I finally took a German language class.

My friend asked me why was I taking a language course now that I've, already been in Vienna for a year and a half. My version and Greg's version differs a little but since my memory is so faulty, Greg's probably the more accurate. Anyhow the upshot of it all is that we couldn't both attend a language course due to finances and since Greg had been unable to do a course for the last 4 months, we decided it was my turn.

The people on my course were all very nice. Since I was pretty much the only person not working or studying, I had the most time to study. Plus of course, having learnt German already helps.

One of the guys on my course is a ballet dancer, hence the first photo. The other guys were just helping him out with his class presentation. Marat brought vodka for our farewell class. I was surprised how nice it tasted. Maybe because it was genuine Russian, or because I had already had a glass of milk to go with my cookie, or maybe even because I justed didn't have much. Whatever, I liked it.

The course did provide me with a new lot of new vocab and context which you just don't get from a dictionary. Plus, it's given me a little more confidence to speak German but not when everyone is so excited to hear me speak German they all stop and look at me.

Having seen how much homework I had, has put Greg off attending the next course.

Scenery on the way home.

Yes I know, the pics don't miss the title, but the train was moving too fast for us to take any good pics. On the way to Venice we didn't get to see much because it was night time. But the view was so picturesque, lovely and simply amazing. The only route through to Italy is through the mountains. So we still often only got tantalising glimpses of magnificence before would be travelling through a tunnel.

We finally got our pic, in the last stop in Italy. The conductor very kindly blew his whistle to let us know the train was about to leave. It gave us a bit of a fright actually. Haha.

As always the food, and the beer on the Dinner Wagon was very nice. Plus we had the bonus of a funny waiter, waiting on us. When he found out that we could speak German, he was very annoyed with us for making him speak English.

Last day in Venice

First on the agenda was to find the train station on the island. Then the fun began. None of the arrivals/departure boards were in operation, nor were any of the monitors on the platforms. Then I remembered that we were warned to check if the trains were striking before we left. Hmmmm. But the strike theory didn't quite gel with how many people were pouring out of the train station.

End the end we decided to trust to providence and come back later when our train was due. And it was. Yay.
On surveying the crowds... no hoardes of people before us, we quickly decided to nip down a side alley. Blessed emptiness. Only 3 streets from the train station. It was almost weird. Then it was funny that everyone would just stick to one little area because that's where everyone else was going.

It was very hot and we found a nice little restaurant on the canal where only the locals ate. How anyone manages to stay skinny there is a mystery to us. So we can safely say that a lovely time was had by all.

We were so pleased to find a chocolate shop like our one in Bratislava. We ended up sitting next to a kiwi from Blenheim. So it was nice to chat to her for a bit and catch up on what's happening in NZ. Then we had fun trying to explain to the waitress that the extra money was for a tip.

As we continued our meander, we were very pleased to come across a Traghetto. Jordy wanted to take a photo as we were crossing, especially since we all decided to do it as the Italians do, and cross standing up. But we thought that we wouldn't borrow trouble and play it it safe, so don't expect to see us in this photo. Jordy still wanted one though because this was "our" Traghetto.

Greg gets a bit fed up with us always wanting to take photos when we should be eating, but we so wanted one that he let us. I really wanted one of us together. So here we are pre pizza. It was very fancy, and we didn't know what was going on. they brought a table just to set the wine on whilst they uncorked it, then did the whole wine tasting thing and presented the cork to us on a little silver tray.

Twice Jordy tried to make the trip a little more exciting but you'll have to ask her for the details. I've decided that at the end of the day, Greg should give up asking me what I want to do next as the last few times my suggestions have almost caused us to miss our train or bus(the last one for the day/night).