One last blog

Now that I've been back for almost a week, it's given me some time to think about my time and experiences in Austria. It was truly an honor to meet all of the cadets and officers at the military academy in wiener neustadt. I can't thank them enough for giving me a great time that I will never forget. I already miss Austria and can't wait to go back some day, hopefully sooner rather than later. Who knows when we'll run into eachother, downrange, in a bar, or otherwise. The Austrian way of life is a great one that everyone can try to match. However, I love being in America, and would never want to permanently live anywhere else. The free ketchup and free refills are just to big to pass up on. Seriously though, I want to thank everyone that positively, or negatively for that matter, impacted my life while abroad. I especially want to thank everyone in room 210 for being there when I had questions or didn't understand your fast as hell speaking. The picture of us is great and I'll keep it for a long long time. Another big thanks to the guys that took us to the different cities. Big thanks to Bernd and his great family for their hospitality. Thanks also to Mathoi and Max and Andy for showing us around Innsbruck and Graz respectively. Thanks to Braz and Ratzi for always being ready for a party. Well, I guess that should go out to all of the Lehmaenner. What a great group of guys. I'll never forget you all. In closing, I just want to say that there was nothing like my time spent in Austria. It was really an experience that I wouldn't trade for anything. For all of those involved, it's not good-bye, just see you later.

the strategery of being classy

     Yesterday I worked on my term paper for my history class for the majority of the day. Ratzi helped me edit it for grammar and all that. I ended up finishing around 3. The paper is seven pages long and about 2300 words, all in German. That was pretty much the last thing I have to do here minus the "exams" this week, all (2) of which are oral. We do have to go to Vienna and take a German test to see how much we have improved, but this shouldn't be too stressful. Last night I was invited to play Risk with Braz, Andy, and Mayr. We played a different way than I'm used to, but I got it after a little while. We started off the game by breaking out a bottle of Cognac and Jameson. Fate led me to have Australia, so I knew it was going to be a good game. I started off slow, but eventually took Asia. We were playing with mission cards, and just as I was about to accomplish my goal of 24 countries, Mayr finished his, taking Africa and North America. The red troops were shocked. After a while we decided to go to the Christmas Market in the city. The specialty this time of year is Punsch. Its a hot drink pretty much made from wine. Instead of having regular punsch, we had the special punsch. If you keeping up with my blogging, then you can probably guess what special punsch is. Yes, those that guessed punsch with another shot of alcohol are correct. After about 4 mugs of this wonderful concoction, we headed to rox for a little bit. The night ended a little early and I went back to the academy.
     Today was a very lazy day. I watched a movie and studied a little bit for my test with major lampersberger tomorrow. It feels good knowing that I don't really have any more studious committments left while I'm here. I can just relax and enjoy my last week (5 days really) in Austria.

