Tag: Switzerland

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Wait, why are we here again?

It came up recently that I had not been posting much about my work, since that is the reason we ended up moving to Switzerland anyway. I’ve had a number of friends email me assuming that work is keeping me very busy since Sarah authors most of the posts on this blog. Work does keep me busy, but not so busy that I can’t take time off to spend with my family.

So when I looked back, it turns out the only real meaningful post I have written about my job was from back in August, and that was within a week of me starting at the hospital. So I guess it is time for an update. Make sure you grab a drink for this post, because it may be a little dry, and pictures will be sparse.

You may remember that I am here to learn about “hip preservation surgery.” This is a new field in orthopaedics that was really started here in Bern within the last 20 years, and has come into its own here over the last ten years or so. One awesome thing about my job is that I get to work with, and learn from, the world leaders in hip preservation. The Inselspital is used to having people come visit for varying lengths of time to learn their techniques. Most people will visit for four weeks, six weeks, or maybe three months. Six months is not common, and a whole year is not very common at all.

But with that said, there are some very cool benefits that come along with being here for a full year. Unlike most other fellows, I get an office (with a great view of the northern Jura mountains), a new computer, and an ability to really delve deeply into what they’re trying to do here. Research here is plentiful, but not much can be done in 6 weeks. So when a new fellow comes, it’s difficult to integrate them meaningfully in research. Since I am here for a full year, I have as much research work as I can handle, and then some.

My mentors/coworkers are like every other group of orthopaedists that I’ve had the pleasure to work with; they’re fun, irreverent, enthusiastic, and sport a great sense of humor. They have taken the time to teach me their trade, but also to integrate me into their culture and social life. I’m learning history and language and medicine and so much more.

As far as how things compare to what I am used to back home, there are some definite differences. First of all, surgical scrubs are only to be worn in surgery, no exception. I repeat, no exception (and when someone says that with a German accent, you listen). Not only that, but there are communal-use surgical shoes (sterilized after each use) that you must wear. And for infected cases, there are a separate pair of shoes that are to be worn only in the Operating Room (OR), itself.

The OR lounge for nurses, surgeons, and staff has loaves of fresh bread, platters of cured meats, and fresh soup brought in daily. There is also an excellent coffee maker and taps for naturelle (no bubbles) and frizzante (bubbles) mineral water. While lots of time can be wasted here, I rarely see people linger her for more than 20-30 minutes.

Lunch is A BIG DEAL here. Back home, “eating lunch” meant shoving cold chicken strips in my mouth as I walked between the OR and the ER. But in Switzerland, lunch is the main meal, and the Inselspital is really no exception. Most of the orthopaedics department gathers for lunch between 11:30am and 1:00pm. Lunch is a time to sit, relax, eat a LARGE meal, drink a coffee, and… eventually… go back to work.

While all of this sounds great, I can’t help but think how different it might be if I were really able to speak the language. My relative shyness in talking, mixed with the Swiss’ natural tendency to not be very welcoming into their friendship circle, naturally means that my ability to make friends with ancillary staff, techs, nurses, etc is not easy. Back home this was not a problem, but here it can be a bit isolating. But even with those obstacles, I’ve been able to make some work friends. Or perhaps my ridiculous way of speaking is just a novelty to them. I’m like a monkey. A monkey who is poor at speaking Swiss German.

But with all of that said, I could not be happier with my decision to come here. The opportunity has been great, and will hopefully provide a continuing productive professional relationship well into the future. It’s exactly what I want to be doing right now. And in a way it really makes me appreciate what I have to look forward to back home. Sarah and I say it all the time: we’re blessed. We’re extremely lucky to be here.

In fact, I’m the luckiest monkey I know.

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Another Perspective

We are in the middle of a slow week back in Münsingen — school, work, laundry. We were thrilled to find an e-mail from Mark and Kelly, our friends who visited about a month ago. Here is what they had to say…

Alas, we have finally crafted our coveted Switzerland Blog. We apologize for the month long delay. Unfortunately, it coincides with exactly how long it has taken us (mostly Mark) to get back on a normal sleep schedule. And in all honesty we wanted the trip to soak in for a while prior to putting “pen to paper.”

