Our flat has been full for the past month and a half. We have had visitors nonstop since the beginning of February. It started with our friend Jen from Hungary just kept going. We had a teacher from Minnesota stay with us for a week while she was visiting our school to see about setting up an exchange program for students and teachers from her school. It was fun having her and she brought us a HUGE jar of peanut butter and a HUGE bag of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. Yum, yum. After that we had a couple of girls from a traveling drama group at our house for a few days. After that, it was our friend Matt from Hungary who cooked some amazing curry chicken for us. Soon after, my sisters came (for TWO whole weeks). The day after my sisters came, a friend of Karin's came. The day my sisters left, Erin,from Hungary came for the night. Then the next night, the Kellum family (a family of 6) and Jen came for a couple of days. The next night, Heather from Hungary came. So, for one night, we had a grand total of 11 people staying in our two bedroom flat. Five in one bedroom, four in the other and two in the living room. Amazingly, we had enough beds for seven of our guests, so only the kids had to sleep on the floor.
Sisters
Kacie and Hannah came for two weeks. They arrived on a Thursday, which is a story in itself, and stayed for my spring break and left the Wednesday after my break. We had a great time - how could we not - three sisters bumming around Europe. We hit four countries in their two weeks. And we have the pictures to show it. Kacie was the official photographer of the group and blessed us with gazillions of photos.
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Arrival
I said it was a story in itself and so, here it is. Thursday. 8am. I arrive at school and teach my only two classes of the day, finishing by 10. I get a quick snack from the cafeteria and go catch the 95 bus. From there I catch the 70, which takes me to the autobus station, arriving with just five minutes before my bus leaves. Hannah is scheduled to arrive at the Vienna airport at 12:45, so I need to catch the 11am bus which will get me to the airport by 12. So, I literally run in to the ticket counter and ask for a ticket. The lady at the counter refuses to sell me a ticket for the 11am as it is so close. I take the ticket for the 12 bus, but run like crazy to try and catch the 11. I do! So, I arrive at the airport and check the board. So far, so good. Planes are both on time. I sit down and eat some lunch and at 12:45, I stand up so I can be right at the front of the gate. No Hannah. By 1:45, I don't know what to think. I wonder if maybe she didn't make her connection but see that the next should arrive shortly so I decide to wait. Besides that, her cell phone doesn't work, so there is not much I can do. By this time, I can see that Kacie's flight is also delayed. So, I wait some more. After the next flight comes in and no Hannah, I go to the information desk and have her paged. No luck. But, in another 30 minutes or so (almost 2 hours late), out she walks. It turns out that she was waiting for Kacie at baggage claim and when she didn't show up on time, she decided to come and find me. So then Hannah and I wait for Kacie's 4pm flight. By 4:45, no Kacie so I have her paged. A couple minutes later she walks out. Lost luggage. We get that sorted out, buy bus tickets and find a bench as the bus doesn't leave for another 45 minutes. Thankfully the bus ride is easy. No problems. However, we have more problems when we get into the bus station. Both girls brought my parents luggage, from the 80's with teeny tiny wheels and no real handles for pulling it. And of course, the luggage is heavy. So, we half drag half carry it to the next bus stop. We buy tickets and somehow lug it on board. Three huge suitcases and two backpacks. We get off two stops later and have to drag the suitcases four or five blocks to the next bus. By this time, we are all dead tired. It is almost 7:30 and it has been a long day for all of us. We again lug our the suitcases on. The next stop we get off is the closest one to my house, but that is not saying much. It is quite a hike when you have so much luggage. Across a parking lot (this is where the handle broke), down a flight of stairs, down the bike path, across a dirt path (this is where we drug the suitcases on their sides through the mud, got the wheels clogged with pebbles and dirt and almost fell down the hill because we were so tired), across the canal, up another dirt hill, across the street and finally into my building. By the time we finally got all the suitcases into the house, it was 8pm. We had just enough energy to make introductions, scramble some eggs and make up the spare bed, before the girls crashed. What an adventure.
More adventures...
My sisters came to school with me for a total of three days. They were able to meet all my classes. They all had lots of questions, and one of them even fell in love with one of my beautiful sisters! During our week off, we went to Vienna for a day (did lots of shopping, visited St. Stephens Cathedral and the catacombs underneath), went to Milan for two days (more shopping), went to Budapest (saw Hero's Square, House of Terror and Castle Hill - no shopping) and toured around Bratislava. We saw as much as we could, but the best part was just getting to hang out with two of my best friends. Gotta love sister time!
