Thursday August 23 16:36

We had another free afternoon today, so I walked to Gmunden with Parker, Liam, Keegan, Mark, Eric, Celeste, Clio, and Fabi. Parker, Liam, Keegan, Mark and I broke off from the group after about a half hour. We went to that same clothing store as last week (the sort of European Macy’s) and shopped around for a little while. Liam bought a classy G-Star coat, but other than that nothing eventful went down at the store. We continued into Gmunden and checked out a couple other shops. One interesting thing about European stores is that they may appear to be small from the front, but actually they go back a ways and almost always have a second floor. Both of the stores we entered ended up going back about a half a block and up at least one floor. Also, we figured out that most Europeans buy less clothes than the average American, but the clothes they do buy is higher quality (and more expensive). The average shirt in a European store costs about 30 Euros, but it is more classy and better material. Anyway, we went back to the café that Crash, Parker and I visited earlier and got something to drink. Keegan created a game where he wrote down every Harry Potter character on scraps of paper, then everyone pulls two names out of a hat and by next September (for the hiking weekend) they have to have write a Harry Potter Fan Fiction. A Harry Potter Fan Fiction is a side story within Harry Potter, and the kids doing it are super “abstract” so I am sure their stories will be interesting. I got a chance to practice my German a little bit by talking to the waitress and asking for the bill, etc. I have been improving slowly, and I am becoming able to function a little bit. Once we finished at the café we walked back to the school. After a little down time, Crash and I decided to go to a Chinese restaurant in Altmünster for dinner. It was fun to just hang out with Crash, but the setting was strange. There was literally not a single other person eating at the restaurant, we were the only two. And there was no music playing for the first 20 minutes we were there, making everything we said very apparent. We ordered in German, so Crash ended up with a salad instead of soup. But my sweet and sour chicken was surprisingly good. Afterward, we walked through back streets and blazed our own trail through a field back to the school to have evening classes. Our class has Martina who is actually surprisingly funny and a great teacher. She was dishing our some serious sarcasm and joking around with us a lot. We had snack and talked a bit, then I headed back to the room to journal. Crash, Johnny and I were just hanging out in our room when suddenly people started going crazy. Blake, Emily (Florida) and Emily (Canada) started running around the halls. Then the Latino kids started listening to music and partying in the downstairs common area. Soon enough everyone was running around outside and through the halls, and now I am really confused as to what is going on.

Inside one of the stores

Walking to Gmunden