Where to begin? How about the beginning. It was early September when I (Mark) booked the trip. Kelly and Joe work together, but I had only met Joe a handful of times, and Sarah even fewer. (Joe barely remembers any of them as he was lost in song – and booze – around a campfire.) Nevertheless, I broached Joe at his going away party with an idea of a winter visit. It would be surprise to Kelly for her college graduation gift….and Christmas gift…and birthday present.  Joe ate up the idea and it was revealed to Kelly in mid-December. A month a half later we arrived in Zurich.

Our first full day was full of rainy adventures.  We started with a short walk along the Aare River followed by a hike into the foothills. After a short rest at home and a Zvieri (afternoon snack — not to be confused with a Znüni or morning snack), Joe, Kelly and I commandeered Henry’s stroller and walked our ‘beer baby’ to the store for a refill. Kelly was at the wheel and received many an odd look. That evening we celebrated Kelly’s birthday with a dinner at the oldest restaurant in Switzerland (1371 A.D.!) and followed it with Quollfrisch and a fire. Joe may or may not remember.

Saturday was a fantastic day. The seven of us jumped on a train and headed to Kandersteg for a day of hiking and sledging (sledding) where each of us enjoyed a fantastic spill at a high rate of speed.  Smartly Emily and James kicked their sleds down the steep portions and walked them back up to enjoy a more reasonably sloped ride. As you can see, Kelly and I were not as smart.

Unfortunately winter weather was relentless and only shared the sun with us twice for a total of 2 hours the entire week. On Sunday, we skied Lenk in some sort of cloud/fog/haze for the entire day, sometimes only being able to see a few feet in front of us. On our last run of the day, we jumped on a chair lift and took it to the highest point on the mountain. Riding through more haze we got off the lift and skied into this! We were high above the clouds, incredible.

On Monday, we embarked on our first solo Swiss adventure. It started with a bus trip at 6:30 a.m., had us standing on the ‘Top of Europe’ by lunch and skiing down the slopes of Grindlewald in the afternoon! We managed multiple train jumps but survived the day only because a sweet English speaking teller helped us through the dizzying options presented to us in Grindewald.

That solo adventure was one of a number of firsts for us:

  • first plane ride(s) over 5 hours
  • Kelly’s first observation of a Swiss surgery
  • Mark’s first diaper change
  • paying $72.00 for two pizzas
  • Mark’s first train ride
  • losing a digital camera battery for two hours only to find it under some slush filled tire tracks – in working condition
  • and most importantly, our first trip to Switzerland. We hope it was not our last.

We cannot thank you enough, Joe and Sarah, for the opportunity provided. You were terrific hosts and made our first trip out of the country (sorry Canada) incredibly simple and easy. Your kids are wonderfully behaved and left quite an impression on us. Be proud.

Thank you, thank you, thank you and we’ll see you in a couple of months! Unless you decide to stay and then perhaps we’ll see you about this time next year?!?

We will leave you with….

The Top 10 things we learned in Switzerland:
10. We are envious that the Schwab’s get to spend an entire year there.
9. Don’t rent a car. Try the 8 day Swiss pass for endless train, bus and even a few cable car rides. Though not much of a money saver, it eliminates tricky foreign language and currency exchanges AND allowed us to enjoy the “views”, ahem.
8. The Swiss are wonderfully on time.
7. Cats are royalty.
6. Snacks are king. Hot dogs wrapped in freshly baked pretzels filled with ketchup, mustard or whatever you can imagine. Awesome. (Kelly’s mouth is watering as we type this.)
5. If you are lucky enough to visit this place, do take the train to the Top of Europe (highlighted by Matt Lauer on the Today Show).
4. Swiss chocolate gets the attention, but seriously, try the bread.
3. Raclette and/or Fondue = heaven. Yes! hot cheese is a main course in Switzerland.
2. Grüezi (hello) and Merci (thank you). Learn it, live it, and use it on everyone you encounter.
1. Henry…..he just wants.
The week went incredibly fast. Luckily we have 650+ photos to fill in the ’hazy’ gaps.

