...just so you can keep everyone straight, I've made a CHARACTER CHART! :)

Alright, well because I know how much trouble my mom has keeping all the people that I talk about straight, I decided to make a character map of everyone!
This is Me! I live in Uniheim with Natalie and am friends with all of these people.
Natalie- My friend from UNI, roomie over here, and the girl that I spend every waking minute with! She is also friends with all of these people.
Lance- Another friend from UNI. He lives directly below me, but not for long. He is way homesick and has decided not to stay here for the semester. He'll be leaving in a couple weeks. He is friends with all of the exchange students.
Petra- This is my entree, or contact person. She is an Austrian student studying in Klagenfurt, and the girl that I am suppose to go to with questions.
Sibylle (Billy)- This is Natalie's entree. Her and Petra know one another and are friends.
Sebastian- The 19 year old kid I met on my first train ride from Vienna to Klagenfurt. He is currently doing his 8 month military service in his hometown of Hermagor (which is about 1.5 hours away from Klagenfurt). We've gone on skiing together in Hermagor and soon he'll be visiting us in Klagenfurt.
Alberto- 25 years old. From Italy. Lives in Uniheim (my dorm) and on my floor. He is friends with Conny and Markus.
Conny- 21 years old. From Austria. Lives on my floor in Uniheim. Is SUPER sweet...my favorite girl friend. Is friends with Alberto, Markus, and Clemmons.
Markus- 26 years old. From Austria, near Hermagor. Lives in Uniheim, 2 floors below me. Is friends with Conny and Alberto.
Clemmons- 22 years old. Lives directly across the hall from me. Super nice. Is friends with Conny. ...I also hang out with many of his other friends, but they aren't on this character chart!
Christian (aka Blabi)- Lives in Mozartheim (another dorm). LOVES CANDY AND FUTBOL! Is friends with Christoph, Christian, and Marcos.
Christian- Is 24 years old. Lives in Mozartheim. IS A TRIPLETT! Is extremely smart. Is friends with Blabi, Christoph, and Marcos.
Christoph- Lives in Mozartheim. Very very nice! Is friends with Blabi, Christian, and Marcos.
Marcos- 28 years old. An Exchange student from Nicaragua. Lives in Mozartheim. One of me and Natalie's best guy friends. Is friends with Blabi, Christian, Christoph, and all the other exchange students.
Misty- An exchange student from Kansas. Lives in Concordia (another dorm). Is friends with all of the other exchange students. She knew Gavin before coming here.
Gavin- An exchange student from Kansas. Lives in Concordia. Is friends with all the other exchange students, Blabi, and Christoph. He knew Misty before coming here.
Hope- An exchange student from Australia. Lives in Mozartheim. Is friends with all the other exchange students. Is just now learning how to ride a bike--Gavin is teaching her.
Audrey- An exchange student (kinda) from Ireland. Always a sweetheart. Is friends with all the other exchange students.
Al- 28 years old. Works at the rec-center. Is the man in charge of all of the exchange student trips. ...basically our tourguide. He is super funny and nice.

Alright, that's all for now. As soon as I make more friends I'll try to remember to add them to this!

MacDon's, The Missing Mars Bar, and My Class Schedule!

WELL—Wednesday night Natalie, Christoph, Christian (aka Blabi), Marcos, and I all went to a pub and watched some futbol. The Klagenfurt soccer coach ended up coming in and watched too. Which was pretty exciting because apparently he’s like a small town celebrity here. BY THE WAY...there was a yellow lab in the pub with someone...just wondering around. And that's a very normal occurence.

After the game we went to McDonalds and got a shake and some curly fries. A couple weird things about the MacDon’s here: They charge 20 cents for every pack of ketchup you get. And…they serve the curly fries with sour cream. I thought it sounded weird, but I tried it and decided I like it better than ketchup! And, there is shrimp on the menu! And, there is no such thing as “super sized” (not that I wanted to!). AND weirdest of all, when you walk in the first set of doors there is a place for your dog to eat—for free. I couldn’t even believe that.

Even though yesterday was Thursday…I’m having a hard time remembering everything I did but here is what I can think of… Natalie and I woke up around 10 and went to the University so Blabi could help us figure out what classes we are going to take. We ended up having to go talk to some advisor to ask a few questions and then when we were ready to sign up, we released we didn’t have a username and password—and we had no clue how to get one. So, anyway, we went home and made lunch and I asked around and eventually managed to get a name and password. Whew.

At 2:30, we went to the city center—which is called Heilegengeis Platz—to get a few things from Woolworths (the closest thing to a target…but really not even close) and from Spar (the closest thing to a Fareway). We met a friend from Kansas there—Gavin—and helped him search for a man-bag (because all guys seem to have one over here), but we had no luck. After all our shopping was done, we went over to Mozartheim to meet Blabi so that he could help us register for classes.

SO, starting this Monday, this is what my schedule will be:

Monday— 2:00-4:00 Topics in American Studies
5:30-7:00 English for Computing 1

Tuesday— 2:00-4:00 Topics in Australian Studies
5:30-7:00 Kickboxing

Wednesday— 8:30-10:00 Survey of English Linguistics
2:30-4:30 English for Business Administration 1

Thursday— 4:00-6:00 English for Business Administration 2
8:30-10:00 Ab-Power

Friday— Absolutely NOTHING!

