Stephansdom, the night run, Kunsthistorisches Museum, St. Ruprechts, Chelsea and Who would have thought study abroad would be so hard?!

The ceiling and organ at Stephansdom

The inside of Stephansdom

Montag 4 Oktober: So today was like most Mondays, I go grocery shopping in the morning, practice a bit, go to class, rinse, repeat. Today I got frustrated practicing so I decided to go to Stephansdom (it's a quick two minute walk from the Center) and write a journal entry for my Art and Architecture class. Stephansdom has been built and rebuilt so many times, so it has a very interesting culmination of styles. It has been bombed and burned down and always a work in progress. It's really interesting inside. The ceiling is very lights, so it's kind of bright from that, but the rest of the interior is extremely dark! It's almost confusing whether it's dark or light inside! I really like it though, I think it's very pretty. Katie and I decided that this week we aren't going to eat out until Saturday, so there will be no sushi this week!

Dienstag 5 Oktober: Tonight is the Vienna Night Run. It's a 5k and a few of us signed up for it a few months ago.  I'm not going to like, I was pretty nervous for it. We haven't had a lot of time to train and get ready for it. Plus I woke up this morning starting to get sick. It's supposed to be cold and rainy tonight for the run. Perfect. It turned out to be ok though. I ran with Marisa and Kylie and we did a pretty good job! We made it in around 30 minutes, so not too bad for not having trained! There were 20,000 people running the race and we got these really awesome running shirts! It was really fun and really exciting! I had a lot of homework to do when I got back home, but it was worth it I would say.

Some windows in Stephansdom

It was so cold!

All of us after the race, we did it!

Mittwoch 6 Oktober: Today is field trip day in Art and Architecture! (It's also fall asleep in Nations and Religions class day... yikes, oops.) We went to the Kunsthistorisches Museum and saw the Egyptian, Greek and Roman collections. They were really cool! I actually didn't take any pictures. You couldn't take pictures in every room, so I kind of just didn't at all. I'll get some next time though. We discussed the changes of the portrayal of the human figure throughout time and it was really fascinating. I really like that class. We talked about how static the portrayal was in Egypt then how perfect and idealized it was in Greek and then how the Romans added imperfections, like showing wrinkles and age. It was really interesting. Followed by more rehearsals, more class. Wednesdays are really hard because we have Performance Workshop for three hours, it's just really long and hard to sit through and it gets out late near 8:00, so that's pretty tiring too. But I made it through another Wednesday so that was good.

Haydn's writing

Marisa imitating Haydn, haha!

Donnerstag 7 Oktober: Today was not such a good day. It's been cloudy for days, I'm stressed and overwhelmed, getting sick and to top it off am really homesick today. I went to German class, then came home and slept then went to my Classical Symphony field trip then came back home, slept and did homework and then my roommates and I decided it would be a good idea to watch Schindler's List while drinking wine and eating chocolate. Not such a good idea. But enough of my pity party, let me tell you about my field trip to Haydn's house. It was really cool. It was really nice, Haydn was well known and rich in his lifetime so he had pretty sweet digs. (Plus the street is named after him, so not too bad) There was a really beautiful courtyard too. It's just so crazy that you can go somewhere where someone like Haydn lived! Crazy!

Elizabeth makes a pretty good Brahms.

Marisa, Elizabeth and I standing on Haydn's floor. No big deal.

Freitag 8 Oktober: Today was pretty much like any other. School, practice, coaching, etc. David made dinner for Ben and I so that was pretty nice of him. It was very good. Mashed potatoes, sausage and bread with olive oil. We had fun watching youtube videos and watching his roommates get ready to go out to a big party at the Ottakringer brewery (I didn't want to go because there was a cover charge). Then I went and met Marisa and Emily at the Traveler's Bar and played a game of pool, called it a night and we went home.

Outside of St. Ruprechtskirche

The windows. Aren't they just beautiful???!

