To gain entrance to the Austrian Wine Academy's Diploma course, the successful completion of their "Basis Seminar" and "Aufbauseminar" with the respective exams is required. Conveniently these Seminars are also available in condensed form in western Austria, where I live. I was also able to talk the Academy into letting me skip the Basis Seminar and just show up for the exam and thus save myself time and expense. Hannelore Geyer from the Academy's administration was kind enough to send me the written study material for the Basis Seminar and arrange my participation in the exam in Bad Ischl, a short, scenic two hour drive from my home in the Tyrol.

Shortly after receiving news of successfully passing the Basis Seminar exam, I received the study material for the Aufbauseminar. Just one quick glance through made it clear that this seminar would be much more demanding. It was reassuring to be informed of our instructors, both of whom I had experienced as very good lecturers in the past. The topics covered were viticulture basics, fundamentals of winemaking, wine faults, wine tasting and judging, Austrian wine, international wine, and wine market evaluation. Much of my free time in the six weeks before the Aufbauseminar and its exam were spent studying the material. Completely new for me, was the evaluation of wine faults and analysis of their causes. My experience in wine purchase and sales and my role as a writer merely require me to spit those abominable wines out, warn people about them and avoid them in the future. I have never occupied myself much with the how and why of unpalatable wines; now I am confronted with organic chemistry and microbiology. I find myself sniffing nail polish, mold, plastic and other disgusting aromas looking for comparisons to various wine faults. I suspect I've finally gone bonkers.

Arriving in Bregenz, Vorarlberg on the 6th of April, 2000 for the Aufbauseminar, I am a bit burnt-out from smelling chemicals and wonder if I really want and need to know all this. As I sip a cappuccino at Restaurant Gebhartsberg overlooking Bregenz and Lake Bodensee, I watch as the other students arrive. The average age seems to be between 30 and 50, and as usual in the wine world, women are outnumbered by men. We introduce ourselves and I discover that the majority of students are from wineries, the wine trade, or the hospitality industry and come from Germany and Switzerland, as well as from all over Austria. I have difficulties understanding a conversation between students from Vorarlberg (Austria's most western province) and Switzerland because their vocabulary includes strange words like "gsi" instead of "gewesen" or "gsä" instead of "gesagt". Once they realize that I am not a native speaker, they seem to try their best to speak high German and I concentrate and try to adjust myself to the unaccustomed rhythm of their speech. As 9 AM approaches all 17 of us make our way to the conference room.

I am disturbed as I read our completely new agenda. Neither of the original instructors are on our list and have been replaced by names I do not know. I am disappointed that the owner of the restaurant and Weinakademiker himself is not there to greet as is stated on the new program. Instead our new instructor sits at the head of our U-formed table and, without an introduction from the host, begins his lecture on enology and wine faults. This young, friendly winemaker from Rust, Burgenland goes through the process of how he makes his own wines and shows us some slides from his winemaking facilities. I have visited numerous wineries in the world and have often had the opportunity to speak with the wine makers. This is similar to visiting a very small and simple winery, but with the disadvantage of not actually being there. Our instructor then borrows a copy of our study material for the section about wine faults and goes through it with us verbally. He quite honestly admits to hearing about many of these wine faults for the very first time. At the end of his lecture we taste all the current wines from his winery. Obviously, this poor winemaker has jumped in as an unprepared substitute at the last minute for this seminar. Beyond the study material that we had all been given six weeks earlier, he didn't have a whole lot of new input or a way of helping us visualize, experience, or understand the information better.

After an excellent lunch in the restaurant we briefly meet our next instructor who is a Weinakademiker from Vienna and are shuffled into a bus that sets off for the spring fair in Dornbirn. There, according to our agenda, we will receive wine tasting training and instruction over Austrian wine districts. At the Dornbirn fair, arrangements have gone haywire, so we are set loose in the small wine section for two hours with the mottoes "Wine from Burgenland" and "each man for himself". I hook up with Maria and Vinzenz, two students from south Styria, for an intensive session of taste and spit. As soon as we meet up again with the rest of the group, we are herded quickly and without warning onto a stage where we describe and judge wines we are given to blind taste, live on television. Our instructor and the TV announcer constantly interject positive words about the Austrian Wine Academy and Austrian wine between the tastings. The whole event is conducted quite unprofessionally and I am not pleased at all with the situation. On the bus back to the restaurant my anger brews to silent fury. The first day is over. I have learned nearly nothing and I am wondering if this whole thing is not a waste of my money and time.

We have a new, third instructor the next morning for the section about viticulture. Mr. Fritz Sailer introduces himself as a winemaker and head of the vine nursery in Rust. He is well prepared and qualified and even if his spontaneous scribblings on the big white board are no works of art, they are helpful in visualizing the work in the vineyard. Mr. Sailer concentrates especially long on the aspects and techniques of summer pruning and I am sure that this will appear on our exam the next day. Although this seminar concentrates on Austrian viticulture, our instructor is able to answer questions about international practices as well. The last hour of the morning he leads us through a blind tasting of Austrian wines where he instructs us to concentrate on a clear, correct description of the wines rather than trying to recognize the grape, district or producer.