Natalie also has a good schedule, but she doesn’t have class on Thursday or Friday! Talk about amazing! I’m pretty excited for all of these ones—especially my first class…it’s based on the Vietnam war, and we’ll be reading a book that I read my senior year of high school…so that shouldn’t be too bad. Oh yeah…all of these classes are taught in English—I wouldn’t pass a single one if they were in German.

ANYWAY, we left Blabi’s and went back home. We cooked supper and then watched some TV off our computer. Earlier that day I put a Mars bar (a milky way) in the freezer so I could have a snack after dinner. BUT, when I went to get it, it was gone! Evidently someone stole it—and believe me, I was MAD! I know, it was only a candy bar…but I had been looking forward to it all day long! So, I settled for some popcorn, ate that and went to bed.

This morning I woke up and went for my run. Remember how after my first run this month I could only go about ten minutes before being out of breath and walking?? WELL, today I ran for 45 minutes STRAIGHT, and then walked for 45 minutes afterwards. I’m not back in shape yet…but I’m definitely making some progress! Oh yeah, and I saw someone else running in shorts and t-shirt today!

After running, I came home and could 2 sausages for lunch (aka hotdogs) and now here I am! I hope you all have a great Leap Year Day!

Saturday Night til Today

Recap:

Saturday night a ton of us went out to Saluds (the Mexican restaurant) for happy hour. Everything was incredibly expensive, so Natalie and I both just got one drink and we sat around and talked to everyone. Then we moved on and went to our first disco. We had to pay 4 euro to go in, and you had to be 21. Apparently I look 21 because they didn’t even question me, but it definitely took a while for them to let Natalie in.

This is Marcos and I at Salud's.
This is inside the disco!
Anyway, we danced until 4:30 in the morning—and when we left the party was still going strong. I’m pretty sure it stayed open till 6am or so. When we were standing outside, an Austrian boy came up and asked where we were from. We told him and then he started SCREAMING at us. He was cussing about Bush (because EVERYONE hates him over here) and saying a lot of other stuff about America. So, instead of listening to him, we just walked away. The walk home was about thirty minutes long and on the way back we found an open gas station so we went in and picked up a frozen pizza. We came home, cooked it, talked to Toni and Christy on skype, and then finally around 6:30 am, we went to bed. It was a very long night.

On Sunday, Natalie and I were incredibly sore from our runs the day before, so we thought walking might make us feel a little bit better. So we ventured out in our shorts and t-shirts (once again, the only two people dressed like that) and walked for about 3 hours. We followed the lake and walked to the next town—Kupendorf. It was incredibly nice out and there were people all over the place! The skate park was packed, and the bike trails were covered with bikers and walkers.

Monday was a fairly bad day. We woke up at nine and had to go to the BIB (international office) to hand in a copy of our passport. Natalie asked Christina (one of the in charge ladies) if she could make a copy so she went to try and apparently couldn’t get it to work. She came back and started saying something in German. She knows we can’t speak German, so Natalie said “what?” And then Christina said “you guys need to speak German,” in an incredibly mean way. So after that, we left and walked over to the rec-center to sign up for classes. The line was INCREDIBLY LONG. We waited in line for over an hour and when we finally got to the window, found out that we needed proof that we are an exchange student—which we didn’t have. We had our Klagenfurt ID’s but apparently that wasn’t good enough.

So, we walked all the way back to our room got our print off and came back. Luckily the line was short enough by that time that we only had to wait another 15 minutes. We ended up signing up for Kickboxing and Ab Power…we’ll see how they go. Both of them are only once a week so it shouldn’t be too strenuous.

Monday night we went over to Mozartheim and hung out with a few friends. We didn't really do much...just played Wii and hung out. The boys insisted on walking us home...which is incredibly cute and they always do it.
The girl Natalie created for Wii--Janellizl.

And this is my girl--Os'madfer.

Tuesday was a GREAT DAY! I woke up around ten and went for a 45 minute run. Normally, people here don’t say hi or smile when they pass by one another, but today I decided to try it. I did it to every single person that I ran by (and there were quite a few) just to see what their reaction would be. All I’d say was “morgen!” (morning!) and everyone was very pleased to hear it. They all were a little startled at first, but then they’d smile and say the same thing back. It was a fun little experiment.
At 3:00 we went to the rec-center to pay Al—the tour guide—75 euro for our weekend trip to Slovenia. And then walked with Misty and Hope over to Mozartheim (another dorm). We met about 10 other people there and then took a bus to the city. We all got Kebobs. It is a Turkish food, but it’s pretty much exactly like a Gyro. It was very very good. After words we went to an Italian ice cream shop and got some ice cream. It was a great bonding experience.
Lance and his Kebob.

Natalie and I had to leave early because we were meeting a few other friends back at Mozartheim at 6. We got there and pretty much left right away. We went to the futball stadium to get tickets for the game that night. Girls always get in free, so that was a plus! Then we walked back to Mozartheim and just hung out and ate some popcorn before heading over. At 8 we left for the game. IT WAS SO MUCH FUN!!!! It was Klagenfurt vs. Graz. Both are Austrian teams, but Graz is much better than Klagenfurt so pretty much everyone was going for them. They ended up winning 2-0.
Delilah, Me and Nat at the game.Klagenfurt is white, Graz is yellow.This is Christian--the new boy I like :)

All of us after the game

Afterwards back at Mozartheim
Afterwards we went back to Mozartheim and ended up staying there until a little after 2. Then I went back to the dorms and hung out in Clemmons’ room. There were five of us hanging out in there (watching youtube videos) until 4 am. At that time Nat and I were exhausted so we both left and went to bed.

