Willkommen, Willkommen, Willkommen Sonnenschein!

As spring changes (ever so slowly and hesitatingly) into summer, I've immersed myself even more deeply into the life of this city. Here's a look at what I've been up to:

Österreichischer Frauenlauf (May 26, 2013)

Krieg und Frieden

It's somewhat ironic, and even more traurig, that I had never met any Afghans or Iraqis until coming to Austria. In the United States, we're not confronted with the "collateral damage" of the wars we've started in an up-close, personal way. We have our oceans to protect us, meaning that very few refugees simply wash up on our shores.

The situation in Europe is rather different. Because of its geographic position, it's quite common for refugees from conflict-ridden regions of the world (Africa, Central Asia and the Middle East, the Indian subcontinent) to find their way to the shores of the Mediterranean, and then by boat to Italy, Greece, or Spain. From there, due to open borders within the EU, it's relatively common (although bureaucratically non-permissible) to move on to countries like Austria, where the economy is stronger.

Thoughts that Express Themselves Better in German

Zuerst gibt's eine überraschende Nachricht -- ich bin einer Improv-Gruppe beigetreten! Und zwar Spiel mit den Kulturen, dessen Ziel es ist, durch improvisiertes Theater etwas zur gesellschaftlichen Diskussion darüber beizutragen, wie Vielfalt in multikulturelles Wien erlebt wird. Es geht ums Ausprobieren der Grenzen, ums Spielen mit Stereotypen und Vorurteilen, um die Gestaltung eines Dialogs zwischen den unterschiedlichsten Positionen.

Und genau das ist im ersten Modul geschehen. Ein Naziwitz wurde erzählt, und ich habe mich plötzlich so entsetzt gefühlt. Das Gefühl ist durch meinen ganzen Körper gedrungen. Ich wusste gar nicht, dass das Erwähnen von der NS-Geschichte bei mir so ein Tabu geworden ist, aber das ist es offenbar. Leider ist es alles ganz am Ende des Workshops passiert, und wir konnten nicht darüber im Kreis reden, aber ich habe ein bisserl nach der Stunde mit dem Leiter des Workshops, der um mich Sorge gemacht hat, geredet, und ich glaub, ich verstehe jetzt, wieso ich nicht damit zurecht kommen konnte:

How Well Do You Know the United States?

One of my favorite parts of working at the school I do is that the vast majority of my students have never been to the United States. Exchange years in high school are not all that uncommon in Austria, and I know that TAs in other, wealthier Gymnasien frequently encounter students who've spent a year in Iowa, Alabama, or Montana. (You have to pay extra to get the "good states" like California or New York, so you'll meet Austrians who've lived in the most random f-ing places.) At the very least, many of them have gone to either New York City, Miami,* or Los Angeles on family vacations.

Not so here at Brigittenauer Gymnasium. There are a few exceptions, mostly in the audio classes and sports classes, where students tend to be wealthier because they have to pay Verein (sports club) fees or buy expensive musical equipment. (I even have one student whose mother grew up in Cranberry, PA.) But, for the most part, the closest my students have come to experiencing life in the United States is a dinner at T.G.I. Friday's.

So I get to be their first real introduction to American culture. I've recently led some pretty successful lessons for 4th and 5th formers (13-15-year-olds) where I give them a true/false quiz about life in the United States. Here are some of my favorite questions from that quiz. (Highlight the white area under each question to get the answer, and some comments from me.)

Skifahren in der Schweiz

People at Harvard are always saying that the connections you make there last a lifetime. Unfortunately, there aren't a lot of Harvard students in my little corner of the deutschsprachigen Raum, so I haven't been able to extend the Harvard bubble for another year here. Which makes me even more happy that I made friends with the VUSers (Visiting Undergraduate Students), who are mostly Germans attending the University of St. Gallen in der Schweiz, during my last year of college. I already went to Oktoberfest with some of them, and this weekend, I was invited to a tiny village in Switzerland for skiing, sledding, eating, and other winter activities.

Schüler Say the Darndest Things: Advanced Cuts

I've mentioned before that my students are hilarious. Many times, their humor can be appreciated by anyone, but some of their jokes are more subtle. The more you know about Austria, the funnier they get.

A Tale of Two Bälle

Last night, I went to the TU-Ball in the Hofburg. I don't want to wax too poetic about it; I primarily want you to look at these pictures, tell me I looked stunning in my dress, and be jealous that my life is basically a fairy tale / something out of a Jane Austen novel:

Austrian Privilege Checklist

A few nights ago, I went out to dinner with some of the other Fulbright combined grantees (after our waltzing lessons -- yes, I'm going to a real Wiener ball at the end of the month!). We got to talking about lesson plans, and one of the other TAs mentioned that she's led some pretty successful lessons using Peggy McIntosh's white privilege checklist. Her kids, though, mostly well-to-do Austrians without migration backgrounds*, weren't really getting how this all relates to Austria. "But there aren't that many black people in Austria," they said. "It's not the same."

No, it's not the same. Which is why, taking my cue from McIntosh's original article, a list of religious privileges I found on the Internet, and the experiences of myself and my students, I've generated this checklist of Austrian privileges:

Fasching

"I'm Gonna Fail!"

"Harvard has failed us," goes the speech by Scott Levin-Gesundheit, my former PAF, at Harvard gradation. "And by that, I mean it's given us B-pluses."

I have, throughout my school career, heard from countless friends and schoolmates that "I'm so gonna fail," "I totally failed that exam," etc. And somehow, it all came out okay. No one actually failed out of high school, or of Harvard, or even failed a single class. "Failure" in the American school system is a subjective -- doing more poorly than you had hoped or expected -- rather than an objective experience. Not so in Österreich.

A Purpose, It's That Little Flame

On Friday, I was leading a discussion with a small group of sixth formers (16-year-olds) about social problems, and making a difference in the world. Suddenly, one of the students, who had been super-engaged and participatory throughout the discussion, turned to me and said, "I feel like it sounds so awful when I talk. Like beschissenes German English." It was a problem that I know well.