bach was not a vegetarian

only 20 days left until i am back in the good old US of A. i am very excited to see friends/family/michael, but i am so unbelievably sad that my international adventure is coming to a close. it feels way too short - i can't believe it has almost been three months. i'm just now getting the hang of things! i can already tell i am going to have to plan my life around these 90 day stints. i'm sure my future employers will love that.

have been busy as ever... i helped michael finish his press pack (we are anxiously waiting to hear back from the producer), saw the klezmatics as part of the klezmore festival, and saw some improv-free-jazz show in a basement (the equivalent of a portland open mic, except fancier and with no inane lyrics to listen to) at which i witnessed what i can only assume was a jazz and lsd-induced freakout by a petite older lady having way too much fun. i had lunch with monika, saw the christian schad exhibit at the leopold museum (where i also realized i don't really understand why people fuss over klimt so much - what's the big deal?), and wrote grad school applications in a coffee shop cum furniture store. i've scoped out three different christmas markets, saw 'the cantor's son' at the jewish film festival, and saw a jugend version of stravivinsky's opera, "the rake's progress." this last one was great fun - meaghan played in the orchestra so i got a free ticket. the opera is about the not-happily-resolved moral degradation of an everyman (which, hopefully and seemingly, was lost on the kid performers), but it was a blast to watch the youngins parade around with representations of booze, sex, and general depravity (respectively, a 6 ft tall bottle of wine, a giant pair of boobs [carried by an uncomfortable looking tween boy], and a cell phone. not sure why/how a cell phone indicates depravity but i was willing to give them the benefit of the doubt). afterwards meaghan and i hung out with opera singers, which i think is fancy and impressive.
tomorrow i'm going to see a musical project of meaghan's roommate... from what i can gather it's austrian hip hop meets classical trombone. should be interesting. saturday i'm going to watch/film/interview luminescent orchestrii, both because they are awesome and because SPIN is in desperate need of materials and i am in desperate need of money. everybody wins!
and next thursday is thanksgiving for 6, which meaghan and i are audaciously attempting to prepare by ourselves. with one oven. i have yet to find either a turkey or cranberries for sale at any store i've been to. after that, it will probably be a frantic and messy scramble to do everything i haven't done yet... see the boys choir, tour the schonbrunn, maybe take a weekend trip to outer austria...

here's some pics from the rathaus christkindlmarkt. christmas markets are the best thing ever. each has a different style and feel to it, but they are all (so far) gorgeous and so fun to wander through. there are gift kiosks with jewelry and ornaments and chocolates and handmade goods... and there are places to buy all kinds of amazing sweets, cheeses, breads, meats, and of course gluhwein every few feet. gluhwein is spiced wine cider and i feel confident that i could survive on nothing else for the remainder of november.

oh no! only 32 days left to become an international pop star!

hi all!

life in vienna has been incredibly fun and busy. my birthday was so rejuvenating - through the grace of my lovely mother and the miracle of online banking i was able to spend not just one, but TWO nights in a hotel room with a bathtub. i spent a huge majority of my birthday weekend immersed in water or sweatin' out toxins in the hotel's sauna. i didn't watch much tv, because it seems that CNN international (the only english channel available) is pretty focused on sad things like "PLANET IN PERIL" and "NO JOBS AT ALL: THE FUTURE" and "DO YOU KNOW WHERE YOUR KITTEN IS?!" not really, but pretty much. but i did have wifi, so i got to catch up on some daily shows and colbert reports, which was pretty exhilarating.

i spent the rest of that week trying to figure out my options for grad school and working on my resume/personal statements. much more frustrating and stressful than i remember it being two years ago... i guess being in school then made things a bit less intense. i'm really wanting to get into a joint JD/PhD in philosophy program but logistically, things are not going my way. we'll see.

halloween was interesting... i had a migraine in the afternoon, so i took my prescription - thinking i'd be better to go out later in the evening. unfortunately my prescription started giving me heart palpitations, so i was hesitant to go out for fear that some juvenile halloween prank would thrust me into cardiac arrest and render me half-dead and twitching in some viennese gutter. luckily, i felt much better by 10pm and my fears subsided. on the u-bahn on my way out, i saw the MEANEST kids ever. i actually think they might have been neo-nazis but i hope not. they spotted this poor girl in a witch costume, started taunting her, and literally tried to light her hair on fire with a lighter. the witch was smart and got up to safely exit at the next stop, but as she was walking out, they squeezed an entire tube of toothpaste into her hair. it was so horrible! i wanted to do something, but (a) i don't know how to say "knock it off you ne'er-do-wells" in german, and (b) i have a categorical rule of avoiding conflict with foreigners in general and neo-nazis in particular. so sad!

anyway, i arrived at my destination without a hitch and met up with meaghan, her roommate james, and her friend sean who was visiting from oxford. we stayed at a pretty lame american party for an hour or two, because there was free beer and entertaining costumes. then we hopped on the u-bahn and headed to "schnapsloch," an illegal, literal-hole-in-the-wall bar that is only open on friday nights. great atmosphere, great music. i drank a flaming beverage through a straw. meaghan did not take too well to the flaming beverage, so we headed home soon afterwards (not before getting some kebab). but it was still a lovely, really fun evening.

saturday was all saint's day, which is a big deal in austria. EVERYTHING was closed. grocery stores, retail stores, everything except museums. i caught the edward hopper exhibit at the kunsthalle, which was wonderful. later, after panicking that i would have to play 'meal or no meal' for the next 48 hours, i found an open grocery store in the praterstern. turns out i wasn't alone. i had to wait in a mob line of no less than 50 people before i was allowed to even go into the store. then it was a crazy free-for-all. imagine what a costco would look like if it was suddenly discovered that armageddon was upon us, and you'd be right on track. no milk left, people buying 50kilo sacks of potatoes, broken bancomat machines, pure chaos. but i got everything i needed and will heretofore pay more attention to upcoming national holidays.

that night meaghan, sean, and i headed out for my first foreign karaoke experience. karaoke in vienna is absolutely bizarre. since it's such a musical town, nearly everyone (except me) who sang had amazing, professionally trained voices. the funny part was that these angelic voices were used to sing really, really terrible songs (like the soundtrack from grease, and many 'hit' songs i'd literally never heard of by major american bands like bon jovi). meaghan sang "goodbye earl" by the dixie chicks, i sang "mercedes benz" by janis joplin, and meaghan, sean and i did a tasteless rendition of tina turner's "proud mary." then we immediately left, which was probably rude... but we had to save face. we then headed to a really cute, red-velvet walled pub that had the best music selection i've heard thus far in vienna. a bit expensive, but for a high quality dance party, it was worth it.

