Second Day of Classes

So, the second day was interesting. Today and for the next three weeks we're in German Intensive mode, as it were, meaning that actual classes haven't started yet, but everyone has a 2.75 hour german class either in the morning or afternoon. I have class from 9.00 - 11.45, und nachdem habe ich Freizeit. For the first week or so there are little orientations or tours that we have after class....yesterday's walking tour of the inner city (informative, but I don't remember much of it off the top of my head) and today we had a guided tour of the art museum lead by the art history professor. (I hope that I can take her class, Art & Architecture in Vienna, but I hear it fills up fast) The museum was absolutely breathtaking....it's this HUGE neo-classical building built in the 1860s when the Ringstrasse was first built to house the permanent imperial collection, so there's an egyptian wing, a medieval wing, and a lot of paintings from the 15th century through the 18th century. Lots of Titian, not much Raphael (but some great ones), and a lot of really cool Flemish art. We walked around the museum and had really cool dialogues about different pieces and how they work compositionally, and what their significance was at the time they were painted and at the time they were collected. I stayed on after the tour and walked around the museum some more...I took some photographs, although they didn't come out terribly well.

The funniest thing happened to me after I left the museum. As I walked down the Ringstrasse to get to the Karlsplatz U-bahn hub (from which I take the U4 one stop to Kettenbrückengasse and walk three blocks to my apartment) I saw a couple of Japanese tourists. They looked really lost, and upon seeing me, immediately asked for help in slow, strained English. Verifying that they were Japanese by looking at the guidebook they were holding I asked (in Japanese) if they were Japanese. They said yes, and I tried to explain to them in half-english, half-japanese, and three German words how to get to the Mariahilferstrasse. (luckily they needed to go to place which I recognized, having taken the Mariahilferstrasse from the Westbahnhof to my apartment my first day back from Murau) After they figured it out they thanked me and asked me where I was from, and we chatted a bit. It was fun! And I haven't forgotten that much Japanese, which is good, I guess! Anyway I walked to the subway terminal where I saw my friend Laila (it's pronounced differently than Leila), so we stopped and had a bite to eat at the Anker in the terminal. Anker is sort of a bakery/fast cheap carb-loaded food/coffee kind of place. Someone called it the Dunkin' Donuts of Vienna, but I think that's a bit oversimplified. For one thing, you can buy real bread there for your own needs, so it is really like a bakery, but they do have a lot of little sandwiches and donuts and stuff. Anywho, after I got off the subway I went to a little asian market and got some sticky rice. My roommates are currently cooking some stir-fry for dinner.....one of these days I have to figure out what I'm going to cook for them....perhaps sushi? I have made sushi, and I can buy all the stuff I need, I think, but perhaps I should re-acquaint myself with the procedure somehow....oh well. I'll worry about that later.

Speaking of my roommates, they're really cool. I share my room with Nick, a classical guitar player from New Hampshire. In the small room on the right is John (goes by JB) and Brad. JB is the guy who invited me to live with the group, he's also a musician. He reminds me a lot of Clayton....it's more than just the midwestern thing, it's the way of talking and socializing....but he doesn't have any of the strange or in-your-face qualities that Clayton does....he's moer straight-laced midwestern....he's really nice. Brad is a really good trombone player (he's working on the Berio sequenza for his junior recital! how cool is that?!) who's allergic to EVERYTHING. In the big room on the right is Cabot, a Tuba player, and Mike, a trombone player who goes to Northwestern. He's not the Mike I mentioned before, the one that I went shopping with....although they both go to Northwestern....freaky! But they're very different.....for one thing, my friend Mike is very gay, but roommate Mike is not. Speaking of which, I'm not sure that my roommates know that I'm gay.....I can't tell. I think they know on some level, but it hasn't really come up. Consequently I'm having a sort of double abroad experience...I'm experiencing both Viennese culture and the culture of 6 striaght college boys sharing an apartment....(well, actually, 5 straight boys........) My friends think that I should not immediately disavow them of their notion and see how long I can play it out. Frankly I'm not sure which is best, but I'm just being myself and they'll just assume whatever they want.