Love,
Kelly & Mark “Schwab”

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Climb Every Mountain

“Love is looking at the same mountains from different angles.”
– Paulo Coehlo

We are in love with Toggenburg. After a week of looking at these mountains morning and night, on skis and by foot, from the valleys and from the peaks, we are sad to be leaving. To be honest, we were already familiar with the grandeur of the Berner Oberland and the Wallis, the Alpine regions nearest to our home. When we first arrived in Eastern Switzerland, we were skeptical of how it would compare. We admit it. We had become mountain snobs.

But it turns out this is yet another beautiful corner of Switzerland. Toggenburg is a string of towns in a valley not far from the border with Lichtenstein and Austria. We have spent the past few days enjoying much of what the region has to offer. For starters, we took advantage of our location and visited the tiny country of Lichtenstein. We took the relatively short and scenic bus ride to Vaduz, the capital of Lichtenstein. We walked around the town, enjoying its beautiful vinyards, cobblestone streets, cliffside castle, and views of the surrounding mountians. Not suprisingly, Lichtenstein feels liks a combination of Switzerland, southern Germany, and Austria. There isn’t much in the way of tourist attractions, so the highlight of our visit was our picnic lunch on a small grassy knoll where the kids had a chance to run around and play before we headed back home.

We are staying at a Swiss holiday village that is specifically for families (Reka Feriendorf). It has a few nice benefits including a pool, playrooms for kids, and a children’s program where you can drop your kids off for supervised activities (Rekalino). It makes for a great vacation that everyone can enjoy. Our kids had dinner at the Rekalino on Wednesday night, so Joe and I had a night out, or rather a night in, all to ourselves. We did plenty of swimming and playing between our other adventures.

Speaking of adventures, Thursday and Friday were our skiing days. We rented our equipment and took the whole family up the first chairlift. Joe and I took turns skiing with the older kids and hanging around with Henry and the sled. It was yet another beautiful day. So beautiful that the snow was pretty wet, and the snow levels were getting dangerously low in some places. Emily and James have really become quite good considering they’ve only skied a handful of times. They are working on keeping their skis straight sometimes (“french fries”) and spreading them out (“pizza slice”) to turn and break. They are handling medium runs like champs.

Friday morning, the kids went to Rekalino again so Joe and I could have a chance to ski together. We made it all the way back up to the Top of Toggenburg above the town of Unterwasser. Then we skied an unforgettable run all the way back down to the town of Wildhaus. It had incredible views and lots of different terrain including wide snowy slopes and narrow trails along the side of a cliff. Whatever you do, stay between the orange poles! In the afternoon, I took Emily and James skiing again while Joe stayed back with Henry. Emily loved to ski back and forth down the slopes singing the Abba song, “I Had a Dream.”

In a way, this whole week was like a dream.

Check out our Sport week pictures here.

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Fasnacht Friday

It is Fasnacht season. What is Fasnacht? It’s a traditional festival that takes place before Lent, and is celebrated primarily in Switzerland, Southern Germany and a few other areas. I always thought it was like Mardi Gras, but in Switzerland, Fasnacht season starts as early as mid-January and goes through mid-March. Nearly every town in Switzerland has a Fasnacht celebration on one of the weekends. The biggest and most well-known Fasnacht  festivals are in Basel and Luzern.

We wanted to experience this phenomenon. So on Friday after school, Sarah and the kids got in the Fasnacht spirit. James sported a mohawk, the girls wore some facial jewels and crepe paper, and Henry had a homemade Fasnacht hat. We drew a lot of looks as we made our way through Münsingen to the train station, and I was a little worried we overdid it. Boy was I wrong!

Once we got to Bern, there were plenty of colorfully costumed people mixed in with the normal business people at the train station. We picked out a costumed family, and decided to follow them. We made it to the parade, which consisted of very strikingly dressed marching bands. There had to be a lot of space between the bands so you could differentiate the music, and in between bands, crowds of costumed people walked right along so that the line between the parade and the spectators was completely blurred. So, after a handful of bands had passed, we decided to follow the crowd and paraded the streets of Bern. We ended up at the Munsterplatz or Cathedral Square, which was packed with people. We had a lot of fun.