Today I woke up around 12. I made lunch and then got ready to go play soccer. We met at 2 at Mozartheim with a bunch of other international students. We ended up playing on an old hockey slab. It was incredibly fun. We played until 4 and then went to the grocery store, came home, ate pizza, and here I am! In about an hour we are going with a few friends to a pub to watch some more futbol.

Alright…time for me to go get ready. Love you all!

This is Graz's fan club. They chanted the entire time. I loved it!

...a few things from today

I just got back from a 3 hour run/walk around Klagenfurt. It was so beautiful outside--60 degrees! I feel so sorry for everyone in Iowa. I know you are all suffering this winter--I heard it's the 2nd worst one in all of Iowa's history...I'm not sorry I'm missing it.

I noticed that not a single person was wearing shorts and a tshirt. I was the ONLY person. Most people were even wearing their winter coats. I couldn't believe it. I was wearing less than half of what they had on and I was sweating like crazy. I was wondering if maybe it's illegal, or weird, to wear shorts before a certain day of the year. Like not before May or something. I dont know...but I sure got quite a few weird looks--I guess it could have just been that everyone was shocked at how white a humans legs could actually be.

Also, everyone's dogs are so well trained. They are rarely on leashes and they follow their owners so well. If I ever took Chuck on a walk without his leash I'd never see him again.

Another thing-- there are swans here! I'd never seen one until I got here but I see them all the time just floating up the stream here. Gosh I love it.

all about my GREAT week!

An update on my last week:

Monday: Well Monday, I pretty much did nothing. I was completely focused on planning out the trip for when everyone comes to Europe. “Everyone” is my beautiful sister, my charming little brother, Chandler Eley, Grant Robinson, Adam Bell, Chad Phares, and Jamie Olson. They are all coming on May 28th, and basically…IM THRILLED! I can’t wait for them to see this place.

Also, on Monday Natalie and I bought a plane ticket from Venice to Rome for March 13th. My Uncle Kris and Aunt Krista are going to Italy to visit their daughter (my cousin) that is also studying abroad this semester, so Natalie and I are going to visit them and help celebrate Megan’s 21st birthday! I can’t wait, it’s going to be an absolute blast!!!

Tuesday: After class on Tuesday, Natalie and I went to the lake and studied for our final exam in our Deutsch class. The weather was gorgeous. We sat on the dock and I rolled up my jeans (to try and minimize the pasty white shade my legs have become) and just enjoyed the lake. Afterwards we went home, made some dinner, and then showered and went over to Marcos’s dorm. We met up with two of his friends and then walked to a pub. There were about four soccer games on, so we watched those and then headed home around 12. I studied for about ten more minutes for my final, and then went to bed.

Wednesday: Wednesday was my final. It definitely wasn’t easy, but I felt I did okay on it. After class I got home and saw that I had a package! I went to the post office right away to see what it was. My jaw dropped when I opened it. It was a pillow made from Brad’s old jeans and flannel. Brad’s mom and sister made it for me. It is so perfect. Being here—thousands of miles away from home—makes me miss Brad all the more. Having this, something of his that I can hold onto every night, just makes me feel closer to him, or like I can feel him with me. There is an angel pin on it too—so now I really am sleeping with angels every night. I love it. It’s absolutely perfect.

After lunch, Natalie and I went into town. We went to H&M and then to the mall. I finally bought a pair of cowboy boots. For like 2 years now I’ve been looking for the most perfect pair, and I finally found them! I CANNOT WAIT to wear them. After shopping, Natalie and I went out to eat at a Mexican restaurant called Salud. We’d been craving Mexican—or anything that tasted somewhat normal—since we’d been here. We devoured a plate of nachos, and then took home about half of our meal for some leftovers. It was amazing. I tried to savor every single bite.

When we got home, Nat and I played dress up and took turns doing runway walks with all of our new clothes on. Clemmons happened to come in while we were all dressed up. It was quite embarrassing. We’re such girls.

After dress up I watched even more soccer. Clemmons, Hammes (a guy that lives diagonal from me), and I watched the Arsenal vs. Milan soccer game, and then half of another one. I love how everyone here is so obsessed with soccer. At home it’s all about football...but here soccer is what they live for—gosh it’s amazing.

Thursday: I got my final back in class. 97 out of 107. …so 91 percent. I’m okay with that. After class I went and got my student ID. My picture looks absolutely ridiculous. I got home and Lance (the other kid from UNI that’s here) and he said that he had mail for me. It got put in his box by mistake (for the second time now). I knew exactly what it was and ran downstairs to get it. I ran to the post office and got another package. This one was from my Mom and Dad. They sent me salad dressing (because it doesn’t exist here), grape jelly (because it doesn’t exist here), TWIX, a giant peanut butter cup, and a few other things that I feel like I can’t live without. It was amazing. I’ve already eaten half of the twix bars—and there were like 50.

