Salzburg in a Day

Man these past two days have been a whirlwind, and it started yesterday morning. I left early for nannying because the girl I nanny was getting out of school early, so I had to meet her at their flat early. I gave myself plenty of time because it was raining and I wanted to go get a coffee before I headed over. So I took the train to an “Anker” which is like a bakery here that sells coffee as well. I ordered my mélange, and looked in my wallet. I could have SWORN I had a €5 note, but alas I had nothing but change. I tried to gather up the change I had and it still wasn’t enough so I had tell the lady “oops, I can’t pay for that drink you just made me, bye.” Super embarrassing. So I then walked to the U-bahn station and waited for the train I needed. I sat and read my book, and when the train came I quickly got on, but of course by the next stop I had realized I left my brand new “I Love Vienna” umbrella (literally brand new, I had bought it 3 days earlier) at the seat where I was waiting for the train. Since I had time I quickly got on the train back to the station I was at not 10 minutes ago, but it was too late. My umbrella was gone =(! I looked everywhere, asked the information desk if someone had turned in an umbrella, but it was gone. Needless to say, I was super bummed.

But things always get better, and I quickly got back on the train to go nanny. I got there a little late because I wasted time looking for my umbrella, but still got there. We hung out for about an hour before I started heating up lunch, which was delicious. After that she did her homework while I got the stuff ready to make “Chocolate Chunk Cookies” (Apparently they don’t sell chocolate chips in Austria-so instead I got some chocolate Milka bars and cut them up into chunks). We made chocolate chunk cookies, which was interesting using the metric system to bake as well as using “vanilla” in power form vs. liquid form like back home, but I added just a teaspoon of water to make the mixing a little easier and it worked perfectly. The cookies were super delicious and the girl loved them too, so we had a good time making them. After cookies, we played games and cleaned up the flat because Mom was coming home from a business trip in a few hours, once mom got home the subject turned to me loosing my umbrella and they very sweetly gave me one of their many umbrellas, joking with me and how I’m from California and am not used to this much rain thus having to carry around an umbrella. After I left nannying I quickly went home to meet Ben since we were taking a 3 hour train that evening to Salzburg so we could spend today in Salzburg then take a train back this evening. We got on the train (which was super comfortable and much cooler than flying haha) and at about 10:00 pm we were in Salzburg.

Once we got to Salzburg we didn’t have a hotel room set up, so we tried the hotels right next to the Bahnhoff (train station), but they were full. So we walked a few blocks to another hotel we had seen in our “Austria” travel book, but it was closed. Awesome. By this time we are just both so tired, and want to find a place to sleep so we will be well rested for our day in Salzburg, so we walked another few blocks, and thank the Lord we found a Holiday Inn (which was in a nice area too-right next to a Porsche dealership). We checked in for the night and went straight to sleep.

The next morning we woke up early and got ready for the day, figured out what exactly we wanted to do and in what order we wanted to do them in. Of course it was raining so the morning was pretty uncomfortable, but we worked through it. We quickly stopped for some coffee then headed on in to town. Our first (quick) stop was Mozart’s house that he lived in for his later childhood, the building had been bombed in WWII and then had been rebuilt. We took a few pictures then continued walking to the house where Mozart was actually born (nothing had been re-done in this building) so we did the museum here. It was amazing to see all the paintings, relics, and actual drafts of Mozart’s music written in his own hand writing. I learned a lot about Mozart and his family and it was a really neat museum, not only did we learn a lot, but it also kept us out of the rain for a while!

After the Mozart Museum, we headed up the hill towards the Hohensalzburg Fortress, which was built by the Arch Bishop so people the Clergy could escape when the Emperor was fighting with the Pope. We got the ticket that allowed us to go to all the museums with in the fortress as well as do the Audio Tour and walk around. First we went to the little marionette museum, then we saw some really cool weapons, torture tools, a really elaborate stove, as well as other relics that were used there. The audio tour was neat and we saw the “torture chamber”, which was really misleading because apparently it was basically just the dungeon room where they kept the prisoners and executed the ones found guilty, but no actual “torture” went on there. The coolest thing about the fortress was the beautiful view, since it sits on top of a hill, it over looks the entire city of Salzburg. When we first arrived there was a lot of fog so we couldn’t see very far, but as the day passed it cleared up and we got some really beautiful pictures.

We spent a majority of our day exploring the Fortress, so after we left we just walked around the town, went to a few churches and walked through the Schloss Mirabell garden. Since we had about an hour and half before our train home was going to leave we had dinner at the Stigelbräu Biergarten. “Stigel” is the Salzburg beer so we of course had to have one while there, Ben had the traditional and I had the citric flavored one. After dinner we went to the train station, got back on the train and made the 2 and a half hour journey home.

Now we are catching up on our e-mails and Facebook, and for me writing this blog and uploading our pictures on to Facebook.

