sajawata

The next two weekends I stayed in Geneva. Was Ida’s last weekend in Switzerland so there was a party for her. For some reason she wanted everyone to dress up as cowgirls and we had serious fun dancing around Tabitha’s house rocking out to country music. Love that so many Europeans have a fascination for all things Western-American (there is a bar called Cheval (horse in French) in Verbier that has cowboy license plates all over the walls including lots of Teton County Wyoming ‘22′ plates. Giggle Giggle.

Skied at Le Crozet in the Jura. Then to Sunday Night “family dinners” at Fadmar’s house. Pamela cooked a typical Chilean dish. Yummy.

Next Saturday was another Carnival in Bern. Major fun dancing in the streets with all the Swiss families dressed in costume and playing music all over town. Sunday was a hike in the Jura with and then Gerhard made Austrian breakfast for family dinner night.

Took Madalena to the Natural History museum in Geneva and it was so much fun watching how excited she was to see all the animals. She is such a good kid.

Found a place in Geneva that offers Salsa dancing lessons for rythmically challenged persons such as myself. Good fun. Am trying to go every Tuesday.

Have FINALLY started French classes. J’mapelle Saja!
Is a bit overwhelming at first due to the immersion technique (The teacher only speaks french, not a word of any other language) but I think this is the fastest way to learn. Its probably a good thing there are no other native English speakers in the class so I can’t cheat. Until now I butcher the pronunciation of everything with my American accent, or default to really bad Spanish pronunciation which surely sounds bizarre. Rolling the r in merci gets you some pretty strange looks. Must work on that.

This past weekend my host family was extremely generous and offered their Chalet in Verbier. I went up Thursday afternoon, had a lovely day on the mountain Friday. The girls came up Friday night and we found some fun aprés ski. Saturday was a glorious warm sunny day on the slopes. Then a bit more aprés ski. Sunday we were all a bit exhausted and it was so warm we decided to forgo skiing in favor of lawn chairs. Wonderful lazy day with a yummy brunch and playing Apples to Apples, the most fun card game ever.

Weekend solo trip to Munich (Munchen). I think they call this ‘getting to know oneself’. I call it getting to know the cold dark Frankfurt train station at an ungodly hour after sleeping through your stop. eeeek.

Overnight train, arrived early Saturday morning. Walked around the city: Marienplatz and the glockenspiel, the Frankenkirch (Gothic cathedral said to be built by the devil due to the fact that it was built super fast), Asamkirche (Rococo cathedral), the Hoffbrauhaus (the most famous Munich beer hall, where Hitler made several important speeches), a beer garden for some dunkel-sipping and pretzel consuming.

That night I met some friendly British guys living in Munich and we ventured out to a Cuban place for mojitos.

Sunday I spent the day at the Pinakothek Museums. Yet again the German museums proved to be phenomenal.

Alte Pinakothek (Middle Ages to 18th century painting)

Neue Pinakothek (18th and 19th century painting and sculpture) Very interesting was the 19th century painting on display that was under restoration. At 8 meters wide it took up the whole room. Very interesting to see how they repair the cracks and blemishes in the canvas.

Pinakothek der Modern with a fantastic collection on the history of furniture. Impressive collection of 20th century paintings. Absolutely loved it. Am now totally obsessed with modern furniture design.

That afternoon there was a giant parade celebrating Carnival, or the last hoorah before Lent. Hundreds of people dressed in costumes on elaborate floats. There was a “wild west” float with cowboys and indians, a saloon, & a confederate flag (Not quite western but made me laugh all the same)

First weekend in Chamonix was so amazing we went back for more the next weekend.

Poor Ida was ill so Swedish Madeleine and I drove up Friday night. Madeleine lived there last winter so she showed me around the aprés ski scene. Hung out at the ‘monkey bar’ most of the night, then the Swedish bar- there are so many Swedes in Chamonix and also lots of Anglo-Saxons. Very few french?

The next morning Dani caught the train up and met us on the slopes. Also a Swiss-American guy Mike she met on the train. Snow wasnt as great as the weekend before but it was nice to have Madeleine show us where to go (Chamonix is so huge you could ski all week and still not see everything) We skied the Flegere area which which looked like heaven on Earth.

That night my new friend Chris (Opey we call him cause he’s a peanut farmer from North Carolina) that I met in Amsterdam came over to visit. Back to the monkey bar, the Swedish bar. Hugely fun night. Opey learned a few Swedish pick up lines which he tried out on all the girls. He is the master of accents, so he tried to convince all the Irish and Australian blokes he was one of their own. Dani and I convinced some Australian guys that we were in Geneva on a search for rich husbands. They then told us they own a private island. Mike was the only one dancing in the whole place. Many many laughs. Back to the hostel for more hijinks including a Northern Irish bloke who spoke part English, part Gaelic, part alcohol-induced rambling. Understood about 10% of what he said, but his story of how he got the nickname “Turkey” was the funniest thing I’ve ever heard.

The next day we all skied the Grands Montets area. Our picnic lunch at the top provided spectacular views of the Chamonix valley. Great skiing.

Opey came back to Geneva for a few days. We took a tour of the United Nations. And he joined our usual Thursday night trivia team at Spring Brothers Irish pub. Nice to have someone to speak ’southern’ to.