The Holiday Edition

Apparently I’m a really bad blogger which isn’t surprising. Most of the time I just forget to write anything. Then when I finally remember to actually post something, it seems that I don’t have anything interesting to say because from my perspective life goes by more or less normally. But, since you all aren’t here, I’ll try to fill you in on what’s been going on lately.
I finally started going to school which is probably a good thing because I definitely had too much free time on my hands before. Although, school itself is definitely not that time consuming. I have six classes which seems like a lot, but they only meet once a week, so actually it’s not really that much. I’m taking art history, a class on the European Union, French, and three German language classes. I think the ERASMUS (exchange student) attitude towards studying is party eight days a week and study in between. I wouldn’t say that I’ve been living up to that exactly, but I certainly haven’t been doing as much work as I would at UPS. All in all I like the university, my classes are interesting and the professors are good. The language thing is challenging, but doable.
Traveling! I’ve bee traveling a ton. At the end of October I went to Perugia, Italy which is just north of Rome. There I met up with Tia and the Gillis family which was so sweet. It was so fun to be in Italy with them and it was really good to see familiar faces from home. Then two weeks later I went to Prague for the weekend to visit Alex and Jordan, two friends from UPS. Prague is a really beautiful, interesting city, and I really really liked it. I must say that the prices were also very refreshing after having dealt with the euro for the last three months. Then the weekend after that I took a day trip to Salzburg which was great. We visited the Christmas markets and saw the city which was so pretty with all its Christmas decorations. Then this last weekend I was in Vienna visiting my Austrian host sister and my friends from when I lived in Austria. It was so good to spend time with my Austrian friends and host sister because up until now I hadn’t seen them for four years or so. I’m probably going to go broke from all this wandering, but it’s been more than worth it because of all the people I’ve seen and the places I’ve been.
On Thursday, I cooked my very first Thanksgiving on my own, and I have to say I'm pretty proud of myself for what I managed to whip up. I couldn't find a turkey here, so we had goose instead which was a very tasty substitute. I also made stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, honey glazed carrots, and apple crisp. It was very good, if I do say so myself. It was also really fun to celebrate with people from all over the world. I celebrated with friends from Ecuador, Spain, France, Poland, and Ireland. It was pretty cool, and thanks to all my friends that came I managed to not be homesick at all.
I have been spending sometime in the actual city of Passau, and it’s great. Just like everywhere else, it’s getting all geared up for Christmas. The Christmas market just opened, there’s a huge Christmas tree in the middle of the city, and there are Christmas lights everywhere. The weather is so warm though, it feels like spring which is horrible. Even worse, there’s not one bit of snow to be seen anywhere. That combined with the fact that I haven’t been skiing at all is slowing killing me. Plus Baker opened before Thanksgiving this year, I really can’t catch a break.
I think that might be it for now. I don’t want to write too much at put you all to sleep. I’ll try to do another post sometime sooner than three months from now, but no promises. I hope everyone is having a great winter.
Love,
Emily