Flight ticket Graz Amsterdam

Amsterdam

Culture

Since 1999 the city of Amsterdam honours the best sportsmen and -women at the Amsterdam Sports Awards. Boxer Raymond Joval and field hockey midfielder Carole Thate were the first to receive the awards in 1999.

Transportation

Amsterdam is one of the most bicycle-friendly cities in the world and is a centre of bicycle culture with good provision for cyclists such as bike paths and bike racks, which are ubiquitous throughout the city. There are an estimated one million bicycles in the city. However, bike theft is common, so cyclists use large secure locks.

In the city centre, driving a car is discouraged. Parking fees are steep and a great number of streets are closed to cars or are one-way. The local government sponsors carsharing and carpooling initiatives such as Autodelen and Meerijden.nu.

Public transport in Amsterdam mainly consists of bus and tram lines, operated by Gemeentelijk Vervoerbedrijf, Connexxion and Arriva; however, there are four metro lines; with a fifth line, the North/South line, under construction. Three free ferries carry pedestrians and cyclists across the IJ to Amsterdam-Noord, and two fare charging ferries go east and west along the harbour. There are also water taxis and a water bus, in addition to the canal cruises, that transport people along Amsterdam's waterways.

The A10 Ringroad surrounding the city connects Amsterdam with the Dutch national network of freeways. Interchanges on the A10 allow cars to enter the city by transferring to one of the eighteen city roads, numbered s101 through s118. These city roads are regional roads without grade separation, and sometimes without a central reservation. Most are accessible by cyclists. The s100 is called the centrumring, a smaller ringroad circumnavigating the city centre.

Amsterdam was intended in 1932 to be a major hub of the highway system of the Netherlands, with freeways numbered one through eight planned to originate from the city. However, the outbreak of the Second World War and shifting priorities led to the current situation, where only roads A1, A2, and A4 originate from Amsterdam according to the original plan. The A3 road to Rotterdam was cancelled in 1970 in order to conserve the Groene Hart. Road A8, leading north to Zaandam and the A10 Ringroad were opened between 1968 and 1974. Besides the A1, A2, A4 and A8, several freeways, such as the A7 and A6, carry traffic mainly bound for Amsterdam.

Amsterdam is served by eight stations of the Nederlandse Spoorwegen (Dutch Railways).. Five are intercity stops: Sloterdijk, Zuid, Amstel, Bijlmer ArenA and Amsterdam Centraal. Many other stations exist in the Amsterdam urban area.

Amsterdam Centraal is an international train station. From the station there are regular services with destinations in Belgium, France, Germany, and Switzerland. Among these trains are international trains of the Nederlandse Spoorwegen and the Thalys, CityNightLine, and InterCityExpress.

Amsterdam Schiphol Airport is less than 20 minutes by train from Amsterdam Central Station. It is the biggest airport in the Netherlands, the fourth largest in Europe and the tenth largest in the world. It handles about 44 million passengers a year and is home base to KLM. Schiphol is the third busiest airport in the world measured by international passengers.

Education

Amsterdam has two universities: the University of Amsterdam (Universiteit van Amsterdam), and the VU University Amsterdam (Vrije Universiteit or "VU"). Other institutions for higher education include an art school, De Rietveldacademie, the Hogeschool van Amsterdam and the Amsterdamse Hogeschool voor de Kunsten. Amsterdam's International Institute of Social History is one of the world's largest documentary and research institutions concerning social history, and especially the history of the labour movement. Amsterdam's Hortus Botanicus, founded in the early 1600s, is one of the oldest botanical gardens in the world, with many old and rare specimens, among them the coffee plant that served as the parent for the entire coffee culture in Central and South America.

Amsterdam is thought to have excellent elementary schools. Some of these schools base their teachings on particular pedagogic theories like the various Montessori schools. Many however are based on religion. This used to be primarily Roman Catholicism and various Protestant denominations, but with the influx of Muslim immigrants there is a rise in the number of Muslim schools. In addition to these schools based on distinct beliefs there are public schools.