All right, I think dinner is ready, so I must dash. In case some of you are wondering my I haven't called when I said I would, it's because we don't have a phone in our apartment yet (we're getting it tomorrow) and whenever I'm out and around payphones it's way too early/late to call the states or I'm just plain busy. Hopefully tomorrow or the next day I'll be able to make/receive calls....I'll post my phone number as soon as I find out what it is. I miss everything and everyone, but I am also having an amazing time here. Write to me and tell me how you're doing! I love hearing about things!

Tschüß!

A Little Catching-Up to Do

So, here I am in my apartment in Vienna! It's so exciting!! I'm in the big bedroom sitting on the window seat, letting the cool breeze wash over me. So, here's the update:

I had to check out of the hostel at 10:00, so I headed directly to the Westbahnhof, and waited around there until 2:40, talking to other students, socializing, etc. I met a few really cool people, including some with whom I still hang out. At 2:40 we left the train station for Murau. After 3.5 hours in the bus, we arrived.

We spent 3 days in Murau, which is a small town in the Styrian province of Austria, which is southwest of Vienna. The town was gorgeous and ridiculously cute, and the main business in the town is the Murauer Brewery. I tried a bit of the beer after the free tour of the brewery which IES sponsored....it was pretty good. Anywho, it's also a skiing place, but not so much when there's no snow. We stayed in the Jugend & Familiengästehäuse (say THAT 3x fast) which is a recently renovated hostel. It was really nice, the rooms where beautiful, and the food was decent. (and free!) All in all, it was really great. The first night we had a general orientation/introduction, and I went to bed pretty early. The next morning, I woke up really early and went on an hour-long stroll around the city. It was fantastic....I must have taken about 50 pictures, which as I said, I will upload as soon as I can.

The next three days were spotted with orientations and lectures and little excursions, most of which are too mundane to go into detail. I was invited by one of my roommates in Murau to live with him and some other musicians, and since he's a nice guy and he had room draw number 7, I agreed. I rushed to the housing interview from my German oral exam, and we chose an apartment on Dürergasse, in the 6th district. (or die sechste Bezirk, a new word that I learned today!) Anyway, we headed back to Vienna the next day, and after picking up our luggage at the Westbahnhof, my roommates and I opted to walk to our apartment. (it was only a couple of miles, but with all that luggage it was a real bitch) We met our landlady, Frau Hinteregger, and her daughter Johanna. She showed us up to our rooms, and a nice man (boyfriend/brother or something) brought all our luggage up. Our apartment is absolutely amazing!! It was just renovated (they finished the day before we arrived) and everything is brand new, the furniture, the appliances, the paint job, all the kitchen suppllies...everything. It's seriously like living in an Ikea catalouge!! (most if not all the stuff is from Ikea, or Ee-ke-ah as they pronounce it here.... they have two, one of which is in the South City Süd, which happens to be the largest mall in Europe, but is kinda far away) But I digress..... The apartment is on the second floor (third floor if you're counting American style) and four of the other 6-person apartments in the building are inhabited by IES students. There are three bedrooms in the apartment, a foyet, 1.3 bathrooms, and a huge kitchen/dining area. I took some pics of the place, which I will also eventually upload.

I've done a lot of exploring of the area surrounding my apartment and the city center. I live near the Naschmarkt, which is an open-air farmer's market type dealie, and there's tons of other little shops around, which has made shopping for food quite fun. There's 3 asian restaurants and two asian markets just on the way to the bankomat, and I look forward to exploring them more. My friend Mike and I went grocery shopping at Hofer, which is a really, really cheap grocery, albeit with limited selection. I picked up spaghetti, sauce, grapes, orange juice, sparkly apple juice, mineral water, a 2.2 kg sack of potatoes, toastbrot, sour cherry marmalade, and three types of candy for €9.98. Unfortunately, we forgot that you don't automatically get plastic bags, so I went around again and picked up some Haribo and 4 plastic bags so that we could take our stuff home. And, of course, as soon as I walked out the door with my shoulder bag and two overflowing plastic bags, it started raining. Luckily it was less than an 8 minute walk from my apartment.