I remember being a little disappointed back in October when Halloween passed without much fanfare. But now I understand why. Who needs Halloween when you’ve got Fasnacht?!

Check out our Fasnacht pictures here.

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Halfway there…

So as of February 1, 2012, we have been living in Switzerland for six months, which means we have six more months to go. Recently I have begun thinking about how my life has changed since living here. Some things are obvious: I speak more German here, I don’t have a car, I can only afford meat when it’s on sale. But other things take a little introspection to figure out. Life is certainly not the same as it was. So here are just a few of the ways things have changed for me in the last six months.

1. I’ve started smoking

Actually, I’ve started second-hand smoking. It’s much cheaper. But it’s also nearly unavoidable since almost everyone seems to smoke around here when waiting for the bus or a train. Even at 6am. Who wants a cigarette at 6am? Apparently the Swiss do. I figure I’m second-hand smoking up to a pack and a half per day now. While the smell of smoke used to bother me in the morning, now I barely even notice it. I also can’t taste food anymore. It might be unrelated… but I expect not.

2. I know the cows who produce my milk, personally

If you read the blog regularly, you know that Sarah and I get our milk, eggs, and potatoes from a farm down the street. We go in a few times a week and fill up our milk bottles, drop a deposit in the till and head home. The sad part is, I can tell what the cows have been eating all week by how the milk tastes. You know that scene in Napolean Dynamite where he is in the milk-tasting competition? That’s now me.

An actual (translated) conversation from a few weeks ago between me and the farmer:

Me: Hello! How’s it going?

Farmer: Super! How’s working at the hospital?

Me: It’s good. Hey, how’s Katya’s (the cow) mastitis doing?

Farmer: Much better. The antibiotics helped. Her udder is much less swollen and red.

Me: Super. Have a great weekend!

Farmer: Same to you!

3. I’ve come to regard Personal Space as a suggestion

The American vs. European cliché about personal space is alive and well in Switzerland. People don’t mind being bumped into, touched, cramped, crowded, or squished into elevators, buses, trains, or the like. At first this definitely made me feel uncomfortable. Then I got used to it, but would still think about it as it was happening. After a while it stopped bothering me altogether. In fact, I’ve started pushing the boundaries the other way; seeing how close I can stand next to someone while talking to them, standing absurdly close to someone in a wide open elevator, sitting on other people’s laps during lunch. I’m waiting for someone to suggest that I’ve gone too far. This may take a while.

 4. I wait at crosswalk lights

Living in Chicago for seven years, you can make a game about how to most creatively cross the street. Things like crosswalks, lighted signals… these are suggestions. In Switzerland, if you cross the street anywhere other than the crosswalk, or when the walk light isn’t green, you will draw looks. More than likely you will draw comments. Das ist verboten! At first you may be tempted to brush this off, but then you realize… every adult Swiss male has done at least some military service, and has a fully functional semi-automatic weapon readily available. Maybe its best to just do what they say. Eat some chocolate, pay attention, and just follow the rules. Welcome to Switzerland.

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Henry Benry

Henry turned two the month before we left for Europe. We have always wondered whether he will remember any of this experience. While the rest of us are immersing ourselves in the language, having cultural experiences, and learning new things, Henry is pretty much oblivious. He has been to Oktoberfest in Munich, skied in the Swiss Alps, and so much more! And yet, here is a conversation I had with him the other day:

Henry loves Legoland“Henry, where do we live?”

“America!”

“Well… where do we live right now?”

“Um, Minnesota?”

“No.”

“At home.”

“Yes, but where is our home?”

(Blank stare)

“Is it in Switzerland?”

“Oh yeah! Switzerland!”

