Friends are fabulous…

For perhaps our third time since we’ve been here, Shannon and I ate at the dinner table last night for dinner!  Even better, we were accompanied by some of our great new friends!  Shannon made some of her great home-made mac-n-cheese, which always lures our guy friends over to pay a visit.  Eric (who went with us to Krems, remember?) and Reyes both helped us dig into the huge casserole dish; dinner was followed by listening to the Backstreet Boys and a game of Ligretto and later Spades.  The guys had to go to work afterwards, but it wasn’t too long before Seth got out of work and helped us finish the mac-n-cheese off, and him coming over gave Shannon a chance to show off her new Ligretto skills.  Simple company is so lovely.

Good food and good progress

Let’s see… how about I start off with this weekend?  Well, the weather was great on Saturday, so first thing in the morning I put on my jogging stuff and went for a little run around the large park down the street.  Even though the sun was still working its way on peeking through the trees, the temperatures were absolutely fabulous so even after I was all tired out, I just sat on a park bench and watched the ducks fooling around in the pond.  Got back to the apartment and Shannon was still asleep, so I made a batch of Austrian-knock-off chocolate-chip muffins and they were a good treat.  Once Shannon was up and ready, we headed down to Mariahilferstrasse where I all the best shopping stores are at.  She settled on a dress, and I found a headband that’ll match my blue dress perfectly—so excited!  Then we went to Coffee Day because it was like 3:30 and we hadn’t had any lunch so we both got CD’s amazing veggie burgers+fries… I swear, the two of us are in the mood for that meal every day. 

In fact, Shannon came to intern in my office today and for lunch, we tried the Coffee Day closer to where I work but they didn’t have hot meals and we were sad.  :-(  So we went to Anker afterwards and I convinced her to get my favorite Shokovanille pastry but I tried this huge apple-cake stuff and it was delicious, too.  Plus, the company was lovely—the two of us fit in some really good (and necessary) roommate bonding/talking time.  Still trying to decide if I should go to Graz this weekend just to get away from the little bit of drama that’s going on over here—every time I think about it, the thought of going makes me happier—but I’m going in 2 weeks anyway.  We’ll see. 

Anyways… to finish off the weekend, Sunday was a totally cold, wet, and lazy day, but that’s what I needed so that I could work up on my Arabic homework and write a letter or two home.  Arabic class went totally great today, by the way.  I know it’s going to take lots and lots of work to conquer the language, but my professor says that I can do it and at every class I learn something new and I get excited about it, not more intimidated, so that’s good I guess.  And I was able to tell him all about how great my day was, which made my day even better!  A big part of it: my big personal project is finally rolling along—someone got back to me and I’ve got a meeting with him next weekend!  So stoked!

What a super day—and it’s not even over yet!  :-D

Lots of Work, and Lots of Fun!

I know it has been almost two weeks since I last posted, and I’ve been meaning to, but I’ve just been having too much fun.  So let me break it down now:

 

Tuesday, Austrian National Day:  Shannon and I started the morning by taking a tour of the Austrian Parliament building, followed by a tour of the Chancellor’s building (I shook his hand! :D) and even though I didn’t get my huge Krapfen, I did get my applesauce-topped waffle and Glühwein.  Our new Marine friend Seth met up with us and it was a good holiday to stand around and sip some hot wine and talk to new people.  We ended the afternoon with a hike up to the tippy-top of St. Stephensdom and the view was remarkable.

Wednesday:  All I can say is that I saw how awesome of a role I am playing here even as an intern.  Pretty cool feeling, let me tell you.

Thursday:  I got an opportunity to dog-sit,  which I took of course because I was in need of a good dog-petting and some extra cash to pay off the Marine Ball ticket. 

Friday:  Unfortunately, my Arabic teacher was sick… so, no Arabic class that day.  On the plus side, this gave me more time for hangin’ out fun!  Our new Marine friend came over and the three of us made some of Shannon’s home-made mac’n’cheese; getting the word out about free food got 2 more boys to join us—it was a good time, eating some pasta and watching Ratatouille with some new buddies.  The night ended with some Fussball matches and a few games of pool.

Saturday:  The morning was beautiful bright and sunny so Shannon and I walked along the Danube canal towards the Hundertwasser house.  I felt like I had stepped into a Dr. Suess book, it was so cool.  Then we had enough daylight left to check out the Prater Riesenrad (Ferris Wheel).  As fate would have it, on the tram we ran into the one other intern Shannon  and I hadn’t met yet, and later we came across a young Kentucky guy.  Boy, is it a small world.  Later, as Shannon and I hadn’t eaten out in a while, we decided to go for a few tapas at the Hilton for dinner that night, and Seth joined us.  Afterwards, we met up with a few more people and watched “Knight and Day” (adorable) and “Despicable Me” (even more adorable).  Friends are fabulous.

Sunday, Halloween:  As suited the holiday, Shannon and I went to  Zentralfriedhof and walked among the graves of Austria’s past presidents and musical prodigies.  The October day was perfect and gave an eerie but calm feeling as we passed tombstones that had been bombed in WWII, some of which had been piled up following the war. We got back just in time for trick-or-treating, so I dressed up and handed out candy and advertised that we'd be watching Hocus Pocus but I ended up watching it alone... there were 2 kids who were so funny, they kept coming and going and then they never came back, and Shannon was talking to her boyfriend the whole time on Skype... I'm so good at planning out super fun-filled events in my head only for them to come crashing down on me, and this disappointment was a good reminder at how much i need to stop fantasizing about everything in life... haha.

