christmas home family christmas home family

I’m at home in Yellowstone for Christmas. I’m taking a break from my tales of jaunting around Europe (oh, and that teaching thing, too) and am concentrating on relaxing at home—I’m hanging out with my family, visiting old friends, going skiing every day, drinking lots of good dark beer, working on application essays for graduate school, sorting through boxes of old stuff to go to the Salvation Army, and enjoying the true Christmasy feel of being home for the holidays.

My parents and brother came to Spain to visit me and to explore for a week before we all flew back together. One of my favorite things is the grin that I feel after waiting edgily for hours for my family’s plane to arrive, then seeing them emerge through the crowds at the airport. It happens every time I see them! I always grin sillily for several minutes, and I’m always overjoyed to see them. The week together in Spain was wonderful, because we got lots of good family time in, and we all got to explore new places. We ate mesas-full of delicious food, drove over breathtaking mountain roads in the northern part of Mallorca, and ogled the masterpieces for hours in the Prado. We wandered the backroads of Santanyí and my whole family tried their hand at teaching English in the elementary school in S’Alquería Blanca.

We spent seven nights on Mallorca, two nights in Madrid, and then flew back to the states. Our planes barely squeaked through snow-laden airports, but we eventually made it home at 2AM on Christmas Eve. It was a whirlwind adventure, and now it’s lovely to be home. I’ve gone cross-country skiing every day since I’ve gotten here, and I plan on going skiing every single day until I leave. Because we didn’t have much time to settle into the true Christmas spirit before Christmas, we’ve been making up for it now: my mom has been reading me Christmas stories every night, I still listen to Christmas music in the car (I LOVE DRIVING!), and I never tire of looking at our Christmas tree. We didn’t go up into the forest this year to cut our own tree, but it’s a real tree nonetheless. Unfortunately, my parents made the mistake of recruiting the fire marshal’s daughter to take care of our cat, Herman, while they were away in Spain: the fire marshal gifted them with a can of fire-proofing spray for trees. It’s white, powdery, and smells like cat piss. Luckily, my parents chose a hearty, healthy tree—it withstood the chemical dousing pretty well, and the fir-tree smell still overpowers the underlying fire-retardant cat stench. No offense to cats.

I might write more about the time with my family in Spain a little later—right now, I’m pretty tired of staring at my computer screen. I’m applying to Portland State University and Georgetown University for MATESL programs (Master of Arts in Teaching English as a Second Language) and Georgetown’s application essay needs to be 500 words long or less. Whoever can express themselves elegantly and accurately in 500 words must be a genius—I’ve been swearing at my essay for three days now, and a few hours ago I finally took a deep breath and slashed the heart out of it to cut it down to size. Now I’m staring at my butchered 499-word essay, trying to decide if it’s worth the risk to apply with the 900-word essay that I like better. Who knows. I’ll sleep on it, choose one version, and hit the submit button tomorrow. It’s funny that no matter how far I go, stress always catches up with me. As soon as I finish Georgetown’s application, I need to work on Portland State’s application, then I need to apply for a few more jobs for next summer, then I need to think about clearing out my room, then oh, yeah, I need to enjoy being at home! Don’t worry—coming home is always my favorite feeling in the world, and I am fully appreciating spending Christmas in Yellowstone with my family.

On Jan. 11, I fly to Seattle to visit my grandparents, and on Jan. 14, I fly back to Spain to start round 2. I am so glad that I get to spend 5 more months in Spain! I’m starting to make friends, my roommate and I are getting along really well, I love my job, and I plan to go back to Spain full of new ideas to try in the classroom. In the meantime, I’ve got two full weeks left at home, and I’m enjoying them to the last drop!

riding in trains (Austria part II)

This first half of this blog is a bit of stream-of-consciousness, or a list of random thoughts, written down while on the train heading from Innsbruck to Salzburg, and then a bit that I wrote while sitting in front of the Salzburg cathedral.

The second half of the blog is a recap of my day in Salzburg. This is the second part of my trip to Austria; go to the first part if you haven’t read that already.

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Riding out on the train early Tuesday morning just as the sun gilds the tops of the peaks ringing Innsbruck.

