I am terrified of flying. Irrationally, unbelievably terrified. So when I came into Salzburg yesterday after a good 12 or so hours of travel, I was about spent. That's a long time to be teetering on the edge of certain and grisly death. It didn't help that I took the smallest plane they make from Frankfurt to Salzburg… "Jimbo's Air" or something like that…

But now I'm here and loving it. The library intern for the Salzburg Seminar, I now am on a three month stint to help run a small academic library in the Schloss Leopoldskron, which is a pseudo-conference center just outside of town proper. The Schloss, actually, houses a year-long set of conferences on global issues of academic interest, and my job is to assist anyone who wants to use the library to those ends. What makes it interesting is that the Seminar has not had a librarian for about two years now: the person running it now (10 hours a week) is actually an admissions counselor who is literally up to her neck in work that she can't spend time on. Thus the need for a library intern.

I plan on going and buying a digital camera this weekend so that I can show you my surroundings, but for right now I'll put up some stock photos and we'll catch up later.

 Let me just say that, by far, the hardest challenge has been the language barrier. I know just enough German to ask for Bratwurst, but not much else. Even the simplest of conversations turn me into a snivelling linguistic infant. Consider this exchange as I was walking around the Schloss:

Passing Teenagers: Allo!

Me (stammering): Uh… uh… allo?

Teens: Wie Gehts?

Me (flop-sweating): AAA… Good… BYE NOW…

…and so my social interactions in Osterreich are sub-par.

I'll get back to you as soon as I can with more pictures and stories… Gute Nacht!

-Jamion