Vienna Austria

The posters around Vienna's neo-Gothic town hall set tongues wagging: In place of the traditional "Construction Work Ahead" symbol showing a man in pants and helmet, they depicted a ponytailed woman wearing rugged-looking boots and a skirt, and hefting a shovel. On "Exit" signs, the traditional running male stick figure was replaced by a running woman, this time in high-heeled boots and a skirt, hair flying behind her.

A Bosnian who tried to enter the U.S. Embassy in Vienna with a backpack filled with explosives, nails and Islamic literature was arrested Monday after the bag set off a metal detector and the man ran away, authorities said. Police sealed off the neighborhood as a precaution and shut down or rerouted nearby bus and tram lines. Officers patrolled the area with bomb-sniffing dogs.

VIENNA -- Beethoven, Brahms, Mozart -- Korngold? Countless millions have at least heard of the classical masters associated with Vienna. Not only the titanic trio of Ludwig van Beethoven, Johannes Brahms and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart viewed the city at some point as their musical home. So did Anton Bruckner, Franz Joseph Haydn, Gustav Mahler and Franz Schubert.

A $60-million sculpture will go back on display at Vienna's Art History Museum next week after police arrested the thief who stole it almost three years ago and found the work buried in a forest. The Austria Press Agency said experts had established the authenticity of the figurine over the weekend: the 16th century, gold-plated "Saliera," or salt cellar sculpture by the Florentine master Benvenuto Cellini.

Seiji Ozawa has canceled his remaining performances with the Vienna State Opera this season after being hospitalized with a bronchial infection and shingles that affected his vision. Ozawa, 70, is in his fourth season as music director of the Vienna State Opera in Austria. He is music director laureate of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, where he was music director for 29 seasons before stepping down at the end of the 2001-02 season.

Olga Borodina will no longer be singing at the Vienna State Opera, according to a statement by the company. The Russian diva, who has graced La Scala, Covent Garden, the Met, the Salzburg Festival and other famed operatic stages, was to make her Vienna State Opera debut this month as Isabella in Rossini's "L'Italiana in Algeria" ("The Italian in Algiers") -- one of her signature roles. But Agnes Baltsa is now singing the part.

Natascha Kampusch is a sad, withdrawn-looking young woman, a lifetime apart from the ruddy-cheeked 10-year-old she was when she disappeared eight years ago. She weighs less than 100 pounds, and police who interviewed her shortly after she escaped from her kidnapper this week described her as having a pallor that comes from a lack of natural light.

"WELCOME to Vienna and this special edition of 'Alternative Radio,' " the MC proclaims to an eager late-night crowd in the hip concert space of Austrian Radio. Jimi Hendrix's freak-out version of "The Star-Spangled Banner" blasts through the loudspeakers, more raucously distorted than ever. The lights go crazy. America has never heard anything like this, the MC enthusiastically announces.

YOU can't escape classical music here. Its history hits you almost from the moment you step out of the City Air Terminal: the bust of Bruckner at the lovely Stadtpark and, around the corner from there, a full-size gold statue of Johann Strauss, the waltz king. In the city center, the Staatsoper, the city's famed opera house that gives Vienna its geographical and cultural bearings.

You look around nervously as you approach the ticket counter. What would people think if they saw you going into a place like this? Even the woman at the counter seems to be looking at you funny. What kind of guy would come here in broad daylight? You can't shake off the paranoia, as though you're paying for a peep show in a seedy part of town.