Time is dwindling

     This week was pretty normal as far as an Austrian life goes. Over the weekend it snowed a lot, so now everything is still covered in snow. At KA Seth and I ran with a group of cadets through the snow on a route I hadn't been on before. We went outside the gates and through a field, on what I assume was a path, except we couldn't see it because it was covered in 5 inches of snow. It was all about trying to stay in running step with the peson in front of you so you could step in their footsteps to make it a little easier. We didn't end up going all to far, just to the next town over, which was about 5 miles total. After KA we had another military history class, where feined paying attention. In the evening we had the dance course again. I've decided that the worst part of the dance course is walking the quarter mile to get to the bus from the academy, and then waking up after a 45 minute nap to the dance class. Actually being in the class and dancing is pretty fun. This week I danced with a girl from Manchester, England. She must have been about 4'8", just not tall at all. She was a surprisingly good dancer though, coming from a ballet background as she said. As we were leaving the dance class back to the bus I was able to take in all of the Christmas decorations in Vienna. It's a wonderful city, and especially beautiful this time of year. However, you're hard pressed to not find a place that looks pretty done up with Christmas lights and a layer of snow.
      Tuesday we had the german course again. Nothing too new or interesting. On Wednesday though, we had our LAST german class. Quite an event, especially now that I don't have to spend four hours a day in a stuffy classroom. During class we watched an Austrian movie parodying star trek and star wars. I don't think the maker could decide on which movie he wanted to parody. After the movie we played a board game to improve our german. It was all about matching up words that would go with different ones, and finding words from a jumble of letters. Afterwards we said our goodbyes. Later in the day, after another history lesson that consisted of doing a sudoku (professional sudoku mind you), we went running again. This time I went with Seth and Rene again, but we took a different route. We went through the same town as last time, but instead of coming straight back, we went across a bridge and then along a river on the way back. This meant running through about 6 inches of snow for 2 miles, which is about as hard as it sounds. When we finally got back on the asphalt, my feet were soaked, but it still felt great running on solid ground. Once we got back inside the park walls, we took the long path around, which was also covered in snow, but trampled on, so there was place to comfortably run. When were about a quarter mile out, the chase was on. I gasped to the end where Rene was stopped, and we lightly jogged in from there. The run lasted about and hour and fifteen minutes. I have no idea how far we actually ran. When I got back I quickly showered because we had plans to see a show that night in Vienna. This wasn't actually just for shiggles, but rather an essay we had to write for a class back at West Point. The show itself though was really cool. It was held in the Volkstheater in downtown Vienna. The play was called "Herr Puntila und sein Knecht Matti," which roughly means,"Mr. Punitla and his servant Matti." It was about a landowner (Puntila) that struggles with alcoholism and his relationship with his friend and chauffeur Matti. He is always happy-go-lucky when drunk, but penny-pinching and mean when sober. He also struggles with whether to marry his daughter to an Attache, or his friend Matti. Overall it was a good experience, and yet another thing to check off the list of things to say that I've done. It was pretty late when we got back to the academy so I went to bed.

Here's a picture of all the snow. As you can see from the balcony, we got about 8 inches in the past few days.

     Thursday started off with our final exam in rhetoric, a class we're not getting credit for, but rightfully so because he haven't actually done anything. The exam consisted of giving a presentation about our time in Austria thus far. It was very laid back and didn't take all that long. The rest of the day was ours to do with as we wished. We have a 7 page history paper due next week, so I started on that. I didn't realize just how long and how much effort it would take until I started. Oh yeah, it's also in german..About 200 words in I needed a coffee/tv episode break. Further diligence throughout the day got me about a third of the way through. Later in the day I went running by myself in the snow once again. This time around it was snowing, but the path I went on was recently shoveled/taken care of, so I didn't have to worry too much about where I stepped. I ran to the next town over again. Instead of distance, I just went for time. I ran 30 minutes out at a pretty good pace, and then came back. I was pretty tire on the way back, but managed to keep about the same time. Later I worked on my paper some more, and then got a pizza in the MAk Casino with Weicher. For those interested, The theme, or I guess thesis of my paper is: What effect did the Austro-Hungarian loss at the battle of Cer have on the for the rest of the war? In English..for the sake of simplicity.
     Today was another work on the paper day. I didn't do much besides that. Between research and writing, I'm about 2/3 of the way done. Ratzi also helped me edit it a little to make the grammar better. He owed me since I helped him with his English homework. The rest of the day was pretty much the same. In the evening Braz, Patrick, Mayr and I went to chen's cooking, a great asian food buffet where I ate entirely too much. My last weekend here will consist of writing this paper due next week and studying for the "final exams" on monday, tuesday and thursday. I'm sure there will be going away parties during the week though, so there's no need for me to fret about a lost weekend. Until next time then. And for those keeping track: yes, only 8 days until my return.

