Sonntag

One more for today, then I'm calling it quits because I'm almost caught up. Hopefully, I'll have time to get in Monday and Tuesday tomorrow before class. Or at least Monday, because we're planning on going to the Opera tomorrow to see something and I have a German assignment due on Thursday that's creative writing and is going to take a bit of a while. So I might have to put off blogging for a couple of days so I can get all the good stuff done.

On Sunday, we packed and had breakfast before we got on the buses to head back to Vienna. This busride bothered my stomach more than the first one because I could see where we were going and I didn't have a book to sidetrack me. Rather than getting sick, it was a lot easier to just lay down (I had both seats to myself again) and go to sleep. I woke up just before we got to the truckstop, where we did the bathroom thing again and took a group picture. The weather up in Mariazell was kind of rainy and misty, but when we got out of the Alps, it cleared up a bit.

Did you know that Austia is building walls around the Autobahn? They are extremely conscious about noise, and have all these noise ordinances, especially in the city. So they're building these noise walls, but instead of looking like the ugly ones we have in the States, they're patterned and colorful.

Also, big trucks aren't allowed on the Autobahn on weekends during the skiing and vacation seasons because there's already so much traffic. They have to park until Monday.

About three hours later, we arrived in Vienna and there was a race to get our bags and money for our landladies/lords because we have to put down a deposit on the keys and pay for laundry. As our taxi driver was putting our bags in his trunk, he dropped mine and it went crash. I have to say, I winced because my computer was in there and so was the candle for my landlady. (Fortunately, everything was ok when I opened it later).

Our apartment is relatively close to the Westbahnhof because the taxi ride only cost 6 Euro for the three of us. We live at Liebhartsgasse 28/6. Gasse is kind of like a little street. Strasse is a bigger street. The 28 is the house number and the 6 is the apartment number. We live in the 16th district, right outside the Girdle, which is a wide road that circles the inner districts. Our landpeople let us in and helped us carry our bags upstairs. We live on the second floor, but Europeans call this the first floor and the American first floor the ground floor. Herb and Ellie are our landpeople. She is from NYC and he is a native Austrian. They've been married since forever, and they almost have a little comedy routine going on. Think almost like Ethel and Fred Mertz from "I Love Lucy." They gave us a quick tour of the apartment and then let us unpack. Around 4:30 they were back to collect our money and give us our keys.

The apartment is beautiful. There are four bedrooms, two bathrooms, a kitchen, and a common area. the ceilings are really high and the rooms are big. It was just renovated recently, and everything is awesome. There's more than enough room for seven of us. It's kind of interesting though -- the Austrians, and maybe Europeans as a whole, have their toilets and their showers in separate rooms. I can see how this would work out really well, except that for the girls, our shower is on one side of the apartment and the toilet is in the boys' hallway. So that can be a bit awkward sometimes. The wooden floors are a bit squeaky, but you always know when someone is coming. Our bedrooms have black sheets that are flannel on the bottom and kind of silky/satiny on top. Austrians don't have layers of covers like we do at home, they have a duvet type thing that they use. It's really comfortable and I've yet to be either too hot or too cold since I got here.

After Ellie and Herb left, we sat around and had snacktime and talked. I also got on the internet and checked email. About 70% of what I got was junk mail. The rest was from you lovely, lovely people. I also looked through the book that Ellie and Herb keep all the addresses of their past tenants in. Katie, a girl from my German class last semester, actually lived in this apartment when she studied in Vienna last spring. Super crazy cool coincidences :-D

Then it was time to journey to IES for our last free meal. They fed us chicken schnitzel and rice. Since it was kind of early yet, the flatties decided to look around the city-center for a while before going back home. We saw St. Stephen's Cathedral, which is absolutely ginormous. There's also renovations going on here. Here's the link to the wiki article. I really have to get back there, maybe this weekend, to take pictures. I'd also like to go to a service there. When we went inside, there was actually a service going on. We heard the Apostales' Creed, and it was a really odd sensation to be able to follow the rhythm of the words, but not have it be in English. I mean, it was really cool, but it wasn't something I had experienced before.

While we were out walking, I started noticing women's shoes. They're much cooler than mine are. I need to fix that. And probably get a new shirt or two as well.

Jeremy had a hockey game he needed to go to, so we were on our own to find our way home. Needless to say, we were really proud of ourselves. Of course, it took six of us to figure out how to get here, but we managed nonetheless.

Once we got back to the apartment, we had communal computer time in the group area. We had bought a bottle of cheap red wine (which turned out to be pretty good) and sat around and laughed and bonded and discussed what we wanted to do for our respective birthdays. And then it was time for shower and bed.

And now I'm in Vienna full-time. Only a couple more days of back-blogging to go! Yay! Love you all :-)