unreliable, unbalanced and inaccurate alternative source of everything since 2013. Sunset Oasis Confidential and Of Course You Did are still out there languishing in multiple formats. Nothing says "I love you" at Christmastime like a couple of skinny books by a woefully obscure Canadian author. Visit my companion site www.megeoff.com for links to your preferred retailer.

A LONG WAY FROM MANY PLACES

Michal and the Black Mercedes Van

Slovakia has yet to qualify for the upcoming FIFA World Cup. The Repre is looking ahead to two qualifiers scheduled for its home ground in late March 2026. I never imagined I’d expend a single neuron on the state of Slovak football. Then again, I never imagined I’d be standing in a shop in Bratislava’s historic Old Town advising my brother-in-law Al on the taste quotient of Repre jerseys and scarves. “The national crest shows off better against the white.” “Yeah, yeah, I see what you mean. I like it.”

Edmonton Ann and I travel well with my sister Montreal Anne and Al. We get along without being in the others’ pockets. Ann and I tend to be laissez-faire while my sister prefers some semblance of structure, a partial schedule at least. Our participation is always optional. Ann and I never worry about disjointing noses nor even skinning them. Our quartet booked our trip to Vienna, Austria about a year ago. Once the details were finalized, Montreal Anne proposed a day trip to Salzburg. The four of us would split the cost of a private car, a private tour. Edmonton Ann and I agreed immediately. I thought, “No herding, no chatty strangers in close quarters; worth the cost.”

Well, I did not welcome Michal and the black Mercedes van outside the Hotel Karnterhof before dawn. I suffer from a self-diagnosed ailment: Irrational Bowel Syndrome. I mean, all of my lower plumbing functions, but I like a firm schedule and, my oh my, overseas night flights are terribly disruptive. Salzburg was distant, about three and a half hours away. As we climbed into the rear seats of the van Ann whispered to me, “We could drive to Jasper (from Edmonton).” That far. I was filled with something more than trepidation because despite three deliciously strong black Viennese coffees and a few cigarettes, my metabolic clock wasn’t meshing with our tour’s timing.

I’m a poor judge of age. I guessed Michal was as close to 60 as I am to 70, or thereabouts. A well-built fellow and very gracious – if a bit gregarious. The four of us learned about his ongoing divorce proceedings and his abrupt change of career. “Art therapy” was proving very helpful. He enjoyed ballroom dancing and photography was a passion, but most of all, he loved people and he loved to hear other people’s stories. And weren’t four Canadians just locked in his van? His mien was that of some ersatz encounter group leader whose area of expertise is “feelings” and inspirational platitudes and I thought, “Oh, God,” for a few reasons.

I generally enjoy hearing other people’s stories and I’m always careful not to draw out a windbag. What I truly enjoy is overhearing other people’s day-to-day private discussions in public places; good material. When my turn came to speak, I wasn’t particularly forthcoming. This fast drive through sleet and snow, and walled in by sound barriers on both sides of the highway – it felt like we were in a slick trench – did not constitute a therapy session. However, Michal did establish that I follow hockey. He said he was acquainted with Peter Stasny, a former Quebec Nordique (and later in his life, a respected Slovak parliamentarian). I said that I hated Peter and his brothers Marian and Anton because they were very good and didn’t play for Montreal. Michal said his current favourite player wears number 20 for les Canadiens: Juraj Slafkovsky (20 points and plus 2 in 32 games at this writing). I began to warm up to Michal.      

Salzburg is renowned for sound (and salt). The city, near the German border at the base of the Alps, is the birthplace of Mozart who, like Elvis, will forever be known by a single name. Red and blue shifts are not mere political gerrymandering in the United States: Christian Doppler, born across the street from Mozart’s home some fifty years after his death, described them as fundamental characteristics of sound waves. They come and go. You can hear it. What refuses to fade in Salzburg are songs about lonely goatherds and one problematic nun named Maria; the famous von Krapps.