sunday night i trekked out to arena to see my dear american friend eddy and his band (parenthetical girls) play a show. they played wonderfully and it was so lovely to see a friend from home. i tried to talk the other band mates into letting me be their ad hoc tour manager for the rest of their time in europe, but they didn't really go for it. monday they played another set at the rhiz, and again much fun was had.

tuesday i tried to sleep in as late as possible so i could stay up late and watch the elections. poll results didn't even start to come in until 1 or 2am vienna time, so meaghan and i cozied ourselves up in a cute english cafe with coffee and sandwiches, ready for a long night. seven hours, two new friends, and many tears of joy later, we emerged triumphant and elated. minus my aforementioned run-in with the u-bahn police, it was a pretty perfect day.

wednesday was a blur. i woke up and fell asleep so many times i lost count. poor meaghan had to go to cello practice that day and said she literally fell asleep mid-phrase, with bow in hand. it was a rough day!

yesterday i received great news from home - some fancy hollywood producer wants to see michael's live reel and press kit! i spent most of the day and night compiling the press kit and frantically skyping with michael about the logistics. he's going to send it all off on saturday - i'm so excited! this could be the big time for michael rockstar...

saturday i will probably head to a couchsurfing.org party, and monday i'm going to catch the klezmatics at a huge klemer festival taking place next week. besides that, most of my time will be spent holing up and doing things that cost no money, because until SPIN pays me or i find a viennese benefactor who will shower me with money and chocolates, i am pretty darn broke. silly things like internet access and u-bahn tickets cost a lot more than i originally planned, and i need to budget for the fact that grad schools charge $50-$75 a pop per application. yikes! the one problem about converting to minimalist non-consumerism, as i have, is that you have nothing to sell on e-bay. :)

okay... dinner time! it is super cold and wet tonight... it got dark at like 3:45! these are the days when i miss cheap video stores and chinese takeout.

xoxoxoxo
ashley

i'm having problems posting pictures but will try again later! :)

amer-i-can!

i have soooo much to catch up on, w/r/t vienna and fun happenings, but for now i'll stay a bit on the topical side.

tonight meaghan and i watched the results pour in at an english pub downtown. we arrived just before 1am and didn't leave until 8 (the massive time difference made this unfortunate schedule unavoidable). we met some interesting people, had some sandwiches, drank some coffee (and later, champagne), and watched american history unfold before our eyes. there was a really great feeling of camaraderie - lots of cheering and clapping and jokes about CNN's questionable employment of available technology (was it really necessary to have a live hologram interview with will.i.am?).

i think my favorite moment came when we were exiting the pub - it was already light outside and [normal] people were starting their mornings. we were speaking in english, discussing meaghan's "obama 08" sticker proudly displayed on her cello case, and a random viennese stranger turned to us and said, "hey, congratulations!" for whatever reason, this interaction is burned into my brain a proud and happy moment that will not soon be forgotten.

it was such a happy moment, in fact, that for the first and only time in 7 weeks of living here, i forgot to validate my ticket before boarding the u-bahn. as luck would have it, it was also the first and only time i have ever seen u-bahn officers enforcing ticket possession. i tried to talk my way out of trouble, pointing to my "winner obama!" newspaper and explaining that i had been up all night and had truly and honestly not yet realized that it was the next day. while the officer appreciated my political leanings, he did not waver in his insistence that i pay the 70 euro fine or else face a chat with "the authorities." bummer.

so now it's 9am and i'm running on no sleep for the last 24 hours. for the benefit of my health and sanity, i will probably go to bed.

liebes!
ashley


you heard it first from heute!


ashley and her celebratory sekt


meaghan and her pin

decided!

cross your fingers that red AZ properly processes my blue absentee ballot.

shameless birthday promotion

tomorrow is my birthday! it is also united nations day, and also OPEC is convening in Vienna. in honor of my birthday, no doubt.

it has been a very good year. i had a real job, got a raise, went to Texas for said real job, quit real job, kinda started a business, had a successful first "pitch meeting," saw crater lake, celebrated my 5 year anniversary with michael, began learning german, sold my car, sold 90% of my belongings, relocated to austria, saw the parthenon, saw freud's apartment, started a potential freelance reporting job with SPIN, and drank a lot of coffee. i'd say my 24th year on earth was fairly successful.

my decadent solo celebration will take place at the lindner am belvedere, where i will have a room with a bathtub (no kitchen in sight) and a television! i am going to get indian take out and catch up on pop culture. very very exciting. today mikey sent me a dozen beautiful red roses with a teddy bear who looks very angry and austrian. best gift ever.

tonight i am going to see larkin grimm (of dirty projectors fame) at the verein with meaghan. then home early to agonize over my ballot, then bed.

alles liebes,
ashley

fun with self-containment!

since i am usually alone here in vienna, i am going crazy have found myself inventing really fun games. these games are so good i might pitch them as game shows when i get back in the US.

1) Welcher Haltestelle? U-Bahn Ausgabe!
In this game you stare at people on the subway and try to guess which stop they are going to get off at. Tweedy fellow with an umbrella and a copy of Der Standard? Rathaus. Pair of skinny tweenagers with black hair and BIPA bags? That's easy: Johnstrasse! Lady wearing at least one piece of clothing made of fur, looking uncomfortable on public transport? Operring! This is a really fun game. I swear.

2) War Time? Dinner Time! (alternately titled "Meal or No Meal?")
This game can only be played on Sundays or any other day past 8pm, which is when 99% of grocery stores are closed. If I have failed to plan accordingly, I get to come up with really creative and Depression Era-inspired meals (foreseeably a pretty good skill to come home with). Usually I am equipped with something along the lines of: old bread, rice, a few carrots, half a head of iceberg lettuce, some peanuts, unidentified gelatinous meat products given to me by Monika, sparkling water, and chocolate. Points awarded for presentation, taste, and absence of next-day salmonella poisoning. Points deducted if bouillon cubes are used (too easy).

