More questions and even more answers

I received several more questions in my inbox after the last post. Really, I'm not making this up. So here goes.

Is it everything you thought it would be? Did you expect something to be different than it actually is -- either with everyday tasks or the mission strategy that was planned?

Honestly, I can't remember what I expected as far as everyday tasks. But I don't think I've been shocked by anything.


As far as the mission strategy, one thing we've learned since being over here is that it's not normal for Austrians to invite people into their homes. Generally, an Austrian will prefer to invite you out somewhere -- a cafe or restaurant -- rather into their home for a meal. This is what we've read and have been told, but of course, we haven't been here long enough to experience it yet. (We have been here long enough to notice that some of the things we have read and been told do not seem to hold true, so I'm curious whether this social habit will fall into that category.) How, and whether, this will affect our plans for small groups is yet to be seen.



Have you had many opportunities to meet people or has the language barrier been a big hindrance?

Meeting people will probably be one of the hardest things for me and Brian since either of us are extroverts. We plan on joining an organization or finding some kind of activity in the neighborhood that will allow us to meet people with similar interests. Of course, this will be easier once we speak German. For now, I plan on using English to my advantage. Once I learn a little German I will find a language partner or two who wants to practice English and with whom I can practice German.



Is being over there (on the mission field) scarier than you thought it would be? Do you think being able to speak the language will change that?

Our arrival in Vienna is somewhat of a blur. It took a while for everyone to get their luggage. Then we went through customs (which was basically just getting our passports stamped -- no questions or anything). Then Brian and I found the driver who would take us to the apartment we were staying at for a few weeks and we left. None of that was scary and it was all a little exciting. But then as the we were on the way to the apartment, I distinctly remember thinking, "Oh no, we live here now." It was just a fleeting little moment of terror -- we had no home, no country and we knew hardly anyone. It only lasted about two seconds and I haven't worried about it since. (Of course, having a home now really helps.)


One of the scariest things is figuring out how to talk to people. I mean, that's what we're here for, right? But we can't just go up to people on the bus and tell them they should be going to church. Unless you're six. Because Carli did exactly that and she didn't seem to have any qualms. Sometimes I wish I had fewer inhibitions. I think learning the language will help some with that, but the biggest help will be meeting people and starting relationships. I think it will get easier over time and with practice.


And finally, the most important question: Can you watch The Office?

I was surprised to find that there are a lot of TV shows from the U.S. aired in Vienna. I've seen signs for House. And one of the electronics stores Brian and I checked out was playing Scrubs in the TV section. And I think I saw "Without a Trace" and one (or more) of the CSI shows when I was flipping channels one day in our temporary apartment. But The Office doesn't air over here. And the shows that do air are dubbed in German. Plus, we don't have a TV. Fortunately, none of that matters with The Office because we're planning on buying it on iTunes. :)

A day in the life

Woke up, fell out of bed,
Dragged a comb across my head
Found my way downstairs and drank a cup,
And looking up I noticed I was late.
Found my coat and grabbed my hat
Made the bus in seconds flat...



Oh wait, that's not a day in my life. Sometimes I confuse myself with a young Paul McCartney.


Well, this is the last of the questions that I've received. I thought there might be more. But I guess you're really not that interested. Or maybe you think I just do better when I come up with stuff on my own. I seem to get more comments that way. But I digress. Here it is: "Describe a typical day." I know, it's not really in question form. But let's not judge.


Right now, there really is no such thing as a typical day. Once school starts, I imagine I will have typical days. But, I may not have so much time to post once I'm in school. So for now, I'll just tell you about some of the things I do -- although usually not all in the same day.

Grocery shopping
I've already mentioned some things about grocery shopping in previous blogs, so I won't go into detail. The actual shopping part is pretty much the same as in the U.S., but of course everything is in German. The hard part comes when you are finished shopping. Paying can be a bit intimidating. You place everything on a conveyor belt like in most stores in the U.S., but after the cashier rings up your items you have to place them back into your basket and then bag them yourself (with the bags you remembered to bring from home). It's like a race. Have you been through airport security recently? Did you feel rushed? Quick -- take off your shoes. And your belt. Empty your pockets. Take the laptop out of the case. Hurry, hurry, hurry. People are waiting. That's what I feel like every time I check out at the grocery store.