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Relationship vs. Individuality: Heidi and I had a long discussion on a train going back from her parents’ house to Innsbruck. A difference between Austria and America, Heidi said, is that Austrians put more stock on relationships. They focus on building a life with someone, on forming relationships, whereas in America, we are more focused on personal gain. It’s true that in the US, it’s considered almost unhealthy to base your life on a relationship. We consider it better to make yourself happy, to find satisfaction in what you’re doing, and then find someone with similar interests, or someone that is at a similar station in life. This position seemed absurd to Heidi: if you’re only focused on yourself, how are you ever going to have the energy required to put the necessary effort into a relationship? Heidi and I only talked about Austrian-American cultural differences, leaving religion out of the discussion (believing or not believing, forming a relationship with God and Christ, how spiritual relationships affect our own relationships, etc.). As with any question, finding a balance is essential. Living completely for another human being is a denial of all that is good in our own, individual lives; living only for yourself is selfish and the surest way to lead a lonely, miserable life. Food for thought.

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Foggy valley bottoms, sun glinting off high mountain slopes as the train whizzes through the Tirol.

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How much do we ever really say to each other? It’s funny what I can’t say here in this blog—sometimes I think I should just send out a mass email, like I did while in Ecuador, but even then, I still can’t say everything I want to in an email. Would it be better to Skype with people individually? Or just wait until I get home, to talk face-to-face? Even with someone in the same room, or sitting side-by-side on a sofa, how much are we really saying? How much can we read someone else’s heart?

It’s a miracle, I believe, when you can connect with someone and know that your words are being understood exactly the way you mean them. It’s these kinds of connections that I miss.

German: head full of words floating in a dark pool, and I just pick phrases at random.

Being here makes me appreciate living in Spain, where my grasp on Spanish is so much less tenuous. As soon as I get back to Mallorca, though, I’ll start thinking longingly of English, and all the ways I can use nuances to narrow in on my precise meaning. Even two native speakers, though, of any language, can wildly miscommunicate—which brings me back to the point that meeting someone at the same level is a miracle.

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Green fields as we cut through the southern part of Bavaria, in Germany! Flat, rolling landscape out the left window, sharp peaks out the right. Instantly flatter as we crossed the Austrian-German border. About to go by Chiemsee.

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Despite this discussion of the aloneness, or the separateness, of individual people, or the idea that every person is (an island? a bubble-boy unable to pop the plastic wrap?) it’s true that “no man is an island” and that we all connect with each other, somehow, at some level. But how? And when?

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fog over Chiemsee, sun blinding through clouds, slanting through copses of trees, rolling white farmland. Coming into Salzburg. When did we cross back into Austria?

Sitting on the steps of the cathedral listening to the singing. Open-air concert of 1) traditional Christmas songs in German, 2) a flute rendition of “Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town,” 3) some song called “Essdet ihr” or “Esse dir”. The third category: perhaps some combination of Latin and the Salzburg dialect of German? No. Turns out to be “As The Deer” (as in “As the deer panteth for the water / so my soul longeth after You / You alone are my heart’s desire / and I long to worship You”). I haven’t heard that song since my years in Youth Group. What memories! 4) the encore: “As The Deer”. Again.

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Now that I’m back on sunny Mallorca, I think there was an interesting dualism in my short trip to Austria. The first few days were spent with Andi and Heidi, and I had some wonderful, interesting discussions with both of them. I played games and drank Glühwein with Andi’s friends, I hung out with Heidi’s cat and drank schnapps with Heidi’s mom, and I felt like a real person. As soon as I stepped off the train in Salzburg, however, I turned into a pure tourist. I loved it! I loved Salzburg, but without ever actually talking to anybody (I mean about anything that matters), how much did I actually see? Can a tourist ever get to know the motivations, or the reasons for being, of life in whatever town or country he or she is visiting? Is it important to have deep convos with everyone, or is it enough to broaden our horizons just by going to new places? Is the answer in eco-tourism, which seeks to have visitors make a connection to the new place, thereby establishing in the visitor value in the land? Is the answer in couch surfing, which “makes the world a better place, one couch at a time,” where people open their homes and share about their culture with curious, receptive travelers? Or should someone have to move to another country, establish herself in an apartment with a roommate from a country she’s never been to and probably won’t ever go to, work with the children—the future of the community—and try to set up meaningful relationships with the people there? Is that the best way to learn more about the world?

Whatever the answer (if there is an answer), I put philosophical musings aside as I traipsed through Salzburg on a gloriously sunny, amazing day.

I got to Salzburg at about ten in the morning and I made my way to my hostel, where I had to fight my way through three large English tour groups about to depart for some sightseeing. Salzburg seems to be the city of tours: you can go on a Sound of Music tour, a Mozart tour, tours of the salt mines (whence Salzburg gets its name: “Salz” means “salt” auf Deutsch), tours of ice caves, tours of Hitler’s Eagle’s Nest (which is actually in Germany, but still very near to the border), and a “Private Deer Finding” tour (which I saw advertised with a picture of two people sitting in the snow, watching deer—no idea what the draw is there.)