Samstag 9 Oktober: Today we went to the flea market like most Saturdays. I got a present for Adam! Then I got some sunglasses and I got a really awesome backpack and managed to talk the guy down from 25 Euro to 16! (auf Deutsch!) That was pretty exciting! Went back home and did some more homework then Marisa and I went to St. Ruprechtskirche. This was by far my favorite church yet! The outside looks kind of just like any other building around it (we had trouble finding it at first) and the inside is really cold. It's just white cement. The ceilings are very low compared to other churches we've been to. There were a few idols that looks Renaissance and their cross looked similar in style, then there were two stained glass windows that looked painted rather than stained, and kind of gothic in style, but the rest of the windows looked stained and kind of more modern, but I absolutely loved these windows! The pictures were these people that looked so content! The music was really interesting too! All of the singing was in gregorian chant style and sometimes it was sung in rounds. It was just so beautiful, especially with the acoustics created by the ceiling and the cement walls. All of the hymns were minor and all had cadences that went I V, rather than the typical plagal cadence. Then when they sang amen, it wasn't plagal either, but a major I V. It was just so pretty. I loved it. It was very small and communal too. It was so nice feeling. (Even when everyone went to take communion and I was literally the only one sitting in the pews). What did we do next? Go to McDonald's of course! (Tradition cannot be messed with!) Every McDonalds is so clean and nice here! At night I talked to a bunch of people from home including a long skype with Leah, which made me feel a lot better. Then we went to Chelsea, which is a bar, but every Thursday, Friday and Saturday they have live DJ's and there is a dance floor. It's so much fun! I think it was the most fun night in Vienna yet! We stayed at Chelsea until about 3 in the morning and it was 4 by the time we got home! Wow! But it was definitely fun!

Sonntag 10 Oktober: So. Much. Reading. Didn't. Get. Out. Of. Bed. Just. Sat. And. Read. And. Took. Notes. And. Read. So. Much. Homework. Kind of sad, but that's literally all I did today... and I'm still behind. 

Beethoven lives upstairs, I turned 21-which in Austria means you've been able to drink for five years, Tosca and Night at the Museum!

Franziskanerkirche

Marisa doing some listening at Beethoven's apartment.

Beethoven's actual writing!!!

My feet in Beethoven's apartment, no big deal...

Sonntag 26 September: Today started with our Sunday tradition- Emily, Marisa and I go to church, then lunch at McDonalds! Today's church was Franziskanerkirche. It was so pretty, and there weren't a lot of people there since it's not a real touristy church. I really enjoy going to church in another language. It's nice because you can enjoy the music and you don't really get bogged down by what is being said and I really love observing people at church. (I guess that's kind of weird, but I really like seeing people so dedicated to their beliefs.) Plus all the churches here are just so beautiful! In the afternoon we went to Beethoven's apartment. (Ok, well apparently the museum is actually in the apartment across the hall from where Beethoven actually lived, but you know, close enough.) Beethoven actually did live upstairs. It was really cool. There were actual scores that Beethoven himself had written. The museum was designed really nicely and there were these cool little listening stations where you could listen to different music Beethoven wrote. It's pretty crazy that you can just walk across town and go to a place where Beethoven lived! After going to Beethoven's we went to Cafe Central, which is a well known cafe in Vienna. It was really good. I got hot chocolate, yummy!

The view from Beethoven's

Cafe Central

Ya, this place was pretty fancy...

Montag 27 September: Mondays are these magical days where I don't have class until 1:15, which means I can sleep in and then get some errands done before I go to class. That's basically Mondays. Normally we have a trio coaching from 6-8, but we didn't tonight so that was nice. I also got a package from my parents today, which really made me happy. The package included a crossword puzzle book and knitting supplies, ahh!

Cute gargoyle at the Wien Museum

Dienstag 28 September: Today was pretty much just like any other Tuesday. The one thing that I learned today is that if you want a kebap before your night class and the kebap place near school is all out of everything, don’t get a kebap from the place off Kertner Straße where you can get pizza and hot dogs. Their kebaps are way too salty and they don’t have the spicy sauce that the other place has. Tonight was the night before my 21 birthday, which in the states means that you go out and celebrate the fact that at midnight you can go to a bar and buy alcohol. Well in Austria you can do that when you’re 16, but at midnight Marisa gave me a pack of my favorite pens and Elizabeth made me a vodka tonic (which I proceeded to knock over a few minutes later, haha). Thank you Marisa and Elizabeth!