flying, schmoozing, eating, and being saved by my guardian angel

    This past Thanksgiving was probably one of the best days I have ever lived through. I went to formation in the morning to find out that we would be receiving a plane tour of Austria that day. We had about an hour of time to kill before we left, so I watched a little bit of TV. At nine we left with the major to the military airbase in Wiener Neustadt. There, we met the pilot who would be giving us the air tour. Our plane was relatively small, an eight-seater I think. The tour was supposed to last about 3 and a half hours, so using the bathroom beforehand was highly encouraged. We had to wait while the plane was refueling, so they offered us a coffee, which we promptly declined for obvious reasons. The plane took off after not too much longer. The land from up above was absolutely incredible. As we got further west, the mountains started to get bigger. Snow also started to show up on the mountain tops. Eventually we got out so far west that everything was snowcovered. It was very pretty. We also flew right by the tallest mountain in Austria. After another couple of hours we completed our airplane tour. (pictures to come later).
     Since the flight went until about 1:30 we missed lunch, which was okay because youre not supposed to eat at all on Thanksgiving Day until dinner time. We had to be at the Ambassador's house at 4:30, so we left around 3 just to be safe. We ended up getting to Vienna pretty early, so we stopped and got a coffee. Luckily we weren't wearing dress grey. Dan was able to talk to the person in charge of us out of making us wear this grotesquely uncomfortable uniform, which turned out later to be a very good call. It ended up being "casual attire" for everyone. We got to his house a little late (fasionably late, as if you will (and I believe you will.)). We were greeted by someone working at the house taking our coats, after being checked at the gate by security. We then walked into the Ambassador's living room and had a manservant bring a different variety of drinks out on a platter, which we could take, or make a further request should our fancy not be tickled. Ambassador Eacho then showed us around his extravagent house, which was adorned with many pictures of him and famous politicians through history. There was one of him with Ex-President Ford quite a while back, and many pictures of him with President Obama. After seeing his house everyone stood around for a while talking, and finding out how impressive another individual was. His second in command was also there, along with someone from the CIA. I'm not exactly sure on that story, as I didn't talk to him too much. Refer to Dan's blog for further details on that one. A little while later dinner time finally arrived. There was all kinds of stereotypical Thanksgiving food, expertly prepared by the Ambassador's chefs. After two large platefuls of food, it was time for desert. There was pumpkin, pecan, and apple pie. I felt it was my duty to try a little bit of everything. My patriotism was matched, if not bested by the Ambassador. He would joke with a friend of his son's every time he would get up to get more food that he was lagging behind. After getting completely full, we resigned to the living room once more, when people started to slowly filter out. We ended up leaving around 8. We got back to the academy around 9:45 after a little walking and train-ride back to Neustadt. This concluded one of the best days ever.
     Friday was a very busy day. We had KA in the morning, where I froze my butt off running with Seth. After that was our military history class. The subject was post WWII Soviet occupation, and the different sectors of the different countries. After lunch we had our German course again. I decided I'd go to Linz and Freistadt with Ratzi this weekend. During lunch I got a text message from him saying, "I'll ask maj. Lampersberger if we're allowed to leave at 1400." I laughed because I didn't think this would be possible. However, around 1:30, he comes up to the classroom and asks the teacher if it would be ok for me to leave early in order to get a tour around Linz and Freistadt by one of his NCO friends, to which she replied yes. Hence the title, being saved by my guardian angel. The others weren't too happy about me leaving early. Sorry guys. When we left, I got to Linz where Stitz gave me a tour of the other part of the city. Ratzi and I left and got to Freistadt around 5, at which time he had tennis practice, while Stitz showed me around the city and gave me a great tour. He's very smart about all things history, and knows a lot about where he lives and Austria in general. Later we met up with Ratzi and went to a bar, where we met Julie, whose house we stayed at one night last weekend. One of her friends was also there. We weren't trying to stay out too late, so we ended up going back around 1 or so. The next day we went to Linz. We looked around the city a bit, and then went to the barracks again. After a funny little chat with Braz, we went to Tina's (Ratzi's sister) apartment. His other sister Teresa was also there. A little while later, some of their other friends came as well.