Anyways, because Austria turned out to be much more expensive than originally planned, I skipped all the guided tours (alas! I didn’t get to reenact Maria’s running over green slopes while bellowing “The Hills Are Alive”) but I did do lots of wandering around and took lots of pictures. I have to say, I am a sucker for kitsch, and I definitely have to go back to Salzburg and do all the things I didn’t do this time. 1) I didn’t go into Mozart’s Birth House, 2) I didn’t have coffee at the Café Tomaselli, 3) I didn’t go into the Felsenreitschule rock stage, where the Von Trapps gave their moving concert before popping over the mountains to get to Switzerland, a mere 250 miles away.

But I really did have a lovely day, and I really, really love Sound of Music (no matter the fun I’m poking at it now) and I’ll most likely have to go on a Sound of Music tour sometime in my life. My favorite things by far: 1) Exploring the city center, 2) Going to a free, midday organ concert, 3) Hiking up the hills that border the city center and wandering through the woods, overlooking the city, 4) Listening to the choir singing Christmas carols (yes, and “As the Deer”) in front of the Cathedral

I ate dinner alone at an Indian restaurant, where everything was labeled “bio” (Biotea, Biorice, Bionaan), and I crashed at the hostel, getting up in time for a mid-morning flight out of the Salzburg airport. I got back to Mallorca and heard about the nationwide transportation strike that had started the afternoon of the day I left—oh! I forgot a really important part of my story! Apart from the unannounced, impending strike, I almost didn’t make it off of Mallorca. My alarm clock decided not to go off—it was on, I swear, and set for 5:30am, NOT pm—and so I missed the bus. My sainted roommate drove me the 45 minutes to the airport before turning around and driving the 45 minutes back to work so that I could make my flight. She was scheduled to fly out to Barcelona in the evening, but the strike started about midday on Friday, so she didn’t get out until Sunday. Thanks to me, she made at least 4 trips to the airport that weekend. Of course, my alarm clock WAS on, and I guess I left it on in the rush to get ready after getting up late, and it proved its being on (and its capriciousness) by going off this morning at 5:30am. Karma. I did bring back gifts from Innsbruck’s Christkindlmarkt (Christmas market), though, to thank my wonderful roommate.

OH! Totally forgot that I got the whole pat-down (grope-down) in the Salzburg airport. A very important part of my experience. I can sleep soundly in my bed tonight, knowing Europe is safe.

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To see photos from my five days of heaven in Austria, here’s the link to the 1^st facebook album: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2050908&id=65202311&l=ef1ad41957

And then the facebook album of pure Salzburg: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2050910&id=65202311&l=635e5e8219

austrian adventure: ankunft / arribada / llegada / arrival

December 6-8 was a holiday through all of Spain, so I naturally took that opportunity, combined with my usual 3-day weekends, to take off. Also naturally, the airport people went on strike—luckily my flight left before the entire transportation system in Spain went under.

I went to Austria to visit two friends, Andi and Heidi, who are both living in Innsbruck at the moment. I had a layover in Köln (Cologne)—a beautiful airport. If you can manage it, try to get a layover in Köln—and then flew into Munich.

It was oddly familiar as I ran through the Munich train station to catch a train to Garmisch-Partenkirchen, where I was going to change trains to Innsbruck…last summer, I was in Munich visiting Rebekah Shraeder, and I went with a group of her friends up to Garmisch-Partenkirchen for a day. We waited and waited in the Munich train station for her friend and his brother to show up, and when they did, we had to run to catch the next train. It turned out that they’d been caught Schwarzfahr-ing on the U-Bahn (riding without a ticket on the subway) and they had to wait for the controller to write them a ticket and charge them the €200 (or whatever the fine happened to be—I don’t remember now). That was a bad day for those brothers. That night, after getting back from Garmisch-Partenkirchen, we all hung out in Rebekah’s apartment for a long time. The brothers left extremely late, and it turned out that the night bus had already stopped running. They got into some sort of argument, and one brother decided to walk back to Rebekah’s apartment, and the other slept in a U-Bahn station, waiting for the first subway to start running. Of course, he got arrested and ticketed for something, being a bum, I guess, and he had to pay another fine, if I remember right. As I said, not a good day. We had an excellent day in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, though! But that’s another story.

