Wien!

for pictures of Vienna: http://pepperdine.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2016422&id=8503477&l=f0518 Aus Ausser Bei Mit…Vienna Wien! I can’t believe our first educational field trip is already over. I still remember getting here and thinking that the time was going by so slowly. I remember looking at the academic calendar and thinking that the educational field trip was so far in the future. Now that it has come and gone, it’s now time for mid-terms (which means that the semester is half over). It’s really sad because some of the people I have gotten to know and love are leaving at semester! Why do I feel like I’m running out of time?! I’ve become really comfortable in Heidelberg. Coming back to Heidelberg Hauptbanhof (train station) really feels like home. Even when I go to Star Coffee to study, they all speak German to me – and I’m always surprised when I can make it through a conversation all in German. Of course it’s not really a REAL conversation, but it’s a conversation nonetheless. Ok: now about Wien. I loved Vienna…how could you not? There’s literally something for everyone. I loved the art and the history that I got to see, especially because a lot of the history revolved around classical music (Beethoven and Mozart) and a lot of the art I saw was colourful, bright, and abstract. I got to visit the graves of Mozart and Beethoven in the most elaborate and beautiful cemetery I’ve ever seen and we even went to a Mozart and Strauss concert together as a group! We all became really comfortable with the subway system in Vienna, and the sauna in the hotel! Personally, I thought it was just awesome to have access to a bathtub and a nice cushy bed. I even got to watch a little MTV for a little breath of fresh air – I’m so out of the loop in the music scene! Warning: here comes the boring part. My favourite art museums were the Picasso exhibit at the Albertina and the Hudertwasser museum. Hundertwasser was an architect/artist who was most known for his disbelief in using straight lines. He never used a ruler when he was constructing his buildings – and this is apparent when you visit his houses. They had undulating walls and checkerboard outsides – trees growing out of the windows and the roof. It was awesome. His art was really cool too – really bright, really expressive, really unique. Picasso was just cool because I’ve been learning about Picasso all my life. His work is a lot more grotesque than I expected. A lot of naked women drawn in peculiar positions and ways…it was really interesting, but I learned a lot about Picasso’s life. Other than art museums, we got to visit Sigmund Freud’s house, the most ornate and beautiful monastery I’ve ever seen in in Melk – and another large art museum called the Kunsthistoriche Museum. There, I saw some paintings of Rembrant…but I didn’t like them as much as the abstract ones I had seen earlier. Not as much personality. I visited a couple coffee houses while I was in Wien because, supposedly, Vienna is known for their coffee houses. There were a lot of cute ones, but I have to admit, I’m not super impressed. The coffee was good – the tea was good, and I got some great ideas for when I want to start up my own coffee/tea shop! I’ve decided that I’m going to try and collect tea/coffee mugs from each cool town I visit and then I’m going to use them in my own shop. It’ll require a lot of packaging, but I think it’ll be worth it. Imagine. Coffee mugs from all over the world? How cool! I have one from Vienna to start off my collection. We finished off our adventures to Vienna with a BANG (or should I say bomb?). 24 minutes into our flight from Vienna to Frankfurt, the pilot of our plane said that we had to do a U-turn back to Vienna due to a “technical difficulty”. We all got off the plane in Vienna in an organized manner…far away from the airport. There were ambulances and police cars all on the tarmac. Safely far away from the aircraft, we were notified that we landed, not because of technical difficulties, but because of a bomb threat. Someone had called in and said that there was a bomb on our flight!! We were towed back to the airport to identify our bags and go through security again. Thank goodness they found out that it was only a really bad practical joke. A drunk man had called the airport because he had a bet that his friend wouldn’t get back to Germany in time for a business meeting (he is now going to jail for three years for his poor judgement!). We were all thankful and blessed that it was just a prank. It was very interesting because you learn a lot about yourself and others when put in those kinds of situations. Throughout the entire situation, I remained calm and didn’t even think twice that anything was going to turn out less than fine. In my head, I was safely on the ground and I was surrounded with great people. If was going to be stranded in an airport, they would be whom I would want to be surrounded with. Others were in tears, some had panic attacks, some were comforting others, and some were cracking jokes to lighten the mood. If anything, this experience brought our group together. We got back to Heidelberg only a couple hours after our expected time and now we have a cool story to tell! I can’t wait till the next educational field trip in Madrid! It’s going to be hard to top the first! Next weekend, I’m headed to Budapest, but I have to get mid-terms over with first! I forsee many long nights in my future, but Budapest is enough of a reward ☺