Travel Bugged Just a girl with an unhealthy addiction to travel (not healthy for my wallet anyway) I've travelled to many a far and distant places including the mazes of Venice (maps are useless in that place) and the towers of Paris (well just one tower of Paris...)

Tentatively, partly because of the cold and ice, and partly because of the nerves, I took the steps off plane in Linz, Austria. Not understanding a word of the language, not knowing the general cultural differences… hell I only knew where Austria was because someone mentioned the Sound of Music. So some would say I was a little unprepared.
Moving to another country for a year was a huge leap for an almost seventeen year old, I had decided on my own that I would like to experience the world through a different view.
My ‘family’ for the next year greeted me at the airport, a ten year old holding a huge white jacket, what I fondly liked to call the ‘marshmallow coat’. My new ‘mother’ greeted me flamboyantly, her skinny arms circling me with a tight embrace and a quick peck to each cheek. As I looked through the fogged up window, now happily wearing the warm marshmallow coat, I immediately began to feel the differences in culture, for one thing, a car is not supposed to drive on the right hand side of the road. My knuckles had become white in the first few minutes of driving down an icy highway at what I would call terrifying speeds… only to find out that my mother was the careful and ‘slow’ driver of the family.
Arriving at my new house I noticed the differences, it was only 5pm yet, darkness had covered the countryside, I listened to the snow crunch underfoot as the ten year old boy watched me in amusement, his short, skilful steps covering the ground much quicker than my slow calculated sliding.
Entering the house I was amused to find some similarities with my own home, for one, Lego covered every inch of the dining room table, but the greeting written for me was not in the only language I knew, but in a foreign scribble of mismatched letters. ‘Herzlich Willkommen in unserem haus Maddison!’ My quick lessons of German while on the plane weren’t helping me now…
Each day that followed was an adventure, it felt as though I was living in a dream world, although my dreams don’t start with an icy ball of snow to the face, thrown by a small grinning boy who can’t fathom the fact it doesn’t snow everywhere in the world during winter. As I toured my new home on the other side of the world, I began to understand the immense cultural differences, people happily wearing Dirndl’s and Lederhosen as if it is nothing, but to me they were making my day, even simple things like cobblestone streets bought great excitement to me, a girl from a modern society and completely different culture. I wasn’t completely sure I knew what culture was before my journey began, but as soon as the kisses were planted on my cheeks I knew that I was stepping outside of my comfort zone, and into something completely new.