Vienna Waits for You

I just got my first paycheck and I have a week off.

It's time to take a trip! How about Vienna? Or Graz? A wise reminder from Billy Joel:

"Where's the fire, what's the hurry about? You'd better cool it off before you burn it out You've got so much to do and Only so many hours in a day /Slow down, you crazy child and take the phone off the hook and disappear for awhile it's all right, you can afford to lose a day or two When will you realize,..Vienna waits for you?"

Actually, the last month has been one of the most low stress I've had in a long time (along with the two months I spent in Alaska this summer). I could really used to having all this extra time. I've been watching a few movies, reading some books, sitting around thinking, learning lots of new German vocabulary words, trying to catch up on meaningful correspondence, looking at maps, going hiking, exploring the area...

And here are some pictures from my weekend in Innsbruck (when I went climbing with Johanna). Unfortunately I didn't take any pictures of climbing.

It's Like Summer in Alaska, But Colder

In the last couple weeks I have settled in even more and there is almost a rhythm to my daily life. A couple pretty cool things have happened too.

The best thing that happened, especially when thinking about the long term, is that I found a church. Yay! After spending ten of my eleven months in Germany looking for a church before I found one, I was very concerned that I would have the same difficulties this time. But I planned ahead and started asking people in the U.S. if they know someone who knew someone who works for a ministry that knows of a church near the little town of Landeck. As promising as that question sounds, I didn’t turn up any possibilities for a while. Amazingly though, my last quarter at WWU, I met Michelle in a German class. I was amazed that we hadn’t had class together before but I found out she had been in Graz, Austria the year before for a study abroad. I also found out that she was a Christian. Although she didn’t really know about the options in my part of Austria, she gave me the name of a University ministry that I could contact in Innsbruck and the name of a denomination or group of churches that are throughout Austria. I looked online before I left and got some information. There wasn’t one in Landeck, but there were some that were in Tirol. I couldn’t find a lot of the towns on my map though, so I waited till I got here and got to know the area and then looked on line again. The closest one was in Imst, 20 minutes on the train East of Landeck. After the train ride and then some inner-city route finding (the Austrians aren’t really into street signs), I found it. It is pretty small from 20-30 people probably that meet in a big room above a store. Everyone was really nice. I got an offer to carpool to a Bible Study and after setting out back to the train station a car pulled over and I got a drive-by lunch invite from two ladies that go to church there. The both work for a ministry called “Vision fuer Afrika” that sponsors kids, kind of like World Vision, but infinitely smaller.

I was back again this week and actually met several people who are my age!!! This is quite remarkable because up until now, the only 20-something person I have met in Johanna, the teacher I went climbing with. The group of girls told me that there was a group of young people from the church that usually meet on Fridays. This Friday is Austria’s National Holiday so the group doesn’t meet but we exchanged phone numbers and we will hang out anyhow and do something. I’m super stoked! So many things have been great so far, and I can’t complain, but so far, most of my friend options have been either 15 year old students or 35 year old teachers with families. Diversity is key and I have enjoyed getting to know a lot of people but it is also really nice to be able to hang out with people who are relatively mature but have time to hang out too.

Speaking of people my age, I did spot one or two others of Thursday night. My first summer at YDA, I was on summer staff with Katie Van Guilder who is from New Hampshire. We recently had a tear filled (just kidding) reunion on Facebook after losing contact for two years. She has been in Romania for about a year now working with a wilderness program there. She and her brother have been travelling around Europe the last couple of weeks before she heads back to the states. When I found out we might be near each other, we decided to try and meet up at some point if it worked out. And it did. They didn’t have internet very often so I wasn’t really sure when to expect them but they ended up rolling into town on Thursday night and called me from the Train station to say they were here. I’m only a ten minute walk away so I walked over there instead of giving them directions on the curvy, unlabelled streets.

I was fun having my first guests in my apartment. We sat around in the kitchen for a while just talking, eating the apples my landlady supplies me with, and drinking Gluwein. Gluwein is like alcoholic counterpart of spiced cider; it is basically spiced red wine. They usually only serve it around Christmas time at the Christmas markets that are all over Germany and Austria during advent. My favorite thing to do that time of year when I was in Germany was to go wander around the Weihnachtsmarkt enjoy a mug of Gluwein and a fresh made Crepe with Nutella schmeared on it. Oh how wonderful.

