Spring skiing rocks my world

I have been slacking the past few weeks when it comes to contributing to my blog. There is a lot going on right now and being in my final days makes me want to maximize the time I have here. This is a double ended sword for me because it means I keep putting off updating my blog but at the same time, I am adding more things to the list of what to write about in my blog. It is a definite lose-lose situation for me. I am going to stop procrastinating and catch up a little bit before it all becomes too overwhelming.

Easter : April 10 – 13

I was unable to recruit any keeners to join me on my Easter adventure, so once again it was a solo mission. I have come to realize that I really do not mind going places by myself but I do feel rather lonely when it comes to eating dinner. It does not faze me to eat breakfast or lunch alone, but there is something about going to a restaurant and eating dinner alone, it is never the highlight of my trips.

I decided that I wanted to go skiing for one last time, to really justify the fact that I dragged all of my ski stuff to Vienna. The hardest part of the whole decision process was determining where I actually wanted to go. Austria offers a wealth of ski areas, all which have been dumped on by snow this season. I decided to head to the town of Zell am See in the Salzburg region. It was a 6 hour journey by train into the Austria Alps. I arrived at night so I was not able to take in my surroundings immediately. From what the maps told me, Zell am See was not a very big town, and had I arrived during light hours, I most definitely could have found my way to my hotel. It was 11:15 p.m., I was tired and I had my skiing wardrobe with me, so I opted for a cab, which took me around the corner from the train station. The best €6 I have spent thus far…

The hotel I stayed at was a really nice, small hotel in the middle of their ‘pedestrian village’. I knew that I had come to ski so I wanted to maximize the time I spent on the ski slopes and not inside any bars… Plus, being alone somewhat deters me from going bar-hopping, not my idea of a good time. On Saturday morning, my first day in Zell am See, I opened the curtains of my room and was immediately confident that I had made a good choice to come here. I was surrounding by Alps and glaciers, I don’t think the smile left my face the entire weekend.

Kitzsteinhorn

The town offers a free ski bus to anyone who looks like they are heading out to ski. Because it was such a beautiful day on Saturday, I made the decision to head to the glacier that was in the area, just in case the weather took a turn for the worse the next 2 days. I eventually boarded the right bus and was whisked away to the glacier, Kitzsteinhorn, in the little town of Kaprun. It is not possible to ski the entire mountain, so they have these panoramic gondolas that bring people to the middle of the mountain (Basically where heaven starts). As I stepped off the gondola I could hardly contain myself, and I wasn’t even at the top of the mountain yet. What I hadn’t realized until then was that Kitzsteinhorn is a sea of snow, with no trees, I guess that is only to be assumed for a 3,202m high mountain. I was literally going to be skiing a glacier for the day, and never had to worry about remotely skiing close to a tree. I don’t think I have a vast enough vocabulary to explain the view from the top of the mountain. I also was not able to pick my jaw off the ground to make an attempt at describing it. I was literally looking out into a sea of jagged mountains, all part of a national park. The whole day was a fantastic adventure, but with a few too many t-bars. After skiing a powerful run, the last thing I wanted to do was keep my balance and continue supporting my weight while sitting on a t-bar. My boots have never hurt me before, and I have always been very comfortable in them. I am not sure if it was the temperature (+25°C at the base) or the altitude but both my boots left huge bruises on my ankles, which made walking in ski boots a little painful, but as soon as I stepped onto my skis, I could have cared less about the pain. By the end of the afternoon I was starting to become a little bit too cocky, which resulted in my almost taking out a few skiers going up the t-bar. I took a few more runs and thought it would be best to cut my losses and head back to the hotel. I really did not want to see how effective my insurance was. Later that night my entire body was in pain. There was even an indescribable pain in my elbows. I think my eyes closed around 9:30 and did not open again until the next morning. I was able to speak to Jodi though, as it was her big 21st birthday… All grown up.

Schmittenhöhe

The next two days I stayed in Zell am See and took advantage of Schmittenhöhe, the smaller, 2,202m, mountain. Since it was the middle of April, snow was beginning to be a little sparse at the bottom of the mountain. I guess that a month of +20°C weather makes it hard for snow to stick around. From the top of Schmitten I could see where I had skied the previous day, and it was absolutely beautiful. Schmitten was still mostly below the tree line so there were actual trails to ski. I was at the mountain before the lifts opened, both days, so I was able to benefit from corduroy trials for a few hours in the mornings. I could not begin to attempt to describe the skiing or scenery. Both were phenomenal and I can only be thankful that the weather stayed fantastic and I walked off the ski hills all 3 days with no broken bones and fully intact.

Spring skiing rocks my world.

Hallstatt : April 17 – 19

This Wednesday, Hannah’s boyfriend is coming home from his semester in Iceland, and on Friday, Conor arrives for 3 weeks. Before the boys arrive and cramp our style (…) Hannah and I wanted to have one last girl weekend.