Thursday night Marcos came over and we took a bus to the other side of town. We went to some Indian peoples' house and they cooked for us there. They made about four or five different things, and it was all SOOOO SPICY! My mouth was on fire. They said that they made some of the least spicy things they could just for us—but it was still the spiciest thing I have ever tasted in my entire life. I was sweating the entire time I ate it. I don’t know how they think that is enjoyable. We even ate with our fingers. They tried to teach us how to do it correctly, but I was absolutely horrible at it. I ended up with basically all my rice on my lap by the time I was done.

After eating all of us went to an Irish pub for an hour or so, came home and went to bed.

Friday: Today I went to class and got my certificate for finishing! That’s basically all we did in class. One of the other students, June (who is actually like 45 years old and from England) brought us a treat—flapjack. It’s pretty much like a no-bake cookie, but without the chocolate and peanut butter. Natalie was obsessed with it. An Indian kid also brought us a treat. But, after last nights experience, I couldn’t fully appreciate it. I didn’t feel like sweating again. It was alright, but I couldn’t finish it.

After class, Nat and I went grocery shopping and stocked our cupboards again. It seems like I got so much, but it was only 13 euro. I’ve definitely learned how to pinch my pennies.

We went to the bank and paid a couple bills, and then went to the rec center just to see what was there. Al (the guy that took us to Venice) works there, and he showed us around. He also talked to me for about 20 minutes about everything I have to do when everyone comes to visit me—where to go, how to do it, etc. He’s incredibly helpful.

Afterwards, we came home and bought another plane ticket for March 18th (for less than 20 euro!). We’ve decided that after we are done in Rome and Florence with my Aunt and Uncle, we are going to fly from Rome to London and stay for a few days traveling around London, Liverpool, and Manchester. From there we will fly/take a ferry over to Ireland and stay for a few days. I have two friends from UNI that are studying there, so we can stay with them. Also, Natalie has a friend over there, so we’ll pry end up staying there too. I’m pretty much thrilled beyond belief.

Around 4, Natalie and I took a nap, and didn’t wake up until 9:45. Since then we’ve just been sitting around and eating. Haha. Anyway, that was my week! We have all of next week off, so we are planning a trip to Budapest and Prague—we’ll see how that goes.
I hope all is well with everyone!

Love, Love, Love.


So Marcos does this all the time--just breaks out in song. I wanted to make sure I got at least one of his many songs on video.

My Ski Trip in Hermagor

Pretty much since we met Sebastian on the train, we’d been trying to find a day when we could all go skiing together, and well, yesterday was the day we went!

SO here is how it went:

I woke up at 4am—crazy, I know—and had to leave by 4:45 to catch our 5:00 bus. We made it to the bus stop a few minutes before five, only to realize that the first bus wasn’t actually coming until 5:52. So, my first thought—we’re screwed. We had to make it to the train station by 6:15 at the very latest to catch our 6:22 train. So, what did we do?? We walked. We walked for about forty minutes to the center of the city where we were able to catch a different bus that took us to the station.

Once we got to the station, we had to buy our ticket from a machine. Nat went to ask someone who could speak English if they would help us, and then we found our way to a bench to sit and wait for the next 30 or 40 minutes. Natalie left me for a little bit to go to the bathroom. As soon as she left, a 60 year old man came over to sit next to me. He said something to me, and as soon as he opened his mouth I could smell the alcohol on his breath. THEN, he began singing something to me in German. I was getting creeped out.

Soon Natalie was back—thank God. The guy then began to speak some English. He pulled out his wallet and showed us that he had no money. Then he proceeded to say that he has a place in Vienna, and we could stay there—for free—if we wanted. OH MY GOSH! Talk about scary! Natalie and I escaped and went upstairs and sat near a police guy to get away from him.

When it was time to board our train we tried to be as sneaky as possible to avoid having him sit next to us…and thank goodness it worked.

Anyway, after that fiasco, we finally arrived in Villach. Sebastian was at the top of the escalator to meet us and we all jumped in his tiny car. He drove us to Hermagor—his home town—and we stopped at Christof’s (Sebastian’s best friend) house. After sitting there for about 15 minutes, everyone was ready to go, and the four of us jumped into Sebastian’s car and drove about 15 minutes to Nassfeld—the ski resort in their village.

Once Nat and I had our gear rented, we were on our way up the mountain! Apparently the boys were expecting to have to teach us how to ski…so they were pleasantly surprised when they saw that we were alright skiers. But, obviously we didn’t even compare to how good they were. Sebastian said that they were pretty much born on skis, and I believe it. Both of them have won several contests, and we saw the trophies to prove it!

I was AMAZED at how good they were. Sebastian can literally ski down the entire mountain BACKWARDS! He tried to teach me, but to say the least, it didn’t go too well. At the end of the day I had fell a total of five times—with one of them being a face plant, and two others requiring me to spend a couple minutes putting my skis back on.

BUT, all in all it was a great day! We left Nassfeld around 3:45. Sebastian drove us to the train station in Hermagor because he had to work at 5 and wouldn’t have time to drive us all the way back to Villach. We got our tickets and then spent the next hour staying warm in a pub across the street.
We got on our bus, and I fell asleep almost instantly, I was sooo tired! After an hour we had to switch trains somewhere along the way, and then still had about a 15 minute ride to Klagenfurt. We got off and then took the first bus we thought would take us back to our dorm—but, surprise, surprise, it didn’t. We ended up on the completely opposite side of town. SO we got back on the bus and headed to the city where we got on the right bus and made it safe and sound back to our dorm around 8 pm.

