Remember That One Time?

Dear reader you know how everyone has that story or stories that will make everyone burst out laughing? Well here is mine!

I had just gotten home from meeting up with one of my friends and had a few groceries to put away. I do not know about you but, when you know you are not going to leave home again for the day one of the first things you do is kick off your clothes and shoes and get comfy in those P.Js that welcome you home.

Well after getting comfy I figured time to put away my groceries. I had not been home for a few days and well some stuff started to go bad. After cleaning out my fridge, what ever stunk up my extremely tiny fridge started stinking even worse in the garbage. And who really wants to have the kitchen also starting to smell? So I did the next logical step that any person would do, take the trash outside. But I figured I don't want to get dressed right now so I had planned on placeing it outside my apartment door for me to take down later. ANYBODY who is judging me for not getting dressed and throwing the garbage away then and there does not live in a building on the fourth floor without an elevator and was wanting to take a nap!

So I stood in my doorway to place the garbage in the corner and that is when it happened! A pretty large gust of wind comes through my apartment and slams my front door right behind me! Most people won't realize that here most standard doors have a stationary door handel which I believe to be useless. So that means when the door is closed locked or not without a key there you stand locked out!  You see I figured since I have done this before there would be no problem but you see my apartment door was on the other side of my door. I live on the fourth floor of an apartment building, I can't climb through a window. There I was stranded, if you haven't picked up on the fact already but inside my apartment was my keys, ID, cellphone, you know the most important things a girl needed. OH! Did I mention I am barefoot and in my P.J.s?????   Well lucky me not knowing my boyfriend or even his parents phone numbers.

What to do? Well that is when I realized I could look up the numbers in a phone book and there is a phone booth on the corner of my street. So I told myself time to suck it up and go. Of coarse the phone booth is completely electronic and to look up a phone number costs 10 cents!!!! Have I mentioned I had no shoes????  Well after my failed attempt of finding a number to call, I realized this was not the end of my story. My boyfriend's apartment is about 20 minutes walking distance from me and he had my spare.
So yes, barefooted and in P.J.s I walked 20 minutes through the city to my boyfriends. On my walk I pass a street where street walking is legal and well the ladies of the night (it was more like 5 p.m. so there was plenty of daylight) on this street are normally half naked and freely advertising. Even they looked at me like some crazy person.

I finally reached my boyfriend's place and his parents were home and this is when I completely melted down from the sheer embaressment of EVERYONE staring at me. Thankfully I put on some shoes I had over there and my boyfriend's dad drove me back to my apartment and boy was I grateful when the spare key opened the door. Since there was a chance that since the one key was in the lock on the inside that it would not allow the spare to open the door and then I would have needed to call a locksmith.

So that is my story and it seems to make everyone laugh.

Blog Break is OVER!

So for the past month this is how I have been feeling since the beginning of this month was my BIG German exam. If you know me you would know how I am not the best test taking person and considering that this was the last German test I had to take which would give me the green light for being able to finish my pre-studies and the proficency the Universtiy is wanting to see that I have. So I was more than stressed out and for about a good month of non-stop studying for the test and practising my writing in German. I was more than happy when the test had ended and took a break from German and just enjoying not having to study for the test.

Well two weeks after the test would I and my other peers be able to see our results, the night after my test I had nightmares and dreams about the test. Dreaming about what I had written and that it was utterly false and then dreaming up of a better paper. So I was just counting the days down for the results since half of the test I found to be a bit above the level we have been taught and just simply difficult and I just wanted to know if I had gotten just enough of those questions right to give me a positve grade. Yesterday was the big day, pretty much everything I have been doing for the past year and a half has been leading up to this moment. Now you can re take the test 3 more times but after all that work who really wants to go through that all over again? When I got to the big board that had all the grades posted up I could not believe my eyes, I double checked to make sure I was reading the correct one but I actually passed. I was blown out of the water since I felt that the one part was so difficult and I thought I did horriably on it and have heard more than a few times that it is common not to pass the first time but certainly by the second chance most everyone passes. So here I was thinking the worse but overjoyed just to find out that I did not have to continue studying as hard as I was.



