oh! oh! oh! oh!

And how could I forget to report on this....

Ani is releasing a new album on September 30th. It's called Red Letter Year!

FINALLY!!!

Have I told you the story of the last time I saw her in concert? no? Ohhhhh it's a good one. It was at Langerado in the middle of a swamp in Florida in March. I bought 4 day passes to the festival just so I could see Ani. I waited in front of her stage all day so that I could be front row and center. Bob was with me at the festival, but of course he wasn't up there in the front row with me. That was probably for the best though, because I probably would have embarassed him. I get really excited when I see Ani. When I'm with other people I have to control myself a bit...but this time I was alone. So I jumped up and down and had a super good time being in the front. I was only about 5 feet away from Ani. Ok, it was more like 15 with the security fence. She played all the old hits and tons of new songs--off the new album I'm sure. How she could last for 2 years without releasing an album, I don't know. It better have about 25 songs on it though...

When she came out at the end for her encore she walked to the edge of the stage, leaned over toward me and I'm pretty sure she said that I was cute. I'm 95% positive that's what she said. And to top off the best concert Ever, the stage hand gave me her set list at the end.

I've seen Ani 6 times since 2000, can't wait to see her again.

Baseball

The Marlins are hanging in there...they're within a game of New York, but I sure would like to see them on top instead of just hanging on to second or third. Of course.

Gosh, it's been a while

Hasn't it? Nothing terribly exciting has been going on in the Suisse, except:

1. I was missing a large sum of money for a few days, that was scary, thanks Swiss banks.
2. I bought an espresso maker and have been enjoying frothy capaccinos with my breakfast. That's how I found out that my bank account was empty.
3. I did not go to Paris or France at all last weekend. I suppose that's because one of my hobbies is declining invitations, even when I make them to myself.
4. I am once again planning to go up Bunderspitz on Friday, we'll see how that goes.

That's the last 7 days in a nutshell. Laura and I had a nice weekend in Delemont. We decided to hang around town and take it easy instead of biking into the unknown--France. Lately, instead of a list of places I've been, I've been making a list of places I meant to go:

• St. Ursanne
• Winkel, France
• Paris, France
• Bunderspitz

Perhaps that will change.

On Sunday we began Event 11 here at the Chalet. There are Brits, Canadians, Danes and 6 Americans from Bellingham. One of them even has the same last name as me...I've never met another except for family of course.

Coming back to the Chalet after my days off is usually exciting. Sometimes in good ways, and less often in annoying, inconveinient ways. Sometimes I find strange things in the fridge--for instance, a llama sculpture made of Chalet Creme cookie boxes or leftovers-that-no-one-will-ever-eat-so-why-didn't-you-just-use-the-whole-thing-up--or annoying notes about how I should do my job--"Great, I hadn't already thought of stocking the soda machine, thanks for your help!!". But usually there are presents for me. Guests bring gifts for the staff when they come here and since I'm never around when they depart on Saturdays I get to avoid the awkward thank-yous and the presents end up on my desk. I love that.

When I got back from my weekend there was something on my desk from one of the girls from Event 10. She said that she had wanted to talk to me about the climate in Oregon all week but I wasn't at work on Friday or Saturday so she couldn't. But instead, she thanked me for having a shaved head (which I don't at all!) and left me a 2009 calendar that has pictures of Californian State Parks. Tops!

Up the Hill and Bike Tickets

I brought Alice back to Adelboden with me for the week. I thought we'd go on some nice ride in the mornings and I could even use her to get to work more quickly. Apparently I become delusional when I'm away because there is No Way I'm ever riding up the Chalet hill again.

I had no problems with my bike on the train from Delemont to Bern, and I nearly got off in Fruitigen without any troubles. Unfortunately, the ticket-checker-man cornered me as the train was stopping and I was collecting my bike. He looked at my ticket and I was preparing to walk out when he asked me where the ticket for my bike was. What? Excuse me? It didn't even use a seat and there are no signs anywhere that say your bike must also be a ticketed passenger. Babies get to ride for free, but not my bike. Then he told me that he should write me an 80 franc ticket and I think something about how awful I am. Instead, he let me off with light verbal abuse and allowed me to buy the bike ticket right there, for ten francs.

Because I was peeved about having to pay for my bike on the train I decided to get my money's worth for the week and ride the bike up the hill on Sunday. I was tired from the mountains over the weekend though and only barely made it to the Chalet. I even fell off once. I did not cry though, that's good news.

I was lucky enough to get a lift up the hill to my house on Sunday night, so I only had to ride back down the hill.

