Salzburg

Hey Everyone! 

I hope you had a fantastic Thanksgiving, or Thanksgiving Break.

I'm getting pretty behind on talking about my travel break... which is a bummer because things keep happening and I keep doing things that would be interesting to blog about... So hopefully I'll get to those eventually I guess. Until then, Salzburg!

Okay, Salzburg is the fourth largest city in Austria and is still not very big. It is very close to the border of Germany and is very touristy. It is also where the Sound of Music is based (for those of you who don't know). There is a lot of natural beauty ("hills are alive") and the city of Salzburg's economy is strongly supported by tourism. The city (and region) were initially strongly connected to the Bavarian Empire but later gained independence and were then acquired by the Austrian Empire (more on that later).

The weather while I was there was really nice (sunny and pretty warm). And I saw a good amount of Americans (like families with older kids) going around, which I was surprised at for the time of year. 

Okay, my Salzburg adventure started on the train ride from Vienna (This is on Friday). It was super foggy and then all the sudden it just ended, like there was a very clear wall of fog that we all the sudden exited and then there were blue skies. So then it was very pretty (imagine lots of small towns tucked away in valleys between huge hills). I arrived at Salzburg and made my way to my hostel (which was filled with a lot of Americans and was very suited to youth). After I got settled I took my guide book (borrowed from my friend) and headed towards old town which is where the large majority of things to see are located. 

I walked along the Salt River (named that because a ton of salt used to be transported along that river and was a huge source of profit for the region centuries ago). The city has a huge mountain-hill in the middle which has a fortress on top of it, the large majority of the old town is in the shadow of the fortress and up against the river. So I crossed the river and walked through old town.

Pretty much exactly what it looked like for me on the walk towards Old Town

I started in Mozartplatz which is a square with a statue of Motzart in the middle. Mozart was born in Salzburg (and spent his first 25 years there) and of course the city likes to recognize that. There are two touristy things in Salzburg for him, his residence and his birthplace. I did not go to either but I hear that his residence is pretty interesting. 

Anyway, I continued to the Residenceplatz which has on either side of it the Old and New Residences, which I think are like government type buildings. The New Residence houses the Salzburg museum which I would be returning to later. The top of the building also has an artsy upside down metal heart in flames which is to symbolize God's love for all creations. Inside the heart there are some small bells (7 I believe) which ring out songs that are appropriate to the season (prolly chiming Christmas tunes right now).

I continued on to the Salzburg Cathedral which was enormous and impressive. 

 (View of the Cathedral from the front, statue of Mary beckoning people into the square towards the cathedral)

There is a central dome towards the back of the cathedral with four organs at each corner of the area (Mozart played them when he was younger and living in Salzburg). It was really impressive and a nice place to visit (as cathedrals normally go). It also had three dates in the front. 774 was when the area either decided the cathedral was to be built or it was finished or something. It was a big deal then because it meant that you were recognized as an official providence of the Holy Roman Empire. 1628 was when the cathedral had to be rebuilt due to a fire. Lastly, 1959 was when there was a large amount of repairs done on the building because a WWII bomb had blasted a hole in the dome.

 (Inside of the cathedral, in this picture you can see two of the four organs)

I left the cathedral and went to St. Peter's cemetery and then church. The cemetery was small and quiet and the church was dark and crazy. 

(Church interior, it was darker when I was there...)

Anyway I found myself at Universitatsplatz which has a market everyday (especially on Saturday and Wednesday) except for Sunday. There were locals selling produce (I actually walked through here the next day (on Saturday) and it was much busier).

I then walked down Getreidegasse which is a shopping street with neat wrought iron signs. It was packed and had tons of types of shops, as well as alleys (remaining from the medieval origin of the street) which had more shops tucked inside of them. So this was a pretty neat area and basically ended my tour of old town as it brought me in a huge circle through Old Town. 

(Getreidegasse; it was even busier when I was there)

It was starting to get a little dark and I wasn't feeling that well so I went back to the hostel to chill out. I met this Canadian guy and this Japanese guy playing wii sports. They were nice enough. I got some dinner and then went to my room to read (I was still not feeling well). I then met my three roommates for the night. They were three girls, two from Taiwan and one from Malaysia. They wanted pretty much nothing to do with me and were very uninterested in talking to me (They mostly were on their phones...). Then they started playing cards and didn't even bother to ask if I wanted to join... I did not like them. Whatever, they left the next day. And that was my first day in Salzburg.

The next morning (Saturday) I woke up and headed for the fortress but took the long way because I wanted to see another cemetery which was bigger and had lots of neat things.

  

Cemetery...