3) Where'd That Ant Come From?
For reasons completely indiscernible to me, I will occasionally find ants in my apartment. Not in the kitchen, where one would normally find a wayward ant, but in strange places - like on a lipstick tube or in my sock drawer. I'm not very good at WTACF yet, though I am good at a related game, entitled "Bug Squasher 5000!"

ummmmmm yeah. tonight i think i am heading to a concert with meaghan. hopefully also meeting up with a pair of great old friends from tucson who are, by a stroke of amazing luck, both in vienna right now.

i leave you with this very self explanatory photo.


xoxoxo

it's not the ending of the world... it's only the closing of a discotheque

i've been busybusybusy!

saturday i went to this amazing "brothel inspired" performance art festival in the university district with that nice girl from yale. various singers/artists/weirdos would "seduce"/recruit patrons, then for a few euro they'd perform artistic "favors." a great premise, if you ask me. i saw a wacky old circus performer telling stories over tea and bundt cake, a scary performance artist lady dancing around in an apron in a mildew-filled cave, and three or four great bands. the evening was totally surreal, though, because under the circumstances i was prone to think most everything that happened was part of an act. it was all very 'down the rabbit hole.' for instance, at some point, three austrian boys were following us around to different performances, acting totally (in my opinion) like stereotypical drunks. after we finally shed them, i said something about how they were very convincing. meaghan (the girl i was with) didn't think they were part of an act. later we saw them peeing behind a port-a-potty (not IN it, but behind it), and meaghan was more apt to agree with me. a similar situation happened later, wherein meaghan was approached by a very strange couple and propositioned to go upstairs for reasons unbeknownst (but guessable) to us. a few people said that the austrian art scene is not as subtle as i was thinking, but i'm still confused.

sunday i was sleepy and had allergies so stayed home watching episodes of intervention downloaded from itunes.

monday i did some work, cleaned the apartment, and went to the market. this delicious drink called "sturm" is in season here in austria - it is essentially "young wine" that is not fully fermented. it tastes like carbonated, unsweetened grape juice. sooo delicious. but you can't close the top of the bottle all the way because the sturm is constantly fermenting and thus emitting gas. i found this out on wikipedia. i wish i would have checked wikipedia prior to the sturm-exploding-in-the-fridge incident. later in the evening, i made another mess trying to open a can of black beans with a hammer and a corkscrew. weee!

today was super productive. i composed a plan of action for next year's autumnal 'adventure' (law school). 9 schools in 4 states. i started my applications and hope to finish them in the next two weeks. also submitted another article to SPIN, arranged to meet with the lady offering me a museum job here in austria, and got $75 in foreign fees reversed from my wells fargo account. tonight i am going to see silver mt zion in a former slaughterhouse/coopted art space. i have some fun pictures but will wait until after tonight to post them.

tomorrow i am SUPER psyched to see animal collective! it is 18 freaking euro but i think it's worth it - don't you? also exciting this week is an orchestra where all of the instruments are composed entirely of vegetables. i don't know what night this is yet but you can bet your booty i will be there.

some funny random stuff:
as i was leaving the park with wifi this afternoon, one of the centenarian regulars at the turkish pub i sometimes go to (actually, why am i calling him a regular... i think i've been there more than he has) asked if i was going to come in tonight and "drink on your computer!?" i love that i am the girl in the neighborhood who drinks on her computer.

one of the musical acts i saw on saturday had 4 male members and one female lead singer. after the show, meaghan and i noticed that all four boys had matching shirts and FANCY italian leather shoes. matching! on purpose! we asked about it, and the drummer said something like "the hot [band member]'s girlfriend ordered them for us online." who spends 150 euro on matching shoes for a free-entry art festival?

one of my neighbors does not have a WC in his apartment. there is a WC next door to him i guess - i see him coming out of it all the time in his skivvies and going back into another apartment. very strange. i'm glad i have a WC in my apartment, shower in the kitchen or not.

xoxoxoxo
ashley

i'm boring today

nothing too exciting going on... trying to take it easy (financially and otherwise) after greece. i would like to take trips to malta, the netherlands, greater austria, and switzerland, so i am working on that... also looking into taking a mini german course to get my speaking confidence up a bit more.

am going to 'preview/interview' for a job on thursday, serving drinks at some art event that takes place twice a week. would be great fun - i hope it works out.

fast forward two weeks - my birthday is coming up! i have never spent a birthday alone! does anyone have any good ideas of what to do for a solo b-day party? michael says go to the zoo, but i don't know about that... maybe it would be a good time to take one of the aforementioned trips?

okay... time to go get lost trying to find the international grocery store and score some black beans and jalepenos. yaaay!

xoxoxo
ashley

all greece-d up and nowhere to go

greetings loves!

i just got home last night from a week-long trip to greece. in a word: indescribable. here's a rundown of what i can remember.

Pre-S: pictures are all here

sunday: wake up, still totally debilitated by flu. get self on subway, airport train, and then airplane. sleep. arrive in athens. get self on metro to port, then ferry. the ferry is like the worst possible cruise ship you can imagine. packed to the brim, with expensive food and water. i got excited because it appeared that there was wifi, but it turned out wifi cost 9 euro an hour. sleep more. wake up several times, worried that i missed my island stop. finally arrive in naxos, greece, 7 hours later. it was already beautiful, even at 1 in the morning. someone from my hostel picked me up at the port and took me straight home, where i pretty much just passed out. the hostel was so cute - very clean, super central to the best parts of the town ('hora' or 'naxos city'), and super cheap. i was steps from the beach and great restaurants.

monday: wake up and go exploring! check out the beaches, the seafront, the shops, a museum, and basically just take ridiculously long walks. went to agios georgios, a beautiful beach right by my hostel. it is lined with umbrellas and cute beach bars, plus a splendid view of the sunset. took a 'shower' (more about this later), and went into town. had a kitrone, which is a lemon liquor that is made exclusively on the island of naxos. kind of like italian limoncello, but more syrupy and packs a bit more of a punch. then went to dinner. had greek salad and chicken souvlaki. made friends with waiter. his name was 'sefi,' like 'jeffy' with a 'z' instead of a 'j.' he was SO nice - having trouble getting back to school because his parents make him be a waiter every year. we had great talks over dinner, then went to a german bar in town where i made numerous international friends. some of them made fun of my greek, while others appreciated my german skills. also, sefi said 'you are so funny' about a million times and i felt special. even though he would say that for anything, like if i spilt beer on myself, or made a grand and illuminating mathematical proof clearly evident to the bar patrons, or put a scarf in my hair. he still said 'you are so funny.' it was great fun. it must have been, because before i knew it, i was walking home AT 6 AM. the sun was coming out!! i haven't done that in years!!

tuesday: was kinda rough at first, because of the night before. still, i managed to get my butt out of bed before 11 and head to breakfast. breakfast in greece consists of a cup of coffee and a piece of toast (and cigarettes, obviously. everyone in greece smokes. all the time. everywhere. airport, hospital, bus, you name it), but it sufficed. then i attempted to walk to another beach, agios prokopios, not realizing that it was a few hours' walk away (until 1.5 hours into it, wherein all i could see was goats and construction sites). found my way back to naxos and took the bus instead. read and swam in the warm, beautiful agean sea, then headed back to naxos for dinner (in a crowded bus where i had to sit on an old lady's lap - literally). went to a great little restaurant and had the greek equivalent of a denny's sampler - stuffed olive leaves, falafel, greek meatballs, stuffed tomatoes, tsaziki, octopus salad, the works. soooo good. went home and had a much needed good nights' sleep.