And now it is Tuesday and the bike has been sitting in my apartment since Sunday night. Alice the bike simply does not belong in Adelboden because besides the Chalet hill and bike tickets, the bike doesn't even fit in my apartment. It can either be in front of the front door, the kitchen sink, or the bathroom door. Since I need to access all those things at least once or twice a day, I have to move the bike from one side to the other at regular intervals. I can't wait to go back to Delemont this weekend.

Laura and I were planning on going to France to see the Tour finish in Paris, but news this morning is that there's no way we can get international tickets, or it will be difficult and involve skipping work to go to the train station and try to communicate in broken French. And then, there's no way we can afford hotels and it's likely the hostels are full. So! We've decided to do our own Tour of France and go to Winkel and beyond.

Winkel here we come!

In other news: Look what the Vols found in the costume box!

And, yesterday instead of a special shaped birthday cake I made a Special Diet birthday cake: No eggs, no dairy, no nuts. It turned out alright...If I had cared a bit more I could have dusted a white cross on the middle with powdered sugar to make it look like the Swiss Flag. Next time. Right now I'm in preparation for the Chalet Birthday next Thursday. I'm going to make a cake that has all the Chalet buildings and grounds on it. First I have to find a map....

Tooor Day France

I went to France. That's right. On my bike, which I've named Alice.

We rode up a mountain (ok, it was a 200 vertical meter hill). We crossed under a large Fence-type-thing and Laura said that it was France, but I bought a post card there (so she could use the bathroom--in the real Tour de France they pee right off their bikes!) and they accepted Swiss Francs, so I'm sure it wasn't really France. Also there was no "Welcome to France, Switzerland hopes you come back soon" Sign.

We rode up the hill a bit more, and crossed the actual border. I wanted to continue on to Winkel, France but instead we rode back into Switzerland and continued onto Pourentrey. We saw a large castle but didn't go up to it because it was a cold, windy day. Instead, we ate lunch outside the Coop. We went in with our bikes and nearly got done with our shopping before we were asked to take our bikes back outside.We'd already gone about 35 miles, so we decided to take the train back to Delemont. But the trains weren't running. And the busses wouldn't take our bikes, so we had to ride. Laura said it was all down hill from Pourentrey so I figured we could do it, we'd probably just be a bit cold.

However, it was uphill and it was hot. And when we saw this sign, I started to cry. I threw my bike on the ground and sobbed. But I made it.

Best Sunday Ever

I just got back to the Chalet. I can already tell it's going to be a good week. There are no random things in the fridge to annoy me. What's even better, though, is that Ruth ironed all my aprons. How wonderful is that? I feel so smooth and wrinkle free. Here's to Event 9!

Here's a dark picture of Ruth. I'll try harder next time.

In other news: Stay tuned for details about my biking trips this weekend, complete with pictures.

All Star Break

Ahhhhh the All Star Break. I guess it happened a few days ago, but I'm on Swiss time now. (wait, is that more precise?)

Dan and Hanley represented Florida in the All Star game in the soon to be demolished Yankee Stadium. No surprises at the game: Uggla made some costly errors at second base during the Longest All Star Game Ever in America. Of course the AL won, again. This is a surprise though: the Marlins are still hangin' in there for the seond half of the season with only a game and a half between them and the Phillies.

Amezaga is still my favorite and I wish I could figure out how to steal this and post it here myself, but i can't so click on this link Please. http://mlb.mlb.com/media/video.jsp?mid=200805072658169

The Marlins are playing the Phillies Friday night. Go Alfredo!

Swiss Rubbish

I've lived in the village for 6 weeks now. I still haven't figured out how or where to put my garbage. Luckily I am quite ecologically minded and haven't had much of an overflow problem, except now and the bin is quite full.

There are signs on every dumpster in Switzerland (Every One) that say "Taxed Garbage Bags Only". When the garbage men empty the dumpster they check to make sure the bags are proper, and if they're not, they leave the garbage right there on the side of the road. I haven't been able to figure out where to buy the right kind of bags, or even what they look like--since most people either lock their bins, or they have stickers that cover all the bags in a certain bin whether they're taxed or not--doesn't this sound complicated?

Of course, no one at the Chalet knows what to do with the garbage, because they live at the Chalet, and we have a large bin that gets the all-encompassing sticker.

I could hike my garbage up the hill and put it in that bin, but really? There's got to be a better way. I may have to go to city hall to buy garbage bags. I don't think that guy speaks english. I'd better study some more useful German I guess.

In other news: Check out my kitchen phone. Every time I answer it I feel like I'm down in the trenches and the General has phoned me to get an update from the front. The handset weighs a ton, and yes those are real bells on top!

Today's cake

It's warmed up here and the snow is gone.

