Arrival and Austria

I am here!! In Switzerland! I still don't think it's clicked in that I'm in EUROPE!

My arrival wasn't as exciting as I expected it to be. I didn't have a window seat on the plane so I couldn't see the Swiss countryside upon arrival, they lost one of my pieces of luggage, and I felt idiotic not having any clue what anyone was saying. I think that's the hardest part of moving to a country where you don't speak the language, and they speak your language. It's like you're a guest in a country and you expect them to be able to speak your language. I feel that's unfair and rude, and thus I'm going to try really hard to learn German.

I've learned a few key phrases so far. Well, really only "Do you speak English or French?" and "I don't speak German." But people often think when I say those two phrases that I know some basic German so they try to talk to me slower and louder, but I still really have no idea what they are saying. It's interesting though, how often it's possible to interact with others without communicating with language. Generally, human interactions are the same so I can typically guess what someone is saying. "Would you like a bag for your groceries?"... "Do you want your receipt?"... "Can I see your train ticket please?"... "Are you waiting in this line?" ... So often I've been able to get by without people knowing that I haven't a clue what they are asking me. But then sometimes they go on and say another sentence. That's when my clueless face turns on, and they realize, "Englisch?"

When I first arrived in Baden, I had rough instructions on how to get to the apartment I am staying at temporarily, but as far as I could tell no one was home from work yet. So I waited outside on the front step. This old lady came out with a glass of water for me, I was very appreciative, but she spoke very little English or French, and I spoke no German. She invited me up into her apartment while I waited. It was surprising how much conversation we were able to have considering that we didn't speak each other's language. I learned that her daughter is studying to be a doctor (she told me this by relating it to Obama's candidacy...I was very confused at first). And she learned that my brother just got married at 22 (we had to pull out some paper for this one to write the age). All of that was shared just using guestures and relations to other things.

Last weekend I went on my first trip... to Salzburg, Austria with Stacey!! Even though we had rain basically all weekend, it was incredibly fun!! On the first day we headed up to a lake near Salzburg and walked around some of the smaller towns. We ended up running into a traditional Austrian wedding, with cannon fire, leiderhousen, broomsticks for the newlyweds to walk under, and an Austrian music group (including an acordian player)!! Talk about lucky timing! We stalked the wedding for a while, following them around and taking lots of pictures. It was quite fun, and I really really wanted to give the bride a Canadian pin. They had already gone in for the reception, so we quickly looked up how to say "Bride" in german. I went up to the door and told the man standing there "Für die braut." He gave me a odd look, but the guy standing behind him understood my terrible german accent and nodded, took the pin from me to give to the bride. It would have been nice to have given it to her myself, but at least she got it!! I was proud. :)

I have the rest of this week off, while most people I know here are working so I'm hoping just to go exploring around Switzerland. Generally I would like to see the main sites around Europe, and go to as many countries as possible. But overall I really just want to tour around Switzerland. While living in Switzerland it would make sense to get to know the country itself, so I hope to do lots of touring around here (especially while I'm poor). Maybe I'll venture over to the French side so I don't feel like such a tourist....

ps. Comments are always appreciated! via the blog or an e-mail!! :)