I had received a magazine when I signed up for SWAP and I remember sitting in Statistics class in October looking at the cover and vowing to visit the little lake-side town. The only problem was that there was no indication of where this place was in Austria. A few weeks ago I showed it to Hannah and said, ‘Can we go there?’ Hannah did not know where my little fantasy town was. One of her friends was over and saw the magazine on our coffee table and said she had been there and that is was absolutely beautiful. She even had the phone number of the hotel she stayed at in her cell phone. It was destiny that we went to this little town named Hallstatt.

Time wise, last weekend was the perfect weekend for us to go. We left work a little early on Friday in order to catch our train and arrived in Hallstatt 5 hours later in the middle of a gentle spring rain. It was the kind of rain that makes the grass look really green and seems to heighten the sense of smell. We were a little skeptical because we could see the town from the train, but it appeared to be on the other side of the lake. We discovered that there was in fact a ferry service that brought us across the lake to this picturesque town. I cannot begin to describe this 900 resident town that is squeezed between cliffs and the lake. You would not believe that this town exists, it is so perfect. Take a look at the newly posted pictures to see what I mean…

After a lengthy 15 minute walk from one end of the town to the other, we found our hotel. We checked in and then headed to the hotel restaurant for dinner. The owner of the hotel warned us that there was a big group coming in and that there would be music. We thought it would be great to have some music to shake this little town up. We heard some kind of music approaching the hotel, but I shrugged it off and convinced Hannah that it was coming from the speakers… Except that there were no speakers in the restaurant. Then, the owner let us know that this was not just any ordinary group coming, but a bachelor party. Hannah and I exchanged looks as if we both thinking the same thing. Our night was shaping up to consist of music, a group of men relatively close to our ages, and free drinks all night. A strange thing happened after this. It sounded as though a parade was heading down the small streets of Hallstatt.

The bachelor party that was bringing the music turned out to be the local marching band featuring everyone from the oldest member of the community to the young teenagers. We were a little confused. This is apparently the idea of a good time for bachelors of Hallstatt. For 3 hours Hannah and I were subjected to marching band music and old men gawking at us because we were the ‘new girls in town’. It was an interesting night to say the least.

We had hoped to visit the salt mines and/or the ice caves over the weekend. We then learned that everything opens next weekend. Instead of taking the cable car to where the salt mines are, we killed some time by hiking the mountain and in the afternoon we took a little boat ride around the picturesque lake. The only real way to describe the whole weekend is through pictures. (There is now a link on my blog right to my albums.)

It was definitely a perfect way for me and Hannah to spend our last weekend together, before we have to ‘break-up’ as we like to say. I think we are both secretly okay with breaking up, because it means our boys will be arriving.

Friday, April 24.

Conor arrives at 8:30 a.m. this Friday. I can honestly not believe it. I remember writing it in my calendar at work and having to count the number of weeks, and I am now counting the number of days. I don’t know where time goes. We are heading to Innsbruck Friday afternoon, and then embark on a whirlwind week of evening activities. I am taking Conor to the ballet performance of Romeo and Juliet; I am trying to rub some of my new culture off onto him.

My bank account proves how much travelling I have done, and I am perfectly fine with that. Thinking back on these last months, there is nothing I would have done differently. When I fly home on the 15th I will have seen all of the Austrian regions (excluding Vorarlberg) and experienced the Austrian way of life, plus Berlin, Italy, Bratislava and Prague.

Although Vienna is a beautiful city, it in no way encompasses the majestic beauty and generosity that the rest of Austria offers. Like any major city, people live in their own world and it does not reflect the actual way of life of the everyday Austrian.

I can be nothing but grateful for the past four months. I feel that it has been a test of character for me, and has shown me who my real friends are, and those whose friendship with me is out of convenience. It is stark reality check, but I am glad that I have been able to experience it. I guess everyone eventually comes to terms with the realization that friendships change, but it is still difficult to wrap my head around it. For the messages that I did receive, thank you. You have no idea how nice it was to know someone was thinking about me. I am ready though to come home and end the virtual family I have had for four months.

Work

I am entering my last 2 weeks of work. It is hard to believe that 14 weeks ago I stood in this building with so much anxiety and skepticism. I will always remember the colleagues who guided me and took the time to talk to me; I don’t think they realize how much of a help and support they were. My final project is to summarize and finalize my proposed concept for the youth program. The workshop I hosted was fantastic, and I was able to collect concrete and valuable data to contribute to my proposed ambassador program. When I leave next week, I can only hope that the work I contributed may help the youth program re-gain some momentum.

Summer time and the livin's easy...

It was 25 degrees today and 22 degrees yesterday. I NOW love Vienna. It is such a sudden change from a few weeks ago that I seem to forget the gloomy days and weeks of no sun. The flowers are blooming and buds are turning into leaves on trees. The city is coming alive, and I am practically leaving. Very strategic planning on my part! The past weekend was full of a flurry of activity...