We went out for dinner and had some classic Austrian and Tirolian fare. I told them the little that I knew about Austrian food and suggested Spaetzl (a sort of midget-like homemade noodle), Knoedel (bread crumb dumplings with meat or cheese inside), or Wiener schnitzel (breaded veal or pork). Katie made the mistake of trusting me and ended up with a Knoedl that was, as we found out later, in a gravy of calf’s lungs. I hear it can be good but she didn’t like it much. I tried a bite and thought it wasn’t too bad but it did have a very distinct flavor. It’s probably one of those ones you either love or hate. I got Wiener schnitzel that was delicious and huge. Greg, Katie’s brother had the best meal though. It was some sort of roasted meat with some cooked veggies with a very good gravy type sauce on it and rive with some sort of cheese dressing. The meat was so tender and delicious. Of course we also had Bier. That was good too.

The next morning we got up and went for a short hike up the hillside to see the Ruine Schrofenstein, a small castle that is still privately owned. In the last post, there is a picture of its silhouette.

The night before they came it had cooled down a lot and there was snow only a 1,000 ft. or so above us. Autumn is now in full swing. The morning after they left, Saturday, I opened my window in the morning and saw snow. Only this time, the snow wasn’t just on the mountains, but rather on the grass and leaves in the yard! It was just a thin layer and melted by the afternoon but it is staying quite cold hovering just above freezing during the day. This means, probably no more rock climbing until spring. The mountains are so beautiful covered in snow though! And it means snowboarding will be coming soon!

Another exciting culinary incident occurred at the beginning of the week. I got home from school and walked into the kitchen to make lunch to discover an infinitely beautiful and large Apfelstrudel sitting on the table with a small pitcher of sweet cream sauce to pour over it. My dear landlady, Brunhilde, had made it herself and brought me some! Apfel strudel is a croissant type pastry with apple pie type filling in it. Yum. It was so good; it was hard to eat my lunch first before digging in. As if that wasn’t enough, the next day when I got home from school, I had just started making my lunch when Brunhilde came down with her hands full of food for me. She had made ham Knoedel (the bread crumb dumplings) in soup and a salad with greens from their garden. She has been so nice since I got here, and the whole family. But after the food offerings, we are pretty much best friends.

After debating whether the awkwardness would be worth it or not, I decided to go to the Matura Ball Saturday night. It is Austria’s version of Prom but they do it in the fall so that they can focus more on studying in the spring. All the parents come and they even had a live big band. Of course Austrians can drink Beer and wine when they are 16 (hard alcohol at 18) so they get to drink at their prom. Since I still had it with me from Kristin’s wedding, I wore my bridesmaid dress to the ball. It was the only thing that was even close to formal enough. I never thought I would use it while I was here or possibly ever again. You know how often I wear dresses.

It turned out to be pretty fun. I sat with other teachers and got to know some of the ones that I hadn’t had a chance to talk to yet, so that was nice. I was also invented to dance by the principal which was fun but a bit strange. I have gotten comfortable with my freestyle dancing in public but I can’t remember how to do a waltz or any other traditional dance even though we did a unit on it in Freshman PE. I guess that was 9 years ago. I brought my camera but then didn’t take any pictures. Oh well.

In other news, my little old Jeep Cherokee finally sold. Providing me with bit of extra money before my firs t paycheck comes and I will use a lot of it to pay tuition for my TESOL practicum which I will do starting in January. And I will probably buy the season pass for skiing that will get me into several ski areas nearby.

In closing, I went for a run today in spite of and because of the cold weather. It was absolutely wonderful. I haven’t ran much since I have been here partly because I have been hiking end climbing too, partly because I am lazy, and partly because I did something to my ankle earlier this week causing sharp pain in my right ankle every time I went from a walk to a run. It was quite strange but seems to be better now. It didn’t swell much but bruised some the next day. The school nurse thought that I must have popped some blood vein or vessel or something and figured that it would recover pretty quickly. Today I tested it out and it was great. I ran down the trail that is right next to the river with views of the mountains off in the distance and then for half the run transitioned to a burly up-hill hike to a great lookout point.