Michal said that only North American tourists are enamored by the film location of what Canadian co-star Christopher Plummer derided as “The Sound of Mucous.” Michal said he’s tried to watch the movie but keeps falling asleep. I warmed up to him a little more. Mirabell Palace is that glimmering white edifice with the extensive gardens and fountain, fit for a singing and dancing brood of snotty brats. He insisted on taking pictures of our group there as we shivered in the rain. The joint is essentially an architectural attempt to reaffirm the Roman Catholic Church’s status in the wake of Martin Luther’s cataclysmic Reformation. The monk had some nerve lifting the veil on doctrine by translating the Bible into the vernacular. What struck me about the Archbishop of Salzburg’s palace was its grandeur and size. A lovely and elaborate space for an unnaturally large number of nieces and nephews.

Michal allowed us half an hour in Salzburg’s Altstadt. The city’s centre is a UNESCO World Heritage site. The cobbles were slippery to walk on. Tourist trap shop windows were eye level. Ann and I paused to grossly overpay for two mouthfuls of coffee. I ordered mine straight up. The woman serving us promised that mine would be as black as her soul. I laughed; she wasn’t kidding. High on a hill, above all the Baroque flourishes was a medieval fort. There was no time to get up to where I really wished to go. Salzburg is something like a monumental novel in a university literature course: either touched on in context to a lesser work by the same author or demanding an immersive semester of exclusive devotion.

As we drove out of Salzburg my thoughts turned to the water closet in our room at the Hotel Karntnerhof. Michal announced our next stop, a little detour up into the Alps, just another hour and a half. Destination Hallstatt, the most scenic place in all of Austria, Michal promised. I thought, “Oh, God.” He added that the local populace, numbering fewer than a thousand, hates tourists. I whispered to Ann, “Oh, Christ. This should be fun. Swell.”

The isolated village of stone and brick is grafted on to a sheer mountain face. Visitors must be able and fit. Ancient crooked stairs. The view from Hallstatt is picturesque: a placid alpine lake in a granite basin – although nothing out of the ordinary in a Canadian Rocky Mountain national park. Half the hook is the impractical, jerry-built quirkiness of the homes, churches and businesses. Hallstatt’s ailment is celluloid rapidly metastasizing into Instagram selfie idiocy. Hallstatt was used as a location for a popular Korean romance and inspired the backdrop of Frozen, an animated Disney film every young parent I know is utterly sick of. Our time in Hallstatt was short, but the place is awfully small and the weather was miserable.

Talkers talk. Expert ones ask questions. Michal learned our next planned excursion was to Bratislava. The Slovakian capital is on the Danube, about 50 kilometres west of Vienna. Bratislava was Michal’s hometown; he still lived there; his daughters and estranged wife resided in the United States – for now, things being what they are down there south of 49. Al’s mother was from Bratislava. Nellie emigrated to Canada in advance of the Russian “liberation” at the close of the Second World War. Nellie had a window and she went through it. Al still had relatives in Bratislava, first cousins he’d never met. The barrier wasn’t merely time and distance, but language too. Still, he wished to finally meet them.

Michal offered to be our driver, tourist guide, translator and facilitator. There were strings attached of course, cash preferred. And our own plans required modifications. I’d been looking forward to the train ride from Vienna to Bratislava. I love trains, but not in an unhealthy track gauge, locomotive number kind of away. They are metaphors, symbols, plot devices and compelling images in music, film and literature. While Michal, Montreal Anne and Al hammered out details inside the van in front of our hotel, I realized my steel wheel rides this trip would be confined to the subway. I was cool with that; subways are equally enticing. What was not cool was a too long a day of seatbelt confinement. I retrieved our room key from Edmonton Ann and hurriedly excused myself, teeth gritted politely, my colon as agitated as I was.

We left Vienna for Bratislava about an hour later than we did for Salzburg. The schedule wasn’t a perfect fit, but still something of a relief. Michal took the long way, secondary roads. The weather was clear. Very little traffic. I was content in the rear of the black Mercedes van. There was something new to see through every window. This was more like it. This was the only way to go.

My Oxford Atlas of the World is out of date. While it reflects the amiable breakup of Czechoslovakia in 1993 in the wake of the parted Iron Curtain, neither nascent republic has yet to tighten up its respective nationalist monicker. I’ve always perceived Slovakia as more of a region of Eastern Europe than an actual country with a dominant race of people. Frankly, my old atlas and my morning newspaper are filled with information about too many places on the planet that rarely, if ever, cross my mind. Travel is, and should be, as illuminating as formal education.