Bratislava, Slovakia

A few months ago it was decided that a group of us were going to head into Bratislava the weekend before Hannah's birthday. To my satisfaction, it actually happened! On Saturday, 4 of us were going to take a boat from Vienna to Bratislava and enjoy the landscape of the Danube. The morning was beautiful, 22 degrees, and we were all looking forward to a boat ride to soak up some sun and feel the breeze in our hair... Our dreams were crushed when we were told that the boats gear box was broken and there would, in fact, be no boat going to Bratislava- we had to take a train. Once that fiasco was settled, we met up with one of our friends who was already in Bratislava, and had been anticipating our arrival via boat. We arrived at 3:30 and took a little walk around the town (city?). We walked up to the castle in Bratislava, which is actually featured on the Slovakian flag. Honestly, if this castle is the most exciting thing in Slovakia and is deemed important enough to be featured on their flag, than I have no hope for the rest of the country (Not that a maple leaf is riveting...). The castle was rather boring and ugly. Of course, there was scaffolding covering the ENTIRE thing, so that made it even less appealing. We spent most of our time at the castle looking at the view of the landscape surrounding Bratislava. It is cool to look out onto a never-ending field of those HUGE windmills that cover Europe. One of the guys I was with, Nigel, knows everything about Bratislava so we found out a lot about everything. Back in town, we decided to experience something incredibly Slovakian- the beer. We did have some time to kill before we met up with the rest of the group, so what better past time? The one thing we quickly realized about waiters in Bratislava was how miserable they all were - making them very un-likeable.

Nigel loves the Danube, so we all walked along the bridge to kill some time and were able to catch the remainder of the sunset over the hills, casting variations of pink across the sky and making Bratislava look a little bit nicer. We met up with Hannah and Jody when they arrived and headed to a restaurant for Hannah's birthday dinner. We caught the 11:50 train back to Vienna. There is not much to see or do in Bratislava, so an afternoon trip was plenty of time. It was a nice city, but I can't say that I feel compelled to return and see it all again.

Burgenland

A couple of nights ago I told Hannah my Sunday plans, which were to visit Burgenland, the last region in Austria I needed to visit in order to accomplish my dream of seeing all of them (without counting Vorarlberg). Coincidently, Peter's (Hannah's boyfriend) parents live just outside Eisenstadt, the capitol of Burgenland. Hannah rang them up and they invited us to lunch on Sunday with a whole itinerary for the afternoon. We caught the train this morning and arrived in a little town. The journey was breath taking, we passed through vineyard after vineyard. Peter's dad picked us up and brought us to their house, where we were fed really good Schnitzel and Burgenland wine. It was such a nice day that Hannah and I laid out on their back deck for a little bit, just looking out over fields and the occasional bike riders. I am pretty sure I drifted off for a little bit, you know, while laying out in 25 degree sunshine wearing shorts and a t-shirt at the beginning of April. C'est la vie.

Peter's parent acted as my tour guide and brought us into Eisenstadt (pretty much one street to look at) and then to Neusiedl am See, a town right on the edge of the Neusiedl am See (the lake). It is a huge sailing town and actually hosted the 2006 Sailing World Championships. The lake is not very deep and they were concerned that the water level might not even be deep enough for a sail boat to sail, let alone turtle. However, this year has provided the lake with the most water in 129 years. After a few drinks by the water we were taken to the bahnhof and headed back to Vienna.

It was an absolute perfect weekend, and I could not have asked for more. Work is ending in a very scary 4 weeks, which means Conor arrives in (now) less than 3 weeks, absolutely insane. I decided to make notes about news headlines in Austria since I have been here. The best one so far, "Vienna saw wettest March for 109 years". FANTASTIC! So glad I lived through that, makes this whole trip worthwhile.

Next weekend is the big ski weekend, I am heading to Zell am See for Easter. Apparently the mountains still have around 4 meters of snow, so I hope the snow will stay even with all this fantastic weather.

Completely off topic --

Of all the personal growth I have made while living in Vienna, the thing I am MOST proud of is.....

The fact I have kicked my nail biting habit! I have girl nails now. Finally. It is weird, but I am genuinely proud of myself... I think a proper manicure is needed now to reward myself :)

Falling in Love

I finally had a travel companion for this trip! My new travel buddy, Steph, decided she wanted to see a little more Austria, so she decided to join me. It was nice to have some company, and I think it gave the parents and boyfriend some peace of mind.

Upper Austria

Adding to the growing number of regions I have visited in Austria, we left for Linz on Saturday morning. Linz is the 2009 Cultural Capital of Europe, so we knew that we were going to be visiting some museums and anticipated a culture shock. We arrived and hopped on a bus that took us to the youth hostel. When we arrived, the reception area was closed, so we could not check into our room. We found some lockers and left our stuff in one so we would not have to carry around clothes all day. The hostel was located a little bit out of the city, but I really liked it. A lot of the Hostel International hostels are not located directly in the city centre, but they all have close access to the public transit so it is no problem. Our hostel was very close to the Linz Botanical Gardens (not quite in bloom yet…) and in a very posh neighbourhood. Then again, Linz was made up of what seemed to be rich people, every car was a BMW, Mercedes or Audi. We headed into town and quickly discovered that Linz was not anything like Vienna or Salzburg. It has struggled to compete with the historic backgrounds of the two, and has always been more of an industrial city oppose to a tourist one. I have to admit though; Linz was a very refreshing change from the beautiful, but repetitive, surroundings of Vienna. There were some churches and really old buildings, but for the most part, the city was comprised of new and modern buildings. This has a lot to do with the fact that in more recent years, Linz has stepped up its game and is trying to lure tourists. It worked for me!

