Day Six

Today was a really tiring but fun day.

The school organizes a day outing to Salzburg, so we had to get up at the crack of dawn to get on the buses in time. I slept quite well on the bus, and I'll be able to sleep in (finally!) tomorrow, so no biggie.
We got to Salzburg, where the weather was gloomy and rainy for the entire day. We had Mass at the Franciscan Church, and it was celebrated by the auxiliary bishop of Salzburg, who is the uncle of Gaming director's wife.
That Mass would have been a good example of an argument for the Mass in Latin and with fixed rubrics, because this Mass was a prime example of people not knowing what to do because of language/culture confusions. I'm just sayin'.

After Mass, we got divied up into groups of 40, and though I tried hard to get in Mr. Pipps group since he's really funny and doesn't have a foreign accent, Krista and I ended up in the group led by the Gaming director (Mr. Wolter)'s wife.

That actually was pretty interesting; Mrs. Wolter showed us two churches, a cemetery, and the garden that the people run through in the Sound of Music.
Mrs. Wolter gave us some background info of Salzburg - salz means salt, which was a super snazzy (read: profitable) export back in the day, and burg means city.

A lot of Salzburg's history has to do with this dude; I missed the first part of this story so I'm missing pieces (story of every story I've heard in Europe so far), but apparently he loved Italy and hated Austria, but was made bishop and prince of Salzburg. He was forced (I think?) to become a cleric, but he did his darndest not to act like it. He made a piazza in Salzbug (several, I think), one with a fountain supposed to rival a famous fountain in Italy that I can't remember the name of.
He had a mistress, made a palace for her, and had fifteen children with her. He also had his own private palace.
He didn't like the original cathedral that was built in 774, so when the people came running to him one day telling him that the church was burning down, he said "Let it burn." Some people even believe that he started the fire.
Anyways, he built a SUPER nice church in it's place, and that church has a couple really cool things about it. First, it looks awesome.

Secondly, it was the first church to try to incorporate "surround sound"; Mozart had four organs installed at the corners of these pillars, and the organists would have someone nod to them when it was time to play, so they could all play in synchronization.
Thirdly, there are a bunch of bishops skulls with miters on them in the church (sorry, I forgot to take pictures), so when Mrs. Wolter's uncle was being made bishop, apparently her little brother started to cry, because he made the connection between becoming a bishop and dying. The auxiliary bishop has received a lot of death threats, because he's apparently one of the most outspoken European bishops against abortion.
Fourthly, a funny story concerning that stinker archbishop mentioned above; when he built the church, he placed two angels holding a golden crown near the top of the front of the church, to signify his princeship. The people of Salzburg then built a statue of Mary in the piazza/square outside of the church, placing it so that if you stood in the correct spot, it would appear the angels are crowning the Mary statue. Pretty clever, if I do say so myself.
Finally, the church was accidentally bombed by Americans during WWII (they missed the train station by twelve kilometers), but the general that made the mistake raised enough funds for the rebuilding of the church, and wow, they did a pretty good job!

The other church we visited was also very pretty, but I loved the cathedral most, so if I have time to upload pictures of the second church later, I will, but no promises.

Anyways, back to the story of the archbishop prince. He was eventually put in prison, but not because of his immoral behavior - nope, it was because he was taxing Salzburg's salt exports too much! While he was in prison, he had a conversion, and then wrote a beautiful letter to all future priests of Salzburg to offer Mass for his soul. Mrs. Wolter mentioned they had that letter in a particular church, but I didn't get to see it.

It was cool how Mrs. Wolter explained the animosity of Europeans towards the Church (the faith is struggling big time here) by showing how they had to see a ton of filthy stuff like the bishop-prince happen, and they didn't always know about the redemptive part (if there was ever one)

Mrs. Wolter led us through a super old cemetery - there's a bunch of cool facts about it, but here are just two.

1. The makers of the Sound of Music were inspired by it - they recreated the cemetery, and used it in the scene where the Von Trapp family is hiding behind the graves. At the actual graveyard though, there wasn't any space behind the tombs.
2. Also, even though the cemetery is very old (7th century, I think), there aren't many people buried there that died before the 20th century. The reason being, the families/friends of every person buried there have to pay rent for the grave - once they stop paying rent, the remains get sent to some church outside of Salzburg. One (if not the only) exception to this rule is the American general that accidentally bombed the Cathedral, but then rebuilt it. The city of Salzburg made him and honorary citizen, and promised to pay rent for him so that his remains could always remain there (see what I did there? ;)) 

After the cemetery visit, we walked to the Mirabel gardens, where the kids and Maria run through in the Sound of Music. They were really pretty, but I kinda felt bad for the gardens, because there were signs everywhere for tourists so it didn't look quite as pretty. 

