The Holiday Season

The Christmas season has started here in Austria.  Without Thanksgiving to celebrate, they began putting up decorations a week or so ago.  Each day, more and more Christmas markets open up around the country and soon they will all be up and running.  This is truly a great time to be here in Austria.  Every town hangs up lights over the streets and puts up at least one tree.  Just outside our apartment we've got a tree, a wreath hanging and lights over the street.  Our Christmas market hasn't started yet but a trip to the neighboring towns offers plenty of them.  Last weekend, we visited Salzburg.  It is one of the nicest cities in the country, especially during the Christmas market season.  The old city is full of big and small markets.  Night and day, the markets are bustling with not just tourists, but natives as well.  There's plenty to eat and drink as you make your way through the rows of booths.  Glühwein (mold wine) and Punsch (hot alcoholic punch) are served at nearly every stand.  No wonder everyone looked so happy!  In addition to the markets, Salzburg has an ice skating rink put up next to the cathedral.  This weekend, we will visit the Vienna Christmas markets for the first time.  The biggest one is in front of the spectacular city hall.  After New Year's, they convert this area into a massive ice skating rink, much larger than the one in Salzburg.

Obviously, Thanksgiving is not celebrated here.  The Austrians have a similar holiday but it is much smaller and not nearly as big of a deal.  Do you feel bad for us since we didn't get the Thanksgiving break.  Well, don't.  The Austrians have their fare share of holidays.  Basically, any possible Catholic holiday is celebrated.  Banks, shops and school close.  Many probably don't even know what holiday it is because they just had one two weeks earlier.  Additionally, they take a week long semester break 3 weeks after the Christmas break in order to boost the skiing economy.  The different areas of Austria have their breaks at different times to keep the crowds on the slopes from getting too large.

I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving and we look forward to being home over Christmas.

Smoking and Bathrooms

These are the two things I hate most about Austria.  Upon entering the country, you’ll notice that not only does everyone here seem to smoke, but Austria seems to be the only western European country not to have instigated a smoking ban.  Their new law, which still doesn’t take effect for a couple years, is to have smoking and non-smoking sections.  They are years behind the USA and the rest of western Europe.  Our trip to Munich proved to be very enjoyable since they have forbidden smoking in all indoor buildings including restaurants and bars.  Here in Austria, one can smoke just about anywhere it seems.

I suppose it’s hard to pass a smoking ban when the majority of the population lights up every 5 minutes including the 16 year olds who take the train with me to school in the morning.  You can buy cigarettes in more locations than you can anything else.  Vending machines are located on every street corner in case you smoke your last one on the previous block.

The other thing which drives me nuts is the bathrooms.  Finding a public bathroom is a challenge and upon doing so, be prepared to hand over some money in order to use it.  Whether it’s a turnstile or a bowl with a scary woman watching over you, bathrooms are never free.  You just finished an expensive dinner at a restaurant and expect that as a customer the bathroom must be free.  Oh no, paying $50 for your meal certainly doesn’t entitle you to use the bathroom for free.  You think you can just walk by and not tip.  Beware, these women will force it out of you, physically or through intense fear. 

This phenomenon makes absolutely no sense to me.  In a country with socialized health care, an excellent public transportation system and many other great things, they don’t seem to understand that using the bathroom is a natural thing that people should be entitled to, at least if they are a paying customer.  It also doesn’t make any sense to me that paying a bathroom attendant minimum wage to watch over the bathroom 24/7 is more economical than simply not charging people to use the bathroom.  I can’t imagine the 10 cents tips add up enough money to pay their wage.  Then comes the other method, the turnstile.  This one shocks me just as much.   Public transportation in every city here is done on the honor system.  No turnstiles, nothing.  There are just random checks every couple months and even those have to be announced in the paper and online.  The only regular checks occur on the national trains.  For some reason though, they feel it makes sense to install turnstiles at bathrooms forcing victims to hand over 50 cents before entering.  I can’t imagine how many bathroom users are required to pay for the cost and maintenance of these turnstiles.  On top of that, a bathroom attendant is often present.

So, with that, I’m going to use the free bathroom in my smoke free apartment.  However, even our apartment absorbs some of the smoke smell from the Wettbüro below.

Joined a Choir!

This week I took a big step in integrating myself into the culture.  I found and joined a men's chorus in the neighboring town of Ybbs (pronounced: ipps).  The choir is the Männergesangversein Ybbs and is nearly 160 years old.  

I was looking around for choirs in the area and sent an email to an address I found for this choir.  It was the email of the former directer but he replied immediately and was extremely excited.  We met for coffee later that day and the following day he drove me to the rehearsal.  The rehearsals take place in a former Gasthaus.  A Gasthaus is basically somewhere between a B&B and a hotel with a restaurant.  

Immediately, it was clear that this was the right choir for me.  It's made up of 25 or so jolly Austrian men who have been signing together for many years.  They love signing and luckily for me....Americans as well.  They were so welcoming that I instantly felt like a member of the group.  The music we sing was a combination of sacred and secular music.  It was all very similar to my men's chorus experiences at St. John's.  Fun music and lots of jokes flying around all the time.  After rehearsal, we pushed the tables together and shared a beer and some food.  I was so thrilled to have found not only a musical opportunity, but a great chance to meet Austrians. 


This last weekend we had a choir retreat in preparation for our upcoming concerts and CD recording.  We rehearsed all day Saturday and Sunday which was a great opportunity for me to learn some of the music and get to know the other members better.  They have a large repertoire since most of the members have been singing with the choir for many years.  We have two concerts in December, one across the Danube from here and one in the Vienna City Hall.  


I am really excited about singing with this choir.  It will be a great experience on many levels!  More to come as our Christmas concerts approach...

  

Clouds, Rain and a day of Sun

It's been some time since my last post about Budapest.  I will attempt to do a better job about making more frequent posts.  A lot has happened since then.

Angela's parents came a visited us for a week.  They saw our daily lives here in Pöchlarn and in Wieselburg.  They enjoyed small town Austria.  Some of our adventures were met with rain which shouldn't be a surprise since it's cloudy and rainy pretty much every day right now.  The worst was when we were biking along the Danube and through the Wachau wine region.  Sun turned to clouds and rain began to fall until we were soaked and frozen with no option but to keep on pedaling.  A stop for some wine and food fueled us along to the finish.  Before heading back to the US, they were able to explore some of Salzburg and drink some beer in Munich.  It was great to have company here.  Anyone else who's thinking about visiting, stop thinking and book a flight!

After dropping Mari Jo and Mark off in Munich, Angela and I stayed for the weekend and saw the sights.  An amazing tour on Saturday,beautiful weather on Sunday and good beer each night made it a spectacular weekend.

Teaching has been an interesting experience for me.  With so many different classes, I'm just starting to see the same students for the second or third time.  I'm learning more and more each day and getting more comfortable with my classes as I get to know them better.  My lessons topics range from agriculture (since it is an agricultural school) to tourist sites in the US to just about anything I wish to teach.  The English teachers at my school are both very nice and helpful.  They've made my experience so far very enjoyable.

Last week I got a tour of the school and it was amazing to see the facilities they have.  From a slaughterhouse where they produce their own meat to gardens, fields and endless labs and machine shops, the school has just about everything.  They even have a bio fuel plant which produced renewable energy for school and neighboring households.  The students spend a large part of their time working in these areas learning practical skills for farming or other related jobs.