Everyone on Earth shares its history, it’s just that some civilizations left more evidence and kept better records. All of what comes to light, often uncontextualized, can be messy. Human. From Bratislava Castle on a plateau above the Danube and overlooking the Old Town to an ultramodern “luxury” shopping mall complete with a “luxury” hotel, the city’s architecture is a dizzying kaleidoscope of varying styles. History writ in building styles and materials. There is medieval, there is Baroque, there is Soviet Brutalism. Romans, Mongols, Ottomans, Hungarians, Hapsburgs, Nazis, even Allied bomber crews, and Stalinists have all left their traces behind. It’s complicated.

Michal picked the restaurant and tended to the arrangements for Al’s lunch meeting with his relatives. Flagship Restaurant Bratislava. A beer-brewing medieval monastery long ago, heavy stone, heavy wood. Dark. Chilly. The massive space was converted into a cinema during the Communist era. The current occupants, restauranteurs who are very aware of university students (and their limited budgets), micro-brew beer on site. The vats are consecrated. Our group occupied a long table. Al sat at the head with his cousins and Michal. I don’t believe any nuances were lost in translation. I could see Michal concentrating intently. I warmed up to him again; he cared as much about Al’s experience as the rest of our group. They took a while up there. Edmonton Ann, Montreal Anne and I chatted down at the opposite end. The food was basic, cabbage, sausage and dough, very hearty, very tasty, reasonably priced and possibly unhealthy (the queue to be seated when we eventually left was two-wide and far too long for my patience had Michal not made prior arrangements). The beer was divine. And the toilets, an unnervingly frequent destination for me (aging is a fussy business), were a well-scrubbed blessing, homey. And, mercy me, the Hotel Karntnerhof wasn’t much more than an hour away.

Dispatches from the Crooked 9 has been your most unreliable, unbalanced and inaccurate alternative source of everything since 2013. Sunset Oasis Confidential is still out there languishing in multiple formats. Visit my companion site www.megeoff.com for links to your preferred retailer. Of Course You Did is still print. Collect the set!

A LONG WAY FROM MANY PLACES

The Hotel Karntnerhof

I had two confluent thoughts as I brought our taxied luggage inside. We had walked into a story by renowned American writer T.S. Garp. Or maybe my childhood chum Harry Lime had booked our room. Ann’s first thought upon viewing the reception area and the neighbouring lounge which also served as the breakfast room was Fawlty Towers, also a family owned and operated independent establishment. Fiction. Ann and I are usually on the same page even if we are unsure of its number.

The Karntnerhof is tucked away at the end of a lane or gasse in Old Vienna or Innere Stadt. The ring road around the city’s First District traces the fortifications of Vindobona, a Roman military camp erected on the bank of the Danube, an edge of the empire, sometime between 1 and 100 AD. Archeology is a long way down: the excavated ruins preserved for exhibit outdoors on Michaelerplatz are deep enough to demand a zoom lens.

Our quirky six-storey hotel was completed around 1880. The residential building became a brothel during the Second World War. The madame’s name was Rosa. It was transformed into a hotel sometime after the Germans pulled out; the Allies’ occupation of Vienna ended in 1955. The 44-room Karntnerhof is of its place and a very different time. The maximum capacity of the tiny lift is 225 kilograms, a close space for three people or two with luggage. The shaft, wrapped in a whitewashed iron grille, takes guests as high as the fifth floor. Our room was on the sixth, up a wide winding flight of stairs.

Travel lodging is secondary to the destination, but by no means an afterthought. Nobody wants to dread or barely tolerate the night after a full day out exploring a strange place. When Ann and I were at the Karntnerhof, we were unlikely to be in our room. For us, the hotel’s prime amenity was the fifth floor dachterrasse, an outdoor patio. It was enclosed on three sides by the hotel itself and two abutting buildings. The view through a grid of pigeon netting was white chimneys balancing at the apex of steep red rooftops, their tiles faded to a rusted brick colour. Towering over the tilted television antennas a little to our right were two green copper spires, their gilt accents shining as gold will. There was a silver cylindrical ashtray attached to the wall by the door. Attached to it by a sturdy cord was a paintbrush. The Karntnerhof expects its smoking guests to be tidy.

