London is an extremely cosmopolitan city. If you have lived in the city for any length of time, it is easy to take its ethnic mix of people living together for granted. Amsterdam, Paris may have sizable minority communities whose origins are outside Europe also, but you cannot compare these cities to London.
So if you are visiting Austria, prepare yourself for what could be a slightly disconcerting feeling if you have always lived in a place where every other person is of a different ethnic background. Do not let your own presumptions before you arrived in the country colour your views of the Austrians however.
Austria is more or less a homogeneous. Four decades of strong immigration has significantly changed the composition of its people, but it is still very much a white man’s country. That however should not be a problem for the new-comer. After all, great swathes of Africa, Asia, the Middle East and Far East, remain African, Asian, Arab and Oriental, but that does not necessarily have any bearing on their disposition towards people of other races. In fact in the case of Austria, its statistical Bureau in 2006 revealed that 814,800 foreigners legally lived in the country. That amounted to 9.8% of the total population – one of the highest rates in Europe.
In 2001 the national census established that just over 88% of Austrians were native German speakers. 11.4% spoke several minority languages. Slovenes, Hungarians and Croats are the longest and most established
among the 11.4% minority communities in Austria. Since then immigrants have flocked into the country from Turkey and former Yugoslavia.
So, whether you end up staying in a small village out in the country or at the Hotel Vienna Danube don’t assume that the staff will all be of German or Austrian extraction. Staff representation in hotels quite often reflect their clienteles’ ethnic diversity. Contact Hotels Vienna for top hotel deals if you are thinking of visiting the city.
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