I put on my overcoat and walked into winter, my teeth chattered rythms

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Winter is in full swing here. There is always ice/snow/slush on the roads, and it usually snows three or four times a week. By “it snows,” I mean a blizzard-like occurrence that leaves several inches of new snow. The bottoms of my pants are always wet and slushy, but thanks to my new snow boots, my toes are always warm and dry. You might be tempted to think that since Austrians are so used to dealing with winter, there wouldn’t be any delays/school closings/etc. And that’s true for the most part. Every morning I pass a few snow ploughs on my way to school. The driveways and many sidewalks are usually shoveled. But this week, winter caused more inconvenience than just chapped lips—my train was actually blocked on the way to school, and after two hours, I finally had to turn around and go home. One of the snow ploughs was at the Kremsmünster (where my second school is), and didn’t hear the alarm or see the lights or the barrier coming down. I heard the story a few different ways, but everyone agreed that the plough hit an oncoming train. No one was seriously injured, but the cleanup took several hours. Other than that, nothing too exciting going on in Kirchdorf or Kremsmünster. Except one more thing: I’m going to be a judge for the Upper Austrian Foreign Language Competition. Some teachers at the school where I teach an extra class in Linz are the organizers, and they invited me to participate. It’s in March, and we’ve had one organizational meeting so far. I think it sounds fun.

Graz

Other than that, I’ve started traveling again. A couple weeks ago, we visited friends in Steyr, a big town by Austrian standards (actually a city here). Then last weekend we went to Graz. It’s the second biggest city in Austria, which doesn’t make it very big, but it was a nice city. Graz isn’t much of a tourist destination; in fact, there’s only one hostel in the city. But it definitely has some sites worth seeing, and the grocery store in the train station was open on Sunday, so that was SUPER-exciting.

We visited the Schlossberg, the “castle mountain,” which had some amazing views. You could apparently see Slovenia from the top, but it just looked like mountains to me. There’s also a really also armory in the city where we unfortunately couldn’t take pictures. They had armor/weapons from the Middle Ages through the “modern period” (i.e., Napoleon-era). It might not sound enthralling, but it really was. If you’re ever in Graz, go for the guided tour. It was sooo worth it!

This weekend I’m getting together with some friends, and we may go to the spa in Bad Ischl (where the last Austro-hungarian emperor and his family vacationed). Then next week I’m going to London to visit Molly and we’re also going to see Dublin for a few days. I’ve never been to either place, so I’m definitely psyched.

More pictures and blogs to follow!

Meg

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Photos

halfway up...
we needed an excuse to catch our breaths, so this became a prime picture spot

Bell tower
magically started chiming when we walked by

View from the top
somewhere over there is Slovenia

Old fountain
though Sarah couldn't actually drink from it, it is still used today as a reservoir for firefighters

courtyard in the old city
from the 17th century