wednesday: woke up and wandered a bit more - got some postcards and took one final dip in the agios georgios. someone from my hotel took me to the port, where i hopped on board for a 2 hour cruise to santorini. this ferry was far less eventful, as it was much shorter and by this time my flu had completely disappeared. arrived in the port on santorini, which is a bit scruffy to say the least. i was kind of worried until i met my hostel's owner, who picked me and 4 other girls up. his name is stelio, and his hostel 'stelio's place,' was unbelievably cute. had great rooms, a pool, beach towels, etc. and was maybe 15 steps to a gorgeous black sand beach in perissa, santorini (much prettier than the port). stelio and his wife and daughters run the place and do an exquisite job. i put on my walking shoes immediately and went out exploring, though i didn't manage to get more than a few kilometers before i was accosted by my other new waiter friend 'adi.' he is from albania and spends his summers working in the greek islands (this is a running theme for young people from the area. they work 12 hours every day for 6 months, then go back home and have a 6 month vacay). he spoke great english and we got along swimmingly. i finished my walk and went home to shower. then went to dinner, had some lovely falafel. the best part of the meal was that my waitress left mid-way through (in a car!) to go pick up her puppy from home and bring it back. then the whole rest of my meal she was a crazy maniac shooing kittens away from her puppy so they did not fight. [all over both islands i was in greece there were kittens and puppies everywhere, just laying around and sometimes scrounging for sardine scraps. i was very tempted to take one home.] after dinner i met adi and we went for drinks and played backgammon (i kicked his ass; he said he didn't let me; i believe him]. another late night - home at 4 AM!! WTF!?!

thursday: woke up and read/sunbathed on perissa beach. so beautiful. the water was unbelievably warm and clear. then home for a nap, then dinner with two girls from my hostel. they are from south africa but are living in dubai. they had the most delightful accents and were truly fun to hang out with. it was great to eat with other people! we took the long walk home then i crashed into bed.

friday: i rented a car! and drove! on a greek island! with greeks! i felt okay because there are signs everywhere that say "i enjoy life, so i drive safely." i saw basically every city on the island, the stand-outs being fira, oía, and akrotiri. fira was busy, bustling and fun. oía, was (as cary previously described to me) science fiction beautiful. just amazing architecture and painting and views. unbelievably gorgeous. akrotiri had an amazing red sand beach that required a small hike to get to, but was well worth it. i swam in the ocean, looking up at these monumental red cliffs and a crystal blue sky, wondering how life could truly be so good. had perfectly delicious tarama salata and toasted break with olive oil at a nearby restaurant, plus a glass of santorini white wine (which was free, like all of my other dozens of glasses of wine on the islands), and headed home. i picked up the international herald tribune, which was kind of a buzzkill (given the international financial crisis), and drank some coffee. ran into the other two girls from my hostel (from texas but living in cairo) and had a few beers. they are totally hooked up in cairo - they teach at an american school where they get free lodging, free maid service, free tickets home, plus a salary. and i guess it ridiculously cheap in egypt. i will look into getting this teaching certificate when i get home... anyway, they were great and were supposed to stay at the same hostel as me in athens the next night. we exchanged emails and i went to bed.

saturday: woke up, read on the beach, and went for a final agean swim. said goodbye to adi and went home to wait for stelio to take me (+ the four other girls) to the port. we all had some lunch there, which was entertaining because all of the waiters/management had a huge screaming brawl half an hour into the meal. the greeks are not shy about their emotional outbursts. then we waited like packed cattle for the ferry, finally being forced (again like packed cattle) onto the ferry. it was scary. they were closing the loading dock while i was still on it. then settled into my seat (this time i paid the extra 10 euro to secure a spot, so i was not wandering cluelessly and aimlessly with my heavy bag throughout the seven hours) and had a pretty comfortable ride. mid-way through, we hit a very rough patch of waves. i did the sensible thing and got a glass of red wine and sat by the life boats (just in case). most other passengers were not so smart, and were sprawled out everywhere, with a noticeable stench of vomit in the air. lovely! about an hour after that, a huge chorus of no less than 100 passengers broke out on the back deck. they were singing greek folk songs and having a great time. while this interrupted my sleep, i still enjoyed it. finally got to athens, where i chugged a red bull and waited for our cab driver, expecting a fun night at my hostel (whose main draw was a rooftop bar overlooking the acropolis). got to the hostel - the poor girls i was with did not secure their reservation and thus did not have beds. they spent a solid hour getting lost in downtown athens looking for a hotel. i, on the other hand, was not minorly disappointed to find that the rooftop bar had closed at 11:30 and that all of my 5(!!) roommates were already asleep with the lights off. i had to brush my teeth with dr. bronners and wear the sundress that was in my purse as pajamas, as i didn't want to dig through my bag or expose my laptop to these grubby, hippy, sleeping strangers. worst night of sleep ever (as you can imagine, after drinking a redbull [i have not had one for a year] and not showering). still an adventure, and a learning experience. note to self: always splurge for the private room.

sunday: after maybe 2 hours (i'm being very generous) of full sleep, i woke up at 7, 'showered,' and went to see the sights. all of the fancy attractions in greece are free to get into on sunday so that was a big score. saw the acropolis, the parthenon, socrates' prison (supposedly), all kinds of monuments, beautiful walking paths, the agora, etc. i was going to get lunch but got nervous about missing my flight so hopped on the metro and got to the airport. 5 hours later, i was safely home in vienna. a much needed sleep was had, and here i am, pirating wifi and drinking some rotwein.

miscellaneous things about greece:

you cannot put toilet paper in the toilet. apparently it screws everything up. you are supposed to put it in a nearby trashcan, but this feels so unsanitary. last night when i got home i flushed some toilet paper and almost had a heartattack, but quickly realized that even my shower-in-the-kitchen apartment can accommodate such complicated plumbing issues.

a shower in a hostel (in greece, at least) is a hose attached to the wall where your hips would hit. and there is no way to attach said hose to a head-height fixture. so all showers are quick, joyless, and without frills.

food in greece is unbelievable. whether you are getting cheap streetmeal souvlaki or a fancy sit-down dinner, everything is just incredible. kind of heavy on the olive oil, but what do you expect? plus olive oil is good for your skin and digestion, if you ask the greeks.

