The street car epic

What a day! Where to start?

I was pretty stressed yesterday morning. The first day of classes, the classes were looking to be harder than I’d expected. I was feeling over my head. I wanted to come home. I was scared.

I had my first German class yesterday. The teacher was boring. She had this stupid dialogue. That pretty much consisted of “Guten Tag ich heiser Hannah. Wie heisen see?” Then she had everyone in the class do it. A lot of times. It went on an on. I don’t really want to take German, but I think once I start to be able to use it I’ll like it a lot more.

After German I needed to go study for my AP test. So I went to this two story starbucks to study. And guess what? A soy no water chai tea latte tastes the same in Vienna as in Sandy, Utah. I spent about four and a half hours studying there. I think I’m ready for this test. And I felt a lot better. I want to stay. Once I had something that was a little familiar, I felt good.

There were some Austrian teenagers and their math tutor sitting next to me. For some reason, they spoke in English. They could not understand how to foil out (x +y)(x-y)I felt vastly superior. I can take the limit as x approaches infinity of that (new skill I learned before I left). I like feeling smarter than people and I like math. I don’t care what that makes me; it’s true. A part of me even misses math class. Math is one of those things that is familiar and always the same, like a soy no water chai tea latte.

At 19:30, I decided I should go home. The sun was getting ready to set and I did not want to be going home alone in the dark (even though during orientation Frau Weissburger said, “Vienna is a safe city. If you are walking home alone at 10:00 at night you don’t need to worry”). But as soon as I got outside I was in such a good mood and so happy to be there I went out walking a little bit. The city is so beautiful. I know it’s strange, but that was the moment I decided I wanted to stay. Walking around discovering this one street in Vienna. I want to do that every day.

At 8:15, the sky was the after-the-sun-has-set-but-before-it’s-dark blue. So I decided to start heading home. I got on the “D” streetcar. When in 5 stops, my stop hadn’t come I looked up at the map and realized I was on the streetcar going the wrong way. So I decided rather than get off in some random place, I would take the car all the way around the circle. I knew it would take longer than I wanted, but I thought that was the best bet.

So when we crossed the Danube, I stayed on. And when everyone got off at one stop, I stayed on, reasoning that they were just not riding it all the way around like me. And when the streetcar stopped and the conductor got out, I reasoned that it was just like the train at the Hilton in Hawaii and they were switching conductors. After 5 minutes the train didn’t start, so I decided I would just get out and figure something out. So I pushed the door open button. Nothing happened. I pushed it again. Still nothing. I was locked in the streetcarI had been really calm until this point, but then I started crying. Then I started laughing. I laugh when things go wrong. When things go wrong if you look on it from an outside perspective, it’s funny. A teenage American who speaks no German being stuck in a streetcar in Vienna because she was too dumb to get off is funny.

I didn’t want to use the emergency exit buttons because Markus said that some students have accidently used them in the past and they are really expensive. I wanted to buy shoes, not new emergency doors on public transportation.

I saw a guy in his 20s walking his dog passing me. I pounded on the window and after 35 seconds, he noticed me. He started laughing, and I laughed with him. It was funny. He got the conductor who turned the streetcar back on. I pushed the button and the door opened.

“Danke” I shouted, rather high pitched, to my knight in shining armor. He shouted something back, but I couldn’t understand it. At this point it was dark enough the street lights were helping me to see, but I could still see fine. I decided I needed to find my way home.

There were 2 old men with potbellies sitting on a bench. I walked up to them and in a moment of inspiration using German I didn’t know I knew said, “Sprecken Sie English?” They laughed, probably having just seen my rescue from the streetcar, and said “Nein. Deutsch”. In my arrogant American way, I had expected them to speak English. I speak English. Why shouldn’t they?

I walked away, looking for some way to get off. I had no idea where I was other than on the wrong side of the Danube. I looked at the various public transportation signs, but none of them were the streetcars I knew nor the U-ban. They were all buses going to places I didn’t want to.

I crossed the street and saw a taxi coming. I did what I’d seen done in movies and raised my hand above my head. He stopped! I hailed my very first taxi. As he stopped, I thought It’s a Volkswagen. I want a Mercedes. Then I realized the absurd snobbyness of that and got in the taxi. It smelled like cigarettes, but I needed to go home. I told him my address; very glad I’d memorized it accidently. He said it would cost 20 Euros to get home. I would have given him everything in my wallet to get home.

He started to drive, and soon I saw that I was in the 16^th district. I was relieved to be getting close to home. After about 10 minutes, I realized that on the street we were driving on, every sign had the word sex in one form of another in it. I started laughing again, hoping things wouldn’t go badly.

It didn’t go badly. I got home. My cab driver asked for 16 Euros. I was so glad to be home I gave him 20. Looking back that probably wasn’t necessary. But I was ready to go inside and I didn’t want to wait for change.

I strangely feel like a thousand times more comfortable in Vienna now. It’s weird. I should be terrified of getting stuck in a street car again. But I’m not. I guess I feel like I can get myself out of anything. I can do this. I would try most anything now. My fear of Vienna is gone.

When I got inside, I decided to take my first shower. Water and electricity are very expensive here. And my water is heated with electricity. So I have to take short showers. I turned the water on and got my hair wet. Turned it off. Put shampoo in my hair. Turned it on. Washed out the shampoo. Turned it off. Put conditioner in. Shaved. Turned the water back on. Rinsed out the conditioner. Turned the water off. I probably only used 2 minutes of hot water. I felt pretty good about that.

Have I mentioned that my bathroom door is made of glass? It is a regular door but the middle ¾ in glass. It is that slightly opaque glass, so it isn’t see-through, but you can see some. I don’t like having a glass bathroom door.

I studied a little bit more, and was studying when my housemates came home. They gave me a note:

“Hannah,

We just wanted to write you a note to say good luck with your AP European History test tomorrow. We are glad you are here with us in Vienna. You are a very smart and confident girl, and like we have all told you at some point: you don’t seem fifteen at all. You are so impressive that you have the guts to come on a trip wit a bunch of college kids, and take college classes. We don’ t doubt that you will do well on your exam and be able to enjoy the rest of the summer with us. Viel gluck! Wir lieben dich!

The group had signed it.

Can I just say that this makes me feel so much better? I think I do get the little sister role. I think I’m okay with that. I am so happy to be here. This is going to be such a good summer. I can feel it.