The same goes for secondary education. Amsterdam is noted for having 3 independent grammar schools (Dutch: gymnasia), the Vossius Gymnasium, Barlaeus Gymnasium and St. Ignatius Gymnasium, where a classical curriculum including Latin and classical Greek is taught. Though believed until recently by many to be an anachronistic and elitist concept that would soon die out, the gymnasia have recently experienced a revival leading to the formation of a fourth grammar school in which the three aforementioned schools participate.

Government

The administration of the municipality of Amsterdam is divided into 15 boroughs or stadsdelen; the central one, Centrum, being circled by Westerpark, Bos en Lommer, De Baarsjes, Oud-West, Oud-Zuid, Oost/Watergraafsmeer, Zeeburg and Amsterdam-Noord, with the six outer boroughs creating a further encirclement.

Amsterdam is usually understood to be the municipality of Amsterdam. Colloquially, some areas within the municipality, such as the village of Durgerdam, may not be considered part of Amsterdam. Statistics Netherlands uses three other definitions of Amsterdam: metropolitan agglomeration Amsterdam (Grootstedelijke Agglomeratie Amsterdam, not to be confused with Grootstedelijk Gebied Amsterdam, a synonym of Groot Amsterdam), Greater Amsterdam (Groot Amsterdam, a COROP region) and the urban region Amsterdam (Stadsgewest Amsterdam). These definitions are not synonymous with the terms urban area and metropolitan area, which are commonly used in English speaking countries for the purpose of defining large conurbations. The Amsterdam Department for Research and Statistics uses a fourth conurbation, namely the City region Amsterdam. This region is similar to Greater Amsterdam, but includes the municipalities Zaanstad and Wormerland. It excludes Graft-De Rijp.

The smallest of these areas is the municipality, with a population of 742,981 in 2006. The metropolitan agglomeration had a population of 1,021,870 in 2006. It includes the municipalities of Zaanstad, Wormerland, Oostzaan, Diemen and Amstelveen only, as well as the municipality of Amsterdam. Greater Amsterdam includes 15 municipalities, and had a population of 1,211,503 in 2006. Though much larger in area, the population of this area is only slightly larger, because the definition excludes the relatively populous municipality of Zaanstad. The largest area by population, the urban region Amsterdam, has a population of 1,468,122. It includes Zaanstad, Wormerveer, Muiden and Abcoude, but excludes Graft De Rijp, Uithoorn and Aalsmeer. Amsterdam is also part of the conglomerate metropolitan area Randstad, with a total population of 6,659,300 inhabitants.

As all Dutch municipalities, Amsterdam is governed by a mayor, aldermen, and the municipal council. However, unlike most other Dutch municipalities, Amsterdam is subdivided into fifteen stadsdelen (boroughs), a system that was implemented in the 1980s to improve local governance. The stadsdelen are responsible for many activities that previously had been run by the central city. Fourteen of these have their own council, chosen by a popular election. The fifteenth, Westpoort, covers the harbour of Amsterdam, has very few inhabitants, and is governed by the central municipal council. Local decisions are made at borough level, and only affairs pertaining to the whole city, such as major infrastructure projects, are handled by the central city council.

The present version of the Dutch constitution mentions "Amsterdam" and "capital" only in one place, chapter 2, article 32: The king's confirmation by oath and his coronation take place in "the capital Amsterdam" ("de hoofdstad Amsterdam"). Previous versions of the constitution spoke of "the city of Amsterdam" ("de stad Amsterdam"), without mention of capital. In any case, the seat of the government, parliament and supreme court of the Netherlands is (and always has been, with the exception of a brief period between 1808 and 1810) located at The Hague. Foreign embassies too are in The Hague. Although capital of the country, Amsterdam is not the capital of the province in which it is located, North Holland, whose capital is located at Haarlem.

