Halloween

Halloween came and went successfully. After asking parents at Nikolas's school if their children were taking part in Halloween festivities, and finding out that they weren't, we were worried that Halloween would be a non-event.

But thanks to Frau Chase's sewing abilities (Bat Boy costume), my program's kids and their generocity, and Frau Chase's pumpkin soup, Nikolas had a great day.

We visited the kids in the dorm where most of them live. They each had candy for Nikolas, and some even dressed up as well. Then everyone came back to our place for pumpkin carving, pumpkin soup, cupcake baking, and even a little movie watching.

Nikolas tried and liked gum for the first time!

Kaffeesahne

Coffee milk--it's more than just half & half! Visiting family recently wondered what went into Kaffeesahne because it has this slight mocca coloring to it. It threw me back to a time when I wondered the same thing myself. I was at Oma's in Regensburg so I asked her.

She told me matter-of-factly that they threw everything in to make it a bit thicker. I wanted to know what kinds of things. She shrugged and said, "Things like ground-up coffee, tea, bread--."

Bread?! When I told her that I found it hard to believe that they'd put bread into coffee milk, she took it a step further. During the Wars, she explained (conversations often turned to the Wars), they used to put anything into Kaffee or Ersatzkaffee (coffee substitute) to make it somewhat drinkable and perhaps even a bit nutritious. Among other things, they threw in old minced up lettuce. Rather than throw anything out, even if it was brown, they'd hide it in hot drinks.

So when my family asked about it, I turned to a bottle of Kaffeesahne fully expecting there to be no ingredients. We're used to seeing ingredients and calorie counts--they don't do that here. (It's also hard to find an index in a book, too) But sure enough there it was on the side. A translation: finely milled coffee, tea, baked products, salads, and sauces (a new one for me)! I bet if they marketed it as an energy drink, they'd rake in the €€€!

Plastik

We're been here two months and we're settled for the most part. That might sound like a long time to get settled, but we were reminded that there's much more to LIVING in a country than there is to just visiting. One difference has to do with the amount of plastic you need to carry around when you live in a place.I'm not talking about credit cards, but instead I.D. cards of different sorts.

Well, the first one is sort of like a credit card--the bank card (blue one below). It's a "Bankomatcard." Yes, they say "card" now in most cases instead of "Karte" like they used to (again, see future blog on what English is doing to German). Austrians use Bankomatcards a LOT, more than they use credit cards. And that's, of course, a good thing. They're spending their own money instead of some bank's.

The second card is actually one that I didn't get here in Austria, but instead 22 years ago on a fine August afternoon. It was the first day of orientation at the University of Maine--it's my University I.D. card. I figured since I'm working for UMaine this year, I might as well bring something that makes it look like I'm affiliated with them. I'm sure you'll agree that I haven't changed a bit...

The red card is our VorteilsCard. It actually took two months to come although we had a provisional paper ticket to use in the meantime. It gets us half price train tickets within Austria if we travel as a family. If we travel to a border country (Austria borders on EIGHT countries!), there's a 25% discount. There's also a Card for single travelers.

The photo I.D. in the second group of cards below is my Aufenthaltstitel, or more commonly, a visa. My status under which I'm in Austria according to the card is "Sonderfälle Unselbstständiger Erwerbstätigkeit" or special cases of non-independent business activities... No, I'm not a spy. In other words, I'm not working for an Austrian company, but I'm not working independently either.


The second card is, in good German, our CarSharing card. Before we leased our car, we thought we would do car-sharing which is very popular in Europe. It's like renting a car but you belong to a company that allows you to call at a moment's notice, reserve a car from some parking lot in the city (if one's available), and then you used the CarSharing card to UNLOCK the car! If you're not authorized, the car doesn't unlock as you swipe it across the sticker on the windshield. The rates are about €2 per hour and then €0.48 per kilometer. It sounds very cheap, and it isn't bad, but it is true that kilometers add up very quickly. We used this once before we got the Citroën. A trip to IKEA cost about €35 ($48).

The third card is a must-never-lose card if there ever was one. It's a Jahreskarte for the Salzburg buses: a year's card. I can use buses without paying each time for a calendar year. It is übertragbar" which means that Jenny can use it if I'm not traveling with her. But if it gets lost, there's no free replacement!

