Austria Bound!

It's official: I will be going to Austria next year!

Back in January, I applied to the Austrian American Education Commission's Program, USTA Austria to be an English Teaching Assistant. This program was to last one school year, from mid-September until the end of May. I waited, waited, and waited I finally got some news in early April:

I was designated an alternate.

I was pretty disappointed and in a state of limbo. But then two weeks later I got this message:

Then I proceeded to yell “I got it!!” and bounce around the house for about five minutes.

For those of you who know me, this particular acceptance was very personal. In 2008-2009, I was a Rotary Youth Exchange student to Austria the year after I graduated high school.

I lived with host families, sat in on the local high school, gained a lot of German skills, life experience, and small anecdotes that I would obnoxiously sneak into any conversation for months after I was back in the States. I never got to go back between when that ended and now. I am looking forward to reconnecting with people who introduced me to this wonderful country.

Me back in 2009.

From mid-September 2013 to the end of May 2014, I will be an English teaching assistant in the town of Villach, Austria.

Villach is a town of about 50,000 people in the Austrian state of Kärten (Carinthia in English). It is the southernmost state, and the city is right near the Slovenian and Italian borders. In my exchange year, my only foray into the state was time in a very clean rest stop at the end of the exchange group's Euro Tour. It will an awesome experience living somewhere I know will be “different”, but still only have a vague idea of what to expect.

My good news was definitely curtailed and distracted for those first few days. The final copy of my thesis at New College (all 120 pages with references, title pages, and everything) was due two days later. More sombering, when I got the news, I was at my dad's house. We were on the way to my grandfather's funeral who passed away just days before. Talk about a million different emotions at once.

This blog will probably be pretty quiet over the summer, but I hope once that I am abroad to update about once a week.