We started the day with an absolutely wonderful Austrian breakfast, I love the food here. Then we had a meeting about pretty much the entire year. I'm sure there was a lot of important stuff in it but because the whole thing was in German, most of it went over my head. Nevertheless, I'm absolutely sure that my language skills have improved over the past two days. I'm still hindered because I'm not at the stage where I recieve immediate understanding, I have to translate things to English in my head still which kind of makes me a step behind. This also gets frustrating because people will ask me things in German and I'll hesitate, but I understand, then they ask me in English and I get all frustrated because I couldve done it in German. Then I realize its probably all for the best since I would have responded in an overly enthusiastic but incomprehensible guttaral mumble that probably wouldve offended any Icelandic people in the area because I had just unknowingly insulted their parikeet.
In the afternoon, we were taken via bus to the Salzburg train station and kind of got the lay of the land of the city for the future.
Okay I dont know why I wrote about that last bit, it wasnt anything too exciting. Oh, actually on the bus back I did accidentally call our program director by the German form of "mrs" and I dont know if he actually heard me but it was really awkward. I was like "Frau Guert...." then there was an awkward pause and he didnt make any form of recognition so I hoped he hadnt heard. However laughing about the incident later, the girl sitting next to me, Madeline definately heard me and said it was pretty obvious. I feel like that's the third or fourth time I've called a German professor by the opposite gender.
When we got back, we all made a really nice spaghetti dinner. We had gone shopping earlier and Professor Guertler had asked me for my advice on a type of wine during the excursion like I had some expert knowledge. I dont know why he came to this conclusion but I think it was the fact that I'm from california and some of the other students here think I have an expert knowledge of alcohol because I hosted a 'party' last year for all the pre-Innsbruckees in which everyone's favorite bev, Keystone Lite, was served. I only drink the classiest drinks as you can tell. Anyways I immediately saw a type of wine I recognized, Santa Christina, and it was fairly cheap so I told him to get that one (he didnt seem to have any kind of wine knowledge whatsoever). I know its a special wine to my mom and I hoped that it wasnt only because her name is also Christina. Dinner was really fun and good but it seemed that a lot of the students in the group either don't like red wine or they just dont drink so about halfway through the dinner there was still a lot of wine left. I ended up drinking about 5-6 glasses because Guertler kept coming around and refilling the glasses and I was one of the few at the table who needed refilling. Obviously by the end of dinner, I had gotten a fairly decent buzz and I'm sure my face was beet red. The nice thing about it though is that my German had improved tenfold (or at least seemed to me), but it wasnt just my speaking but also my comprehension. I got really confident and then was one of the people most joining in the conversation. Because I was speaking so much, I also was making more mistakes than everybody else as well and Guertler made a jocular comment that people should stop serving me wine. So the combination of that incident, my 'expert' opinion of wine, and the fact that during dinner I asked about a Biergarten in town(essentually an establishment that exclusivel serves beer) I think he has me pinned as the alkie of the group.
Dinner: note my beet-red face and goblet full of cheer
We finally found an Irish pub that the Guert had warned us about (very expensive) but they had advertisments about international sporting events so we went in to try to see if they would play the game. Inside the place was hopping, and it was in this really neat basement crypt. We immediately saw an assortment of Irish-american memorbelia including Boston Red Sox and the Celtics banners among which was a "fighting irish" lisence plate so it seemed we had found the proper place. I asked the bar-tender if they had Sattelite (enthusiastic 'ja!') and if they had NBC (another 'ja!') and then I asked if he would put on the game. Immediately his face went to some desprate look and he mumbled some excuse in german about there being patrons wanting to watch the game that was already on TV. I looked up and it was some frighteningly manly Romanian women playing pairs tennis, not exactly the prime irish pub sport... None of the patrons couldve cared less what was on the TV. There were also other TVs that were turned off so I asked if we could turn it on another TV and he said something about his manager and college sports and I pieced together they had some lame rule against playing these sports on TV. Ah well. We ended up sitting in the back of the pub and we ordered our first (and really expensive) drinks in Europe. 
I couldnt resist so I splurged on a Strongbow cider, they had it on tap. We were there for a couple hours and it was quite an experience. The other Austrians in the room with us would suddenly break up into some hearty drinking song every 15 minutes or so and we were getting a kick out of trying to comprehend what they were saying. After a couple beers we were soon singing our own songs, trying to cheer on the Irish from across the Atlantic. It was a really fun atmosphere. 
Coming back to the hotel, we discovered that we were losing 27 to 3 and we got really depressed. Nobody else wanted to listen but I listened to the rest of the game. It was not fun. My favorite part was when we fumbled the ball 18 yards from our endzone. We all decided we picked an excellent year to miss Irish football.
My evening culminated when we were in one of the girls' rooms and Madeline told me a rather humorous story about her and her friends having a nickname for me before we had officially met. Apparently there was an instance towards the end of the year last year when she and her friends went to Target. She claimed that they never go and that when they do, they stock up a whole bunch. Well apparently I was there and they walked their cart past me and it was half-full and I looked at the cart full of Target amazingness, but she claims that I gave a disgusted look at the cart and at her like I was judging her for buying so much. Later in their shopping they walked by again with the cart 3/4 full and I apparently did it a second time, and then she claims I gave the strange look at them a third time when their cart was full. I feel like I'm not one to judge people on the fullness of their Target shopping carts if anything I would be happy at the many joys they were about to purchase but she swears it was me. I do recall going to Target some time last year but I think the main purpose for the trip was to purchase some underwear for the summer, so if anything I think it wouldve been more embaressing for me. So a couple days later we had our first Innsbruck meeting and after when she got back to her room, her roommates were like "so do you know anybody going?" and she replied "You wont believe this, but shopping cart guy!" and apparently they all freaked out all screamy and giggly like all girls do. I really have to laugh at this story because I think there have been many times where similar insances have happened to me and my roomates and friends in which the end reaction was always the screaming giggling one.
Time to get ready to go into the city! Classes start tomorrow and I we'll be a lot more busy so I dont think I'll be able to post as often. Until next time.
1 comment:
Hi Charlie! I'm glad you've entered the blogosphere. It sounds like you've already had many good experiences and I look forward to reading your updates.
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