Alone in Vienna

Sherkhan left this morning for Milan and then home to America, so I'm all alone.

After Sherkhan left, a girl stumbled into the room of our hostel. Later, we glanced at each other as a Slavic family made a lot of noise this morning. When they left, we began talking. She asked me where I was from and was shocked when I said America (she's not the first in Austria to be shocked either).

She was born in the Soviet Union and moved to Bavaria when she was a little girl after the Soviet Union crumbled. She told me that she had only met one other American in her life. His name was T.J. from California and "he was a black." It sounded like it was an international school function, where students were brought in from other countries or something. She was not impressed with him. She paused for a second and added that it had nothing to do with him being black, he was just too reserved. German's aren't as smooth at covering up their racism as we are.

Less than 5 minutes into the conversation she said that a guy in Munich printed a paper twice a year giving news that wasn't widely reported. She had read one issue, which was about the attacks on September 11th. These are her paraphrased words:

The Jews knew about the attacks before they happened. They got an email telling them not to go to work that day. But there are things in the paper that I don't belive like Osama bin Laden worked for the CIA.

I was stunned. I had heard about the Jews being emailed before 9-11 many times, but what do I say to her? I weighed my responsibilities. I was the first American that she really got a chance to talk to, do I listen to her and break down the stereotype that Americans don't care what the rest of the world thinks? Do I stand up for us Jews? What is my job as a future educator, correct and break her confidence, or reinforce wrong information?

All of this was going through my head. I told myself to make a decision that I wouldn't regret. So what did I do? The American side won out, I said nothing.

Or put another way, an 18 year old girl was in her underwear talking to me; that doesn't happen to me everyday (hardly ever!) so I didn't want to do anything to disrupt anything. Yes, I am a horrible person.

The girl left me with a message, "Tell the Americans greetings and I don't like all of them, except for you." Then she left. I still can't wrap my head around what happened. Let me just say that the Jews are not involved in any conspiracies. If you've ever met a Jew, you know that we are not agreeable people. It's worse when Jews get together. I've seen marriages go 50 years based on a shared enjoyment for bickering with one another.

While walking around, I saw a guy flirting with a poster of Claudia Schiffer. He stared at the poster and would continuously look down and blush and then look back up at the poster again. It was a special glimpse into my future.