On the train Steph and I chose what museums and galleries we wanted to visit. We settled on 3 because of our time frame, and my attention span. We discovered the Linz ’09 card, which cost us €10 and gave us access to over 20 attractions, which was well worth the money. We went to the Lentos Museum of Modern Art first, which is right on the Danube. It is a really cool building, made out of exposed concrete with glass covering the entire building. Steph is an architect student at the University of Waterloo, so every now and then I learn a little about the shapes and purpose of buildings. The Lentos was hosting ‘The Best of Austria’ as part of their cultural capital events. Basically, the museum took art out on loans from some of the best museums in Austria. Viennese museums included the Belvedere and the Albertina. While I was looking around, it struck me that they did not choose the best pieces from any museum, or any well known Austrian painters, such as Egon Shiele. After all, the Leopold museum is dedicated to his work. I told this to Hannah when I got back to Vienna, and she suggested that it was probably because they wanted to showcase the lesser known artists and demonstrate where the heart of Austrian art is. Touché Hannah, touché. I have made up my mind that I enjoy modern art. The only pieces I took interest in were painted after 1990. We opted for some lunch after the Lentos, and the weather decided to co-operate and gave us a beautiful day of at least 15°C, so we had lunch outside in the Hauptplatz. It was fantastic.

Determined to discover Linz, we set out for our second museum of the day, the ARS Electronica Centre. It is more like a kid’s science museum, so it was perfect for me. Very hands on and cool, I even had a picture of the inside of my eye taken. The museum had nothing at all to do with Linz but it dominates the Danube and just looked cool. Afterwards, we headed down Landstraße to the OK Centre for Contemporary Art, which was putting on Biennale Cuvée 09, the world’s best in contemporary art. Instead of paintings, it displayed real pictures and played films.

Steph was looking a little tired after this, I am sure she will never go anywhere with me again because of how much walking I always make her do. It was about 5 p.m. and we decided to head back to the hostel and take our stuff to our room. We went out for dinner to a really good Italian restaurant and drank some good Austrian Riesling wine. Conor (the ever so experienced sommelier) told me that Riesling was the up and coming grape in Austria. We hit the town for a while, and decided that since it was the night we had to change our clocks, we should head in a little early, for a fresh new day of travelling.

We slept through my alarm and ended up being late for check out… Life goes on.

To punish us for having such a nice day the day before, Mother Nature decided she would rain on Sunday. I tried to keep the spirits high, it worked… I think. Steph did decide to continue travels with me instead of going straight back to Vienna. We left for Melk, a small little town on the Danube. If Austria had asked me if I loved it a few weeks ago, I may have given the awkward silent, ‘I like you, too’ response. But while sitting on the train from Linz to Melk, I think I fell in love. I saw a different side of Austria that you don’t have the chance to see while in a big city like Vienna. I think that, as a traveller, you have the tendency to appreciate a place that is different from home, because it is refreshing. I think you only fall in love with a place when you realize that it reminds you of home. The river, farms, mountains and small towns along the train tracks let me see how most people in Austria live, and what their towns look like. Much like home :)

Lower Austria

We arrived in Melk, a town of less than 6,000 people. Although the town itself is tiny, the Stift Melk or Melk Abbey, dominates the town. (See the pictures on facebook) It was a beautiful abbey, but that was about there was to do in Melk, especially on a rainy day. We headed back to the train station with high hopes of continuing onto Krems. We had to change trains to get there, and when we arrived at the station, we realized we were going to have to wait 45 minutes for the train. It was already 4p.m., it was cold, it was rainy and we were not smiling anymore. We got on the next train to Vienna.

Life

I am starting to focus on finishing my co-op report for school; I have to send it within the next 2 weeks to guarantee that it arrives at Dal before May 7th, the deadline. It is a struggle to write because of the length restrictions. Every topic has to be answered on only one page, difficult to do when I am asked to write about BAWAG as a company plus the skills and experience I have gained. How do I fit everything? In one of my university classes, we had a poet come in and talk to us (This was obviously not a business course). She said that when you write poetry, every word has to have a purpose, and I feel that this is relevant to me while writing my report… Having such a small amount of room to write is going to mean I choose my words wisely.

A group of us are heading to Bratislava on Saturday. It is the first day of the season for the boat that goes up the Danube from Vienna to Bratislava, so we are taking it. I am looking forward to it.

I am busy at work organizing this workshop for the BAWAG apprentices. The biggest struggle I have is forming the question to ask them. I know they have to be done right, or I am going to see a lot of blank stares and awkward silence, not quite what I am going for. I am picturing Matt and 4 of his friends and how I would go about making them have a dynamic group discussion that does not digress from the topic at hand, not an easy task!

Conor arrives in 3 weeks; I cannot believe how fast the time has gone by! As much as I can’t wait to see him, his arrival symbolizes the end of my time in Europe, something I wish I could prolong, now that I have fallen in love.