there were so many tours for foreigners going on while i was seeing "the" sights in athens, and many were hilarious. i overheard one memorable spiel "so one wall is 6 meters and the other is 13 meters. what is that? it is double!!" clearly, it is not double, but i certainly admire this tour guide's attempt at a simplistic explanation of the aesthetic value of the golden mean.

so there is the rundown. certainly incomplete but at least a summary, if anyone cares. this week i will be finishing my final application to SPIN, sleeping, reading, and hopefully getting a booze-serving job here in vienna. more blogs to come. missing and loving you all.

ashley

first impressions - greece (i'm changing my name to euthalia and i'm never coming home)

naxos is AMAZING. the scenery and architecture is drop dead gorgeous everywhere you look, and my part of the island is full of nice old men and cheese shops. what else could anyone want out of life? i'm going to make this post quick and full of pictures because it's siesta time and i have to go get my beach on!!

if you click on the pictures they will get bigger.

this is my ferry! i took a train from the athens airpot to pireaus port, where the ferries leave from for the islands. the ferry was insane - i'll write more about that later.


this is the view of the port while waiting for the ferry to leave


this is part of a beach in naxos - the water is even more colorful than this picture shows (i forgot to bring my memory card reader so this pictures are not the best - i'll upload others if/when i ever go back to vienna


this is the sea in the port area of naxos town


same


this is an unfinished temple for apollo/doorway to nowhere. it was started some 2600 years ago and i guess they never got around to finishing it. there is a cafe called "relax! cafe" down the hill from it - probably the builders took the hint. or maybe sarah palin was in charge of its planning?


same unfinished temple for apollo


byzantine church


same byzantine church. you are not allowed to take pictures inside :(


horsies!


this is the beach that is maybe 20 steps from my hostel


this is a hotel my mom would stay at


this is my view from my balcony if i look to the left


view from balcony if i look to the right


this is a view of the northwest part of naxos

yaaaaay greece! time to go get a kitrone and do some sunbathing. love to all!!

it's a price i have to pay - i'm a big girl all the way

so... still going to greece! i leave my house in like 12 hours! i am so so excited!

sunday through wednesday i will be in naxos, thursday through saturday i will be in santorini, and saturday night/sunday day i will be in athens. i found amazing hostels at ridiculously cheap rates. i have no set plans other than to hike lots, beach it up, and eat and drink my fill of ouzo and tarama salata. it would also be nice if i had a bathtub at one of my hostels, which would justify (somewhat) my purchase of lots of fun spa products.

i just tried to find songs centered around my destinations. if you can manage it, don't ever download yanni's "santorini." i wasn't paying enough attention and now i own this piece of crap.

anyway, things are going well... except i have a most horrendous headcold. finding a pharmacy past noon on a saturday is no small feat in this town - i spent an hour and a half searching online, and then another 45 minutes actually finding an open 'apotheke.' it was near the place where i was doing laundry, luckily. 99.99% of pharmacies here are open 9-5 weekdays and 8-12 saturdays. if there is an emergency, you can spend all of the energy you have finding one in a nearby district, walk to it, ring the scary little bell, and wait in the cold for a mean pharmacist to come help you. if you are lucky, as i was, they will give you grippostad c. i feel a lot better, albeit loopy and caffeinated. we'll see if it works. no luck refilling my US prescriptions though - i will have to see an austrian doctor for those.

this was an interesting and difficult adventure here because there is no such thing as walgreens. they have grocery stores which sell no medicine whatsoever. they have 'drugstores' that sell soap and toothpaste and eyeshadow and the austrian equivalent of 'slimfast' but no medicine whatsoever. then, they have 'apothekes,' which sell ridiculously expensive face/body products AND medicines (prescriptions, sudafed-ish things, advil-ish things, etc.). so it takes patience and tenacity to get well in this town, at least as a foreigner.

yesterday i tried medicating myself at the asian market, a new-found personal favorite. the korean soup and ginger tea are helping, but not as much as my GRIPPOSTAD! i like that word!

i am all ready for greece. have two swimsuits, good hiking shoes, citronella spray for skeeters, sunblock, and two good books. i might need more books, as two of my ferries are over 6 hours long. i will leave this to be resolved in the next few days. damn i wish someone would send me some books.

umm i am going to find an internet cafe to print my itinerary. then i am going to find a pub that knows how to make hot toddies, the only possible cure for this terrible cold. my only real worries are that 1) zeus already hates me and 2) i won't be able to taste my wonderful greek meals. pray to zeus for me.


xoxoxoxoxooxoxxoxoxoxoxo
ashley

going to greece!

i just booked my skyeurope ticket to athens! i'm so excited... i will arrive there this sunday! i haven't decided which islands i'll go to (at least two of the following: spetses, naxos, and santorini) but i wanted to get my flight while they were still fairly cheap. i'll also spend a night or two in athens but mostly i'm excited for the islands - i've heard nothing but amazing things about them. for a few hours i got caught up in fancies of combining it with a trip to malta, but i think i will save that for later in october or maybe thanksgiving time. because they don't celebrate thanksgiving here and i hear malta has some well-known birds.

since i last posted i've been reading a lot. i finished "when you are engulfed in flames" in a day; i've now moved on to the short fiction of oscar wilde. i'm going to need something a little more exotic to prep me for this holiday, though.

tuesday night i debated between going to see 'eraserhead' on the big screen at the film museum, or going to see a Missouri band called "someone still loves you boris yeltsin" at a club i haven't tried yet. i opted for the latter because doing anything lynchian alone at night in a foreign city seemed like maybe the worst idea i ever had. the band was pretty good - poppy and catchy. the club was fun - it's situated under one of the u-bahn lines so every so often the whole place would shake and there would be a nice additional whirring noise added to whatever song the band was playing. i would have stayed for my usual "i'm from america too!" speil, but i wasn't feeling so great. i think it's all the temperature changes (cold outside, warm in my house, hot in a crowded subway, cold walk to club, hot sweaty club, etc.).

yesterday was a walking adventure day - i went downtown in hopes of trying out a place called 'cafe central.' i guess it's where all the intellectuals used to hang out, and now it is an overpriced tourist attraction with dry cake and free wifi. it was unbelievably crowded so i went to a lebanese restaurant down the street instead - had some lentil soup, researched greece, people watched. then i walked down to the wiener konzerthaus, where leonard cohen was/is playing sold out shows last night/tonight. i was hoping that maybe they'd reserved some student discount tickets, but no such luck. i hung out outside the venue for a solid hour with some hitch-hiking australians who had made a fancy sign asking for tickets. they got one! there were two of them (people) and i was hoping maybe they would just give the single ticket to me, but no dice. i was going to try again tonight but it is raining like mad and, regardless, now i'm saving all my euros for greece. then i got semi-lost wandering around, found my way back to the stephansplatz, and stared at nothing for half an hour. i sometimes wonder what the hell i'm doing here, but then i remember that i felt that way in portland and i might as well be somewhere fancy if i'm going to contemplate the futility of my existence. right. right?

