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.
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