As students chat over another very good lunch in the restaurant, the atmosphere is much more positive after our informative morning lecture, but everyone is dreading the afternoon. Our Dornbirn fair fiasco instructor will be guiding us for the rest of the seminar.

Mr. Günter Vymazal introduces himself much more formally this afternoon as our main lecturer and representative of the Austrian Wine Academy. He is then bombarded with complaints about the afternoon at the Dornbirn fair and questions that were left over from the enology and wine faults lecture. He is able to deal with this satisfactorily before leading us in a wine tasting workshop. Mr. Vymazal teaches us the standardized tasting technique that the Austrian Wine Academy has taken over from the WSET in a clear and easy to understand manner. We receive standardized tasting forms divided into sight, smell, taste and complete impression. Other than defining the color and its depth and clarity, we shouldn't spend too much time on the optic and go on to the smell. Here of course, the most important thing is whether or not the wine smells appetizing and free of faults. Further, we should note the intensity, stage of development and attempt to categorize the aroma as fruity, flowery, vegetal, spicy, earthy, woody or chemical. Once done, we may finally taste the wine. Sweetness, acidity, tannin, body, intensity, alcohol content, and the length of the finish along with flavor category are all to be noted. In the complete impression we put together the information we have gathered from sight, smell and taste and judge the wines' quality, maturity and estimate the vintage, potential, region of origin and grape variety. Our instructor emphasizes the importance of attempting to remain as objective as possible and judging the wines' quality while trying to forget personal preferences. We roll up our sleeves and get to work. We have 5 minutes per wine and 10 Austrian wines to taste blind. We all take turns describing the wines with our mentor coaching us. Mr. Vymazal corrects a train of thought here, interprets the meaning of flavors and aromas there, channels us to the right grape variety and guides us to the right district. Mr. Vymazal does this well and it is interesting to observe the improvement of the entire group. Then, believe it or not, we are bussed off to visit a Vorarlberg winery.

Vorarlberg is a beautiful place and is famous for its skiing. Hemingway described the beautiful mountains, forests, lakes and streams, but he never said a word about the wines of Vorarlberg. Officially, there are 12 hectares of vineyards, but the Vorarlberg Winemaker Franz Nachbaur informs us that a whopping 20 hectares exist and that his winery is the largest with 2 ½. Most of the vineyards are owned by passionate wine makers who produce wine for their own consumption. Mr. Nachbaur is the only full time winemaker relying solely on his income from the wines he produces. His work can be considered preservation of landscape culture. Everything is done by hand and winemaking facilities are miniscule. He is able to produce quite drinkable wines in good years and nearly all of his wines are drunk in the Lake Bodensee area. The visit was interesting for its sociopolitical and cultural aspects and obviously not for state of the art winemaking. Our Saturday morning lecture from Mr. Vymazal covers the Austrian wine market and Austrian wine districts. This again includes tasting training of 5 Austrian wines. We spend the afternoon on west European wines including tastings of Italian, French, German and Spanish wines. Most of our group has had little experience with wines outside of Germany and Austria and one afternoon spent on the rest of western Europe appears too short. Mr. Vymazal is forced to cover only the very basics of Italy, France and Spain, whereas if the group had had more previous knowledge and experience, he would have been able to spend some time on current developments in these regions. The students are relieved to hear that the blind tasting part of our exam will include Austrian wines only. I, personally, am disappointed, since I find it much easier to identify a New World Cabernet or a Tuscan Sangiovese than to distinguish the difference between an Austrian Zweigelt and Blaufränkisch. I am predicting, considering the inexperience of our group, that whatever international theory that will appear on our exam, Mr. Vymazal is going to make a point of at least mentioning. That in mind, I make a note to brief myself on DOCG and Burgundian classification that evening.

At the end of our lecture we are scheduled to meet the restaurant owner and receive a tour of his Vinothek and wine cellar. I suspect that Mr. Greber is a recluse, because again he is not present, but we do receive a quick tour from the head waiter. I go out for a quick dinner with some of my classmates before going back to my hotel to study for the final exam the following day.

Sunday morning at 8:30 AM all the students gather nervously for our last lecture before the afternoon exam. Mr. Vymazal is quite late because of complications at the check out in his hotel and our section on eastern Europe and New World wines gets started 40 minutes late. Everyone is very attentive because we have no further chance to reread any material on these subjects before our final test in the afternoon. The blind tasting for this lecture includes wines from South Africa, New Zealand, Chile, Argentina, California, Romania and Czech.

