Oktoberfest

(9/18/2010)  Oktoberfest

 Saturday was the opening day of Oktoberfest and since this was also our first free weekend a bunch of us decided to go.   We took the train from Salzburg to Munich.  Most of us were really tired on the train ride there.  It was also Jordan’s birthday the night before so some were more tired than others.  Jordan feel asleep on the train and he was holding a piece of bread in his hands, he looked the way a little boy would cling onto his teddy bear while he was asleep.  Jamie, Melanie, Katie Van Dyke, Martina and Christina were all wearing their Dirndls and Jonathan had on his Lederhose.  They looked so cute and blended in with all the other Germans there. 

When we got there the first thing we all did was eat.  My mom recommended trying the Würst and Semmel with mustard.  I don’t like mustard but I figured since I was at Oktoberfest I should at least try it.  Well I still don’t like mustard, but that Würst was super good.  It was the most delicious Würst that I’ve ever had.  Oktoberfest was super crowded so it took us a while to make it up to the top of this big hill.  At the top you got a great view of the whole festival and all the rides.  There were just throngs and throngs of people everywhere.  My next stop was the giant ferris wheel.  I went with Pat, Christina, and Becca.  The ferris wheel is the biggest ferris wheel in the whole world.  From the top you could see an amazing view of Munich.  After that we spent some time wandering around before we met up with the rest of the group again.  The next ride that I went on was the giant swings.  I’m not afraid of heights at all, but the swings were actually a little scary.  They took you up really high and then you just hung there and swung around.  We also got a really great view of the city from the swings. 

People hadn’t been lucky enough to find a spot in a Biergarten so they went to a bar down the street for a drink.  It wasn’t too interesting there so I decided to just walk around by myself.  I thought I could explore the city of Munich for a while, but it turns out there’s really nothing that interesting that’s in the same neighborhood (I did go into a church though).  When I was done exploring, I decided to get some more food at Oktoberfest because I was still really craving another Würst and Semmel.  As I was waiting in line for my Würst, I saw a lot of people eating this sandwitch looking called Hax und Semmel.  So I decided to order that instead, I think I was some type of chicken, but still not as good as the Würst.  When I was done eating I met up with the group again.  Jamie, Mia, and I took a bathroom stop before heading back into Oktoberfest.  When I walked out of the bathroom Mia and Jamie were just having a casual conversation with two German men.  Apparently Mia said they came up to her and started talking about her shoes and they kissed the ground.  One of the guys was from Bavaria and the other was his German neighbor.  The Bavarian taught us how to says “cheers” in Bavarian and German.  He told us about his apartments and how he lives.  He would always say things like, “in Bavaria we say this, and in German its like this, then in English do you say it this way?”  In the middle of our conversation a crazy Frenchman came up to us and handed Erin a tooth flosser.  Jamie immediately took it from her and proclaimed her love for flossing.  Before we left the Bavarian sang us the Bavarian national anthem and then we had to sing him the Pledge of Allegiance.  As weird as it sounds, it was really fun talking to strangers.  I thought we had a really funny conversation with them. 

I didn’t really feel like staying at Oktoberfest any longer because I was getting quite tired.  So Sarah, Becca, Katelyn, Maria, and I took the train home.  I wish I had stayed though.  Jamie told me they finally got seats at a Biergarten because they danced on the tables and when the police whistle at them to sit down, other people had to scoot out of the way to make room for them (you can only get served in the beer tents if you have a seat).  It sounded like they had a fun night and Jamie said they got to talk to more strangers.  Overall I’d say Oktoberfest was pretty fun.  But now I understand why locals say it’s something you only need to do once; it’s just so crowded there and the rides are really expensive.  My only regret about the day is that I didn’t get a shirt, I guess I thought I’d save my money for other things.  One side note, it was really funny to see all the Germans walking around wearing their heart-cookie necklaces, apparently it’s a big things at German festivals.  (I liked the one that said “Opa ist der Beste.”