Carinthia & Styria

I made it my goal a few weeks ago to visit every region in Austria, with the exception of Vorarlberg, because it is really far away and apparently doesn’t even want to be a part of Austria anymore. Last weekend, as a solo mission, I tackled 2 of the regions, Carinthia and Styria. I figured that by visiting the capitals, Klagenfurt and Graz, I would be able to absorb as much of the region as I could. I had a fantastic weekend in both cities (towns) and am glad that I decided to stick closer to home instead of travelling to different countries. It should be known that under strict travel advice from my dad, I did not accept candy from strangers this entire trip, I swear. I told Hannah this advice my dad had given me, and she said, ‘Oh, so he knows about the case in Austria from a few years ago?’… What?? Apparently someone had left chocolate on the hood of an Austrian mayor’s car wishing him a Happy Valentine’s Day one year. It turns out the chocolate was laced with poison and the mayor who was given the chocolate is paralysed forever. SO, note to self: No candy from strangers.

Klagenfurt, Carinthia

In order to maximize my time, I left for Klagenfurt on the Friday night. The train ride was 4 ½ hours and I arrived in Klagenfurt at 9:30p.m. I had google mapped directions from the train station to the hostel I was staying at, but in the dark in a completely foreign place, I was not willing to take the chance of becoming lost, so I hopped into a cab in hopes that I would be taken into the right direction, which I was. The hostel was a Hostelling International hostel, which is a member’s only hostel, and has certain standards and conditions it has to maintain. When I arrived I headed to bed, only to find that I was sharing a room with someone else. Out of respect, I did not turn the light on when I came in, so I was not aware if I had any sheets on my bed… The morning revealed to me that I had in fact been sleeping on straight mattress and pillow, I felt a little dirty. I headed into town with my backpack because I didn’t want to have to come back to the hostel before I left for Graz. I had noticed that there were lockers at the train station, so I went there and left my bigger pack for the day. Klagenfurt is a beautiful city/town. Standing in various points in the city, if you look up all you see are the steeples of churches with that onion shape at the top. The look of the town reminded me a lot of Salzburg. I took a bus out to Wörthersee, the lake about 5 minutes from the town. Surrounded by snow capped mountains, it was beautiful thing to see, I imagine it would be really nice in the summer. The sun teased me all day long, coming out for little periods of time throughout the day. It was of course better than being in rainy Vienna. I walked around the town and came across a farmers market, which I have come to love. It can be compared to a huge flea market because of the random junky tables, flower and food vendors. The town is centered around the Lindwurm statue, which legend has that some warrior killed this dragon, and now there is a statue commemorating it. Klagenfurt was a very picturesque town, but by the afternoon I was ready to move onto something a little more exciting, Graz.

Graz, Styria

I took the bus from Klagenfurt to Graz which lasted a little over 2 hours. It was a breathtaking drive and many parts of the drive reminded me of driving through the townships, the Laurentians and British Columbia. I really enjoy travelling during the day, you can actually see the things around you. When we arrived in Graz, you would never expect to be driving into an old city. The newer part of the city has been built surrounding the old town. From the train / bus station I did not believe that I was actually going to see old buildings. I arrived at the hostel I was staying at, which was awesome. It was perfectly located between the train station and the inner city of Graz. I ended up bunking with 3 girls from the States, 2 from Maine and 1 from California. I decided not to stick around the hostel for dinner, so I took a bus into the inner city to walk around. I had read about the Murinsel, which was built in Graz when it was the Cultural Capital of Europe in 2003. It is a bar / café that was built and then lowered into the Mur river. It looks like an open seashell and is very cool. When I returned to the hostel, I took a shower and appreciated the fact that I was not charged for the water or towel, services you come to appreciate when travelling. I woke up the next morning to an absolutely beautiful day. Breakfast was a feast of a buffet, all included. I headed out into the city with my trusty map and top sightseeing places, courtesy of the information centre. Graz is filled with romantic courtyards and all you can do is picture what it must have been like in the olden days. At 11 a.m. there is a building in Graz, called the Glockenspiel, on a side street that has shutters that open and two wooden figures come out dancing to a Styrian song. I don’t know whether or not my life has been changed because I saw it, but I am glad that I did. I then climbed to the top of the Schlossberg, the mountain with the famous Graz clock (or course covered in scaffolding) and bell tower. I was up there at 12 and all of a sudden the city started singing this symphony of bells. The bell tower that I was near chimes 101 times every hour, so that dominated the sound, but there are so many churches in Graz that the city literally went into song, it was very pretty. Afterwards, I met up with 2 of Hannah’s friends for lunch; they were in Graz for a film festival. I headed back to the hostel and caught the train back to Vienna at 3:30. I had no clue how long the trip was going to take, which ended up being around 3 hours. Quick Fact: Arnold Schwarzenegger grew up close to Graz.

All in all, the weekend was a huge success, and I really loved Graz, definitely a place that I would want to go back to.

Vienna has started campaigning for their mayor elections, which take place in September 2010. They start campaigning very early because of the fierce competition between the two parties. One of the candidate’s campaigns is based on the notion that he wants to stop immigration into Austria and kick all of the foreigners out of country. The scary thing is that people will vote for him because they base their opinions on the idea that foreigners have taken all their jobs, and therefore kicking out the foreigners will only have a positive impact with their abilities to find jobs… A little scary that people can think like this.

