Blogging with a Bottle of Wine

(Oct. 5, 2009)

I'm sitting comfortably at my desk relaxing with a glass of wine, and it seems like the time to start recording. First things first: good wine is damn cheap. There is always a better bottle to buy, but the Chilean sauvignon blanc I am drinking now is pretty good for 1.99 Euros (roughly $2.80 at current exchange rates). It makes TJ's 2 buck chuck (or is it 3 buck chuck?) look like swill. Sorry TJ's. Speaking of libations, the beer is amazing too. A very respectable case (Stiegl—brewed in Salzburg, if I remember correctly) only costs $21. That's even better when you consider the fact that it comes in pints rather than 12 oz. bottles, and that $2.25 (roughly) of it is deposit. I think I fell asleep at the airport and woke up in heaven. Anyway, I digress.

Today was my first day in Seitenstetten working at the Gymnasium. It's tough to get from Waidhofen an der Ybbs to Seitenstetten: to catch the bus that gets me there in time to start work I need to get up at 5:00 am. The bus leaves at 5:43. Still, that was no problem today—I practically sprang out of bed because I was so excited to see what the school would be like.

I got to work very early—even before the secretary. I scared the wits out of her when she came up to the door. After she regained her composure, however, she recognized me and showed me around the school. "Das Stiftsgymnasium der Benediktiner" is loosely affiliated with Catholicism, and is located in the Benedictine monastery in Seitenstetten. Although some monks teach lessons (mostly religion), the vast majority of the teachers and professors are secular. I will rarely interact with the monks as I will mainly be working with English teachers. After getting some of my bureaucracy for the day out of the way (more on that to come), I waited a while in the teachers' lounge for my "Betreuungslehrer" (this is a tough one to translate; it means, sort of, the teacher who I will be working closest with, who I am to go to first for advice, and who sort of acts as my guidance counselor whilst I am here, but even that definition really doesn't explain the meaning fully—suffice to say that there is no translation for "Betreuer" in English, and the closest translation might be something like "care taker" or "liason").

My "Beteuungslehrerin" (feminine of the above) is Frau Elizabeth Zach, a very friendly woman (and informal, by Austrian standards), and I am glad that I will be working closely with somebody so outgoing. She showed me around a little more, touching on some things that the secretary missed, and we talked for a while before she needed to get to work. During this time I also had a veritable hurricane of introductions; I remember only a handful of names. I suppose; however, that I will have enough time to catch up on that later. I did catch most of my English-teaching colleagues' names though. The laundry list is not that long, and I am very fond of everyone so far. In addition to Elizabeth there is Siegi (See-ghee), Markus, Gertraud, and Ingeburg (who I have not yet met… and yes, the Oxford comma was intended here).

I also got my schedule for my Stammschule (main school). I will be at the Gymnasium (or monastery, if you will) on Tuesdays and Thursdays until about noon, as well as every other Friday until half past eight. Since I am working in another school as well, I have a second schedule, which due to Germanic efficiency, fits this schedule perfectly. At my secondary school— a HTL (Höhere technische Bundeslehr- und Versuchsanstalt—don't even get me started—it's basically a technical high school with a vocational emphasis)—I will work Mondays and Wednesdays. Monday I start at 11:00 and get done around 1:00; Tuesday I begin at 8:15, teach for two hours, and then for another hour around 1:00, so that I am done at approximately 2:00. All in all, it's not a bad schedule.

I also observed my first class today (still at the Gymnasium here, despite that small aside). Gertraud invited me to visit her 3^rd form class (equivalent to the 3^rd year in Gymnasium) and to act as her "walking dictionary". It was great to get to hang out in a class and offer some tips to the kids.

Gertraud was also kind enough to give me a ride back to Waidhofen a. d. Ybbs, since bus connections are relatively infrequent. As if this were not enough, a further testament to the generosity of my teachers is that we are working out a plan for me to ride with them from Waidhofen in the morning so I don't have to get up at such an ungodly hour. To say I'm thrilled is an understatement, since I neither expected nor requested this. I will be riding with Prof. Leo Mader and Prof. Lotte Mader tomorrow morning.

After all the excitement at the school I was certainly ready for my day to be over. However, I still had some bureaucratic stuff to take care of. Namely, I needed to report to the authorities that I will be living in Austria, as well as pick up my identification card. The process at the city hall was actually, and surprisingly, very stream-lined; however, getting the paperwork filled out by my landlord was anything but. Living in a dormitory building, there is a management office that is open on weekdays, but when I arrived, there was nobody there and the doors were locked. This was… frustrating. Especially considering it was during clearly advertised open hours. Admittedly, I arrived only five minutes after the lunch hour ended; however, that does not excuse the administrator returning over thirty minutes late. After two other people somehow budged me in line (maybe I look like a dumb foreigner… that's all I have to go on here in way of an explanation)I got my paperwork stamped (in triplicate, of course), and proceeded to city hall, where getting everything authorized and getting my identification card took all of twenty minutes. Go figure.

After all that, I was ready for a stiff drink, which turned out to be some Chilean wine, which brings us back to the present. I'm done typing. More to come. I'm going to finish my bottle of wine, listen to some music, and probably fall asleep with my shoes on. Prost.