The coat of arms of Amsterdam is composed of several historical elements. First and centre are three St Andrew's crosses, aligned in a vertical band on the city's shield. These St Andrew's crosses can also be found on the cityshields of neighbours Amstelveen and Ouder-Amstel. This part of the coat of arms is the basis of the flag of Amsterdam, flown by the city government, but also as civil ensign for ships registered in Amsterdam. Second is the Imperial Crown of Austria  »” in 1489, out of gratitude for services and loans, Maximilian I awarded Amsterdam the right to adorn its coat of arms with the king's crown, in 1508 replaced with Maximilian's imperial crown when he was crowned Holy Roman Emperor. In the early years of the 17th century, Maximilian's crown in Amsterdam's coat of arms was replaced with the crown of Emperor Rudolph II, a crown that also would become the Imperial Crown of Austria. The lions date from the late 16th century, when city and province became part of the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands. Last came the city's official motto: Heldhaftig, Vastberaden, Barmhartig ("Valiant, Determined, Compassionate"), bestowed on the city in 1947 by Queen Wilhelmina, in recognition of the city's bravery during World War II.

Netherlands

Demographics and urbanisation

Agglomerations consisting of only one municipality are not included. Sources are CBS based see and - Rotterdam (Rotterdam, Barendrecht, Capelle aan den IJssel, Krimpen aan den IJssel, Spijkenisse, Schiedam, Vlaardingen, Maasland, Maassluis, Rozenburg)

- The Hague ('s-Gravenhage, Rijswijk, Wateringen, Voorburg, Leidschendam, Wassenaar, Westland, Zoetermeer, Delft) - Utrecht (Utrecht, Nieuwegein, IJsselstein, Maarssen) - Eindhoven (Eindhoven, Veldhoven, Geldrop, Son en Breugel, Waalre) - Tilburg (Tilburg, Goirle) - Groningen (Groningen, Haren) - Haarlem (Haarlem, Heemstede, Bloemendaal) - Arnhem (Arnhem, Rozendaal) - Leiden (Leiden, Katwijk, Voorschoten, Leiderdorp, Oegstgeest, Rijnsburg, Valkenburg, Warmond) - Dordrecht (Dordrecht, 's-Gravendeel, Hardinxveld-Giessendam, Papendrecht, Sliedrecht, Zwijndrecht) - Heerlen (Heerlen, Kerkrade, Landgraaf, Brunssum) - 's-Hertogenbosch ('s-Hertogenbosch, Vught) - Sittard-Geleen (Sittard-Geleen, Beek, Stein) - Amersfoort (Amersfoort, Leusden)

Language, religion, and culture

The official language is Dutch, which is spoken by a majority of the inhabitants, the exception being some groups of immigrants.

Another official language is West Frisian, which is spoken in the northern province of Friesland, called Fryslân in that language. West Frisian is co-official only in the province of Friesland, although with a few restrictions. Several dialects of Low Saxon (Nedersaksisch in Dutch) are spoken in much of the north and east and are recognised by the Netherlands as regional languages according to the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages, as well as the Meuse-Rhenish Franconian varieties in the southeastern province of Limburg, here called Limburgish language.

There is a tradition of learning foreign languages in the Netherlands: about 70% of the total population have good knowledge of English, 55- 59% of German and 19% of French.

The Netherlands is one of the more secular countries in the Western Europe, with only 39% being religiously affiliated (31% for those aged under 35), although 62% are believers (but 40% of those not in the traditional sense). Fewer than 20% visit church regularly .

According to the most recent Eurobarometer Poll 2005, 34% of Dutch citizens responded that "they believe there is a god", whereas 37% answered that "they believe there is some sort of spirit or life force" and 27% that "they do not believe there is any sort of spirit, god, or life force".

In 1950, before the secularisation of Europe, and the large settlement of non-Europeans in the Netherlands, most Dutch citizens identified themselves as Christians. In 1950, out of a total population of almost 13 million, a total of 7,261,000 belonged to Protestant denominations, 3,703,000 belonged to the Roman Catholic Church, and 1,641,000 had no acknowledged religion.

