On the 29th of December I was finishing a teddy-bear in my studio, and on the 30th I was already knitting the clothes for my teddies in the train taking us to Vienna. We went there to celebrate the New Year. Odor of coffee and apple strudel. The New Year concert stages are the peculiarity of the New Year’s Vienna.
People in the streets were buying hats featuring pigs, but we decided to stay faithful to our teddies and walked straight into the hats featuring polar bears. The New Years costumes were not a question. 
Having taken the New Year program booklet at the hotel, we went out to search the open dance floors where my ancient dream finally came true and I danced the Vienna waltz in Vienna. Just in the street! And the next morning we got one more present as we saw a huge glass walls gallery featuring the collection of old teddy-bears near the fountain of newlyweds. And everywhere across the city plenty of teddies in national costumes and Steiff teddies.
What a great holiday! Vienna never stopped to surprise us with its “teddy dominance”. Even in the suburbs we came across two sweet old-timers at the antique shop! And in great state if not counting the whole in one of the bears’ head showing the sawdust as in Miln’s Winnie the Pooh.
Also a lot of souvenir teddies: clay, silver and simple straw figurines, brooches and Christmas decorations. So, if you are fond of teddies of any kind, you should go to Vienna and you will be absolutely stunned with the variety of teddy-bears.
Oksana Skliarenko for 1/2009 TEDDYBAR und Seine Freunde | 