After a while we went out on the town again. We went to the RememBar and Rox, where Ratzi continued to show his myriad of skills in the art of womenry. At Rox I talked to Helene, one of the people that was at the apartment. The night drove on for a while until it was time to head back to the kaserne. The next day we woke up and headed back to Neustadt.

racing, chasing, neighing, and playing

     Last week was not very eventful at the military academy, save for the last few days.
     On Wednesday, Major Pulsinger (the riding instructor) asked us to wear our riding uniform to riding lessons. We weren't sure what he meant by this, so upon further inquiry, we found out that he meant the Dress Grey uniform that all West Point cadets have come to love and cherish. If you have ever seen anyone in this uniform, you could understand how uncomfortable it is. When we got to the lesson, we found out we were filming in order to send a video back to school detailing what we've done with him so far. To show us off and make us look good, we used stirrups for the first time, as well as riding outside. The stirrups made trotting so comfortable. While alternating standing and sitting between each trot you don't even feel discomfort in your most sacred place. We rode with three cadets from our year group, one of which was Rene Poschinger, who is also my roommate. The group was lead by Major Pulsinger, the three Austrian cadets, the four West Point cadets, and 3 Austrian students from the military high school. It ended up being a lot of fun, and we got some great footage too for our "propoganda" video. More to follow on the video. If it gets online then I'll post the link. If not, I'll post it when I find it.
     On Thursday in the evening, 40 cadets from our year group went go karting. In total we payed 980 Euros for 2 hours to rent the place. It was tons of fun. Turns out, all Austrians know how to drive VERY well. Do to a tragic miscommunication on my part, and some slow driving in general by the Americans, we ended up losing to the first place team by 7 laps, and 2 laps behind the second to last place team. Yes, Prestige Worldwide, as we were named, finished in dead last. To my dismay, our team name fell upon deaf ears, as almost none of the cadets had seen Stepbrothers, and those that had didn't get the joke... their loss. After the race, the gokarting place gave out trophies and medals to the top three teams, and there was a champagne shower at the end. Daniel Weicher and Max Koran were two members on the winning team. I forgot the other..sorry. below is a picture of the guys after karting.



After we got back, of course we had to go to the MakCasino to celebrate with a few drinks, which ended up turning into more than a few drinks. Would would've thought?
     On Friday we had a very normal day, concluded with the four hour german course in the afternoon, which I'm still not sure if I'm getting credit for back at West Point. Having class that long with only one break is torture that late in the day before a weekend.. Anyway, after class, Ratzi (an Austrian cadet from my year) left for Linz, the capital of upper Austria. He lives nearby in the city of Freistadt, so it was no trouble for him. When we got to Linz, we checked into the barracks we were staying at that night. This isn't technically allowed, but Ratzi pulled some strings and talked to a guy he knows that's in charge (shh, don't tell anyone). A little while later one of his friends came that is from Linz, and was also a cadet at the academy as a member of the second year by the name of Stitz. However, he had to leave the academy. I think he likes being an NCO better anyway... We started off the night with a few drinks, and then went out into the city. We went to a lot of great clubs, including one that had three completely different atmospheres. One was rock music, another pop, and the other, I don't know what the hell it was.. there was fog everywhere and I couldn't see much. After some time here, we went to the Rox in Linz. For those that don't know, there is also a Rox in Wiener Neustadt. I can now say I've been to every Rox in the world..all two of them. The night ended here for me and Stitz at around O' dark: thirty. Ratzi came back a little while after us, and took some very nice pictures of us sleeping...pretty creepy if you ask me. Anyway, here's a picture of Stitz, Ratzi and I at Rox:

      The next day when I woke up, Stitz had gone out and got breakfast. What an angel. Ratzi had some studying he needed to do for a test on Monday, so Stitz took me into the city to show me around. Linz has a ton of very cool history, much centered around the Second World War. Linz was slotted to be Hitler's city of residence after he conquered Europe, thus all of the industry in the city and pretty sites as well. Something rather interesting, but very morbid at the same time: The following picture was taken atop the mountain where Hitler supposedly decided to go into politics in order to "help" people.