However, Christian schools are still funded by the government, but the same applies for schools founded on other religions, nowadays Islam in particular. While all schools must meet strict quality criteria, from 1917 the freedom of schools is a basic principle in The Netherlands.

Three political parties in the Dutch parliament (CDA, ChristianUnion and SGP) base their policy on the Christian belief system.

The Netherlands has had many well-known painters. The 17th century, when the Dutch republic was prosperous, was the age of the "Dutch Masters", such as Rembrandt van Rijn, Johannes Vermeer, Jan Steen, Jacob van Ruysdael and many others. Famous Dutch painters of the 19th and 20th century were Vincent van Gogh and Piet Mondriaan. M. C. Escher is a well-known graphics artist. Willem de Kooning was born and trained in Rotterdam, although he is considered to have reached acclaim as an American artist. Han van Meegeren was an infamous Dutch art forger.

The Netherlands is the country of philosophers Erasmus of Rotterdam and Spinoza. All of Descartes' major work was done in the Netherlands. The Dutch scientist Christiaan Huygens (1629-1695) discovered Saturn's moon Titan and invented the pendulum clock. Antonie van Leeuwenhoek was the first to observe and describe single-celled organisms with a microscope.

In the Dutch Golden Age, literature flourished as well, with Joost van den Vondel and P.C. Hooft as the two most famous writers. In the 19th century, Multatuli wrote about the bad treatment of the natives in Dutch colonies. Important 20th century authors include Harry Mulisch, Jan Wolkers, Simon Vestdijk, Cees Nooteboom, Gerard (van het) Reve and Willem Frederik Hermans. Anne Frank's Diary of a Young Girl was published after she died in The Holocaust and translated from Dutch to all major languages.

Replicas of Dutch buildings can be found in Huis ten Bosch, Nagasaki, Japan. A similar Holland Village is being built in Shenyang, China.

Windmills, tulips, wooden shoes, cheese and Delftware pottery are among the items associated with the Netherlands.

Military

Conscription in the Netherlands was suspended in 1996. All military specialities, except the Submarine service and Marine Corps(Korps Mariniers), are open to women. The Dutch Ministry of Defence employs almost 80,900 personnel, including 22,900 civilian and 68,000 military personnel[citation needed]. The military is composed of four branches, all of which carry the prefix Koninklijke (Royal):

Economy

As a founding member of the Euro, the Netherlands replaced (for accounting purposes) its former currency, the "Gulden" (Guilder), on January 1, 1999, along with the other adopters of the single European currency. Actual Euro coins and banknotes followed on January 1, 2002. One Euro is equivalent to 2.20371 Dutch guilders.

The Netherlands has a prosperous and open economy in which the government has reduced its role since the 1980s. Industrial activity is predominantly in food-processing (for example Unilever and Heineken International), chemicals (for example DSM), petroleum refining (for example Royal Dutch Shell), and electrical machinery (for example Philips). In the northern place Slochteren one of the largest natural gas fields in the world is situated. So far (2006) exploitation of this field resulted in a total revenue of ?159 billion since the mid 1970s. N.V. Nederlandse Gasunie still is the largest public-private partnership P3 world-wide following the global energy-transition of 1963 from coal to gas, coupling oil and gas prices. With just over half of the reserves used up and an expected continued rise in oil prices, the revenues over the next few decades are expected to be at least that much.

The Netherlands has the 16th largest economy in the world, and ranks 10th in GDP (nominal) per capita. Between 1998 and 2000 annual economic growth (GDP) averaged nearly 4%, well above the European average. Growth slowed considerably in 2001-05 due to the global economic slowdown, but accelerated to 4.1% in the third quarter of 2007. Inflation is 1.3% and is expected to stay low at around 1.5% in the coming years. Unemployment is at 4.0% of the labour force. By Eurostat standards however, unemployment in the Netherlands is at only 2.9% - the lowest rate of all European Union member states. The Netherlands also has a relatively low GINI coefficient of 0.326. Despite ranking only 10th in GDP per capita, UNICEF ranked the Netherlands 1st in child well-being.

