An Outdated Update

Well helllloooo blog! how ya doing? I haven't updated you in God knows when so I hope your system doesn't crash with the amount of Austian amazingness I'm about to put in here!

Where did I leave off?
Thanksgiving? oh my. I've got a lot of work to do.

After Turkeyday I did things like... go for a day trip with my family to Bratislava by Boat...

weeeee!!!!!

my dear Host Oma: it was her birthday trip.

terrible quality, none the less this is Bratislava

Played ma cello in a school concert all bym'self :} hehehehehehhehehe




Spent some quality time with my 3d class (12-13 years old)











And the Great Master Grahm (art teacher)
















Saw Krampus

(I should add, Krampus is an Austrian Christmas tradition: good children get presents and bad children get hit by chains and sticks! weee!!) (of course that's a little false. everyone gets hit by Krampus, not just children! or you can pose for a picture instead.)

got lost

wo...bin...ich???

Christmas carols

and packed up my stuff in a suitcase
and a backpack
and a laundry basket
and a box
and two trips

and moved to my next host family!


I got me a biiig family: my goal is to meet all of them by the end of the year. and if I was here for two I might make it to the names as well. We'll see.

My host dad and I went to a caberet one night in Cafe L.E.O. (it was fantastic: to anyone who lives in or around Vienna... go to it!) (in an attempt to keep this blog a little contained i wont go into details. but here's a picture!

I was so close to this wailing beauty! Hardly any zoom!

Went to Salzburg with Rotary!

so many people, so little time.... it was our "goodbye to the "Oldies" trip. I'll clarify. there's two exchange groups in austria: one begins in Jan. and one in Aug. The folks that came in Jan are now starting to say their bye-byes and our big bye bye party was in salzburg. mehhh....


And lots more christmas stuff that I need to write tomorrow. Or later today. But i don't feel like it right now. I'm hungry.

Thanksgiving in Austria!

Hai all! 

Thanksgiving, as you might know, is not celebrated in Austria. But right now I feel as though I couldn't have celebrated thanksgiving any much more better than I did these past two days.

I'll tell you about it.

on the 22nd I hung out with a bunch of American exchange students in a German course, then afterwards I was suppose to meet up with some more friends and prance around Vienna for a couple more hours. It was a little harder to find these peeps as I had thought, so I wandered aimlessly through the streets of Vienna (it is so pretty at night) and came apon Cafe Central. 

OMGAELFAKLJH 

it's really pretty.

and kind of expensive.

but I thought, hey, it's thanksgiving. why not? So I ordered a whopping big slice of Apfel Strudel and a kleiner Kaffee, sat down with my Pooh Bear book and read. 

On the way home I came across this wicked cool dude named Flo on the train, he had the craziest dreadlocks and just seemed so chill with the world. raaasssttaaa sstttyyyllleee 

I must say, I was a little intimadated at first because when random men come up to me and start in on conversations, I am trained to try to ignore them because they will probably rape me. I need to stop doing this because the stories that come out of these random people on the train are fantasticly inspirational and they probably wont rape me. Anyway He works in a firm for people with mental disorders and loves it, he has a deep appreciation for music and art... anyway, he was rad and heard my story, too. And. was interrested in it. whoooaaaa....

then I skyped with my family! and it was a lovely surprise because it wasn't just mums and pops and sister, it was mums and pops and sister and cousin and cousin and aunt and aunt and uncle and aunt and cousin and baby cousin and uncle and cousin and VICKY LI (my dear exchange student from 3 years ago) and bird and turkey and the WHOLE GANG! (well, not the whooollle gang, we were missing those from the mid to western side of the country...) oh and friend and friend. I love them!

Today we had another thanksgiving! but this one involved real food, not just a video of my dad's super professionally fried turkey. I chilled with my Host aunt, Oma and Opa, organized a slideshow of pictures, talked and talked about family history, the different dialekts of austria, how my host Opa's grandfather dined with the austiran emperor... it was great! then we ate and it was the best that I could have asked for. I am so fortunent... 

That's ma story! 

luve ya!

oh, and don't forget to read the post that came right before this, it's a new one, too. 

LIEBE GRÜßE

Cleo

A Turnen Experience

Here's what they said, "ok. so you throw the ball at someone and try not to get hit. when you do get hit you go outside the box. to get back inside you have to hit someone on the opposite team with said ball."

this is what I heard, "ok, du -------------- ball----------------------- run--------------------get out-----------------------------ball------hit---"

And then we started playing a type of dodgeball-fight-to-death game!  I don't think I need to explain it more :)

But you learn by experience! next time, watch out, Austria, you ain't gunna win on me!

HHHHHHHAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaLLLooooaoOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Well, now, what has been going on here?