I'll try to upload my non-iPhone pictures later

We spent about ten minutes there, then walked Stiegskeller for lunch provided by the university. It was a super big room (dang, I should've taken a picture...) and dinner was very delicious and fun. The other groups had already arrived, so Krista, Maria (an LCI student I was talking with) and I had to squeeze ourselves into the middle of an already full table. 

We had soup first (mostly broth, with some sort of potato shavings/noodles), then the main course, which was chicken, some vegetables, and really yummy dumpling noodle like things. I talked with Maria most of the time - she's from Slovakia, and she's very funny and extraverted. We talked about weird American things, weird European things, and funny words. 

After dinner, everyone had free time, so we joined the other LCI students to spend our last six hours in Salzburg. 

So far, I really like the LCI students. They're more mature (the youngest is 19, and the oldest is at least 26), more open and helping them with their English is super fun/ny. We also had two FUS girls, Jessica and Christine in our group, and they're both super sweet. They're the ones that sing the pretty music at Mass (though Jessica was going a little crazy with the organ at Mass today - I think she was just really excited/nervous to be playing in such an old, cool church)

One of the students, David (a Hungarian), has been in Salzburg before, so he was our "guide" (I use the term very loosely - he didn't know exactly where he was leading us most of the time). He led us up and up and up a side of the mountain - tiring, but it was fun to talk to the girls. David was also pretty goofy and reminded me of David. He also reminded me of an Indian tour guide, the way he would say things like "Come this way!" and "We are in the city now!"

Maria is the most fluent with English, and also very opinionated - if she didn't like the path we were taking, she would let us know (most of the time I agreed with her.) It was nice talking to her, since she's also been in the states, and it's easy to understand her. She REALLY doesn't like the idea of selfies, and that was super funny.

Maria and I

Iryna is the next best at English after Maria and David, and I think she's the oldest. She's been super sweet and friendly since I met her, and was constantly asking me if I wanted to go anywhere in particular. She asked me about Thanksgiving dinner a couple days ago, and thought it was such an amazing thing that Americans do.

Then there is Monika and Veronica - they're both very shy and not very good at English, but they are super sweet and once you get them talking, they get very excited. Veronica asked me to sing the national anthem for them (and I sung it too, Dad!), and then they both sang their anthems - it was super sweet and awesome. We also discussed the happy birthday song, and their versions of it - apparently they just sing happy birthday in English when it's someones birthday. They thought the monkey version of the song was super funny, but they didn't quite get the humor in the St. Greg's doom and sadness birthday song. ;)

We basically ambled around the city for the six hours - my feet are tired now, but it was the most fun I've had in Austria so far.

Selfy with Mozart! And a random family in the background!

With about an hour and a half to go, Maria, Krista, Jessica, Christine and I accidentally broke off from the other LCI students. We spent the remaining time trying to find a place to eat - all the promising market stalls from the morning had closed, which was a big bummer, because the entire free time I was talking about obtaining a chocolate covered pastry (twisted like a pretzel - it looked AMAZING) so that never ended up happening.
Most stores in Austria (and I think general Europe) close around dinner time, so we had some problems trying to find somewhere to eat. The McDonald's was too expensive (can you believe it?), but we found a cheaper Burger King, got some shakes (yes, I know, that's kinda pathetic, but like I said, the market stalls were closed!), and sat there for awhile figuring out how to get back to the meeting place.

It was kinda funny, because everyone, including Maria, was freaking out a little bit about it and wanted to give us a ton of time to walk a little ways to the place. I wasn't too worried, since I actually had a pretty good idea of where to go, but I didn't want them to count on me in case I messed up, so I just relaxed while they planned. I think I'll be more comfortable giving a little directions next time we're out - I just didn't want to make that leap of faith in myself on the first outing.

After chilling at Burger King for awhile, we left to get to the buses, and right next door, we found a little bakery that was just closing, but had some cheap and super yummy looking food. I got these donut ball things - Maria said they were sweet cheese ball things, but I don't think so, because I didn't taste any cheese. It was still very good though.

We made our way to the buses (it was super easy), then got bussed back to Gaming, and here I am! This is definitely the most fun I've had, so I'm really hoping Krista and I can do more things with the LCI students, and branch out from there. (hahahahahhahahahaha, who am I kidding?!)

Anyways, I'll (hopefully) upload more pictures later.

Day Five

We didn't have any classes today, but I still had to get up early (i.e. 7:20) for breakfast, and then a three hour meeting after that. I don't remember most of the meeting right now - the last half hour I was dozing on and off.