     After tour through Linz, we went back to the barracks to find Ratzi asleep, not quite having accomplished his goal of studying. We woke him up and then went out to get some lunch. After lunch, Ratzi and I went to his house in Freistadt, agreeing to meet up with Stitz later. I met his dad and two sisters. His older sister is 25, and the younger 18. We took a picture, and for some reason they felt it necessary to put on the high heels they had just bought right before the picture. We were all pretty much the same height before the picture, but during...well, let's just say I had to stand on the step. Yes, I was reduced to step-standing for the picture. Nothing agaist them, they are just girls that love shoes I suppose. They were very sweet.
     Later on in the night, we and a few of Ratzi's lawyer and software engineer friends went to the American Chance Casino in the Tschek Republic (another country checked off the list). We stayed there for a few hours until some had won, and some had lost. Ratzi was the big winner of the night, winning 90 Euros on the Roulette table. I only lost 5 Euros on the night..not too shabby. Afterwards we went to a few bars in Freistadt. The first place we went to we ended up staying the longest at. The owner of the place won the lottery and wanted to open up his own place. He doesn't really care about making money, so drinks were dirt cheap. Here we met up with Stitz (who was having a great time at this point, if you know what I mean), and Ratzi's sister Teresa. Later on we went to another place that was really crowded, but Ratzi knew the owner, so all was well. When we were having a few drinks in the back, someone called someone gay, but either way, my tall Austrian friend's honor was at stake, so someone went flying into the bar, and it wasn't Ratzi. This got the fat guy's companions involved, but was quickly broken up. I think Teresa wanted to see another fight, as she antgonized the fat drunk one throughout the night, which was hilarious. On the way out of the bar, I discovered that someone had "mistakenly" taken my jacket, which I was rather fond of. Doing the only natural thing, also under the guidance of my Austrian companions mind you, I tried on another jacket until I found one of equal or better liking. An eye for an eye, and a jacket for a jacket is how the saying goes I believe.
     The next day after lunch, we went to Stitz's grandfather's house, where he gave us a presentation about his time in America serving in the Army. He served the Austrians in World War Two, but was later a sort of police officer in the American sector after the war. Somehow he got to go over to America and serve as a signal NCO, where he was a master sergeant, and eventually sergeant major. He spent his time in Fort Gordon in the years leading up to the Vietnam War. He showed us all sorts of pictures from around the area, which I was very familiar with, being from the Atlanta area myself. It was very interesting seeing everything during this time period, being told from the perspective of an Austrian. This concluded the weekend in Linz and Freistadt. Afterwards, Ratzi and I headed back to Neustadt to start another week.
     On Monday our teacher, Dr. Vazulik came from West Point to see how we were doing. We gave him a tour of the castle in German, by which he seemed very impressed. Obviously, we have all gotten much better and proficient at speaking during our time here thus far.
     Today we had a training exercise with the first year group, which is meant to improve land terrain reading skills. Basically, the task was to determine how to best utilize land against enemy troops. Securing and defending was the central theme. We were kind of thrown into this, skipping the classes that they had taken the previous week leading up to the exercise. It didn't really matter much though...In all we were out for about 9 hours in the cold looking at the terrain, which would have been quite pretty had I not been shivering. Luckily we don't have to do the rest of the training with them this week because the American Ambassador to Austria if coming tomorrow, where we will give him a tour of the castle (a common theme for visitors). On Thursday, we will eat Thanksgiving dinner at his house in Vienna. Until then my avid readers...

It's been almost a month? my bad...

