Brunette Is The New Blonde- 'cause im in Vienna

So quiting my job, leaving my family and friends behind (love you Xen), and giving away my car aside... I did finally follow my heart to Europe (namely Vienna but thats not really the important factor here). Ahh Europe, where you get assigned seats at the movies, the toilet is made with a balcony for displaying your masterpiece once you've finished, and not to mention where the "Z" and the "Y" have played musical chairs on the key board making it extra annoying to write a post. Its quite sensational, and if you would like further and deeper explanations of the craziness listed above, please feel free to inquire, I assure you, it can be entertaining hahah. Yes Im finally here.

So the differences are quite frequently throwing themselves at me. Mostly, as the title of this post startes to describe, there are more blondes here than brunettes. And i dont mean the trashy staten island type blonde hair which is accompanied by an orange, almost nucleaur, glowing skin. I mean the kind of blondes you see accompanied by German shouts that you saw in Holocaust movies hahah.. its great. I feel like their sky blue eyes can pierce through my jacket and see the yellow star on my bicep. Well ok, its not so bad. I guess thats something thats instilled in you, but once you look around, you realize they their beautiful blue eyes to good use as they stare abhoringly at almost everyone. That makes it easier :)
And the good thing about the blonde situation, is that I can finally be the blonde, while being a burnette.. following me here? well in the center of town that is. Thats where all the pure breds hang out with their blonde manes shimmering as they prance about.

My street is nice and diverse. I live about 3-4 blocks away from the "booming"* shopping street (* when I saw booming, please remember this is Vienna, which means the shopping area is about 8 blocks long and one street wide, and closes at exactly 10 min to 6 or so) known as Mariahilferstrasse. No no, you can do it. Maria-hilfer-shtrasse. See, not so bad.. Which brings me to German.
Its strange, but when I was a traveler, I didnt mind not knowing the language. In fact i was pround to try and sound out these gutteral words out to locals, and show them that I respect them enough to try to speak their language. But now, being a local, well at least being a temporary resident haha (I wont get too ahead of myself), I find it abnoxious that they keep throwing it in my face how good their German is. I mean honestly! Do you HAVE to speak on your cell RIGHT next to me.. if you dont mind, I dont appreciate you mocking my lack of knowledge of German and thus making it IMPOSSIBLE to eavesdrop on your conversation! So please, stand next to someone who can appropriatley do so. Hahah.. well in all seriousness, It feels like they're all ganging up on me, staring at me, probably telling their friend on the other side of the phone how bewildered I look. So I'm forced to stand on the train in misery. And once in a while, when I feel- as the British say- cheeky, I whip out my own damn cell and in PERfect, AMERICAN English, I pretend to talk to Marian (damn woman.. PICK UP!! I need to look super cool!).
I think I have adjusted to the cool demeanour of the Ausies.. oh wait thats taken.. hmm, Austies? Yea that will work. I think I have adjusted to the cool demeanour of the Austies, and now I enjoy walking around, exploring. It was a bit frustrating at first that no one makes eye contact, I mean even in NY you do that when theres only the two of you on a cross walk waiting for the light to change, or passing on a narrow street in opposite directions. And even damn men dont like to look.. I swear they know Im a Jew! But yes, aside from the occasional Italian tourist, Rico Suave glances are never seen around these parts. And thats fine with me now. I just get back at Vienna by not doing my make up as often hahah.. I gather not to many of you will understand the logic of that statement, but i wont go into that. In fact, I dont think Ill go into much more, as Im sure ive lost most of you by now. Novels arent appreciated by those who have jobs and can only read this during a small window of boredom.
The only thing I will say, aside from telling you that when you ski here (just small mountains) they dont have lifts to get you to the top, but ASS STICKS, which you shove up your ass practically and it drags you ever so gently up the mountain while your skiis stry to stay as straight as possible to ease the pain of getting ripped a new one. But the funnest part comes when youre at the top, and you have literaly a second to remove your new closest friend out of your ass before drags up into neverneverland, by your ARSHE. Right, so aside from that, There are awesome places, cool rich snobs, a new outlook, and more walking that Ive gained. I went shopping my first week here, for food, and thought it would be an AWESOME idea to surprise Emir with a fridge full of food at our new place. So I went like a good little house wife, down to the food store (about 10 blocks away), and loaded the cart with anything and everything. Only to realize AFTER Ive paid for everything- and returns are myth to Europeans- that I HAVE NO FUCKIN CAR IN EUROPE!!!! yea well, needless to say my back and arms were soar the next day, but I did manage to SLOWLY drag this shit to the appartment. Im proud of myself.. well not the lack of prethought, but more the ability to stick with my stupitidy and work it out hahah..
Gotta love it!

Barefoot on concrete

Sometimes you need some fresh air. I don't know what it is about walking barefoot, even on the cement blocks which carve out the neighborhood, that I enjoy so much. Maybe it makes me feel a part of the world again. Sometimes you get lost in your own thoughts and the metaphysical bubble in your head gets too big, and you need to reconnect. Maybe its the opposite, feeling the hard ground beneath your soft steps helps you forget the world you live in and helps you form a bubble of your own- in which only you and the sensation brushing up your body with every step exists. Walking out and making the darkness part around you and it lets you wonder the land but still hugs your path, it is comforting to look down and see your naked feet, unfolding flashes of light beneath you- blink by blink- on the grey cement.
Toes and heel pushing off the ground, it might almost look like you're helping the world spin with every stroke. And I guess that's why it seems so scary to stop or slow down, would I fall off? or simply realize the world I imagine around me isn't at all what I thought it would be. Its getting clearer and clearer how little say people have in the world. My feet are tired of spinning the world without getting what I want out of it. With every step my feet get dustier and dustier... you figure out the metaphor