A highly mechanised agricultural sector employs no more than 4% of the labour force but provides large surpluses for the food-processing industry and for exports. The Dutch rank third worldwide in value of agricultural exports, behind the United States and France, with exports earning $55 billion annually. A significant portion of Dutch agricultural exports are derived from fresh-cut plants, flowers, and bulbs, with the Netherlands exporting two-thirds of the world's total. The Netherlands also exports a quarter of all world tomatoes, and one-third of the world's exports of peppers and cucumbers. The Netherlands' location gives it prime access to markets in the UK and Germany, with the port of Rotterdam being the largest port in Europe. Other important parts of the economy are international trade (Dutch colonialism started with cooperative private enterprises such as the VOC), banking and transport. The Netherlands successfully addressed the issue of public finances and stagnating job growth long before its European partners.

Graz

Culture

There are currently 228 buildings in Graz that are classified as highrise buildings. In Graz a building is classified as being highrise if the floor of at least one room is 22 metres above ground level. Buildings that are classified as highrise have to adhere to much more stringent fire safety regulations because the ladders of the majority of fire appliances used by Graz Fire Brigade cannot reach higher than 22 metres.

In Graz there are a some new high rise buildings in the pipeline, the only one that currently (July 2007) is looking certain to be build is a 15 storey officeblock opposite the "Stadthalle" on the southern edge of the city centre. The construction of this officeblock is to commence in June 2008.

Health services

In Graz there are 8 hospitals, 6 private clinics, 44 pharmacies and 2 ambulance services.

Transportation

An extensive public transportation network makes Graz an easy city to navigate without a car. The city has a comprehensive bus network, complementing a tram network consisting of six lines, two of which run from the main train station (Hauptbahnhof) to the old town before branching out. Furthermore, there are seven night-time bus routes, although these operate only at weekends and on evenings preceding public holidays.

From the main train station (Hauptbahnhof), you can take regional trains to most of Styria. Direct trains also run to most major cities nearby including Vienna, Salzburg, Innsbruck, Maribor and Ljubljana in Slovenia, Zagreb in Croatia, Prague in the Czech Republic, Budapest in Hungary and Zurich in Switzerland. Trains for Vienna leave every hour.

Graz Airport is about 10 kilometres south of the city centre and has a railway station within walking distance (east of the airport). The non charter flight international destinations from Graz are Berlin, Cologne/Bonn, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt/Main, London, Munich, Stuttgart, Zurich, Girona/Barcelona (from 8/11/2007) and Oslo.

Austria

Demographics

An estimated 13,000 to 40,000 Slovenes in the Austrian state of Carinthia (the Carinthian Slovenes) as well as Croatians (around 30,000) and Hungarians in Burgenland were recognized as a minority and have enjoyed special rights following the Austrian State Treaty (Staatsvertrag) of 1955. The Slovenes in the Austrian state of Styria (estimated at a number between 1,600 and 5,000) are not recognized as a minority and do not enjoy special rights, although the State Treaty of July 27, 1955 states otherwise.

The right for bilingual topographic signs for the regions where Slovene- and Croat-Austrians live alongside the Germanic population (as required by the 1955 State Treaty) is still to be fully implemented. Many Carinthians are afraid of Slovenian territorial claims, pointing to the fact that Yugoslav troops entered the state after each of the two World Wars and considering that some official Slovenian atlases show parts of Carinthia as Slovenian cultural territory. The current governor, Jörg Haider, has made this fact a matter of public argument in autumn 2005 by refusing to increase the number of bilingual topographic signs in Carinthia. A poll by the Kärntner Humaninstitut conducted in January 2006 states that 65% of Carinthians are not in favour of an increase of bilingual topographic signs, since the original requirements set by the State Treaty of 1955 have already been fulfilled according to their point of view. Another interesting phenomenon is the so called "Windischen-Theorie" stating that the Slovenes can be split in two groups: actual Slovenes and Windische (a traditional German name for Slavs) , based on differences in language between Austrian Slovenes, who were taught Slovenian standard language in school and those Slovenes who spoke their local Slovenian dialect but went to German schools. The term Windische was applied to the latter group as a means of distinction. This theory was never generally accepted and fell out of use some decades ago.

