This month has been really busy and fun and I can’t believe that it’s already been almost 2 months since I started work in Austria! I feel like it’s gone by so fast already and we are already almost a quarter of the way through the winter season.
This month we had some really interesting events in and around Schladming and did some fun things with the other staff. One of the main events that we got to see was the World cup night race for skiing that was held at the hill where we live. The race was on a Tuesday and the entire weekend leading up to it was absolutely crazy with people everywhere setting up stands and security and extra fences everywhere. The worst though was the day of the race because the streets were crowded and to get onto every different street or into any store you had to go through a security checkpoint. It was kinda a fun atmosphere because everyone was so excited but it was also sometimes really overwhelming. We live literally across the street from the base of the ski lift so it’s a VIP area and you needed a special pass you get in. This meant that every time we left the “zone” that we lived in, we had to bring passes with us so that we could get in and out of our street.
We didn’t have to work in the evening because many of the guests would want to watch the race from the side of the slope. We were welcome to join because we had the right pass for it. About an hour before the race we took a very circular route through a lot of security to climb right up to the side of the slopes. We had such a good view of the racers because we were pretty much at the highest point that you could watch the end of the race from. We watched the whole area fill up with people and the whole mood was so exciting and anticipating. It was also snowing pretty hard right before the race so it looked really beautiful under the stadium lights and everything was sparkly and lit up.
By the time the race started the area that we were standing was pretty full but thankfully not to crowded and it was so loud. People were cheering all the time so we couldn’t really hear the names or countries of the competitors. Luckily some of the people in our group had the roster on their phones so we could follow along and cheer for the appropriate countries, (basically including Germany, Austria and for me, Canada.) Of course most of the people in the crowd were supporting Austria so it got really loud when an Austrian competitor came down, but there was also some pretty good cheers for Germany and Switzerland as well. To be honest I couldn’t always understand what was happening because to me every competitor looked really similar but it was interesting to watch it with some of the ski instructors from Tauernhof because they were able to see differences in form and technique and explain it to me. Occasionally competitors would fall and it always looks so bad to me because they are going so crazy fast, but to be honest it also always looks kinda funny.
I was originally with a big group of the other staff from Tauernhof but only a few of us stayed right till the end of the first half of the race, so maybe about an hour and a half. The finals wouldn’t be until an hour later so we decided to go back home and watch the finals from the roof of Tauernhof which also has an amazing view of the slope. The other benefit of watching from the roof is that we could also see the start of the race on the screen and then watch the end out the window, all while staying warm. The TV was a few seconds behind the live race and we often could see the end of the race before the TV or hear the cheers before it came onto the screen.
There were 2 pretty crazy things that happened in the second half of the race which were really entertaining. The first was that a girl ran out of the crowd and across the finish line seconds before on of the competitors finished and set off the sensor for his finishing time. So when they put up his time (which was not legit because of the lady) he was so excited because the time that they had recorded would have put him in first. Once they figured out his actual time it was like third or something, but not first. The second thing was that there was a big upset for first place. The competitor from Austria who was ranked first in the first half was the one who was expected to win, and everyone was so hype to watch him. Because of his position he had the last run of the night, but really close to the start of the race he had a big fall and was disqualified. The Austrians were rioting. It was insane. We could here people shouting on the slopes and in the streets and people were being totally crazy. This meant that a guy from Norway won, which was a bit unexpected even though he was a strong competitor.
I went to bed pretty soon after the race but didn’t sleep very well because there is a club across from our campus that was really loud and busy that night. One big downside of the race was that there were tons and tons of drunk people everywhere so we kinda had to be careful of where we went in the evening and also had to be aware of making sure all the doors on our campus were locked and that our guests were aware of keeping their doors closed and not leaving out any ski equipment or anything. Things didn’t really start to calm down until about 6 in the morning and even then there was still people out in the streets and new crews of people who were there to help clean things up. By the end of the next day however, they had everything taken down and the city was really empty. It was almost a bit weird how fast it went from crazy to quiet but it was nice to not have to go through all that security.
I feel like the race came and went so fast but it was really cool to get to be a part of it. It’s something that I think will probably be a once in a lifetime thing for me because I’m not that interested in the ski races but it’s a really cool experience that feels very unique to this mountain area in Austria.
The next two weeks here I’m really excited for and one of the main reasons is that they are both being held in English. This week is a very international group and after meeting a few of them I think it’s going to be really fun and different from all of the other normal weeks.
Kelsi's Travel Times 