At the airport again...and I thought my trip just began yesterday

For the next eighteen hours this is my life. For the next eighteen hours this is my life. I train my eye to loose focus as it stares out of the three meter airport window out onto the arriving flights. My shoulders slumped; my head cocked, or rather fallen to the side I realise nothing is in focus. I am most probably only a few walls away from you but I might as well be miles away. And when the chimes of the airport wake me from my emptiness i stand up and follow the zombie herd to the passage way. No, of course not, they are not all zombies, some are quit happy: maybe they are just launching their own voyage, or going off to vacation, or reuniting with loved ones, but to me, I only see empty.For the next eighteen hours those airport chimes will be watch and I will train my ears to speak the language.
Life is a river, yes, and chapters are opened and closed as the river bends, and all of this has been pleeded to me, but to process this I have naively failed. Cant a river finally find its fill and be satisfied enough to stand still?

Why is happiness something we find in the ripples of the river and not the sand which is the foundation and what carries the river throughout its journey?

Enriched, I have absorbed so much, changed in some ways and reinforced my character in others. What makes me different from someone who has only read about Europe in books and websites: about every monument and every square and can recite to me the importance of each? Experience, thats what. The people that I have been have been unforgetable, the smiles and the giggles I will hear for all my life; the nuisances and the nuances have taught me to be patient and open; the joy, the hardships, the drinks, the debates, the adventures, braving the unknown, standing up for things that are right and things you believe in, and helping someone see something in a different light as they do the same for me. Not to mention I got to steel a pen from the Flying Pigs, and you couldnt do that by reading a book now can you !! And now thats all behind me..and now poof! and im home. Poof and im home!

An Aside...

Just a bit of a warning, please dont expect my last entry to be a happy one haha, so prepare to be deep, depressed, or get out of my kitchen hahah.

Rio Duoro, Porto (Portugal)- Last stop

To watch a city get dark while sipping on sweet wine, to watch the swarms of seagulls grow and drape the simmering sky and the sky breaking cathederal tower in the distance. The pastel rooftops, bleached my the ages of the sun, break the silence of the sky as the river running beneath echoes the violin and accordian blowing the symphany of old dirt stained fingers. I dont know this city but I feel at home amoungst the twinkle of the water and the twighlight of the sky.
The glimmering lights of the night remind the day that it is time to set, as me and my friends watch the shift change, spectators of a tradition as old and as inevitable to the universe as breathing is to us. Inhale..exhale...day...night...And just as the day can only last for so long, so can this moment. Thats what makes this voyage so incredible and so painful. As amazing as it was to be here, you must maintain this philosophy in your mind. Hard not to get attached. Heavier and heavier is the sand in my sand watch, pooring faster and faster as the sun sets inch by inch. With every next beat of my heart and every desperate breath that I take, I know that this does not last.
This city will remember my face, as the faces of all the locals, the travelers, the seagulls, the builders, the wreckers, the layers, the finders, and that is all that will be left of me here... a footprint.

Dachau Consentration Camp-The Vastness

Walking through the metal gates and bars that form the words "Arbait Macht Frei"..closing your eyes as you stomp through the pathway with the group you only hear the grinding of the rocks beneath the souls of your feet, an though the wind blows a chill that offers no comfort, the air is still. Still as the hearts of those who have been here. The heavy breaths around you resonate only for a second, and then are lost in the vastness of the yard, as lost as the prisoners once their souls were color-coded and then removed. These breaths are carried to the sky where the birds circling above, chirping of love and laughter, only taunt you as you sweat in shackles stained with innocence. The drizzle is appropriate, the drops they are not any heavier than the tear shed that has washed the soil for years, and the drops are not received with no more concern than those tears. The walls here do not glimmer and are cold and still; shameless as the eyes that befell and glared down towards whimpering hands-drawn out in plea. Cold as the walls the eyes were.
Out of the windows you will not find hope, only fear, and sunlight only meant in was time for more suffering, more tears blood and sweat- rest will come another time.
Bald floors without fuzz, as bald as the heads were shaved, as their dignities were shaved, as their humanity! Stepping on the bald floor and you feel as all that mentioned breaking underneath you.
The black and white posters are good reminders, and give a sample, but you do not hear the sharp voices and the pang of humiliation, you do not feel the warm blood dripping down as your bones are shattered, you do not feel the mass desperation as you push just one more inch so your life is spared; you do not see your father die or your mother wounded, or your child disappear- you only see a poster, and you say "wow, poor them".
The term "skin and bones" is rarely used as such an accurate description, but when a dandelion found on your work field is your salvation from hunger, and you must share its petals with your loved ones, the term has a much graver meaning. When your despair has eaten away any smiles you had hidden, and any laughter left in the glimmer of your memory, when your despair forces the only pure ounce of energy you've absorbed from that dandelion, to put your one blood stained knee in front of the other and crawl what remains of you across that white border line, because that is your only way out, only hoping that the screams of your people will bring help from beyond the walls, and the people of Dachau will carry your freedom. And as the bullit penetrates the back of your neck-home.
When you consider that, thats when you can respect life, and the breath you breath, and the people that make you smile.
As you walk out, past the barbed wired fence, leaving behind bad senses, a smooth river escorts you and bids you a due, as if trying to erase your goosebumps and trying to wash away what you've seen. Humming a sweet lulliby. But then at your last glance, to the left, you eye catches a sobering glimpse of the graves and ashes of thousands unknown, inscribed "Do Not Forget", and then you know no river of time can ever subdue the pain of this place.

People are you serious??

thanks for txting me that you read my blog, but can you people please write down a thought.. maybe even a full sentence :)