Religion

At the end of the twentieth century, about 74% of Austria's population were registered as Roman Catholic, while about 5% considered themselves Protestants. Both these numbers have been in decline for decades, especially Roman Catholicism, which has suffered an increasing number of seceders from the church.[citation needed] Austrian Catholics are obliged to pay a mandatory tax (calculated by income  »”about 1%) to the Austrian Roman Catholic Church, which might (have) act(ed) as an incentive to leave the church.[citation needed]

About 12% of the population declare that they have no religion. Of the remaining people, about 180,000 are members of Eastern Orthodox Churches and about 8,100 are Jewish. It has to be noted that the Austrian Jewish Community of 1938 - Vienna alone counted more than 200,000 - was reduced to solely 4,000 to 5,000 after the Second World War. The influx of Eastern Europeans, especially from the former Yugoslav nations, Albania and particularly from Turkey largely contributed to a substantial Muslim minority in Austria  »” around 340,000 are registered as members of various Muslim communities. Buddhism, which was legally recognized as a religion in Austria in 1983 has a following of 20,000 (10,402 at the 2001 census).[citation needed]

While northern and central Germany was the origin of the Reformation, Austria (and Bavaria) was the heart of the Counter-Reformation in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, when the absolute monarchy of Habsburg imposed a strict regime to maintain Catholicism's power and influence among Austrians. The Habsburgs viewed themselves as the vanguard of Roman Catholicism and all other confessions and religions were oppressed. In 1781, Emperor Joseph II issued a Patent of Tolerance that allowed other Christian confessions a limited freedom of worship. Religious freedom was declared a constitutional right in the Austro-Hungarian Ausgleich in 1867 thus paying tribute to the fact that the monarchy was home of numerous religions beside Roman Catholicism such as Greek, Serbian, Romanian, Russian, and Bulgarian Orthodox Christians (Austria neighboured the Ottoman empire for centuries) , and both Calvinist and Lutheran Protestants.

Austria continued to remain largely influenced by Catholicism. After 1918, First Republic Catholic leaders such as Theodor Innitzer and Ignaz Seipel took leading positions within or close to Austria's government and increased their influence during the time of the Austrofascism  »”Catholicism was treated much like a state religion by Engelbert Dollfuss and Kurt Schuschnigg.[citation needed] Although Catholic leaders welcomed the Germans[citation needed] in 1938 during the Anschluss of Austria into Germany, Austrian Catholicism stopped its support of Nazism later on and many former religious public figures became involved with the resistance during the Third Reich. After 1945, a stricter secularism was imposed in Austria, and religious influence on politics declined.[citation needed]

Culture

Austria's past as a European power and its cultural environment have generated a broad contribution to various forms of art, most notably among them music. Austria has been the birthplace of many famous composers such as Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Joseph Haydn, Franz Schubert, Anton Bruckner, Johann Strauss, Sr., Johann Strauss, Jr. and Gustav Mahler as well as members of the Second Viennese School such as Arnold Schoenberg, Anton Webern and Alban Berg.

Vienna has long been especially an important center of musical innovation. Eighteenth and nineteenth century composers were drawn to the city due to the patronage of the Habsburgs, and made Vienna the European capital of classical music. During the Baroque period, Slavic and Hungarian folk forms influenced Austrian music. Vienna's status began its rise as a cultural center in the early 1500s, and was focused around instruments including the lute. Ludwig van Beethoven spent the better part of his life in Vienna.

