My wife, daughter, son-in-law and I just returned from a Christmas ski trip to Innsbruck, Austria. I love Austria. It is a beautiful place and the people are as hospitable as can be. I highly recommend it. And the skiing is great, too. There are at least a half dozen snow covered slopes a free short bus ride away. I like everything about Austria except for one thing: They smoke. I mean they smoke cigarettes inside restaurants. All of them. It came as somewhat of a shock to our systems, what with a complete ban in Ohio and many states. And prior to that, just about everywhere in the U.S. there were no smoking sections in restaurants.
They smoke in almost every restaurant. And rarely is there a no smoking section. In fairness, there are several small bakery-cafes that totally prohibit smoking. What is so ironic is that my image of Austria is of outdoorsiness, hiking up into the fields of Edelweiss and Julie Andrews twirling and singing in the crisp, pure mountain air. While it is this and more, it is also a place where legions of beautiful young ladies and handsome young men in their twenty-somethings sit in restaurants for hours on end puffing away on cigarettes. How unfortunate.
Our last restaurant of the trip was at a very nice little Italian place. The maitre'd insisted they had the best, freshest fish of any place in town. That was appealing. But I looked around and noticed there was smoke everywhere. I asked him if there was a nicht rauchen zimmer. He said, no, but perhaps next year. Instead of saying "mi dispiace, troppo fumo" and leaving, we decided to stay and take up a seat in a corner of the place. This restaurant was one of those authentic looking Italian places with the low cavern-style vaulted ceilings that cut off about half of the overhead airspace. The fish was excellent, by the way. In Europe, dining out is meant to be a leisurely experience. They bring you the food and don't bug you much. you can stay forever. You have to actually trip a waiter and request him to bring the bill. So, after about two hours, the place was so filled with smoke that my little family was literally gasping for air. it was truly that bad. We grabbed our smoke-tainted coats and took our smoking bodies outside for some fresh air.
Now, what was this "next year" thing the waiter was talking about. When I got home I looked up some information on Austria and smoking. Apparently about 30% of adults are regular smokers and another 20% are occasional smokers. Austria does have something called a partial smoking ban. Smoking is banned in schools, hospitals, and airports. And restaurants that have more than 750 square feet of space must have a no smoking section. But the rules are voluntary and I can vouch that the no smoking section rule is being blatantly ignored. Austria, it appears, is determined to be the last great bastion of smoke-filled air in Europe. France and Germany went smoke-free as of Jan 1, 2008. They join 15 other European countries in banning smoking in restaurants. Crimony, even Albania has banned indoor smoking!! Turkey is about to do the same.
I wish Austria would get on the smoke-free wagon. It would make a wonderful country perfect. And perfectly healthy. The next time I visit Austria, if smoking is still going on in restaurants, I'll seek out those smoke-free bakeries and take all my meals there. Yeah, I can handle that.
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