Our glass of wine in the Rialto.
Sunday, February 10, 2008
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!
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
Friday, February 8, 2008
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! :)
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!
Thursday, February 7, 2008
...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!
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!
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
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.
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!
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!
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
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!)
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!)
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