Fingers crossed....

Dun dun dun......

Had to set the tone for this particular blog today. So, I was on my own in terms of the house-hunting for a place to live in Vienna. I started looking early, and by golly I found something quite good (hopefully).

In Europe, it is common to have a sub-lease when going to study abroad (what a concept! Mandatory in Europe, and should be in the US-in my opinion). You simply put an add up on one of the many different websites out there for renting, post flyers at the University, etc. In my packet of information from the Fulbright Commission, I was given tips on which websites to look at for housing. I was looking on www.wohnen.carreer.at and found a promising post. I emailed the girl, asking more about the apartment, and told her my situation. The plus was that she was renting her room for the same time-frame that I would be in Vienna. Great! Score! But I wasn't the only person vying for her room either. She told me that she couldn't promise me anything, but that I had a good chance because I sounded so nice. I was hoping for the best, but knew that she could just say that she didn't want to rent to someone so far away. In the end, she so kindly decided that I should get her room. Woohoo! From the pictures she sent me it looks really nice. Very IKEA. So, once I get to Vienna, I'll post some pictures up, and hope that it looks like the photos I have seen....

Rewind to Tuesday the 8th, 9:00am...I check my email one last time before heading to the airport. I get an email from the girl saying that she would like me to transfer the money to her account, for the deposit and the rent for September (she pro-rated more or less for the month, since she knew I wasn't going to be there until the 23rd, and that meant she could stay there longer). Total = too much to post in this blog. So, of course I didn't have the time/energy to do it from the US (hello 10 hour flight...), so I told her I'd do it from Germany.

Fast forward to today: I had to take out money from Deutsche Bank, who thankfully partners with BofA so that you can take out money for no fee except the exchange rate. But I had to got to the ATM 3 times on 3 different days in order to get enough money to be able to transfer the deposit and rent to the girl in Vienna. So, Eva and I go to the bank this morning, and I asked the nice lady behind the counter to check if my account was still active (from when I studied here before). She checked, and then checked with her colleague, and came back and told me that they had sent letters to me telling me that they needed proof of my student status, and that since I hadn't sent them my ID,that they made it a "working persons bank account" for which you have to pay. Since they didn't hear from me, in January of this year they closed my account. If I wanted to reactivate my account under student status, they needed a copy of my ID, and I would have to pay them 54€ for the time that I didn't say I was a student. She said that I could do that (which I didn't want to do), or I could walk out and she would pretend like she didn't see me and then I wouldn't have to pay. I was happy that I didn't have to pay that, but also I had to transfer the money somehow. Eva was with me, and she has an account with Deutsche Bank. The lady (and Eva) so kindly let me transfer the money through Eva's account, and did everything for me (such as filling out the paperwork, etc...). She did however, take my old card that had expired, and threw it away (hahaha!). But let me tell you, it makes a person REALLY nervous to transfer over that large of a sum to someone you don't even know!!!! Lets hope it works.....