Another Monday
It was another Monday, all right, with its own ups and downs. German was especially funny today: we played a little game at the end of class, and the games Birgit comes up with are always a hoot. Here's how it worked: the class was divided up into two groups, and each group had to collectively come up with 8 funny infirmities, maladies, or bad situations (in German, of course). After both groups had come up with eight things, the groups took turns saying one of their problems and asking the other group for advice. The people in the other group then had to yell out (in German) as many pieces of advice as they could, funny or serious, and for each viable piece of advice their group received one point. Here's an example: one of our group's problems was "I made a face and it got stuck like that. What should I do?" The people in the other group came up with only two pieces of advice, I think...."get plastic surgery!" and "kill yourself!" so they received two points. The other group ended up winning, but our group came up with better problems, I think. We had crabs, purple hair, someone stole our nose, we even had premature ejaculation. (Birgit hat uns ein sehr lustiges Phrase gesagt.....sich (o. dir, Dativ!) einen runterholen)
After German my friend Gretel invited me to go have coffee, so we went to this little café right across the street from school on Johannesgasse. It was called Rühmann, or something....I can't remember.....The coffee was really really good (and inexpensive...only €2.20 for Melange, which is cappuccino and cream). Traditionally coffee is served with sugar, a glass of tap water (since coffee dehydrates you) and sometimes little macaroons or cookies or something. This place served delicious coconut-chocolate macaroon things which were out of this world....also, we had a table next to a slightly open window that looked out onto Johannesgasse, so we amused ourselves by calling out to passing IES students from the window who, due to the acoustics of the narrow street, could hear us perfectly but could not see us very well.....it was amazing to see the looks on people's faces as their names are called out, seemingly from the heavens, with no immediate explanation. We had tons of fun.
After the café I returned to the center and did the reading for Music History. AA&A was OK....if not a bit more boring than usual. My mind was really wandering during Music History.....I spent the time doodling and eventually inventing a cipher that evolved into a form of IPA, but with simpler characters that are easily combined for diphthongs, consonant combinations, etc. (yes, I was that bored....) After class I was going to go to see Schwannsee at the Staatsoper, but I was so tired (probably the lull from the coffee) that I couldn't bring myself to stand in line for two hours to see a three-hour ballet that I could wait until November to see anyway, so instead I decided to go straight home but vowed to put my time to good use to make up for not going to the ballet. I stopped at Billa to pick up soy sauce and soda, but since Pepsi Lite was on sale I just bought a six pack of 1.5 liter bottles @ €.59/bottle, which comes down to €.40 a liter, which is cheaper even than Merkur! (and that comes out to about $.45, which is a good price even for the States!) In any case, since I only had a €5 bill with me I couldn't get soy sauce too, but that's OK.
I went home and Cabot, Mike, and Nick were fixing dinner, which was delicious: chicken stir-fry and delicious fried basmati rice.....oh it was so good! The only real downer of today (which was a big one) was that our friends in the apartment upstairs were robbed. It was a serious affair, too....it probably involved at least three people. First, they seemed to know exactly when to do it....for one thing, all of them were in school, and the retired couple next door to them (who are always at home) happened to be on vacation this week. And why the 4th floor apartment? Why not ours or the one below us? Anyway, the managed to pry the lock open by breaking the plate off and doing something....I couldn't quite tell....anyway they went in and rummaged through everything and took only the good stuff: the two laptops, everyone's cameras, Naomi's cell phone, Natalie's one expensive bracelet, Natalie's passport (no one else's, though) and some other things which I can't remember. It ended up being about $10,000 worth of stuff. Not only that, but one of them took a bowel movement in their bathroom and left it there.....the whole thing was completely traumatizing to them, and really to everyone, because it could have been any of us. From now on, I think everyone will be more careful about deadbolting their doors and making sure the front door on the ground floor is closed and locked.
So, other than that, it was a good day! I talked to the 'rents, which was great! It always makes my day to hear from people back home....it reminds me that I actually have a home, and am not merely a stranger in a strange land. All right, now I'm off to bed!
After German my friend Gretel invited me to go have coffee, so we went to this little café right across the street from school on Johannesgasse. It was called Rühmann, or something....I can't remember.....The coffee was really really good (and inexpensive...only €2.20 for Melange, which is cappuccino and cream). Traditionally coffee is served with sugar, a glass of tap water (since coffee dehydrates you) and sometimes little macaroons or cookies or something. This place served delicious coconut-chocolate macaroon things which were out of this world....also, we had a table next to a slightly open window that looked out onto Johannesgasse, so we amused ourselves by calling out to passing IES students from the window who, due to the acoustics of the narrow street, could hear us perfectly but could not see us very well.....it was amazing to see the looks on people's faces as their names are called out, seemingly from the heavens, with no immediate explanation. We had tons of fun.
After the café I returned to the center and did the reading for Music History. AA&A was OK....if not a bit more boring than usual. My mind was really wandering during Music History.....I spent the time doodling and eventually inventing a cipher that evolved into a form of IPA, but with simpler characters that are easily combined for diphthongs, consonant combinations, etc. (yes, I was that bored....) After class I was going to go to see Schwannsee at the Staatsoper, but I was so tired (probably the lull from the coffee) that I couldn't bring myself to stand in line for two hours to see a three-hour ballet that I could wait until November to see anyway, so instead I decided to go straight home but vowed to put my time to good use to make up for not going to the ballet. I stopped at Billa to pick up soy sauce and soda, but since Pepsi Lite was on sale I just bought a six pack of 1.5 liter bottles @ €.59/bottle, which comes down to €.40 a liter, which is cheaper even than Merkur! (and that comes out to about $.45, which is a good price even for the States!) In any case, since I only had a €5 bill with me I couldn't get soy sauce too, but that's OK.
I went home and Cabot, Mike, and Nick were fixing dinner, which was delicious: chicken stir-fry and delicious fried basmati rice.....oh it was so good! The only real downer of today (which was a big one) was that our friends in the apartment upstairs were robbed. It was a serious affair, too....it probably involved at least three people. First, they seemed to know exactly when to do it....for one thing, all of them were in school, and the retired couple next door to them (who are always at home) happened to be on vacation this week. And why the 4th floor apartment? Why not ours or the one below us? Anyway, the managed to pry the lock open by breaking the plate off and doing something....I couldn't quite tell....anyway they went in and rummaged through everything and took only the good stuff: the two laptops, everyone's cameras, Naomi's cell phone, Natalie's one expensive bracelet, Natalie's passport (no one else's, though) and some other things which I can't remember. It ended up being about $10,000 worth of stuff. Not only that, but one of them took a bowel movement in their bathroom and left it there.....the whole thing was completely traumatizing to them, and really to everyone, because it could have been any of us. From now on, I think everyone will be more careful about deadbolting their doors and making sure the front door on the ground floor is closed and locked.
So, other than that, it was a good day! I talked to the 'rents, which was great! It always makes my day to hear from people back home....it reminds me that I actually have a home, and am not merely a stranger in a strange land. All right, now I'm off to bed!
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