Breaking bones....

Guess what happened to me on my BIRTHDAY? Well, on my way home from the volleyball course I was teaching at, lost in thought, I had a crash with my bike... when I got up from the road I was like - "Wow, I can move my shoulder, lucky me!"
But when I took a second feel, I realised I had not been so lucky after all - I noticed my right collarbone was facing the wrong way!
So I went to hospital to have an x-ray done - it looked a little like the pic above - was slightly flustered, got a corset at first, which should have moved the bone back where it belonged. But when I had a check up with a second X-ray on Thursday it had not moved as far as the docs had anticipated and, considering my profession and interests, I was advised to have it fixed with surgery... and then it will look a little like this:
So, on Monday next, I will undergo my first real surgery, well, I had my tonsils taken out when I was 8 or so, but I do not think that counts - it´s too far back, I guess!
Anyways, just wanted to give you guys and update on my situation, it´s not that bad, though, sounds worse than it really is - the pain is acceptable, I actually returned to the volleyball camp for Thursday and Friday - did not play, naturally, but was there to assist. And my lovely Rita is there to help me wash my hair and everything, so I´m alright, I reckon, and soon, we´ll be laughing about it.
Alright, gonna go now. If I get the x-rays, I´ll put one in here for you guys, maybe you´re interested? Wish me luck!
ERF

Back from Benenden, into the middle of MAYHEM

Hi there,

Have just come back from 3 wonderful weeks in England, check out www.benenden.at to see more pics like this one, showing Lisa, me and Ellie on our way to Rye Royal,


or that one, showing the whole group of TU 6 at lovely Brighton seaside.

So, having returned from my summer in Benenden could mean that I now have some time to relax and enjoy the last part of the holidays - well, not for me, it doesn't! As soon as I returned on Friday, reality kicked in again - in good ways, though!
First, I was able to play in my team´s second game of the season and we won 2:0, a relativley good performance by me as well as the rest of the team!
Then, on Monday morning, Rita and I started moving flats. So, we got up at 7 and started kicking boxes around - thank god, Mum, Dad and my friend Alexander helped us, so we managed to get ready by something like 6 pm - wouldn't have happened without Christian and Arthur who came to the rescue at the end of the day and helped us with the last truck load.
On Tuesday, we still had to paint the old flat, so up we got at 7 and started working on it - took until 2 when we finally handed over our flat to its new owner - so, now, we still have to organise our new appartment so people can actually see it, open the doors, etc... a lot of work ahead of us still... but good stuff!
And, at the weekend, Rita and I are going to the Südsteiermark with a few mates - that'll be awesome, good relaxing down there! Talk to you again soon!
ERF

The holidays have started... not really though...

Hi folks!

.... sorry for not having been very active on this account for the last half year, folks,.... or, actually, whoever is out there.
It seems I might have been a bit more active on another account though, but make no mistake, this is my god son, Georg Jakob, and not a baby of my own! But he`s groovy, and I'm getting into this thing quite a bit, so who knows.... ;-)
I've just finished the school year and needed to relax and fill up the engines for a while before the new stuff ahead is kicking in... Rita and I are moving to a different place here in Linz, so we're organising things like a new kitchen, a new rentee for our old flat, a moving van, and so on, and so forth... quite a few things, really.
And in a week and a half I will be leaving Austria again for a while to go to England and do my course at www.benenden.at again... Looking forward to that actually, that'll be good again... and I do not have to worry about putting up stuff in the new appartment or about cooking without a kitchen or about... about nothing really, so that´s magnifique!
The picture I'm showing you today is from my Matura... A-Level exams, as others might call it... it shows the group of people who I taught for the last 4 years... they were my first group of students of English and I daresay they all did a great job and I feel they actually learnt something... and I do not mean just for the finals, in general is what I meant...
Here they are with their teachers (can you spot me?):

I wish them all the best in their future and hope to see them again some time to be able to reminisce in the good old times! Cheerio,
Ernsti

Bush Government Count Down!

Check this out!
I have just found a George Bush Countdown Clock for my Blog!
I´m gonna install it straight away, seems pretty cool!
Find it yourselves here!
ERF

Our trip to Brussels 30/11/07 - 2/12/07!