After a quick break it is time for the final exam. We have two hours to finish the 100 point test and usually only 60% of the students pass it the first time The first section includes multiple choice questions. The next section includes open questions with space of a half to a whole page to answer for each question. The last part is a blind tasting of five Austrian wine with maximal 6 points per wine. Here emphasis is given to a correct description with only a maximum of 1,5 points for recognizing the grape variety, vintage and district. A few students don't feel ready to take the test and decide to postpone. They can take the exam at a later point without paying another fee. I believe I am well prepared and appear to be one of the most experienced in the group, but I am unreasonably nervous. I'm feeling a bit nauseous and my hands are clammy and trembling. I try to laugh at myself and figure out why I'm so nervous. I've never had stage fright before ---- perhaps it was my uncertainty with the language. I try some autogenous mental training and tell myself they won't be docking points for bad German grammar and I will certainly be among the 60% that pass.

The exam begins. I don't know the answers to any of the multiple choice questions on the first page. There is a chemical formula ....which wine fault does it represent? I pass the questions on the first page; I'll go back to them later. I don't now the answer to the first one on the second page either. #§?L!, but the next ones I'm sure of ! Then I start on the open questions. Here, I am confident of my knowledge, but my hand is trembling so that I can hardly write. My handwriting looks like I am suffering from the advanced stages of a disease of the nervous system. Despite this I scribble like a mad woman, hardly finding enough space to write everything I would like. I then go back to the unanswered multiple choice and remember some of the answers and guess on the others. Then comes time for the tasting... 6 minutes per wine. This is where I expect to do well. I do not spit out the first wine, but swallow, hoping to calm my nerves. I go through the steps of describing the wines and even complete the variety, district and vintage. The test is over and Mr. Vymazal unmasks the wines. I am euphoric because I have recognized 3 of the wines and described all of them accurately. I think I have done well, but hope that my writing is legible and my German grammar acceptable.

We all go into the restaurant, relieved that the exam is behind us. The Wine Academy has arranged a degustation menu for us. The time has come to relax and enjoy. All of our meals here at Bergrestaurant Gebhardsberg have been very good and this meal crowns them all.

Despite the wonderful company, and new friendships made during the Seminar, I am eager to get back home to my husband and children. I break off immediately after the dessert so I can make the last train that will get me home late that night. Our instructor Mr. Vymazal wishes to take the same train, so we agree to share a taxi. The good-byes take a bit longer that they should and we are suddenly in a terrible rush to make the train.

I already have my ticket, but instead of running to the train that is scheduled to leave in five minutes, I agree to look after Mr. Vymazal's box outside the station while he heads in to buy his ticket. Suddenly my fellow student Vinzenz, who is on his way to Salzburg, appears huffing hurriedly, "Come on, Julia, we'll miss the train, it leaves from line 4 in two minutes!" I tell him I must look after Mr. Vymazal's box. "Damn the box, it's probably just a couple leftover wines! He'll be back for it himself. Meanwhile no one will steal it!" I have too much luggage myself to deal with the box and agree to abandon it. We run to the train lines, up stairs, over a bridge, down stairs, just to see our train pull out. "Maybe Maria is still in the parking lot!", Vinzenz shouts and we run backvia the stairs and bridges and catch her just in time. If we speed on the freeway we'll catch up with our train at it's next stop in Feldkirchen. I say, "Let's get Günter's box!" The three of us run back, but find no box: it's gone! We jump into Maria's car. She should be on her way to Berlin where she will be presenting her family's wines from south Styria, but now she has agreed to race us the 20 kilometers of Autobahn to Feldkirchen where we really do catch up with our train!

On the train, we find Günther Vymazal in the dining compartment and sit down at his table. I'm a bit miffed that I missed the train because of his box and he didn't. I ask, "How were you able to go back and get your box, and still make the train?!" "I left the box behind, I hope you have it with," Günter replies. I explain how there is no way I can handle a full suitcase, a ten kilo bag of books, a laptop and his silly box. Günter says, "That was no silly box. All the exams are in there."

Vinzenz and I laugh, "What a joke," and look nervously around the train compartment for sign of the box. Günter assures us that this, unfortunately is the truth. I am appalled. I cannot believe that he is on this train and my exam, my clammy trembling-handed exam, is who knows where and I along with all the other students may have to go through that whole ordeal again. Vinzenz has his cell telephone with and we call back to the restaurant in Bregenz to get someone to go to the train station to find that box of exams.

The atmosphere is tense as the three of us sit together waiting for a call back from Bregenz. Finally the call comes, the box has been found, and will be delivered, still sealed, by the generous husband of one of the students. The husband is a respected businessman from Bregenz has offered to deliver the box personally to Mr. Vymazal in Vienna the following day. What a relief for us all! The three of us order a bottle of Blaufänkisch from Mittelburgenland and chat as if nothing ever happened at all.