Birthday celebration!

Me with the brownie Katie made!

Stained glass from Stephansdom

At the Wien Museum

Mittwoch 29 September: Today is my 21 birthday. The day was really busy and really stressful. Full of classes, rehearsals, my first chamber coaching and then I had to perform in performance workshop (which got out late, so we didn’t get home until 8:30). My art and architecture class went to the Wien Museum, which was pretty interesting, a non-stressful part of the day. We saw artifacts from Roman control of Vienna up to the dark ages. But for dinner our RA’s Alex and Anna made Tirolerknüdeln. Which is this ball of ham, sausage, breadcrumbs, onions, celery and who knows what else. After you roll it into a ball you boil it, then there’s a broth and you put the ball in the broth. It was really good! It was also fun to hang out with all the Dürergasse kids. After that we went to our favorite sushi place for just a little more to eat, haha! When I got home all my roommates met in the living room and Katie gave me a big brownie that she made me! (Complete with sprinkles and butterfly candies!) It was so good! Thank you Katie! Then Emily gave me another pack of pens! (I have a LOT of pens now.) Thanks Emily! Meg got kinder eggs for everyone (my toy was a dinosaur!) and Lauren got cookies for everyone! Thanks Meg and Lauren! So even though the day was kind of awful, my roommates made my birthday totally awesome! I’m pretty sure it was the most low key 21 birthday any American has had, but I liked it that way and it was perfect!

Donnerstag 30 September: Today was another class, rehearsal and then sushi filled day, haha, yes I got sushi for dinner again today… We went to a new café tonight, Café Sperl. The hot chocolate was… not satisfactory. I had to add sugar cubes.

My birthday gift from Allison!

Freitag 1 Oktober:  So this morning totally sucked. I had a German quiz and didn’t fill half of it out, despite the hour of studying I did in the morning… Later we sat through a lecture about the Vienna Phil which I feel like could have been really interesting, but it was presented in a boring and kind of confusing way and most people fell asleep (myself included). Then we had a coaching, which was tiring, but our coach Barbera brought chocolate for us, so that was good. I got the most amazing package today from Allison, it had a ceramic hippo, and there were a bunch of little gifts wrapped up and stuffed in its mouth! Each package had a charm for a necklace! It was so amazing and I love it so much!!! Right after that Emily and I came home, changed and left for the opera with Ben. Yep, we went to the opera at 5:00 for an 8:00 show. We waited, then waited, then waited in another room, then bought our standing room ticket, then waited and then ran to get a standing spot! We got to stand in the second row. The opera was Tosca and it was totally amazing!!! It was just another one of those experiences I hardly have words for because it was just so incredible! Unfortunately I don’t have pictures, because I didn’t know if cameras were allowed. They are, but not during the performance, so next time I go, I will have pictures! Afterward we met up with Kaitlyn and Jay and went to 1516 and split a pitcher of their house radler. It was an awesome amazing night!

Jenny and me at the Schönberg museum.

Kaitlyn, David, Katie, Emily and Jay at the Belvedere.

On our way to the Rodin exhibit.