Residency and housing

Man, it seems like forever since I wrote in my blog! Ben and I have been busy with lots of stuff going on. We more recently came across some issues with our residency permits, but thankfully things have been going well with the paperwork that we need. We still (unfortunately) haven’t been able to turn our residency applications in yet because of these paperwork issues, but we are working on it, and hopefully it won’t be too much longer until we are able to submit everything. One of the things that we might have to change because of our residency is housing (where we currently live is not situated to have a married couple), so keep us in our prayers while we look for new housing, and other possible options. Also, that if we are able to find another option that Ben is not “locked in” in his current housing. Even though some things have been rough and stressful, we trust in the Lord who brought us here, and we know that He has a plan and we just have to let him show us what it is.

Other than housing items, life has been going well. Ben was finally able to start his archival work and seems to be enjoying it. Since the books he’s working with are so old, he has a bunch of white linen gloves that he has to use when looking at them as not to mess up the print and such. Today he came home and said he was able to find a lot of good stuff to work with so that’s great. I know he’s been stressed worrying about all this paperwork, but it’s good that he is still able to be able to focus on the reason why he is here, his research.

For me, nannying has been going well. Yesterday was the second day for the English class, and the Mom wasn’t there because she was on a business trip. She got a “substitute” to take over for the class, and I was mainly just there to help, but I was still able to help the kids. When I arrived at the church where the class is taking place I saw the substitute standing outside in the rain, so we quickly went inside and started talking. She joked with me saying that she easily recognized me as the person she was looking for (since the Mom had told her about me) since I was the one walking around in the rain in capri pants-the Mom obviously told her I’m from California (haha) and obviously I need to buy better clothes for this type of weather. During class the kids did work sheets with basic greetings, then filled out a sheet about them, their eye color, hair color, name, family, hobbies, etc. Since I know very little German, it was quite funny to see the kids acting out their hobbies (like swimming and gymnastics) so I could then tell them what it is in English and how to spell it. Otherwise, nannying has been pretty calm. I go there around lunch time, heat up lunch, we eat, she will do her homework, and we will play games. Fun and simple.

During the week, Ben and I have stayed in town and have just explored. Last week we walked a few blocks down and found a really busy part of down town, which we didn’t think we were really close enough to. So we spent the day looking at shops and walking around. For the past few weekends, Ben and I have gone a little outside the city going more into the forests surrounding Vienna. This past weekend we went to Hermesvilla outside of town, which was another palace built by the emperor for his wife, who apparently didn’t much like the city life. This was their “getaway” house complete with huge stables, and obviously forest ground. When we went it was raining a lot so we looked around as much as we could with out getting too wet, then we went inside the palace to visit the museum there. We went through the house and we were able to see relics that had been in the palace when the emperor and empress still lived there. I wish I would have been able to take pictures, because it was so neat! The palace was huge and had amazing elaborate furniture; it would have been really neat to be able to live in such a place. Overall, a pretty good weekend.

For the most part, Ben and I during the week have been staying in town doing our work stuff, but this week (tomorrow evening) we will be taking a train to Salzburg to stay the night and spend Thursday roaming the city. We want to go to the factory where they make the Mozart chocolate, possibly do the Mozart museum and overall just explore outside of Vienna. As soon as we get back I will write another blog describing our first real experience out of the city.

Whew...

Man these past few weeks have been busy! Ben and I have been working on trying to get all our residency papers together, which is proving to be quite a hassle with a lot of complications with getting all our documents “authenticicized” and junk. But we still have been able to do quite a few fun things.

Mainly last Thursday we spent the afternoon at a Beer Tent in downtown Vienna. I didn’t realize that Vienna also does Oktoberfest celebrations, so instead of taking a 5 hour train ride to Munich and then back the same night, we decided to go to the festivities right here in Vienna. We ordered a liter of beer each along with pretzels, fries, sausages, and apple strudel to top it all off. We had a great time eating, drinking, listening to the music and overall enjoying the atmosphere. Then on Thursday evening we went to an Organ concert at a neo-gothic church downtown. Before it started we went to a café for some coffee, then after talking and hanging out for a while we headed over to the church. The organ concert was interesting, it is quite an instrument. The acoustics in the church were made for this kind of music so it was interesting to hear how it sounds in the church. We listened to a few more popular pieces (none of which I had heard) then the musician played his own piece, which was much more whimsical than the other pieces played.

During the weekend we really just hung out around town and walked around more. On Sunday we went to the outskirts of Vienna where the forests are. We got to a look out point and were able to see the whole city of Vienna, which was beautiful. Then we walked around in the forest a little, and headed home, stopping at a café along the way of course.

On Monday, I started the English class with my nanny family, and overall things went really smoothly. Since it was the first class, it was mainly a lot of coloring and learning in which countries English is considered the “Mother Tongue”. The kids seem to know some English but not a whole lot, and of course when I was introduced as “Katie from California” some of the boys started snickering saying “Hi Katy Perry. Hehe.” Such clever 10 year old boys… after the class was over and the kids all got picked up the mom said “I think we deserve some coffee,” so we went to a café (I just got hot chocolate) and ordered a yummy dessert to all share. While we ate and drank we continued to talk about the differences in America vs. here and I told the girl how we will have to make some American Chocolate Chip Cookies soon =)