Mayor's welcome and the local news

On the Balcony with Mikel

I realized that the last several posts that I have done have been centered around travelling, so here is the news from closer to home.
   A few weeks ago a 250 kg (550 lb) bomb was found during excavation for the Haupbahnhof renovation. I like to think about Graz as a piece of the medieval/renaissance period, but people here are still living pieces of WWII. The area around the Hauptbahnhof was evacuated and the bomb exploded. There was some damage to surrounding buildings, broken windows. Check out the full story (in english) here.

Sitting on the representative's seats with
Theresa, Mikel, and Ruth

   In other news, there was a welcome last night for the exchange students put on by the city of Graz. There would have been a welcome by the mayor, but he was in a meeting. Instead one of the other members of the city government gave us a lovely welcome followed by a rare chance to see the Hauptplatz from the Rathaus balcony and a reception with food and drinks. There were so many more students than they expected that they started running low on the wines and hour d'oeuvre sandwiches.

   The downside of spring in Graz: everything is green and blooming! I finally bit the bullet and tracked down some Claratin- or as it's called here, the Claratyn. And, like most things, finding allergy meds happens just a little differently here. If you want basic vitamins, shampoo, or the like you visit your local "Schlecker" or "dm," which does not have a pharmacy. For anything else, you visit the Apotheke, which looks like it could have come out of the turn of the century.  I walked up to the dark wooden counter and briefly explained the problem (auf Deutsch), and requested Claratin from the attendant in a white coat, who fetched a month's supply of life-giving Loratadine from the drug-lined wooden shelves.