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Published: November 20th 2008
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Making Burgers
He was very excited since he'd never had a "real American hamburger" before. Hallo alle.
Since we last spoke, it's been rather low-key here. I had my midterm for my German for International Students class on Tuesday, and that went alright. My professor had put stuff on it that we'd never learnt, which was pretty annoying, and it threw all of us off. I was sitting inbetween a friend from Australia and a friend from Spain, and we decided to make it a team effort and use each others' papers to "bounce ideas off of one another."
Tuesday night, Thomas decided he wanted to cook us dinner, and Libor and I had no objections to a free, well-cooked meal . He invited, as well, 4 of his French friends, so it was an interesting night to say the least. Libor had one of his sport classes, so he didn't get back until around 9:30, and in true French style, we didn't eat until about 10. Thomas had made stuffed peppers, stuffed with some kind of meat. I'd asked him what it was but he kept avoiding tell me, and I finally just gave up. Whatever it was, it wasn't bad. I then heard one of the French
Kochmeister
Master Chef. girls say to Thomas, that the fish was really good. He avoided looking at me, and I just stared at him. He finally turned and cracked a smile and said, "Suurpriiise." Stupid French.
I will admit, though, that it was good.
We just hung out for the night and watched the Frenchies make fools of themselves , who had had a bit too much wine there. It was great fun.
Yesterday was pretty low-key. We were yelled at by the Putzfrau in the morning, per usual, and then I had Czech in the afternoon. Of course, I went up to school and as soon as I got there realized I forgot my books, and so ran back down to my apartment. I borrowed Libor's bike to make it back up to school in time, as it was 12:57 and class started at 1, and I made it there at 1:03. Not too shabby.
Czech is getting a bit frustrating. The other kids aren't the quickest bunch I've ever
France
France chopping some onions. The bread is called a Semmel, and it's like a roll, but basically the closest thing we can get to a bun. met, and they're having a real hard time understanding EVERYTHING about the grammar. Granted, Czech is a very difficult language, but German is also a very difficult language. German is easier than Czech, but a lot of the same structures and underlying concepts lie in both languages, but for some reason, the Austrians just can't get it. We had our "midterm" in that class, too, but we don't get grades on it, it was more just to see what we knew. I was the only one I saw that answered everything, which I thought was entertaining.
Last night I had volleyball. I made Libor a proposition, that if he'd let me borrow his bike to go there, I'd cook him dinner. He agreed, and I had my first experience of "night driving" in Europe, which was interesting. It's definitely gotten a lot colder here , and I nearly froze as I was riding along, but such is life. Volleyball was actually also really good last night. People are finally starting to talk to me which is fun. The coach was even chatting with me a lot about Austria and Austrians and if it's different from home and
Spain
Spain enjoying her burger (as well as Coke and Heinz Ketchup). whatnot. I had on a UVM shirt and he said, "oh, you go to school in Vermont?" , and I said, "How in God's name do you know that??" Apparently he skiied with his university's team back in the day and they'd been to Montreal for a competition, and they'd also gone down to Stowe, etc. Who knew? The kids were all also pretty chatty with me, once they saw that I was speaking with the coach with relative ease in German, they all got a lot more talkative.
After volleyball was also a lot of fun. I had a presentation for my Italian class today, so, to adequately prepare, Libor, Olga, and I took a trip to Neubaugassekino. This time, I was the host, and we watched Mystery, Alaska, about a small town in Alaska and their hockey team. It's a really good movie, and Olga wanted to watch it to practice English of course, and Libor wanted to watch it to see how much English he could understand, and plus, he's in love with Alaska and is dying to go there. We watched it with subtitles, which was always entertaining to see how different they are from what's being said, but both understood it well .
Today I woke up on the early side to finish my presentation. I was done by 1, and took my time and moseyed up to school for class at 3. I was on the list to go first, but a girl who was also presenting today went first instead . Hers was pretty long, and so I was under the clock for how much time I had before the end of class. When I got up to do mine, my professor said, "This will be interesting, we'll see if there's a cultural difference." The other kids in the class didn't understand , and my professor gave me a little introduction, saying I was an American exchange student and blah blah blah. My interesting level shot up at that point. My professor asked me where exactly I was from, and I said Rhode Island, which she already knew. She said, "yes, but where in Rhode Island?" I said, "Oh, it's a small town, I doubt anybody here would know it..." She insisted, and I said, "Well, it's called Westerly." She got really excited and said she knew Westerly and this and that and all about the Italians living in RI. Needless to say, I was stunned.
Anyways, I did my presentation, which was only about a half hour long, not 40 minutes, and I don't think anybody in the history of the Italian language has ever spoken as quickly as I did. Try having 30 Austrians staring at you and you'll see what I mean. The good thing was that I'd thrown in a few jokes now and again into my presentation, and was praying they would fly since Austrians have a different type of humor from Americans, and luckily they did.
Now I'm just hanging out for the evening, probably going to make a trip again to Neubaugassekino. I could be reading, but I've decided to reward myself with a relaxing night after spending a week preparing for this presentation.
Tschüss!
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Nanbo
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The Kochmeisters
I think all you Kochmeisters shoud send an email to Emeril for an episode on International cooking...........what handsome dudes you all are........anyway bless the French that he got the better of you and served you fish............ see just another way of experiencing the international life!!!!!!!!!!!! How did your Italian Prof know about Westerly????????? that would have been interesting....anyway one of my tennis buddies told me the other day her husband taught at your university in Graz...........they are both German and came here about 27 years ago when he took a professorship at the Coast Guard Academy so see..........how easy it is to connect when one travels.....love, Nanny