May 12, 2020

Your Guide on how to survive a zombie apocalypse in Vienna

Due to the whole Coronavirus saga, Vienna’s empty streets have inspired a lot of comparisons to a zombie apocalypse. So we did some research in the deep dark net to understand what one should do if the undead were to rise and descend on our beloved sweet city. Don’t be afraid. Our uniquely Viennese zombie apocalypse guide won’t save you, but it will increase your chances of survival.

Here are 11 things to do if, or when, a zombie apocalypse goes down in Vienna:

1. Get your hands on something to defend yourself, like a Schnitzel hammer for instance

So you’re watching the ORF news, eyes glazed over, because, ya’ know, it’s the ORF news, and all off a sudden, a nasty, absolutely nasty looking (we’re talking like a over-boiled Frankfurter kind of nasty) zombie appears and eats the news reporter.

What do you do?

Well, the first reaction will be to lock all your doors and bunker down in your apartment. This is a valid decision, but you’re going to need weapons in case the zombie’s turn up at your door. And this ain’t Texas, so don’t go thinking you’ll find a gun anywhere. Here are a list of makeshift weapons we suggest you arm yourself with:

a.) your grumpy old Omi neighbour who always calls the Polizei when you throw even the tiniest of dinner parties. Once Omi hears all the zombie’s moaning and groaning, she’ll surely take action and the zombie’s shall feel the wrath of a pissed off old Viennese neighbour.

b.) if you’re living in an Altbau, they’re going to need a key for the elevator in most of the buildings. Wait until a bunch of the Zombies get into the elevator and then continue to press the button on all the floors, repeatedly, so the zombies are stuck riding the elevator up and down. Continue until the zombies fall asleep (assuming zombies nap), or that grumpy Viennese neighbour comes out. Otherwise, try to lure them down to your creepy Altbau cellar. It will freak even a zombie out being led down to a cellar like yours.

c.) if you live in a Neubau, you have the problem that your walls are so thin you can hear your neighbours having nightmares each night, so the zombies will be able to break through the walls. It won’t take them long to reach you. So, take advantage of your super low ceilings by putting a trampoline in their path, so when they approach and can’t resist to jump on the trampoline (as, who can?) they’ll smack themselves up against the low ceiling. This should give you enough time to escape.

d.) of course, every person living in Vienna will have a Schnitzel hammer – make Schnitzel out of those Zombies!

e.) If you’re on the street when the undead turn up, you can use the following weapons:

i.) lure them into the bike lane and let the angry cyclists take care of them

ii.) lead them into a coffeehouse and let the Viennese waiters take care of them with their Wiener Grant

iii.) do a disappearing act by standing behind one of those smoking bins that somebody has dropped their lit cigarette into

iiii.) any day old Semmel you can find lying on the street should do some damage when you throw it at the zombies

v.) find the closest real Viennese character and have them complain the zombies to death…well, they can’t die, but maybe into paralysing boredom

vi.) have them stand on the left side of the escalator in the U-Bahn station and let some pissed off commuter take care of them

f.) spray them with Wiener wasser. Cuz’, ya’ know, Wiener wasser is magical and can fix everything.

2.) Take shelter underground

So, because your cellar, like most cellars in Vienna, are probably scarier than any zombie, we’d suggest you take shelter by either:

+ buying a ticket to the Dritte Man Tour, which will take you into Vienna’s sewer system where you can lose your tour group and hide out there for a while.

+ or, you can just head into the subterranean parts of the Wienfluss (Wien river).

3.) Hide out in the old Flak war towers

The city of Vienna must have seen this zombie apocalypse coming, which would explain why they haven’t demolished the old WW2 war towers around the city. Well played, Stadt Wien. Well played.

Head to one of the Flak towers with supplies and bunker down. These buildings are built to withstand an invasion of any kind. And if you’re a fan of marine life, you can hide out with the fish in the Haus des Meeres that’s housed in one of the war towers.

4.) Get supplies

Ok, so the zombie invasion seems to be settling into the city. You’ve seen zombies sitting back in Schanigarten, Spritzers in hand, and others sun baking naked in those little garden houses. Looks like they’ll be sticking around for a while. You’re going to need supplies, but where can you get them?

Well, we’re sure by now that the zombies have taken over the Billas, Merkurs and Spars, however they probably haven’t thought of your local Turkish corner store. Head there and stock up. Another option could be to head to the countless urban farms set up around the city. With zombies being meat eaters, they wouldn’t have touched the veggies in these gardens. This means you could also head to all of the vegetarian restaurants around town, as the zombies would have had no interest in these, as well (we’d recommend Swing Kitchen – their Vienna burger is da’ bomb). And you thought all of these veggie places and hippy gardens were just gentrification!