After that I walked down a modern shopping street, into old town, and then to the base of the hill that the fortress is on. Having the option for an overpriced ride up an elevator thing or a hike with good views I choose the hike (of course). I thought I could get in for free if I hiked but that was not true, I had to buy some fortress pass to get admission to all the museums in the fortress (I was not planning on visiting them) so that was annoying. I explored the fortress and took some pictures and took in the view (gave really nice views of the city on either side of the fortress and of the surrounding countryside). Then I went to a museum which was pretty interesting. It had old weapons, tourture instruments, musical instruments among other things from the fortress. Also some information about life in the fortress. 

After that I opted for a walk through Monchsberg which is another part of the mountain-hill that the fortress is on. It is really pretty and some people (presumably really rich) have houses up there. There were some old outposts and some cafes on top of the cliffs. It was a good time. I eventually got to a museum of modern art and took a much more reasonably priced elevator ride down (was the only way down at that point of the walk). Then I found some lunch at this kooky cafe that had an African theme. It was extremely delicious. 

Then I went to the Salzburg museum and that was pretty cool. I got some background to the region. Many artists have been inspired by the natural beauty there so there were a couple rooms devoted to paintings of the region. There was also information about the religious artifacts from that area throughout history. The region was pretty rich until the early 19th century which is when Austira acquired it. It struggled for awhile and in the mid-1800s it built its central station which is when the whole tourism industry started. This brought wealth the region once more and is a very obvious part of the city today. 

Then I went to the Salzburg Panorama which an artist did just to do a 360 painting of the city and surrounding country from the fortress because he loved it so much. It was not really that exciting. There was a temporary exhibit on the real Von Trapp family (the family from the Sound of Music). It was kind of depressing because the real Von Trapp family's story is pretty different from the one told in the movie. The man (Mr. Von Trapp) was in WWI and was an important military person. He had hard times once the war was over, so he and his family started a singing group (in Salzburg) that eventually made its way to America and did performances (and were quite successful) there. I think they were just called the Von Trapp family (side note, some of the grand children have started a musical group called something like the new Von Trapp group or something). The mother of the family I think was actually somewhat disappointed in the movie's fictional take on their life. There was also a Sound of Music tour (focused on the movie not the real life), that takes you to see many of the main sights. It is actually supposed to be pretty good but was crazy expensive and I didn't have time for it (plus I was not that interested anyway). Also, according to this exhibit, if you were to ask locals about the movie, most will not even know what you're talking about.

I then headed over to the Mirabell Gardens just to see it. There are scenes from the Sound of Music here and you can tell why. It is a very nice garden area. There is also a palace where I think they have museum things and also concerts at night.

Then I went back to the hostel (it was dark) and I met my new roommates. They were pretty cool, they had just arrived, there was one guy from Argentina, one guy from Chile, and one guy from Sweden. They were friends and they were trying to see Salzburg in one day. I gave them some info on the things to see as best I could and then I left to go get some dinner. I went to a cozy restaurant and got some dinner. Then I went over to a cafe to chill. I got a monstrous (and delicious) ice cream dessert (I did not realize that it was going to be so huge). A DJ showed up so there was some music. It was nice to hang out there but I left after awhile because the place was starting to fill up and I felt bad for taking up a table. 

I went back to the hostel and just hung out in the lounge as a lot of other people were doing. There isn't that much to do in Salzburg at night. At other times of the year different things are opened late but at this time there are only classical music concerts (which I already did in Vienna and are pricey) and the bars are pretty local and small (if I were more adventurous perhaps I would have found a bar and tried to chat up a local I guess). 

Anyway, I just hung out and crashed. The next morning, I packed up and checked out and went to the train station where I stored all my crap. Then I walked back to old town (again...) and went to the cathedral for church! I wanted to hear the music because I heard that it was really good. The mass was entirely in German, but the choir was really really good (Random fact: this city has like thirty something Catholic churches). Then I left and was feeling not too good so I just got myself to Munich and the hostel and took it easy. The train ride was really pretty, it was pretty much entirely through Southern Germany, which featured more small towns tucked against hills. Many of the houses had solar panels on the roofs (which was awesome). 

So overall, Salzburg, pretty darn touristy, but very pretty. You can spend a full day there and see a lot that there is to see, but if you want to do everything I would recommend two to three full days. There are also things in the surrounding area (including Sound of Music sights) that are apparently worth seeing but I did not make it to any of them.

Anyway, next time I'll tell you guys about Munich! 

Nick 

Scotland! (Part II)

Alright everyone! Time for (the greatly anticipated) Part II! 