Fun and Merriment in the Chalet Kitchen

We took a few pictures in the kitchen this afternoon.

Ruth is still in the process of making me a Chef School graduation diploma, but at least I have the outfit.

This is the whiteboard that I post individual jobs on. During dinner I like to keep everybody at their own posts to avoid confusion. The vols think they're pretty funny and helped me post jobs today. Oh, and Wendy is what we call the dishwasher.

This is the delightful fish cake I made for Carly today. Ruth fixed the nasty Happy Birthday part to make it a bit more presentable.

Luzern

Luzern was a nice town. In fact, I enjoyed it much more than Bern. I thought it offered more to do and was more interesting. Bern is on the UNESCO world list--or something like that--so everything there is very old. The entire old town part of the city is protected. Luzern is more of a mix of old and new, which I think makes the old parts look more interesting in comparison.
I didn't pay to see anything in Luzern, and I didn't take any pictures. But I plan on going back.
I did see free things there and I found some very cheap postcards. I saw the famous water tower and chapel bridge, the mill bridge, the Jesuit Church, the public library, the lion carving and the old town walls.

The covered bridges were fun to walk across because they had paintings from the 15th and 16th centuries up in the rafters. Normally I don't appreciate art much, but nearly every painting included a headless person, or a person being beheaded, or a pool of blood or a skeleton doing something mundane. I suppose during the time they were painted (middle ages, plague, war, fire etc) every day life was as scary as that. So, the paintings were more exciting to look at that landscapes or paintings of the Virgin Mary and Jesus--like I've seen at every other art museum ever.

I also enjoyed the Jesuit church a bit more than the Bern Cathedral. The Jesuit Church in Luzern is Baroque, which I suppose means that it's pink and gold inside. I really need to study up on my architecture. I guess I'm learning by exposure and immersion rather than reading. Rick Steves said that I may encounter the local music school using the organ for practice and indeed I did. I would have enjoyed the church more if I didn't have to listen to really sappy American wedding songs with pipe organ accompaniment. I think it marred my sacred experience.

Like I said, the inside of the church was pink and gold, which was a bit of a change from the other old churches I've seen that are grey and dark and scary inside. This church also had Relics on display. I'd never actually seen one and I was quite surprised to see them. Apparently Relic = bedazzled ulna. Gross. Who came up with that idea? "Hey! This guy was really awesome and it sucks that he's dead so lets take his bones and cover them in beads, sequins and wires and then put it in a box and pray next to it".

Even cooler than the macabre arts and crafts was the Swiss saint they had on display. According to Rick, there was one Swiss saint, and he lived in the 15th century as a hermit up in the hills. He loved animals and peace and the actual robes he wore are on a wax sculpture in one of the recesses in the church.

After the church I went to the library and did some cranky live blogging, and then headed over to see the lion. It's a big lion carved into a cliff. The lion has a spear in his side and he's laying on some shields crying. It's awfully sad.

I still had a bit of time to kill so I went to find the old town walls. Rick doesn't say Anything about the walls, I just happened to see them on a map. They were definitely the coolest thing I saw in Luzern. They look just like what old castles in movies look like. There are still about 4 towers that you can walk up and down in, and then you can walk along the top of the wall and pretend that you're a knight protecting the city from maurading germans. Or, that's what I did anyway.

When I go back to Luzern I'm going to pay to see these attractions:

The Depot: The history museum/archives. Apparently it's a whole warehouse just shoved full of stuff in glass cases. There aren't any real displays so to get the history on any item you're interested in, you scan a barcode with a scanner you get at the desk which describes the history. Sort of like a do-it-yourself museum experience.

The Panorama: an old circular painting of an old battle just like the one they have in Gettysburg

The Glacier Garden: Describes the geology of the area, and has a house of mirrors that's supposed to be awfully good

Boat trip: You can take boats around the lake for a decent price.

And I will definitely make sure to have a picnic on top of one of the old town wall towers.
Pictures next time.
But for this time: here's some Snow on the Mountains.

Check out Bunderspitz!

And this is Elsigenhorn. Neither of these were white a few days ago. In fact, if you look back in an old post, you can see Bunderspitz without snow for reference.

It's Barbeque day

And that means that it's raining. Das Wetter ist schlecht. Es regnet. Of course. I havn't had one nice barbeque day all summer. Damn this Swiss summer. Well, actually it's winter here now. Last night it snowed up on Tschenten Alp, and the hills above the Chalet are all totally white. I think tomorrow I'll take the gondola up to see the snow before I come to work.


Because its so cold, I went to the boiler room where we keep extra clothes and got myself a jacket. I also found myself a pair of snowboots to keep my toes warm while I barbeque.
Check it out.


