Red Bean & Taro Mochi

Today was a very special day, Liam’s Birthday! We spent the day having as much fun, and eating as much good food, as possible :)

The morning started with a birthday hot chocolate (and coffee) inside the old postal savings bank building, which was built by Otto Wagner in the early 19th century. This was a super cool cafe, serving coffee out of a bank teller winder and with seating in the grand bank hall.

The old postal savings bank building

Birthday drinks

Afterwards, we did a little Vienna scavenger hunt, following prompts from a booklet and completing little challenges around the Hofburg Palace. This was quite funny and we had a nice time exploring the palace gardens some more.

About to start our scavenger hunt

Since it’s Liam’s birthday, we had to get more cake! We went to another branch of Vollpension, the same intergenerational cafe we visited yesterday. Here, we had some refreshing drinks along with apple strudel and an almond-fruit sponge cake.

Yummy birthday cakes

Nest, we visited the Vienna Sound Museum. This was a very cool and interactive museum covering a wide range of music topics. We got to listen to sounds as they would be perceived by a fetus in a womb. This sound perception begins at 20-24 weeks and is established by 28 weeks of gestation. We also got to listen to sounds as they would be perceived by animals, such as carp, chimps, cats, and turtles. Additionally, they really emphasized the importance of taking quiet breaks to protect against hearing loss.

Learning about the perception of sound

Now for some more museum highlights! Using a virtual reality workspace, we created “CLONGS”. In the words of the museum these are “unique sound creatures” which “harmonize visually and acoustically”. I’m not entirely sure what that means, but creating them and watching them interact on the roof was very fun.

In the classical music exhibit, we learned about Beethoven, Mozart, Strauss, and many other musicians and composers who lived in Vienna.

One of the last exhibits, and the coolest one, was on pulsars. Pulsars are the cores of exploded stars which rotate around themselves. These create sounds, which were catalogued into over 600 drawers in the museum.

Drawers of pulsar sounds

You could pull out each drawer and listen to the sound that was recorded from that specific pulsar. The first pulsar discovered was thought to come from alien life, and so was aptly named the “Little Green Man 1”.

Lastly, we got to try conducting the Vienna philharmonic! The recording of musicians would respond to the speed and intensity of your conducting… a very cool experience.

Conducting the philharmonic

After the museum, we visited the interior of St. Charles Church. As all the churches we’ve seen in Vienna, the interior was covered with beautiful frescos. What was unique, was the interesting neon light installation hanging from the roof.

Inside St. Charles Churhc

Looking up at the neon art installation

Lastly, a grand birthday dinner! Liam was craving some dumplings, so we when to Chinacy for Chinese food. This turned out to be one of the best restaurants we’ve been to so far! The food was so fresh and well cooked, absolutely fantastic. We had spring rolls, dumplings, salmon (for me) and duck (for Liam), and for dessert, some mochi.