Sabbath

Goodness, I love Sundays.  Especially the kind of Sunday I had yesterday.  I went to bed last night with a feeling of a day well spent and it was so refreshing.

I got up a bit before 9, and since it wasn't yet too hot, I ran a new route and loved it.  The perfect amount of incline, not too many cars, great distance.  I came back and cleaned up a bit and had lunch with my family before heading off to Vienna.

I wanted to try out a new church yesterday.  Last week, I tried one out that had been recommended to me by a fellow American.  I got there, sang the hymns, listened to the sermon, received communion with the congregation and chatted after the service.  I was grateful to have had some spiritual nourishment, but I wasn't sure this was the right place for me, so when I got home, I searched for more English speaking churches in Vienna (what on Earth did we do before Google???).

Sundays mean less frequent trains, so took an early afternoon train and arrived with an hour to kill.  As much as I hate to affirm the American stereotype when abroad, I made for McDonald's, ordered an iced chai (who knew McCafe was actually decent?) and settled down into a comfy chair to use their complimentary wifi.  I got some work done on my grad school research, comparing tuition prices (gag), locations, curriculums at each school.  It may not sound like a ton of fun to you, but it's really exciting for me these days.

I was so focused on my notes that I didn't leave with a very good spare time cushion.  I took the underground, got off at my stop and promptly got myself completely disoriented.  Thank goodness for all those years of German classes, right?  I asked an Austrian man for some help, got set straight and raced to number 12 Kagranerplatz.

Immediately I felt good about this place.  It felt familiar and as soon as we started singing, I was just happy.  There were people of all colors, ages, sizes--it just felt right.  The pastor got up and had my attention from the first sentence.  He's British, and I can't tell you how hard I was laughing inside as he mused about Jesus being a "jolly good chap" (no, I'm not kidding).  I think I had made up my mind there.  This was my new church.

After the service, I was introduced to a bunch of people around my age and they were all so nice and welcoming!  It came time that I needed to leave to make my train, though, so I travelled back to the train station with a new Romanian friend, Andrea.

On the underground ride, I found out she's also 23, she's half Hungarian, lived in Vienna for the last year and a half and will be here for quite a while longer.  She was just so sweet and has a very warm personality.  I'm excited to get to know her better and the others in the Young Adults Group this year.

Of course, the day ended with the USA losing the women's world cup to Japan, but it was still exciting to watch the game!

2 weeks down.  Here's to a fantastic 50 more!

Grace and peace,
Hilary

Settling in

I live in Austria.  Weird.

I've been here for 2 weeks now, familiarized myself a little with Hollabrunn and gotten myself into a routine.

I don't really know what I should tell you all.  I mean, I'm living pretty normally.  I don't go to class with a hovercraft, I don't spend my weekend skydiving...besides the fact that I'm an American living in Austria, it's not too far out of the ordinary.

My German class is alright.  I was hoping that I'd meet people who I'd be able to call friends for the year, but most of them are only here for the month of classes--they came to Austria just to improve their German.  I'm also the only native English speaker, which is a first for me.  My class consists of 2 Russians, 2 Hungarians, a Lithuanian, a Turk, a Chinese man, a Czech girl, a Ukrainian and me.  When any of us go out to lunch after class, we speak (read: struggle through) German together (unless the Hungarians are there, as Hungarian still comes more easily to me than German).

I met up with a few other foreigners on the Donauinsel (Danube Island) last weekend, which was in a way a relief.  I hadn't heard a native speaker in person since I said goodbye to Josh at the airport almost a month ago!  We swam in the Danube and had cold drinks further down from the swimming area.  It was ridiculously hot that day, so both activities were welcomed by me.

AND...I saw Harry Potter yesterday!  It came out in Europe a day earlier than in North America, so I jumped on that opportunity.  Unfortunately, I had to watch it in German, as it was already dubbed, but since I can understand WAY more German than I'm comfortable speaking, it wasn't a problem at all for me--I was pretty proud of myself, actually!

In other news, I booked my ticket to Germany today!  I've got some vacation time in August, so I thought I'd go up and visit some old friends near Hannover.  I did a short exchange the summer between junior and senior years in high school, so I've known these guys for a long time.  I visited them again when I lived in Hungary, but haven't seen them since then, so it's been almost 5 years!  I can't believe it's been that long.

Sorry for the lack of pictures in this post.  I haven't taken many in the last couple weeks.  I'll get on that soon!

Grace and peace,
Hilary

Sweet Magyarorszag

In honor of 4th of July today, I began my German course in Vienna.  I thought for sure I'd run into at least one American (especially since I was at a language school all morning), but when I finally heard that North American accent, I froze, got too shy and just kept stumbling through a German conversation with a classmate from Turkey.  Dang.