The rosary from the Flohmarkt

Samstag 2 Oktober: This morning Katie and Emily and I went to breakfast at the Naschmarkt then Emily and I did some shopping at the Naschmarkt and Flohmarkt! I got so much awesome stuff! I found sweet potatoes! So of course, I had to buy some. (Plus I’m cooking dinner tonight for people and I’m thinking sweet potatoes sound pretty… sweet.) At the Flohmarkt I got some really awesome stuff! I got a necklace with Elvis on it, a necklace with Mary Magdalene, an old cigarette box, a new bag for school and a really beautiful rosary. It was so much fun going through all the stuff there, but next time I’m bringing smaller bills and more coins. It’s impossible to haggle if you only have bigger bills… Tonight is the night of museums in Vienna, which is where you buy a ticket and then you can go to any museum until one in the morning! I started making dinner around 5 and people were coming over at 6. I had to go to the grocery store to get an onion and I went to Zielpunkt (their produce was rotting, they didn’t have onions anyway) then Spar (had barely any produce) then finally broke down and walked back to the Naschmarkt. I spent all afternoon looking up recipes for sweet potato dishes, but everything needed too many spices and ingredients, so I decided to make something up. It turned out amazing! Here’s the recipe:

This hand is a sculpture and the painting is the ceiling

Recipe for Emily’s Viennese Sweet Potato Caserole

Three sweet potatoes-diced

Two eggs-beaten

¾ cup milk

Two cups bread crumbs

¾ cup apple sauce

Cut up sausage

One onion-diced

Set the oven to around 200 C, then bake for about 45 minutes

Eating sacher torte!!!

Yummy!

Museum Quartier, it was hoppin', but we were not..

It was so good! Katie and Emily and I hosted dinner (Marisa was in Styria this weekend, and Elizabeth was sick again. Frowny face) and Ben, David, Jenny, Kaitlyn and Jay came over. (Everyone also brought one or two bottles of wine) We ate our meal followed by chocolate ice cream and then we were off to the museums. We started at the Secession (since it’s just down the street from where I live, no big deal or anything.) and saw Klimt’s Beethoven, which was just amazing! We decided this was a night for sampling of different museums, it’s not enough time to fully take in everything, that’s just too much for one night! Then we went to the Arnold Schönberg museum, which was really interesting and I liked it. After that we went to the lower and upper Belvedere. We saw so many amazing works of art. We saw the Sleeping Beauty painting, there was a Rodin exhibit going on at the Lower Belvedere, then we saw Klimt’s Kiss and that painting of Napoleon that you see in every history textbook ever! (I was going to upload pictures of the art we saw on the blog, but uploading is taking so long tonight, that I’ll just let you look those up on your own) We decided after that that we needed a bit of an art break so we decided to either go to the chocolate museum, schnapps or marzipan museum. The marzipan museum was closest and most convenient so we went there. There was a huge line, but we figured it was worth it, I mean there must be marzipan samples at a marzipan museum right? Outside they were making and selling these tiny little sacher tortes so everyone got one to split with someone else. Jay and I shared one and it was hands down the most amazing sacher torte I’ve had yet! Everyone is always raving about sacher torte, but up until now, I have not been that impressed, but now I get it! This cake was amazing! I will be back for more, definitely! Once we were in the museum, it was just so hilarious, it was this awkward museum of sculptures made out of marzipan and you could just tell that everyone there was thinking “ok, so when do we eat samples” but that’s literally all it was-looking at marzipan sculptures… so awkward! We went to Museum Quartier to finish up, but so many of us were tired by then we decided to call it a night, plus it was getting close to 1 am anyway. We got some pizza on the way home and called it a day. A really great day!

We have a lot of fun at Dürergasse 1812

Sonntag 3 Oktober: So with great meals comes a great need to clean… I spent a long time cleaning dishes and the kitchen this morning… oh well. Sundays are good to get work done, so that’s pretty much what I did. I did homework and then I went to my viola lesson. They’re really long and difficult, but I feel like I’m learning a lot and we talked today about focusing on me learning how to practice, so I’m pretty excited about it all. Then tonight since it is October 3 and all, Katie and Elizabeth and I watched Mean Girls. It was nice.

The first week of classes, the Vienna Phil and one quiet weekend!

My new comforter! Haha!