I’ll tell you, they don’t lie when they say that one day it will click. I’m waiting on the german part to click, but culturally I feel awesome. I actually had a panic attack the other day thinking about how I was already in my 4th month and haven’t really EXPLORED a city that lies 30 minutes away from my house. So, to compensate I wrote a long (and it’s getting longer) list of all the places yet to be explored in Vienna. I don’t know If I’ll finish by the end of the year, but I’ll at least have scratched the surface. The list includes:

• ·      A visit to the chocolate museum
• ·      Eat my way through a menu at a café (not literally, of course I’m not a fan of digesting paper)
• ·      Climbing up Stefansdom
• ·      Visiting every district in Vienna
• ·      Stopping at every stop on the u-bahn
• ·      Take cooking/baking courses so I can eat sachertorte for the rest of my life
• ·      Learn traditional folk songs

·      And that’s only 7 of the manny things to do in Vienna. 

S  So. I gotta get in on that. An adventure a day. Let’s go.

     Here are the pictures from the week! 

More things: Perchtoldsdorf is so cool. so so cool. They have this harvest festival to thank God for the grapes to make wine. The history behind this particular festival is that a long, long time ago poor men worked to guard the vinyard from evil people trying to steal grapes. 

 One time one of the guards was beaten! And almost died! He was taken to one (of the maaaannnnyyy) heurigers (restaurants serving local food and wine- in P-dorf there are about 40 heurigers.)  in P-dorf (whooh, sorry about all of the interruptions!) and was SAVED!

 So now, every year there is a small parade that marches from that heuriger to the church and for the entire weekend people drink, eat and are merry.

 HERE. is the Weihnachtsmarkt infront of the Rathaus. we were there for the opening, where they light up the tree, then the burgermeister sings or speaks, there's music, food, drink, things to buy, and lots and lots of people.

 and things to buy

 and cute little people on their daddy's shoulders

Going around Vienna at night is the way to do things, it's so pretty. 

What I didn't say in the last post today :P

ok, but really some cool things have happened this week so I do want to share with you. I mean, I kind of left you hanging with the whole Prague, Dresden, Berlin and Salzburg thing to talk about silly homesickness (how lame of me!) so I'll fill you in.

Auto Rally: In Horn there was a cray cray Car Race!

This is my car. but they spelled my name wrong. 

I don't know anything about cars, but I'm pretty sure this engine is cool. 

 It lasted the whole weekend, it was cold, but man it was cool seeing all those fast cars, I felt so masculine! Wee!


Salzburg: I went to visit my friend Tobi in the salty burg!

Vienna and Salzburg are so different in culture. I was kind of expecting that, naturally, but it was stil shocking. Salzburg is more rural, the people move slower, and have lots of time to say hello to random passerbys. I took advantage of this and said hi to errrybody!

Prague: hopped in a bus with a bunch of crazy exchange students and drove to Prague! My friend Celeste and I sang, "walking in Prague... with you" and had a jolly time.

Dresden: hopped in the bus again and drove to dresden...

then...

Berlin: had a jolly time roaming the streets in Berlin. I made up a song with Tobi about the berlin wall here are the lyrics:

there once was a big wall in Berlin that sepperated east and west
it was constructed by the soviets who thought it would be for the best
those selfish bitches were very wrong about what they thought would occure
for people were starving in the east while feeding the soviet's war.

while in the west was not so bad
but still people didnt have fun
for families were sepperated
in this shitty show.

However in 1989 things began to look hopeful
the wall came down and now tourist can buy the dust on cheap postcards.

you can buy the dust on post cards!

The tune is to the Harry Potter theme.

on the way back, a 9 hour bus ride to austria, I made up a cool poem game where we would write funny poems/ tell a joke/ story/ whatever in the mic to the entire bus. it was quite fun. here are the poems that I wrote:

Schade Schade Marmelade: (auf Deutsch)

Schade, schade Marmelade
wir sind in ein Auto flabeflabe
du neben mir
ich neben dir
und wir singen zusammen
Schade schade Marmelade.

(auf englisch)
pity pity Marmelade
we are in a car flaba flaba
you next to me
me next to you
and we sing together
pity pity marmelade.

Driving Driving Driving: 

driving driving drivng
Oh how I love to drive
driving driving driving
it makes me feel so alive
moving this way and that
like a giant bat
when I think to myself
why am I not a cat?

then my friends Crash and Celeste wrote me a poem that made my heart melt..... and whenever I look at it I feel sooo good and happy. merrr....

OK that's pretty much all.

This one goes out to my Almond Joy

Wow, hello blog! Nice to see you again! I should be updating this more often because of all the crazy stuff i’ve been doing like going to an auto rally, finishing my application to University of Wisconsim Madison, traveling to Salzburg to visit my old friend Tobias Pablik, touring Prague, Dresden and Berlin with Rotary... but I haven’t been writing because frankly, I’ve had too much of the "3rd month blues" to even want to go near a word processer.