German class continues, and is becoming increasingly more difficult. I can put sentences together now, which is a plus, although I feel like my co-workers expect me to be fluent by now... Ain’t going to happen! There are some people in my class that are just so horrible at speaking German; it literally hurts my ears to hear them talk. It is painful.

My job took a huge turn for the better last week, and I feel that I am now contributing to the well being of the company. Among contributing ideas for the content of the website, I have been put in charge of building an ambassador program for the youth of the bank. The concept behind that is using the current Apprentices at the bank to increase youth involvement and have a constant focus group for product feedback and development. I am currently working on organizing a workshop for 5-10 apprentices, aged 17, for their input. I am approaching it by imagining having Matt and his friends in a room, and ways that I could keep them entertained with the thought of creating a program… I am preparing for a lot of awkward silence. I feel that the work I am doing is having a positive impact and will one day benefit the bank, which is all I can hope for. I cannot believe that I only have 5 weeks of work left; it has gone by too fast, like everything always does.

I am heading to Linz, Melk and Krems this weekend with my friend Steph, and I promise I won’t let her eat candy, or follow someone to his car to see his ‘puppies’… Oh dad.

Funkenfest

Tara does Vienna.

This past weekend my friend Tara, who is from Halifax but doing a SWAP term in Berlin, came and stayed with me and Hannah. She brought a friend of hers from Berlin, and someone that I met while I visited her, Martin, who is originally from Sweden. It was a bit of an international house for the weekend. They arrived at different times on Friday evening, so Hannah and I planned on making dinner for them (I helped plan and buy food while Hannah cooked…). Tara is a vegan, so we racked our brains to come up with a meal that would be edible for everyone. We ended up having fried vegetables with curry and rice, and it was fantastic, kudos to Hannah for having frozen homemade curry in our freezer. We had bought some wine for dinner, and that influenced our decisions for the evening. We had originally planned a big night for Saturday, as the Europeans have no clue what Jager bombs are, I thought I would give them a good introduction. Needless to say, after Friday there were hardly and ingredients left for Saturday. It was a fun night out on the town, and some felt the effects more than others on Saturday morning.

We didn’t have the opportunity to lounge around on Saturday morning because we had tickets to the Spanish Riding School performance at 11 a.m. Being an avid horse lover (sarcasm) I was actually blown away by the performance. The horses literally dances around the ring, and were perfectly in tune with the music. To think that Jodi was actually able to do that in Portugal was pretty cool. However, I will now always have the satisfaction of knowing that I went to the see the real show, and she didn’t… The riders looked old school with their hats and long coats on, and I am pretty sure that the saddles were lined with diamonds, they sparkled profusely. I don’t think Tara quite appreciated the experience, as she was feeling the Jager bombs from the previous night. (German Lesson: Jagermeister means 'hunt master' in English.) After the riding school we headed back to the apartment on request of some of the members in our group, and enjoyed a quiet afternoon watching skiing on t.v.

That night, Saturday, some of Hannah’s friends had planned on going to the Vorarlberg Funkenfest. Vorarlberg is the most western region of Austria where they practice this annual tradition. Every year a different town is invited to Vienna to host the tradition. Basically, they build a huge tower of wood surrounding a pine tree and tie a witch doll, with flashing red eyes, to the top of it and light it on fire. The tradition is to burn the witch, which will in turn scare away winter, not that Vienna had much of one this year. A group of us headed to the 19th district to Am Himmel for the festivities, which is an area on the top of a hill, that you can look out and see all of Vienna. Tara, Steph and I took a picture of ourselves in front of the fire to send to SWAP. They have a lot of contests for participants, so we are hoping that the fact we have all become friends and attended a traditional Austrian event, we will win something! We stayed for a few hours and then all headed back to our apartment for a flip cup tournament (I introduced them all to flip cup too) and a little sing star session.

On Sunday I took Tara and Martin out for a little sightseeing. We went to the Lower Belvedere museum and saw an exhibit by Alfons Mucha. The plan was to go to see an Opera at the Staatsoper, but I had messed up the times, so we opted out of that. We did some sightseeing and then met up with my new Canadian friend Steph and 2 of her floormates in the dorms she lives in. There is a jazz festival going on right now in Vienna so we went and checked out some live performances. The bands were amateur musicians, who were showcasing their work, but they were all very talented musicians and it was a really cool thing to visit on a Sunday night.

Life right now

My weekend schedule is absolutely full with adventures from now on until I leave to come home. It is absolutely insane, but I only have 7 weeks of work left. When I started in January there were 16, it has gone by so fast. I am heading to Klagenfurt and Graz this weekend in my attempt to maximize the amount of Austria that I see.

I had my mid-evaluation yesterday for work. I was able to speak to my career advisor, and he seems pleased with how everything is going. My bosses were very generous with my review and it instils confidence in myself to know that they think I am doing a good job.

Our internet is supposed to be fixed today, which means the return of Skype… Over the past 3 weeks Hannah and I have done a lot of bonding at night, which has been great. I would go as far to say that we have become good little buddies! I spoke to my dad last night; I have figured out that it costs nothing for me to receive calls, so it is a good way to talk to people. Should anyone feel inclined to speak to me, my phone number is 011 43 680 219 7223.

