I.
The Holiday season in Salzburg has begun.
Let's go back in time to about two weeks ago, which was easily the busiest (and most fun) week I've had in recent memory. During this week I...
The Holiday season in Salzburg has begun.
Let's go back in time to about two weeks ago, which was easily the busiest (and most fun) week I've had in recent memory. During this week I...
- Saw a slew of Wooster friends, including a surprise visitor, in addition to my regular Salzburg crew.
- Stayed out every night until the buses no longer ran, and subsequently spent way too much money on taxis.*
- ....and then got up most mornings at 5:30 a.m. for school.
- I think I averaged about four hours of sleep a night. Somehow I managed to not fall asleep in the Konferenzzimmer. As far as teaching goes, it was a perfectly fine week, but nothing terribly exciting. For this week I was at the HAK doing a lot of workbook exercises with the students. Yawn. Usually I come up with my own lessons, but the students have an exam or something coming up which meant the teachers were all freaking out a bit about being behind. On the plus side, I did not have to prepare any of my own lessons, which fit in nicely with my nights out.
- Went to Vienna for a long weekend. A Fulbright event was the perfect excuse to go, along with a four day weekend as it coincided with a HBLA week.
- After a crazy week with no sleep, I was pretty wiped out right before going to Vienna. I could maybe have used a ruhetag in between at this point.
- Quickly forgot about being exhausted because...VIENNA.
Vienna is the most beautiful city ever. You are just going to have to take my word for it because I have almost no pictures to share. Between making plans to see Vienna-based Wooster and Oakton friends, I pretty much booked myself for the entire weekend before I could even crack open the museum guide (or a camera). This, however, was fine with me. I'm obviously coming back, and Vienna is one of those cities where I could walk for days, never set foot inside a building, and still be in awe.
The weekend in Vienna included a guided tour of Theater an der Wein, the best schnitzel I have ever had (it was also the size of my face), brunch, brunch again, coffee(s) and cake(s), a Christmas market, seeing many friends, and stomping around my old grounds in Ober St. Veit. Oh, did I mention I used to live in Vienna? It was sometime in the early 90's and I totes remember every second of it.
In terms of sites, I did make it to the Kunsthistorisches Museum and the Belvedere, which had a great exhibition in time for Klimt's 150 year Jubiläum. And then there was a lot of walking around and riding the U.
So in sum, I was reluctant to leave Vienna but very much looking forward to a bit of peace and quiet back home in Salzburg.
I admit this last week was not exactly my favorite one at school. Between coming off my Vienna high and upcoming Thanksgiving, I was not in the most school-minded mood. Not to mention my schedule was completely revamped for the week (seems to happen every week anyways). I don't really mind the schedule changes as my school is good about giving me advance notice and it meant I had shorter days. Except for one incident where one of my teachers had not bothered/forgotten to tell me she wouldn't be in that day, which then required another five teachers to figure out what was going on/where I should be, the week rolled along pretty smoothly. This week's lesson, no surprise, was Thanksgiving.
Going back to the whole student-impressions-of-America theme...I showed my students some YouTube clips of Black Friday shoppers at Walmart. Their jaws nearly dropped to the floor. This was nothing compared to my teacher's reactions. More than one cornered me after class as if hoping that I could explain to them how rational homo sapiens can fight like neanderthals over half price iPads at Best Buy.
II.
As most of you know, I am not of the Christmas-celebrating variety. More of the latkes-and-applesauce variety. But don't for a second think that I wasn't as excited for Christmas in Salzburg as any kid who grew up awaiting the old fat man coming down the chimney.
The Christmas markets, or Christkindlmarkt, in Salzburg opened on November 22, which just happened to be Thanksgiving day back in the ol' U.S. Even if we couldn't celebrate T-day on the actual day, we still had good reason to be in a festive mood.
Opening day of the Christmas markets is full of people, cannons, and lederhosen. Yep, even in freezing weather there were plenty of dirndls and lederhosen clad celebrants. All of us grabbed a mug of glühwein and made our way around the stalls. Well, I had to stop and eat a massive thing of Kaiserschmarrn first, because glühwein on an empty stomach is just a terrible (and dangerous) idea.
There was a lot of chocolate, many people, excellent food, and a huge assortment of kitschy ornaments. Including blingy reindeer figurines (damn I forgot to get a picture of those).
We didn't stay super long as it was cold, slightly rainy, and my feet got all wet. Good thing the Christmas markets are open for the next month. Bad for my bank account...
And then....it was off to Vorarlberg for Thanksgiving I with the parentals, some more family, and friends.
...and then I rushed back to Salzburg for Thanksgiving II. We've been planning for this only since about, say, our first week here? With a roster of some twenty people, Thanksgiving in Salzburg was an exercise in logistics and organization. Thank gd for Facebook groups. And Googledocs.