today the weather was as predictable as my german language abilities, so it was a good opportunity to catch up on some work and logistics management at home. i might go to the turkish pub for a round of darts later, but we'll see. my sleep is irritatingly back on pre-jet-lag-adjustment schedule, due mostly in part to good books and tired feet.

i think a lot about what wonderful friends and family i have. i don't know who reads this, but most likely if you do, i love you a whole darn lot. you are all so lovely and talented and interesting and generous and wonderful - i hope that my intermittent postcards and/or artery clogging gifts from abroad convey this properly.

auf wiedersehen for now meine lieben!
ashley

PS if you have greece info/tips please pass them along. my mom will have a heart-attack, but i think i'm going to try to be flexible and not have much booked in advance.


this is part of the hofburg imperial palace by day. i say 'part' because this thing takes up a solid 1/8th of downtown vienna. i've been to the at least 3 museums inside of it and still fail to recognize what it is when i walk by. you can read more about it here, if you like. as far as i can tell, the best part about this place is that it houses the 'princess sisi' museum - a venerable shrine to princess sisi, who was the incredibly vain and anorexic mother of franz ferdinand et al. they worship her here. she wasn't even that pretty or skinny, if you ask me.


this is that same part of the hofburg palace by night! so pretty...


this is the wiener konzerthaus. if you look closely you can see me begging for tickets in the cold pouring rain like a character from a dickens novel, if dickens was obsessed with jewish singer-songwriters in the 1980s.


this is an eastern european dish that michael would like me to learn how to make before i come home. yes, i am still inexplicably in love with him.

she's alone in the new pollution...

hey folks. i just figured out how to make my heater work without it smelling like 400 year old dust in my apartment - i think. if the end of this post starts to sound hazy we'll chalk it up to gas fumes.

yesterday i got to see monika + family again. we went to the 'vienna prater,' which is a giant permanent fair here in the city. it houses a huge ferris wheel, referred to as the 'riesenrad.' you may have seen it in 'the third man.' when you enter the lobby for the ride, you end up standing on a revolving platform with little ferris wheel-cart sized dioramas, and the walls have an (edited) history of vienna from roman occupation until 1955. super cool! <---- austrians LOVE to say this. the carts on the ferris wheel ride are huge - like twice the size of my bathroom in portland. if you book ahead, you can get a fancy furnished cart with coffee and cocktails inside! if someone comes to visit me i will do this nice thing for them, because i am nice.

then we went to dinner in a real biergarten. i think it was the first time i've actually done this, though i'm not exactly hip to the subtle difference between an austrian cafe and a biergarten. regardless, i had some sausage things with pommes (french fries) and a "salad." i put salad in scare-quotes because it was mostly potatoes, plus a few cucumbers, one slice of tomato, and one indiscernible white vegetable. also all of it was half-pickled. it was pretty good! it just wasn't a salad. OH and for dessert, lucas ordered this thing called mohnnudeln, which is potato pasta shaped like fat worms, covered in a butter, sugar, and poppy seed sauce. it is one of the strangest things i have ever tasted; not bad really, just not really dessert? and it is not exactly cover-of-gourmet worthy either - you can imagine what grey potato pasta looks like smothered in butter and crushed poppy seeds. mmmmmmmm!

then i came home and tried to navigate the seemingly endless maze of problems with my 'handy' (austrian cell phone) and internet connection and went to bed.

this morning i tried in vain to find envelopes for over an hour, until i finally called monika. she was like, 'uh, the post office?' duh. then i went out and got lots of fun things to put in those envelopes! i'll be sending out chocolate care packages to the fam this week, plus a few to portland/phoenix/philly (although i may have to combine recipients into one package. i have no idea what this will cost me). i also found a wunderbar bookstore with a huge and non-lame english section (most english sections consist of sci-fi, crime novels, and an endless array of sex in the city spinoffs). i got 'i am a strange loop,' 'the complete short stories of oscar wilde,' and the new david sedaris.

on my walk home i saw what i can only imagine was a political rally. the elections are coming up here, as at home, and there are signs all over the place. except here, when politicians put signs up, they offer up head shots to be defaced by teenage ne'er-do-wells. anyway, there was a huge stage right in front of the stephansplatz with a disproportionately small crowd. it was not like an obama rally. it was also not like a hitler rally, which i was afraid it might be. when the candidate was done talking an austrian pop band starting playing and people started rocking out. it seemed very low key for a campaign event - there were lots of security officers, but it didn't really seem secure. most of the officers were straightening their cute hats in shop window reflections.

now i am home and exhausted. i'm trying to finalize a trip to greece which i hope to take in the next week but i think i'll have to do that tomorrow. speaking of which, if anyone has any suggestions/info re: greece i would love to hear it. right now i'm thinking athens for a day or two, but and the remainder of a week on spetses and naxos.

alles liebes
ashley


this is the austrian national library. i got a card here, but it turns out i can't check out any books. it's literally the austrian national library, full of historical documents, original musical recordings, etc. things 8th grade teachers refer to as "primary sources." but it will be a fun place to hang out, to be sure.


this is the view from the steps of the library


this is the riesenrad. both monika and i forgot our cameras so i stole this from flickr. :-/


mohnnudeln.

blogger (or maybe the secret police?) won't let me upload the political rally video but i'll try again tomorrow.

the secret to life/non-death...

... is to listen to your favorite song whilst doing ANYTHING. mine, coincidentally, is "once in a lifetime" by the talking heads. today i did pretty much everything in tandem with this song, and today was a good day. coincidence? most likely. but who cares?

so much to catch up on!

so the last time i posted, i ended up playing darts with everyone in the pub where i was pirating wifi. i came in second behind a man who was aged no less than 150 years. his son/great-grandson/friend/employee bought me a glass of wine so i felt obliged. it is fun pretending like you don't know how darts works and then pretty much kicking everyone's ass.

since then i lose track of the days. does my diction sound weird? when i was abroad with my mom last year she would do this hilarious thing where she would try to emulate the accent of a region (as if they were speaking english) instead of actually trying to speak that language. i think maybe i am starting to do that, at least in writing.

anyways, since the last post i have:

1) been to the vienna modern art museum, aka the MUMOK. it was amazing. i starting feeling faint and having heart palpitations on the second floor. at first i thought i might be truly sick, but then i rationalized that i am probably just an art pussy. their main attraction this month was "good painting, bad art," which was nothing to write home about. but their residence exhibit was basically everything interesting and avante garde that happened in austria 1968-1971. most of it was superbly brilliant, and a solid half of it was simultaneously superbly brilliant AND stomach turning. all kinds of "utopian architecture," which i suppose means "art that is not painting and also makes you very uncomfortable - please don't bring your children." 8mm videos, giant inflatable "sculptures"/penises/living areas, paintings of chairs with boobs coming out of them. you know. just art.