I would write a long post about Luzern right now if my head were up to it. Somehow I ended up with a glass of strong Danish Liquids (that's what Jen calls them) last night and it was maybe not a good idea.

In other news: The Marlins have fallen to third in the National League East. How did the mets sneak past them? How did they lose 9 to 1 to the Dodgers?! Andrew Miller is letting us down. C'mmon fish.

Hippo Cake

Oh, And here's the Hippo Cake that I made for Molly last week. She said it was the best cow cake she's ever seen.

The Many Splendors of Bern

I was supposed to go to Delemont this weekend and ride my bike. Laura and I were planning to bike to the quaint medieval village of St. Ursanne and picnic by the river in our bike clothes. We were going to have a dip in the chilly water. Unfortunately it didn't happen that way. It happened this way:

I was thawing 11 kg of ground beef, preparing to immerse myself in Raw Mince for Thursday Night Meatloaf when my phone rang. It was Laura calling to tell me not to come to Delemont because she was going to Rome instead. There was a delivery of very important insects to be picked up on Sunday. So she decided to make the most of the task and leave two days early, even though it meant breaking our plans only three hours before I was planning to leave Adelboden. But, my bag was already packed so I got on the bus anyway.

And now the story of my cranky, self-pitying, miserable day in the Splendid City of Bern.

I arrived in Bern around 10:30. The cheaper hostels' reception was already closed, so I set out for the Youth Hostel International. I was exhausted, it was dark and I only had a very vague idea of where I was going. Rick Steves' maps are sometimes inadequate. Luckily, the swiss post large maps of tourist areas. I took a very scenic route but managed to find the Hostel around 11:30. When I told the man at the desk that "Yes, I am looking for a bed", and "No, I do not have reservations" he frowned. After grumbling over a spread sheet for several minutes he found me The Last Bed. I slept miserably.

The next morning I spent a few minutes chatting with my roommates. They were three girls from Norway on a 22 day rail-pass trip through Europe. They were heading to Interlaken that morning so I lent them the Rick Steves and they seemed fairly impressed. How do people get around without such a handy guide? As I was leaving, I gave them a Resses and they said "Wait, do You want some chocolate too? We went to Belgium and got a bit carried away" So I was thinking they had a few chocolate bars or something. No, they gave me a whole kilo of chocolates, wrapped up in a gold box with a burgundy ribbon.

In hind-sight, I wish I had left the chocolate for the same reason they passed it off to me. When you're hauling around a backpack all day, that extra kilo sucks. Also, when I packed the chocolate yesterday I tipped the box on its end in my pack--a very bad idea--and now they're all gooey and squished. Or at least one or two chocolates that once had carmel in them no longer do.

Then I headed to the Aare River. The old city of Bern was bordered on three sides by a great bend in the river. This way they only had to build one city wall. Rick told me that when in Bern one must go swimming in the Aare. It was a warm day, so I headed down to the big riverside park that has lockers. I was a bit worried because I didn't actually have a swimming suit, I had planned to just swim in my unds. I don't know what Swiss laws regarding public decency are, but the very first thing I saw at the park was the bare backside of an old man. So I wasn't too concerned about my unds anymore. I threw my bag in a locker, put on my gecko shoes and headed upstream.

This is the park by the river where you can see a naked person about every 5 minutes if you want to.

The river is fed by snowmelt from the mountains and runs very swiftly. The locals walk up river for a ways, find a set of stairs and jump in. Then, they float down the river for a ways until they see another set of stairs. The river is swift so you have to swim quickly and grab onto one of the hand railings to keep from being swept away.

Look carefully, you can see people climbing out.

On Friday, when I was standing up to my knees in the River Aare in my unds the water was about 17 C. Getting in was awfully difficult, but I was helped in my the knowledge that as soon as I got in I wouldn't look ridiculous anymore. Also, the swift current drug me right off the slippery rocks. Getting out was harder. Bobbing along in the river was fun, but I suspect the fear factor has something to do with its appeal. First, you could get hypothermia and die if you miss the last red pole exit. Second, there is a dam downstream that would chop you into a billion pieces if you miss the last pole. And Finally, when you're getting out the current is dragging you along at quite a clip and the water gets shallower and there are huge boulders along the bottom that you could break your leg off on. Phew. I did it three times and decided that was enough. Then, I layed in the sun like a lizard to dry off and warm up.

After I got dressed I moved down the river a ways and laid on the bank and pretended to be some sort of swiss Huck Finn for nearly two hours. (Then I made a bed reservation at the hostel in Luzern and moved on to the Bern Cathedral).

Here's a lovely video of the river.