As I got into Innsbruck a couple hours later, it started to snow. Big, fat, juicy snowflakes—YES!! I started humming “It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas…” I was definitely in the right town (make that, in the right country) for being in the Christmas spirit: Christmas markets, Glühwein, Krampus… read on, Macduff!

Andi Schwab (last year’s language assistant in Linfield’s German department) met me at the train station, showed me his apartment, and from there, we set off with a group of his friends to a Glühwein stand. Glühwein is, in essence, pretty nasty mulled wine, but it sure warms your innards on a cold winter evening. It was -10º! (Ok, Celcius. Still, it was in the teens in Fahrenheit, and that’s pretty darn cold, especially when yours truly brought no winter clothes to Europe…) After a couple of mugs of Glühwein, we went into a pub to thaw noses and toes, and to have a beer. I had some really good conversations with Andi’s friends and Andi’s girlfriend (who came to Linfield in May—such a nice person! I joked that I only ever saw her in pubs. She was at Linfield for the seniors’ bar crawl, and we spent many hours in McMenamin’s; now, we were meeting again, in one of Innsbruck’s pubs.) I got lots of good German practice in!

It was a bit déjà vu hanging out with Andi’s friends, because they’re all from the Austrian region of Vorarlberg, which has such a strong dialect that it’s almost a separate language from German. They all talked to each other in “Vorarlbergish” and all remarks directed at me were in High German (Standard German). It was almost exactly like being on Mallorca, where all life around me happens in Mallorquí, and my involvement is in Castilian (“regular” Spanish). Sorry about the digression into languages—I seem to be a bit like my friend Lily Niland, who is in Perú right now. In all her blogs, she writes about language and baseball. In all my blogs, I write about language and touristy things—it’s what interests me! (Lily, I love reading your blog with your nihoñol and béisbol stories!)

Anyway, back to the flow of events: I crashed at Andi’s apartment that night. The next day, Andi went skiing (next time I go to Innsbruck, I’m bringing my ski gear and a wad of cash ready to blow on the slopes) and I explored around Innsbruck. I went into a couple of fascinating museums—I love museums!—and bought myself a pair of gloves to combat the onset of frostbite. Best €17 I’ve ever spent. In the afternoon, I caught a short train to Hall in Tirol, a nearby town where Heidi Herzog (the language assistant in the Linfield German department before Andi) is currently helping out in a small store. It was really nice to chat and catch up with Heidi—when we were at Linfield, I hardly ever saw her outside of class and I didn't really know her. These few days were a great time for me to actually talk to Heidi and get to know her as a person, and not just a language instructor. I keep wondering about my students here—do they actually see me as a teacher? Or just as an American who really doesn't know what she's doing, but is having a good time trying? I guess my students that I've met at the bar in town might have a different outlook than the rest...but that's a WHOLE nother story.

In the evening, I went back to Andi’s apartment, where a “small gathering of a couple people” was in full swing. I met lots more of Andi’s friends, and we ended up having a lot more Glühwein and playing a game called Activity, which combines Taboo, Pictionary, and charades. I, as the lone, stuttering American, was given easy cards—or, at least, cards where I could actually understand the German word that I was supposed to act out, explain, or draw—and I’m happy to say that our team won.

The next day, Heidi and I went to her parents’ house just outside Saalfelden, about two hours away from Innsbruck. Almost as soon as I walked in the door, Heidi’s mom offered me gingerbread cookies and apple schnapps. Aaah, I felt right at home! I immediately settled down on one of their amazingly cushy couches and fell asleep.

I woke up for an amazing lunch—bratwurst, käsekrainer (another kind of sausage), and a knödel (a lovely kind of dumpling) in a creamy chanterelle sauce. Home-cooked food at its finest. And, that came with homemade apple juice! They have an apple tree on their property, and in the fall they picked the apples, pressed them, and made the freshest, most delicious juice imaginable. Ashley Bennett, another former Linfield student, actually helped pick the apples when she visited Heidi earlier this year—thanks, Ashley, for all your hard work! I sure enjoyed it.