As I said, I live in the 6th district, which is southwest of the city center. The city center (the 1st district) is surrounded by the Ringstrasse, which lies where the wall around the old city used to be. IES is in the first district, in a palace called Palais Corbelli. It's literally three minutes away from the big cathedral, which for most intents and purposes is the center of the city. Outside the Ringstrasse are the next 8 districts, which circle the ring in counterclockwise order. These inner nine districts are encircled by the Gürtel (belt) and outside them lie districts 10-23. The Westbahnhof is on the western side of the Gürtel, and (in case you are looking at a map) our apartment lies a couple blocks off Mariahilferstrasse, which we used to walk from the Westbahnhof. As I said, I've been exploring a lot, gathering the local art, architecture, sights, smells, sounds, and tastes of the city. It's been great. In a few days I'll know the makeup of the city, and I'll be able to really get around without getting hopelessly lost. I've been using the U-bahn (short for Untergrundbahn; the subway) a bit to get the hang of it...it's really nice. It's very fast, clean, and safe, but it is a bit expensive. I'll probably end up getting a monthly pass for €45, because the other options are a one-way (€1.50) a three-day (€12) and an eight-day nonconsecutive pass (I can't remember how much that is). There's some other ones, but they're slipping my mind at the moment. It's only one subway stop to the institute, and so far I've just been walking since it only takes 20 minutes, but I won't be keeping THAT up. ^_^ All right, I think that's all I have to say at the moment. Next time I'll talk about the academic portion of my experience (at least what's happened so far) so stay tuned! ^_^

Hey everyone! I'm still at orientation in Murau. It's such a beautiful city, very cold though. I just went through the housing interview...one of my roommates from orientation here invited me to live with him and a bunch of other musicians, so I jumped at the opportunity. (especially since his number was way better than mine.) We are living at Dürergasse 18-9 1060 Wien, which is one subway stop (or a nice walk) away from the institute and another subway stop (in the other direction) from practice rooms we can use. Tomorrow we leave Murau and go back to move into our apartments in Vienna. It's so amayingly beautiful here. My friend Kate and I spent all day yesterday walking around town and taking pictures...as soon as I get to the institute I will upload them all so you can see. Yesterday evening we were entertained with a show of traditional Styrian dancing. (Styria is the province Murau is in) It was interesting....7 dancing guys and one playing the accordian, and all in liederhosen....also one of the dancing guys occasionally played the clarinet, but it was tuned about 45 cents lower then the accordian, so the overall effect was rather frustrating.

I#ve met a bunch of great people here....I'm really excited about starting the semester. For the first three weeks after we return to Vienna, we have half-day intensive German classes and the rest is free time. I have o stop now since I'm running out of time on this dinky computer, but I will update my blog soon with the journal entries I've been writing here in Murau.

Here in the Hostel

So....the traveling was interesting. Flying Virgin Atlantic was HELLA fun, what with the on-demand TV and movies, good food, and comfortable seats. Not only that, but you get that little pouch of free cheap shit...I think it had headphones, a pen, a towelette, one of those eye cover thingies, and something else....I don't remember. I watched Will & Grace, Friends, and I watched (for the first time) Shrek 2, Mean Girls, and Big Fish. Shrek 2 was.....eh. It was OK, I guess. Mean Girls was a really good movie, especially for a teen comedy/drama/moral thing. I really enjoyed the premise, and all the characters are over-the-top, but still completely believable. Big Fish was also really good, but unfortunately it was kind of a downer for the last thing that I watched. I mean, it wasn't depressing per se, but I was definitely crying at the end.

Heathrow was....frustrating. We had to wait inside the plane 'cause they did that shitty thing where the plane parks in Timbuktu and they ship 40 people off the plane to the terminal at a time. Anyway, when I finally got to the terminal, I walked for about 15 minutes and then I realized I had gone to the wrong place, so I had to backtrack and then go back again. GRRR. The line to go through security moved so freakin' fast though.....Jesus. The line contained maybe 75 people and I was through in 15 minutes. Then I had to wait in limbo (a.k.a. the Terminal 2 lounge) and watch a monitor which would eventually tell me which gate my flight would be in. Austrian Air was fantabulous. Simple, but fantabulous. Both of the two stewards were really cute, and they served this little schnitzel snack was really cool. I sat next to the REALLy talkative Sri Lankan guy who seemed to think it was necessary to comment on everything I did. (or didn't do) For instance, when I ordered Coke with my meal, he said "don't you want wine?" and I was like "well, I don't drink" and he was like "oh".....then he commented on the fact that I asked for no ice. Then after I ate everything on my plate except my tomato and did not order tea or coffee, he said "you eat and drink very little. Are you watching your weight?" I didn't really know what to say to that...I think I gave some noncommittal response, like "um...no........."

