Friday, August 15th, 2008

This morning I went to the Belvedere Palace and had another Dr. O tour. On the tour we looked at these heads that were created by Francis Xavier Messeschmidt. Cameras were not allowed in the museum, but I was able to sneak some in. This guy who created these busts, was a very interesting guy who had purposely harmed himself and went to sculpt those different expressions. He did this in order to scare away the demons. Another exciting part of the tour was seeing the room where in 1955, the state treaty was signed. Did you know Foster John Dulles, the U.S. State Secretary was a representative who had signed that state treaty, which declared Austria's independence? I was also able to view paintings that portrayed Biedermeier, a lifestyle and mentality that existed from 1815-1848. Also in the tour we saw Gustav Klimt's famous painting of "The Kiss", which to me wasn't all that spectacular, but it popular among the tourists there. They were really uptight in that room about taking pictures. I also saw one Monet painting, but the best painting I saw was the painting of Napoleon on his white horse.
After the tour I rushed out of there, because I had a train to catch to Salzburg. It was really raining in Salzburg. With a group of friends, we arrived at our hostel, which wasn't that great. I perfered the room at the Alps much better. We walked in the rain and had a late dinner, which wasn't that great because the cheese was really smelly. At the hostel, they show the movie, The Sound of Music, every night, so I watched it for ten minutes. I was too tired to stay up, so I went to bed on this very thin mattress.