Actually, it was thanks to Ashley that I went to Austria during this break—December 6^th is a big day in German-speaking countries, because that is the day that St. Nicholas visits the kids. (On December 24^th, the Christ Child, das Christkind, is the one who comes with all the presents.) In central Austria, specifically around Saalfelden where Heidi grew up, there is another tradition that happens on December 5^th or 6^th: the Krampuslauf. Krampus is a devil-figure that used to have some sort of pagan significance, but was taken up by the church as a symbol of evil. So, during a Krampuslauf (“Krampuslauf” could almost be translated as a “Krampus Parade,” but it’s more like a mad running in front of and around the various Krampus figures… “Running of the Krampuses”?) both the figures of Krampus and St. Nicholas are present—St. Nick, to remind people of good, and Krampus, to remind them of evil. I actually have no real explanation to present—it is one of the creepiest Christmas traditions I’ve ever seen. When Heidi was teaching at Linfield a couple of years ago, she showed a video showing lots of devil-figures running around holding flaming torches and beating people with chains. (This is a beloved tradition.) And then Heidi explained to us that there were jails in the town squares. We were very confused, and Heidi asked, “Who do you think they put in the jails?” The answer? The women and children. Duh. The Krampuses run around and drag people, kicking and screaming, into these large cages… I’m making it sound terrible, but the Austrians around where Heidi live seem to love it. I was more bewildered than anything, so of course, when Ashley reminded me of our captivated confusion about Krampus, I wanted to come to Austria during this magical time of the year to see the crazy event!

Here’s a Colbert Report video that sort-of explains the Krampuslauf (thanks again, Ashley, for the link) http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/258162/december-09-2009/the-blitzkrieg-on-grinchitude---hallmark---krampus

And below is my rather silly video of the evening: we started off at Zell am See, but the Krampuslauf was actually contained behind ropes and there were security people guiding the Krampus figures around (no chain-beatings this year) and Heidi declared that it was like a “sleeping pill,” so we went to the town of Almdorf to try and find a wilder Krampuslauf. All in all, it was a good introduction to the mysterious tradition of the Krampus, but I was still left bemusedly clueless.

Stay tuned for photos and the end of my short stay in Austria.

mallorcan gems

As I walked through town this afternoon to buy snacks for my trip to Austria tomorrow—I'm visiting Heidi Herzog and Andi Schwab, two erstwhile language assistants in the Linfield German department—I saw the most beautiful sunset. Of course, I didn't have my camera with me, but Mallorca isn't lacking in beautiful sunsets. Here is a series of photos that I took about a month ago from the kitchen window:

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Utterly unrelated, but still interesting:

At the end of my previous post, I started a list of useful phrases that I´ve picked up since arriving. Here are a few more gems:

te sabe mal / et sap greu : please, would you mind. In Ecuador, they say "no seas maldita, hazme el favor..." which literally means, "Don't be evil, do me a favor..." Here, the common phrase is "¿te sabe mal...?" ("et sap greu...?" in catalan) which, translated word-for-word, means "Does it know you poorly?" or "Does it taste bad to you?" or something like that. It's the equivalent of the English, "Would you mind?..." (fill in the blank with what you want the person to do.) The real-life example that I heard: "Et sap greu deixar-me això?" (Would you mind leaving this with me?)

me has pillado : you got me! I was talking with a coworker from the school who was telling me about Carlos Moyá, a famous tennis player from Mallorca who is retiring. The only other famous tennis player from Mallorca that I've heard of is Rafa Nadal, who I learned about this summer: when people on my guided hikes at the LSR this summer (see at the workplace) learned that I was going to Mallorca, lots of people mentioned "that gorgeous Rafa Nadal." So, in order to expand my cultural learning, I asked my coworker who else was famous from Mallorca. "Erm... ara no sé...Jeni, me has pillado!" (Uh...at the moment, I don't know... Jeni, you got me!) "¿Me pillas?" is exactly how Ecuadorians say, "¿Me cachas?" in a conversation to check if the other person understands: You following me? You got me?

jolines : frick, darn, shoot. The nice form of "joder" or "jódete" --look those up in a dictionary; this is a family-friendly blog :) The kids, especially in the high school, use both the polite(ish) and not-utterable-in-church forms of this interjection.

ir de marcha / anar de marxa : to party. Literally: "to go on the march." Ecuadorian equivalent: farrear. A very useful phrase. Lots of words have X's in them in mallorquí, by the way. It's pronounced either "sh" or "ch", depending on the word. The word for "net" as in "internet?" Xarxa. "to talk"? Xerrar. My boss's name? Xisca.

el tió de Nadal caga regals : ok, so this isn´t exactly an everyday phrase. However, in my online catalan-learning course, this phrase popped up and it seemed share-worthy. For Spanish speakers, read the following explanation: "Diem que el tió caga regals, perquè el considerem un ésser viu (cagar, normalment, significa "fer excrement sòlid.")" In English: "We say that the Christmas tree shits presents, because we consider it to be a living being (shit, normally, means "to excrete solid waste.")"