2) been to an american pop show: a band called "portugal. the man." honestly, they kind of sucked. it was like a cross between journey and blonde redhead - which might sound great, but trust me; it wasn't. afterwards i introduced myself to the band members, because from my research they appeared to be from portland, but they seemed a bit put off because no one in portland has ever heard of them and everyone in vienna wanted their autograph. i was apparently dampening their fabulousness by talking about berbati's after they just played to an international crowd of 500 (woo-hoo?).

after this show i met an american and potential friend. her name is meaghan and she went to yale ('06). she studies cello at the conservatory here. i think maybe we could hang. it was so relieving and wonderful to speak to someone in english, especially about austria.

3) been to a balkan disco show: a band called bucovina club orkestar. they were good! they threw full bottles of vodka at the audience mid-way through their set. i was too far back to receive any of these delightful attendance gifts but whatever. everyone was dancing, as it is impossible not to do at any balkan music event.
on the subway on my way there, a strange young man kept asking me if i would have coffee with him at the next subway station tomorrow morning. i said "maybe!" but i said it in english and he did not speak english. i think i am thus relieved of obligation?
also on my way home from the show, two teenage boys asked for cigarettes in return for a swig of gosser bier. i said take the cigarettes; i don't want beer. they were apparently very offended by this, as they followed me 3 blocks down the street (though they clearly had a bus to catch), all while thrusting a half empty, teenage-saliva-swathed beer can at me. how very tempting!

4) been to a viennese laundromat. so amazing! in the first half hour i made friends with an old viennese lady because even she thought it was confusing. in the next hour and twenty minutes i made friends with one young couple from houston, and another older indian couple from lansing. now i know when i am lonely that i should just go to the laundromat.

nothing is funny right now. i am too tired. write more later.



this is the mumok


this is my new favorite cleaning agent


i too like sex more than gender!


this is the band i saw tonight


this is me in my sprockets uniform


xoxoxoxoxoxox
ashley

"try to remember always just to have a good time... good time... good time..."

so today i was kind of a bum. i slept until 8, ate some musli, read some freud, and fell back to sleep until 3(!). how lame! then i went into town but decided against museum hopping, as it was so late and most exhibition halls close between 6 and 7. so i went shopping instead. it has been so freaking cold and wet here for the past three days so i needed some autumnal gear. a black trench, black hat, black boots, black gloves, and purple umbrella later, i come home happy. then i try everything on and realize i look like the female version of the mike meyers "sprockets" character from SNL. tres chic!!

then i signed up on this site called justlanded.com, in hopes that maybe i will find a friend to navigate the daunting under-the-subway music scene with. then, while skyping with my mom, i was accosted by no less than three austrians wanting to be "chatty friends." now i am kinda bored and cold, i can't use up all the bandwidth on my usb internet stick to download a movie and i can't find any music show listings for the evening. guess i will see if freud will put me to sleep again?

more tomorrow my lovelies!

pictures are: me (next to jason priestly), and some gems from my walk about the museums quarter (look closely).

"now in vienna, there's ten pretty women..."

when i used to hear this leonard cohen song i thought he was talking about the ten pretty women that he was in love with or had neuroses about or whatever. now i realize he was being serious. there are literally ten pretty women in vienna. i feel so incredibly spoiled by the attractiveness of west coast americans - generally the people here are either terribly scary or gorgeous. very few in-betweens. most people look like they were out partying the night before until 4 am (for the last ten years), although i have yet to discern the location of these parties. otherwise i might look like that too.

let's see... it has been a very busy few days! saturday i went to go the area around mariahilferstrasse - a kind of times-square-y outdoor shopping wonderland. i saw two separate dudes wearing leather pants (before noon), and at least a dozen young lasses in yellow catsuits carrying backpacks that were presumably meant to look like jetpacks (but closely resembled, and possibly were, vacuums). i bought 'the very hungry caterpillar' in german for monika's son (11 euro!!!) and some wrapping paper, then wandered around until a marching band took to the streets and i lost the ability to walk and hear.

i came back to my hood for a snack and had something called kebap (also kebab). it was a meat sandwich (although i have no idea what kind of meat it was - i swear it was chicken but michael tells me it must have been goat or lamb - yikes.) with veggie fixins and a tsaziki-like sauce. sehr gut, and sehr cheap - 3 euros for that and a beer. i think if i run out of money i will just panhandle and eat kebap.

then i hopped a tram to monika's - a very fun evening indeed. the pachlers invited their friends torsten and gaby and their daugther sina. torsten comes from east germany and came to austria after the fall o' the wall, and gaby likes to wear belts with fringe on them. also, torsten likes to go tanning and work out 10 times a day and perm/highlight his hair. neither of them spoke any english, which made for an interesting and exhausting night for all of us. but all in all it was great fun - monika is a fantastic chef and the kids were adorable. they had tiny baby champagne glasses full of apple juice (which came from a boxed marked "100% cloudy!") - they would toast each other, guzzle it down, and lick their chops. also notable was that these 2 year olds both ate all of the fancy adult food (fish and potatoes that weren't fried or in stick form) off of fancy adult china with fancy adult flatware.

sunday i ventured out to the schottenring, which houses the university and the sigmund freud museum. the museum was a trip - it resides in freud's actual apartment while he lived in vienna. once again there appeared to be the problem of too much stuff and not enough space - belongings, photos, and manuscripts basically piled on top of each other everywhere - but at least i got a handy-dandy guide book with numbers to indicate was ist das. i always wish museums talked more about the actual impact and analysis of the things they house - more explanation than just exhibition - but i guess that's what college is for. i got "the joke and its relation to the unconscious" and went on my merry way to schwedenplatz. apparently this area is where the nightlife is, but at 5pm, i guess it hadn't started yet. i'll go back again another time. then i walked back to stephansplatz, finished kundera's "identity," and had some espresso. i came home, looking forward to a cozy night in with a bottle of wine, only to find that every store closes either all day or before 5 on sundays. boo!! tea and leftover cake sufficed nicely, though.

