When I first arrived in Salzburg in October of 2008 I
was miserable. I left shorts and t-shirt weather and for the first time in 12
years was required to wear a peacoat. I remember thinking “but its only
October, doesn’t it start to get cold after Thanksgiving?” I grew up watching
all these Lifetime movies of girls wearing lovely fall coats, walking in fields
of red and yellow fallen leaves, and there I was bundled up, misguided, never
exposing more than a centimeter of skin.
When my first winter rolled
around I was shocked. How could it possibly get any colder? When would this
bitter cold go away? Why was I always so sleepy? These were all things that I
hated, time taught me, however, to appreciate them.
When spring finally arrived,
I say finally because five months of snow was unbearable, I blossomed like all
the flowers. Skirts, dresses, and tanktops were being dusted off and placed at
the front of the closet, while all the winter clothes were pushed into boxes
and hidden in a dark attic, where they belonged in my opinion.
Spring, however, introduced
me to a whole other sight: women in Dirndls and men in Lederhosen. I hope not
to offend anyone, but my naïve 2008-self thought it was all one big joke. I
knew that this was the traditional garb of Austrians, but I couldn’t believe
that the younger generation wore them and— did so with pride. I was arrogant
and looked down on them, but year after year I started recognizing dirndls as
an early sign of spring.
I, however, had a huge issue
with seeing past the dirndls. With my Northern California feminist-hippy mindset
I thought the pushed up lady bits was a tad bit tacky. I could clearly picture
a beer hall filled with drunken men in lederhosen harassing the poor
beer-maidens in their dirndls, lowering them onto their laps, as specks of spittle
would fall onto their lacey blouses. That was until I lost my dirndl-virginity.
This past April, I was
invited to a “Traditional-Freak” wedding, which meant you could either dress in
traditional Austrian clothing or Goth. I’ve got some weird friends. The whole
“Dressing Up Adna” turned into such a spectacle for my Austrian friends. Lady bits
were pushed around, extra makeup was being added, braids were braided, the
whole shebang. I thought I would hate it. I thought I wouldn’t be able to
breathe. I thought my lady bits would fall out; on the contrary, everything
stayed in place and breathing was only semi-hard, as a result, I ended up
loving the whole experience.
Because of my experience at the wedding I became a lot
more open-minded to traditional dresses and soon after realized that it
could’ve been much worse; I could’ve decided to study in Macedonia:
Could you imagine all those
layers and metal in the spring? I’d wear a dirndl any day of the week.
Signed, Converted American
Sources: http://www.123rf.com/photo_5340377_bavarian-woman-in-dirndl-holds-beer-stein-in-front-of-at-oktoberfest.html
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