First off, I want to apologize for the delay, I have had a quite busy week during which I had a major grade due in every class. However, it is done, I finished today. Things went well for the most part but it was very very busy. Oh I was also minorly sick (thanks to one girl on the Scotland trip who got the majority of our class sick) which didn't help anything.

Anyway, Scotland!

So, we woke up Wednesday morning (still in Edinburgh) and walked towards the Royal Mile. The Royal Mile is a place that was introduced to us on Monday but I forgot to mention it in the earlier blog post. It is a street that has very many shops and famous buildings on it. When you guys look that the pictures of Scotland that my friend Rosemary took on facebook, you will see many pictures of me and my class walking in a street, the street was prolly the Royal Mile. It is very famous and has many things there, like a really amazing cathedral, it is very close to the Scottish parliament, has a huge stone heart (picture on facebook) that people spit on (there is a legend that if you spit on the heart then you will return to Edinburgh at some point in your life so a lot of people spit on it on Monday because we all already wanted to come back), yeah. If any of you do find yourself in Edinburgh at some point and you see that heart, don't stand on it for a picture because it is a very gross heart (many tourist couples do not know that..).

Anyway, we went to a swanky hotel near the Royal Mile where we had a meeting with Geoff Huggins who is a Scottish Government employee who works in the mental health part of the government he essentially told us about the plan for the Scottish government (I think I mentioned that earlier). He was quite cynical and informed us that the Scottish government wasn't actually doing that much with positive psychology other than funding smaller organizations (like the PlayField Institute mentioned in my last post). He also said that Martin Seligman (the father of Positive Psychology and former president of the American Psychological Association) was a not nice person and asked for a very large sum to help the Scottish government with the plan, which they said no thank you to. We had been lead to believe that Seligman had done a lot with that plan so we were shocked to learn that he was not involved and that Positive Psychology was not a big part of the plan... Anyway, he was an interesting person to see. He was quite smart and knew a ton and gave us a viewpoint of improving overall mental health from a governmental standpoint which was good for us to get. After talking to the class about it later, the visit got very mixed reviews as some people really didn't like him (found him rude and boring) while other people really enjoyed him for his honesty.

After that visit we were released onto the streets of Edinburgh to conduct street interviews. We were supposed to approach at least five Scottish people and ask them questions about well-being such as, "How do you define happiness?" and, "what are your strengths?" and, "what qualities lead to a successful positive relationship?" I personally did not like these interviews because we just approached people on the street and asked them if we could interview them. Then we blindsided them with these opened questions that were not super easy to answer without some thought. But what we generally found was that the Scottish people were content and enjoyed their lives and that many placed a large value on their relationships. Nothing too surprising. 

We still had a large amount of time on our own in the city so we went to a restaurant and got some Scottish food. Apparently the Scottish love deep fried things so I got a deep fried pizza and a milkshake, which was good(ish) but interesting. My friend got deep fried haggis. If you don't know what haggis is, I suggest you do a wikipedia search. It is a very Scottish food. One thing we were unable to try which I really wanted to try (this lead to a desperate search on Friday night at midnight) was a deep fried Mars bar. I am quite bummed that I never got to try one. It is extremely unhealthy. After lunch we split up and I went with one friend on some adventures, including climbing the tower that you can see me (getting attacked by wind) at the the top of on facebook. That was a really cool tower and gave a great view of the city. We then went back to the hotel for another academic visit. 

The room was horrendously hot so many people were falling asleep and having a rough time concentrating... but we got this presentation from a women who was working on improving mental health on college campuses in Scotland. The information we received there felt like it was mostly common sense but it was still interesting to think about. She worked with a program that essentially was increasing awareness and resources for students who just started college who were having difficulties with starting the college lifestyle, as can happen with many people when they first start college... 

After that we went to a cafe where JK Rowling worked and like invented Harry Potter so that was neat. And the cafe was really cool and had elephants everyone. We then left when it was time and had dinner at a fairly fancy place (apparently DIS really wanted to treat us on these trips in terms of food) and that was fun. My group (when I say group I mean the people I usually hung out with) ate with one of our tour leaders so it was cool to talk to her during the meal. Afterwards we went back to our hotel. Many people were going out that night and Asa invited me but I just wanted to go to a bar (not a club). So I went with a couple people to a bar and we drank a little (not very much Mom... chill) and played spoons. We went back to the hotel with the intention of finding the rest of our class so that we could hang out with them but we had just missed them (we found out later that they really wanted to hang with us). So that was a bummer so I just hung out with people for a little while watching TV and then went back to my room.