today i stayed in until around noon because it was raining outside. then i remembered i'm from portland and got my ass out of the house. wrestled with my financial conscience for an hour and a half at H&M, but ended up buying nothing (which was good because the USB modem stick i had to purchase was 100 freaking euros). then some more window shopping and a tiny bit of real shopping, at the "bipa!" for mascara and soap, and the eurospar for yet another amazing grocery store experience. i found some mustard, as well as lemongrass flavored water, real müsli, kefir, figs, and vino. yay! except i got yelled at by two scary austrian ladies for holding up the line trying to figure out the debit machine.

right now i am squandering wifi from a turkish pub near my apartment. its five other occupants are staring at me intently, and THE SWEETEST SHOW EVER is on tv. sarah palin's middle eastern döppleganger is dancing around, á la soul train, on a checkerboard floor. i thought this channel was like c-span or cnbc, since there is a weird ticker at the bottom, but i guess it's just middle eastern vh1. i love it. i'm going to make friends with the bartender here, she is sassy and chubby and blonde and is friends with all the turkish blue collars.

i don't mean to be all obnoxious and cliched, but i feel really alive here. my emotions are always extreme - terribly happy, supremely overwhelmed, nail-bitingly nervous, tearfully sad, stop-in-my-tracks awed. it feels great. it is still kind of unbelievable to me that i am here. last night i dreamt in broken german, which i think is a good sign. i navigate the public transport like a seasoned pro, and even signed up for a club card at the sephora-ish boutique downtown. i feel so fancy!! i really want someone to come visit so i can show off ;)

Lassen sie mich in ruhe oder ich rufe die polizei!

miscellaneous austria FACTS, according to me:
people love to eat ice cream, even when it's raining and cold
people love to smoke inside of malls and while holding their babies
no one receives education on the merits of brow grooming
brand names of food/drink: cappy juice, emotion water, tofeefee chocolate. and those are just things presently in my fridge.

DID YOU EVEN KNOW??
the word 'hamster' is germanic!
müsli from austria is delicious!
vienna has the world's oldest zoo! (at least that's what monika told me. she also told my mom, apparently, that austria has never been in any wars)

the pictures are: mariahilferstrasse, part of the schottenring, a palace (i lose track of which ones they are; they are literally everywhere), the vienna opera house, the danube canal, the menu for my welcome dinner from monika, the street i wish i lived on, the napkin from my delicious kebab adventure, a mean note one of my neighbors left on my floor (monika translated as something like 'it is an abomination that a person cannot leave her flowers outside without fear of them being stolen. for shame" then other people added "where's my ashtray!?" pretty funny), finally - the moon view from my apartment (creepy/pretty looking. speaking of creepy, i am tingling with excitement for the night a ghost appears in my 400 year old apartment).

Tschüss liebes!

day 1... er 3?

so.... first post! guten aben! it is 7:10pm here in austria and i'm rounding out my first full good day. travel day (tuesday/wednesday) was pretty rough - i was totally sick (not sure if it was actually a bug or just nerves). the austrian air flight from DC to vienna was so amazingly kitsch it was unbelievable. first class had big purple chairs with yellow accents; economy had neon green chairs with orange accents, and every flight attendant wore head to toe red (i'm talking hats, tops, skirts, tights, and shoes). OH and they were also all hot, like in the 60s in america when you could discriminate for hotness. pretty amazing.

lucas and marc picked me up at the airport. they are the husband and son (respectively) of monika, my former aupair and surrogate sister/mother/shoulder to cry on while i am here. they live in the burbs but were kind enough to have my apartment pretty much all set up for me!

the apartment is quite different - the only shower is in the kitchen, which is immediately present upon entrance. i can't wait until someone comes to visit and i can cook them dinner while they are showering. they can even help with the soup broth if they squirt the shower head over the wall! the bed is typical austrian, as far as i can tell. no top sheet, one blanket, and one pillow. although it is unbelievably comfortable for being so utilitarian. also, the apartment holds more storage than i can ever imagine using - 4 full sized bureau/armoires, all much bigger than the one that i had in my apartment in PDX. this amazes me - space for clothing for a family of 12, but no bathtub??

my neighborhood, according to monika, is 'full of those turkish people.' but it feels really safe and there are always children yelling and causing a raucous so i guess that's a good thing? also, apparently none of the turks (is that a derogatory term?) speak english, which is good because it forces me to practice german. there is a subway stop 3 blocks away, and bus stops all around. also a really great looking farmer's-type market right by the subway stop (i haven't tried it yet, but will this weekend).

today i finally woke up feeling like i could start adventuring. i took the subway to stephansplatz (where st. stephan's cathedral is - literally. you come up the subway escalator and there it is, in it's permanently under constructed glory). the point of going there was to get a usb internet stick for use in my apartment, which i purchased, then had to immediately return because it was not compatible with macs. :( they said sometime in october. i inquired as to which day in october. they said 'sometime in october' a few more times. i think this is how it works here.

i walked around A LOT, had some coffee, did a ton of people watching, had some more coffee, walked more, went to the english bookshop (purchased milan kundera's 'identity'), ate some broth and noodles, walked more, and went to the vienna jewish museum. the first floor exhibition was under construction (a running theme), but there was a great max berger exhibit on the bottom floor, some funky hologram exhibit on the second, and literally thousands and thousands of relics on the third. it looks like they have hardly begun to unpack them, as the glass cases surround boxes of what appears to be another 4 floors worth of jewish artifacts. i wasn't allowed to take pictures and a museum employee was literally 20 steps behind me every where i went (except the kids' room, which had the entire hebrew alphabet spelled out with legos). then i got back on the subway for home and took a shower. in the kitchen.

then i went to a viennese grocery store, which is amazingly fun to do. an entire 1/6 of the store is dedicated to chocolate. also, i could not find mustard anywhere, but hangers and men's socks were readily available. they hurry you through the checkout line, make you throw everything back into your basket, then usher you to another area to bag your own groceries. i had to watch 3 or 4 people do this before i even dared attempt the process. the checkout lady was scarrrry. so i got fruits and veggies, cherry jam, spicy sausage sticks, cheese, pasta, pesto, and a bottle of champagne. the champagne is for tomorrow night, when monika and her family/friends are having me over for a special welcome dinner. i am very excited! but scared they will make me speak in german. BUT i am getting pretty good at it; i just ordered a glass of red wine like a real viennese/turkish local. yes it tastes like they put carbonation and sweet n' lo in it, but i just don't care.

i know i am forgetting a lot but i will be better about keeping up with this (in case anyone cares) :)

pictures are: monika, my kitchen shower, my fancy ass toilet, the view from my flat (a pizza parlor), and st. stephans cathedral

guten nacht my lovelies... write again soon!!