Montag 20 September: Today was the first day of real classes! I only have one class on Mondays and it's not until 1:15! I woke up early non-the-less because Meg's phone went through the wash and she needed me to set an alarm since she has class in the morning. Oh well. Every other Monday the cleaning lady comes and cleans our apartment and brings new sheets. Today's sheets are very funny! My new comforter (the sheets consist of a fitted sheet and then a comforter, no other sheets, just the comforter) has a pattern that is a zebra print center and then side borders on the right and left that are red with these kind of Grecian heads on them. They're so funny! I had lunch with Amanda and we tried a new place called Mama's Kitchen. I got a snitzel semmel sandwhich, which was really good! My one class today was Austrian Art and Architecture. I'm so excited for this class! Every Monday we have a lecture and then on Wednesday we go on a field trip! We get a free museum card so we can get into several museums for free! Another part of the class I'm really excited about is our journals. We have an ongoing assignment that is this journal. There are a few required entries, right now I'm working on my "What is art to me?" entry and then we are supposed to make entries for each of our field trips and have some entries of individual experiences such as travel or other Viennese excursions. We were so pumped about the journal that Kristin and I went out to shop for Moleskines right after class. After some searching I found one! I made dinner for everyone tonight. I wanted to make grilled cheese, but I don't know the word for groyere cheese in German so I just went with the easy way out and made pasta. Pesto with sundried tomatoes and artichoke hearts. Yum!

Dienstag 21 September: Today begins the long days. Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday I have class at 9 and then have another class at midday and then another night class. I can finally go home around 8. Marathon days with awkward breaks in between. Today started with German and then I had Classical Symphony, which is a musicology class. At night I had Nations and Religions. I'm trying not to buy a weekly U-bahn pass until October so I can buy a month pass. Plus this week is supposed to be really nice out, so it's not so bad to walk. After Nations and Religions Katie and Ben and I went to get sushi. We have this favorite sushi place near our house and all the maki is always 50% off. It's so good!


Mittwoch 22 September: I start Wednesdays with Nations and Religions again. My professor lives in Budapest so he takes the train to Vienna, teaches Tuesday night then Wednesday morning and goes back to Budapest. In Art and Architecture we talked about all the field trips we'll be going on which makes me super excited! Today was the first day of performance workshop which was stressful to say the least. We tried to discuss schedules for ensembles... I'm playing in ten ensembles... This is a very difficult thing to coordinate... For the time being we had to sacrifice our Friday afternoons for two coachings, which is pretty upsetting considering that most people are done with class at 10:30 or at 1:00 on Friday and can then go and travel. I will not be done with class until 4:00 on Friday now. Frowny face. I'm not very happy about this. I was even more unhappy when I found out that while all the string players were trying to figure out schedules everyone else in the workshop got a free standing room ticket for Friday's Vienna Phil concert that will be conducted by Dudamel! What?! Are you serious?! Dinner tonight: more sushi! haha. They love us there! While we were waiting for our sushi they brought us four of these honey schnapps drinks and then three fortune cookies and some sort of special candy just for us! So great!

Donnerstag 23 September: No performance workshop today, which is exciting and means that I get done with class at 3! This entire week has been just great for practicing! I've been very productive! Not a whole lot going on today, just homework and a little bit of shopping on MariaHILF. (The shopping street, really called Mariahilferstraße.)