Hi there, people, I just wanted to show you a few impressions of Rita and my trip to Brussels last weekend! It was marvellous to visit Emilie and David, my former room mate in Vienna again, and this time they had chosen a different place for a reunion! Last year over Easter, we went to Paris to spend some great days there with the two of them and the twins Brice et Sebastien (also former mates from Vienna!) - and this time it was Brussels!
When we left from Vienna, everything went really well and we arrived in Brussels perfectly on time, got our luggage and were picked up by David. We arrived at his flat and met Emilie, Vincent (David´s brother) and his girl friend, Charlotta.
Then we went out to get some food. David and Vincent knew a really nice place where we could have food at that late time of the night. After all, it was already past midnight when we got our meals - but it was worth it, because they were definitely delicious! Rita and I shared some Iranian lamb, which tasted very much of aniseed! Wow, interesting! Look at it, there we´ve got it on a couple of pics.

After this delicious meal, we decided to stay out and went to a little bar - the atmosphere there was just groovy, with a lot of Caribbean music from the 80s and 90s we all had a really good time, ended up going to bed at 5 in the morning!

So, when we got up at around 9.45 the following day, we were quite tired! But, as the day was outstandingly beautiful, we had to seize it! Here are some of the sights we discovered throughout our tour:










left to right: Manneken Pis - Rita in the Gallerie Roi Hubert - Baker´s Guild on Grand Place

After meeting Emilie and David for lunch, which was, as you might guess, amazing, we walked on trough beautiful Brussels and enjojyed David´s knowledge about the place. We were quite tired by the time we got back home - but we were invited to a party of David´s friend Alain. So, off we went to a suburbian apartment with Portuguese, English, French and Belgian people - well, there were also two Austrians but I mean, we knew them in advance! :-)
It´s a pity we did not take any pics there - however, we took some from the way home... it was good fun, thanks, Alain!
On the pic, you can see Jose, a Portuguese interpreter in Brusses - a very nice chap - but everyone there was just really interesting and good fun to talk to!
The follwing day started even later!
This time, we only got up at around half twelve and had breakfast together, then went off to see some more of Brussels. So, Rita, Emilie, David and I discovered the Royal Palace (below),

the Palais de Justice, the old England House, now a museum, saw some of the fantastic comic art designs on the walls of Brussels and so on and so forth. We had some super crepes and salads as well as some lovely last drinks at another atmospheric restaurant, waffles at the Christmas Market and eventually returned home at around 4.45pm. Then we were invited to Vincent´s place for some Gloeg (Charlotta´s Swedish) and had to catch our train to Brussels airport!
The trip would have been perfect, if not for the return journey! First we nearly chose the wrong lane for check in (twice, actually) and then we unexpectedly had to wait as well. Due to an airport "traffic" jam we started an hour late and, thus, arrived in Vienna an hour later than expected also! My brother Christoph was not very happy about the delay and, when we tried to pay the parking fee, we encountered another problem: the parking ticket did not work anymore - so I went to find someone who I could give some money to - successfully, of course, and when Rita and I finally hopped into bed at home in Linz it was around 2 in the morning! But.... time does not matter when it comes to experiences and weekends like that!
We would like to thank Emilie and David again for their kindness and for showing us around so patiently - I hope you had a good time too, friends! Ok, I´ll be on here again soon, check out the blog again some time before Christmas!
Oh, for more pics, see my flickr page...
ERF

Brussels - we´re coming!

Hi guys, don´t actually know whether you get this in due time - but next weekend Rita and I are going to visit mon ami David in Brussels! I can´t wait to see it again, as I went to see Iny a few years ago and found the place just outstanding! So, this time it´s me and Rita checking out the night life with dear "old" friends Emilie and David - should be good!
I´ll put some more pics on this as soon as I have more! The 2 you can see are...

the Town Hall of Brussels and...

... Rita et David avant Monmartre á Paris!

It was a super trip there, hopefully, this one will be just as great! ;-) Check here again next week for further information!
ERF

Explaining Maria how it works!

Hi there today I´m showing to Maria how a blog works... hopefully she´s gonna be alright! -9

ERF

Mathias Gabler´s second birthday do - wow, what a party!

Well well well.... who would have expected that! After having invited Mathias to a couple of days full of wine and no worries, Sandra, Sonja, Joachim, Mathias and I met up in Gamlitz last Wednesday to reminisce in the good ole times and spend some quality time together - it was great fun!
We ended up sitting outside at a "Buschenschank" (a vinyard´s place where you canget food and drink directly from the wine makers) in the rain and tried various different tasty wines until we finally had had too much and then went back home - as far as I know anyways...
On Thursday, we got up relatively late and ended up going home quite a little earlier than I had planned, but we were too knackered to stay longer... The picture shows Mathias enjoying hisHavana cigar, which I had got for my birthday the other day from Josch.... Look at more pics on my flickr page!
ERF

Photographs of Benenden online now!

