Hey everybody, I really suck at this updating every day thing huh? Anywho, where were we, oh yah! The third day of school!

Right, so October 9^th was the first day I had to take the bus, and a little fore warning, me and public transport in Tulln have a few issues. Now, I have my pick of two buses to go to school every day. The one is five minutes earlier then the other so we figured it was a good idea to take that one because then if we missed it, we would have a backup plan. Now, when the bus doors opened, there were so many kids that we could barely get in. In the end, the only way I fit was because the door was the type that swung out, then presses straight in to close. So that was how I ended up riding one stop, spread eagled against a bus door thinking "Oh my God, my life is turning into a Saturday morning bugs bunny cartoon!" I was still thinking this when the doors opened again and I fell out on my butt on the bus stop. After that I carried on, and after some slight confusion actually managed to get off at my school's stop! Since Wednesday was also the first day I had to be in school for the full day, it was a pretty long day, 9 hours in fact. Now, before you start freaking out and laughing that I have to be at school from 8-5 everyday, let me explain something to you. Everyday has a different length. With my current schedule, I have one day where I have 9 hours, and one day when I have 4. Most days, almost every class is done at 2. Now, on this particular Wednesday, my last class was computers. Now, I'm not sure if I've told you this before, but my schools layout is about as confusing as Hogwarts. It has a total of five levels, (I think, that's how confusing this place is, I can't even tell!). None of the hallways run the whole length of the school, Not all the hallways actually line up as level, and the rooms aren't actually numbered chronologically, they are numbered randomly since the numbers are actually the class that is in them. All in all, it's a pretty easy place to get lost in. Now, I had already figured out where class 2bk is, but the computer lab was a whole other story. Two steps out the door, I was hopelessly lost and spent the next ten minutes trying to find the exit. Now, since we hadn't figured out the bus schedule yet, I had to call my host mom, who was going to look it up during the course of the day. This was also my first day with my new cell phone. Now, for anyone who isn't clear on my technological capacity, it sucks, as does my complete lack of luck around any mechanical object. So that was how I managed to accidently turn the stupid thing off. After that I quickly discovered that you needed a pin number to open the bloody thing again, which I, of course, didn't know. So I went off looking for another phone I could use, which should have been easy, except for the fact that Daniella's number was, you guessed it, also programmed into my phone, blocked by the bloody pin. Now as I've said, mostly everyone had already cleared out by this point, which is how I found myself attempting to explain to a janitor, in incredibly mangled German, that I not only needed a phone, I also needed a phone number. Eventually he took me to the office, and the principle got me to explain in English. There still somehow managed to be a miss communication however, and he thought I was trying to call my family in Canada. He called my rotary counsellor to get that number, but then the vice-principle stepped in and cleared everything up. After that, it was a simple matter of looking up Krumpholz in their records, and calling her up, but as you may have guessed, I had long since missed my bus and she had to come in and get me.

The rest of the week went pretty well, with me only missing the bus once and getting off at the wrong stop once. Apparently, the bus doesn't stop at every stop and you have to hit a button that beeps, asking the driver to please let you off. ( If you're over there, being all "I could have told you that," You should have, because I don't understand these things!) Luckily someone else had to get off at the next stop, which was luckily still in Tulbing, or else I would have been on that bus for a long time! Saturday was fun. Kristiens kids (recap, Daniella's boyfriend, and his two kids are named Jasmin and Dominic, trust me the double Jasmin thing really gets confusing!) were up for the weekend (they come every second weekend) so we planned a day trip. We went hiking. That was fun. There was a decent path, and not too much uphill. Along the way, there was this "exotic" bird mini zoo that we went in to. ( I say "Exotic," because it was mostly owls and falcons that aren't that exciting for me, but there were still some cool ones for me too.) The place was one of the most depressing things I've ever seen in my life. The cages were small and dirty, and all of the birds looked absolutely miserable. Zoos always make me a little sad, animals in cages and all of that, but this was different, I was practically crying the entire time. It didn't help that Jasmin (Kristien's, not Daniella's) was being really mean to them. She was trying to scare them, rattling cages, and she even poked on with a stick. That was when I told her to cut it out, but she didn't listen to me. After that, we headed back to the house, and me and Daniella made supper. Oh, just a side note, I've become the official kitchen helper. It started because I was bored but now I'm really starting to enjoy it. Peeling potatoes is oddly peaceful. We made this really delicious meal called Kaisermann, that I have vowed to learn before I leave, along with a few other dishes. In Austria, some of the traditional foods are more like dessert, but they eat it as a meal, and I'm hoping to bring that tradition back, that and Wienerschnitzle. (Yes Corinne, I realize that was probably spelled wrong.) These things are delicious, but probably pretty helpful to all the weight I've been putting on lately!

