Moments of doubt

I'm trying to stay positive, but it's a challenge sometimes.

It's a challenge mainly because the reason I moved to this country has been a big disappointment.

There, I've said it.

For the first time I can think of, I've moved away a place where I'd rather stay, and that was Copenhagen. I came to Vienna with the mission of studying, learning, absorbing knowledge and becoming specialised in my field. I was hoping it would also be a nice city to live in, that I would have a good time and make some new friends. But that wasn't my motivation to go here.

Vienna is great. I've had some fun, met some nice people. But I'm very disappointed with my studies. I can't blame it on the university of course, it's my responsibility to choose the education that I want. The sad thing is I expected more from this experience than I get. The big majority of my classes I find utterly boring and irrelevant to what I want to do with my life. I thought I'd be challenged, but I'm learning much less than my potential and my motivation to study is really really low.

I guess I just didn't expect that a course called "Water resources planning and management" would discuss Pythagoras' theorem, or how to calculate the mean value. Or that my different courses would re-use the same pictures, and the same information. And then I find it frustrating when you have to sit on the floor for lectures because the room isn't big enough, or there's 70 people in a room for 50 competing for oxygen. Or when your mandatory courses are taught at the same time at different campuses. Or when you have to fill out form, after form, after form with the same administrative data.

There are surely bigger problems in the world. And as I've said, I try to focus on the positive (...like recycling bins in the hallways). But when it's gray outside all the time and I miss someone's arms around me, I ask myself why I relocated my life again. I keep wondering if I'm on the right path (and it's the first time I've seriously doubted). Because at the moment, I feel like I'm at the wrong place at the wrong time.

To be constantly lost

Liebes Österreich,
(apparently this country isn't feminine and thus needs an 's')

Just got home from some errands (book craving) and had the magic realisation that I haven't used Google maps at all this week. Admittedly, I've spent most of the time at home since I've had a sore throat, and it's only been 4½ days, but it felt like a small victory anyway. To be constantly lost, maybe that's one way to describe how it feels to move to a new city (country). In translation, in direction, in life. And the beauty lies in the perspective that you can't find something that's not lost.

When I sat down I was going to write about last weekend, which I've been postponing. I went to Warsaw, to attend ELLS student conference (European League of Life Sciences) and present my bachelor thesis. Now, the main reason to go was not really the conference, it was to meet up with my peers from last year in Copenhagen, because some of them went on to do their second year at other universities. After a lot of struggle for some of them (missing a flight, then flying to the wrong city and renting a car to get to Warsaw), we had a great time together!

The conference exceeded my expectations - I listened to an abundance of interesting presentations, and I was very satisfied with my own presentation as well. There was also an abundance of vodka and some Polish night life to lift our spirits after a lot of nitrogen and sludge and dying animals ;) As I have been in Warsaw before (with my beloved grandma a year ago to celebrate her 75th birthday) I had already seen the most sights, otherwise the time would not have been sufficient. But I got my dumplings and vodka all right!

Unfortunately the weekend had a very annoying end for me, as the Austrian railway company had written the wrong departure time on my ticket so I missed my train. I had to wait 8 hours for the next train, which was the night train... Which was very stressful, but I ended up re-visiting the national art museum (kinda boring art to be honest but at least good wifi) and then got on the same train as my friend Nathalie, and we even made some new friends that night! But as I got home at 7am instead of 9pm, I was way too tired to attend any of my morning classes (they were taught at the same time...) and came down with a sore throat, which has prevented me from running! Will catch up on that next week hopefully, but I've decided to be extremely careful so I would be fine this weekend, as I get a visit that I've been longing for...

Fish and friendships

Dear Austria, Happy National Day!

In 1955 on the 26th of October, the Austrian Parliament signed the declaration of neutrality and declared the country permanently neutral. In celebration of this, I went with a new friend to the parliament building for a tour and ended up shaking hands with some (random) politicians, one of them was from Tyrole and told me had studied Swedish for ski instructors. Wow, what do you even reply to that?

This room is actually not used as it was built for the monarchs... But it's much nicer than the one in use!

This Friday, I went with a group called Young Water Professionals on an excursion to learn about small hydropower plants. We went all the way to Ybbs and Lunz am See in Lower Austria on a very cold day, and looked at technologies for fish passages (Fischaufstiegshilfen) at hydropower plants. We met this really cool old man who has invented a kind of spiral waterpower tube that can transport fish both up and down inside the hydropower plant! Because the normal passages are kind of stairs so the fish can jump up the stream next to the power plant, but it doesn't actually let the fish come down again... At Lunz there is ongoing investigation on how different elements in the environment are affected by surge and sunk - when the water sinks away for example after heavy rain, some stupid fish may get trapped in puddles and die. Sad. I didn't really get this part, because all was in German, but the people were kind enough to give me summaries in English afterwards.

Fish Feeding and the surge and sink constructed study area

After returning from that long day, my fantastic flatmate brought me to a fantastic house party - there was even chocolate fondue! And boardgames! And a pool table! And so much alcohol! haha!

So a quite eventful week actually, and I've made a few new friends! My companion at the parliament I met at a football table game (which we won), and I've met a lovely American girl who seemed to be like an overseas version of me - I imagine I would have been something like her if I'd been born there. Except the marathon  running maybe. And today I had a pancake brunch with a language tandem partner who's gonna help me a bit with German (but mostly we were talking about other stuff...). And I've had dinner and coffee with some French girls! And talked a bit more with some of my classmates, as we hung out after class and met up yesterday for cake and wine at someone's house.

I of course knew all of this would happen, as I am a person who inevitably makes friends, but the first weeks before it kind of takes off is really dull. I was also expecting to be more busy at university and spend more time there and meeting people there than I have been so far. Seriously, I've read four novels since I got here! And about halfway through my fifth. Which is not a bad timekill at all, don't get me wrong, but it's definitely not the most social one. In hindsight I think the good thing about it is it allows the brain to rest, when otherwise it's working hard to adapt to everything new around me. Some days I've even declined social activities because I've been tired from things that usually doesn't affect me at all, but it takes more energy when I'm in a new place and acknowledging that and allowing for more rest than normally I think will benefit me and my overboiling brain in the long run.

There is so much more I feel like writing about, but I'll save it for later. Probably I can put up some more pics from the excursion soon!