Julia was off someplace warmer, but the place I stayed in last night in Vienna was impressively comforting for a hostel and exactly what I needed. The shower didn't break off the wall when I turned it on which immediately put it up above the last place I stayed. I changed into comfy clothes and my blue wooly socks that always make me happier and went down to make some soup. The kitchen was full of people making pasta and chicken stir-fry and a bunch of other delicious dishes that put my powdered soup mix to shame. I sat down at a table with Andy Knight, a Kiwi who got a two-year visa to travel around Europe and maybe work, eventually. He shared his 2-liter bottle of red wine (only 3,50 euro!) with me and Jessica, an Aussie that was on the last month of her year-long trip. It was lovely talking with those two because they had already been traveling so much and staying in too many hostels that they were tired of the usual hostel-talk. We stuck to other topics like the benefits of old cars, anything to get away from, "so where have you been?". While an Indian girl serenaded us with Beatles songs on a guitar, Andy and I played a drinking game with the last of his wine, a nice simple game that was entertaining but not enough to combat my exhaustion. I hadn't intended on being very social at this hostel since I was just so tired from traveling through Eastern Europe and such little sleep, so when I went upstairs to get my laptop I just stayed up there and fell into my enormous pillow. I feel bad now because I didn't say good-bye to Andy; I hope he wasn't offended! In any case, his hometown is an hour north of Dunedin and I can always try to track him down some way or another. Jessica and him were the two most normal, nice people I've met at a hostel so far!

I left the hostel feeling very refreshed and comforted. I checked train times and saw that there was one in about 40 minutes so I booked it over to the station, picked up some bananas and kiwis on the way and now I'm on my way to Munich. I'm sharing the compartment with a young woman and her very cute baby; they are both asleep now so I'm not going to be creepy and keep looking at them. It made me happy to help her life her bag up into the overhead racks, making up for all the help I got with my backpack on that Serbian train!