Musing on Austria

The last time I was in Austria was as a student thirty some years ago. It presents such interesting contrasts to where I live now, Mexico, and where I lived for most of my life, Canada. Mexico is struggling not to be a failed state while possessing boundless natural resources: gas, oil, gold, silver, copper, two seacoasts with abundant fisheries, huge tourist industry and a hard-working population. But still, the battle with the drug cartels is ongoing and the educational levels are abysmal. Austria, on the other hand, is very like a paradise on Earth. This is an extremely well-run state with extremely low levels of crime and very high levels of education (gee, I wonder if there is a relationship). Austria's history is interesting. It was once a great, imperial power, ruling over much of central Europe. At the time of WWI the Austro-Hungarian Empire was the second-largest state in Europe, second only to Russia. The 18th and 19th centuries were mostly prosperous and the 19th, at least, fairly peaceful. But then came the horrors of the 20th century: two world wars that first tore away all of her empire and second saw her a mere apprentice to the new horrors of Nazi Germany.

Nowadays, Austria is viewed as being a kinder, gentler Germany with much less weight of guilt than its larger neighbour. I suspect that one factor in this was the movie The Sound of Music, which personalised Austria and separated it emotionally from the sins of Germany. Austria, in some mysterious fashion, also managed to not be divided into separate zones by the four occupying powers at the end of WWII. In 1955 it achieved its complete independence and the occupying powers left.

I was saying that Austria is very like a paradise. It is a mature culture with an enormous amount of historic, aesthetic and human capital. Vienna, no longer the capitol of empire, still has the architecture of one. Austria's cultural capital is enormous, including vast amounts of fine art and architecture, literature and, of course, music. Vienna and Salzburg are two of the most important centres of music in the world and attract large numbers of visitors every season (including myself). For someone who loves music and culture (and skiing too, I imagine), Austria is a wonderful place to be. I suspect it is not so welcoming to entrepreneurs because of the weight of tradition which shows itself in high taxes, a lot of regulation and just the sheer weight of custom. But, with a bit of money, you can live extremely well here.

Speaking of which, almost by accident I wandered into one of the finer hotels here today, looking for a place to eat lunch, and stumbled across an excellent lunch buffet with pretty much everything you could possibly imagine, including a bottomless glass of sekt (they refilled mine three times and started on a fourth when I stopped them and switched to cappuccino). The dishes were too numerous to itemize, but I did take photos of the dessert area. I would tell you what these are, but apart from Sachertorte and Tiramisu, I haven't the foggiest idea!

This one, for example, had an orange-colored baby plum on top, a chocolate mesh, and the dessert itself was a kind of citrusy cream, not too sweet. None of the Austrian desserts I tried was heavily sweetened.

So, ok, this plus Mozart is just one kind of paradise...