Austria's current national anthem was chosen after World War II to replace the traditional Austrian anthem by Joseph Haydn. The composition, which was initially attributed to Mozart, was most likely not composed by Mozart himself.

Austria has also produced one notable jazz musician, keyboardist Josef Zawinul who helped pioneer electronic influences in jazz as well as being a notable composer in his own right. Falco was an internationally acclaimed pop and rock musician.

Among Austrian artists and architects one can find painters Gustav Klimt, Oskar Kokoschka, Egon Schiele or Friedensreich Hundertwasser, photographer Inge Morath or architect Otto Wagner.

Austria was the cradle of numerous scientists with international reputations. Among them are Ludwig Boltzmann, Ernst Mach, Victor Franz Hess and Christian Doppler, prominent scientists in the nineteenth century. In the twentieth century, contributions by Lise Meitner, Erwin Schrödinger and Wolfgang Pauli to nuclear research and quantum mechanics were key to these areas' development during the 1920s and 1930s. A present-day quantum physicist is Anton Zeilinger, noted as the first scientist to demonstrate quantum teleportation.

In addition to physicists, Austria was the birthplace of two of the greatest philosophers of the twentieth century, Ludwig Wittgenstein and Karl Popper. In addition to them biologists Gregor Mendel and Konrad Lorenz as well as mathematician Kurt Gödel and engineers such as Ferdinand Porsche and Siegfried Marcus were Austrians.

A focus of Austrian science has always been medicine and psychology, starting in medieval times with Paracelsus. Eminent physicians like Theodore Billroth, Clemens von Pirquet, and Anton von Eiselsberg have built upon the achievements of the 19th century Vienna School of Medicine. Austria was home to psychologists Sigmund Freud, Alfred Adler, Paul Watzlawick and Hans Asperger and psychiatrist Viktor Frankl.

The Austrian School of Economics, which is prominent as one of the main competitive directions for economic theory, is related to Austrian economists Joseph Schumpeter, Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk, Ludwig von Mises, and Friedrich Hayek.

Other noteworthy Austrian-born émigrés include the management thinker Peter Drucker and the 38th Governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Complementing its status as a land of artists and scientists, Austria has always been a country of poets, writers, and novelists. It was the home of novelists Arthur Schnitzler, Stefan Zweig, Thomas Bernhard, Franz Kafka, and Robert Musil, of poets Georg Trakl, Franz Werfel, Franz Grillparzer, Rainer Maria Rilke, and Adalbert Stifter, and of writer Karl Kraus.

Famous contemporary playwrights and novelists are Nobel prize winner Elfriede Jelinek and writer Peter Handke.

Austria's cuisine is derived from the cuisine of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. In addition to native regional traditions, it has been influenced above all by Hungarian, Czech, Jewish, Italian and Bavarian cuisines, from which both dishes and methods of food preparation have often been borrowed. The Austrian Cuisine is therefore one of the most multi and transcultural cuisines in Europe.

Typical Austrian dishes include Wiener Schnitzel, Schweinsbraten, Kaiserschmarren, Knödel, Sachertorte and Tafelspitz. There are also Kasnockn, a macaroni dish with fresh Pinzgauer cheese and parsley, and Eierschwammerl (chanterelle) dishes. The Eierschwammerl are the native yellow, tan mushrooms. These mushrooms are delicious, especially when in a thick Austrian soup, or on regular meals.

The candy PEZ was invented in Austria. Austria is also famous for its Apfelstrudel.

The most popular sport in Austria is alpine skiing and Austria shows constant dominance in the Nations-Cup. Similar sports such as snowboarding or ski-jumping are also widely popular. The most popular team sport in Austria is football. However, Austria rarely has international success in this discipline, though the 2008 UEFA European Football Championship is jointly being held with Switzerland. Besides football, Austria also has professional national leagues for most major team sports including ice hockey and basketball.