At 6 pm the sun had already been behind the mountains for a while and the moon was already up, snow blanketing all the peaks nearby, and behind me a bench and a “alter” of sorts with Jesus on the cross. And as I stood there and admired all that lay before me, a few tiny snowflakes fell from the sky. For me, running is like therapy. It is so refreshing and life-giving. I hate that feeling when it has been a week or more since I have run or really sweat a lot doing something intense. Somehow I feel like when I sweat, all the gross fat and unhealthiness gets sweat out of me too. And the cold fall air is so awakening. It hits you so boldly but cheerfully as your cheeks turn rosy with color. I was alone seeing all this beauty and feeling all those things. I stood at that outcropping and just sang. I love to sing. Usually I sing in my car, especially on long drives alone. I just sing my guts out. Sometimes I sing in my room too in Bellingham or at home. But here, my room is right next to two guys I don’t really know and it is sometimes hard to tell when they are home or not. I don’t really like to sing around people if I am the only one singing, but especially not people I don’t really know. So I just let loose up on that hillside. Pretty soon the cold was penetrating my thin layer of spandex and I had to head back down but oh what a feeling.

It was a wonderful run and a great end to a great week. It made me feel so alive and so thankful to be alive.

“let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross…” Hebrew 12:1-2

Sick of the Oerchkatzelschworf (not really)

So on the down side, I've had a sore throat for over a week, and in the last day or so it has turned into a full fledged cold with a nasty runny nose and a cough. A perfect combination right when I am shaking hands with all my new co-workers and for spreading sickness to all my new students. Luckily I actually brought a box of non-drowsy nasal decongestant. Yay! I hear teachers get sick more than people in almost any other profession. Sweet! I can take it. Bring it on!

On the up side, I got to go rock climbing on Sunday! WooooHooooo! One of the teachers at my 1st school, Johanna, climbs too. When I was introducing myself to one of her classes last week, I told them that I climbed and so after class she invited me to Innsbruck for the weekend. On Saturday night we went to a rap concert, in German. Then climbed most of the day on Sunday. Johanna and I have a pretty similar climbing ability, but we went with some friends of hers that are really very good climbers. I don't have the European rating system completely figured out yet, but I'm sure they were easily climbing 5.12. I on the other hand, after not climbing most of the summer, I spent a lot of time hanging on the rope. This can bit a bit embarassing, especially with people you don't know, and especially when you are hoping they will invite you to go limbing again. Unfortunatelly there wren't many easier climbs in that area, but it was still fun, and at the end of the day, we found a couple that I could do. So I got in one successful sport lead and one tough, but doable route on top rope. It was a nice end to a hard but super fun day. It was so nice to be outside with other climbers and I think we will proably do it again. Maybe next time Johanna and I will go without the pros so we can actually feel good about ourselves :) Another positive thing was that I learned a lot of new climbing vocabulary, like "Sloper" which is "sloper" in English, or "Hang-dog" which is "hang-dog" in English, one really hard one to remember was, "Boulder" which is "bouldering" in English. There are a few words that overlap, but actually I did learn how to say other things that actually were German words like: Rotepunkt-redpoint, Henker-bolt, mehrereseillaenge-multi-pitch, or sichern-belay. Now you too can show off your awesome climbing vocab auf deutsch.

I have now been to 16 different classes since last Monday and have 9 more to go before I start seeing students for the second time. That means I have repeated my name, hobbies, homeland, and other such important information 16 times (or more, depending on how well the students are listening). I also always get to explain that I am from the Washington that's in the Northwest and not the one where all the cool politicians hang out. Some of the most popular questions that students ask me are: What do you think of Bush? How old are you? (To which I reply, "how old do you think I am?" just for the fun of it) Have you ever met/seen a movie star? and Can you say, "Oerchkatzelschworf"? (not really sure on the spelling) Which is the word for "squirrel tail" in the Tirolian dialect. The first time a class asked me, of course it caught me off guard, but since almost every class asks me if I can say it, I now have lots of practice. Most classes are quite impressed with my ability to say it, especially when they think that I can't speak any German. Today in one class, before they asked me if I could say Oerchkatzelschworf, they asked me if I cold speak any German. I promptly told them that the only thing I knew how to say was Oerchkatzelschworf. They actually laughed quite a bit over that one. I think I have won that class over with my charm and wit.