Freitag 24 September: Thank Gott it's Freitag! What a long week! Wow! Today I just had German and Performance Workshop. There was an Alexander technique lecture in workshop and it was really funny to observe everyone watching their posture during the lecture, haha. Ben gave me his ticket to the Vienna Phil for tonight!!! I was so happy! It was so incredible. It was another one of those experiences like seeing the Eiffel Tower! The program was Gioacchino Rossini: Ouvertüre zu "La Gazza ladra", Julián Orbón: Tres Versiones Sinfónicas, Leonard Bernstein: Divertimento for Symphonic Band, Maurice Ravel: Pavane pour une Infante défunte and Maurice Ravel: Boléro. There was this one part in the Bernstein that was a string quartet bit and I actually got a little teary eyed, it was just so amazing and beautiful. It was just so incredible! I can't even really express in words how amazing it was! It was so clean and shimmery and beautiful. It was just inspiring to see an orchestra where everyone clearly cares! It was also amazing to see this sold out concert hall where people pay to wait outside an hour before the concert to stand for two hours in the back of a concert hall and even that is packed! The concert hall was amazing too. I don't have pictures because cameras weren't allowed (even though many people disregard this rule). Dudamel was just incredible too! So amazing. The dynamic range was unreal! It was so insane how quiet they could get! Everyone in the audience was so into it and it was just so crazy to see that many people so into Classical music! No one was asleep or looking at their phone, they were just there. The Vienna phil will only actually be performing in Vienna two more times while I'm here, but I will gladly stand for two hours with a bunch of smelly people to see it again! Basically, thank you Ben for the ticket. After the concert we went to Chicken Dinner, which is totally my favorite night time hang out now! Zan really wanted to make Austrian friends, but I the norms here are very different than in the States. People don't really go out here to meet other people. They already have their people and they go out to hang out. There is no penetrating those bubbles. Just because someone is looking at you, does not mean that they are interested in talking to you or approaching you. They just like to stare here... When we finally got home, I was so tired and ready for bed!

Packing up at the Flohmarkt

Samstag 25 September: So this weekend Lauren and Meg are at Oktoberfest so I have my room to myself, and I'm not going to lie, it's pretty nice! I slept in this morning and then had a relaxing day of homework, laundry, grocery shopping. Just getting done what needs to get done. It was really overcast and rainy today, so that was kind of a bummer. I was going to go to the flea market, but I didn't make it until it was shutting down since I didn't want to go while it was raining. I got a coin purse for only funfzig cent! (50 cents) I was really exciting because I've been looking for a coin purse everywhere! Marisa made dinner for us tonight and it was so delicious! She made dill chicken with rice and bell peppers, yum! It's quiet with two of the roommates gone. (It's kind of nice, seven girls can be a lot at times) After dinner Marisa and I worked out to one of her work out dvd's, which was really painful and fun! At night we took it easy and Emily and Zan and I went to Phil to get some hot chocolate. I got a hasselnuss cho, which is an Italien hot chocolate with hazelnut! Yum! Tomorrow the plan is church, practice, Beethoven house. It should be a fun Sunday! 

Chicken Dinner, München and Oktoberfest-Eins, Zwei, Drei, Super!

Chicken dinner. Can you see the movie?

Donnerstag 16 September: Today I took it easy. We are home in Vienna for the day and then tomorrow we leave for Munich to go to Oktoberfest. My feet hurt like crazy so I'm staying in bed as long as I can today! I stayed in bed until 3:30 then Marisa and I walked around near IES and then Mariahilf. I started coat shopping, since it's starting to get a little bit chilly, but I didn't end up buying anything yet. At night Emily and Elizabeth and I went out to a new bar Emily read about. (Not new, but new to us) It's called Schikaneder, but we call it chicken dinner. It's super awesome. They play independent films on the wall and have really cool music, and it's not too expensive. I think it's my new favorite bar in Vienna.

Freitag 17 September: So I'm kind of sad this morning because my train doesn't leave for Munich until noon and Marisa and Ben leave for Munich at 6 am. I really wanted to go to Dachau, but it closes at 5:00, which is when I'm getting to Munich. So I decided to wake up early and go to the train station to see if there's any way to change my ticket. Here is the time line of my fabulous morning:
5:00 wake up ugh...

Sitting on the floor in the train, eating lunch.

5:20 leave for the Wesbahnhof train station
5:50 get turned down for a switch in ticket by that same bitchy girl that I always get at the öbb office
6:00 decide to ask how much a ticket to Munich is. It's 83 Euro, forget it.
6:30 arrive back at my apartment and realize I forgot my keys, ring the doorbell and call my roommates
6:35 fall asleep on the steps of Dürergasse 18
7:00 wake up and decide to go to a bakery and get breakfast
7:15 finish breakfast and head to the grocery store. It doesn't open until 7:30 so I sit on a bench

Still sitting on the floor, yep right next to the WC, Super!