This is the cathedral viewed from my HuckFinn spot on the river.

The Bern cathedral is a huge pointy gothic church that is on every Bern postcard ever.
Outside the cathedral is a large park. I wandered around the Platform (as it's called) for a few minutes, peering over the cliff down at the river and watching people play bocce ball on what used to be a cemetery, and definitely still contains bones. A few girls in neon pink sashes approached me and asked if I wanted to play tug of war. So I did, with about 9 other strangers. We beat the pink-ladies. Their english was about as good as my german but I understand that they were celebrating the end of their exams with some sort of hazing ritual.

I thought this was a monument for some dead person, since it was on the church Platform.

But when I got closer I realized it was an old weather station thing.

The great doors outside the Cathedral are decorated with a scene from the Last Judgement. Michael the Archangel with his sword is eviscerating a green demon right in the middle and on the right hand side are people suffering the torments of hell and on the left are people entering the gates to Heaven. It was designed and installed in the 15th century (though recently the original pieces were removed to the Bern Museum and plaster casts stand up there now). Apparently during the Reformation most of the churches statues were destroyed and rest somewhere under the Platform. Thankfully the main door scene survived Reformation because everyone loves to see people burn in the fires of hell.

I paid the kids admission price to climb the tower. The stairs were windy and old, but it was neat to see the carvings and statues on the tower up close. Here are some of the things I saw.
At the top I met an old lady who asked me if I wanted to know anything about the cathedral. I said "Tell me anything because I don't know anything yet" She laughed and began telling me everything she could think of. She told me about the 54 Berns of the world, one of which is in Idaho and she's been there. She's also been to the one in Indiana and hopes to go to New Bern South Carolina for it's 200 year anniversary in 2010. She asked me if I was learning German and I said I was trying, then she put me on the spot and I couldn't remember a single word. Then she told me about every mountain on the horizon. I wanted to take a picture of them, but somethings just won't come out on film (or digitally as it were).

I wonder if he was one of the masons? He's way up on the tower part that was built in the late 19th century.

Rick Steves says that there is a woman named Marie-Therese Lauper who stands at the top and answers questions. I hope thats who I was talking to.

The architecture was amazing, and I've read a whole booklet on the construction and significance of every twist and turn of the pointy spires but I don't understand the architecture words yet...I'll have to revisit the cathedral before I can give a more detailed description. But in short: There was a small church on the site starting in the 13th century, in 1421 the corner stone for the great cathedral was laid and over the following hundred years or so they built the church--though without the great steeple which wasn't added until 1890-something. There's also lots of political history involved which I don't quite understand because it was all about the city government buying the religious rights from certain groups and such. And the booklet I have is a bad translation into english which doesn't help. The main point: it's an old church.

Oh, a monkey with a looking glass! I wonder if this is a point of historical reference--the great evolution debates were just beginning when this was sculpted I think.

After the church I moved on to the Bear pits and the main tourist center of Bern. The Bern Bears are kept in the pit because legend goes that some guy who had a castle killed a bear in the spot and thus decided to name the city Bern. The bears are miserable looking. They sit on their bottoms with their mouths open skyward hoping that someone will drop a carrot or apple in. It's not the worst bear-enclosure I've ever seen though. It was built in the 1850s and is a concrete with gravel floors, but it's still bigger than the one in Eureka, California.

It was about 90 degrees out so I decided to go into the tourist center to enjoy some air conditioning. I paid the students admission price to see the Bern Show, which sounds a lot cooler than it actually is. The woman asked me how old I was and I said 17. She said, oh, I thought you could have gotten a 16 and under rate. Maybe next time.

The Bern Show is a light and picture show based around a three dimensional map of Bern. I think they stole the idea from Gettysburg's Electric Map show. The map twists and turns and lights show important areas. On the walls they show pictures relevant to whatever history they're talking about at the time. They even had ghostly Napoleonic uniforms march out to give one of Napoleons' speeches to Bern. The show was alright but it went so fast that I didn't learn terribly much from it and at the end I had to sit through a 10 minute tourist commercial for the city.

From the Bern show I headed up to watch the old clock chime. I stood in the middle of the street with about a hundred other tourists and listened to some shop blast Tom Petty's Free Fallin' for what seemed like 20 minutes. I had no Idea the song was so long. The clock finally went off--some bird crows, a creepy elf thing rings a bell and a few bears circle the bottom and Father time turns an hour glass upside down. It was the lamest thing I've ever seen. Well, it was cool, but I was hot and tired and cranky.

