In Vienna we buy groceries almost daily. Small batches, a day or so’s food at a time. We carry it home on foot or in the bus or streetcar. If we need something bigger, like stuff from Ikea, we take a few hands along. Larger items, mattresses or refrigerators, we have delivered. We plan ahead a bit for Sundays and holidays, since most stores will be closed. In this context black Friday seems like a bizarre sport of a perplexing culture. What’s the rush? Why ruin a holiday? Who needs to fill an SUV with stuff, even cheap stuff.

So it was with even greater sadness than I would usually have felt that I encountered this sliver of my culture, passed along by Rob at Extraordinary Observations:

Only on Black Friday are we not only given the opportunity, but also in some ways expected, to act this way. Why do retail stores need to open at 4am? Why do they encourage people to line up outside all night to run through the store like rats when the doors open? Does this tradition really boost a store’s profits by that much?

Granted, this is an extreme case. But it begs the question. What makes “consumerism” a good thing? This is the other side of the financial collapse. How can we have a compassionate, considerate capitalism. Is such a thing possible.

One of the nice things about visiting Vienna as Advent nears is that the Christkindlmarkts start to open up. One of the more colorful is this one at the Wiener Rathaus, but there are many variations on this theme around the city. I like to grab a langos (a kind of garlic elephant ear) and Nathaniel enjoys the hot dogs and schaumbecher (a chocolate-covered marshmellow cone).

I love the walk down Kahlenberg, so near my grandmother’s home in Grinzing, so far above the hustle of the city. Just follow the path down from the overlook, as long as you keep going down you won’t go wrong. Generally follow Kahlenberger Strasse until you hit Beethovengang. Its a walk you can easily imagine Beethoven enjoying.

We visited the Haus der Musik in Vienna today. What a really pleasant surprise it was! I usually can’t pay attention to more than an hour or two in a museum, but I felt like I could spend a whole day here. It has a lot in common with science museums in that the exhibits are highly interactive, but the whole focus is on sounds and music. I found the computer based modules very engaging and absorbing. I wanted to try every one, but Mary and Alex and Nathaniel kept dragging me forward through the place. The whole environment was soothing and felt welcoming, unrushed, isolated from real time and the real world. I highly recommend it to anyone visiting Vienna.

I’m in Vienna with my family visiting Oma, my grandmother. All I can say is flying is nothing like it once was. What a mess. Plus all the carbon guilt. Sigh. But I love Vienna and I love love love the new positive sense of the US that is evident in Europe.