The World is Your Oyster

There are things to love about all places. Some just take longer to find than others. Brazil and I had a curious relationship. Maybe it was infatuation - it was easy to adore, with so many instantly applealing traits: sun, beaches, warm friendly people, dancing, parties...It's the immediate satisfaction sort of love - exciting, thrilling, new. Germany, I must say, has a different appeal. One might question my motivation for leaving Brazil to come to a country where the sky is permanently gray and the language sounds like an overexaggerated coughing fit. I came to visit loved ones, of course. Believe me, these people make it worth leaving Brazil. Regardless, Germany...the country where I'm scorned for asking rhetorical questions (I'm wasting tmie by doing that, I guess?) and where everything has a reason for being or else it's schtupid. Today I was told an American football is not a ball because it's not round, and balls are round. We're schtupid to call it a ball; it should be called an egg, like it is in German. I responded 'What about a ball without air, it's not round, is it still a ball?' Of COURSE it's schtill a ball, it's SUPPOSED to have air and be round. Don't ask rhetorical questions. (Silly Americans, we've been misnoming the football all this time! We should have just asked the Germans for their help.) I feel bad because I'm exaggerating a real conversation for dramatic effect (no, I'm just saying that to be nice, I'm hardly exaggerating at all), and I wouldn't want my beloved German friends to think I'm making fun of them. The foreigner's perspective on German culture has an enormous potential for humor, and that's what I'm trying to convey, hopefully not at the expense of any German individual, but at the expense of all the efficient, logical, emotionally-controlled people of Germany, as a whole.
We're currently in Hintertux, Austria for the week on a ski vacation. I decided devote my trip as a time in my life to 'develop alternative skills' (strategic interview language). Stuff you can't learn in school, you know what I mean. This week, it's my ski form, which is rapidly improving.

I've decided to take a two day side trip to see Vienna. It has been my dream to go there for many years (but I didn't realize it was my dream until yesterday when I realized it would be possible to go). I'll be there Saturday night staying with a friend of Ulrike's, a fellow neurologist. I can hardly WAIT to see it, I bet it's the most romantic city in the world.