7:16 look at the time. 7:18  look at the time. 7:19 look at the time. 7:20 look at the time, you get the idea
7:30 go to Zielpunkt and buy snacks for the train
7:35 reach in my purse to pay and find my keys. ugh.

Dinner, yummy!

Weißer Bräuhaus. Isn't it so Bavarian?

Walking around Munich. This is their Rathaus.

So then I went to my train at noon. For the first stop we had to sit on the floor because there were no seats that weren't reserved. For the rest of the ride we got to sit but we had to seat hop at every stop which was kind of annoying, but not too bad. David packed sandwhiches for us and I packed drinks and snacks so that was pretty good too. Marisa and Ben met us at the stop near our hotel and I got all checked in. After that we went to get dinner. We went to this traditional Bavarian restaurant called the Weißer Bräuhaus. It was founded in 1490. Isn't that just crazy to think about! We had to wait a while to be seated, but it was well worth the wait. It was really awesome too because every time we spoke German to the waitress she spoke German back! She didn't even try to speak to us in English which was refreshing from Vienna where everyone switches to English. I ate two meatballs and potato salad. I drank a radler (lemonade and beer, it's super yummy!) and then for dessert Marisa and Ben and I split these apple doughnut things with ice cream and whipped cream! It was so delicious! After that we decided to rest up for Oktoberfest tomorrow so we headed back to the hotel and went to bed.

Ready to go back and go to sleep!

Waiting to get into the tent. Oy!

Playing Sabateur, waiting for festivities to start!

The tent, it was huge! And this was just one tent!!!

Standing on benches!

It says something about "you are madness to me"

I'm wearing a travel money thing, can you tell?

This is where Hitler played pool. Kind of eerie.

I have a bruise from holding this beer...

Samstag 18 September: Well today is the first day of the 200th Oktoberfest! We were up by 6:30, breakfast at 7, on the Sbahn by 8 and at Oktoberfest in line for a tent at 8:30. Breakfast at the hotel was amazing! It was this incredible buffet! I had smoked salmon sandwhich and this granola that tasted exactly like the vanilla granola I buy at Sunflower Market at home! Ok back to Oktoberfest. We got there and realized that we were some of the only people not dressed in liederhosen or drindels. Kind of embarrassing, who would have thought that so many people dressed up! So originally our plan was to go get a table (you need to be seated at a table if you want to order beer) drink one beer once the keg was tapped at noon, sober up and go to Dachau before it closed. That didn't happen. We finally got into the tent (we were at the Pschorr-Bräurosl tent) around 9, but that didn't mean we got a table... We wandered around asking every table if they had room for four for about an hour. What people do is they send in one or two friends to snag a table and they hold the table for all their friends. So each table only had one or two people at them, but they were all "taken". It was incredibly annoying and frustrating! So we kept looking, but we weren't having any luck. We finally decided to split up. David and Ben went off and Marisa and I stayed together. Eventually we decided to just stand near a bunch of tables with empty spots, since they weren't letting anyone else into the tent. There were other people doing the same thing and we would kind of smile at them and shake our heads every time someone would turn us down for a seat. It was crazy, David and Ben were offering people money to sit down, Marisa and I would go to tables of boys our age with puppy dog eyes. There was just no way to find a table. Finally this group left a table near us and a group of friends sat down. Some of them were the ones we were smiling and kind of joking with us and they offered for us to sit with them! Yes! Finally! We succeeded in getting a table at Oktoberfest! YES! (David and Ben were still searching, but Marisa and I got lucky!) At this point it was 10:30 so we had a while to wait before it all would start. The group we were sitting with all work or go to school together in Munich but they all came from Italy, Pakistan, Malaysia, Finland, France and Germany. So it was a really international table and we all just spoke English to each other. One girl had a card game with her called Sabateur. It was kind of complicated and had a lot of different types of cards, but the main point of the game was to build a path to gold and some people were trying to get to the gold and some were trying to not get to the gold. It was really fun once we got it and I think I'm going to try to find it in a store here so I can play with my brother Adam when I get home! Near noon the parade came through the tent and things started getting crazy! (ok so they were already crazy before this) People were standing on benches and chanting and cheering. It was just nuts. We made friends with our waitress whose name was Frannie (pronounced Francie) She kept coming by to look at our card game and chat with us, this turned out to pay off because she served us first! We were the first table in our whole area to get beer, it was really cool! Beer at Oktoberfest comes by the liter, that's a lot of beer! Ben and David told us they got a table outside and we decided to meet outside at five. So for the next five hours we drank beer, sang a lot of German drinking songs and I probably spent about an hour and a half of my life waiting in lines for the bathroom! We had such a great time with the people at our table and talking about differences in our countries! It was awesome! I had two beers, but I didn't finish my last one because it got kind of warm and gross after I was gone at the bathroom for so long! Marisa and I also enjoyed a very large pretzel and then later a gingerbread cookie. After we met the boys we noticed that someone who shall remain unnamed was acting kind of weird. The moral of this story, don't take candy from strangers. Especially at Oktoberfest after three liters of beer. I'll leave it at that. We decided it would probably be best to get dinner and then reassess after that. We went to a restaurant where Hitler used to play pool. We ate a ton there, the portions were huge! I had chicken and rice and frites (and water!). It was very good. We wanted to play a game of pool, but with the circumstances the way they were, we decided to go back to the hotel and call it a night instead. We went back and I watched children shows in German for a bit. (That's the best because I can understand everything they say!) Overall it was a good day though.
 My Tips for Oktoberfest:
1. Get there super early. 8:30 wasn't early enough!
2. Wear traditional Bavarian clothing, if you don't you look silly. (Believe it or not)
3. Bring something to do while waiting, like Sabateur.
4. Try to be friendly and make friends with other people waiting, you can look out for each other.
5. Pace yourself, things can go downhill fast, and the bathroom line is long!
6. Pretzels are yummy and good to fill up your stomach while drinking beer!
7. Don't plan anything else for the day. You will be here all day!
8. Don't take candy from strangers! I'm serious!
9. Have fun and go with the flow, you might have to be flexible and don't get frustrated.
10. Eat a good breakfast, it's going to be a long day!