There was a class the first week that I don't think was so impressed with me. Evidentally they were disappointed because I don't look like an American. Naturally, I was curious what it was that didn't quite match up in their minds. Turns out that I shouldn't be blond and my shoes were a bit strange. I think there was more to it than that, but those were the only details I could get out of them. I did tell them that I dress a bit differently when I am the teacher than when I am hanging out with friends, etc. Oh well, what can I do?

It is pretty cool, because now when I walk down the street I frequently see my students, although usually they recognize me first. Since there are about 300 of them so far, I have trouble remembering their faces much less their names. But they say hi to me and I had a nice conversation with a group of them while we were ordering Donner Kebabs in town. A couple girls also said hi to me and I asked them if we had had class together today. They said no, that they just saw me at the school. I thought it was prety cute that they started talking to me even though they hadn't actually ever met me. We talked for a minute and when I walked away I think I heard one of them say that I was nice (yes!). Hopefully they will still think that when I start giving them homework.

Well, tomorrow I am presenting my first real lesson for the whole period on the U.S. school system, so I need to get to work. I am a bit nervous but excited. I am actually really enjoying my time in the classroom so far and look forward to trying out my lesson planning skills.

Tschuss! (Bye)

Finally the Good Stuff

Oh my glory goodness, finally I have internet access! It's FREE and only a five minute walk from my apartment! As much as I don't want to be dependent on the internet, it is such handy thing. It is so useful for looking up train information, getting in touch with your boss and setting up a time to meet, looking up information about making international phone calls from a pay phone/cell phone/land line or comparing internet service so you can buy it. And now I get to use it to see if I can order a US to European power plug converter since I dropped mine on the floor a few days ago and broke it. Oops.

I actually wrote some a few days after i got here but I think the Word 2003 is a bit too old for my version and or language issues. Anyway, you will hear about my first week as soon as I get a power converter and figure out how to hook up my laptop to the school's internet connection, which may be never. I will show you some pictures of the first week though: This is in Landeck, a 20 or 30 minute walk from my house. Yes that is SNOW in the moutains! And we got more last week too, at lower elevations, although alot of it has melted. Keep it coming!

Laundry! My landlady does my laundry for me since there are no laundromats in Laneck, I just have to hang it up to dry. If I need anything ironed, she'll do that too.

After settling in, getting a cell phone, registering with the authorities, buying food, and all the other important things one must do in the first few days of living in a new country, I finally went and had some real fun. I took this pic, coming down from a hike. The little building is the Ruine Schrofenstein, basically an old, little castle that is still privately owned. You can take a hike up to it though, which is on my list of things to do. There is another castle which you can see in the picture below, at the top of the picture in the middle.

This is Landeck from above, facing south. Do you want to see my house? Ok, there are two tree tops poking up from the bottom of the picture, one is dead. At the very tip top of the live tree there is a row of white houses with grey roofs, 3 or 4 of them. Mine is the 2nd from the right, almost exactly where the tree top points. My 1st school is over to the right probably under the fat branch, a five minute walk from my house. My other school, a buisness and tourism school, is also off to the right but further up and out of the picture, it is about a 25 minute walk, but conveniently right next to the grocery store, and across the river from the rafting company.

This phot is for Kristin, Pam, and Miranda. Pam gave Kristin the delectible bag of granola for her Bachlorette party, but when I was getting ready to head out for my international flight, Kris insisted that I take snacks. Of course I couldn't turn her down, so I thought that the least i could do would be to show them both how much fun the granola and i are having in the Alps.