I was so tired that I didn't go to Mass, and even slept through lunch. I had to get up eventually though, because there was yet another meeting. This meeting was about two hours long, and I've forgotten most of it too, mostly because there have been a bajillion meetings this week.

After the meeting, I talked with Jamie and her friend for bit - another person who promptly forgot my name after introduction, which is completely fine, but didn't think it worth the effort to ask me again when I left...*sigh* this seems to be a continuing trend.

Then I talked with one of the faculty, Marosh (I'm not sure if that's how his name is spelled, but that's how it sounds) about trying to visit Kristin. I didn't quite understand him, but basically I got the idea that it would be much simpler for us to meet for a weekend in Vienna since we'd have to go through there anyways.

After that, I eventually found a little path into the field behind the Kartause, and climbed up a ways to find a little bench off to the side of a gravel road running through the mountain, and I finished reading my philosophy homework up there. Reading Plato in a beautiful hill in Austria - sound dreamy, right? Honestly, I think my good ol' Pennsylvania is just as beautiful, but at least I was almost completely alone up there. I don't know, living with 200+ other people has made me feel penned up and I'm not looking forward to three more months of this feeling, so please pray for me.

Right now I'm actually trying to figure out where I left my keycard - you guys should place bets on how many times I'll lose the dang thing this semester.

After the walk, I went to the Mensa and ate some yummy toast by myself. I didn't know where Krista was, and honestly, going to the Mensa is becoming a chore and a headache. I really don't like being able to eat when I want, and being confined in super close quarters. Plus I'm already tired of the whole meeting people, eating with them, and then after that meal, the people promptly forgetting or ignoring me. Wahwahwah, I know I'm a baby, but there you have it.

I started reading more homework (Three to Get Married - you were right, Katie!) - I've only read a little bit, so I'm not quite sure what I think about it yet.

The girls from yesterday and I were planning on meeting up at seven tonight (the Kartuase is having a showing of The Sound of Music - it's actually going on right now), but only one girl showed up, because the other girls were really busy preparing the music for Mass in Salzburg tomorrow. That was fine by me, since those particular girls sing really well and use very appropriate songs for Mass.

So Jenny and I prayed the Rosary while we walked a bit in the fields I walked in earlier today, I came back and ate cereal while studying.

One thing Austria does trump the US in - their milk is DELICIOUS! I can't remember if I mentioned it before, but I think their version of the fattier US 2% is 3.5%, and it is sooooo gooooood. I ate Choco Flakes with the milk, and they kinda look like one half of a peanut shell.
Other foods I'm trying out are Zartbitter (a chocolate covered gingerbread that looks like a chocolate covered pretzel), some weird granola bars, Milka bars, and an Austrian sort of trail mix.

Random facts:

• the mosquitoes are every bit annoying here at they are in Toledo. My right ankle is swollen right now from two bugbites I have there. Also, the bracken here is EVERYWHERE and it's super annoying nd pokey.
• I figured out the basic tune to Backwards In Time by the Avett Brothers, and now I'm working on some tabs I found, including The Piano Man.
• these are some partial quotes from Three to Get Married that I'm feeling really apply to this semester so far; "for it is the nature of man to be sad when he is pulled outside himself, or exteriorized without getting any nearer his goal.", "He who has no purpose in life is unhappy", and "To love what is below the human, is degradation; to love what is human for the sake of the human, is mediocrity; to love the human for the sake of the Divine, is enriching; to love the Divine for its own sake is sanctity."

Day Four

Today was an improvement on yesterday.

I didn't think it would be, as I woke up a little late and took a late shower, thus making Monika miss her shower so she could get to breakfast in time. Not very considerate of me, especially considering Monika is an LCI student.

The Mensa doesn't offer many options when it comes to breakfast, and those options don't vary from day to day. I'll probably be rotating between granola and a ham & cheese sandwich for the entire semester. Yay. At least I have Choco Flakes to munch on in my room.

My first class for B days is Medieval World, which was pretty interesting. Lots of talk about emperors and Constantine - neat stuff. Plus the teacher is gonna break up the class, with lecture on Tuesday, and completely class discussion on the assigned readings for Thursday. It sounds chill and fun. Plus Krista's in that class, so I don't have to awkwardly sit by myself during the small breaks - we get to sit awkwardly together! Yay!

Next class was Christian Marriage, which has fifty girls and nine boys (Krista counted)
Our teacher has hilarious facial constructions, and when I understand a joke he makes, it's usually pretty funny. Thing is, I don't actually know what he's talking about most of the time, because he's Scottish, and has a VERY thick accent (Rosie, he sounds like Stoick from How to Train Your Dragon - they say "hiccup" the same way!) Also, I'm wondering how he's going to spend three hours a week for sixteen weeks talking about Christian Marriage - we already got the basics and a bit more covered today. More interesting will be watching Krista alternately sass and squirm three hours a week, for sixteen weeks.
We'll see how long she lasts.