However, for the next generation of exchange students and even those exchanging today, I believe that this post will give you a little bit of hope for coping with homesickness. 

And sorry for potential grammatical and spelling errors, my auto correct is in German so every word is underlined in red right now which makes self-correcting a pain in the bum.

Homesickness is real! Oh lordy lord! For some reason I thought I could battle it and make it though this year unscathed. No. No no no no no.  That is impossible. BUT. It’s not all terrible. It’s quite bittersweet actually. Homesickness is only a way to realize how lucky you are to have something to be homesick for. For instance, how lame my dad’s jokes are, or when my parents and sister dropped me off at the airport they stuck with me in the security line until the last possible moment. Then instead of turning their backs and leaving for good they stayed right outside the security gate until I was completely out of sight.

At the time it seemed like the most annoying thing. „why don’t you guys just llleeeaavvee already!" but no, they stayed there and waited and watched and waited andd..... waited. (it was a long line.)

Now I look back on that afternoon thinking about how fortunant I am that they didn’t just leave like their haughty, impatient daughter wanted because it proved they are going to stick with me and support me though the bitter end and then more. I can’t ask for more than that.

So danke, mumzie and popzie and embilz for not leaving me at the airport to fend for myself because even though I thought I could, I know now I couldn’t. if that makes any sense.

To any parent who’s reading this who’s kid is going on exchange, don’t leave them at the airport. No matter how much they try to push you away, come the 3rd month they’ll really appreciate the last seconds they had with you.

Well shoot, I should stop writing because I don’t want insue water damage on my computer.

I love you my crazy, funkey, weird, smelly, lame, annoying, sing-songie, music-playie, punny, family! I’m happy i’m homesick because now I know how you’re actually kind of cool! 

Oh mein Gott! look what I forgot to do!

Put the link up for Licht für die Welt!

here it is http://www.light-for-the-world.org/howwehelp.html

Love.....
Cleo!

Watch Out For That Scooter Gang!

Those 10 year olds will take you down. I have scars to prove it.

Yeah, just kidding. I haven’t been ambushed…yet. 

Today is the 7^th which means… 3 more days until my 2 month anniversary with myself in Austria! How romantic. I plan on taking myself out to a fancy restaurant in Vienna and tell myself how great I think I am. Maybe treat myself to a new pair of shoes because if you haven’t seen, mine have just about as many holes as Swiss cheese. Or more.

I must say, there have been lots going on in the past month! Or weeks… has it been a while? Time doesn’t really exist for me here just yet. Unless I’m late for something. Then it really exists. ANYWAY My English is getting worse: which I view as a good thing because maybe without it I can wake up one day and magically be wicked good at German!

Look here’s something cool!

normal fountain pen and abnormal something or other pen of destruction

gasp! what's going on???? 

would somebody help this poor pen?

what a monster. 

MURDERER!!!

IT HAS BEEN DEVOURED!!!

Wow! Cool, huh? Writing in pen has a whole new meaning.....

On Monday I saw my first Italian Opera in Austria with german subtitles! (La Traviata) It was fantastic. And dramatic. And….. ooh man. I tried not to get homesick for the Keene Chamber Orchestra. It almost worked.

P.S. GOOD LUCK MUM IN THE CONCERT ON OKT 14 AT 4 PM AT MONADNOCK COVENANT CHURCH, BASE HILL ROAD AND ROUT 9, WEST KEENE! YOU ROCK ILOVEYOU!

P.P.S for those of you who live close, go and watch. And for those of you who don’t live close, join me in whining about it.

Whinewhinewhinewhinewhine!!! (wasn't that fun?)

There was a pretty sick fashion show in Perchtoldsdorf for breast cancer the other night; it was hilarious! Almost everyone knew each other there, and cheered each other on when they walked down the runway. Even the burgermeister (equivalent to a mayor) modeled. There were singing and other musical/comedy acts, people shimmying down the runway, lots of little kids looking all cool in their cool clothes… Oh if only America had that much style…. It was a great time. Dette and two school friends also took a walk down the runway in dirndls, fur coats, bags and P.Js. (not all at the same time, of course…) 

The day after (or something like that) (oh, this was today!) (God, I have no idea what’s going on right now LOL!) My class all got together with baked goods to raise money for an organization called, “Licht für die Weld” (light for the world) which provides access to treatment and rehabilitation for people with disabilities. Our group is raising money to allow blind people in Africa regain their sight by one simple operation which astonishingly only costs 30 euros! 
One day our class went to Vienna to experience what it was to be blind at a "dialogue im dunkeln" where you go down into dark basement....  

and manuver your way through a city, park, boat, and bar with your hands, ears, nose and a stick. At first I saw this: 

then, after a while my brain adjusted and I saw this! 