Hmmmm. So, not only will Henry not remember his year in Switzerland, he doesn’t even really understand it as it is happening. However, he has had a big year in his own two-year-old sort of way. He went from a pretty limited vocabulary, to speaking in complete sentences, repeating and incorporating everything he has heard and making us all laugh. “Hey dad, you wanna hear something? It’s super cool and funny!”

This week, Henry finally got out of his pack-n-play that he has been sleeping in for the past 6 months. We figured it was time since he could no longer lay down in it without his head being wedged in the corner. Not that he was complaining. He usually slept all curled up like a snail with his butt up in the air. But, he immediately took to his “big boy bed,” and when we checked on him the first night, he was sprawled out on his back with his legs stretched out and his arms above his head. I was so happy for him!

The second morning in his new bed I went in to get him up, but his bed was empty. The covers were bunched up on the floor, so I lifted them up expecting to see him there. But he wasn’t. I listened, and I could hear breathing. So I bent down and looked under the bed, and there he was, sleeping peacefully. And this was at 8:30am. I don’t know what we did to deserve this, but he is an awesome sleeper!

This morning was Henry’s second time at Spielgruppe. It translates as “play group,” but it is a sort of short-term, in-house day care for 2 – 4 year olds. Henry gets to go to Ursula’s apartment for 2 hours every Friday morning. Last week didn’t go so well. Of course, all the other children speak Swiss German. The teacher speaks a few words of English for Henry. But, all of a sudden he was completely on his own in unfamiliar surroundings and couldn’t understand what people were saying. I imagine he felt a lot like the rest of us felt 6 months ago, and the way a two-year-old deals with that feeling is by crying for his mommy.

But, with a little help, he did really well this week. When I picked him up at the end of Spielgruppe, he said, “Mommy, I didn’t cry!” And who knows, at his age he might still be able to absorb some of the language from this exposure. He is a fast learner.

[singlepic id=705 w=320 h=240 float=right]In fact, since our earlier conversation, he now likes to ask, “Hey dad, where do we live?” That is our cue to say, “I don’t know, Henry. Where do we live?” He gets a big smile on his face and says, “Switzerland!”

There is just one more big project for Henry this year: potty training.

We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.

 

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Welcome to Rainy, Snowy, Foggy Switzerland

We’ve been busy with our first visitors from America since September! We loved playing tour guides and showing them many of our favorite spots. Unfortunately, we couldn’t control the weather. I’ll give you the quick run down, and let them tell you about the experience in their own words in a later post.

Day 1: Some good friends, Kelly and Mark, arrived last Thursday for a Swiss vacation. When they arrived, our cute Swiss town was rainy and dreary. But, it was decided that we couldn’t let the weather stop us, so we grabbed all the umbrellas in the house and walked over to the farm to get some fresh milk and potatoes and introduce them to our animal friends. Back at home, we hung out our wet clothes, started a fire and checked the weather forecast. It did not look good.

Day 2: We awoke to more rain. The kids had school, including an ice skating field trip for Emily and a morning in the woods for James. The rest of us took a wet hike across the Aare river and up the ridge to look over our valley. In the afternoon, our guests tagged along on a trip to the grocery store and other errands to see what it was like. We all went out to dinner at the oldest restaurant in Switzerland, and them walked all the way home in the drizzle because, inexplicably, the buses stop running at 6:30pm on Saturdays.

Day 3: More rain. This is getting ridiculous. But, even though it wasn’t a clear day, we all went to the mountains anyway. We took the train to the mountain town of Kandersteg (where we spent Christmas), and rode the cable car up to Sunnbüel. It is a beautiful area with hiking, cross country skiing, and some downhill skiing. It is surrounded by mountains, but it was snowing the whole time so we couldn’t see much.  I’ve been there twice now, and I still haven’t seen the mountains in the beautiful valley to the south. We brought two sleds and a picnic lunch and had a great time playing in the snow.

Favorite memory: Flying down a ski hill on sleds, even though it was way to steep for sledding. We all crashed and ended up with snow in places it doesn’t belong, but we laughed all the way — and all night when we saw the pictures!