My second Deutschkurs, or German lesson, started last night. Montag und Mittwoch habe ich Deutschkurs von sechs bis Viertel von neun Uhr. We are learning the fundamentals of sentence structure, so I can actually say things now. It is a rather rewarding feeling. We are 9 girls all from different countries, with the exception of 2 who are from Thailand. There is occasional passing around of my translator so we can communicate. This is suppose to be a more intensive version of the course, with only 3 ½ weeks of class oppose to 5. There is one lady from Thailand who wants to buy the translator from me so bad. Every class she eyes it and I feel that I need to have it with me at all times to avoid the potential of it being stolen. She has offered me €200; I think she wants it mostly because it can translate Thai. I will not sell it to her; she just needs to get over it.

I have slowly passed through the homesickness faze. I was spoiled with Skype as it allowed me to speak to my family and Conor whenever I wanted to. It was hard when it was just taken away, but now that some time has passed I realize that I am still alive and that everyone at home is doing just fine. I send e-mails to the parents and communicate with my siblings and friends on facebook, so it is not like I have been cut off completely. It was weird, I could actually feel a certain kind of pain, not that it hurt, it was just a nagging feeling of missing contact from home. However, that is starting to pass. Hannah told me that a study proved that it is around the 2/3 point of being away that the missing feeling kicks in, so I was right on schedule! I do miss you all, but I am glad to be on this adventure and being able to share the experience through this blog has been great.

A Quick Life Update

A quick life update... Without Skype, I am thinking that this blog is going to become my main source of communicating with everyone!

One of my classmates at Dalhousie is doing her Co-op for the Management Career Services, the people who help us find jobs and do workplace check ups. Saying that, I have my mid evaluation on Monday. Most of the advisors visit the work places of the students and meet with them and the employers. Unfortunately, Dal doesn’t have the budget to send my advisor all the way to Austria, so we are having a phone evaluation. The first half hour is done just with my boss, and then the second part is just with me. I think it is a way for Dal to have feedback about how the co-op is going and if there are problems that needed to be sorted.

Anyways, back to my classmate. Part of her job is to profile students for an upcoming MCS e-mail bulletin. My classmate has asked me if I would mind being featured! She asked that I send her information concerning my workplace, living arrangements, any communication mishaps and how this international working experience is going to affect my career path and future career choices. It is scheduled to be sent out in September, so that will be exciting, I am curious as to what information she will use.

After much deliberation, I have decided to declare my major in Business Management. We are given a few options in Commerce, and I feel that this is the area that is best suited to my skill set. Time wise, I could have double majored at Dal because of the fact that I have so many transferred courses from CEGEP, but Dal doesn’t allow double majors in Commerce. It will however allow me to take courses in different fields, so I can continue pursuing courses in marketing on top of my major. We have to start taking courses relative to our majors in the winter of 2010, after our second co-op.

I have decided to go to Zell Am See, Austria for Easter. It is looking like a solo trip for now, which I am actually pretty okay with. I am sure that all this alone time will eventually start taking its toll on me, but I am rather enjoying being able to go where I want. I have been able to realize that I am completely self sufficient and can successfully live in a foreign place by myself. Saying that, I do miss having certain people around… You know who you are.

I think that covers the general highlights of my life to date :)

Salzburg and Mariazell

I know this is very long overdue, but we have not had internet for 2 weeks. I don’t even know where to begin it has been so long… ( I apologize now for the length of this one…)

Salzburg

Two weeks ago I went to Salzburg with two other Swappers, Simon and Steph. We stayed at a youth hostel, Yoho, which was pretty fantastic. It was right between the train station and down town core of Salzburg, so it was very convenient. The rooms were actually quite nice, with 3 sets of bunk beds… It reminded me a little bit of summer in Panorama. We arrived on the Friday night and had dinner at the hostel, some typical Schnitzel, and then headed out on the town. I had read about the Augustiner Brau monastery that instead of producing cheese, made beer. We headed there first. This place was unreal. I think that it could sit about 2,000 people in 4 different rooms. There were 2 options of beer size, a half litre, or litre. We opted for the litre. It was such a cool setting, except that there were pictures and sculptures of Jesus everywhere so you felt like you were committing a sin. We had some fun and met some members of a Scottish stag party, who had all worked in B.C. the past summer. The walk home brought on some adventures, including a few funny occurrences with reference to the Sound of Music, which was filmed in Salzburg (More on that later). We returned to the hostel, only to find the bar busy with an international tour group. We met some of the Canadians who go to Western and Dalhousie.

