Austrian National Day

Jumping back to last weekend...

26th October is Austria's National Day - Nationalfeiertag. Google knows I'm in Austria:

To mark the occasion, lots of museums are open for free and you can go and look round the Parliament building on the Ringstrasse:

I went with C, bright and early for the first entry at 9am. There was already a queue. We were greeted at the door by some people who were clearly important and well-known political figures, but at this stage we weren't quite sure who they were (C is from Munich). We shook hands and smiled anyway. Later it became apparent that they were the first and second presidents of the National Council (Nationalrat), Doris Bures and Karlheinz Kopf. At least we got a photo with the cuddly rabbit.

The building is extremely impressive throughout.

This is where parliament used to sit (now only used on special occasions):

And this is where they sit now:

I now feel marginally better informed about Austrian politics, but not so well that I'm going to risk attempting to explain any of it, you will perhaps be relieved to hear. The cuddly rabbit runs "democracy workshops", but unfortunately I don't qualify - only 8-14-year-olds get in.