By this time, I was STARVING. I took a shower and made supper and then was off to bed. I woke up this morning completely bruised up. But, all is good, and I am sooo happy that I got to spend yesterday skiing with Natalie and Sebastian—it was sooo much fun!

Here are a few pics from yesterday:


Right before we headed down...Natalie, Sebastian, Me, and Christof.

After a while--at like 10:30--the boys were ready for a beer. So this us in a pub at the top of the mountain.


The boys and their beer. Christof, Marcus (another friend who is a ski coach there), and Sebastian.

Me and Nat on the mountain.


A gorgeous view that I couldnt pass up.

Sebastian, Me, and Nat. This was taken by an automatic camera on the mountain.

This is Sebastian spinning in circles on his skis down the mountain. Pretty impressive if you ask me. Ignore my voice in this video. I sound so dumb.

After a short lesson, I tried to do the same thing.. ...gosh this is sooo embarrassing!

And here is another video of me trying to do the same thing. I'm only adding this so you can hear Sebastian's voice...it's soo cute!

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!

Alright, well, I’ve had an amazing past two days. Valentine’s Day isn’t that big of a deal here, but this year they had a huge party at the University. BUT—I’m pretty sure the best part of my day was getting a Valentine’s Day card from my best friend in the whole wide world. (thanks Toni). Then, a little later Lance gave me a Valentine that was mistakenly put in his mailbox. That one was from my Grandma—thanks!

Then, after a long 4 and a half hours of class, I got home and got dressed and ready to go out to eat with Natalie and our two friends Connie and Billy. We went to an Austrian restaurant and I ended up getting Weiner schnitzel—which is basically just like a breaded pork tenderloin, but for some reason it’s super popular over here. Connie got a salad, and there were potatoes on it! And apparently that’s pretty normal here. I tasted it and LOVED it.

Then we went back home and I showered again (because I already smelled like cigarette smoke from the restaurant). Then about 5 or 6 people came over and hung out before heading over the V-day party.

We didn’t go to the party until about 11:30. It was at the main university building…just across the street from my dorm. It was soooo much fun! First of all, there were probably 1000 people there (I might be exaggerating a bit…but it was PACKED) and every single guy there was GORGEOUS. There were also 5 bars set up there. FIVE! I couldn’t even believe it. The people here are like alcoholics.

Anyway, we stayed there until 3 or so…and I don’t think it got over until about 5 am. Then, the next morning I had to be awake and at my class by 9am. Talk about miserable. I don’t think I learned a single new word in class today…I couldn’t focus at all. There were only 7 of us in class so we decided to cut class a bit short and go out for dinner. That was pretty fun! We went to the UNI Pizzeria. Two of the ladies that I went with ordered pumpkin soup. It was like warm spicy pumpkin soup with whipped cream on top. WEIRD.

Anyway, I got home around 1:30 and then slept until 5:30—which was definitely well needed. Natalie and I made plans to go skiing with Sebastian tomorrow and we have to take a bus that will take us to the train station at 5am! So, basically I need to go to bed right now!

….oh and I forgot to mention, I got a flower from a boy!

Me, Natalie, Billy, and Connie at the Austrian restaurant.

Marcos and I in my room

Natlie, Hope(the australian girl), Audrey (the Irish girl), and me. ...and markus is to the far right but you cant see him very well.

Connie Me and Nat

At the UNI Pizzeria.

Boring Blog.

I realize I haven’t blogged in forever, so updating you might take some time…but I’ll try to keep it as short as possible! On the Friday before Venice, I hung out with Clarence—but learned that his name is actually Clemmons! Haha, so I called him by the wrong name several times before he—or anyone else—corrected me. That’s embarrassing. I have discovered that Clemmons makes tons of weird facial expressions at the most unnecessary times…it’s quite entertaining, but it took a while to get used to. Anyway, we just hung out in his room with four or five of his friends.

After a while, I got bored and went to see what Markus (I used to spell it Marcus, but now learned the correct spelling) was up to. I ended up hanging out with Markus until 3:00 am (and I had to be up by 8 the next day!). I discovered that he is almost identical to one of my really good friends in high school, Nathaniel Hansen. Their personalities are SOOO similar. And, they like all the same bands, and even have the same body type and hair. I love him to death!

Alright, anyways…I didn’t really do anything Sunday night after Venice.

On Monday night though, I ended up hanging out with Clemmons, Markus, and a bunch of other people. It was soo fun. And once again, we stayed up till 3 am. Pretty Ridiculous.

Today, class went by super slow. For lunch I ate eggs once again. Afterwards, Natalie and I went to our friend Marcos’s (the Nicaraguan) and he made us hot chocolate—with notella—and french-fries. And now I’m back in the room, getting ready to make dinner—peanut butter toast. Woohoo.

Alright, sorry for such a quick and dirty update. Tomorrow’s will be better :)

Last of the Venice pics

THE TINY STREETS!

Al (the tour guide) nat me and lance.

Just hanging out at night. That is Marcos on the pole--I LOVE him!

The church that a 20 year old architect built.

GROSS

Venice Pictures

Our glass of wine in the Rialto.