When we woke up we discovered that Salzburg offers something that is a rarity in Vienna, sun. We woke up to a beautiful day, and realized that Salzburg is basically surrounded by snow covered mountains. We decided that it would be a good idea to visit the fortress that overlooks the city of Salzburg, the Festung Hohensalzburg. It is basically all you can see from anywhere in Salzburg. When we actually arrived at the top, after a short but heart pumping hike, the view was stunning. It was cool to walk around the fortress and try and imagine what it must have been like actually living there. We explored it for a little bit, Steph and I took millions of pictures, while Simon tried to deal with his 2 day old hangover. Looking out from the cannon holes, all you can see are church steeples and mountains, it was quite beautiful. When Jodi and my dad were here this summer, she had taken a really cool picture that captured all the steeples of Salzburg. I desperately tried to find the spot, but am pretty sure that it wasn’t here that she took it. I think I found it the next day. As we walked down, we decided that today would be the perfect day to do the Sound of Music tour. None of us really remembered the movie, or the songs, but we knew that we were in Salzburg and that this was our chance to have a little piece of Julie Andrews. So we put our pride aside and boarded the bus. The best part about these tours is the fact that you learn something, and see things that you have otherwise not known about. The Sound of Music tour brought us to…

Leopoldskron Castle: Where the boat tipping scene was filmed
Hellbrunn Castle: Where the original gazebo has been moved to
Nonnberg Abbey: Where the real Maria was a nun
St.Gilgen and Lake Wolfgang: I don’t think this was in the movie, but it is in the breath taking Lake District. It reminded me a lot of Invermere.
Wedding Church Mondsee: Where the wedding of Maria and the Baron was filmed.
Mirabell Gardens: Where a lot of dancing and singing took place.

The majority of the tour was people like us, but then there was one couple that made the tourist level soar. They gasped and sang and loved every moment of the tour. I vowed to never turn into that kind of couple. And where were they from? The U.S.A.

Feeling touristed out we headed back to the hostel and all fell asleep, for a power nap. We had great aspirations about what we were going to do that night, we wanted to go to a club that hosted a lot of MTV d.j.’s, but we ended up sitting with a group of travellers and played Uno all night. At least we stuck to a budget...

We had to check out by 10 a.m. the next morning, so we put our stuff in a locker and set out for another exciting day of Salzburg sightseeing… Until we realized that we had seen most of Salzburg the day before (it is not very big). We headed up to the ridge that follows the Salzach, the river that flows through Salzburg. We were able to see a panoramic view of Salzburg, and it was incredible. I am pretty sure that this is where I took a picture similar to the one that Jodi has. We headed back into the town; I wanted to buy some of the painted eggs. I am not talking about tie-dyed kids eggs, these are amazing. They are painted by students and housewives, and I just hope I can bring them home without breaking them. Hannah had also asked me to pick some up for her mom. We also walked by the Christmas in Salzburg shop, and I saw a lot of ‘Pyramids’ – These Christmas candle things. I felt inclined to buy one, but reality kicked in and I remembered that I only have 2 suitcases… After that we collectively agreed that we had seen Salzburg to the best of our abilities and headed back to the train station.

That was the end of the Salzburg weekend.

Mariazell

Last weekend, I decided that I needed to go skiing again, to fully justify the fact that I dragged all of my skiing stuff out here. After much deliberation, I decided on the town of Mariazell, which the Pope visited last year. The trip there was almost more exciting then the skiing. I left Vienna at 6:45 a.m. I had to transfer once in St. Pölten (Where the trial is currently being held for man that held his daughter hostage in his cellar for 24 years, raped her over 3,000 times and fathered 7 of her children. She gave birth in the cellar each time, with no doctors). From there I took the ricketiest train to a town 2 hours away. There is so much snow that the train could not go further, so we had to get off and board a bus. A man was putting chains on the tires of the bus literally from the 60s. My first thought – Safe. The ride was alright, except for the kid sitting in front of me who puked the ENTIRE time. That was nice. As you enter further into the interior of Austria, English starts becoming very rare. Luckily, my german language skills kicked in and I was able to figure out what time to arrive back at the station in the afternoon. Skiing was fantastic. All the rain we have been receiving in Vienna has clearly been snow there and I literally skied powder all day long. The mountain still wasn’t as high as I had hoped, but I am waiting for Easter to really take a long journey into the heart of the Austria Alps. Although I do not know what my surroundings looked like because it snowed all day. I had a little 'experience' on the chairlift. I was riding up with someone who clearly did not know what he was doing. As we approached the top of the hill, I tried to lift the bar up, but he would not take his skis off… He did not take his skis off until we were half way around the top pole, heading back down the mountain. We were the chair that made the chairlift stop, and had to jump off. Thanks buddy. The lonely day came to an end; it was a good day, but not talking all day kind of takes a toll on you… Driving back down to the train station (1 hour) you could really see how much snow they still have. Some of the snow banks were taller than the bus we were in. It makes me hopeful that Easter will be fantastic.

My friend Tara is arriving on Friday. We are going to the Spanish Riding School on Saturday, and hopefully the Opera on Friday or Sunday night.

I received an e-mail from Sky Europe saying that they have cancelled the flight from Prague to Venice, the one that Conor and I were suppose to take. Instead, we are leaving for Italy on an overnight train from Vienna 2 days earlier, and taking Budapest off the travel plans. We are going to head to Prague when we return from Italy and before we head home. This way, we can maximize time in Italy, which takes the stress away of needed to be in places at certain times.

Sorry for the long post, my life is just that exciting…

p.s. I will add pictures as soon as we have internet back at our apartment.