The Flight and Arrival

"Look Lexi! Christmas came early!" It's always Christmas when snuggling up with an Austrian Air flight blankie. And the flight attendants are cute. What a bonus. "Are all the boys in Austria this cute?" we ask. We sure hope so, and joyfully anticipate more Austrians with cute faces.
8 hours, several awkward sleeping positions, and two surprisingly good airplane meals later, we see our first glances of Austria. So green! To a die-hard pheonix girl like Lexi, the sight is beyond all wonders of the imagination. We go to get our passports stamped. We are through! We look at the stamp. "That's it!?" shouts a guy in our group. A little black box with the words "Wien - Schwechat". A little anti-climactic. But exciting nonetheless.
As we leave customs and step on to Austrian soil (well, okay, Austrian tile flooring) we head to the baggage claim. The airport is surprisingly small. Elizabeth sees her bright red suitcase and pulls it off, checking the tag. She sees airport codes: VIE and IAD. "IAD? Is anyone here from Idaho? No? Okay. I'll put it back on." And as it goes around, she realizes that that was, indeed, her suitcase that she just put back on the conveyer belt. The stupidity has begun.

And then came the forceful van driver...
So after getting our bags and meeting our prgram director we were herded into the tiniest of elevators. So get this-- we even got lost on the elevator. we got on and couldn't remember if we had pushed the button, and it didn't feel like we were moving, but all of the sudden the doors opened and a poor little German kid was standing there. We started asking questions and all he replied was "I don't speak English." We were on floor -1 (yes, negative one), and highly confused. we went back up, saw the rest of our group waiting for us, and went promptly back down to the empty corridor, highly confused. We went out to where the vans were parked and the forceful van driver herded us in. "Get in! GEt in!" he shouted over and over in English with the thickest accent ever. We were wondering about our luggage so we stepped out of the van. "Get in!" So we did.

There was a beautiful rainbow on the drive into Vienna. Absolute Gorgeousness. Plus it was a ways to the hotel. Amazing. We are in Europe.