Mitbewohner

So, it's been awhile. Sorry. Sorry Mom, but, as I've said before, it's really a good thing that I'm not updating this blog. That means that I'm actually doing other things. This past week, school started. Can you believe that? It's the second week of March, and I just started school. Classes were...interesting. I can just say that they are much different than UNI. First, they are in German. Second, you never know exactly what room you're going to be in. Third, everything in general is crazy. Lastly, they are extremely long. I went to several different classes, including the Life of Literature, Lyric Translation, Linguistics, Survey of Austrian Culture, Phonetics, Grammar, and a general speaking class. Some were great. Others were totally boring. Let me tell you, when a course is in another language, you have to really concentrate and pay attention. When a class is very boring, it's very difficult to pay attention. When a class is in another language and is very boring, it's impossible. That's how a couple of my classes went. Another class, Lyric Translation, saw me in my most nervous state I've ever been in. I was the only male student in the class. I was also the only student not in my master's program. I was also the only student from outside of Austria. The point of the class is to pick pieces in a foreign language and translate them back into your own language, namely German. We were all told to introduce ourselves, state our focus of studies, and tell the professor what languages we could translate from. The students ahead of me introduced themselves. They said they could translate from English (of course because everybody speaks English), Slovenian, Italian, French, Spanish, Russian, Polish, pretty much any language you can think of. The thing that made me really nervous was that they all said three or four languages. I was sitting there, alone by the fact that I was a male from a different country who could only halfway speak two languages. So, I was nervous when it was my turn to talk. Luckily, it went ok. The class giggled a little when I said that I was from the US (for some reason that's always funny to people), but I made it. The rest of my classes throughout the week went well. It's going to be a very different semester than any other I've ever had. I'm excited for it, though. More important than the beginning of my classes, was the arrival of a friendly face from Cedar Falls. My former roommate Dan Rieger came to visit me. He flew all the way from Chicago to Austria just to spend time with me over spring break. What a great friend, right? That's what I say. I also say that all of my other so-called friends who decided to save their money by not taking a week out of their schedules to visit me halfway around the world could learn something from Danny, haha. Just kidding. I think it's absolutely great that he came here to visit. It's crazy to hang out with friends in a different country. I don't know what it is about it, it's just surreal. I picked him up from the train station yesterday. We got a local delicacy to eat, then headed over to my friends' dorm to spend the evening with them. This morning, we got up to walk to the city center. The weather was beautiful, so we sat down at an outdoor cafe in the middle of the Neuer Platz. If you google Klagenfurt, you will see pictures of a statue of a dragon. We were sitting right next to that dragon drinking coffee in the warm spring sun. It was really unbelievable because we used to sit at our dirty kitchen table at the corner of 22nd and Walnut drinking coffee together. There's a big difference in location there. After the city center, some friends came over to my dorm. All of us went on a walk to the lake. The sun was shining off the surface of the lake which reflected on our faces. The mountains are still covered in snow, which makes for a proper beautiful picture. The whole day was spent outside, walking in the wonderful weather. I love the mix of my friends from all over Europe with my friend from Cedar Falls. It really is simply surreal. Friendships are truly magical, and I believe the ones I have here, back in Iowa, in Germany, in San Francisco, in Colorado, or wherever else you may be are some of the best imaginable. I hope you all have a wonderful Sunday and let that continue throughout the whole week. Peace.