Letter from Austria

Dear Bloggers,
I lasted through my first week in Austria, and guess what? I LOVE IT HERE! Everyone is making me feel like part of the family, especially Cari, my host mother. Every night before bed when Gerry isn’t home yet, she gives each of us kids a small piece of apple strudel. Cari is an amazing cook, almost as good as my mom. You would never guess by just looking at her. She’s thin as a twig and her blonde curls fall around her shoulders and cascade down her back when she wears it down. Most of the time she wears it up though in a tight little bun. When I asked her why, she just shrugged. Of coarse, either Axel, Rose, or Gerry have to help us converse. I think I’ll try to teach her English and maybe she can teach me some German. I’ve already picked up a few words. They are Willkommen(welcome), du(you), angelangt(arrive), and unbedenklich(safely). That would be nice. You can tell she’s a lawyer, though. Whenever someone takes a second strudel when no one is around, she can always find out who did it.
Then there’s Gerry, my host father. Gerry is so much fun to be around. He always takes his work home and asks us what we think would make a good video-game. Of course, Nanda has the best ideas because she has a wild imagination. Gerry has quite an imagination, too. That’s probably why he tells each child a story before bed. He saves me and Rose for last because he said we’re special and he thinks we deserve it cause we share a room. We are the only ones who do that. So far, I think Gerry is a lot like my real dad, funny and playful. After our story, Gerry has us recite this prayer:
Thank you, God
for today,
You blessed my work
you blessed my play.
I really think it is a sweet prayer to say at night. I like it.
There are two girls in my family, Rose(Roselyn) and Nanda. Rose is 13 and is my main translator in the family. She can be a couch potato at times but otherwise she is pretty awesome. She likes to play around with cosmetics and I’m usually her mannequin. Not that I mind. I like to help her out and let her play around with the stuff I brought with me. I guess it was a good thing to. The only problem is that she does her make-up really, how do I say this, unique. She like to cover her eyelids till you can’t see any skin anymore! She does all this to Nanda, too. Nanda is even more willing then me. She lets her do her hair. I made the mistake of letting Rose do mine when I first got there and ended up with having to get my hair cut shorter. Trust me, you don’t want to know. My hair is still long, though. Nanda will never learn. She is only six after all. She’s real sweet to me. She gives me kisses before bed every night. I like it. It reminds me of my brother back at home. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I really miss that kid.
Axel is, how do I put this, Axel. He’s kind of a brainiac really. He’s trying so hard to learn about me that it’s kind of touching. He doesn’t really like to talk about how school is for him. I can’t seem to figure out why, though. He keeps his life to himself. I can’t say as much about me. He pries for more and more info on me and my life and everything else, especially my family. I’ve told him everything I can without being to personal. I fight the most with him. It’s like we’re actually siblings. I’m not even kidding. We fight about food, his sisters, what I teach him, about my brother, we even fight about whose socks are whose. But I still think he’s pretty awesome. He likes to teach me the games they play in Austria, like cricket. Some of them are pretty neat.
The house is really cool, too. There are four bedrooms, meaning Gerry and Cari share a room, Axel gets his own, Nanda gets her own, and Rose and I bunk together. The only problem is that there are only one and a half bathrooms which is hard to handle with three teenagers in the house. The dining area is also the living room. It is actually a really big room and I think it’s my favorite. There is where we discuss family issues. I like how they include me in the decisions they make. The coolest part of the house is the...wait for it... POOL! I wish I’d brought a bathing suit. Cari says she’ll buy me a new one, though. The outside of the house is like a mixture of modern and older style. It has a tan coloring to it, a lot of shades of brown. Since we live in the suburbs of Vienna, there is a lot of beautiful forestry and really clear skies at night, the kind you don’t see in the actual city.
So far, everything is good. I love all of my family(although I really miss others speaking fluent English). I’m looking forward to starting school. Thanks for blogging with me.
Your Friend,
Haley