Wednesday, April 16, 2008

Langenzersdorf

I paid Vienna a visit this weekend and went to the medieval craft fair in Langenzersdorf. It was a really nice event - no fee and very much focused on education and passing on information on all sorts of stuff from the Middle Ages. I loved how open and friendly everyone was, ready to explain everything and talk about anything, especially the guys from the Wiener Wache/Dreynschlag. Markus and me spent a long time talking to them about their group, fighting styles and training. Very, very informative and interesting (of course, I couldn't stop finding comparisions to Kendo).
Just a pity that the weather wasn't all that good. That night there had been a storm, and the people sleeping in tents had a quite eventful "rest".
Also talked a bit with Viatores Vitiosus about leatherwork, since I'm really intrigued by it and would like to start it myself. It looks like that will be a bigger (ahem, financial and temporal) investment, so I need to think about it some more.

Photos:


Pretty armor


Arduinnas Gefährten showing their skills with a bow (later they shot with their feet - yes, really)


Music, my favourite part of these markets


The highlight of the day - two trebuchets. One big, one smaller, shooting 150m into a field. In the evening, they shot fireballs :->

Sunday was Kendo training in Vienna. It amused me to see how everything is connected. One day I talk with Dreynschlag about footwork in historical fencing, the next day we practice ashi sabaki. Everything's connected, and the more you learn, the more connections you find.

1 comment:

Magpie said...

"the more you learn, the more connections you find" - this is rather close to what I always tell one of the other apprentices: "Learning is like a jigsaw puzzle - the more you already know, the easier it becomes, because everything begins to fit together."
And it also reminds me of a conversation with another friend, in which everything - Tibet, bad and not so bad parents, the Nazi time, the school system and a dozen other topics all turned out to be interrelated.