Thursday morning was interesting as Asa was still drunk from the activities of the previous night. We had to wake up, pack quickly and bring our luggage upstairs because we were checking out. We were then going to go on a hike to Arthur's Seat but it was raining fairly heavily and we left late, so we only walked through the town to the base of the hike and turned around which made some people very grumpy (I was just happy to go on a walk). We then loaded all our stuff on the bus and went to Glasglow! It was a great bus ride because everyone was exhausted so we all slept.

Once in Glasglow we checked into our hotel and then walked (a very long walk) to lunch and then our academic visit for that day. Lunch was at the Willow Tea Rooms (not the famous one but their second restaurant) and we enjoyed some sandwiches and fancy, delicious deserts. I also just had a great time at lunch cuz everyone was at my table was in a really good mood and generally being hilarious. After that we went to the academic visit (was quite a walk), GoWell. I really enjoyed this visit because everything we had talked about in our Positive Psychology course was applicable at the individual level but GoWell was focused much more at applying Positive Psychology from a more macro, group view. The organization was studying the effects of housing developments on well-being on some populations in Glasglow. The organization studied the effects of relocation and housing improvements as it related to well-being. I found it very interesting and won't go into it in great depth here but I enjoyed the visit.

After that we had time on our own so we went back to the hotel and got our rooms. Then I went out with some friends which ended up as not super fun because they wanted to go shopping so that happened for awhile... bleh. But eventually we went to get dinner and had a Chinese buffet (we were all looking for something a little different) which was actually pretty good (and really expensive). We then went back to the hotel and ran into our group on the way back. They said they were going to go to a bar much later and we should join them (we ended up not finding them because the bar they were going to go to was closed...) So with time to kill we decided to go to a bar ourselves... which turned out to be a very interesting experience...

I'll pick up there next time for the third and final, exciting entry about Scotland!

I should post that one soon. Like tomorrow or Wednesday hopefully. 

Goodbye everyone!

Nick

Tivoli

Hey Everyone!

This weekend I went to Tivoli! For those of you who don't know what that is, it is a very old amusement park in Copenhagen. It is the second oldest amusement park in the world (opened in 1843). It is fairly small due to it being in the center of the city. It features a small assortment of rides, a few nice gardens and fountains, and lot of very expensive restaurants (featuring food from all over the world). It also has some stages on which plays and concerts are preformed. I think concerts are preformed every Friday night so I might try to catch one of those in the future. Also, the park has weird hours through out the year. It is about to close because the summer season is going to be over. It will reopen for 10 days in October for the Halloween season and then will open again in November for the Christmas season. For these other two seasons, the park gets decorated quite a bit and apparently it is definitely worth the visit for the different seasons so I am looking forward to visiting Tivoli again! Also the park costs money to get into and the rides cost even more money (and they cost a lot) so I bought a pass that allows me to get into the park unlimited times and ride the rides for no cost! The pass was not cheap but it will definitely save me money if I'm going to go back at least two more times so it was definitely worth it.

But yeah anyway I went on Saturday night and met up with a friend and a girl I didn't know (she was cool too) and we rode roller coasters for a good 3 hours. I then got a milkshake, which was quite different from the milkshakes I get back in the states. (As many of you know I am a shake/ice cream connoisseur so I have to comment on the quality of the shake) The shake was kind of like icy chocolate milk. It had only high quality ingredients so it tasted pretty alright, but it was not thick at all. Very strange. It was worth a try and I enjoyed it, but I definitely prefer the thick ice cream milkshakes from home (for those of you who know my ice cream habits, can you believe that I have only had ice cream on the 2 occasions in Bornholm?). Anyway! The park was very nice and I can't wait to go back later this year!

Here is a picture of the park during Christmas time (I can't wait): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Tivoli_Copenhagen_night.jpg

I also met my host mom's dad this weekend. He was very nice and liked to talk so I'll prolly tell you guys about that in the future because he had some thoughts about the United States that surprised me. I also had my first volunteer experience with DIA last week and Denmark had their elections last week which was kinda cool to see. They had their first female prime minister elected and she is from the red group the Social Democrats (The most influential red party). The other half is the blue. I won't talk about politics too much because it is confusing, but generally the blue group is more traditionally conservative and the main group is called Liberals (yes it's backwards and confusing).

So my life has been filled with lots of work and doing some fun things, I've been kept quite busy. This Wednesday I'm going to be going to the National Museum for a Nordic Mythology trip. So that should be interesting. I also think I'm going to take some time tomorrow afternoon to do a little exploring! There is also a bike race going on all over Copenhagen so I might try to see some of that!

That's all for now! Hope everyone's life is going great!

Nick