The assigned reading is the book by Archbishop Fulton Sheen It Takes Three, so I am looking forward to that. The paper and tests don't look very intimidating, which I can't say of my other classes. Also, Professor Cassidy challenged us to memorize the Instruction on the Day of Marriage from the 1962 Rituale Romanum. If we memorize and recite it perfectly in class, we don't have to write the paper or take any of the tests! That would be sweet, and if it were any other class, I'd totally memorize it, but this class looks like it'll be the same amount of work either way - writing the short paper and taking a few tests, or memorizing a good page and a half of instruction, so I'm not sure if I'll do it. I already have a ton of reading for my other classes.

After classes finished (I finish right before noon Mass every day), pretty much the entire campus went to noon Mass as the bishop of Gaming was saying Mass. The bishop seemed really nice, but honestly, I slept through his sermon because I was already sleepy and couldn't do any more interpreting thick accents at that point. The music, even for Franciscan, was off today, people were clapping for the bishop (he seemed kind of embarrassed), and then we all crammed in the apse of the church to take a picture with the bishop. So, I was glad to get out.

There was a long line for lunch because of the "Mass rush", and it was packed in the Mensa. Krista and I eventually ended up finding two open chairs, and just sat in the middle of this table. The girls on one end were nice and we talked to them a bit, then left when we finished.

We came back to our room, left for the Spar, and I returned with more snacks and milk (yay! 3.5% fat - I'm looking forward to this!) whereas Krista came back with chocolate bars for her family, and then a bottle of wine and plastic cups for herself. Yep, she's acclimating herself into this Europe thing quite well.

Then I piddled for an hour while Krista worked out, and when she came back, we set off for a jog.
Don't worry - I'm still a big bum, but I wanted to use my pretty sketch book, so I figured I'd jog with her till I found a good spot for sketching.

We ended up climbing a little ways up the mountain that the rowhouses (the teachers houses) sit on, but it was super muddy, we didn't actually jog. I found a dryish place to sit, and spent the next hour or so sketching a big blob into my beautiful watercolor book. It's kinda sad actually, but practice makes perfect, so hopefully I'll have at least one sketch that resembles my object by the time the semester is over. Krista explored around a bit, and then found a decent place to jog. I joined up with her later at the Mensa for supper.

phone pictures - don't judge

The Mensa wasn't super crowded, but there weren't a lot of empty tables either. Krista ended up running into a friend of hers, and so we sat at his table with his friends. They were all really funny, and it was the most "normal" I've seen a group of Franciscan students (that had more than one male in the group) act. Half of the table left a while after they finished eating, and I thought we were eventually going to skeedaddle too, but Krista's friend ended up talking to her for another hour or so about her leaving Franciscan. He was super nice and thoughtful - Krista should appreciate the friends she has that she doesn't hang out with as much more. *cough* Krista *cough* ;)

Came back to the room, "finished" my watercolor blob, studied for a bit, then I went out to pray the Rosary at the Kartause.

As I was crossing the courtyard to the church, my paths crossed with another girl. We ended up talking a wee bit, and I asked if she would like to pray the Rosary with me, and she did! That was really nice, because when I pray the Rosary by myself, I end up getting super distracted and take way more time than I should.

When we finished, I asked if she wouldn't mind singing the Salve with me. She asked me to hum the tune so she could remember if she knew all the words; while I was humming it, a girl I met a couple days ago walked out from the chapel and overheard me. She's a music major, and she seemed super nice - she and her friends sang for the Mass at Gaming two days ago, and not only did they have beautiful voices, they also sang some really pretty songs too (read: Latin songs)

So anyways, she asked me if we were going to sing the Salve, and ended up singing it with us. It was really nice and sounded AWESOME in the church, despite the fact I had a scratchy throat and Jenny (the girl who prayed with me) didn't know all the words. Jessica (music major) had a really good voice to cover for us, plus the acoustics (or whatever you call it) in that church is amazing.

Afterwards, we talked a bit outside, and we're going to try to make it a regular thing to meet at nine for Rosary at the church. I'm really glad to have more people praying with me, plus, Jessica's music major friends will probably be coming, which will make the Salve sound even better!

Now I'm back, and guess what? I might get to bed on time if I finish this right now, so peace!

Day Three

Today wasn't a great day.

I woke up in time for breakfast, but I ate by myself because it was too early to be "courageous" and ask to sit with a group.

