Tuesday, October 03, 2006

Vienna Bear vs. Budapest Bear: Cage Match

Rick and I just returned from a short jaunt to Vienna, the “Paris of the East.” It’s chock-full of palaces and castles and museums—much larger, more elegant, and expensive than Budapest. Of course, Austria is a Western European, wealthy, capitalist state, while Hungary is an Eastern European, post-communist, poor state. Both cities have their charm, but their cultures are very different. It’s kind of like—well, let’s just let the wildlife speak for itself.


Vienna bears enjoy fanciful tea parties dressed in colorful folk costumes.



Budapest bears are pressured from childhood to win Olympic glory…



...or sentenced to hard labor in Siberia, simply for looking too much like wolves.



Vienna bears promonade happily hand in hand, showing off that extravagant little parasol they picked up somewhere.



Budapest bears are forced to the front before they’re even big enough to hold a gun.


Vienna bears enjoy forming pop bands with precious miniature musical instruments.



Budapest bears crouch in the corner, wearing the helmet and gas mask they stripped off a dead Nazi, just praying they get a chance to take some fascists down before they die.



Callous Vienna bears run happily over the proletariat.



There are no more bears left in Budapest. Only frightened dolls…



...and bloodthirsty, man-eating horses.

All photographs taken on location in Vienna and Budapest. No bears were harmed in the making of this post.

4 comments:

Emily said...

Oh shit, Chewbacca, that is freaking hilarious. I especially like the despondent, lumpenproletariat Siberian bear. And the soldier bear who appears to be wearing a colander as a hat. Awesome.

Anonymous said...

I had misread the title of your post and thought you were going to be surveying the different beers that can be found Budapest and Vienna. This is much better.

Let's get our historical facts straight, though. Hungary was an Axis power during WWII. Just for the record.

Jessamyn Harris said...

oh, shit, emily, I can't believe you busted out with that oh shit chewbacca shit!!

ahem.

can you promise me you didn't force, nor bribe, these bears into these situations? how do we know these bears were found in their natural habitats and not, in fact, set up? maybe you're only showing the wildlife you want to show to push your "agenda".

no, though, really; I just laughed my ass off.

although I thought old timey st. petersburg was the true "paris of the east" or whatever.

Ganch said...

Wow...the suspicions raised by my humble nature photography! You guys are smart. J: I think there's probably lots of "Paris of the East"s. I just write what rick steves tells me. Oh, rick steves.