Sunday however, was amazing! We spent all morning making apple plum jelly, and an apple plum cake. (There's a plum tree and an apple tree in the backyard, and the fruits were ripe and super good, so there's been a lot of apple plum stuff going on lately.) In the afternoon Kristien and Co. Came over and we played this game called activity. It's like charades, Pictionary, and whatever the game is where you have to describe the word, without using it, all thrown into one crazy board game of madness. After that is when it got really interesting though. I went to coffee with my third host family, that was what we needed the cake for by the way. They were really nice, and live in Katzelsdorf, which is maybe ten minutes walk from where I live now. It's a young family with the mom, Daniella, the dad, Stephan, and three kids. Two little girls 8 and 6, named Clara and Stephie, and a 2 year old boy who's name I can't remember. They also have a huge chocolate lab, two birds and two pet rats whose names I also can't remember. I think that that household is gonna be loads of fun, never a dull moment there!

We are now moving back into the realms of school. Now after the first week, they pulled me out of all of the hard classes, like physics, and put me into the lowest level of German (still too hard for me) and as an assistant in English classes. This is quite fun because I'm able to meet so many different people. Now everywhere I go, at least one person stops to say hi to me. They try to speak to me in English, and I try to speak to them in German, it's a great system. The week passed with no real mishaps, except the time I got on the wrong bus and ended up sitting at some random stop for an hour till the next bus came.

Now, on Friday I went to Vienna with my host mom, got on a train and went to a little town called Bad Mittendorf. At the same time, everyother exchange student in Austria was also doing the same thing. We all met up, and they took us to this hiking lodge called Linzerhouse. When we got there we were assigned rooms. I was sharing one with Chantel, Libby, Mia, Josie, Jackie, Shelby, and Racquel. And guess what, there were no beds! That's right, there were two large mattresses, a walkway in the middle, no shelves or closet space, one mirror, and the closest toilet was one floor down. We also didn't have any shower's in the whole thing. It was really exciting because we got to see each other again, but we also got to meet all of the oldies! (for anyone not in the loop, oldies are the people who come in January from Australia, New Zealand, and parts of South America). They were all really nice, and all of the Aussies were totally insane! They all also have really funny nicknames, like mum, and spider. On Saturday we hiked up a mountain, and this one guy, Kiwi, (his actual name is Kiren and he's from New Zealand) did the whole thing in Lederhosen! The hike was kinda fun. I was in the last group to finish, and we were hiking from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. The entire climb was pretty scary. To any Lord of the Ring's fans, you know Emin Mull? Well, the mountain looked like that except straight up and no Gollum. There were also these crevasses everywhere. Some were little, some were big enough to put your foot in, and some were massive. Also, a lot of the rocks were loose, so you were sliding everywhere. Quite frankly, it was terrifying. I fell four time, and managed to twist both of my ankle. Also, my hands swelled up like Aunt Marges in the third Harry Potter, which was not a cool experience, let me tell you. Still it was fun. All of the exchange students kept randomly bursting into song, which was both amusing, and made them really easy to locate. The evening was a lot more interesting though. It started when we all came down at 8 o'clock, and were presented with a torch. Now, I'm not kidding, a torch as in a stick with fire on top, grab your torch and pitchforks! They ran out right at the end, so I gave mine to Kiwi who hadn't gotten one and looked like someone had just run over his puppy. We then walked for about 45 minutes, a group of teenagers carrying sticks with fire on the end. It is one of the funniest things I have ever done in my life, and no one got set on fire (really a miracle in and of itself, what were they thinking, giving us fire to play with!) and eventually we reached our destination. We were supposed to have a dance, but we were all so tired from the walk, that that was pretty much a flop. The next day, we had to get up by 8 am for breakfast, and then had nothing to do till our train at 2. Me, Mia, Libby, Josie, and Chantel eventually got so bored that we decided to force our stiff limbs into taking us for a walk. I'm sorry guys, we didn't run up a hill singing the hills are alive, we sang All Star and Skater Boi instead! The only other person we came across was this old farmer, that gave us a really wierd look, and a bunch of cows. It was awesome. Then I took the train back home with all the other Viennese students.

