The bedside alarm clock flashes red, 0:30…Damn. I’ve been asleep for one and a half hours and my body just remembered that it has no f#&*ing idea why its night time out. My body is exhausted but the reptile brain is full tilt trying to figure out why the sun is not on the horizon. The bed in which I am wide awake is 5000 miles away from home and at back in Middle America its 5:30 and I should be arriving home from the salt mines of hospital IT.
However, I’m not in Middle America I’m enjoying my first international trip in Budapest Hungary and the past two nights I have slept like a baby after long days of new food and café leche fueled walkabouts in the most incredible city. But that doesn’t change the fact that my body is having my first experience with jet lag. In 3 and half hours I will be boarding a train for just the fourth country I have been to.
After a couple of hours I finally squeeze in 1 additional hour of sleep before the alarm goes off. Our destination Vienna Austria. This will be a literal dream come true for my partner Rebecca as we are going to see the spectacular dancing horses. The lipizaners of the Spanish Riding school are in Rebecca’s words: “The fantasy of every horse crazy girl and the pinnacle of communication between horse and rider. Simultaneously beautiful to the non-horse person and impressive to anyone who works with horses.” But first we have a longer than estimated 45 minute walk from the Budapest city center to the Keleti train station to catch a high speed train to Austria and there is a time crunch because there is a fair amount of walking and the horses we are going to see are tightly scheduled.
It’s September and Budapest at 4 o’clock in the morning is a bit brisk but excitement and haste to get there make the walk through the mostly dark and deserted streets of a different country one that I can still feel on my skin as I stand writing this (2 years later in my warm and cozy home.) We arrive crossing the road to the building that is recognizable as a train station to anyone no matter the country or signage.
Keleti is immense and the faces of many nations and many languages are mingled in the vast open space of the station. The open air was cool and in my Midwestern heart there was a thrill of exotic adventure and dreams realized that elicited goose bumps even in my warm jacket. It was beautiful and founded a love of train stations and a feeling of endless possibility in travel.
Just a few more hurdles to jump and we would be on our way to realizing dreams for both of us. Ahh buying tickets to and from a different country. Tickets written in a language (Hungarian) which when typed into goggle translate caused it to either give back jibberish or just outright refusal. We waited in a very short line to buy tickets a little less on time than we had hoped (see above 45 minute walk) but after a few minutes and a lot of pointing and explanation in English to the very patient Hungarian woman teller we had tickets to our destination. But wait will these bring us back? An important question since as far as we can tell we are allowed to move freely between Eurozone countries with the caveat that we must have return fare procured. Back in line to confirm that these tickets are two way tickets. Another wait but the teller seems to be assuring us that these are in fact two way tickets. We walk towards the train and I turn to Rebecca and see both uncertainty and overwhelming tiredness. I smile.
We board our train and start passing down the aisles of the empty looking for our seat. After, a bit of misunderstanding and explanation by some concerned German but English speaking tourists we figure out which seats are ok for last minute travelers to sit in.
We are moving out of the city now and into the countryside. Everything is calm and relaxing with one exception, we have found out that there are two train stations in Vienna and we don’t know which one to get off at. No problem we will use our smart phones to connect to the as advertised train wi-fi… no luck. We struggle with this for far longer than we should have. (Give us a break we are new to travelling and are both a little introverted.) Rebecca is anxious now and I’m frustrated. I resign to go get us drinks and pastries from the dining car. I make my way from car to car as we tear through the country side. I arrive at the dining car and the only thing more beautiful than the blond Austrian girl handing me an equally beautiful cup of Nescafe was the melodic sound of her English. Austrians for the most part spoke very precise clear English with a German accent. The train was alive with the sound of music. And that music told me not to worry that there was a problem with the internet on the Hungarian portion but once we were in Austria we would be able to access wi-fi and check our stop. I made a triumphant return back to my seat and the 21st century.
Hurdling through Hungary to our soon to be known destination. We gazed sleepily while snapping blurred pictures of small town life and corn fields at 80 miles per hour, 5000 miles away from the equivalent back in Illinois. We also saw another country Slovenia across an expansive lake. Thanks to google we soon had our destination Vienna’s West Bahnhoff from there we had another long (45 minute) walk to Spanische Hofreitschule (Spanish Riding School.)
We started immediately hurrying down the busy shopping street past fashionable Europeans in light jackets and teens in hoodies. We made our way past the shops towards the beautiful old world buildings and through squares which guidebooks would spend paragraphs describing and were waiting in line on location just outside of the Riding Schoo. It was not a let down.
We stood just outside the entrance in line underneath an alcove which had received carriages carrying nobles for the past three or four centuries. The heavy beams where the horses were tied would prove it with deep troughs in them where bored horses had chewed the wood. Once inside we procured our tickets and made our way to the main stage. The balcony just above which the men and their horses were already performing (technically practicing.) We quietly found one of very few open seats on the wooden benches above the arena and settled in. It was quiet with just the sound of the uptempo classical music piped in over hidden speakers and the horses heavy breath on the down beat of their trot. It was still cool and my jacket felt good.
We made it in just enough time to grab tickets and find seats among the crowd. The event we were witnessing was actually a practice which Rebecca specifically wanted to see.
In Rebecca’s more informed words:
“The Spanish Riding School and their Lipizzaners are famous for performing dramatic “airs above the ground.” In the “airs,” a 1200lb animal obediently stands on its hind legs and then launches itself and the 140lb or so human into the air, landing with grace and control. The grace and control is key because a mistake could send the animal to the ground on top of its rider. This is what people have been flocking to see for centuries. This is not what we came to see.
Before a horse and rider can contemplate hurtling vertically through the air, they must spend years training together and learning to trust one another. They spend years doing mundane riding activities like trotting a circle to build the muscle, obedience, and trust necessary to try something more dangerous. This is what I wanted to see. I wanted to see the foundation being laid because I wanted to understand what kind of horses and humans find themselves at the Spanish Riding School. Outside of a polished performance you can see the personalities of each individual and the techniques each rider uses to work with their assigned mount.
What I saw surprised me. Lipizzaners are rotund creatures, so it would come as no surprise that they do not like to miss their meals. But, the riders and trainers at the Spanish Riding School had harnessed their mounts’ love of eating. When an animal performed something particularly well, whether that is one of the “airs” or simply trotting a very nice circle, the rider stops the horse and feeds it a sugar cube. And the horses seem to feel genuinely motivated.
In America, many of the horse breeds have been selected for “quietness.” They are predictable (for a horse) and unafraid, but they also tend not to be very motivated. The Lipizzaners want to work and they want to work well.
Later we took a tour of the barns. Some of the stallions (they are all stallions) greeted us eagerly with their heads hanging over their stall doors. Others were resting from the morning’s workout. Some were even lying flat out on their sides in deep sleep. Throughout the tour it was clear that the Spanish Riding School prioritizes individuality from its stallions. Some are bedded on straw and some on shavings, depending on their needs. Some kept away from the tours. Some have windows. None are stalled near a horse they do not like.
The “airs” are a rare feat today and are impressive to equestrians and non-equestrians alike. But, the feat that most impressed me is the Spanish Riding School’s ability to keep about 20 stallions happy, healthy, and well schooled in the middle of an industrialized modern city. And to remind non-equestrians of the close history horses and humans have shared.”
Well said Rebecca. To be continued…
No to Someday 