VENEZIA

Hey Everyone! I’m back from Venice, Italy…and it was sooo much fun! About 18 of us went, and we were all international students. There were 5 Americans, 3 Indians, 1 Polish guy, 1 Nicaraguan, 1 Australian, 4 from I don’t know where, 2 Irish girls, and then our “tour guide”—his name is Al. Al actually works at the University in Klagenfurt, and will be the one that takes us on all of our weekend trips—the next one is to Slovenia, where we’ll be staying in an old prison that has been turned into a hostel!

Anyway, back to Venice… After our 4 hour train ride, we arrived in Venezia at 3 in the afternoon. I was sooo excited to be in another new country, and in Venice of all places! Our group stuck together the entire time, and I absolutely LOVED Al. He’s only 28 years old, so he was super fun to be around and fit in great with all of us students. He told everyone we had to take at least 2 “freaky” pictures. So, a lot of the trip was spent trying to find some semi-crazy/weird stuff for everyone to do.

To be honest, there is really not a lot to do in Venice. If we were to go on a gondola ride, it’d cost 50 Euros per person—so 150 US dollars for two people—I decided against that. Instead, we walked through the city, went into some gorgeous church, went out for some Italian pizza, and drank some white wine in the middle of the city.

The church that we went through was built with every type of marble possible. You probably couldn’t even put a price tag on this building. It was beautiful! I wasn’t allowed to take any pictures from the inside, but gosh it was amazing!

Going out for pizza was INCREDIBLY expensive. We went to the cheapest place we could find. My pizza was 8.50 Euro, mine sprite(which was just one tiny can) was 4 euro, service charge was 1.50 euro, and my chair—yeah you have to pay to sit—was 2 euro. So, in total my pizza and sprite was 16 euro, or 24 dollars! It was good, but still…definitely not worth what I paid. Al told us to put olive oil on our plate so that our crust would have some added flavor, and oh my gosh, it was sooo good! You all should definitely try that at home!

After we ate pizza we went to the Rialto (which is funny, because at UNI that’s like our dining center). But here, the Rialto is like a huge open area surrounding by marble buildings and extremely tiny bars. Natalie and I went into a bar and an Italian guy (that had a lazy eye) ended up having some connection to Des Moines and bought us a glass of white wine. It was incredibly nice of him! ...What was really weird though, was that since here the drink age for beer and wine is only 16, we saw such young Italian kids going to the bar and ordering their drinks.

Anyways, afterwards sitting in the Rialto for a couple hours, we walked back to the train station—this was around 11. Marcos (the Nicaraguan, and like my favorite person here) and I went for a walk to some Pita place and I got a little spinach rollup thing.

At 12:15 we got on the train. We got off about 15 minutes later to catch another train, but it was delayed so we ended up waiting from 12:30 to 2:15 in the FREEZING cold weather to wait for our train. We didn’t end up getting back to Klagenfurt until about 6 am. Then we took a taxi back home, showered, and slept until 3:00 pm.

All in all, it was a GREAT trip! Venice was gorgeous, and I can’t wait to go see even more places!

The entire group that went.

Hanging out on some bridge.

Under some bridge.

And at sunset!

Night time over the water!

And ill put more pics on another post

Today was a great day! First of all, class went by super fast. Afterwards I was in the kitchen cooking lunch and a super cute Austrian came in to introduce himself--his name is Clarence--we talked for the entire 20 minutes I was cooking. Haha, and as we talked, he sat at the kitchen table and rolled his own cigarettes--that's definitely something I've never seen before. By the way, EVERYONE smokes here! Yesterday I walked past the rec center and saw a huge group of people taking an exercise break so that they could smoke their cigarettes.

Anyways, a little later I was in the hall and ran into Clarence. He asked if I wanted to go with him and his friends to the lake! SO, at 3:00 me, Natalie, and like 7 of his friends all walked there and just sat on the dock and talked for a while. One kid brought a guitar and was singing "Sweet Home Alabama." Gosh that was hilarious.

We went home, and then he came in and asked if we wanted to hang out with him tonight! Gosh, HOW EXCITING! Anyway....by that time Natalie and I were craving chocolate like you wouldn’t believe. So, we went to the grocery store and got a few things (I got some mock Twix bars!), and now we are getting ready to hang out with Clarence.

OH YA! …when I was at the market, I saw Alberto, and he said Marcus wanted to know what I was doing tonight! So, hopefully I end up seeing him tonight too! :)

Tomorrow I'm off to Venice! I'm beyond excited!

This is the stream that runs along side the path I run on. I'm standing right across the street from where I live. Isn't this GORGEOUS???

This is the view from the dock. ...Andrea, it's quite hard to see in this picture, but the cross is on the very left mountain at the very top.

This is Clarence and a few of the other ones that were with us.

HAHA! This man randomly decided to go for a dip. AND LET ME TELL YOU, IT WAS COLD!

As the sun was setting tonight. .....right over the mountains to the left is where Italy is!

...just another day in Osterreich.

Well, apparently I cannot sleep at night. I swear I wake up two hours after falling asleep every single night…and then cannot fall back asleep for three hours, literally. It’s horrible. I wonder if there is such thing as Tylenol PM here…

Anyway, today I had 4.5 hours of German (every t/th I do. m/w/f is only 3). …that gets to be a bit long, but I’d still rather sit through 4.5 hours of German than 50 minutes of high school Spanish with Mrs. Daza. For lunch I made eggs, which is what I have had everyday for lunch so far.