Another thing about grocery stores is the hours. They're open from some time in the morning (not sure when, but early enough) to 6:00 p.m. or maybe 7:00. They usually stay open a little later on Thursday and close a little earlier on Saturday and are closed all day on Sunday and holidays. We're lucky enough to have a 24 hour gas station nearby in the event that we need something really important -- like Diet Coke -- when the grocery store is closed.

Other shopping
Everything I wrote above applies to shopping for other things as well. We have to carry it home. Paying for things can be intimidating and stressful. Stores close early. The biggest problem with buying things is having to carry it all home. Fortunately (for me), Brian does most of the carrying.


Going into town
Brian and I head towards the inner city (i.e., the touristy side of town) at least once a week. This involves walking to a nearby u-bahn station (u-bahn = subway), then taking 20 minute trip to the city center. We may go to look around, shop or to get a bite to eat (usually pizza from Pizza Bizzi). I call it the touristy side of town, but there are a lot of locals there as well. A lot of our trips are for specific reasons -- to go to a store in search for a hard-to-find item, visit the doctor, go to church, etc. (We often stop in the inner city on our way home from church because it's the only part of town that has stuff open on Sunday because it's considered a tourist area.)


Going to church
We've visited all three of the churches of Christ in Vienna. The first one we visited is located in the far south part of the town. Getting there requires about a 25 minute u-bahn ride, 15 minute bus ride, and walking for 15 or 20 minutes. The second one we visited is more centrally-located. It takes about a 20 minute u-bahn ride, switch to a different u-bahn line for another short ride, then a short walk. The third congregation is an English-speaking group that meets at the same location as the second congregation. The u-bahn station is about a 10-minute walk from our apartment, so the first congregation takes us about 1 hour and 15 minutes to get there and the second and third congregations takes us about 40 minutes to get there.


Church services are pretty similar to what we're familiar with from the U.S. -- except of course, they're in German. Unless you're with the English-speaking congregation. :) The three congregations probably have less than 50 members between them.

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Of course, my day is also filled with household chores like laundry, cooking, and cleaning -- most of which I've written about in previous posts. We don't have a television, so my free time is filled with reading and spending time on the computer -- mostly the latter. Starting next week, my free time will probably be spent studying German.

For Sharkdog, this is how he spends most of his day.... sleeping.

Wish list

9.13.07 - Important update: If we're not home, the mail carrier should leave a notice for us to pick up a package at the post office. But with our first three boxes, there was no notice! So, if you send us something please let us know. If you want it to be a surprise, you can wait up to two weeks -- that should be plenty of time for it to arrive. (We haven't had a problem with this since those first few packages.)

I was going to write this yesterday to follow the "what's not in Austria" post, but the deliveries of my niece and our stuff from the U.S. thwarted that plan. If you recall the previous post, you may be wondering whether there's anything you can send us. Or maybe I'm the only one thinking that. In any event, there's always something we can't get in Austria, so here are some things we would really enjoy from the U.S.

Don't feel any pressure to pop something in the mail today. I'm going to place a link to this post on the sidebar so you can refer to it when birthdays or Christmas roll around. This is mainly directed to those who generally buy us presents for such occasion. I'm not suddenly expecting a birthday gift from everyone just because I live overseas. :) Although... never mind.

I've separated the list into "one time" wants and "anytime" wants. If we receive something, I'll update the list. So whether you're going to be making a trip to Vienna and want to pack a little extra or you want to send something our way via post, here are some suggestions.

One-time Wants:
Any of the Nooma videos (You can buy these at Christian bookstores or online at http://www.nooma.com/) -- Except "Rain" (001), "Flame" (002), "You" (015), and "Today" (017)


Anytime Wants (i.e., foodstuff):

peanut butter -- creamy or crunchy (our favorite is the Great Value brand from Wal-Mart and Peter Pan, but anything works)

cream gravy mix with sausage (the kind you would make for biscuits and gravy)

dark corn syrup (like Karo)

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P.S., I don't know why, but I don't like the idea of just posting our address out here. So if you don't have our address, you'll have to ask. There is a link to email me on my profile.

P.P.S., If you're going to send us one of the DVDs for a birthday or Christmas present, please let me know before you buy it or at least before you send it so hopefully we don't get duplicates. I know it ruins the element of surprise, but I can deal with that. If you're going to send a DVD some other time of year, feel free to keep a surprise. I don't expect DVDs to show up randomly all that often. Don't worry about this. If we get duplicates, we know other people who would be happy to take the extras off our hands.

