Wee ... redefined!

You know you are living in another country when the following takes place ...

While volunteering at Libby's school, I overhear the English teacher, from the U.K., address her English group of students. She begins to state the following, "Children. Yesterday, the boys Lou was in total disarray. Do you know what I found all over the floor? Wee. Yes, children, there was so much Wee on the floor it was disgusting. Do you know what happens to that Wee when the boys step into the Lou? The Wee gets all over the boys slippers. Then, when the boys come into the classrooms, that Wee on the bottom of the boys slippers gets tracked into our room and onto our floor. Who wants to have Wee all over our schoolroom floor? It’s disgusting. Totally disgusting. I don’t want to find Wee on the floor of the Lou any more."

I just laughed and laughed (not out loud of course) and couldn’t help but think of “the wee little pigs” in a brand new light!! Pigs really are disgusting!!

Living in another country and finding a new place to live is quite the experience, too! As we’ve begun the process of looking for a new place to live, I’ve had to ask the following of the owner’s of potential Flats: “Do the lights come with the Flat? Is the Kitchen staying or going with this Flat?” When you move in and out of Flats here in Austria (most of Europe for that matter) people typically buy their own light fixtures. When you move into a new place, there is a wire hanging down from the ceiling with a light bulb attached. That’s where your lighting fixture gets mounted. Along the same line of thinking, kitchens are not always included in a new Flat. In fact, one Flat we looked at you have to purchase the kitchen separately. If you don’t want to buy it from the owner, they take it with them (which means dismantling it) and you have to buy another kitchen.

When looking in the want ads, the ad will say a Flat has 3 rooms. That doesn’t mean 3 bedrooms. That simply means there are a living room and 2 bedrooms. A kitchen is normally an assumed room in a Flat.

Finally, the best part of looking for Flats is the “Kabinet”. This week we found out that a Kabinet is a little room that is smaller than a “normal” room but big enough, sometimes, to be used as an office or a bedroom. We love the little Kabinet rooms!!

So, we continue our search for Flats. Our desire right now is to live in the 2nd district, which is close to the girls’ schools via public and very strategic for meeting Austrians. It’s close to the city center and would be a great place to have people come to our Flat from all over the city. We’ll keep you posted on the progress!!

Signing off ...