The e-card (again CARD, not Karte) now takes the place of the Krankenschein (or doctor's form). It used to be that you'd take a Krankenschein to the doctor if you needed to see one, or a dentist or an eye doctor, and he or she would rubber stamp it and send it to the Regional/National Health Organisation (or Gebietskrankenkasse). Now they swipe your card and get paid. National health works here once again after an overhaul in the 1990s. For €23.42 a month (now just short of $30) Jenny, Nikolas, and I are covered for health, dental, eye, and medications. Unbelievable. In order to get that rate, Jenny had to register as a student at the Universität, but the total cost of that was €379 or about $520 for the semester (see future blog about college costs!) (see "Salzburger Schnipsel" to read about Jenny's life as a student) The second card is, as it says, and IKEA Family Card ("Family" instead of the German "Familie"--awful!). With this card, we get some things cheaper, but perhaps the nicest perk (pardon the pun which will become clear in a second) is that we each get a free cup of coffee in the IKEA restaurant. Cool, huh?!

Finally, we have a run-of-the-mill library card. It's quite impressive, though, you consider the number of libraries it includes. The Universität Salzburg is an old European school with no one campus you can point to and say, "That's the university." It's all over the city. It could be the huge Nawi (College of Natural Sciences) or a branch of the Theological Seminary (one department has three room). You could be anywhere in the city and walk by a door that has this emblem. Anyway, every department has their own library and then there's the Main Library in the Old City. This one card allows me to check books out of all of them.

Finally, I give you a side-by-side of my two I.D., the one I used in 1990-1991 when I was a student in this program and my visa which I use as my main I.D. this year. See...not a hair's difference....

Gesellschaft mit keinen Sorgen um Haftung

GmbH. You see these letters at the end of a lot of company names. It's much like our "Inc." or the British "Ltd." It basically means that the company is a legal entity, much like a person. It can make a profit or lose its shirt, much like a person. And if you want to sue the company, you're only suing the entity, not the people who work for the company.

In German, it means Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung, or organisation with limited liabilty. Liability is an interesting concept because it seems that in the U.S., we're scared to death of it. In Austria and Germany, it doesn't seem to be that big of a deal.

You see it for sure on the playground. There are structures here that just wouldn't be allowed to exist in the U.S. because of the fear of injury. In these pictures, you see Nikolas just enjoying himself, yes, pushing the limits at times which can make any parent nervous, but it seems like he's able to judge for himself how far he can go and still feel safe. I think in the U.S. we take this decision-making out of kids' hands because we're too worried about what might happen.

So it seems that playgrounds could be called GmkSuH or organisations with no worries about liability.

Nikolas taking B.P. for the BoSox

In an attempt to help get Boston's bats rolling, Nikolas took batting practice all the way over here in Salzburg, hoping to send good vibes to such hitters as Big Papi, Jason Varitek, and Jacoby Ellsbury, all of whom had no hits in the LCS versus Tampa Bay.

It seems to have to have helped as the Sox came back from a 7-run deficit to beat Tampa Bay with walk-off J.D. Drew hit to right. Nikolas pulls most of what he hits, and it was exactly that kind of hit that won it for the Sox.

Gaisbergspitze

We can see one mountain from our apartment. No, it's not the Untersberg which I'd seen from both of my previous Salzburg homes. However, the Gaisberg ain't too shabby.

This past weekend, it was so sunny and clear that we had to head up to the Gaisberg. Many people bike up the mountain, many take the bus, and many drive up which is what we did.


Nikolas was surprised to see snow, our first sight of it this winter. It was good packing snow so we had to have several snowball fights. There's a Skihütte at the top which serves soup, roast pork and dumplings, different kinds of Wurst, and french fries. So there we sat with others in the sun which was just warm enough to take a bite out of the chilly air. There was even snow at the end of our table!

After lunch, more snow balls. Then we walked to the city-side of the mountain for clear views of Salzburg, the Untersberg and Hoher Stauffen. As an added bonus, we got to watch several paragliders hurl themselves off the mountain! It's scary to watch but so cool at the same time. We could even see our apartment building from up there, too.

There's something about mountains that amaze me. There's something about them that just makes me not want to look away. Obviously, I'm not alone. In Innsbruck, we visited the Alpenvereinmuseum which chronicled the history of climbing the Alps. Fascinating stuff.

Die Zeitumstellung

Weird. I got up yesterday at 7 a.m. wondering how my Red Sox had done in Game 1 of the Division Series. I got a cup of coffee and sat down at the computer to take a look at mlb.com expecting to see a final score. Instead, I found that the game was still being played! They're playing the Angels in California so they're, I guess nine hours behind us.

So there I sat watching Jon Papelbon striking out Chone Figgins to end the game while drinking my breakfast coffee. Weird!