I had history class (my first class on A days, which are typically Monday and Wednesday), and I like the teacher so far. I think he'll really help me appreciate Europe, as he's already helped me appreciate Gaming itself more. However, we had a five minute in-class break to "stretch" (I hate these little breaks in long talks - I just want to get it over with) and I talked to the girl sitting next to me, that the super friendly girl in front of me introduced me to right before class began. I'm not sure why, but the conversation with the girl sitting next to me kinda upset me for the rest of the day. She wasn't snobby or anything, but didn't seem authentic in the conversation and seemed to be looking around for other people to talk to.

Blow one to my inflated ego.

We got out of class about ten minutes early, and I was pretty discouraged going back to the room. It's funny/weird how one little thing like that can make me such a baby. Anyways, I thought I had about half hour before my next class, so I piddled around, then eventually left ten minutes early so I could find my class and be in it early.

It was strangely quiet in the halls as I walked to class, and I saw some other classes in session as I walked by. I didn't panic right away - I found my classroom, opened the thick door, and found myself staring at a professor paused in the middle of his lecture, staring back at me. I closed the door pretty confused - maybe that class was getting out really late? Then I double checked my book, and sure enough, I was twenty minutes late to class.
Drat.

Since it's a big offense to miss class (though I wouldn't have missed it anyways), I opened the door again and walked into class, found a chair as quickly as I could, with as much elegance as I could muster (which wasn't much)

Blow two to my inflated ego.

The class was philosophy, and they were already in the middle of the discussion, so I had no clue what the heck was going on. I reached into my bag to pull out a pencil and realized that I had forgotten it again, so I had to ask the guy sitting a chair to the side of me if he had a pen or pencil I could borrow.

Blow three to my inflated ego.

The guy was really nice, and gave me the pen he was using, saying he didn't need it because he was "really good at remembering." So I took the pen, but I saw him use his friend's pen several times in class to write down a few things. Oops.

The professor is Irish, very nice and quiet, very handsome, and also, unmarried. I almost felt bad for him.

Since I had missed the first twenty minutes of class, I was pretty confused, but whatever I made out was pretty interesting. I'm worried that I'm too much a scatter brain for philosophy, and not good at understanding abstract things, but I'm still looking forward to it. I hope it will help my dimwittedness.

The guy that let me borrow his pen kept sniffling his nose during class, so against my better judgement, I finally reached into my bag and offered him my wad of toilet paper. I thought he would be disgusted, but he politely took one piece to wipe his nose. His nose sounded SUPER stuffy (it started making my nose feel stuffy, and I just wanted him to blow it all out, dang it man!), but he didn't use the rest. It was pretty comical, but my deflated ego couldn't help deflating a little more.

At one point during class, Professor McNamara had to wipe the board, but he didn't have an eraser. He asked if anyone had any tissues he could use, so the guy offered the toilet paper. As he was giving it to the professor, he looked at me and said "It has two uses!", so I wouldn't feel bad. I couldn't help laughing to myself though, because that toilet paper definitely had more than two uses.

After class, I went to Mass with Krista, and let's just say I can't wait to figure out how to visit Kristin so I can get some sort of refreshment on Sundays now and then.

Krista and I then went to the Mensa, where we got our food, then awkwardly stood amidst a rush of people, trying to figure out where and who were we going to eat with it.
Somehow or another, I ended up sitting at a table with Monika, her two LCI friends (Iryna and Veronika), and three other girls. I didn't feel particularly warm and fuzzy towards the other girls, though they were nice enough, and I tried to make some conversation with them.

The LCI students, however, particularly Iryna, were super funny and were asking all about meals. They thought the idea of a PB&J sandwich was weird, and loved the idea of Thanksgiving dinner. I walked back to my room with Irnya, and she gave me one of her composition books when I mentioned I needed to buy some at Gertrudes. She was super sweet and funny, and was so happy when we parted, that she shook my hand! It was the funniest thing how she was so excited, and put her hand out to shake mine to show how excited she was.

When Krista got back to the room, we set out to Gertrude's to get the books. We found it was closed for another hour (the Gaming shops close for two or three hours in the middle of the day for lunch), so we piddled around. We found the bakery, got some sweet pastry thing there that even Krista liked (and she doesn't like doughnuts! scandal, I know!), and waited in the rain for that hour. Once we got our books, Krista had to hurry to class, so I read some of my history homework, than my deflated ego decided to reward its patheticness with an hour nap.

After Krista's class, we went to dinner, and I had pork and these weird noodle things that were really good and tasted (but didn't look like) Grandma Long's noodles. Because Krista had a good day socializing but felt done with talking to people, and because I was still feeling sorry for myself, we ate by ourselves.

