there ARE kangaroos in austria

my family visited me this week. i would classify it as basically a semi-tour of vienna followed by a mega tour of european beer drinking. we also got to see bratislava and i took them to the same two places i went last time i was in bratislava: the crappy castle and the awesome restaurant. we had the famous zlaty bazant slovakian beer. unfortunately they did not get the same "bratislava" experience i did in the sense that i had to run away from falling debris the moment i arrived in the city, but they got the idea when i sort of reenacted it. i took jake out to LOCO on wednesday night an we met up with some other friends who were still in town. much to his disgust i made him take the tequila shot with a slice of orange and told him to "think of my pain every wednesday at 6 pm your time". in hindsight the tequila may have been a bad move because i later saw jake become a little overly-patriotic about his own country to some of the locals. i later learned that some "locals" actually turned out to be american as well. we stayed out after public transportation ended and tried to find the night bus but failed miserably and ended up walking 3 km back to haus erasmus (reminiscent of walking home to the north pole last semester). at one point in the night i had given up hope and thought we were wandering around aimlessly in vienna so i finally shoved jake into a cab and by some divine miracle remembered the street address of my dorm. the cab drove a block, turned, drove another block, and dropped us off at the front door. i just wasted 5 euro.

the best part about the trip (besides seeing the fam of course) was this australian bar called Billabong. the parents had been there while jake and i were at LOCO and suggested it. as soon as we walked in we saw 3 screens of NCAA basketball that was to be on all night. thats all the reason i needed. ive fallen in love with this bar for the following reasons:

1. they speak english
2. 2 euro pitchers during happy hour
3. they show all the basketball and soccer games
4. they play (what i consider) great music
5. they asked me to play on their bar cricket team

im not kidding about the last one. im heading off to my whirlwind tour of europe today. ill be on the train for about 22 hours. no more posts for about 2 weeks unless something utterly hilarious happens and i simultaneously find an internet cafe. happy easter everyone.

cheers.