I have recently been working out with one of my close friends here and I am starting to fully enjoy it I also am wanting to get that cute bikini body that everyone here seems to have. The only down fall is that it has recently been extremely cold and has snowed for a few days which make going to the gym some what of a chore atleast getting myself there. Because I feel like I have to pack so much in a bag and change there and or turing into an icicle just getting there. Having a work out buddy make it easier and also nice to have someone there to help motivate me.

Considering that I am a born and raised South Florida girl you can imagine how many encounters I have had with snow, not many and before living in Vienna I hadn't tried any winter sports other than ice skating. Here in Austria all schools are out in Febuary and for high school and under have only a week off which gave me and my boyfriend to do something I have always wanted to do but have never been able to. We went sledding! We were the only people our age on the hill going sledding everyone else were half our age but we didn't care we went anyways and had a lot of fun. I think I found a picture of expresses pretty well how I probably looked like when flying down that hill in the Prater on a butt saucer just adult size.

Needless to say it has certainly been alot of fun lately but I am starting to get tired of this cold wintery weather. Spring please come soon!

New Years In Vienna!

Like most everyone else in the blogger world, I am going to write a post about my New Years and all of that good stuff! I will just say it now, New Years in Vienna is something everyone should have on their bucket lists. New Years in Times Square seems to be the place to be for New Years for any American but the idea of having to stand for 6 hours to watch a ball drop seems to extreme for me.

Even though Florida is a great place to live New Years is not a big hoopla like it is here. My family has no real New Years traditions other than sitting in front of the T.V. and watching the ball drop and afterwards going to bed. Exciting I know.

There is quite a build-up to New Years in Vienna, buying fireworks, stands all over the city selling luck charms which can be strange to any onlooker. Stands that look similar to Christmas markets sell Pig charms to big stuffed pig toys, mushroom, four leafed clovers and chimney sweeper figures in all different sizes. Having any one of the named items are good luck charms.

Another tradition that is safe to say similar in all German cultures, which is probably going to be something I do every year no matter where I am. For me it is something I enjoy and a great way to pass the time while waiting for the final countdown. FONDUE!!!!  There multiple variations but the one that is traditional for my boyfriend and his parents is meat fondue but with soup instead of oil. It is certainly delicious and takes awhile so 12 seems to come soon after dinner.

The last thing to do before the year ends is to sit down and watch Dinner For One. Dinner For One is a short act about a woman on her 90th Birthday and has out lived her other friends and her butler James. The procedure is the same as every year and her butler must act out all of the 4 dead friends of Ms. Sofie. It is a wonderful skit no matter what time of the year it is, just it is only on T.V. just before the clock strikes Midnight!

Another new tradition for me is melting small lead figures over a flame and then pouring it in a bowl of water and trying to decipher what your shape means. It is an entertaining way to read into your New Year, it always seems to bring a good few laughs.


A small list of things I wish to accomplish before 2013:

• Go to the Gym.
• PASS THE EPD! That is my BIG German test that will allow me to study in the University. It also proves for my visa that I speak German not like a native, but good enough for studying. Talk about no pressure!
• Travel with the Interrail this Summer
• Finally get the ball rolling on finding a job.

• And did I mention my BIG German test?

A Review on my year in 2011:

Was a very happy girl to stand front row of my ultimate favorite singer Iron and Wine. You can say I am a big fan, and since I have never seen him in concert before it was a pretty big deal!

My trip to Prauge with my lovely boyfriend over Valentine's Day.

Going  to Budapest with my best friends on Spring Break!

Going back home for the Summer and spending time with this cutie and my family!

Jumping out of a tiny plane over the Florida Keys.

Celebrating Birthdays.

 Going to Bratislava with one of my best Friends for the day.

Celebrating Christmas for the first time without my family.

A Not So White Christmas.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas this year! 

This year Christmas was a rollercoaster for me since I was not able to be back home and nor was my family with me. I spent this Christmas with my lovely boyfriend and his parents.

For me an average Christmas entails baking some cookies with maybe a pie. Other than that I spend maybe a day shopping and I am ready for the holidays. This year was certainly different.