Why not, right?

This year Vienna has been very active towards this cause, last week they held a 5k night run fundraiser (which was AWESOME) (VIENNA IS SO FREAKING BEAUTIFUL AT NIGHT!!!)

Here’s the link if you wanna know more about Licht für die Weld! CLEO PUT THE LINK HERE AND DELETE THIS!!!!

Thanks for reading, guts! 

And it goes. A little. Something. Like. This.

(Excuse the title of this post, I really just had no idea what to call it, and this song is stuck in my head.
However, I can only remember that one line...)



Where did I leave off?

Ah so!!! Wandern Wochenende. I remember.

After the weekend with practically no german speaking, I was astonished to realize that when I returned to P-Dorf how much more I could comprehend! Sometimes all you need is a break. Buuuutttt... I have been a little lazier about only speaking german. I decided it was ok, though. I'm here for a year, I can communicate with basic vocabulary, but I really just want to have a couple of decent, get-to-know-eachother conversations with people. (they did involve an unhealthy amount of "ah so!!'s and genau" from me. sometimes I over use those phrases.... Ah so!)

There's a choir in my school that I started attending, also a spielmusik club, which is instrumental. that will be SUPAH fun. I also met another student from the U.S of A in the school! (wow, they're lurking everywhere!) We had a nice chat in english where the use of the word "patootie" was understood. I think I may have said it 5 times in every sentence... ok, that's not 100% true...


ANYWAY... this weekend was great fun. Oh boy Oh boy! Dette's uncle is a runner, and he organized a community running event with 5k run and walk, 10k run, and some little-er ones for the little 'uns. it was oberaffenmegaturbogeil!! (ha ha) I forgot my shoes, though, and had to make due with 7 year old Converse with holes all over and 0 support. Eh, it wasn't so bad though. I think my vibrams are jealous and my feet are mad at me. But it all turned out in the end. I GOT A TROPHY! no idea how I'm going to get that home... but I came in 25th over all and 1st in my age group. WOOHOO USA represent!

now my muscles hurt because I've been a lazy exchange student who eats too many chocolates and goodies. 

Later on that day one of my friends from school had a surprise birthday bash in Wien. wowzawoo, it was a busy day! The theme of the par-tay was"bad taste" ooooohhhhhhhhhh that was funny. so so so funny. Here's a couple of pics from the event. 

Dette and Nani bad-tasting it up!

look at that sexy, bad tastey backpack!

Everyone was neon, clashing, crazy and b-e-a-u-t-f-u-l. lots of 80's fashion. BRILLIANT! The shirt I had I found in a Flea market in Altmünster for 5 euros. It belonged to a friend of the owners and I'm sure it has a really cool history. 

Und das ist alles. Genau! 

Ah so! 

Atta girl, O.P.! 

Side note, my niece, Olive, kicks butt at the Gelbes Auto game. she already has 3. I'm so proud....

For Alex

Dear Alex Fosse:

If I spread my hand over the top of the jar, my fingers almost touch the rim

We forgot to Yodel!

High on the hill there's a lonely goat herd.... And that's all of The Sound Of Music I'm going to quote. 

HOWEVER, there were some pretty cool things happening this weekend that I want to share with y'all. 

This weekend was the Rotary Hiking Weekend in the Alps! Weee! That was fun. Around 100 exchange students in one Gasthaus. (shown above. it's bigger on the inside)

Ok, I'm kidding. but how cool would that be?

I left my house at 10 to walk (all by myself, aren't you proud??) to the train station to Miedling, then to Wein, where I met up with a few exchangers, then to some town that I cannot pronounce or remember how to spell (my german WILL get better) where we met up with almost ALL of the exchange students. 

ITWASCRAZY!

It didn't get less crazy. 

That's a lie. After the hike it wasn't so crazy.

And in the mornings, too.

Over 100 students sharing one house, 6 bathrooms and 4 showers.

PARTY!

Here is a friend I met on the mountain. His name is 8193.

 On to the hike! It snowed where we were, but most of it had melted or had been washed away by the rain. It was niceeee to be in slightly colder weather. but I was glad for the winter jacket and sweaters my host mum had lent me!

 Later on that evening we went to the Disko! I have some great pictures of it which I will post on my Picasa  web album. My facebook was getting too full...

 The morning after the hike was beautiful! My friend Blake proposed to me, how romantic! Our wedding date is set 20. October just in case you want to send me a wedding gift.

Well, there's more, but you'll just have to wait.

Love you all! and Miss you!

-Cleo

P.S. I'm no longer on my facebook, it was getting too... well, NH-ish, I wanted to focus on Austria. So if you want to contact me, do so at cleo.flemming71@gmail.com

I love emails! they're really fun.