Dinner done, I spent the next couple hours reading history and a bit of Plato in the tea kitchen while listening to some Gregorian chant to make me feel more at home (plus Fr. Shell said it's good to listen to). While I was in the kitchen, the super friendly girl from my history class walked in to wash some dishes. We started talking a little bit about classes, then ended up talking for about twenty-five minutes about random things. It was really nice and the girl was very welcoming - she kinda reminded me of Emily.

I'm trying to "discipline myself" and get in to some sort of schedule that Fr. Shell says I need (ya feel me, John? ;)) so I'm trying to make it a regular thing where on school nights at nine, I go to the Kartrause and pray the Rosary.

It usually takes me a long time to pray the Rosary by myself, because my mind rambles all over the place, but when I was almost done, I heard some people singing the Salve Regina in the back of the church. I quickly finished, then walked out to talk to them once they had finished.
They seem like a nice couple, and when I asked that if they also make their Rosary/Salve Regina time a regular thing, if I could join them, they were really nice and said yes (but they're not sure if they're always going to do it at that time/that place)

So I come back to the room, my ego still pretty deflated, but feeling better for having heard them sing. I'm trying to get over my self pity and offer it to God, but I'm a big baby, so keep praying for me please!

Now I'm going to try to get to sleep on time, so I can be all bright eyed and chirpy tomorrow. Wish me luck.

Day Two

I almost missed breakfast again today, but I just made it in time! For breakfast, all the Mensa has is Greek yogurt (unsweetened, not refrigerated = nasty), some granola, some rolls, and a cheese and meat tray. The roll with a slice of meat and cheese was actually pretty tasty, but I foresee myself quickly becoming tired of it after a couple weeks.

After that, we had really long meeting in the Kartause's library, met the faculty, and people told us about a lot of stuff, the majority of which I've already forgotten.

After this meeting, Mr. Pipp (the director of Student Life in Gaming - very funny, reminds me of John) took us on a short walk around Gaming. Gaming is known for its banks and hair salons - I think Mr. Pipp said it had four banks and five hair salons, which is rather ridiculous for a town of its size.
Some of the little shops looked promising - there was a pizza/kebab shop run by a Turkish man and his sons (Mr. Pipp highly recommended the kebabs), a toy/office supply store, and a bakery. I really like bakeries, and this one sells some kind of deep fried pastry on a stick, which sound DELICIOUS! I'm predicting this treat will be a big highlight of my stay in Gaming.

After the tour, we had lunch. Pork, carrots, noodles, and a meat sauce for the noodles - everything was strangely super bitter, so I ended up eating a bowl of granola for lunch. It was also pretty tasty, but I'm not sure if I used milk or half and half with it, because they keep the glass kegs with the dairy next to the coffee machine, and they don't label them. Because of this, I ended up drinking half and half instead of milk last night at supper, but I like half and half, so it all worked out!

When I finished my super yummy granola and milk/half and half bowl, I came back to the room and slept solidly for an hour, so that I almost missed the next meeting (noticing a trend here?)
This meeting was all about housing rules and was long and Krista was freaking out during its two hour duration because she STILL hasn't gotten her suitcase from the airport yet. After the meeting, Krista immediately jumped up to talk to Mr. Pipp about the suitcase, while I got in one of six groups led by RA's for a tour of the campus itself.
The tour was helped orient me (though I've already forgotten all the room's official names), but it was longer than it needed to be because we had to wait on other groups to go through.

When we finally finished, I went back to the room to check on Krista. She got her suitcase thing figured out, but didn't have any respectable clothes to wear to eat supper with me, and our LCI roommate (who's actually Bosnian, not Slovenian) had to go to a meeting, so I was on my own. I almost chickened out and waited 45 minutes for Monika (the LCI roommate) to finish her meeting, but I decided to be brave and talk to some people on my own since my nose has FINALLY stopped dripping!

So I got to the Mensa, and the main food line looked nasty, so again, I went for the roll with meat and cheese. After retrieving my small morsel of food, I looked about the crowded Mensa for the least intimidating place to sit. There were some really crowded tables, some super long tables with a couple scary girls sitting at one end, one table with only one person sitting at it, and one completely empty table. I almost went with the completely empty table, but remembered I was there to be brave, so I actually asked the loner if I could sit with him. He seemed kinda surprised, but said yes.

