Wednesday September 14th

E:
It became a rather cold day while we were out. It's been so hot lately that we dressed for hot weather. Katherine wore a new long dress, which is very light and cool. She got kind of cold when we were outside; but she was a good sport about the cold weather.
Our goal today was to go see St. Stephens Cathedral and open a bank account here. We accomplished both. I’ve noticed that offices don’t keep their spaces as clean as offices in Canada. The people at the bank weren’t messy, but desks weren’t tidy, i.e.: papers stacked on the desk with little desk top space left.

The Cathedral was cool. The buildings here are so intricate and detailed. It is mind blowing the amount of man power and time that went into the Cathedral, and all of the other old architecture around Vienna, to make all of the elaborate ornaments. (It made me think of the Salt Lake City Temple; both built without modern day technology... instead, pure hand sculpting, a lot of man muscle, and determination over time)

The gelato here is great. We’ve got a small shop that sells it just around the corner. We usually get a small on with two flavours and share it. Boy it is delicious. 2 euro for a small cup of pure goodness.

Tuesday September 13th

E:

Katherine and I planned to go to an outlet mall. It happened to be outside of the Vienna transit districts and we would have had to pay 7.20 euro each for a one way ticket and then a taxi at the last stop to then get to the mall. It just didn’t seem worth it with the time that we had. So, at the station where we would have boarded a REX train, and at the point that we found out that it was going to cost over 30 euro to make the trip, we decided not to go.

Instead, we strolled down some of the streets with the most beautiful buildings; old buildings of course. After going through some of the shops, we went and sat at a park. It was by a huge stone building decorated with elaborate statues and mouldings.

Sitting on that park bench, I thought to myself, “We are in Europe”. Back home people build fantasies around places like this. It was rather neat to think that I was enjoying a carefree afternoon with my wife in Vienna.

Almost care free.  At different points in a day either Katherine, I, or both of us find ourselves needing a break, food or water. Things go well when we are sure that we get enough breaks, water, and meals/food. It’s easy to get moody or less patient and harder to have fun when you’re tired and/or hungry. Today was a hot day so it was tough at points, but we took some breaks and then found ourselves feeling better.

One break today was at this interesting book store. Since Katherine and I know basically no German, we ended up looking at the photo books.

Later, Katherine found a dress and bought it. We ate chicken nuggets for dinner. It was a cool night, and after guessing wrong which tram to take, we ended up strolling the rest of the way home. It was nice.  ... except for the part where I caught a glimpse of the strippers standing just outside of the door to the ‘Piano Bar’, who didn’t happen to be wearing much at all. That was upsetting to see and a surprise. Back home they don’t lure people in to the club by placing the girls just by the entrance. Other than that upsetting experience, it was an enjoyable walk home.

We finished off the evening by watching “The Holiday”. It was good to hear some people communicating in English.

Scriptures with Katherine, then prayers; now off to bed.

Monday September 12th

K:
We've been here for about a week now and we are running out of clothes to wear. Finally the dreaded laundry day has arrived. 
We have no laundry in our apartment or in the building so it was a bit of adventure just to figure out where we were going to do it. When we moved in our landlord told us we could just wash some things here at home by hand in the sink, but bigger things we'll have to take out...HA you should see the size of our sink. That would be a funny thing to try sometime, but not when we're completely out of clothes. 
So we set out this morning in search of a Laundromat (which my WHOLE life I thought were called Laundry Mats, but if you google that it actually corrects it to Laundromat. I always thought that was a cheesy name that people named their Laundry Mats to be witty or cute). Anyway, we finally found one not too far from home. When we figured out how to work it all though (not knowing any German), we realized that each load to wash costs us 5euros! And the soap they provide you with smells like I would imagine freshly washed bed sheets in a hospital smell. Just strange and not like home. We will definitely buy our own for next time. Boy oh boy do we miss Mommy and Daddy's basement: where we could do free loads of wash with delicious smelling soap and leave the room without worrying about the clothes we're washing. 


Sitting still while our laundry moves around and around for what seems like hours:

Enjoying a good game of Mille Bornes (one of our very favourites) while we wait.

Enjoying a good snack while we wait. Verdict on this Austrian snack: Paprika chips are a success, a little like all dressed back home. Chocolate milk is very rich, almost like it's made from dark chocolate. Good, but not as sweet as home.

I love my husband. He keeps me entertained while we WAIT. 

Another handy little thing for while we wait: mobile internet. Being here for only 4 months we can't sign a contract for internet to have it set up at home so we got one of these USB stick things. It's kind of cool because we have the internet at the Laundromat, and where ever we happen to need it when we're lost or translating important things from German, but also kind of strange because we pay for it by the GB so we can't do things like watch videos or Skype or upload pictures to our blog posts unless we're at the school using their wireless internet instead. 
So about 12euros and 2hours later Eric and I finally have clean clothes! They smell strange and aren't really 100% dry yet but they are clean. We pack them up in our suitcase again and take them home where we hang every pair of pants, underwear and socks from any surface we could find in the apartment, until they're dry enough to fold up and put away (or until we wear them all and have to do it all again next week sometime). 
It was nice to finally get home this afternoon and get to shower and put on clean clothes. Isn't that just the very best feeling?

Orientation Week

Here are some things we're learning and seeing, and some things maybe you'd like to know and see as well. Some of what we know in Vienna so far. 
 