The waterbottle was a gift from Miranda. Right before I left WA, I went climbing with Miranda and she found out that I did not have one of the new YD Adventures water bottles becasue I was stoked to see the new ones. Now, this may be a bit too much detail for some people (so feel free to skip to the next, hopefully more interesting paragraph), but the new YDA water bottles are Nalgene brand bottles, or simply 'Nalgenes'. The old ones, on the other hand, were just some no-name brand bottle. Most people probably wouldn't care, but any serious outdoor enthusiast knows that Nalgenes are clearly superior to all other water bottles. They last a long time, and even if they don't, they have a lifetime guarantee. So if you decided to throw one against a tree multiple times to prove how strong it was, and it cracked, you could get a new one for free. That was of course just a random, probably untrue, example. Anyway, they are wonderful. So Miranda, having just found out, that I only have the inferior bottle, insists that I take here Nalgene. I insisted back that I didn't need another Nalgene. Which was true, I have 6 or maybe seven Nalgenes of different shapes, sizes, and colors, plus 2 no-name bottles. We bickered about it for a few minutes and then let it drop. When I was several hundred miles away from Miranda, I realized that she had tucked it under some climbing gear in my car. So in honor of her kindness and persistance, and my love of Nalgenes, it is privleged to be in the picture as well.

Now we can move on the orientation week, which took place east of Landeck in the province of Salzburg, in the little vaction town of Saalbach Hinterglem. I learned some good stuff, met a bunch of US and UK teaching assistants, drank lots of Austrian beer, learned a Scottish folk dance, learned to yodel, and attacked on of the teachers with his hand carved pocket knife (well, pretended to anyway).

This is us getting ready to go hiking. Woohoo! Note our friend on the left, who is a student at Oxford university, compared to the two on the right who hang out in the Oregon, all clad in their Carharts and other outdoorsy parafanelia. Just a funny observation.

Ooow! There it is, the knife attack of Hans, in his Leaderhosen. The Austrians also know how to dress for hiking.

Hans and I after we made up.

A bunch of Fulbrighters.

The hike took us up to a little mountain inn, where of course we drank beer,

listened to Hans play the accordian, sang along,

made friends with local sheep, and played the nail game. I have no clue what it is called, but you have to nail your nail into the log, taking one swing per turn, before anyone else gets their nail in. The trick is that you do not use the normal nailing end of the hammer but rather an adze-like skinny end. This game is a challenge whether you have drank any beer or not. it is also good practice for ice climbing.

Katie and I befriending a cow in town.

Once I got back to Landeck, of course more hiking was in order. This trailhead seemed to be about 3 km away though, so I walked along a country road for a while before I got to the next town where the trail started. It was a road with infrequent, but quickly moving vehicles. it was a bit narrow, and had lots of fun curves so that made things a bit interesting.

This is Grins, just a bit west of Landeck, where the hike began. Really cute little town.

And the mountains!!!! I've had my camera for almost two years, and hadn't read the whole book yet to figure out all the rad functions on it. But I brought it with me, hoping I would find the time to do it, and I finally did. I knew that it had a B&W function and accidentally found it once before, but then couldnät find it again. So I was very happy to finally learn a bit more and do some black and white, I love it. It is so classic. Now i jsut need to work on my photo taking abilities.

I think I gained 2 or 3,000 ft of elevation in just short time. I was just getting close to the real mountains before I had to turn around (in order to avoid walking on the road in the dark). Although I ended up taking a 'short-cut' through the woods, and some fields, another town, an orchard or two, and then met a hunter who gave me directions. It was fun. I think.

I get to see these mountains every day. Not always from such a good view point as this though. Alot of that snow is the fresh stuff. Oh yeah!

A beautiful end, although this was taken before my short cut.

Yesterday was mzy first day at school. Everyone have been very nice, I got to go to three classes and introduce myself. One class spent the whole hour asking me questions. Today I went to my second school but didn't have any classes so I wasn't there long, but it also went well. I will spend one week in one school then the next week in the other. I teach twelve classes per week and will mostly be in the same ones each week. I will be working with students between 14 and 19. I found out one of the other teachers rock climbs, so we are going to try and climb this weekend. Woo Hoo! I'm so stoked because I was having trouble finding information on climbing and meeting climbers.

The last week of October there is no school at all because of a national holiday and then All Saints Day. They celebrate all of the Catholic holidays, or at least get school off for them. I am definately going to try and travel. I'm not completely sure but probably to Graz in the south where my Austrian friends are. I'm also going to meet up with a friend from my first summer at YDA who has been in Romania working for an adventure ministry and is now travelling with her brother for a few weeks.

Well I guess that's all for now, I'm going to go eat some Munich style white sausage with delicious sweet mustard (I have never enjoyed mustard so much), and tortalini. I know it is a bit of a strange conglomeration, but it's good.