Day 4: Cloudy and foggy. As Henry says, “Are you kidding me!?” We couldn’t wait for the weather any longer, so we took them to Lenk for their first day of skiing. There were some complicated logistics, great snow, and a few stunning moments when the fog blew off momentarily. But generally, you couldn’t see more that about 25 feet in any direction. It was very discombobulating. We caught up with our friend Lorenz, who was also there for the weekend, and he invited us all back to his house for tea, a panettone (popular pastry, like a giant muffin that originates from Italy), and a schwitz in the sauna.

Favorite memory: Watching my kids run out of the sauna and into the snow completely naked with nothing on except mittens on their feet. They loved it!

Day 5: Cloudy and foggy again. Kelly and Mark took off early for their own Swiss adventure. They made it to the Jungfraujoch – the highest point in Europe, where they were finally above the weather and were able to see mountain peaks all around. They also skied at Grindelwald, a popular Swiss ski area just below the Jungfrau, until the fog rolled in again and they called it a day.

Day 6: Kelly (a surgical assistant) joined Joe at the hospital in the morning, while I showed Mark (an architect) some of the architectural highlights of Münsingen. They all met up in Bern for lunch and a private tour of the old town with Joe as their guide.

It was so nice for us to have friends visit from America! We were able to connect in a different way than we have been able to for 6 months. We loved having an excuse to go back to some of our favorite places to show them off. We had a lot of fun, and we think they did too!

(We also took some great pictures!)

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It’s the Little Things – Garages and Language

Another Monday. It was, in all ways, a normal day for our life here in Switzerland. Henry and I went to music class and to the grocery store. James had a friend over for a playdate in the afternoon. But, throughout the day there were many little things that made this day different than it would have been if we were in America. I’ve chosen just two to elaborate on…

Garages:

There are no garage door openers here. No buttons to push. No machines to effortlessly open the garage. Everyone still manually opens their garage. Ours flips up with the help of two gigantic cement blocks attached to the lever. Some have springs, some slide sideways, but I haven’t seen any that roll up the way garages do in America.

Also, I have never seen a double garage. There are only very narrow single-car garages. This is probably because no one here has more than one car. Unlike us, most families have one car, and they negotiate who gets to use it when. Whoever doesn’t get the car rides their bike and/or takes public transportation. As you might expect, the average size of cars here is smaller than in America. Although there are also vans and other large vehicles. I love watching the family across the street park their van in the tiny one-car garage. All passengers have to get out before pulling it into the garage, someone has to manually open the garage door, and then they have to help guide it as close to the wall as possible on the passenger side so the driver can squeeze out, exit the garage and manually close the door.

At first the garage, among other things, made me feel like Switzerland was several decades behind in terms of technology. But, I have since come to understand that the Swiss value things like sustainability and durability over minor inconvenience, while in America we choose convenience over quality and reliability every time.

Language:

It could be argued that this isn’t really a “little” thing. It was, in fact, the thing that scared me the most about moving here. I studied German independently for over two years in preparation, but was told that Swiss German is so different I wouldn’t be able to understand them. Indeed that is true. I still have to ask people to speak “high German,” and even then I have to concentrate really hard to be able to keep up. Every time my phone rings, my heart beats a little faster as I answer and then try desperately to understand who is calling and what they are asking. If Henry interrupts me while I’m on the phone, as two-year-olds are oft want to do, then I’m screwed. My brain can’t do that much.

At music class this morning, I understood most of what the teacher said, some of what the other parents said to each other and to their children, and a few words of the songs. This is a huge improvement over what it was like in my first music class. But half the time I still have no idea what we are singing.

We are quite adept at greetings, transactions, even small talk. And we find that, even when people know we speak English, they still address us in German/Swiss German. Originally I assumed that was because most people in our town can’t speak English. However, I have since learned that most people speak English at least as well as I speak German. They just prefer not to. Now I choose to take it as a compliment and a reflection of our integrated-ness.

Swiss German is a spoken language only. There is no written form of this language. When my parents visited, their tour guide told them that when people speak Swiss German, it sounds like they all have a terrible throat disease. And from the outside it can sound strange. But the more I hear it and start to understand it, the more respect I have for this language.