After I finished praying, he introduced himself and started talking to me about Gaming and asking me about my flight. He was really nice, had a good manner of speaking (at least compared to most of the other guys I've met so far) and he's apparently really good at soccer because his high school team went to Europe for a soccer tournament thingy, and won more than two games/matches (which he said was a first for an American team, since Europeans are so in to soccer). He was quite impressed when I told him about John wrestling for Wisconsin, and he said he liked wrestling too (he's from Ohio, and was talking about the place where they hold states, and how they have sixteen mats out and it's huge and amazing and I couldn't help thinking about Dad disparaging Ohio wrestling so I just played super ignorant and smiled and waved, boys!)
We were talking about wrestling for a bit when five or six people came and sat with us, including the guy's girlfriend, who is an RA and pretty nice (I had to laugh at myself, because now I understood the guy's slight confusion when I asked to sit at his table - what kind of hermit was I that I didn't know he had a girlfriend?! Craziness!)

The guy that sat next to me (he has an identical twin that was in my campus tour group the hour before) started talking about wrestling too and how it's so fun and fun to watch, to which I said it was nasty for girls to watch, and he had to agree with that. A girl, named Audrey, sat on the other side of me, and I mostly talked to her for the rest of the meal, since she had spent the week before in Ireland.
She was super nice, and I had a lot of fun talking to her. She told me how Cork, Ireland was really nice, but Dublin wasn't so much. However, she and her group were trying to figure out which pub to try one evening, and an old man was watching them. When he sad them heading into one pub, he called out "you don't want to go to that one, unless you want to get beat up tonight", and then he recommended a different pub. They followed his recommendation (it turned out to be a really good pub) and as he walked about, he called out "good choice!"
Basically, since the big crowd of people came over and sat at the table, I couldn't help snickering to myself about how I accidentally picked a popular people table, of all tables, when I was being such a chicken before.

So, that was a pretty fun/ny dinner, I felt extremely proud of my social "success" and now am rewarding myself by dedicating my last couple hours of today to being a recluse in the room with Krista, eating Milka, and reading a book on Krista's tablet.
Btw, here's Krista's blog.

Day One

This is the first official full day at the school! I missed breakfast this morning, because of my phone's alarm clock. The phone hadn't set it's clock to Austria time, so I set the clock for 1 a.m., to get up at 7 a.m. in time for a shower and then breakfast. However, I had difficulty sleeping last night (hashbrowns: jetlagprobs), as did Krista, so about six in the morning, we were both up and tried to figure out my Google voice number thingy. Somehow, during the fixing of that, my phone set the time correctly to Vienna time, but didn't adjust the alarm.

So I was woken up by Krista knocking at the door about half hour before we had to leave, and as a result, missed breakfast. For the tour we went through later that day, I spent most of my time counting down the minutes till lunch.

We took about an hour drive to the monastery of Melk, which was cool. We had Mass in their super Baroque church first thing, and that was nice (no guitars! yay!), but again, my nose was super drippy and distracting. Also, they had a new alter in the middle of the church, which was, well, kinda lame. I mean, they had such an awesome high alter! Why not use it?

Special rooms where royalty would sit during Mass - I wonder what they did for communion?

The architecture was amazing, and then we got a guided tour through a couple parts of the monastery, half of which was through these rooms specially set up for tours. These special rooms were all mainly lit by colored lighting, so they called different rooms "the Green room" and "the Blue room" and basically the lighting was really weird and strange, so that was funky.

Anywho, they did have a lot of cool artifacts, like a really cool expensive Crucifix and a travel breviary; they also had a bunch of sacred vessels on display, which I thought was kinda dumb. Like, I know they're super expensive and ancient and whatnot, but they were made for the Mass, so I just think they should be used for that and not just put on display. It was kinda sad.

This is the view from the monastery into the valley below (the river is the Danube, which is not blue)

The monastery also had a really cool library, but we weren't allowed to take pictures, so you'll have to look it up. We walked through a room called "the Marble Room" because, you guessed it, there was lots of marble! It was a really pretty room, and used by royalty (particularly Empress Maria Theresa) for dining. The room had a cool grating on the floor and some windows so that while everyone was eating, they could hear the musicians playing (below? I blanked out on that part)

Special windows!

Special grating! 

Notice the weird foot sculpture booklet - this was in the tourist shop)

After we finished the tour, we had to wait awhile for the rest of the groups to finish their tour, and then we got a nice lunch (at last!!) at a restaurant connected to the monastery. First we had a really yummy soup with weird little puffy balls in it, then a meal consisting of super tender pork, sauerkraut, and a weird sausage looking thing that Krista and I decided tasted like breaded potatoes smooched together. We're still not sure what it was, but it tasted okay. Then we got a yummy apricot cheesecake (the country around Melk is known for it's huge apricots) and headed back to campus!

