However you ended up in Vienna, at some point you’ll find yourself transforming from ‘human’ into ‘Viennese.’
Here are 18 signs that the transformation has already begun, and you’re becoming Viennese:
1. You stop at a red light and wait patiently
2. You’re confident enough to call “Zweite Kassa, bitte!” in the supermarket
3. You are ok with drinking really average coffee for the sake of spending hours in one of Vienna’s comfy coffeehouses
4. Sundays no longer scare you
You’re trained in having a full fridge of supplies to get you through the shut down. You are also not panicking when thinking about what the hell you’re going to do on Sunday when the whole city becomes a ghost town. You are now the mister Miyagi, the sensei of Sundays (for the kids out there, Mr Miyagi was the teacher in Karate Kid… if you don’t know Karate Kid, well, we give up).
5. The sentence, “Ich brauche kein Sackerl” just rolls off your tongue, like other phrases such as, ‘Bist Du deppert!,’ or ‘Gemma!’ or ‘Passt schon’
6. You don’t do any loud work at home after 10pm, or on a Sunday – you even try to vacuum quietly
7. You know the difference between a Melange, a Kleiner Brauner and a Cappuccino
8. You become surprisingly defensive when somebody claims that a Kipferl or Käsekrainer wasn’t invented in Vienna
9. You’re used to getting an eye-roll from the person behind the Wurst counter in the supermarket when you ask them to cut the Wurst fresh
10. You already have a brunch reservation for a Saturday two weeks from now
11. You don’t even try reaching anyone in an office on a Friday after 2pm
12. You choose your socks wisely in the morning, because you know when you visit a friend’s home, you’ll have to take your shoes off inside
13. You don’t talk on your phone in a doctor’s waiting room, or on public transport and find yourself having dark thoughts about the people that do
14. You say “Grüß Gott” to strangers instead of “Guten Tag” and never think about what it actually means
15. You choose the empty seat furthest away from the other person in the U-Bahn, bus or Straßenbahn (tram) to sit down
16. You put a sign out in your building letting your neighbours know when you’re having a party
17. It takes an offer of free drinks as an incentive for you to meet your friends outside of your Grätzl (neighbourhood)
18. You’re so f*** well behaved
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