A Day for Giveaways

A picnic in the Burggarten was the perfect excuse for a friend and I to spend a sunny Friday afternoon. We picked a spot, laid out some snacks, and got ready for a long recap of who-did-what in the summer. Some hour into our little reunion, a woman approached us with the latest issue of a magazine. We kindly rejected the offer.

She didn’t move.

"Ich habe eine große Familie," she said. (I have a big family). She was asking us for money, yet we could only offer her some snacks. I handed her a chocolate bar, and as she accepted it, she scanned our half-full box of crackers. We silently agreed to let her have it as well.

A few ‘thank you’-s later, she was already on her way. "At least we know she has something to eat," my friend said. Watching her walk away, I could only agree.

- Mina Nacheva    

"Brief Encounters" are readers’ narrations of the funny, surreal and bizarre of everyday life in Vienna. 

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