On Thursday evening, after the conversation class I headed to Sternbraeu with the other TA's. Although it's probably as big as the Augustinerbraeu that we were at recently, its split into different, smaller restaurants, and so has a completely different feel to it. I must admit that I found the atmosphere much more 'restauranty' then 'brewery'. There was a much more 'sensible' feel to the evening with no-one suddenly bursting into song, a lot less 'cheersing', not that many people in traditional dress and the food was much more expensive. However, that's not to say that I didn't have a good night! I spent most of it reminiscing with the other British TA's about primary school games, and teaching the Americans what it means to have had a British childhood. I'm not sure how well we sold it to them, but it was fun nonetheless.
Afterwards, a few of us carried on the night in one of Salzburg's many Irish bars and had an incredible find : Walker's Salt and Vinegar Crisps! In Austria (and Germany too), the flavour 'Salt and Vinegar' just doesn't exist, so this was a cause of much excitement. A few of the other TA's saw some of their students out as well, but as mine are either quite a bit older, or from a village an hour outside of the main city I luckily haven't had this experience yet.
On Friday it was time for the Losers to cook a meal for the Winners of the quiz last week. We cooked them Tortilla Soup, which basically tasted like a fajita in a bowl. It was absolutely delicious. Although it was up to us to cook the actual meal, everyone else contributed to the starters/desserts and drinks, so we ended up having quite a feast. A lot of people were able to make it, and it was nice for us all to be in a big group again. It was another great evening so thank you to Rachel and Libby for offering your apartment if you're reading this!
In addition to Mozart and The Sound of Music, Salzburg is also famous for its breweries. Due to its close historic and geographic relationship with Bavaria, it is considered by many here to form part of the 'Beer Belt' around Southern Germany. With this in mind, we headed to the second brewery of the week on Satuday. I went to the Stielgbraeuwelt with four other assistants. I'd actually already been there once before, for the Jazz concert, but this time got to have a proper look around the museum. It was pretty interesting to learn about the beer making process, and see the different forms it goes through, and the different machinery used. However, the highlight definitely came after the actual museum tour as we headed to the restaurant area to redeem our three vouchers for beer tasting. In comparison to the other breweries, I'd say that this one finds a happy medium. It isn't overly loud and 'beer-happy' like the Augustinerbraeu, but doesn't have the slightly 'stuffy' feel that the Sternbraeu has, so I'd happily come again and stay a bit longer. We all sampled the different beers and I've definitely got a new favourite - the Radler Himbeer. It's a raspberry flavoured beer and is just so drinkable that it could probably be dangerous!
After the Tortilla Soup the night before, we were all craving a bit more Mexican and so headed out to a Mexican restaurant afterwards. I had 'mixed chimichanga' with a cocktail, and that all went down very nicely. We headed over to Cecilia's house after and on the way it started snowing. It was so cold, but also so pretty and had started settling by the time we got to her house. We spent the evening watching British comedies, like Miranda, Dad's Army and, of course, Michael McIntyre. The American who was with us had never heard of him before, but was crying with laughter with us before the first sketch was over. An absolutely hilarious evening, and it was such a novelty walking to the bus stop through the first snow afterwards.
I woke up to a great amount of snow on Sunday morning. Every year when the first snow comes, my host family drive into the mountains and go on a walk. This year was no exception, and so we joined up with another family and headed out for the day. My host mum assured me that it was just going to be a 'walk' and that I wouldn't even need hiking boots. Needless to say I was skeptical after my past experiences of an Austrian 'walk', and definitely had reason to be! We drove about half an hour to the nearest ski village, and then proceeded to walk UP the ski slopes! It was great fun walking through the deep snow and having snowball fights. We stopped at a little cafe at the top and had a hot chocolate, which was lovely. The owner of the cafe gave the children some spare plastic bags so they slid a lot of way down, which looked great fun. I didn't have any proper snow boots with me so in the end I ended up joining them sliding most of the way down, but that definitely wasn't intentional.
That evening I cooked the family a traditional 'Shepherd's Pie', with the help of Jakob and Nani (the son and daughter). It went down really well and was nice to have some English food as well.
The next week was a short working week as the Thursday and Friday were both Bank Holidays for All Saint's Day. Each school in Austria has 'Schulautonome Tage', which are days off, but they get to decide individually when to use then. My evening school used them to give students the whole week off, but I still had to go into my other school on Monday and Tuesday so an early night on Sunday was in order for my 6am start the next day.
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