 

I always plan to bake like there is no tomorrow and have different sortiments of all kinds of sweets and lots of them, but then when time rolls by reality sinks in and I never bake as much as I plan. Well this year was a tad bit different. Since for my birthday I was given a mixer I wanted to bake something that would require me to use it, and also find a recipes that my European boyfriend wouldn't find too sweet. Since most Europeans will say American baked goods are too sweet for their taste. So I found a really yummy Cinnamon Swirl Bread recipie that I thought would be perfect, and of coarse an eray of cookies. Gingerbread was number one, cinnamon stick cookies, vanilla kipferl, and last minute butter cookies. Did I mention we were only 4 people?

Now I have to confess I had a little help from my boyfriend when it came to the butter cookies. How yummy does that look?

Don't go thinking we just had cookies for Christmas, no we had a feast just as well before we even began to think about eating cookies.

Last year in Vienna it would not stop snowing and it snowed almost every other day it was my first ever white Christmas. This year on the other hand it was not white and around 40F which is warm for Vienna at Christmas time.

So with a good 6 to 8 hours of baking I was not finished with any Christmas preperations. Shopping anywhere in Vienna that has more than 3 major stores is pretty much the biggest headache you could imagine. People were not shoving and fighting over anything or atleast no where I was shopping but just the mass of people everywhere was astounding.

One nice aspect of this Christmas was the tree, even though it is much smaller than back home my boyfriend and I went out together to buy our tree. For me it was the perfect tree buying experience I can remember. Normally, buying a tree entails going to atleast 3 different locations to find the perfect tree and is pretty boring. This time all I had to do was point and say that one looks good and after having the boyfriend haggel the price a little we were on our way back.

In Vienna and  I would say some other European countries it is tradition that the baby Jesus angel brings all the gifts aposed to Santa. In German Santa is called Weihnachtsman litteraly meaning Christmas man. Also in Vienna after baby Jesus brings the gifts on Christmas Eve he rings a bell to notify the children that he was there and it is time to observe the pretty packages. In the States Santa brings our gifts Christmas morning and only a few gifts from family can be opened on Christmas Eve but Christmas morning is when children get to dive in. For me this was a bit strange since I am used to opening gifts in the morning so when Christmas day came around in the morning the little child inside of me was sad not to have anything to open in the morning.


Even though it was a bit sad not to be with my family this Christmas, I felt very blessed and grateful for what I had since it was what I would call a perfect Christmas just having my family there would have been the icing to the cake.

Bratislava Here We Come!

Last week here in Austria was another Holiday, which meant pretty much everything would be closed even school! Two weeks before I had gone in to the OEBB office and was checking out some train ticket prices when I saw that no matter when you buy your ticket a two way ticket to Bratislava was only 14 euros. I figured, I can afford that and asked a freind the day before if she was wanting to come with me. So the next day we woke up and got ourselves ready for an excursion to Bratislava, Slovakia.

The morning was starting off good until when we were buying our train tickets the woman in the office told us that we have about 20 minutes to make the train at another train station and not where we were. In Vienna there are more than one major train station and I got mine mixed up.

I think if you would ask anybody that has traveled with me they would tell you there is never a dull moment! Between the running to get to the train's platform in time or just simply touring a new city. When traveling with my friends I am blessed to know two languages and having friends that speak languages that I don't. So no matter where we are we will always seem to find a person that will speak one of the 6 languages we all speak as a collective group.

When in Bratislava on a cold windy wintery day it is good to keep a sense of humor.

Bratislava is only an hour from Vienna with the train and the tickets are inexpensive as well! Only 14 euros and you can buy your tickets the day of your trip and it will stay 14 euros! Bratislava is a perfect one day trip for everyone. It has a very quaint european medivial feel and is not too large. For me one day in Bratislava was perfect, it was a nice diversion from day to day routine. If you really just want to hit the main sites, visit the city's center and just take some photos than I would reccomend not planning on staying in Bratislava for more than a day.  Austria is a bit expensive in comparison to some other neighboring countires but I wouldn't say Bratislava had a huge difference in prices. The currency in Slovakia is Euros.