Hi there, as promised, there are some of the pics I took online now! Check them out on my flickr page!
Also, more on www.benenden.at or on http://benendenisfun.googlepages.com/home, a site created by Matt, one of the students of TU6! The picture here shows the teachers of my TU: Lisa, Alex, Cass and Ernsti (well, I, actually!) We were cool! ;-)
ERF

There and back again - an Austrian´s tale!

Hi, it was ingenious once more to be able to spend some time in Benenden... wow, I cannot believe I´m still saying that after 7 times of going there... you´d expect to get bored by it, wouldn´t you? Well, I am not and I was not. Just lovely it was!
So, back in Austria, I´m trying to make amends with my sleep deficit, going to bed before midnight is not such a bad thing after all!
Thanks one more time, GB, I don´t know what I would do without you and your beauty sometimes... Ok, that sounds really gay. but you gotta be there to understand I guess, the area around Benenden and the places we go to are just fantastic! Pics to be seen soon! For got my camera....
ERF

Being in Benenden!!!

Hi there, I havent been writing as I have been really really busy in the last few days what with all the England thing going on and stuff! ;-)
No, seriously, check out the page: www.benenden.at - it´s just groovy and contains lots of pics that suit the occasion....
ERF

Hola from Barcelona!

Wow, the first 3 days had quite an impact on us... we saw loads of things, had really good weather for sight seeing and managed to get locked in the house... all in all quite an amusing first few days.

Crossing the Alps already proved to be an amazing experience, the beauty of these mountains is virtually undescribable!

Then, when we had arrived we were not certain whether Esther would find us - she was there alright, and so we went to their flat and took off for a first walk through Barcelona...
Along the Avinguda Diagonal, one of the longest streets of Barcelona where we came across houses of the typical Barcelona Jugendstil. Quite nice - the most striking feature of the first few hours was "la poya" though, the dick... I wonder why they call it that, do you?:

So, anyways, we went into town, met up with Llorenc (Lorenzo), Esther´s boyfriend and had dinner in a beautiful Catalan restaurant, mmmh, very nice food there, especially the sea food was delicious for me! Not for Rita, though! Look at Esther and the beautiful "bombas":

The following day, Esther and Lorenzo took us to Montjuic and the Olympic village of 1992! Beautiful area, lots of huge monuments and superb view over the city! We had a really good time there, enjoyed the atmosphere while a guitarist was playing outside the museum up there.

Then we went back home and watched Fernanda Alonso win the Grand Prix of Germany on Nürburgring, which also was an interesting experience... fantastic atmosphere again, I can tell you!
On Monday, Esther and Lorenzo had to go to work, so we took by ourselves and went up the second hill which captivates Barcelona in its valley: Tibidabo, slighlty higher than Montjuic and with a huge chapel on top! Also, they have an ancient amusement park up there, which looked quite cool and bars with brilliant views over Barcelona! See for yourselves:


Afterwards we went to one of the highlights of my tour! The "Estadio Camp Nou", where Barcelona FC plays their home games in front of as many as 85000 people sometimes! I have to say, Rita enjoyed the toour probably even more than I did, as I have been to other stadiums before and she´d only been to the one of LASK Linz (not very impressive after all), but it was really cool. I want to show you the changing rooms and the grounds from above:

In the end we were really tired again and returned home, where Esther and Lorenzo looked after us like little birds - this has been great so far, honestly, Barcelona is well worth visiting! Check this blog for more in the next few days, also check out my flickr page for more pics!

3 hours to go...

Hi there, we only have like 3 more hours until we leave for Barcelona, and I am still stupidly trying to get some info on this page... that´s a bit stupid indeed, considering I have not been writing for the last year, roughly, and now I want to make up for it, it seems.
Well, nevermind, that´s cool we can relax for the whole of next week, just today, we should actually go to a little village outside the city in order to experience some of the good ole "real" Spanish surroundings...
Cool, we cannot wait anylonger, will be cool... are already planning our trip for the next year... Washington! ;-)
ERF

Barcelona, we´re coming!!!

