Burgenland is a small country. A very small one, even within the tiny Austria. Nobody in the entire world would ever notice it. There have been just a few remarkable items in history, that made Burgenland famous: among them the Summer of 1989, when hundreds of citizens of the Democratic Republic of Germany passed the Austrian-Hungarian border near St. Margarethen and went west. This was the beginning of the breakdown of East-European communism. What else have we brought to the world? Here is the answer: “Opus”, Geritzer and spas.
“Opus” is a band of five. Two musicians come from Styria, one is Carinthian and two are Burgenländers, Ewald Pfleger from Ollersdorf and Kurt Plisnier from Stegersbach. They started their career in the 70´s in Stegersbach and became rather popular in Austria in the early 80´s. Their biggest stroke of luck was the single “Live is Life”, recorded at the soccer stadium of Oberwart, September 2nd, 1984. It´s a cheerful song about a band and the great feelings they have on stage, playing for an enthusiastic audience. “Live is Life” was sold about 10 million times and was translated even into Russian and Portuguese. “Opus” went on a world tour in 1985 and were even welcomed by the President of Guatemala. The song “Live is Life”, of course, is the most successful Austrian pop song ever, since it had held the top rank in a lot of playlists worldwide. Recently, Burgenland celebrated its 20th anniversary. Congratulations!
Andreas Geritzer is the first Burgenländer to win an Olympic Medal. He sailed the Laser boat competition in the Agios Kosmas Sailing Centre at the Olympic Games of Athens 2004 and achieved the Silver Medal among 42 participants. The winner is Robert Scheidt from Brazil. Geritzer was born in Vienna in 1977 and graduated at a commercial college in Vienna. Since that time he has been practising the sailing professionally. Geritzer moved to Neusiedl am See, where he finds the best weather and wind conditions on the lake. He had already qualified for the Olympics of Sydney in 2000, where he came
in 5th. Now Geritzer is one of the most successful sportsmen of Burgenland.
Congratulations!
September 8th, the spa of Stegersbach was re-opened. After a year of rebuilding and changes the spa and its wellness setups can be used again by tourists and residents, also. A second hotel will be opened in December. So tourism in Burgenland will claim another height. The spas of Bad Tatzmanns-
dorf, Lutzmannsburg and Stegersbach attract a lot of tourists into Central and Southern Burgenland, and so do the Golf resorts. This is a very promising supplement to the number one attraction of Burgenland, the Lake Neusiedl. The operetta festival of Mörbisch, the opera in the quarry of St. Margarethen, the open-air-plays in Güssing, Kobersdorf, Parndorf etc. get more and more popular, too. Congratulations!
Per aspera ad astra – you need to be diligent to succeed. Just like “Opus”, Andreas Geritzer and those who rack their brains over Burgenland tourism.
Hooray! Hooray! Three times hooray!

Sincerly Walter Dujmovits, jun.