Servus. The last two days here have been pretty low-key, but I suppose I'll catch you up on them, since I know how you all hang on my every word . Yesterday I had my final exam for DetuschIntensiv, but only the written portion. I was the first one done yet again. I'd like to clarify that I was always the first one done in my German class at UVM, and typically TIED with some dirty hippie in Italian class--don't ask, it's a joke with my friend Meg. Anyways, I finished that and we got out of class early. I grabbed [View Full Entry]

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Gruess Gott! I have decided that it is absolutely vital that every single person visits Austrian in their lifetime. It is hands-down one of the most amazing places ever, and now I shall reccount to you my adventure to Wien, die Hauptstadt Oesterreichs; Vienna, the capital of Austria. On the trip there was me, Elizabeth , Meghan , Libor , Dietlinde , Thomas , and George . Friday I had class and we were shooting to make the 1:36 train. Naturally, Eva decided to keep us a little bit late, so we all literally had to fly home to [View Full Entry]

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Hello hello hello hello, It's about 6 o'clock at night right now and I'm in an insanely good mood, so decided to let everyone know about my adventures since we last spoke two days ago. Yesterday was a bit stressful. I found out that every class I'd picked out for my study plan back at UVM was not being offered here this semester, even though the university had assurred me it would be. I had to scramble to find classes with enough credits that I'd be a full-time American student, which is 12 credits. In the European credit system, 24 credits [View Full Entry]

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Due to technical difficulties with the website, I couldn't upload this yesterday, but hopefully it works now. Also, Regina and Nanny & Grampi have been having problems seeing my pictures. Hopefully, it was just the website and the problem's resolved, but if anybody else is, let me know! Today I woke up and it was raining, so I caught the bus to Roseggerhaus and then walked up to school. From Roseggerhaus it's still about a half-hour walk, but I didn't mind. Class was class. We had our first test today, which wasn't too too bad. Hopefully I did alright. I was [View Full Entry]

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Today was a pretty low-key day. Since I have my bus pass now, I got to sleep in a little bit later, and then still had my 25-30 minute walk up to school from the Hauptplatz. We got our tests back, and I got a 51/58, which in the Austrian grading system is a 1, which is also called "sehr gut" , and the highest marking you can get, so basically an A. I was one of the 3 people in the class to get above a 50 which I was happy about. Call me the next Emeril, 'cause not only [View Full Entry]

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Today is the festival Aufsteirern in Graz. It's a celebration of Styrian & Austrian culture, which thus loosely translates to Lederhosen as far as the eye can see. My friends and I met this morning at 10am in the Hauptplatz to begin our official induction into Austrian culture. When we got there, the mayor of the city was addressing everyone in the Hauptplatz, and so we listened a bit then began exploring. It was so cool to see just average people dressed in the traditional clothes: men in Lederhosen, women in Dirndl , and [View Full Entry]

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Like I said yesterday, Eva, my teacher, took us out into the city for class, and sent us in varying directions to learn the history of Graz. Today, I retraced our steps and took some pictures and thought I'd share the things with you, since I think it's beyond cool and totally mindboggling to think about somet of these things. P.S. Today's life lesson: Always choose American batteries. As I was walking around, I went to the Grazer Dom, or Cathedral of Graz, and was actually the only person inside there for a while, which was really cool. I walked around, [View Full Entry]

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Today was the best day I've had yet!! I got to sleep in a little bit later, because instead of having class at school, we instead met in the Hauptplatz at 9. Eva split us into groups and gave us each a different set of questions, then set us loose in the Innere Stadt , to talk with the locals and learn some of Graz's history. I got paired with my friend Elizabeth, from Brisbane, Australia, and another guy in my class, Libor, from the Czech Republic. Libor doesn't speak English, so it was good 'cause we had to communicate enti [View Full Entry]

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Hi all, I'm in the midst of an epic battle against the washing machines that I'm pretty certain are from the time that washing machines were invented. They're roughly a foot tall, and you can fit just about a pair of pants and a shirt in there, and then boom, it's full. They're supposed to last for about 25 minutes, but you have to go downstairs every few minutes to check and put in 10 more cents so it doesn't turn off. The kicker is, the clock doesn't really work or something, so my clothes have been in the washing machine [View Full Entry]

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Hi all! I FINALLY HAVE THE INTERNET!! It's been nice being able not to have it in my room, 'cause I just do my homework and then read my book at night (since we don't have a tv, either), but it was starting to get inconvenient what with homework assignments, etc. Finally, though, I have it! Yesterday I had class and then sprinted with a few people down to the WIST office, our housing people. We handed in our paperwork and then, if you believe it, got EMAILED our passwords so we could ACCESS the internet. When we were like, "So...um....stupid [View Full Entry]

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