Now, once again we're back in school. About half way through Monday, I got paged down to the office and met with my counsellor, Dr. Bernhard Seyr. I had met him once before, and he had come to tell me that they had booked my presentation for... that evening. Since I had planned to translate my presentation that week, this was a wee bit of a problem. When I tried to explain this to him he was all, "Well of course you're going to do it in English, we don't want it in German." Well that made my life easier. And so, I found myself in my first Austrian Rotary meeting. Turns out, my club has an interesting rule, no girls allowed. There are no female members, and the whole club has to agree on a specific "Woman's Meeting," for them to be guests. This was a little bit shocking, though not quite as shocking as when they brought me my food, a fish... that still had its head, with caviar. That was so bizarre! The whole head thing was really creepy. I don't want to make eye contact with something while I'm eating it! After I was done I couldn't quit looking at it! (you're not actually supposed to eat the head). By the way, in case you're wondering, caviar doesn't taste disgusting, it tastes like nothing. My presentation itself went really well, and everyone said it was very good and interesting. They aren't exactly a party crowd though and I felt like I was talking to a bunch of robots. I know it's rude, but they didn't even nod along! All in all, it was a success.

Nothing else really interesting happened all week, uptill Friday. On Friday I once again found myself in Vienna. This time it was to take an exam. Now, my school decided that I should learn more German. They found me a course in Vienna. It's three hours a day, five days a week, for 4 weeks. I still will have to go to actual school for part of the day though. Anyway, they needed to figure out what level I would be in, thus the exam. That took all morning, but I was able to spend a few hours in Vienna's largest library. I also got a library card that works in every library in Vienna (except the national one), because you see, it was pretty cheap. The price was..FREE! Cool huh?

Yesterday me and Daniella and Jasmin went to the world's largest amethyst mine. It was fun, but I couldn't understand much, which made it a little boring. They also had this cool thing, where they had a patch of ground, gave you a pick, a shovel, and a bucket, and let you look for a few yourself. I actually managed to find a few! The funniest thing is that when you are leaving, they give you a handful of really nice ones, so it looked like you actually found something! But that's okay, I don't mind, they're really pretty!

Wow, I actually caught up! That is crazy! Well, we're making more cake today (apple, we ran out of plumsL) and doing yard work. I'll try and talk to you again soon!

 

Ellyn

P.S. I realize I kinda left you guessing with those pictures last time, so here it is,

First picture

Left to right front row:

Aiyana (again with the spelling) from somewhere in the states, Jackie from Canada, Martha from somewhere in the states, Shelby from Texas, Chantel from Canada, and Libby from Oregan. Peering over the back looking scary is Sebastien and I think he's from Argentina, but I'm not absolutely sure. They are all decked out in Maple Leafs because they did a French Canadian song for the talent show

The next picture is Svenja, then it's my dorm room, then the school, and finally the view from the school.

P.P.S. By the way, good job to Jamie Liegh, she guessed it! Tschus means see you later! Have an imaginary cookie! By the way Corinne, it must be spelt differently in Swiss German cause I looked it up!

(once again) Ellyn