Q & A - Take 2

Here's some more questions that I received:

What kind of things are not available in Austria?

What kind of things can you get in Austria that you can't find in the U.S.?


There are a lot of things that I haven't been able to find in Austria yet. Maybe they're here, I just haven't found them. Most of the missionaries I know in Europe have a list of U.S. goods that they stock up on when they return to the U.S. or when someone from the U.S. visits them. I've found a really helpful blog from a woman living in Germany who lists product substitutes and where to find those hard-to-find items. There's also a British import store in the city that carries some foodstuff from the U.S. in the event that I really need something. But it's expensive, so I'm going to try to avoid buying there, if possible. Some of the things that I haven't found here (or are quite different than what you get in the U.S.) are brown sugar (no soft brown sugar), vanilla extract, breakfast sausage, deodorant (not that they don't have it here, it's just not the same), peanut butter, and cream of chicken soup. I'm sure there's more, but this is what comes to mind.


I haven't really found anything in Austria that I couldn't believe I was able to live without in the U.S. There are at least two things that are available in abundance in Austria that I never paid much attention to in the U.S. Ice cream and chocolate. Two things that I really need, right? If you go to the inner city, you can't take two steps without seeing someone eating ice cream. And I know they're not all tourists. The "eis salons" are always packed. And the chocolate aisle at the grocery store! It's unbelievable. Swiss, Belgium, German -- they've got chocolate from all over the continent.

And in some stores, yes, even chocolate from the U.S.

Q & A - Take 1

Wow! I can't believe the flood of email that I've received with such insightful questions. Well, maybe flood is not the right word. Maybe light shower is more appropriate. Or fine mist. Maybe just a fog. But in any event, there are questions in my inbox. (And even if there weren't and I'm making this all up, you could never prove anything!)

First, to address Sharkdog -- You know why you have to wear the collar when we leave. Someone told us that the neighbors would call the police if there was a lot of dog barking. And that someone is one of our neighbors! So really, it's for your own protection.

And now, I think the next question can best be summed up with this clip:



So, what is it that we're doing here? Before I answer, I think it's important to point out that what we're doing here is a new work, not a work-in-progress. I didn't fully realize this distinction until I landed in Vienna. My previous experience with missions was with a work that had been started years earlier and I had a specific task for a specific duration. When we landed in Vienna and no one was there to pick us up, I quickly realized that this experience was going to be quite different.

What does it mean that we're not joining a work-in-progress? I guess it means that what we're doing now won't look like what you're used to. We don't meet together each Sunday. (Right now, we are meeting with the existing congregations and trying to form relationships with the Christians there.) We don't hold gospel meetings or seminars. We don't even have small group or one-on-one studies. That's not to say that we're not going to do these things (or that we are going to do all of them), just that we're not there yet.

Now that I've told you what we're not doing, you're probably wondering what we are doing. The short answer is "settling".

Of course, there's also a long answer. One of our main objectives right now is to figure out how to do things right -- how (and when) to shop, how to wash our clothes, how to use public transportation, and so on. We even have to learn how to take out the trash properly! Also, there are a lot of legal requirements we must fulfill in order to stay in Austria. We're in this for the long haul, so we want to make sure we start off right.

Next month, Brian and I will start language school and start the long road to learning German. Not only do we feel like it's important to be able to speak German in order to reach people on a personal level, the government feels it is important in order for us to live here. When we get our visas, we must sign an agreement that we will study German (language) and Austrian culture and will eventually be tested on these subjects. For at least the next six months, we will spend about four hours a day, five days a week at the university.

I know this is already long, but there is a related question that I would like to tack on.

One question that was asked is whether we are working with the existing congregations and programs that they have established. My answer is, "not right now." During our first two weeks in Vienna we were offered the opportunity to lead Bible studies for African refugees and to teach classes at a private university loosely associated with the churches of Christ. Both of these are good opportunities, but at this time we want to focus on learning German and finding our place in our community. That's not to say that we don't plan on participating in existing programs, just that we want to be careful not to accept a leadership role that will later prevent us from doing the work that we've set out to do.

Keep the questions coming. I promise all of my answers will not be this long.