Inga’s House

What’s so special about „Inga’s House“ you ask? EVERYTHING, and when I say everything, that’s exactly what I mean – see here.

Did I hear you say WOW, what a lucky girl? Yes, that’s precisely how I feel. I met ‘by accident’ of course, a man who had studied at Princeton University, pursued fusion energy, he has a PhD to prove it, and almost immediately (it actually took us 10 minutes) we fused. But let me start at the beginning of this incredible story.

I am a German born American, lived all over the world, have done just about everything there is to do (yes, I’ve got plenty of T-shirts to prove it), and after officially retiring from my job in Greenwich, Connecticut, U.S.A. on December 31st, 2004 I moved to Klagenfurt, Austria where I started my own business of translating websites from German to English and held business English courses for people who wanted to improve their English. See my website.

Teachers and I never really got along so my formal education is really minimal. Everything I know I have taught myself. When something catches my interest, I pursue it to the end and try to find people online or in ‘real’ life who can help me deepen my knowledge in that field.

………….It had been the winter of our discontent: real estate crisis, financial crisis, economic crisis, was there anything or anyone not engulfed in some form of crisis or other? I don’t particularly like a crisis but I do love change – change has always brought me a little further in my personal development.

I always felt what I was doing here in Austria was meaningful, was helping others move on and up. But somehow things did not feel right any longer, something was missing. I was thinking about creating a new website, concentrating more on….on what?! I really could not put my finger, brain or heart on ‘it’. There was a lot of empty space in my thinking.

The universe hates a vacuum, so on April 27th, 2009 it sent me a very strange email via a member of the Austro-British Club in Klagenfurt, Austria. There was to be a talk by an American at the University of Klagenfurt about :“Environmentally open sewers“ and they were looking for an interpreter. Here is a photo of the lady who got the whole thing rolling: Helen is the one in the pink tank-top, Michaela is on the right, the little girl is her daughter, Lilith.

I just love this kind of misunderstanding. For the interview that Marcin did on the train go here.

At least I had heard of open source software but I was not prepared for what I found online on the OSE Wiki and Blog. I have to admit it took a lot of reading through a lot of pages, of talking to Michaela and Erich before I agreed to being the interpreter for the talk in Klagenfurt. Remember, everything I know is self-taught and interpreting from English to German was not my strongest point.

On the spur of the moment I decided to join Michaela and Erich on their trip to the “Subversive Fair” on Linz in Upper Austria that started on May 16th, 2009. See day one and two. We arrived at the fair on Saturday at noon and Marcin and I worked like a team from the get go.

Stay tuned, there is much more to come

Inga – The Village Elder