I looked around for an example of the language we hear ALL THE TIME. This video is a Swiss woman who could very easily be any of the parents in music class or school. Listening to the full 8 minutes isn’t necessary, though it gives you an idea of what we encounter every day.

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How Sweet it is

Switzerland is the land of chocolate. Did you know that the average Swiss person consumes over 26 pounds of chocolate every year?! We always have a few bars of wonderful chocolate in the kitchen. I’m on a mission to try every kind of chocolate in the amazing aisle at the grocery store. But this week, we had a chance to go a little deeper into Swiss chocolate culture.

On Wednesday afternoon, when the kids are not in school, I took them to the Kambly factory. Kambly is a Swiss company that is best known for their cookies. At their factory, they have a special program for kids to make a cookie creation. I had registered Emily and James, so when we arrived they received an apron and got to work. I was expecting them to churn out a batch of cookies, but no. They made a work of eatable art, complete with a cookie base, cake ball snowman, chocolate tree, and marzipan decorations. At the end, after over two hours of hard work, they didn’t want to eat it! (You can see their finished creations in our gallery). Fortunately, there were plenty of Kambly cookies laid out to sample, so we all spoiled our supper before returning home.

The next day was my birthday, and I had another treat for my sweet tooth. Recently, I discovered a great blog called “My Kugelhopf” written by an American living in Zurich who loves sweets, chocolate and traveling. It’s perfect for me! She gives a tour called “Sweet Zurich,” so I signed up. Joe’s gift to me was staying home with the kids for the day (he worked late a couple of nights to make up for it). So, I grabbed my book and my camera and hopped on the train.

This tour was deliciously sophisticated, like a chocolate appreciation class. We walked around the beautiful old town neighborhoods of Zurich visiting small, boutique chocolate and pastry shops. We learned about the different tropical regions the cocoa beans come from, the ingredients and process involved with making chocolate, and how different decisions affect the taste and quality of the final product. I tasted a dark chocolate with ginger and orange, a white chocolate with lime, an unconched chocolate with raisins (and learned what “conching” is!), among many other things. At a specialty cupcake shop, they even had a candle in a cupcake for my birthday.

Before I knew it, I was back on the train, but there was one more sweet treat on my list. After reading the blog and meeting the author, I wanted to try a Kugelhopf. I stopped at the store on the way home and picked one out. I opted for the less traditional chocolate kugelhopf (or gougelhof in this area.) At home we had a little celebration with the cake and a few cards and presents. I feel very blessed, and very full. I think I need to eat salads for the next week!

See all the sweet pictures here.

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Breaking the Law

Sundays in Switzerland are very quiet. And that is how they like it. In fact, there are a number of customs and some actual laws to help keep it that way. For starters, it is illegal to employ staff on Sundays, which is why most stores are closed. There are, of course, some exceptions, but generally there is no grocery shopping or shopping of any kind on Sundays. It is also illegal to hang laundry outside or wash your car on a Sunday. It is considered an offense to mow your lawn or vacuum on a Sunday, or generally do anything that makes too much noise.

Many of these laws are in place because most Swiss people live in apartment complexes and share walls and plumbing with other people. Incidently, it is also illegal to flush the toilet after 10pm.

So what do the Swiss do on Sundays? It seems that many of them visit relatives and friends. Others spend weekends skiing in the mountains. They also eat a particular kind of bread on Sundays called Zopf. It is a braided bread that everyone buys on Saturday to eat on Sunday. Although I don’t always go shopping on Saturday, and sometimes we find ourselves without much selection in our kitchen. It’s a good thing the pizza delivery place in our town is open on Sundays! (Though it costs about $48 to get two pizzas delivered, so we try not to do it too often.)

When we are at home on a Sunday, I find myself at a loss. So, today I broke the law and vacuumed and did a bunch of laundry (though I don’t hang it outside). And then, we did what most other Americans do on Sundays, we fired up our Apple TV and watched football.

I’m feeling rebellious, so I think I’ll go flush the toilet before I go to bed.