After the last hour and a half of class, Marcos, a 28-year-old (everyone seems to be much older hear…they are all shocked when I say I am twenty) lawyer from Nicaragua (and VERY cute) came with Natalie and I to the bank. Natalie had to exchange some money…like 110 US dollars. SO, Marcos exchanged his money too—3 dollars! LOL…he got 2 Euro back. Gosh, I laughed so hard about that. Anyway, about Marcos—his first language is Spanish, but he speaks English too. Guess how he learned?!?!? His parents don’t speak it and he’s never taken a class or anything, but he learned by listening to American music. How is that even possible!?!? Ugh, it just boggles my mind. By the way—everybody listens to American music here—like Creed, and Colbie Caillat, and pretty much the exact same stuff that I listened to at home—which is quite nice.

After the bank we went and signed up for the Venice trip (YAY!), and then we went to the Bipa (Sally’s Beauty Supply) to look for a blow-dryer…but nope, they don’t have any. SO, it looks like tomorrow Natalie and I will be going to class with wet hair AGAIN.

I went for a run again tonight…I went the same distance today but felt much better than last time! I am determined to get back into shape. You would not believe how beautiful it is here! If it’s nice out tomorrow I am going to take my camera with me on my run and post the view from the lake. I could easily see myself living here—but don’t worry mom, I won’t J.

Natalie and I ate pizza for supper and then watched A Knight’s Tale. AND then I finally got to talk to Sanny (Toni) on Skype for like an hour. Gosh I just loved that! I miss you Ton!

Hotdogs and Syrup

Servus! Natalie and I just got back from our friend Alberto's room. We watched the Osterriech und Deutschland futbal game with him and Marcus. Germany won 3-0.

Last night we were having a few drink with them and Alberto asked us if we wanted to grill some sausages. HAHA! Grill sausages?? We said no, but tonight he ended up doing it; apparently in austria, "sausage" is actually an american hotdog. I tried to tell them that, but they said no, it is a sausage, when you have bread with the sausage, then it is a hotdog! So, I'm pretty sure they do not have actual american sausage meat here.

HAHA, oh yeah...when I thought they were making actual sausage meat, I asked if they ever have it with syrup, and they said no, but said they would try...so they got out their syrup. Little did i know though, that their "sausage" is actually "hotdog." When I explained to them that hotdogs would not be good in syrup they insisted on trying it anyway! DISGUSTING!

By the way, syrup cost 5,90 Euro--or 9.50 US dollars!!! Holy cow.

We also found out that there is an american grocery store in klagenfurt somewhere--thank god.

Also, instead of shaking hands with the other team after soccer games, they exchange jerseys.

Next Stop

I have become obsessed with one phrase here..."nachte haultestelle" --pronounced neychste haulteschtella--which means next stop. I hear it whenever I ride the bus and cannot stop saying it wherever I am, and in any social situation; I get plenty of confused looks.

Also, I forgot to mention last night that we found out that there is cold milk here! Thank goodness for that.

AND, I didn't mention that we do that french kiss on the cheek thing when you say hallo to your friends. That will probably take a while to get used to.

....and I'm pretty sure that not everyone wears deodorant.

Tusch!

My First Purchase!

I definitely felt a bit of déjà vu today. Once again, my alarm did not go off! Natalie and I woke up at 9:10…class starts at 9. Then, to make it worse, we tried to plug our blow drier into our adaptor things (because the plug-ins are different in Europe), and ended up blowing a fuse—so yup, we were forced to do our makeup in the dark.
When we showed up at class, the mean lady who is in charge of the international students just happened to be sitting in on our class and was quite angry that we were not there in the morning. But, our teacher was nice and completely understood.
After class, Natalie and I went shopping with Petra and Billy (our contact people, or entrees), and bought an alarm clock, thank God! I also bought my first bottle of wine for 3, 49E….it wasn’t very good. We both cooked for ourselves, did our homework, and then hung out with a few Austrian friends (Alberto, Marcus, and Connie), or Osterreich friends. I will write more tomorrow...Gute Nacht! (Good night!)

More pictures from today!

This is the top of the monument that was placed in memory of the people that were killed by the plague. ...13th century? i think thats when.

This is the bottom half of that same monument. ...notice the Italian marble!

This is the church in the middle of the city. In the olden days, whenever the Emperor changed, the people would swith their religion to whatever religion they were.

The church's steeple.

The founder of Klagenfurt. He was an architecht and super duper rich. He thought the land and area was beautiful, so that is how this place all began!

....alright this post goes along with the two others below it!

More pictures!

This was built in 1480, for the archduke. It was also made for a place for the Emperor to stay if he ever came to vist, but haha, he never did. The columns on the side are even older than the building; they are from the Roman Ages...10th or 11th century. In english this place is called The House of the Golden Goose (I dont remember how to say all of that in German).

This is the same building--notice the left side and how crooked the building is!

The town was very competitive with the archduke, so the people decided to build a cityhall that looks very similar to the archduke's just to prove they could build something as great. This building also has Roman columns at the door. This is where the mayor would have lived.

