Meine Klein Welt

Faithfulness

by


Christ Church Vienna

This morning’s collect began with the statement,

“Almighty and everlasting God,
you are always more ready to hear than we to pray”

I think sometimes I regard prayer as a chore. Something that should be done…Something that God wants me to do. Like most chores, it becomes something that I can put off too easily. I rationalize the need to a preference. Sure my room could be cleaner, but I can make due with the clutter…and I don’t have the energy anyway.

What I miss out on by treating prayer in this manner is the bounty of blessing God desires to bestow on me. His blessings are greater than anything I can fathom, yet too often I toil away in prayerlessness attempting to do God’s work without God’s blessing. The absurdity of a life such lived is striking as I write it, yet remains too easily maintained.

God’s faithfulness is not dependent on mine. He is always more ready to hear…

Back in Vienna

by

After spending a little more than 2 weeks in the US, I’m back in Vienna and back in the thick of things at VCS. I had a great time seeing family and friends even though the weather was equally hot and muggy in Tampa and Philly.

Here are some other highlights from my brief stay in the US:

  • Visited my old pal, the ENIAC, for inspiration
  • Attended a block party in Philly
  • Played with an iPhone – pretty snazzy, but I think I’ll make due with my latest hand-me-down cell phone
  • Fired a .44 Magnum – wow. No way Dirty Harry is firing this thing one-handed. I don’t care how cool Clint Eastwood is.
  • Stood in an airport security line with the 2007 NCAA Strutting Champion – and she had the trophy to prove it. I’m not really sure what a strutting competition looks like, but I think the picture I have in my head is a lot more amusing than the real thing.
  • Watched 2 movies and a couple of sitcoms on the way from Tampa to Washington DC. – fyi that’s usually a 2 hour flight.
  • Crashed at my dad’s apartment in DC after missing my flight to Vienna.

As you can see my time in the US was very exciting.

I’ve just finished my first week of orientation at VCS, and am looking forward to the school year…though I think I wouldn’t mind if I had an extra couple of days…or a week even…to get ready. Though I probably think that every year. School starts this Thursday!

Prater Film Festival

by

Prater Film FestivalFor the last few years, there is a Film Festival in the Prater during July.  Older films are featured here and many of them are black and white. This year’s theme is science fiction and they’re showing everything from The Forbidden Planet to Star Wars on the big screen.

I caught two films while I was here: the first was Alphaville which was French with German subtitles. I had a little trouble following this one even though I got the basic gist of it. The fact that the main character was an American portraying many of the accustomed stereotypes was quite amusing.

Tonight I saw Westworld, which was written and directed by Michael Crichton. Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: Westworld is part of an amusement park where people can pay top dollar to spend a few weeks in the Old West. It is populated by highly sophisticated and life-like robots that have all the functions of a normal human beings. Patrons can even go so far as to shoot and “kill” these robots in realistic gunfights without fear of harm.  Everything is going fine until the robots start acting strangely…cue sinister music.

Both nights were perfect for outdoor movie watching under the Riesenrad.

Why I Love Vienna

by

RathausMaybe it’s just the sunshine talking after enduring the summer weather in Plymouth(temps in the 60’s with plenty of rain), but yesterday I felt a little pang of sadness for that day when I might leave Vienna.

Since the weather was so nice, I decided to take a walk along the canal and then through the city to the Rathaus where there is a summer film festival. It was the middle of the afternoon, so I was just planning on checking out the scene, snagging a few schedules for future reference and maybe grabbing a bite to eat. Just as I was about to leave a group of musicians assembled on the stage and began to play some toe-tapping jazz/blues/ragtime numbers. It was a wonderful way to spend my afternoon, taking in some live music with a cool beverage and the sun overhead.

I’ve included three short video clips of the music below. Unfortunately my 5 year old point-and-shoot camera doesn’t take stellar video and it forces my clips to be 30 seconds or less. So the video’s not so great, but the audio comes through nice and clear.

Back to Austria Where My $ Goes Farther

by

Falling off the Geek Ladder

So I’ve now finished year 2 of my 3 year Master’s program, and am enjoying a couple of days to myself in Vienna before I head back to the US. I enjoyed my time in Plymouth hanging out with friends from last year and learning a few things in my classes. Though the weather was mostly cold and rainy, there were a few pokes of sunshine and even some really nice days the last week when I was holed up in my room trying to finish all my work. I’m already looking forward to next year.

One thing that I noticed upon exploring the summer scene in Vienna is that things are a lot cheaper here. I normally wouldn’t have noticed, but living in England for a month I got used to thinking about prices being double in dollars. For instance, if I bought a value meal at McDonald’s for 4.5 Pounds, I was really spending $9 on a meal. In Austria, if I spend 4.5 Euro on a McDonald’s meal, it only costs me $6.25. What a savings!

So I’m looking forward to being back in the US for a few weeks where I don’t instinctively do math in my head to think about how much I’m really spending on something….or cringe when I figure it out.