Monday:  Monday was a lazy day for me.  It was a holiday here, and unusually warm, so I picked up my book (currently reading: Reading Lolitah in Tehran) and went to the park.  My mind was all over the place though, so I gave up on reading and just watched the ducks in the lake.  When it got dark, I did a bit of Skyping with the family, then my roommate and I ended the night with a showing of “The Hangover” (love it!) at the boys’ place.

Tuesday:  My second official Arabic class went pretty well, but the work part of the day is what I’d really been looking forward to for a while now; I was finally interning in Shannon’s office.  However, not even halfway through the day, I knew for certain that I had made the right decision when I had a choice between the internship I am currently doing, and the position my roommate has, which I was also offered.  Love my office.  Love my staff.  Love my job.  Love my life.

Wednesday:  Wednesday was back in the office as normal, which I was just fine with.  Arabic class followed, and while some stuff was review, I actually learned a lot of very new, interesting things about the grammar of the language; it was very cool.  I was pleased to hear that my pronunciation is actually pretty accurate 80% of the time.

Thursday:  Got a look at the Russian Embassy.  It’s absolutely gorgeous.  The day itself was even even more gorgeous; the weather was so warm, I had to go get a little shake from McDonald’s to cool off, which I’d been craving for about 3 weeks now anyway.

Friday:  Today was another beautiful day— I went out to lunch today with a coworker, who I’d been dying to talk to.  We ate outside and even in my skirt and blouse it was a warm (yet unbelievably windy!) afternoon.  For once my evening is free; a perfect opportunity to catch up on my blogging!

Happy National Day, Austria!

I’m looking very much forward to spending my day off work celebrating with your people in the heart of your nation—I spied a bakery stand right outside of Parliament yesterday morning with a Krapfen as big as my head, and it has my name on it! 

(As does a bottle of Glühwein and a vanilla sauce-covered waffle…oh boy, it’s a good thing I walk around so much here…)

Be Careful What You Wish For

So the saying goes and, as I wished for stuff to do all last week, this Monday morning I sure got a load to do—so much, I kissed my lunch break goodbye.  I thought about it though, and between sorting through snail mail/email or trying to juggle 3 tasks at once, I’ll go with the juggling any day.  I felt so productive it was fabulous and I got to cover for other people in my office doing their sort of projects that I otherwise would not have gotten a chance to do.  Of course, this meant that I had absolutely no time to attend to my own personal project, but that’ll make my project extend that much farther out into my internship, I suppose.

didn’t think I’d make it home in time to run out to the grocery store before it closed but Shannon and I managed to make it to Spar in time to stock up for the national holiday tomorrow—oh, if only it weren’t for that unpaid overtime keeping me in the office 'til 5:30… :P

Keeping Up With the World

Cases like the following seem unfathomable in this day and age—

Iran restricts social sciences seen as 'Western'

Another Successful Weekend

  

Geez, the days are just flying by.  Was it really last Wednesday when I wrote my previous entry?  Thursday consisted of the conference the whole day—it was about migration which is important and everything but I have found that typically conferences like these consist of reiterating the issue at hand for hours on end, while usually the last half hour of the program addresses the solutions or outcomes everyone is hoping to achieve.  So, at the end of the day, it doesn’t seem that productive, but it sure beat sitting in front of the computer all day in the office.  During the coffee break, I talked to two young women from an NGO based in Vienna and their experiences working for an NGO gave me something to chew on for the rest of the morning.  During the actual presentation parts, I took notes and I tried to follow along but even though I didn’t catch all of the German discussion (it was half in English, half in German), I nevertheless got the underlying points of EU migration that were stated repeatedly throughout the conference and practiced my German vocabulary, if nothing else.

Friday afternoon took forever to arrive, it seemed, but at last I was headed off to the Language school for my first official Arabic lesson!  The class was mainly review, but important review, and I was really pleased with how much I have learned in the past year, how much I remember, and how much my new instructor covered that I was already familiar with—I think he was pretty pleased, too, especially when it came to reviewing numbers and past tense.  I got my first homework, a little story, which I just finished reading through but I really ought to read through once or twice more, at least.  I’m so excited to see what kind of progress I’m going to make over the next month and a half.

After class, I made it home just in time for Shannon and I to get dressed into our pathetic excuses of 80s clothes before grabbing the last of the burgers at the party.  It was super fun and Shannon and I definitely decided, who needs boy intern friends when you can become friends with a houseful of marines???

  While Shannon and I took our time getting out of the house the next morning, we still totally got a day’s work of walking in because we spent over 4 hours strolling just through the gardens of Schönbrunn Palace and by the time we decided we’d seen enough of the gardens, the Palace itself was closed to tours that day… so we’re going to save Sisi’s summer house for a colder, winter day.  The flowers were all pulled out by this time of year, but the colorful trees depicted a perfect October afternoon instead. 

Sunday consisted of actually making it out of the house by 9, where we met up with one of our new buddies and headed off to the village of Krems, which is about an hour train-ride away from Vienna.  It was overcast all day and it turns out there actually wasn’t that much to see or do there (the village 5 minutes away that we wanted to take a bus to, of which there were of course no buses running that day, was a temporary dungeon-home to the Crusades’ Richard the Lionheart!) but we went in a beautiful church, had a lovely little lunch, and were just pretty awed to be strolling through the streets of a village that is—no joke—over 1,000 years old.  Speaking of old, I was on my lunch break one day last week and there was a truck at a stop light that read “The Black Camel—in Vienna since 1618” or something and all I could think was, dang, that company is older than my country is.