While I was in Bern I also saw the Swiss National Bank and the square outside where 1/2 of Switzerland's gold stock is buried. I saw the parliament building, but couldn't take a tour because it's still being renovated. I think I'd like to go back in the next few months and see the inside, since it is the capitol of Switzerland. I did get some free booklets that detail the swiss governmental procedures and history. A tour would have been easier though. And I saw a fountain that had a large ogre eating children on it.

And then it stormed. Lots of thunder and lightening and torrential downpours. That was my trip to Bern. Then I got on the train (I can ride the train for free after 7 now...) and went to Luzern.

My Bike

I will now describe in detail the pedals and shoes I have for my bike, which is in Delemont and who knows when I'll see it next. I was supposed to be riding my bike this weekend. Humph.

I have Look pedals and some type of shoe. They are the ones that you have to twist out of. I used to have the pedals that have the little strap and cage, but I wanted something nicer for biking in the Alps. I just have to get better at getting my feet in and out of them.

It's Lonely Travelling with only Rick Steves for company

Grösse from Luzern. I am awfully cranky and I am travelling alone this weekend because Laura ditched me to go to Rome at the last minute. That was not so nice, and it's raining.

I travelled to Bern on Thursday night and stayed the day there on Friday. Last night I travelled from Bern to Luzern and stayed at the worst hostel I've ever been to. It was actually a very a nice place. It was well decorated, well appointed and most importantly kind of cheap and entirely dry. It wouldn't have been so bad at all except that when I arrived at 8:30 the reception was closed and there was a long line of people waiting to check in, including a very fussy baby. I didn't get checked in and to my room until 10:00.

At least I got a bed though--after getting the last bed at the hostel in Bern on Thursday night I have a new appreciation for how important reservations can be--and I called ahead. I saw several people turned away from the Backpacker's Luzern.

I shared a room with 3 Korean girls who woke me up at 7:30. I think they were practicing curling with their suitcases, or playing shuffleboard, or something equally noisy that requires sliding a plastic covered suitcase along the entire length of the floor. It was almost as bad as being woken by the sound of a nylon sleeping bag being stuffed. Luckily, I have yet to encounter any real backpackers at the backpacking hostels I've stayed at here in Switzerland so there's no real danger of experiencing that awful type of wakeup call.

I left my backpack in a train station locker and have been walking around all day carrying my Rick Steves' guide in true touristic style. His tours are fun to follow even though it means stopping every few feet to consult the book--which would be more embarassing if there weren't ten other people doing exactly the same thing everywhere I go. Most of the time I feel like I'm on a big scavenger hunt ("...find the swiss Marilyn Monroe").

Rick Steves even guided me to the Stadtbibliotek, where I am currently blogging from. This may be the first (and perhaps last) on location blog I do, since I'm normally much too busy enjoying myself to spend time writing. Regardless, I've been having a pretty decent time with Rick, considering my gloomy mood.

I was in Bern yesterday and I have quite the post in the works that will detail items of historical and cultural relevance as well as quite a bit of complaining. Stay tuned for the complete Luzern and Bern tourist posts.

In other news: Since I'm feeling a bit cranky, today's theme is "Things I do Not like about Switzerland"

1. The z and the y are switched on the keyboard.
2. Paying 2 francs to use the bathroom at the train station is out of control. 2 francs!
3. Ridiculiously expensive coffee, that becomes more expensive when you have to pay to use the bathroom afterwards.

Catherines' Cakes

Here are the cakes I made for the Catherines.

They had their birthday on the 20th and 21st of June. One is American and one is British.

Catherine's birthday involved a scavenger hunt with the final clue leading her to the attic where her castle cake awaited. The Deputy Manger was slightly concerned about having flaming things in the attic of the Chalet, but it all turned out okay.

Ruth decorated the castle cake. Here's an extreme closeup of the people she drew in the windows. This is a functional castle rather than ruins I suppose. I was hoping it would be castle ruins but alas I did not have time to decorate two cakes the day I made them.

Here is Catherine's snail cake. I'm not sure if there were fun and games involved with her cake. I decorated this cake.

I also have pictures of the hippo/monster/monkey cake and the mountain cake. Unfortunately my camera battery died, so the hippo is electronically trapped there. Furthermore, Ben took the picture of the Fitzer-shaped cake so I have to track him down to get that one.

Something to look forward to!

Stöckli adventures

Is it Wednesday already? I've been dead busy, I haven't gotten home before 10 pm yet this week. Perhaps tonight will be different. I haven't been working the Whole time. Last night, for example, I was in Stöckli until nearly 10 getting a haircut from Ruth. She did an alright job for a first timer, though I did have to touch it up this morning. Actually, it's fairly amazing that it's not a terrible haircut considering she used Rachel's embroidery scissors to do it. Oh gosh, I just realized: My mom is reading this! Mom, don't worry, it's just a bit shorter. You know how unruly it gets, and you should be glad Ben wasn't cutting my hair.

