SO STRESSFUL, More on Stephansdom, the mood chart and a day at Hallstatt! (That's my Statt!)

Montag 11 Oktober: Today an awful thing happened. I couldn't find my music before our coaching on Francaix! I looked frantically, then went to the library, it wasn't there. I had to tell Barbara (our coach) that I didn't have it. Luckily Zan forgot his music too, so it wasn't as bad as it could have been. Then we decided to just coach on Tchaikovsky (which for some reason I did have the music for). But this was not the first time I lost something important today, no clearly today was the day that it all fell apart. I had a lesson in the morning and after setting out my lesson sheet that your teacher signs so you can get credit/reimbursed for lessons, I couldn't find it in the morning! I had to go to my lesson without it and Matthias (my teacher) said he would sign it next week. The only problem with this was that tomorrow is the day we get reimbursed for our lessons so far. Needless to say I got home at night and literally tore apart my room looking for all of these missing papers. I only found the lesson sheet.

Dienstag 12 Oktober: So today after all of that I forgot my lesson sheet at home and by the time I got it and made it back to school, they were all out of money for reimbursements. This is clearly just not my week. I looked for my music forever, and still didn't find it, then I had the epiphany to look under a couch where I dropped some music last week and sure enough it was there!

Mitwoch 13 Oktober: Today my Art and Architecture class went on a field trip to Stephansdom, now I know I've talked about Stephansdom a lot in the last few posts, but it's pretty much a defining landmark in Vienna and I've had to do a lot of reading on it for my class so it's been on my mind. Here are the pictures from the field trip and what I learned:

The ribbing on the ceiling is more complicated in the later Gothic and you can tell which part of the church is older by looking at this.

Here's kind of a weird picture of the pulpit. But you can kind of see a self portrait of Master Pilgrim (the builder of the pulpit) peeking out a window. The detail on this was so amazing! The more intricate detail indicates it is late Gothic.

The stairs going up to the Pulpit. The wheels with three symbolize the father, son and holy ghost and those wheels are rolling up, while the wheels with four (representative of earth: four elements, four seasons) are rolling down. On the rail there are lizards and toads crawling up the banister to symbolize evil and at the top is a dog (to symbolize faith) scaring off the toads.

Here is another self portrait of Master Pilgrim. The story goes that he was made fun of for spending so much time and attention to detail on this "ugly" organ loft and he said that he would carry it on his shoulders and he made a self portrait of himself carrying the organ loft on his shoulders.

This is the top of the main altar which shows a painting of the stoning of St. Stephan and the heavens opening up for him. These windows behind are the last of the old windows. The rest of the windows were taken out and replaced with these ugly simple pastel windows in an attempt to make the church less dark. Kind of sad.

 We had our Framcaix coaching today (with music this time, haha) and Barbara introduced us to a new candy! (she always brings chocolates to coachings and throws them at us when we're getting tired) She calls them "cocos". They're kind of like Ferrero Rochers but with white chocolate, coconut and a macadamia nut in the middle, so basically I loved it! Yum! At workshop today a dramatic soprano came and taught a master class. We were all required to attend. Elizabeth sang and was so amazing! She sounded just incredible! The master class was really interesting. It's interesting to see someone of a different instrument be taught. Then for dinner what else but some celebratory sushi!

Donnerstag 14 Oktober: Today was pretty busy, two piano coachings, I had to perform with all three of my chamber groups for workshop today, but it all made me feel really great. I felt like I learned a lot today and that was really good and it felt good to perform and just play because I wanted to. (Even though I had to play, I decided that I wanted to and it made it all much better)

Freitag 15 Oktober: Today I was so tired. I needed a break so Emily and Amanda and Amanda's roommate, Joncie and I went shopping on Mariahilf after German. I didn't buy anything, but sometimes it's just nice to go out and look. The rest of the day included more practicing, coachings and homework. At night we went to Chelsea again. That was fun, just me, Emily, Marisa and Elizabeth. Then we ended up going to a party that David's apartment was having. The events that followed have really made me reevaluate what friendship is and question a lot of things. It also made me think a lot about not letting others ruin your experience or bring you down, because in the end you are the one that decides how other people effect you, not them. 

The view of Hallstatt from the ferry.

Samstag 16 Oktober: Today Amanda and I went to Hallstatt for the day. Hall in latin means salt, and Hallstatt is the oldest saltmine in the world. More about that in a minute. So Amanda and I booked the train for 5:40 in the morning and booked our seats on one ticket, Amanda had the ticket. I left for the train station at 5:05 and we were meeting in front of the train at 5:30. Unfortunately after just missing both of the Ubahns that I needed and several frantic phone calls with Amanda telling her to get on the train without me I was pulling up to the train station Ubahn stop at 5:39. As soon as the doors opened I sprinted up the stairs, ran across the street through traffic (definitely a frogger moment) then up another set of stairs to the train platforms, just as the conductor looked out the train for a final look I ran up waving my hand, jumped up to the door and just as my last foot left the ground the train took off!!! Yes, I pretty much just jumped on a moving train!!! It one of the craziest things. As I started walking through the train Amanda called me, "Oh no! The train just left! What do we do?!" and I said "tell me which compartment you're in because I'm on the train!!!" We were so happy! I still can't believe it! The train ride was around three and a half hours long and we had to make a connection. We were both super tired so we set an alarm for when the transfer was and we pretty much slept the whole way. Once we got there we rode a ferry from the train to the town. It was pretty cloudy and cold today, but it was still so beautiful! It was so nice to get away for the day too. It was just what the doctor ordered! When we got there nothing was really open, haha. So we found a cafe and had coffee (well I had Heiße Schokolade) and just sat and relaxed sipping our warm drinks for a few hours. After our morning of leisure (wow I kept wanting to spell that liesure since in german i and e take on the sound of the second vowel...) we went to the salt mines. You have to ride a lift up the mountain then once you get there you have to wear these funny outfits because it's so cold, and you go down slides in the mine and it's dirty and all that stuff. They were very funny. The tour wasn't exactly what I expected it to be. I thought it would be a lot more salt, but it was mostly a lot of history about the mines and the towns, but it was still really cool and really interesting. The mine was set up in a really visitor friendly way too. It's just amazing to me how much money and effort they put into all of their museums. It's like every museum is just really nice and up to date, it's really nice. The tour was also in German and English so it was pretty cool to be able to listen in German and try to understand then hear it in English and see how close you were. I was pretty close most of the time, but sometimes I was way off, haha.

