When will you realize, Vienna waits for you?

5:15 P.M. (Vienna time)

I made it!!!
I think I spoke too soon about how smooth the first leg of my journey was -- the flight from London to Vienna was delayed about an hour. Nevertheless, Michele, Kellen and a homemade Austrian "Willkommen Alycia" flag awaited me at the airport.

First we went to my new home at "Molkereistrasse". I am living in one of the off-campus residence-type buildings, which is typically where students, and especially exchange students, studying in Vienna live. From what I've heard so far, it's actually one of the nicer "Studentenheim's". I just found out today that it's a "Passive" house, which basically means it was designed to be very energy efficient. Interestingly enough, despite claiming to be so "energy efficient" and therefore "green", they don't recycle here! I'm sure anyone who has been to Europe would be pretty shocked by this.
My "flat" is on the fifth floor. I share a kitchen and bathroom with a roommate, but I have my own bedroom (with it's own key). I was pleasantly surprised by the size of the place, as well as the abundance of storage space. The flat is also pretty much fully accessorized with cooking utensils, bed sheets, and even my own TV with cable! I've only just started to unpack today, and I am hoping to go shopping for some posters and decorations within the next couple of days.

After dropping off my bags in my room, Michele and Kellen took me to the shopping district so I could pick up a few things (towels, blowdryer, alarm clock, etc.) Go figure the first place I go to in Vienna is the shopping district ;)! The public transportation system (subways, trams/streetcars and buses) seems to be absolutely flawless, and I don't think we ever waited more than 3 or 4 minutes for the next one to come. (That being said, it's also rather complicated, and I'm sure I'll be getting lost quite a bit over the next few weeks.) Despite such an intricate transportation system, I still feel like I've never done soo much walking, and I'll definitely have to invest in some warm winter gear to get me through these next couple months. (Who'd have thought a CANADIAN girl would be saying this, ehh?)
I don't think I fully comprehended how big, beautiful and bustling of a city I was moving to, and it finally hit me as we marched through the cold (!), winding streets that I am living in an international city, and in the capital of all of Austria. (I should look up the population, I really have no idea! Although I did find out that Vienna is not only a city, but also it's own province/state.) It turns out that Austrian students are still on in-between semester holidays until the beginning of March, so it looks like I'll have lots of time for navigating around and exploring before classes kick-off.

My first night was (to be completely honest) pretty emotional. My roommate had not yet arrived, I was without internet, and it turns out my phone can only receive incoming calls (unless you have a phone card), so I definitely felt pretty lonesome. In Germany I was lucky enough to always have my host families around, so I don’t think I’ve ever really experienced that type of homesickness. I went to bed around 10 P.M. and should've been absolutely exhausted considering I only slept a couple of hours on the plane, but I woke up (without an alarm!) at 8:30 this morning, ready to go with Michele to do all of the "administrative" requirements for my exchange (getting my student card and library sticker, getting my student public transportation pass, buying a cell phone, registering with the city of Vienna).
*Funny story*: When I was registering myself in the city, the ladies that worked in the office had half-naked posters of various men (David Beckham, etc.) posted around their desks. I thought this was fairly hilarious considering this was a government-type building.

Today I also finally met my room mate. Her name is Stephanie, and she is an exchange student from (the German-speaking part of) Switzerland. Turns out we are the same age, and so far we’ve hit it off really well. She is a student at the Marketing & Economics school. (There are several Universities in Vienna, the biggest one of course being the University of Vienna.) She has already been here for two weeks, and is part of Erasmus (a European Union student network of exchange students), so she has already met a lot of other exchange students, including some living in our building. I’m hoping to meet all of them soon as well!

I conquered the grocery store for the first time today, which was quite an experience, as I just ate whatever my host families bought/made while I lived in Germany. I bought some of the items/brands which I knew from Germany or Canada, and thank goodness I understand German, so I could read the labels on the other things I was buying. I’m hoping that my roommate likes to cook as well, and maybe I’ll be able to learn some traditional Swiss dishes!

I’m off to a “card night” with a few of the exchange students..
More to come soon!
-Alycia