Hi there, everyone out there in the void... isn´t the heat virtually unbearable? I think, my mind is totally numb most of the time from trying to cool down, I´d love to have a air conditioning system in the house... but, no, there isn´t one and so I have to bear with it for as long as it lasts... I know that many of you guys suffer from the same heat, so I should stop complaining! And I will, as Rita and I are going away soon! On Saturday morning, we´re off to Barcelona for a week! Can´t wait! Here´s one of the things waiting for us... The Arce de Triomphe of Barcelona! Nice, ey?! Hopefully, it´s not too hot! ;-) More pics to be delivered soon! ERF

Mathias Gabler´s surprise party in Neupölla!

What a successful weekend!
First I corrected the last test of my class and had no fail grades, then Rita and I went to a wedding and to a surprise party for a friend of mine in Lower Austria´s northern area, the "Waldviertel" and then I had a really good football match on Sunday, too... our team did not win, but we put up a real fight for the last time, as we´re being relegated to the 2. Klasse Nordwest in Upper Austria. Check out the blog about football here.
So, there are a few more pics on my flickr page, check them out, too, they are good fun. Mathias was so incredibly happy when he saw Rita and me arriving a little late (3 hours after the real surprise) but were basically a new surprise again, which was super... so we had too much drink and too much fun to be described in a little diary entry, but... groovy night, singing on singstar, drinking excellent wines, talking to fantastic and friendly people. Sabine and Mathias´ relatives are amazing! :-)
So, there´s a pic here: It shows Mathias and me singing Father and Son... he did not quite know how to sing it, but I reckon we didn´t do too badly, considering we´d already had a few... so, it was a great weekend,... there are more to come, I hope as our present was to spend a weekend somewhere in the Burgenland tasting wines... looking forward to that one!
ERF

Martin "Xi" Kopf - my man in Denmark!

Hi there, folks...
Today I just want to send you a link to one of my mate´s travel blogs... he´s a really funny man who has done journalism and English so the whole thing has been done up really properly and he always gets pics on his blog too... he started out his journey in Denmark and has now moved on to Sweden!
We studied together in Vienna, and he´s good fun, always up for a laugh! (as people from Vorarlberg normally are!) Xi, if you see this, haha!
Check it out - that´s his blog: http://mann-von-welt.blogspot.com/
ERF

Some new pics on the picture site!

Hi everyone, I haven´t been in touch for a while, due to several things that have been going round my head for too long, really...
Stressful times at school, no success at playing football, a hamstring injury on top of all that and not a lot of motivation to write even more things on the pc, when correcdting and preparing take up so much time in the first place...
Anyways, don´t want to bore you with details about teaching, it´s still an amazing pastime, am really happy to be allowed to have such a marvellous occupation, it´s so satisfying... that´s what the kids would lkike to get, haha!
Yeah, apart from that.... Rita and me are going to Barcelona end of July, Zweilaenderlauf is coming close, a lot of work ahead in that respect, too, and also, preparation for the summer courses is about to start - beforehand, though, I have to grade about 115 students to make sure that they receive the grade they deserve, so there´s still a lot of responsibility there too, am not willing to decide about students fates too lightly!
The picture you see was taken last year in Paris and shows Eros, standing on the tip of the Opera House, which has been placed where there used to be.... damn, I´ve forgotten!
Yeah, well, look at my pics and enjoy your time, I´ll be back soon - by the way, if your write a commentary, I get an info mail, so I´d be happy to receive one every now and then... ;.)
ErF

Eric - happy birthday!

Hi mate, as you are one of the few people checking my blog every now and then, I´m hoping this receives you well and in the shape that I expect you to be in - which is, as always, a very good one! ;-) Happy birthday, I do not know how to get in touch with you - well, I could have phoned your parents! But I have no new mail address not anything like a phone number, and the old one is not in service anymore, is it?
Take care, hope everything´s going well, have even bought one of your great shavers!
Cheerio,
ERF

Birgit, my friend from school!

this is a picture of Birgit, my friend from school!

ERF

Winton weekend - I´m coming!

Something really exciting has come up - not that I have a lot of time and so on, but still... Karl, my mate, and me are going to Winchester next weekend! Yeah, there´s a grand reunion at King Alfred´s College every year, where people from former uni sports teams meet and compete against the momentary teams... good fun, and some great partying involved too!
Apart from that, there´s not a lot to tell... have been really busy in the last three to four weeks, what with writing papers and correcting them as well, and so on... it was good fun as well though! Next week we´ve got the semester break so there is some time to relax and some more time to go out and have some fun too! ;-)