Random little parts of my week that remind I am not in America anymore

Friday night I was going to a friend’s house to hang out and I walked through a Ubahn station and at the exit there were a bunch of policemen and some people that looked like drug traders so I thought it was just a drug bust and I just kept walking. Then they started yelling at me in German and of course I had no idea what they were saying. Then I realized this must be one of the random monatkarten checks. After that all was good, but needless to say I was quiet scared for a little while, because I had no idea what was happening. Church was good. We were an hour late because we couldn't find our map for the church and we couldn't look it up on the internet because the internet wasn't working and then we found it, but we forgot that the strassenbahn don't come as often on Sunday. We missed Relief Society. Sunday school was really good, I understood what was happening most of the time and even read some stuff for them. The teacher had some kind of nervous disorder so she couldn't talk very fast which was great. The guy in front of us gave us his card. He is like a ceo or something for probably the biggest bank in Austria. He was also the translator for the first counselor who is American and doesn’t know very much German. The pic is Ruth and I on Sunday while we were waiting for the Strassenbahn. We each bought new scarfs and didn't know how to where them. It took me about fifteen minutes to figure out how to put it on.

Melk to Krems

So we went on a bike ride from Melk to Krems on Friday. The countryside is super beautiful. So this is me, Brittany, and Annalise in the courtyard of a monastery that we went to.

This is me on my amazing 7 speed bike, with the beautiful country side behind me.

Me and Rachel next to a huge stack of wood. One of the logs had a bunch of beer bottle tops shoved into it.

Me, Anna, and Rachel

me at the top of castle ruins. You can see the Danube river in the background.

Bratislava

So last Friday, we spent the day in Bratislava. It looked a lot like Vienna except it was dirtier and it was obvious that it has been under communistic role for a long time. I took about 70 pictures but I won't put them all up.Only the ones with people, because they are more interesting.

This is the guards in front of the place where the President lives. We were there for the changing of the guard, but it wasn't really that interesting.

Some random tourist shop with interesting shutters.

Here is Rachel, Me, and Marinda climbing on the only part of the old city wall that is left. It looks like we are standing on the ground, but we aren't we climbed up a little ways.

Here is me standing next to a small wall at the castle.

Me and Brittany sitting on - I don't really know. Something at the castle. We couldn't go in because they are renovating it so it is closed for 5 years. This is the thinnest house in Bratislava, probably in Slovakia too. My arm span is longer than it. This is me, Ruth, Joseph, and Alisha standing on a castle wall. Behind me is Micheal's Tower. A street musician. Me in a small crack in the wall type of thing. It turned out not to be such a good idea because when I climbed in I ran into tons of spider webs- gross. Plus everywhere I touched the wall just crumbled. So Bratislava was super fun for the day.

I met my host family yesterday. They are very interesting people. Franz and Marina have two sons Julian and Benjamin. Julian is 17 and lives here and Benjamin moved out just a little while ago. Our room is huge and we have bunk beds but the are really tall. I sleep on the top. It takes us about a half an hour to get to school.Today was the first day of classes. I had two classes. Deutsch, which was interesting, I have forgotten a lot. and then a class with Cindy. Then Ruth and I went searching for a Billa, grocery store, and basically walked down all the streets in the first distict and still didn't find one. Then we got on the street car to go home but we couldn't remember which stop we had to switch cars on so we rode to one end of the city. Then we rode back, again missing our stop and rode almost to the other end of the city when we finally found out where our conection was. The connection was only 2 stops from where we got on. Moral of the story - don't ask the viennese for directions. They all give different directions and not one of them was ever right. On the way home we went to a Billa and bought some food. We decided to have dinner in the park. The last two pictures are of the park we ate dinner in and us. Tomorrow we go to Bratislava, really early in the morning. Fun! Sorry the pictures are not all right side up. I was in a hurry.

First day in Vienna

So I arrived in Vienna this morning at about 11:00 am. The flight was extra long, because we had to wait in the airplane, on the runway for about an hour because of the storms. Apparently our flight was the last one that the group was waiting for so when we came out we got on the bus and went to the hotel. (from which I am writing this.) The hotel is really fancy looking and pink. We have about six hours of free time before dinner. but I am already hungry. So we'll probably go for a walk around once we all shower and change into clean clothes. My suitcase got pretty beat up. There are black marks all over the front and one of the little plastic things on the bottom is completely gone. Other than that it all went well. The pictures are of the view of the street from our window at the hotel, and a cool bug with out a roof. As we were standing on the porch for quite a while some Viennese guys who must have been on a lunch break and were sitting in the back of their truck, started laughing at us because some of the girls were taking tons of pictures. If this doesn't make sense it is because I am very sleep deprived and I'm trying not to sleep until tonight.