Another early morning. Yawn

The snack I packed. Isn't this just creepy?!

Sonntag 19 September: Even though I slept for eight hours, I was so tired when I woke up! My train was at 8:24 this morning and I wanted to catch the Sbahn by 7:30 because the subway system of Munich is very weird and then next train wouldn't come until 7:50 which was cutting it close. Breakfast started at 7, so I wanted to leave the hotel by 7:20. We ate fabulous breakfast and I packed a few snacks for the train. I went to check out thinking it wouldn't be too long, but it turned out that fabulous breakfast was not free. Oh no, it cost 10 euros a breakfast so I had to pay for that and it took time for the payment to go through. Needless to say we missed the 7:30 Sbahn. We waited 20 minutes and thankfully just made it onto our train back to Vienna. We were off and about half an hour into the trip the train suddenly stopped. There was an announcement in German and all I got was "Vienna" "Get off the train". So we got off the train. No one spoke very much English so we kind of spoke Gerglish for a while and determined that a train ahead of us derailed (assuring, I know) and we were going to have to go back to Munich and catch another train to Vienna. We took an Sbahn back to Munich and got a new train to Vienna through Salzburg. We made that train and were off again. I fell asleep for a few hours and when I woke up the train was stopped. This time all I could make out was "working" and "20 minutes" (the Bavarian accent is very different from the Austrian one, and it kind of sounds like a different language!) That was great because our layover in Salzburg was 20 minutes! We made it to Salzburg and thank God, the next train was also delayed, so we made it! Getting home to Vienna felt so great! I was three hours late and had a very stressful morning but I was so glad to be home!!! For dinner Marisa, Katie, Elizabeth and I went to get sushi and then I just relaxed! Ah! Tomorrow classes start! I only have Art and Architecture at 1:15 but I think I'm going to practice in the morning. Time for bed! What a great week!