"There and Back Again" A Traveler's Tale by Jenna Veverka: Last month shenanigans

I couldn't possibly accurately relate all of the things I've been up to in the last month but since you all enjoy my pictures, I will try to spare you from my long and detailed stories and just get to the good parts.

It was pretty sad to miss thanksgiving for the first time ever but the delicious food we made and having leftovers for 3 nights helped console me and my sorrows:

Two of my housemates were from New Zealand and Korea and had never really celebrated thanksgiving before, so we did our best to have all of the necessary items.

My first real fußball game:

USA VS. AUSTRIA

It was everything I expected to find at a European sporting event

We got there and the stadium was blasting silly Austrian songs just before the game started, everyone got a flag and noisemakers and was chanting and yelling lots of things in German. There was a huge crazy fan section with insanely huge flags (like 15 ft.) and a percussion section. I guess the game didn't count for anything so our team didn't try very hard and lost but it was still fun and our crazy USA student section entertained all of the austrians around us :)

Salzburg round II:

I had another great time in Salzburg. Alone this time, I decided to venture to the valley where the opening scene to the sound of music was filmed. Venture, I did! I almost got on the wrong train going to Salzburg and got there an hour later than planned so I started running out of daylight which I didn't think would cause problems until I found myself alone on a completely wooded mountain with no light. I thought I was going on a normal walking trail to the valley, but it was more of a crazy steep hike on a road with no sidewalks or safe place to walk. Not my brightest idea.The sun set earlier than I hoped and I had to decide whether or not to keep going a half hour and make it to the valley with no daylight left, or to head back and try to get back to the town by the time there was no daylight left. I was pretty freaked out to be by myself in the woods to be perfectly honest and as I was contemplating what to do, I unfortunately thought "What if there are bears in here?!" That knocked the indecisiveness right out of me and I immediately started jogging back down the hill. I made it down the mountain just in time, got some delicious soup, walked around the desolate town, and hopped on a bus back to Salzburg.

I was bummed to have failed checking off that experience of belting "the hills are alive" in that valley but I am just happy I didn't get attacked by wild animals or learn any lessons the hard way.

The next day, I hit the fortress for a few hours. Built starting in the 1300s, the castle had a lot of cool medieval stuff: weapons, kings' chambers, all the good stuff.

One of the coolest exhibits was the marionettes, they actually perform full operas with them!

What's more exciting than old instruments!? It sounds lame but there was a great exhibit with instruments dating back to the medieval ages too.

I can't remember what this one is made out of exactly but I believe wood. It's called the serpent and you can see they even painted it like serpent/snake creatures.

Let's see other than that:

I got to sit in on a Vienna Philharmonic rehearsal!! The brass coach at IES who played in the phil for 30 years hooked us up and I got to listen to Also Sprach Zarathustra. Going to a rehearsal was way cooler than a performance because we got to hear the epic opening multiple times. My entire body was literally vibrating from the sound of the organ. Righteous. Man that was unbelievable. Those guys just don't mess up. ever.

I befriended two Austrian girls I got to play a trumpet trio with. My trumpet teacher needed a fanfare for some award ceremony at the conservatory so she asked me to play with two other students of hers. One was from Korea and has been living in Wien for a few years and the other girl was born and raised in Austria. It was fun working with them and practicing my german. We often just nodded and laughed because they couldn't understand what on earth I was trying to say but we all had fun.

Went ice skating in town and started a giant conga line/dance party with all of the kids there. There were some teenage boys that were particularly excited to be ice skate-conga lining with us.