Hallo Everyone! After 30 hours of travel time, I finally made it to Klagenfurt, Austria! First, let me just tell you about my journey here. I left from Des Moines, but weather was bad in Chicago (where my connecting flight was) so the bag checker guy told us that our flight was leaving in 15 minutes! We hurried up and said our goodbyes to everyone and made it on time!
Our plane was completely empty! Well, maybe not completely…there was one other girl, our stewardess, and the pilot. The weather was kind of bad, so we had to circle the airport for an hour before landing. Then, after boarding our next plane, we had to sit for three hours so our plane could be “de-iced.” Once they finished that, a snow removal truck broke down right in front of our plane—how unlucky! Finally at 7 PM, we took off, and began our 8 hour and 20 minute journey across the Atlantic. We all had TVs in front of our seats, so I watched Winn Dixie as I ate my airplane dinner. The dinner was smoked salmon salad, pasta with mushrooms, and bread rolls. It was horrible. The only thing I ate was the roll. Everything else smelled, and tasted like plastic.
Natalie and I attempted to sleep on the plane, but we were sharing the middle three seats, so it didn’t work out very well. I ended up getting in one hour just before they served us breakfast—which was slices of ham, salami, cheese, bread rolls, and a chocolate chip muffin. I ate two pieces of salami, a piece of cheese, and my roll. …it wasn’t very good either.
Then, we got off the plane, got our passport stamped!, and found our luggage. That part wasn’t too hard—we just followed the crowd. Then, we were on a search for the Sudbahnhof bus. That took quite a bit of time, and a few conversations with some Austrians (who spoke very little English). The bus cost 6 euro (we found out later that we could’ve taken a train for only 1.5 euro!).
We were dropped off at the train station, and asked a lady for help who was actually heading to Klagenfurt too! We bought our tickets (40 euro each), and waited about an hour and a half for our train. The lady that we met was named Rose. She was from California, near LA, and was going to Klagenfurt to visit a friend that taught at the university. We later learned that she is extremely rich (this was like her 15th trip to Europe, and she’s been to EVERYWHERE else in the world), she has three daughters, she has a phd in economics and politics, and her husband is a dentist and teaches at a university. She was very sweet, and ended up buying me and Natalie some kesa semmel (cheese bread) at the train station.
We got on the train and sat in a nice little cabin thing, with 6 chairs—3 facing 3. We were sitting with a nineteen-year-old Austrian boy named Sebastian Jank (pronounced Yank). He spoke very good English, was very intelligent, and VERY cute. He lives in Corinthia, probably a two hour drive from Klagenfurt, and he invited Natalie and I to go skiing with him over there. Apparently he has connections, and if we go with him, he can get us free ski rentals! So, we exchanged numbers and email addresses and will hopefully be going over there sometime soon!
When it was getting near the time to get off the train, we got all of our bags near the door. We thought we had one more stop before ours, but at the last minute found out it was ours! Rose was off, and Natalie was off with one bag, but I was still on the train when the doors closed! I was incredibly scared, but thank goodness Sebastian was still with me! He told me to get off on the next stop, and ride the train back to the station. So, ten minutes later, he helped me off the train (with my two bags, my huge backpack, and one of Natalie’s suitcases because she had no time to grab it before the doors closed). He told me he’d email me that night to make sure I made it back alright.
So there I was. Alone, in a brand new country, and with four huge bags to lug around. My process for walking with all this stuff was this: I had my 50 pound backpack on my back, and my purse on the handle of one of the rolling bags. I would take two rolling bags about ten steps, and then grab my purse off the handle of one, walk back to the other rolling bag (while keeping my eye on the two I just moved), move that one to the other two, grab another bag and walk ten more steps, and do the entire process about ten thousand more times. It was quite the process.
Anyway, I eventually made it to the posted time schedule, but obviously had NO IDEA how to read it. Luckily, a nice lady came walking up the stairs who could speak a bit of English. She told me my bus was coming at 17:44 (5:44 non-military time), in ten minutes. I got back on, and eventually made it to the right station. I was hoping Natalie would still be there when I got off, but nope, I was still all alone! This station was much busier, and I was even more scared! In order to get inside, I had to go up an escalator, and with three rolling bags, it was impossible to do. So, I left one bag at the bottom, took two up, left them there, ran back down and grabbed the other and then luckily, a kinda scary looking Austrian man helped me down the next set of escalators. Then, I sat with a kind girl that spoke some English. I borrowed her cell phone to call home, but it wouldn’t dial out. So, I sat there unsure of what to do for the next hour and a half. I kept trying to listen for anybody speaking English, but there was absolutely no one.
Eventually, I remembered that I printed off the address to my dorm, and dug it out of one of my bags. I went and exchanged some money, and grabbed a taxi (all while using the same luggage-moving process). The taxi driver spoke no English. So, I just took out my paper and pointed to the address, and off we went! The taxi cost 10 euro, and I didn’t know if I was supposed to tip, but I ended up giving him 3 euro…the only small “dollars” (but they’re actually coins) that I had.
Once I got in, I found out that Natalie was out to eat with Lance, so I had no way of getting into my room. I sat in some other guys room (who spoke English!) for the next 20 minutes and waited for her to get back. I was soooo glad to see her! Apparently, her and the girl that picked her up drove to the station that I got off at first, and when I wasn’t there, assumed that I took a taxi to the school.
So, I went into my room, dropped my bags, and realized I was STARVING. Lance and Natalie walked me to the Uni Pizzeria and I ordered a salad to go (6.5 euro). FYI, there is no salad dressing here! I think everyone just uses oil and vinegar…so, that’s what I used. I ended up only eating the cheese off of the salad. Then I took a shower (and dried off with a hand towel because I had no room to pack any big towels)…because after 30 hours of traveling, I smelled horrible. Natalie and I unpacked everything, rearranged our room, and went to bed. Which, by the way, I didn’t bring any sheets or blankets; luckily there were sheets here, but no blankets. So, the only “blanket” I have right now is a mattress pad.
I slept for a good 2 hours but then at 7am (US time—and I know that because the only time-telling device I have is my cell phone which is stuck on US time) I was wide awake. I was completely worried because I hadn’t called my parents yet, so I knew they were worried and wondering if I made it here okay. And I just had a million other things running through my head. Finally at 10:30am, I fell asleep, and I slept until 1:30 pm (Austrian time).
Natalie, Lance, Lances roomie (Rom—a 26 year-old Indian that is doing research here for his doctorate), and I all went to the supermarket. It was raining out, but we took a bus (and didn’t pay for it :/). The supermarket is called Hofer, but has the same symbol as an Aldi’s back home. I can’t even begin to tell you how weird it was shopping there! I had no clue what most of the stuff was, but managed to get 27, 27 (they use a comma and not a period between euros and cents) worth of food—and finally some toilet paper! Rom has lived here for six months already, and speaks German, so he helped me out quite a bit.
We got home and I made some rice (reis) and mixed vegetabales (steakgemuse) in some olive oil (olivenul), and sprinkled on some salz and pfeffer. We do not have any plates or silver wear yet, so I ate it out of the pan with the spatula—real classy.
….that brings me to what I am doing now! I’m sorry this email is so long—I promise to keep all of the others at least half this size! I am attatching a video of where I live, and a picture of natalie, me, and Sebastian on the train. And also a picture of Rose (she was trying to hide from me, so it’s not the greatest). I LOVE YOU ALL AND MISS YOU BEYOND WORDS!!!!! Adios! (I don’t know how to say goodbye in German yet).
No comments:
Post a Comment