Stöckli is an interesting place. It's the staff house, and right now the ten volunteers have made themselves quite at home in there. I hadn't been in there for weeks. They're quite messy and love to write things on large pieces of paper and stick them to the walls. I suppose most people like to do this. I certainly enjoy it. One of the posters is a list of names of people playing the murder game--dead people are crossed off. My name is scribbled out, it's quite sad. There are a surprising number of people still alive, and an overwhelming number of dead people who were offed by my neighbor, Jen. Another poster has a list of german words. It's a short list, actually it's just the conjugation of the verb Sein--to be and the two phrases "Du bist spät" with the comment "Kat says this alot" and "Es tut mir leid" --"I am very sorry". Glad to see I'm helping them learn german. The last interesting poster has a list of quotes--things they've said, or other people have said that they find amusing. I'm not sure how I feel about this one:

"Can you do (the worst job ever), I'll make you cookies, Kisses!" --Kat

I guess I say that alot. But I make a lot of cookies too.

In other news:
I've been hugged twice now by guests. Yesterday it was because I made a special cake for a person with a special diet and I put her first initial on it in blue frosting. It makes me feel good but, I think I prefer thank you cards.

Oh, and the volunteers--bless their little hearts--have made a folder on the Stöckli computer entitled "Cakes!" and it's full of pictures of my cakes. I will post all those soon. Yesterday I made a hippo cake that looked more like a monster/monkey.

Ahhh Sunday, Sunday

Back at the Chalet for the week. I had a nice train trip from Delemont this morning--I got on all the right trains and didn't get sick on the bus at all!

I attended the leader's meeting tonight so that I could make sure that allergies were discussed with the entire group (to avoid another incident like we had last week with the fondue). I also asked the leaders to send their special diet people to the window regardless of whether they thought they should come or not. This should put an end to my chasing people down in the dining room.

For the record--the nut-allergic-girl last week (who made other leaders upset that they couldn't have their swiss night chocolate fondue) had an allergic reaction while she was on a program day and had to be taken to the hospital. She's just fine now, thank goodness. But we weren't kidding about the fondue.

Here's to an uneventful event seven!

My First Bike Ride

Yay! I'm a real biker. I think that Laura and I rode about 50 kilometers, but it's hard to say really because we were stopped many times. We ran into a motorcycle race, some gravel roads, and a bike store that we needed to go to was closed for lunch--but most of our breaks were caused by my inability to pedal any further without feeling like I was going to topple off my bike. I'll get better though, and I only fell off my bike once for real.

Having a bike is wonderful. I understand why Laura would get up and bathe her bike first thing in the morning, or get upset when I said nasty things about it. I was just jealous. Now I don't have to scowl at her bike maps anymore and I've already decided to bike around every lake in Switzerland before I leave. Who needs baseball?


And now for a little photo essay of our first bike ride to the top of a small mountian in the Jura.

This is Laura being a good sport and waiting for me. She's laughing at me, I've probably got my leg stuck between the crank and the frame, or I'm scooting along with both my feet on the ground because I've refused to pedal anymore.

Here I am trying to get my feet in the pedals. This has been my biggest problem so far, trying to get the little plastic cleats on my shoes into the little plastic clips on my pedals.

Pete's Bike Store

Pete seems to be the only American-loving Swiss I've met so far. He had an Uncle Sam piggy bank and a large-ish american flag on top of his file cabinet that was covered in stickers for all sorts of American made bikes and bike accessories. A great place to spend the 4th of July--I think we found the right store.

Pete didn't have a single new bike in his store. He also didn't seem to have any sort or organization system for his goods besides piles of similar types of things. For instance: he had a large rubbermade bin of seats behind his door and a stack of helmets around the corner from the cascade of bike lights. My kinda guy.

I asked him for the Trek 1.7 and he gave me a crosseyed look and said it wasn't in the magazine anymore. He did have one Trek hanging up by the door. I had to ask him three times to take it down before he realized I was serious. He said it was second hand, and that he'd give it to me for 600 CHF.

Laura said it was too big for me--52 centimeters, but I said that it was right for my budget. So I took it out for a ride. Pete shortened the stem and gave it a not-so thourough tune up, and it was alright.

An hour and a half later I walked out with new brake pads, slightly crooked handlebars and a new-to-me-bike. He gave it to me for 500CHF after everything and Laura's straightened the handlebars for me.

I love it.

We walked about 2 kilometers to the Münchenstein train station, which looked about like Pete's Bike store--dilapadated.