First things first, Turkey. Truthahn is not a big thing in Austria...the first placed I called about procuring a bird, an organic farm near Salzburg as recommended to us by our program director, did not have any turkeys for us. Too bad, as I was so looking forward to a biobird.
So in the end I ordered two turkeys from Merkur, a nice grocery store here in Salzburg. Now, I know a thing or two about cooking, but nothing about prepping or roasting a turkey.
So I was more than a little nervous that we would end up with birds that didn't fit in any of our ovens, or that something else turkey-related would go completely haywire.
In the end, we more than pulled it off and Thanksgiving in Salzburg was a great success. Some twenty of us gathered and spent the day cooking, eating, collapsing into a food coma, going back for seconds, playing games, including some hilarious drinking games, and just hanging out. I am so very lucky to have such great fellow TA friends and others here.
The weekend in Vienna included a guided tour of Theater an der Wein, the best schnitzel I have ever had (it was also the size of my face), brunch, brunch again, coffee(s) and cake(s), a Christmas market, seeing many friends, and stomping around my old grounds in Ober St. Veit. Oh, did I mention I used to live in Vienna? It was sometime in the early 90's and I totes remember every second of it.
In terms of sites, I did make it to the Kunsthistorisches Museum and the Belvedere, which had a great exhibition in time for Klimt's 150 year Jubiläum. And then there was a lot of walking around and riding the U.
So in sum, I was reluctant to leave Vienna but very much looking forward to a bit of peace and quiet back home in Salzburg.
I admit this last week was not exactly my favorite one at school. Between coming off my Vienna high and upcoming Thanksgiving, I was not in the most school-minded mood. Not to mention my schedule was completely revamped for the week (seems to happen every week anyways). I don't really mind the schedule changes as my school is good about giving me advance notice and it meant I had shorter days. Except for one incident where one of my teachers had not bothered/forgotten to tell me she wouldn't be in that day, which then required another five teachers to figure out what was going on/where I should be, the week rolled along pretty smoothly. This week's lesson, no surprise, was Thanksgiving.
Going back to the whole student-impressions-of-America theme...I showed my students some YouTube clips of Black Friday shoppers at Walmart. Their jaws nearly dropped to the floor. This was nothing compared to my teacher's reactions. More than one cornered me after class as if hoping that I could explain to them how rational homo sapiens can fight like neanderthals over half price iPads at Best Buy.
II.
As most of you know, I am not of the Christmas-celebrating variety. More of the latkes-and-applesauce variety. But don't for a second think that I wasn't as excited for Christmas in Salzburg as any kid who grew up awaiting the old fat man coming down the chimney.
The Christmas markets, or Christkindlmarkt, in Salzburg opened on November 22, which just happened to be Thanksgiving day back in the ol' U.S. Even if we couldn't celebrate T-day on the actual day, we still had good reason to be in a festive mood.
Opening day of the Christmas markets is full of people, cannons, and lederhosen. Yep, even in freezing weather there were plenty of dirndls and lederhosen clad celebrants. All of us grabbed a mug of glühwein and made our way around the stalls. Well, I had to stop and eat a massive thing of Kaiserschmarrn first, because glühwein on an empty stomach is just a terrible (and dangerous) idea.
There was a lot of chocolate, many people, excellent food, and a huge assortment of kitschy ornaments. Including blingy reindeer figurines (damn I forgot to get a picture of those).
We didn't stay super long as it was cold, slightly rainy, and my feet got all wet. Good thing the Christmas markets are open for the next month. Bad for my bank account...
And then....it was off to Vorarlberg for Thanksgiving I with the parentals, some more family, and friends.
...and then I rushed back to Salzburg for Thanksgiving II. We've been planning for this only since about, say, our first week here? With a roster of some twenty people, Thanksgiving in Salzburg was an exercise in logistics and organization. Thank gd for Facebook groups. And Googledocs.
First things first, Turkey. Truthahn is not a big thing in Austria...the first placed I called about procuring a bird, an organic farm near Salzburg as recommended to us by our program director, did not have any turkeys for us. Too bad, as I was so looking forward to a biobird.
So in the end I ordered two turkeys from Merkur, a nice grocery store here in Salzburg. Now, I know a thing or two about cooking, but nothing about prepping or roasting a turkey.
So I was more than a little nervous that we would end up with birds that didn't fit in any of our ovens, or that something else turkey-related would go completely haywire.
In the end, we more than pulled it off and Thanksgiving in Salzburg was a great success. Some twenty of us gathered and spent the day cooking, eating, collapsing into a food coma, going back for seconds, playing games, including some hilarious drinking games, and just hanging out. I am so very lucky to have such great fellow TA friends and others here.
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| La Piece de Resistance |
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| Extremely pathetic iphone pic showing about 15% of us. |
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