Vienna, Austria - Part 1

I arrived in Vienna on Tuesday evening.  The main purpose of my trip is to go to a conference outside of Vienna in Rust, and attend some meetings in the city itself.  So Wednesday morning was spent doing some work before having a lunchtime meeting.  I had the afternoon free though, and did a small amount of sightseeing with a colleague from another Australian university who is here for the same conference. 

I was in Vienna last year for a similar conference so had seen the “main” sights – but there were quite a few things I didn’t get a chance to see last year.  One of those was the Sigmund Freud Museum – at one point I was studying psychology at university (I ended up graduating in a different field) and often think about going back to uni to finish my psych degree.  I was never a fan of Freud’s theories – but one can’t dispute that he had a major impact on modern psychology.   The museum is located in Freud’s actual former practice and apartment in Austria. 

 

If you don’t have an interest in psychology or Freud, this certainly isn’t a “must-see”.  But if you do have that interest, it is certainly fascinating to see the number of personal effects of Freud (both Sigmund and Anna), as well as literature (both documents written by them as well as books written about them) that are on display. 

After we visited the Freud museum, my colleague wanted to visit St Rupert’s, the oldest church in Vienna.   This wasn’t somewhere I would have visited on my own as it is much smaller than the other churches that tourists usually visit, but I’m glad I did.  Very interesting architecture, and not being a typical tourist destination, (although listed in the Lonely Planet guide), it was fairly empty – the perfect place for some quiet reflection.

Thursday morning I had another work meeting, then a couple of hours before I had to be back at the university to travel to the conference (which is about 70km from Vienna). I used the time to visit the UN, which has its 3^rd headquarters in Vienna.  Relevant for the conference I am here for, and they also run guided tours (make sure you take your passport as identification as security does take your details).  It was an interesting tour, we had a very knowledgeable tour guide, and honestly just an interesting place to people watch – there are more than 5,000 staff from all member states.  I wonder how many people work in the New York office?