Living in Vienna is wonderful set of books (lent to us by the Morgans), from which we have learned everything we know, and will continue to pull all useful knowledge from. They are lifesavers and we'd be lost without them. I started to list some specifics we've found in here, but I just can't do it. You name it, they've got all you'd need to know about it. We love them. I know they will be talked about again, and they will be henceforth be referred to as "the Books".

Map of the Subway lines. We live off the U6.

These signs are almost like an oasis in the desert sometimes. This means that right below you is a U station, and it's helped us find our way a few times.

This is a speed limit sign. It means 30 kilometres per hour.

SPAR is the most economically friendly chain of supermarkets. There are SPAR, INTERSPAR and EUROSPAR stores. This one happens to be like 50m from our house. Also, you will never find one of these open later than 8 o'clock. That's one important thing you should know about Vienna. Everything around here shuts down really early. Most things at 6pm, and when you're lucky you can find stuff open til 8, but anything open after 8 is usually the kind of place you would never want to find yourself in anyway.

These (plus an Evian water bottle) are the only familiar things I came home with on grocery trip number one. PS I did not get Evian because I am a water snob, only because here in Vienna the big this is sparkling water. It's almost hard to escape it, and Evian was the only name I recognized and could be sure was still and did not contain alcohol.

That's another thing. Alcohol is everywhere! It's strange to not order a drink before or with dinner. They actually sell it right in the grocery stores all over. It takes up more space than juice and water usually.

A breakfast in Austria typically consists of bread, jam and coffee. THe selection of jam in the grocery store is virtuously endless. There is also a large selection of honey and spreads, like Nutella. There is hardly any peanut butter though.

This is the selection our grocery store has, and our's is a big one. That empty spot is for Skippy Peanut Butter, which have not tried yet because it's really expensive and hasn't been in stock the last few times we've looked. I miss Kraft :(
BIPA looks like a cute little cosmetics shop, but it's actually just a normal drug store. It'd be similar to a Shoppers Drug Mart in Canada, but without a pharmacy.


This is about the closest thing to plain white toilet paper we found in the grocery store. They have some of every colour, and we even saw one with a Hello Kitty pattern. Our bums will be grateful to get back home though because softness and comfort is not something they value here in toilet paper, as much as home at least.

Our mini fridge, decorated with a letter from the Piersons held up by magnets of the Calgary Temple and Peter's Drive-In. A little taste of Calgary in our home. 

Obdachlos

E:
We're renting our apartment from a kind member of the church who happens to be a neurosurgeon. But tonight we are on our own. We took the normal train and it took a lot longer than I had anticipated. At our last stop we were tired... exhausted and jet lagged-- we had just toted 3 50lbs bags with our carry-ons onto two trains and a tram and through two huge stations.
Next stop, home for the next 4 months. I called our doctor-landlord. He woke to answer the phone, "What happend? What took you so long? I thought you landed at 7" I explained, but explaining couldn't change reality-- you don't do brain surgery on anything less than 8 hours of sleep.
I have to admit the news of that phone call was rather discouraging and disappointing. I felt abandoned; however, I really couldn't blame Heber. Just one of those miscommunications that ends in trial.
We sat on a step in the dark while we let it all sink in and rested. There we were with no other phone numbers, no map, no speaky German, no energy... just too much to carry. Katherine cried a little, but was brave. We did have each other, and Katherine was a good support to me while I tried to comfort and support her.
After resting for a few minutes, we ventured down the road to an open restaurant. Perhaps it was my 3rd attempt at speaking to the locals. My success rate depended solely on the other parties English ability. This one happened to be a success. We made it to a near by hotel.
Looking back the whole experience wasn't too bad. In the moment it was hard, but I figured that we'd get through it. It was really a battle of determination against the exhaustion. Determination won this time. The whole event kind of strengthened Katherine and I. We became a little closer tonight.
Before going to sleep, I took Katherine out the window and we sat on the roof. We're in Europe.

London, Heathrow - Vienna, International

A nine hour, overnight flight is way too long. A five hour stop over in an airport in a city and country, is not long enough.

Weary little travellers. So tired.

A traditional English breakfast and a plate of fish and chips for lunch.


A few naps later, and we're back in the air again.




A few hours later, Vienna lets us in. Knowing no German, at 8 o'clock at night, we navigate the way to our apartment with all of our bags.

"T minus..."

We actually woke up on time today, which felt like an accomplishment. Good start to busy day. T minus:
6 hours - Out of bed at 7am. Goodbye family, have fun at Morgan and Steve's wedding. We've got a lot of work to do!
5 hours - Maybe start packing our suitcases. 4 months. 2 bags. 100 pounds. Plus a carry on or two (thank goodness). Trip to the mall. Good idea? Maybe not, but we got the screen of our nice new camera protected with Ghost Armour. Looks great!
4 hours - We've got time...do a little more packing...play with Verona and Max (before we leave and they grow all up)...and visit with Jordan, Breanne and Benjamin.
3 hours - Oh no...we're supposed to be at the airport now and nothing is fitting in the bags...maybe bring a third? (Katherine's freaking out).
2.5 hours - Maybe we should leave the house? Say some goodbyes, and take some casual pictures. (Breanne's turn to freak out for us).
2 hours - We made it!
1.5 hours - With no drugs, explosives, or firearms, and just a quick pat down, they let us through and we're off.
1 hour - Dinner (our last "Great Canadian" meal). Word search puzzle (provided by Melissa and Jordan). Wait some... K: "Oh darn, I should probably cancel my phone before we leave the country"
0.5 hour - Boarding. There's no turning back now.
0 hours - Take off.