Navigating the 'Burbs

I bought a bike on Friday. Finally, after two years of not riding in Miami (which has recently been rated the Worst City to Bike In, by Bicycling magazine), and another year of being insanely jealous of Laura's bike I decided to buy a bike.

Laura picked out a bike store online. The site had lots of nice pictures of American made bikes, and the store seemed large and well stocked. The store was located in Münchenstein, which we knew was sort of in the Basel area. While we were on the train to Basel we passed the Münchenstein stop, and we knew we'd made some sort of mistake. I grew especially worried when it took our train nearly 20 more minutes to reach the Basel station after that.

There is a large information booth at the Basel train station. There's a wall of brochures and people there who speak english and should be friendly. I went in there with the address and showed it to the woman behind the counter. I asked her, "Can I walk here?" she said "You could walk to Geneva if you wanted". Now, imagine the snottiest, morst irreverant, german accented tone you can and you'll get her affect. She handed me a bus map and circled the stop nearest the store. She acted awfully put out when I continued to pester her with questions like "Where is the train station on the map" and "how much does the bus cost?"

We decided to walk. What's the point of spending three francs just to save a half hour walk? Plus, we figured we'd pass some other bike shops or see other interesting things along the way.

(This sounds like such a bad idea in hindsight. I've been conditioned to accept this attitude as normal though. Mom, remember walking to the Lincoln Memorial in 95 degree heat with 90% humidity? That's just the way things are done. A trip doesn't count unless you're 40% miserable--which means that for that to average out at the end you have to spend some of the time being 100% miserable. So, of course we Had to walk. Of course, it took more like two hours--though that time included a picnic behind a bus shelter. And, of course we saw nothing interesting along the way.)

We saw Things though. We saw several McDonalds' and our first glimpse of what I suppose is middle.class.suburbia.industrial.Switzerland. There were no sidewalks in places, weeds that were knee high, and nothing else but strip malls and factories for scenery. It felt like being back in Miami for about a half hour. Miami minus the palm trees though, so I guess it wasn't so bad. We did decide to take the train back.

And then we made it to Pete's. Which was nothing like what we expected.

Awkwardness

The universal sign for awkward is to bring your shoulders up around your ears, place your hands at about waist level with your palms up and your fingers pointing out. The sign may be universal but the meaning varies. In the States, awkward can mean "bad at doing something" or "inefficient" while in the UK (at least as far as I can tell) awkward means "annoying".

We had the most complain-y group ever from America here this week. One of the guests was named 'the Awkward one', but I suppose this was the UK definition. She complained about everything--hiking, the weather, no chocolate fondue (even though severe nut allergies were given as a reason, she wondered why the allergic girl couldn't have been excluded).

She did however like my food, and told me so. The volunteers who overheard it made wrinkly nosed faces and something close to the universal awkward sign.

I'm off to Delemont tonight, hopefully I'll buy a bike tomorrow. I've decided that I must have a new bike--more on that later.

Say Hello to my Little Friend

His name is Marvin, he's a pointy eared squirrel. The vols refeer to them as Squats (because they're squirrels with bat ears). He comes into my kitchen and steals bread. I'm pretty sure this is not inline with Swiss hygenic standards. I chased him out past the shop yesterday, and I could have grabbed him by the tail. I thought better of it because cleaning up blood and bandaging fingers takes too much time and makes me cranky.

Here's a little story about something else that makes me cranky: Special Diets that aren't Really That Special.

For example: there's a little girl here this week who is allergic to Wheat, Eggs, and Milk. Ok, not a problem. I got some special wheat free bread, rice cakes, soy milk, margarine stuff like that for her. I havn't been able to find egg-replacers here in Switzerland though. I make her special food at dinner time. It's my job, I enjoy doing it.

Unfortunately on Monday morning we were out of soy milk and she was upset because she did not want to eat the wheat-free bread because it wasn't white. She had an apple for breakfast. Ok. At dinner time I went out of my way to make her something nice because I felt bad about breakfast.

After all the serving dishes went out, she didn't come to the window. I had to go out into the dining hall and announce her name, hoping she wasn't eating posion food, which makes me both panicky and cranky at the same time. I've written on this point before--that allergic people should be responsible for their allergies. On this occasion though, I found the girl and said "That has wheat, eggs and milk in it" she said "Oh, it's ok, my Mom said I could eat it". Wait, what? What!?

The End.


In Other News: Last night while we were walking home Jen asked me: "Are you planning on climbing any Real Mountains" to which I replied, "Humph!!!"


*I didn't take this picture, I stole it from someone's flicker album. I'm usually terribly busy when Marvin comes around.