 
The food was yummy too! I had ordered a chicken breast with a blue cheese sauce that was really tasty after a huge hike up to the castle in Bratislava.

It was also the perfect thing after being beaten up by the heavy winds.

In Bratislava the things I would recomend to do would be:

Go to the castle in Bratislava, even though it does not look that pretty but the view of the whole city and mountains are worth it.


Go into the Micheal's Tower it is a museum or arms and not only is the last medivial gate standing in Bratislava and at sunset it is perfect for pictures of the castle.

 

  Until next time!

Tipping In Austria

Tipping in Austria is unlike in the States. Tipping in Florida is 10% of your total at a resturant and at a coffee shop the change given back goes into the tip jar. Waiters and Waitresses normally are paid lower than minimum wage and live off their tips.

When I was living in the States I worked at a local smoothie bar and I know tips were what really made working with all the rude people easier and helped with the wages I was paid. I could right a whole post on how you are supposed to act around a tipping jar because after working at the smoothie bar for a year I saw some people that did not know what was proper. For example we had a few people steal our tips, we even had people search in the tip jar for the change when a order was 3.25 they would thumb around looking for the 25 cents.

I believe Tips should not suppliment a low wage but rather reflect on the service itself. If that person went out of their way for you and was not rude then tipping is easy.

When I was in France tipping was included with the price which made everything you just had to add up your bill and no exactly what it is you had to pay.

What is custom in one European Country is not in another. Here tipping is called "Trinkgeld" which means drinking money *literaly* so unlike the States it not always 10% but it can be spare change and or 2 to 3 euros. And this is not at your local coffee shop but I mean even in resturants that is an acceptable amount for a tip. Now please use some common sense and if you have racked up a high bill and a table of 4 or more please don't tip 3 euros. The higher the bill the larger the tip, but that is up to your own discretion. Always tipping is a good habit, but if you feel the service was poor and the waiter cocked an attitude then you don't need to feel obligated to give him anything.

Here is a TIP! When traveling abroad it is better to do research on what to tip whereever you may be or may be going. Because it is a known fact that Americans are big tippers and once hearing your accent you can be taken for as a fool. The waiter or waitress will either let you tip whatever you wish even if it is not accustom to tip. Also make sure you know the currency because you don't want to give more than you think you are.

In Austria when paying for the most part the waiter or waitress will pull out a big black pouch and that is the cash register. Every waiter will be wearing one, and after recieving your bill they will stand right beside you with pouches open waiting for you to pay right then and there. So you have to be quick on your feet on what you will leave because if your total is 5.50 euros and you have a 10 you can tell them 6 and they will hand you back 4 euros. Leaving the money on the table is not customary but if you don't speak the language, you can always wait for them to give you back the change and then hand them what ever you see fit as a tip.

Moving Abroad But Don't Know Where?

Moving abroad can be a big decision for anybody, but what happens when you don't know where to go?

If you are not moving for work reasons, it makes the deciding of where in the world to go a bit difficult.  Most common is to move to a country where the language is same as your own, or a large popular city. London, Paris, Rome, Barcelona are the top names I have heard when people are talking about Europe. It was also the cities people would have expected me to move to. But in fact not only is Vienna a big metropolitain city but it is cheaper than the cities talked about above. Paris can just burn a whole through your wallet by finding the tiniest closest to call home, I would say it is comparable to trying to live in an apartment in Manhatten close to Times Square.

Also another thing to think about is you don't want to move abroad with out knowing the quality of life. So not only for me personally was Vienna the perfect choice but now according to Mercer's 2011 Quality of living survery Vienna ranks number one! WOOT WOOT! 

Living in Vienna has certainly been not an easy transition but I can vouch that here they take pride in high quality food, public transportation and even the water here comes from the Alpes and is perfectly safe to drink. 

Packing your bags and leaving your old life is difficult, so make sure where ever you relocate to fits your personal needs. I would not reccomend letting these surverys determine where to move, but rather noted.

Here are some more reading material talking about Vienna and its recent ranking. Times

Belvedere in November