We kept getting really lost getting to the salt mine even though there were these signs all over the place directing us there...

Going up the mountain to the salt mine.

There were all these really cool mirror cube stacks on the hike up to the mine, I thought this was the perfect application of modern art in nature. It was just so cool. On some of the cubes they had information about the area in German.

This is what the outfit looked like. Mine was maroon. The picture of us together wearing them is on Amanda's camera, but once she tags me in it I'll post it so you can see!

This is what the wall looks like. The light kind of washed it out, but can you see some of the salt sparkling?

This is so cool. It's a little lake! This is the ceiling reflected in the water! Isn't it so pretty. They had the story of Hallstatt illustrated and projected against the rocks, it was really cool. They were mining salt in Hallstatt when the Egyptians were building the pyramids! Isn't that amazing! People are just incredible, what they are capable of doing! Wow. 

The view from up near the salt mines.

After the salt mines we got lunch at this little stand. They had roasted chickens (very Bavarian) and so we split a half chicken and serving of fries. It was amazing! It was so warm and seasoned perfectly! Oh it was so good! After that we walked around and looked at all the little shops. We went to this one that had all these hand carved little nick nacks. They were all so pretty. After that we went to the chapel of St. Michael. It was a really pretty church with a cemetery and then a charnel house out back. Several things I noticed about the cemetery: A bunch of the grave stones were wood! How do they maintain that? Also they all had flowers and candles, all of them, it was pretty remarkable. Several things I noticed about the church: The stained glass windows were the perfect combination of fancy and letting light in, they were really nice. There were kind of two churches in one. There were two altars in front and the church was kind of divided into two cells. It was interesting. Several things I noticed about the charnel house: Well I guess they gave us a paper to read, but here are the facts about the charnel house: A charnel house is what is used when there is no more room for graves. Bodies are dug up and the bones are placed in a charnel house to make room for more graves. In the case of this charnel house, the skulls were bleached by the sun and then painted. Different symbols meant different things, roses love, laurel leaves meant status, etc. They were really pretty. It was cool too because we saw photos of this charnel house in my Art and Architecture class so it was really cool to see first hand. Before leaving we got some apfelstrudel, yummy! Luckily we had the insight to check times for the ferry and realized that if we were going to take the last train as we had planned, there would actually be no ferry to take us to the train, so we had to take a different train, but that was fine and I was really glad we thought to look at that, (or rather that Amanda thought to). 

The adorable town of Hallstatt!

A bunch of the houses here had trees like this that grew up the side of a house and the branches grew around the windows. Isn't that just crazy?!

Owl babies! These were at the carved wood stand. Aren't they cute?

The cemetery. See how they graves are wooden? They kind of look like bird houses.

The view of Hallstatt from the church. (Yes it's a view of another church, haha)

Balance of light and beautiful stained glass.

The skulls in the charnel house. See how they're pained?

The inside of the charnel house. SO many bones.

Auf wiedersehen Hallstatt!

The train ride home was good. We slept a lot and we had the compartment to ourselves the whole time, so that was really nice. Every time they come by with the food cart it makes me think of Harry Potter when they're on the Hogwarts Express and the lady asks if they want anything from the trolly. I got home and hung out with my roommates for a while, then I watched Love Story and went to bed. What a tearjerker. 

Sonntag 17 Oktober: Happy two month anniversary Vienna! Can you believe it's already been two months?! That's so crazy. This is the longest I've been away from home. Today and tomorrow also mark the halfway point. I leave on December 18, so two months from tomorrow, and I can only imagine that the second half will go faster than the first. I keep thinking about this chart that they kept showing us when we were getting ready for studying abroad. It was a kind of line graph showing what emotions everyone would feel and when they would hit. At the time I thought that was extremely stupid and that there was no way to anticipate emotions, let alone generalize and say everyone would go through that. But now that I'm here and experiencing it, I would have to agree with it. I feel like my emotions are almost always right on par with that graph, haha. Today was like most Sundays, catching up on homework and taking naps. We skipped out on church today since we all have so much work to do getting ready for midterms, but I want to be sure to get as much done as possible before Allison gets here. She comes to visit on Thursday! I'm so excited!!!! For dinner Elizabeth and I went and got sushi. That was really nice to just sit and chat. I really love my roommates, I got really lucky!

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.