In June the city is hosting a HUGE soccer (American soccer) tournament! They have this sign in the middle of the city counting down the tage (days), hours, and minutes until game time! 124 more tage!

...by the way, these pictures go with the blog below this and there are even more pictures on the blog above!

The City of Klagenfurt!

So, the original plan for today was that my entrée (contact/helper person) was going to come over at 8:10 am and help Natalie and I set up a bank account at the Hypo Group bank a couple blocks away, and afterwards we’d go to our first German class at 9 am.
This is what actually happened: Natalie and I stayed up WAY too late talking last night (till like 3 am), and somehow did not wake to my super loud alarm clock on my phone at 6:45. Instead we woke up to the sound of Petra (my entrée) calling our room at 8:17am—seven minutes after we were supposed to meet her!
So, we quickly showered, left the room with wet hair, and I’m sure made a great first impression! We quickly went to the bank (in the rain and with no coat, hat, or umbrella), and then sped walk to our German class.
The class was great! Our teacher’s name is Angelica and she is very, very nice! We had class for about an hour, had a half hour break, and then had class for another hour. During break, Natalie and I went to look for something to eat—because obviously we had no time to make breakfast—but didn’t see anything appetizing, let alone know what anything was called—so, instead I settled for an orange juice and just pointed to where it was. The first taste of anything is a shock here and of course this was too. Everything that comes in a bottle is carbonated. Everything—even the water! So, I drank carbonated pulpy orange juice—weird/gross, I know.
After class, Natalie and I had to go to the bank again and finish signing papers and what not. Then we went home and made some lunch. I had peanut butter toast and she had peanut butter bread—there is different bread you have to use for toast and for regular sandwich bread!
Afterwards we went to a meeting for the international students and signed papers and stuff. We found out that this weekend we will be going on a trip to Venice, Italy! It costs 42,0 E (approx 60 dollars), and is a guided tour for a day. We’ll leave at 10am on Saturday and leave Venice at midnight the same day; we do not have to pay for a hostel or anything.
After the meeting we went on a guided tour of Klagenfurt. Natalie and I both didn’t wear coats, and regretted it after walking around for an hour and a half. We learned a lot about the history and just saw where all the shopping/pubs and such is. One thing she mentioned was that crosswalks (which they call zebra stripes) are illegal to walk across when the light is red—which is normal—but, if you are at least 4 meters away from the zebra stripes, you can cross at anytime. So yes, jaywalking is legal and encouraged!
Afterwards I went into Woolworths—the most comparable thing to target—and got hangers and towels (YAY!) and a few other things we’ve been dying to get. My total bill was 29,22 E—pretty impressive bargain shopping I thought. I accidentally said “si” instead of yes or ja (ya) when the checkout lady asked me a question—stupid American! Oh yeah, and they sell Barilla pasta and sauce there, so I definitely purchased some of that!
One other thing to note: the policemen walk around like the Nazis did! …like heel to toe and straight legged! AHHAHaHAHA!
Tonight I will be doing my German homework and cooking some of that delicious Barilla!

Auf Wiedersehen!!! (Goodbye!!!)

Lance, Natalie, and I on our bus before the tour of the city.

A church in the middle of the city. 50 years ago, ground next to this was dug up and a mass grave was found. It ended up being full of people that the town buried after Klagenfurt had it's thrid and final breakout of the plague. They relocated all of the graves.

Natalie and I showing off our cool city.

Natalie standing near one of the buildings in the Landhaushof. A hof is an open area that is enclosed with buildings. ...like a big brick circle in the middle of the city. Once a year, there is a celebration, and a very big and tall tree trunk is placed in the middle of the hof. It's tradition that the boys climb it and grab a ribbon from the top, bring it down and give it to their girlfriends in exchange for a kiss.

Another view from inside the hof.

There are still more pics, but I have to post them on the post above this, ...so look at that next!

...THEY DRINK LAKE WATER HERE!

A few things I forgot to mention yesterday:
- Sebastian just opened a can of beer on the train like it was nothing! They just drink casually over here all the time!
- In public restrooms, like at the train station for example, it cost to pee (or poop for that matter)! It was 0,52 euro to use it there. How RIDICULOUS!

…alright anyway, today Natalie and I woke up around noon and went for a run to the lake which is probably ½ a mile from the university. We were both out of shape so we walked half the way back. The lake is gorgeous though, and the mountains are right there too. A few people said that the water is so clean that they drink from it, and they were serious!
Anyway, after our run we both ate lunch (I ate 3 eggs—brown eggs—and Natalie had rice for her third meal in a row). Then we watched a movie on Natalie’s computer and after that it was time for supper! We both cooked a pizza (the sauce on mine tasted just like spaghettios, and the meat was salami but it looked like pepperoni), and then we skyped Celeste and Kelli.
Then, we gathered in the hall with some other people on our floor—Alberto, Connie, and Peah (sp?). I was wearing sweatpants and a tshirt and told them that this is what I would wear to school in Iowa, and they thought I was joking! HAHA! They really think Americans are lazy slobs now! Afterwards, I talked to my aunt, uncle, mom, and dad and now I am off to bed!

Words that I learned today:

keller—basement
kellner—waitor
entshuldugung—excuse me
genau—exactly
schnittbohnen—greenbeans

My Thirty Hour Journey

Warning: this is kinda long.

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).