So I moved to Vienna again. Which means more posts on this blog! The fabric of reality likes it much better when what I am writing and where I am writing it agrees with the blog title.
Although literally nobody reading this could have failed to discover this fact, I have in fact moved to Vienna to start a PhD in Geology at the University of Vienna. But that doesn't start for a couple of weeks yet, so I have had plenty of time to get my doing stuff shoes on and, well, do stuff. Note that this isn't the kind of scintillating, picture filled cultural voyaging stuff, rather the travelling to offices to get things signed, opening bank accounts, getting SIM cards and buying furniture stuff.
Currently (well, until Tuesday if the delivery counter at Ikea are to be believed) my living quarters consist of a very spacious (14 square meters) room with nothing in it apart from variously strewn about belongings and a matress I'm borrowing of a flatmate. I like it because a) it is a roof over my head, which wasn't a certainty a month ago and b) because it is central enough to be near what feels like EVERYTHING. I haven't adjusted out of London mode yet, being able to reach pretty much anywhere in central Vienna within half an hour and some of the most impressive architecture and parks of the Ringstrasse in around 15 minutes leads me to occasionally giggle under my breath like a mad man while I am (briefly) on the way to places. I'm getting to use the tram a lot here as well, which is mostly just nice because it is fun to go in trams.
There is a kitchen, WITH an oven and WITHOUT any form of shower/ bath etc (unfortunately as I discovered while property hunting, that latter is not a given). My flatmates seem very nice, obviously one of their best features being the fact that they are fluent in german. Our conversations havent ranged too widely yet, partly because they are both very busy working and studying for their exams. Thus is revealed the downside of the Austrian 'choose when you want to do your exam from these three dates' policy, you may be able to postpone your exam, but then you have to do a bunch of revision in September just before the next year starts....
We have had the odd conversation about how great Europe is and how english people are lame stick in the muds for not hanging out in it as often, and I promise I didn't have that conversation JUST to piss off Peter... I will say that I learned you can choose to go abroad to study for half a year or a full year in another country, when you are only 17 or 18. Even if you don't know the language to start with. When I asked how many people do it, the answer was 'oh, only a few in each year'. Can you imagine if we were allowed to do that in the UK? Would anyone go? I wouldn't have gone.
Aaanyway, I am hoping that having to speak at least a little german every day will go a long way towards improving my casual comprehension. I already learnt the german for semolina! It is Gries / Weizengries, if you were curious.
I could go on about how nice it is here but heck, you already knew that, didn't you?
Der Tom
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I was looking down my list of favourited blogs just now when I thought, I wonder if Tom will resume his blog now he is 'In Wien' again, so I clicked on it for the first time in a year or so... And you've written something this very day!! Spoooky.
ReplyDeletefor the 2nd time ever i pressed the google reader butten (thank you tom) and here low and behold is something to read! (along with 300 bbc science articals...)
ReplyDeleteanyway i knew you could go aboard when you where 17/18 we had several Germans come and be in our 6 th form at various times which was pretty cool (obviously nobody left England though as that's just bad form. mind you people here are genuinely scared of london.. )