   

First day of classes

(9/13/2010)  This was the first day of classes.  It was just a really long day, I had german for 2 hours in the morning, then Philosophy (which I’m really excited about), followed by an hour and a half of Bib Trad, which is just going to be super boring.  Mag. Aussermair, the theology professor just talks very softly in a monotone voice.  She even has to use a microphone so we can hear her more clearly.  I think she is a very smart person, it’s just that there is a big language barrier between us and her, more so than any of the other professors.  I have two german teachers, Rene on Mondays for conversation and ösd and then Feldner for conversation/grammar.  Neither of them are a good as Dr.Mclarry.  Our whole class just misses us so much; she was such a great professor.  But oh well, we’ll see how it goes with these two.  My philosophy professor is Alexander.  He seems like such a chill person.  I don’t think I would like philosophy as much if I had bad teachers. 

(9/14/2010) We had the second day of classes.  On Tuesday’s I have german with Feldner.  Then Fine Arts with Frau Dr. Loos. Followed by music and then after dinner I have English, both classes with Gundi.  Frau Loos and Gundi are the sweetest people ever.  Frau Loos knows so much about art.  She could literally look at any piece of art and tell you about its whole background.  She used to be the curator at her own museum so she’s pretty legit.  I have Gundi for both music and English; even those two classes aren’t my favorite subjects, she is definitely the best teacher I’ve ever had.  Gundi is like a sweet old grandma, she’s just so cute and funny.  She gives us life advice in class.  She’s also just really enthusiastic about both subjects.  Today in music we watched a video about the crown singers (or something like that) and we listened to a lot of other music pieces.  For English I can tell we are going to have to read a lot of books, but I’m actually excited to read them.  Everything we get to learn about in music, art, and English is right here in Europe; I can just go see all the pieces of art of places of literature that I study.

Meine Lieblingsplatz: Mirabell gartens

(9/12/2010) Went to church, ate kebaps, went to Mirabell gardens, and dinner with Faculty

       On Sunday I decided to go to the morning mass at the Dom (cathedral).  The mass was in german and I thought it would be a good opportunity to learn, although the only word I actually understood through the whole thing was Geschichte (meaning history).  After mass, a couple of us got kebaps and then wandered around the city.  On our way back home we decided to stop at Mirabell gartens, where a scene from The Sound of Music was filmed.  So far, Mirabell gartens is my favorite place in Salzburg.  It was such a nice day and the garden was absolutely beautiful.  It’s just perfect.  I really can’t get over how beautiful it was, I am in love with that place.  On the walk back I also got to see the horse fountain from one of the opening scenes of The Sound of Music. 

          That evening we had drinks and dinner with the faculty.  All our professors came over and we all got to meet them.  Then, we took “the longest bus in Austria,” a tour bus with 72 seats out to a restaurant in the country and had a delicious steak dinner with all the teachers.  

Salzburg - the city of salt

(9/09/2010) Salt mines, birds of prey show at the castle, and hike to see the river.

On Thursday we went on tour to the Salzkammergut.  First, we visited the salt mines.  At the salt mines we had to wear big white shirts and pants.  It looked like we were wearing giant white jump suits or members of the KKK when we put on our hoods.  We all lined up and sat on this long train bench.  We rode underground for a while before we got off and walked in the tunnel.  We had a funny tour guide who told us how they used to work the salt mines and all this other stuff.  At the end of the tour we got little containers of salt to keep.  When we had free time at the salt mines we played around on a playground and looked at little huts in a Celtic village. 

          After the salt mines we went to a castle.  While waiting for the tour to start people tried using the stilts.  Jamie and Erin were actually really good at walking with the stilts.  I tried it, but I couldn’t stand on them for more than 3 seconds.  We went on a tour of the castle and afterwards saw a birds of prey show.  The show was all in German and I was really tired so I couldn’t focus.  The trainers were dressed as Robin Hood and then they would let the bird fly around the castle.  There was one super huge bird that was actually interesting to watch and they had a bald eagle, but all the other birds were really small.  On the way back from the Salzkammergut we stopped the bus and went on a tiny hike to see a part of the river that had lots of rapids.  It looked like it could have been about class 3 or 4, I actually don’t know.  But I could clearly see the “V” in the river, which I learned about when I first started kayaking.  I was super exhausted from the scavenger hunt the day before and from all the touring that I just went to bed super early that night.