Sunrise and sunset in Vienna mirrored the timing Ann and I are used to in Edmonton in November and December despite the eight-hour difference. The late autumn temperatures in Vienna were chilly enough to require layers of clothing but not unpleasant. Because our room had no appliances, I cached my tins of Stiegl Goldbrau and Pilsner Urquell behind the flower pots on the dachterrasse. Isolated and above it all (“Up on the Roof”) and no bigger than an interior room it must be some kind of oasis come summertime. I considered it unser Zigarette und Biergarten. Apparently those two improper nouns require capitalization.

Jorge, the man whom I assumed to be the Karnterhof’s general manager was incredibly patient with me. I pestered him with questions. He explained that German is a grammatically complicated language and fluency is no easy feat. After Jorge listed the various forms of articles (way more than French), I replied, “The.” I asked Jorge about a curious character I had noticed on subway and tourist maps and on certain street signs. To me it suggested a curlier capital B or a stacked lower case a and b, rendered in some dainty font I was unfamiliar with. I knew strasse meant street, but from time to time it was rendered as straBe. He said the eszett represented an even sharper s-sound than pronounced in strasse and to try and imagine strassse. Not to be outdone, I countered with thorn, the defunct Anglo-Saxon character which closely resembles the capital Y on your QWERTY keyboard. Thorn’s sound is th as in "the" and so Ye is not ye if ye know what I mean. Ann and I asked Jorge about anything we were curious about: this or that restaurant for supper; public transit; the Art Advent am Karlsplatz Christkindlmarkt and the big daddy Christmas market at Schloss Schonbrunn, which boasted a skating rink and curling sheet.

One Karntnerhof curiosity I did not ask Jorge about was a painting in the hotel’s bibliothek. This was the room Ann and I passed through a few times per day en route to our semi-private cigarette garden. There was a desk with a computer on it, Windows, black (I found a few of my books for sale on Amazon Deutsch). Red hardbound volumes of Nietzsche on the shelves, coffee table books celebrating the arts and architecture of Wien, and, of course, airplane fiction left behind by fellow travellers: Mozart and mish-mash.

Works of art hang throughout Hotel Karntnerhof, in the halls, the rooms, the reception area and the lounge. Some are charcoal nudes. Many are studies of birds which I presumed dated from a time when scientists were known as natural philosophers. An oil painting by the dachterrasse door in the bibliothek stood out, captivated me. Mystified me. A scene from an art museum. Most of the art lovers wear military uniforms. Every arm of the Nazi war machine is represented and most of them are contemplating a large painting in an ornate frame. An inside story is more familiar to me as a literary device. The painting within the painting depicts a vanquished villain or wounded hero of myth. Christian or Classical, I could not say. Whatever happened to him was grievous. I read the date on the canvas as 1959. Ann read it as 1969. Consequently, the artist’s name remains as much a cipher as their subject.

I asked Jorge about the highs and lows of his trade. He said February could be a quiet month, but the Karntnerhof was usually always full otherwise. There were just too many people in Vienna, he said. A gentle lament for one of the hidden costs of a vibrant tourism industry. Naturally, Ann and I were not part of the problem. Strangely, despite the unaccommodating lift and the nineteenth century charm of the lounge, Ann and I rarely encountered the hotel’s other guests except at breakfast. These other people from other parts of the globe were most annoying, sometimes delaying our access to the coffeemaker and buffet for minutes at a time.

There is no place like home. Ann and I agree on that and most other things. As a trip winds down switches in our heads flip. We begin repacking a day in advance of our departure. We have missed our life at the Crooked 9. Our holiday is the blank squares on the kitchen wall calendar. I am always glad and somewhat relieved to revisit the chore done weeks before in Edmonton. Me and my clothes are worse for wear. I conduct myself like a spy when we travel: observe, explore, learn, blend in – we tend to bypass those racks of tourist brochures found in every hotel and avoid curated or orchestrated activities. Extraction is always welcome. Faces: I was glad to come and I’ll be so sad to go/But while I was here I had me a real good time. Ann and I have bedded down in every type of hospitality establishment ranging from no stars to five. Utilitarian requirements always. Until now. My memories of Vienna will always commence with the Hotel Karnterhof: I did not want to check out.

Dispatches from the Crooked 9 has been your most unreliable, unbalanced and inaccurate alternative source of everything since 2013. Sunset Oasis Confidential is still out there languishing in multiple formats. Visit my companion site www.megeoff.com for links to your preferred retailer. Of Course You Did is still print. Collect the set!