Krista and I spent the remaining time we had before dinner and the next two orientation meetings began by cleaning up the room a bit, and walking down to the local grocery store (which our Austrian driver of the previous day called a mall, to the astonishment to a couple girls)

The store is about a five or ten minute walk, which is super nice. I got some cleaning stuff, and also, snacks! Right now I'm eating a super yummy Milka bar. Also, I got a little carton of chocolate milk; the chocolate flavoring was excellent, but the milk itself was rather weak. I plan on making a series of blog posts, ranking all the chocolate milk encounter.

At dinner, Krista and I walked in, got our food, and sat at the only table unoccupied. We started talking about being terrible at talking to people (I'm excusing myself until I'm finished with this drippy nose/cough thing) when a friend of me and Krista walked over with two of her friends, and we finished off the meal with them! It was a bit awkward, but actually pretty nice.
Then we had to rush to the orientation meetings, which last about two and a half hours. The second half of the meeting was mostly about alcohol, which would've been extremely boring for me since I don't share the same excitement as most of the students about finally being able to drink!!!! omg!!!, but the speaker, Mr. Pipp, was super funny.

We just got out of that, and now I'm going to finish that Dickens book, eat more chocolate and go to sleep. Hopefully my head won't get mad at me for trying to sleep at the "wrong" time again tonight.

Made it!

After some frustrations with United delaying my first flight to Chicago (O'Hare was a big mess with weather conditions - Krista got stuck for a long time there and I'm still waiting for her to arrive), a nice United man helped me transfer to Washington, and then I had a little wait there before the eight hour flight to Vienna. I had an interesting little event with leaving my bags unattended for fifteen minutes to get dinner, then coming back to find out that if I had gotten back two minutes later, the airport police would've come and confiscated my bags. *whew!* Another crisis averted! 

Everything went pretty smoothly, aside from the fact that my nose was drippy the ENTIRE time and I didn't always have access to tissues. An Austrian lady had the window seat, and I sat between her and an America guy. He thought I was Austrian at first and asked me if I spoke English. 

"Yes!"

"Oh, good, because I...how do you say it, no speake Englase?"

"Um, I don't know - I don't speak German."

Anyways, he seemed like a jolly fellow - made me think of how someone would describe a typical happy American businessman. 

I watched a movie, then tried sleeping, which was very sporadic, thanks to my drippy nose. 

When we started coming down into Vienna, my ears went kinda nuts so I couldn't hear anything well for a good while (my left ear hearing is still wonky). I've had to repeat myself a lot so far because I can't tell how loud I'm talking, so I just try to talk normally, which apparently isn't loud enough. 

The food on the plane tasted decent enough, but I definitely felt the aftereffects of it. Combined with that, and my drippy nose, I haven't ventured to talk to many people and I avoided the Mensa (cafe). 

I slept for half of the two hour drive to Gaming in a bus driven by a very handsome young Austrian who was teaching a girl and her boyfriend how to say "I love pickles" in German. 

For the parts of the drive I was awake, the landscape seemed very similar to something you would see in New Hampshire (I've never been there, but I imagine it'd be like that...plus I overheard another student saying the same thing) - hilly and pinetree-y. 

The campus isn't quite as secluded and up in the mountains as I thought it would be, but it's very pretty! I still have to find those "alive" hills yet, Dad. ;)

The room Krista and I are sharing with a Bosnian exchange student is really nice - it has a beautiful window sill, which we're not allowed to sit on! Why have such a pretty window sill if you're not supposed to sit on it? Hmph! Speaking of that rule, there's a TON of rules for living in the dorm - more so because the Kartruase is used as a hotel in the summer. I'm sure I'll feel the benefits of living in a dorm soon, but for right now, I'm missing those commuter privileges (not having/not knowing rules) 

I can't WAIT to go to sleep tonight! Also, I found the Dickens book and the St. Therese book I thought I had lost in my backpack (so clever of me to put them in the back!), so I'm feeling much better about this shindig now. Thanks for all the prayers! This first week is gonna be a tiring one, what with learning all the rules and going on all the excursions, so I'll definitely be needing them! 

Hello all!

...I know, another blog? Things are getting a little out of hand here!

Anyways, this blog is pretty much for me to update family/friends on what I'm doing (or not doing, because I can be a big ol' lazy bum) in Europe this semester, and also, for my international crafting neighbors.

For my crafting pals, I wish I could let you all know ahead of time when and where I'll be visiting so we could try to meet up, but since I'll be travelling with a small group of student friends of mine most of the time, it's hard to plan too far in advance. However, whenever I do know of my plans in advance, or if I'm just trying to find a good place to visit for the weekend, I will post here so hopefully we can get in touch and meet up!

Everyone, I have no idea how often I'll be able to post, in between studying, travelling and the crummy WIFI on campus, but when I get a chance, I'll be posting!