I'm home! Save and sound in the U.S. I'm writing this from my bed in Chelmsford. I arrived in Boston at about 7:30 pm on Thursday May 14th (sorry for the delay in post) after a very long day of traveling. But it was all worth it to see my family and boyfriend again.
I believe I put up my last post just before singing in my friend Jeff's recital on Tuesday night, which went very well. It helped that I had a surprise practice performance Monday night- since I didn't have any exams on Tuesday, I went with a few friends to a jazz bar to see another friend, Michael, play in an open jam with the host band. While talking, I mentioned that I was singing Misty the next night, so Michael took it upon himself to tell the band and I was coerced onto stage. Haha, it wasn't exactly my best sing- I was really nervous- but it was very fun and Michael talked me through the solos and stuff like that. So now I can say that I sang in a jazz club in Vienna!
Then our performance on Tuesday night went very well. Possibly the best the three of us had played/ sung the song and Jeff sounded great on his other pieces. Greta is also Jeff's accompanist so after the recital, the three of us went out for pizza and it was awesome. We sat for over two hours talking about all kinds of things. I'm not sure exactly what it is, but the three of us share a very unique connection regarding our outlooks on music and life, so spending that time together was really special.
Wednesday, being my last day there is still a bit of a blur, but I think I remember the basic outline. In the morning, I got breakfast with my friend Xenia from church. She is the same age as me and leads the choir and we're both so sad that we didn't meet sooner. Xenia is from Russia, but is studying church music in Vienna at the University. So I showed her IES and she showed me her building which is beautiful. We definitely plan to keep in touch even though I've left.
Then... I took my Lied final... which wasn't really an enjoyable experience for anyone in the room. It was really hard! We had to identify and analyze 3 pieces of music, answer a few other questions and write an essay in 2 hours. It was a general consensus that we all wanted to cry after turning in our tests. But... such is life. While I may not have gotten every answer right on the test, I know that I've done well in the class otherwise and I knew it was more important to get as much of the city and my friends as possible in the last of my time there- which meant sacrificing some study time and I have no regrets about that.
After my exam I met up with my friend Ugo from church to visit one more time before I left and then went with the other students to Dr. Solvik's house for a pot-luck. I can't remember how much I've told you about him, but Dr. Solvik is my Lied professor, the head of the music department and was recently made director of IES Vienna. Outside of IES he is a musicologist who basically discovered a Schubert song cycle, translates musicological publications in 6 languages and is THE foremost Mahler scholar... in the world. He is quite easily one of the most brilliant people I've ever talked to in my life and scared the living daylights out of me for the first 2 months of school. It turns out that he is actually a really cool, and normal, person and is really fun to talk to outside of the class room. His two kids are adorable, while at his house, his daughter Sophie invited us to play with her and her Barbies. It was awesome.
After returning from his house I finished up the last of my packing and we all decided to go out. It turns out the club we decided on was pretty lame, but we made the best of it. And on the way home, I bought and ate my last Kabab :-( I then proceeded to get a whole four hours of sleep before getting up at 7 the next morning. I finished up the very last packing and ran some errands down town in the morning. Then Danielle, Brian, Angie, Christa and I went to breakfast at Aida, the cafe under our apartment like old times.
What followed the rest of that day is something of a saga and is deserving of its own post, but I promise it is entertaining. I'll try to have that up shortly. In the meantime- here are some pictures from my last few days in Vienna. Talk to you again soon.
Love,
Caitlin
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