The sound of music

Who does not remember, the legendary ‘The Sound of Music’, shot in the picturesque Salzburg in Austria? My work had taken me to Austria a few times, and I had seen the wineries and Swarovski in Innsbruck, Schonbrunn and also the heartbreaking walking tour of Hitler’s Holocaust days in Vienna. But I would always remember Salzberg for more reasons than one.

‘You have taken away my money’, the teenage girl said, 100 schillings to be exact. The year was 2000, and I spent a beautiful sunny morning in front of Von Trapp Castle, the meadows where Do-Re-Me was shot, the church where Maria marries Capt Von Trapp and the spot where ‘Sixteen going on seventeen’ was shot.

After checking in at the airport, I went to the store. As I opened my wallet searching for the schillings amongst a few American dollars, the shop keeper pointed a few Schilling notes amongst the bottles down below and said, “sir, you have dropped your money there”. I was a little perplexed and thought I must have dropped it while opening the wallet. Travelling through Europe in those days, you would carry different currencies in different countries. Well, I took the money he gave me and thanked him profusely with a puzzled look. perhaps.

After passing through security, I went to the little duty-free and searched for something to buy with the extra schilling I had. The shirt with Mozart’s picture was an ideal souvenir as he was born there.

As I was waiting for the flight announcement, a girl came rushing through the security gates, looked around, spotted me, the only non-white in the rather small waiting hall and came straight to me. She was breathless and said, “You have taken away my money,”.

I tried to apologize, explain my mistake and even offered to pay her in American dollars, which she flatly refused and wanted her currency note back. I was devastated and a few onlookers looked on curiously. Then an idea struck me.

I took her to the duty-free, found a shop keeper, explained the whole thing, paid him in dollars in exchange for the shilling note.

In all, I felt like a heel for her passing words. I still retain the Mozart shirt as a reminder of what she said, “do not take what does not belong to you”.