Guitars and Go-Getters

I've been in the City of Mozart for two months now, and I went to my first concert at the Mozarteum today--the School of Music at University of Salzburg. It was a guitar concert that Victor (a student who is studying guitar) invited me to. The first piece was a little bit less that amusing, but as the concert progressed, the talent and creativity of the artists began to show through. The guitarists understood their instruments perfectly, and knew exaclty what to do to manipulate the guitars to produce the desired effects. Just from watching the performance, I learned so much about the guitar and the importance of the tension of the strings, the different ways you can use the instrument to produce sound, and the effects of putting several different sounds together. At the end, the group played a song called, "Staubzucker" that incorporated hundreds of different tones from the strings, the body and the sound hole of the guitar. I give it two thumbs up for creativity and fun with music. Leaving the concert, I noticed a lot of the people clicking their tongues to the beat of the last song, or talking about how they enjoyed that last part of the concert especially well.
I admire those ambitious people who have enough energy, endurance, and excitement to accomplish their dreams, even if it doesn't mean that other people will notice. The sacrifice that is required to excel is so worth it in the end... not that I would know yet, but I'm in the process of sacrificing an awful lot in order to learn German. Some days, it doesn't feel like it's worth it, especially when I compare to how things could be if I just went home, got a job, and lived comfortably among friends and family. The important difference is this: when all is said and done, I would not have been content with that life where I just stopped when things got rough because I was "good enough" at it. I would have added German to my long list of "adequacies," and not excelled at one more thing. This time it's worth it. the language, the culture, and especially the people are changing my life in every way for the better, and someday, I'll be able to say that I stuck with something until it was a success! For now, I'll look to the future and hope for the best.