     It's been quite a while since my last blog. sorry about that... I guess it's due to the fact that I've been pretty busy, or just a general lack of motivation to write down what I've been doing. Well, let's get cracking.
     I guess it was the last weekend in October that I did something since my last post. On the 29th we went to the Steiermark, the southern region in Austria known for its many vinyards and something called kernöl, which is basically pumpkin oil. It's quite tasty on salads and bread and whathaveyou. The first place we went to was a chocolate making plant, not unlike Wonka industries. We were able to see the entire process of making chocolate and could also taste the chocolate at all points of the production. It was pretty nasty until they added the sugar. They made all types of different chocolate, from 100% dark chocolate (bleh, no sugar or creme), to chili chocolate (also bleh). Pretty much all types in between were very tasty. At the end of the tour you could taste every kind that they made at the plant, which was upwards of 100. I didn't go very long before i started to feel sick...
After the House of Upset Stomachs..er, chocolate plant, we visited the vacation house of a colonel at the academy. He has a ton of land and makes his own wine, which may be the best I've had so far. We stood around in his cellar drinking wine and eating bread for a while. Not a bad life... After much drinking and merrymaking (which seems to be a common practice in Austria) we made our way to a local restaurant, where we had fried chicken and french fries, not quite a local dish, but good nonetheless. It was however, accompanied by salad with kernöl, which was again quite good. I'm bringing home a bottle to share the wonders with those interested. After all of this we went back to the MilAk.
     The next day (Saturday now), all of the cadets minus one went to Budapest (pronounced Buda-pesht, who knew?), the capital city of hungary. Dan's fiance Michelle (hope I spelled it right) came along as well, as she was staying in Austria for a few weeks to visit Dan. We took a free walking tour of the city, which ended up being a great experience. I'd recommend free tours to anyone, not obviously just because it's free, but the tour guides really have to know what they're talking about because they work for tips. So really it only ends up costing about $10, and you still get to see everything you would normally, plus the guides advice on local eateries and whatnot. Because Monday was a national holiday, we got to stay longer than we would on a normal weekend. Sadly, there weren't to many halloween parties to be found in the city. After the good long weekend we went back to the adademy to start another week of rigorous academics (or something like that...).
     Not much really happened the following week. A few history classes and riding, and then some meeting, but that was about it. During the weekend Seth and I went to Graz, the capital of the Steiermark, with an Austrian cadet named Bernd. We met him during our first week in Austria when he was showing us around Vienna. We went to his house for the weekend. I can't begin to describe how good the food was. I ate enough over the weekend to satisfy an impoverished nation for a month (sorry to those from impoverished nations reading this). He also had a sauna in his basement, which is definitely something I want when I buy a house. We did quite a few sessions in the sauna in the evening after dinner. You may be asking: "But Matt, don't you usually go out drinking in the evening on the weekends? And wouldn't the sauna make you dehydrated, thereby lowering your tolerance to alcohol?" Well, the answer would be yes on both accounts... Fortunately, we were able to prepare ourselves for the evening by having a couple beers in the sauna, a great idea, no? Am I proud of what I did? Well, yes.. you only live once right?

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     After a while we went out to the town for a while and met some of Bernd's friends, including a dance instructor at one of the nearby dance schools. I got to see him in action at one of the clubs we went to, and it was kind of funny to compare him dancing to the feeble attempts of myself and everyone else in the room. The next morning we slept in a bit and then had a very large brunch. After this we ended the weekend a bit early and came back to the academy. I was able to finally get a bit of work done. 

     This past week was pretty much the exact same as the last, Graz included, except this time we went with people from our year group, and more was paid for because we did cultural things as well (yes very surprising I know). One of the places we went to was an armory from the 16th-19th century. There were hundreds of thousands of pieces of armor and weapons encompassing 4 floors of a building. The tour was in German, but I found myself understand the majority of what he said, which is a testament to how much I've learned since I've been here. After doing the obligatory, but always fun, night of merrymaking, we woke up and had a very good breakfast in the city with one of the Austrian cadets. After a while we again went back to the academy.