Salzburg at last

I've only been in Salzburg for a week, but it already feels like I'm been living here for months.  Salzburg is absolutely amazing.  The flight over was very long, but I was asleep for most of it.  I think the longest I stayed awake was for two hours to watch the movie on the flight from SF to D.C.  On one of the lay overs a bunch of us played cards, so that was a really fun to get to know the others.  Landing in Salzburg was the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.   The view was incredible, we were surrounded by the Alps and the land was just so green.  Landing in San Jose or Oakland is nothing compared to this.  On the bus we were given chocolate Mozart balls, which the driver joked about an called them our bus tickets.  When we first got to the center we had a short orientation meeting with the director, Rene Horcicka.  He told us a few general rules of the center and then gave us our rooms.  My roommate for this year is Jamie Jakstis.  She was in my german class last year and she's super nice.  Jamie and I have a room on the 3rd floor of the main building.  We have our own little balcony that looks over the courtyard.  The room is the same set up as everyone else's, but it's still really cute.  I really feel like I did not bring enough clothes though because my closet and shelves have tons of empty space.  It's also really hard to decide what to wear because I only have about eight choices.   

(9/08/2010) Lunch at the cafeteria, Scavenger hunt in the city, and karaoke night at O’Malley’s

The second day we ate lunch at the Salzburg AG, which is a big cafeteria that serves all these Austrian business people who work there.  I ate the schnitzel and soup for lunch and it was really good, way better than the commons ever was.  After lunch we went on a scavenger hunt throughout the city.  That was our first opportunity to really explore Salzburg.  We walked all around the old town taking pictures of places like Mozart’s Geburtshaus (birthplace) and the old churches.  We walked everywhere around the city and after about 3 hours of walking my feet really hurt.  But in the end it was all worth it because my group won and we got chocolate balls.  That night was also the first night the whole group went out together.  We all went to O’Malley’s, an Irish pub across the river, for karaoke night.  The non-smoking section was mostly filled with UP students, but we did also meet a couple students from Redlands too.  Karaoke night was really fun; everyone was singing and dancing.  They even played a Spice Girls song, which was awesome.  It was just a great night because all of us were there together.

Auf Wiedersehen America!

Hello friends :)
So this is going to be my blog about all the adventures I'll have in Salzburg and all over the rest of Europe.  I don't know how good I'll be at updating blogs, but I'm going to try my hardest.  It'll be pretty hard for me to stay in contact with everyone over the next year so hopefully this will allow us to stay somewhat connected.  Well here it goes, enjoy!

The last couple of weeks I've been (somewhat) focused on getting everything together for Salzburg.  It was pretty exhausting work.  I'm pretty sure I've gone shopping everyday for the last two weeks.  I probably set a record number of visits to the mall.  Buying new clothes was really nice, it just made it so much harder to pack everything.  When I first started packing it really wasn't that hard.  I though packing my stuff up to leave Portland last year was really difficult.  As my UP friends know I had tons of extra stuff then.  But this time I just looked in my closet, took out what I wanted to bring, and then put it by my suitcase.  Well the hard part came when I had to eliminate clothes.  Oh it was so painful! It took me about 2 hours to decide which two shirts to take out and I had to cut back from 13 pairs of shoes to only 6.  The space really wasn't even a problem for me.  I used space bags and they were miracle workers, I just wish they could eliminate the weight.  Once I had packed everything in it was only 5 lbs overweight, and again I had to make more sacrifices with my clothes.  I finally got my suitcase to weigh 45 lbs and I hope that in the next 4 hours before I leave that I do not add anything.  I'm waking up at 4:00am tomorrow to leave for SFO.  From San Francisco I'll fly to Washington D.C. and then to Vienna and finally take a flight from Vienna to Salzburg arriving at 11:20am Wednesday!

I'm super excited for the adventure that's ahead and I'll miss you all!