“How was my year?” Called the Leopoldstadt resident in his key cell phone. “It was shitty! A huge shit!”

Recently I hadn’t dared call him anymore, my best friend. And I didn’t drive in his city either. First because lockdown war, second war government crisis and third, I was really scared of that.

In any case, I finally reached him, my dear Leopoldstadt. And so I asked him how it was, his year, and that I wish him all the best for the next one.

“You, I’m standing at the EMI on Kärntner Strasse,” said the Leopoldstadt resident. “I really need to buy something with Pretty Yende.” “With whom?” I asked the Leopoldstadt resident. “Yende! The opera singer. Didn’t you hear her in ‘La Traviata’? On television without an audience? So this broadcast from the State Opera?

Now the Sisi is also played by a Swiss woman!

“Oh,” I said. “And how was the other year for you?” “Oida”, called the Leopoldstadt there. “Do you want to karniefeln? First I had myself vaccinated in St. Stephen’s Cathedral, then the demonstrators in front of the Burgtheater singed me with Bengalos and on Ballhausplatz the journalists ran over me because I was constantly resigning. And now the short as a manager goes to a Trump – Followers in the USA, Sisi is played by a Swiss woman and after 90 years my favorite record store is closing. The only thing that can help me now is Pretty Yende! “

But then I explained to the Leopoldstadt resident that I don’t want to annoy him, but that he can be happy that the In short and the bloom from politics said goodbye have, while in Germany Friedrich Merz has moved from the investment slide Blackrock to the leadership of the CDU. But then suddenly the Leopoldstadt resident started “strano! È strano!” to sing. This is Violetta’s aria in “La Traviata”. And then, as you could hear, the saleswoman put him in front of the door. Because singing is not allowed in retail, even with an FFP2 mask. Not even for the boosted. It is strange! It is strange!

“What’s going on in the world?”

“Everything will definitely get better in 2022!”, I encouraged the Leopoldstadt resident. But suddenly there was quite a noise to be heard and then an exchange of words, and after a minute the Leopoldstadt resident said that he had just stepped on a dachshund on Kärntner Strasse, but only by mistake. And then the dachshund owner immediately held her cell phone in front of his nose and said she was going to put it online, because he was obviously an animal hater.

“What’s going on in the world?” The Leopoldstadt man called out. “Can we go back to the Sperlhof together please, German? Have a beer?” But then the Leopoldstädter and I saw that the Sperlhof closes forever at the end of the year.

È strano, we said there. strano.

This column will also appear in the Austria Newsletter on December 30, 2021, which bundles reporting on Austria in the SZ. Register now for free.