     It's good to note here that over the past few weeks I earned the Austrian Sportabzeichen, which, for those familiar with the German proficiency badge, is quite tough to get. To get this, one must do a series of track and field events, along with swimming and running a 5k. The list to get the best one is: shotput 8 meters (which was hard for me), swim 300 meters in 8 minutes (too easy, did it in 4:40), run a 5k in 24 minutes (again, too easy, 20:55), sprint a 100 in 13.2 seconds or 400 in 65 (tough, did the 400 in 62 seconds), and high jump 1,4 meters (I knicked the bar as I jumped over, but it somehow stayed up). The paperwork has to go to Vienna to get approved, but I should have the award soon.

Living the life

     Two Fridays ago, the group along with Major Lampersberger and a „willing“ recruit went to Melk, and the surrounding area of Wachau. Wachau is regarded as one of the prettiest areas in Austria. The Donau River runs through Melk to Kremz. The area in between is the Wachau region. We started off by visiting the giant Stift Melk. A stift is basically the German word for a church where there is also businesses, and sometimes a school. It was built during the baroque time period and has some very neat architecture. The library inside is extremely old and has a lot of historical books. The Roman Catholic Church also inside the stift was unbelievable. Before we went inside, the guide said it is probably the prettiest church ever built. Needless to say, it lived up to its expectations.

     After this we went to the local military post that hosts the 3^rd Engineer battalion. We got a short intro as to what they do there, and then we took the motor boats out on the river. They did all sorts of formations, and towards the end I got to drive and attempt to stay in the similar formations. After this we ate lunch and then went to a very old castle, which was very cool. The guy who built it was a robber that stole from people in the surrounding region to fund the castle. He had a balcony high up where he kept his prisoners called the rose garden. The prisoners could either starve to death, or jump to their death. There weren’t big leaves down beneath, so you couldn’t do any crazy avatar stuff or anything like that. After this we went out to eat at a place called a Heuriger. They basically make their own wine and are only opened when they have wine left. We learned all of the steps to wine making. They aren’t allowed to sell most other types of alcohol, and for the most part can only sell food that they make. For example, our meal consisted of a few bottles of wine, a platter of fresh cold cuts, cheese, and fresh baked bread. After much merry-making we headed back to Neustadt.

     The following week was pretty standard: riding, dancing, and a few classes mixed in. I had more riding lessons than actual class lessons. On Friday we had another excursion, this time to another monastery type place.  This place was more for commercial wine, and there was lots of it. We got a grand tour of the winery below the stift. Additionally, we saw an eagle show at a nearby castle, which was very cool. They trained the birds so they would fly directly over your head. There were golden eagles and also a bald eagle. In German, the bald eagle’s name is Weißkopfseeadler, which translates to white head sea eagle. I came within about two inches of it as it was flying over.

     During the weekend I went to Innsbruck in western Austria. We basically went around and saw all of the cultural stuff there was to see. We also took a tram up one of the higher mountains around Innsbruck, which was about 2400 meters. We had to walk up the last 100 meters in order to get to the very top. There was a good bit of snow and ice at the top, where it was also -10 degrees Celsius. One of the cadets from the MilAk showed us around because he’s from Innsbruck, so we didn’t have a chance to get lost. We also ate a lot of the local food, which was incredible. Innsbruck is quite famous for their pork products, and rightfully so. I could barely move after the lunch we had it was so good.

     Monday we had another dance course, where we learned more dances that I’ll never use in my life. One of them was a crazy foot crossing waltz type thing. If anyone out there reading has ever done this dance at any time, please feel free to tell me I’m wrong. It’s a good experience though in the long run, further “culturing” myself. Today (Tuesday the 26^th) was a national holiday similar to our fourth of july. That basically means that people have an excuse to go out the night before and party, and then use today as a recovery day. Austrians always find something to celebrate. Our Commandant from West Point is coming tomorrow, along with several other officers. We have to show them around and basically give a tour. Luckily the general doesn’t speak German, so I can give my presentation in English. This weekend after another excursion with the major, myself and the other west point guys are trying to go to Budapest. We’ll see how that goes.