So now I'm here at the hostel, which I managed to find despite the conflicting sets of directions. It's a nice hostel....12 beds in a room with a nice bathroom and lockers next to each bed. My suitcase is an inch short of fitting into the locker, so I have to figure out some other way to secure my stuff. Well, there's more than enough room for all the stuff that I actually can't afford to be stolen. It also looks like there are only two other people in my room, and they both look trustworthy. One is a really cute guy from Germany who is simultaneously sort of jaded towards me and also really nice. (he kept talking to me in German....did he think that I could somehow? He figured out pretty quick that I couldn't, asked me where I was from, and commenced talking to me in English.) Every time he leaves, he tells me where he's going. It's kind of funny. He was obviously taken aback by all of my luggage, since it looks like he's just backpacking it.

All right, I'm going to try and find a phone and call home! We'll see when I can actually post this to the internet!

And now, an actual blog

All right, so here's an actual blog.

I'm scared. Scared to death. There are so many unknowns and I don't know how to handle them all. I'm just so used to having a modicum of control, or at least being able to pretend that I do. Now as I watch all my stuff (my life, really) being packed away into those increasingly heavy suitcases, the sense of foreboding and anxiety increases. As exciting and thrilling as I know the experience will be, this phase of the journey is pretty hard. I've been close to tears all day. I listened to the Minkowski recording of "Since By Man Came Death" from the Messiah on my way to Kelsey's and I just started bawling. It was awful and, in retrospect, a bit maudlin. It's Margaret I weep for, right?

All my clothes are packed, at least the ones that survived the cut. Choosing the books was hard, since I know that they'll provide me with much-needed comfort and I wanted to bring way more than I had room for. (especially since I'm trying to leave room for stuff I'll bring back...) Even if I don't read them, nothing beats a familiar book on my shelf to let me know I'm at home. Of course I have all my DVDs, and all my music is on my iPod, and my laptop is full of fanciful diversions, but hopefully I will not coop myself up with things that are reassuring and familiar. This will be the time to take some risks.... not physical, mind you, but cultural and spiritual. I have my trinkets from home, the frog from Gail (thank you), and all my photos

I just had another wave of fear. They pass through me occasionally and my mind goes blank. The Bene Gesserit were right: fear is the mind killer. It's been a long time since I've felt fear like this. It's funny, I fear everything and nothing. I'm not afraid that the plane will crash or anything like that...I simply fear what I do not know. For one thing, I have no idea what I'll be doing after 2:40 p.m. on Thursday. I know I'll be on a bus to Murau for the three-day orientation, but who knows what kind of things that will entail? What kind of people will I be meeting? Will I have free time? Too much free time? Will I be so worried about everything that I won't have fun? (Will I worry that I'm going to worry about my worrying?!?!??!!?) AHHH!

**deep breath** But you don't want to hear about all this, gentle reader. Let me relax and tell you what I DO know: I arrive at Heathrow at 11:45 a.m., and I have a 2.5 hour layover. Then I leave for Vienna, where I arrive at 5:30 p.m. local time. From the airport I take public transit to the Westend City Hostel, which is near the Westbahnhof. I'll stay the night there and then meet up with the rest of the students at 2:00 p.m. at the Westbahnhof, and we'll leave from there to go to Murau. From then on I'll be in their ward, and during orientation I'll register for classes and figure out who I want to live with and where I'll be living. I think that we'll also have instruction in survival German, and learn about the culture and stuff.

I hope to have enough free time/money to take trips to nearby countries, like Germany, Italy, the Czech Republic, and who knows, maybe even Romania! (I'd like....1 MILLION lei.........ha ha ha ha) Wouldn't that be nifty? We'll see. It's all so exciting, but so SCARY!

All right, I should probably go to bed now. The next time I post will be from across the pond! Toodles!

This is a test.

This is a test of the emergency blogging system.

In the event of an actual blog, you would receive information about my whereabouts/misadventures/antics/interests/stressors/cultural highlights of England in the 14th century.

This has been a test of the emergency blogging system.

In the beginning....

there was excitement, angst, happiness, and stress. And Robert saw that it was blog.