Before I get too far ahead of myself, though, let me tell you about Hungary!  When I left Hungary after my exchange year, I told my families and friends that I wanted to try to come back to visit every two years.  To be honest, I was really trying to convince myself it would happen, but I was pretty sure it'd be impossible to afford that (and especially at first!).  BUT!  Two years ago, it happened to work out with a great ticket find, so I visited!  And when I committed to this au pair deal in Austria, I realized it'd be really easy to visit again--I'm so grateful for this.

So I took off on a beautiful Tuesday afternoon for my old stomping grounds.  When I landed, I met my friend Josh in the airport!  Josh and I studied together in South Africa last year and we were both Resident Advisors this year, so it was so wonderful to spend the first few days in Europe with him.

Zsombi is a friend from my Hungarian high school.  Since his university is in Budapest, we got to stay at his apartment while there.  We completely ate up Budapest in those 5 days Josh was there.  Most of this things I got to see as an exchange student, but it was so cool to go back, be reminded at the history of the city and gawk at the beautiful buildings and scenery.

On our first day, we walked around the city for the whole afternoon.  We stopped to buy cherries on the bottom floor of the giant market at the end of Vaci street and ate them outside on a bench outside Zsombi's university.  We saw St. Stephen's Basilica, a beautiful, giant church which is also home to the holy right hand of St. Stephen (Szent Istvan), King of Hungary.  Yes, that's right.  His hand.  Want to know what makes it better?  St. Stephen was the king of Hungary from 1001-1038.  That's a really old holy hand.  If you'd like to see a picture of the relic, then look here, as there was a funeral going on while we visited, so I didn't get a picture on this visit.  But here's Zsombi, me and Josh outside of the church!

We walked for what seemed miles and miles that day...we actually did a giant circle through Pest (did you know that Budapest is actually two cities?  Buda and Pest are divided by the Danube river).  Naturally, we were famished by the time we got home, so we changed into comfy clothes watched a movie and ate palacsinta!  I was so excited...these are definitely one of my favorite Hungarian foods.  

We went to Parliament the next day, and I could do an entire blog entry on just that.  Instead, I'll just share a few things I didn't already know that I learned that day:  

-Everything used to build and adorn the building are from Hungary.  This not only stimulated the economy, but is still a reason for pride.

-The exception to this is in the entryway.  As you climb a grand red-carpeted staircase with gold leaf all over the walls and regal decorations everywhere, you can see 8 giant pillars of marble.  They weigh 4 tons each and I believe our guide said they were 3 meters high (don't hold me to either of those...my memory's a little foggy).  They came from Sweden and there are only 12 like them in the world.  The other 4 are in the Parliament in London, making Hungary richer, or so our guide jested.

-New addition since my last visit!  There are now Buckingham Palace-style guards watching over the crown jewels.  They're to keep straight faces, but you're not allowed to go up to them to try and squeeze a laugh out.

My friend Levi (also from my Hungarian high school) joined us that evening to go up to the Citadella on the hills of Buda.  From there, we had an incredible view of the Danube river, the Buda Castle (on the left) and Parliament (the dome building lit up on the right, just above the bridge).

I'll try to go in fast motion now.  We hit the Buda Castle district...beautiful, no?

And couldn't resist the opportunity to climb on artillery.  

We went to the beautiful town of Szentendre, where we ate delicious langos,

Took pictures at beautiful churches, walked the cobblestone streets and stairs throughout the town.

On our way back home, the light on Parliament was stunning.  Photo op?  Definitely.

Then it was time to say goodbye to Josh as he headed to Finland to see family...

And hello to Debrecen!  My former home as an exchange student!

I saw all 3 of my host families.  They were just as welcoming as ever.  Some of my highlights:

Flying kites with sisters Csenge and Flori and my host-aunt.

Just hanging out at Anya and Apa's with host aunt, Apa, Ica-mama and Csenge.

Evening excursion ending with our newest Olympic sport suggestion: partnered roller blade racing.

Cooking with the girls in Anya's kitchen.

Delicious Hungarian food around a cozy table.

Csenge officially becoming a GINMAZISTA (high schooler)!!  

And dinner on the farm with Klari, Laci and the dogs.

I wish I also had a picture with the Toth family as well!  They were also wonderful hosts and very dear to my heart--but our picture together is on their camera.  I'll have to e-mail them to get it soon.  =)

All of these make for a very happy Hilary.

Look out soon to hear about my life here in Austria!  German classes began today, so I'll have studying and homework to do, but I promise I'll find some time soon.  Hehe, the less time I wait, the shorter the blog will be, promise.

Grace and peace (and a happy 4th of July!),

Hilary