As for what you should stock up on, here’s what we’d suggest:

+ Spritzer wine and soda water

+ Manner Schnitten

+ a water resistant pair of Hausschuhe (we know how much you like your hausschuhe, but with the current situation, you’ll probably want to prepare for all settings.

+ Soletti

+ Shisha, Hawara

+ the biggest loaf of Leberkase you can find

+ bottles of Hohes C

+ beer (even if they only have Ottakringer)

+ flour for Palatschinken

+ whatever else you couldn’t live without during the Coronavirus shutdown

5.) Barricade yourself in the ORF Funkhaus

If you’re in the 4th, or 5th district, bunker down in the old ORF Funkhaus. This place is made like a bunker! Plus, it’s a great place to get funky while the city is overcome by those fierce zombies. What?! You’ll need something to occupy yourself with.

6.) Head to the Donaukanal, or the Donauinsel

Here’s the thing, as far as we know from all of the research we’ve done (aka. all of the films and series we’ve watched) zombies can’t swim. So when the apocalypse happens, head to the Donauinsel, or the Donaukanal.

If you go to the Donaukanal, bunker down in one of the waterside bars (Strandbar Hermann is recommendable because the sand will surely slow the zombies down when they’re coming towards you), lure those undead bastardos close to the canal and push them into the water. The strong current’s flow should take them out of town and towards Bratislava.

Same goes if you take refuge on the Donauinsel. Lure them to the water and push them in. If you’re lucky, maybe even the angry swans will take care of them. Otherwise, they should be swept off to Budapest. If you want to confuse them to buy you some time before pushing them in, implement the above plan in the FKK area of the island. All of the nakedness will throw them right off.

7.) Bunker down at home and play Austro-pop from your windows as loud as possible and drive them out of town

Austro-pop is a genre of music that appeals to only a very specific audience. For everybody else, it’s a form of torture, unless they’re under the influence of loads of alcohol. One method that may work in saving the city is if everybody bunkers down at home, sets up very loud speakers by their window, and blasts Austro-pop tunes until all those schiach looking zombie characters are driven out of the city. We recommend something from Rainhard Fendrich, Andreas Gabalier, or Georg Danzer.

[fve]https://youtu.be/DLXzieOjY3o[/fve]

8.) Choose the friends to weather out the zombie apocalypse with carefully

Now, that friend who moved out to Simmering that you haven’t seen since they moved out there, may now come in handy. Chances are high that the zombies won’t bother commuting out this far to a suburb that pretty much looks deserted most of the time anyway, so you might want to travel out there and bunker down with them.

We’d advise against choosing your 6th and 7th district friends as your apocalypse buddies – without their flat white and daily dose of Ramen, they’ll prove useless. 19th, 13th and 1st district buddies could work out as being good choices, as, well, they’ve probably got some money behind them and that always helps in a crisis.

Your Favoriten crew have street smart, which could come in handy during the apocalypse, while your Meidlinger crowd could confuse the hell out of the zombies with their accent long enough for you to escape.

Oh, and as everybody has atleast one in Vienna, be sure to include that rock climbing, bouldering friend in your apocalypse circle. Their fitness levels could come in handy.

All we’re saying is, choose your friends for the zombie apocalypse carefully.

9.) Remember, everything happens years later in Austria so just keep on eye on when the zombie apocalypse happens in Germany and do what the Germans do

Like Austria deals with most crises and difficult decisions, we should act similarly during the flesh eating zombie crisis – observe what Germany does, and act accordingly.

If any zombies do show up here before hitting up Germany, just politely remind them of Gustav Mahlers saying: “If the world ends tomorrow, I would go to Vienna. Everything happens 50 years later there,” and that they must be confusing Austria with Germany. Then kindly offer them directions towards Bavaria.

10.) If there’s a last stand against the zombies, make sure it happens in the Schweizerhaus

The never ending supply of Stelze you can keep throwing at them and feeding them, could just possibly fill them up and spare your life. When you see them getting the meat sweats (because who doesn’t when eating a Schweizerhaus Stelze, right?!), you know you’re going to be okay.

11. Keep up that positive Austrian attitude

Even though there are human-eating zombies attacking the city, there’s no need to go losing your head, and more importantly, losing that carefree Austrian ‘Des passt scho’ and ‘Schau ma mal‘ attitude.

You never know, it might just inspire the zombies to chill the fuck out, pause their invasion, sit back in a Heuriger with an Achterl and enjoy the good life for a while. Long enough that the waiter can give them a taste of Wiener Schmäh that will both confuse them with its passive aggressiveness, but make them fall in love with the city at the same time.

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