Time to switch gears

So, today was my last day of German classes. Nearly everyone in the class is continuing, but I had to make a choice between German class and skiing, and chose skiing. I feel I got a very start, and am hoping to study more on my own--at least to get through prepositions and two more cases! Learning German requires a lot of memorization, especially which nouns are masculine, which are feminine, and which are neutral, as well as the plural form of each noun. Then there's splitting verbs in two, making sure the second part of the verb is in the second position in a statement or question and the first part of the verb is the last word before the ending punctuation. Of course, there are irregular verb conjugations as well. In any event, I am now able to read menus well enough to figure out what dishes have dreaded (to me) liver, sweetbreads, and certain particularly nasty vegetables. And, I can say "Nehmen Sie VISA?"

Last weekend, Henry and I chose Sion as our train destination. Sion is located in the Canton of Valais, where French is spoken. Yay!! I could practice my French. The weather was very yucky (a term of art) on Saturday morning. The train from Zurich was packed with weekend skiers, snowboarders, and other snow lovers, but most of them got off in Visp, to connect to ski areas. The highlights of Sion are castles set on top of two hills--the city sits mostly in the valley in between. One of the castles has a delightful museum, chronicling the history of the area, from prehistoric times through the present. Because of its geographical position, Valais became a popular route for the Crusades and trade through the Alps. With about at least a foot of snow already fallen in some spots, and with the snow continuing to fall, it was no easy task to hike up the hill to the museum. After a number of slips and slides, we were rewarded with a wonderful view of the castle ruins atop the adjacent hill, and, when the sun came out after our tour of the museum, the city of Sion below and the Alpine peaks along the horizon. Although only a few of the explanatory notations in the exhibit were in English, Henry and I managed between the German and French explanations. I also managed to explain in French to the cashier why Henry should receive a discounted entry to the museum. As we left the museum, I commented to Henry that we would never find a museum like this in the United States--it couldn't comply with the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act)! At the same time, part of what made the museum so interesting was its layout--many small rooms (close to 30 in two buildings) on half floors (four steps here, five steps there), each room with a separate theme.

Back to food--About the only way to get low fat (forget no-fat) food is to buy Weight Watchers products! Go figure...

The last few days, Henry has been in Potsdam, Germany, giving a talk and serving on an advisory committee of a scientific institute there (PIC, but don't ask me for what it stands!). Following his return, we will head off to Andermatt, so I can ski and Henry can "avant-" and "apres-" ski.

Welcome to the new administration

The only English language station we get on our television is CNN. Thank goodness for that! At least I could watch and understand Obama's entire inauguration speech in real time! And what a wonderful sight it was to see so many people joining in history in the making. I could feel the excitement across the airwaves! Fortunately, or unfortunately (depending on one's viewpoint), the honeymoon is over tomorrow, with much hard work ahead. As far as I can tell, which isn't much after just over two weeks of German, Obama is getting good press here.

Last weekend, Henry and I rode the train to and from Lugano. We're taking advantage of the half-fare passes we bought for train travel throughout Switzerland. We lucked out with the weekend weather. Not only could we view the snow covered mountains along the way, but it also was warm enough for me to remove my scarf, gloves, and hat after we arrived in Lugano! Indeed, there were even some sailboats out and about on the lake. We had a lovely lakeside walk after failing to succeed in communicating in Italian with the waitstaff at lunch. It's rather amazing that a country as small as Switzerland can have 4 official languages (German, French, Italian, Romanisch), with some areas being provincial enough that many people do not speak German, the otherwise most widely spoken language in Switzerland. It will be interesting to find out whether I will be able to understand German German when we move on to Munich, no less be understood when I speak Swiss German. In fact, the dialects are different. When Henry tried speaking German German to a local shopkeeper the other day, the shopkeeper responded that he could more easily communicate with Henry in English than to follow what Henry was saying in German German. As was the case when we returned by train from Einsiedeln, our return train from Lugano was filled with skiers and snowboarders, daytripping from the cities to the winter mountain resorts. Public transportation really works!!

This is the week I've been looking forward to in my German class--the topics are essen und trinken. I told Henry we have to go out to dinner this weekend so I can order for both of us in German--Swiss German that is. Interestingly, as I learn more German, but am still at a loss as to how to say a specific word or phrase in that language, I automatically try to think of the word or phrase in French, rather than English. I suppose that's good practice for when we visit Sara in Paris in a couple of weeks!

Sun!!!

It took over a week and a half for us to see the sun here in Zurich, but it finally arrived yesterday. On Sunday, we had a sneak preview of sun when we took the train to Einsiedeln to visit Rod Franklin, a friend of ours from Del Mar who currently works just outside of Zurich. Because Einsiedeln is out of the valley in which Zurich sits, it does not suffer from overcast skies and it also doesn't suffer the lake effect from the Zurichsee (it's really a lake, but no matter). It was just as chilly in Einseideln as in Zurich, but the sky was wonderfully blue all day! The city of Einseideln was built around a monastery which continues functioning to this day. The friars produce some decent wine, which we had with our lunch. The outside of the monastery building does not prepare one for the rather over-the-top ornateness inside the cathedral. Cherubs and angels are not only part of the painted and gilded ceilings; they also hang over the nave. If cathedrals do rococo, then this is surely one of them! The apparent sighting of the black madonna is also reflected in several pieces. Rod has graciously invited us to stay at his apartment, which will make skiing quite a bit more convenient for me once I finish with my German classes.

I've been to several museums, and all exhibits have been impressive, especially in the quality of their presentation. It certainly helps that they all have English commentary, but they are also very informative. I bought a museum pass which gets me into most museums in Switzerland without additional entrance fees, so I've been able to go to a museum for an hour or so at a time, see one exhibit, and save the other exhibits for other days. It definitely breaks up the German studying time!

It's amazing how smoothly and precisely the bus, tram, train, and cable car system works around here. When the schedule says there's a 3-minute connection, you don't need to worry about making it. The Swiss pride themselves on keeping to the schedule.

If I gain a lot of weight while I'm away, I will likely be able to attribute it to all of the cheese I'm eating. The assortment is great, and all of it is good. We had cheese fondue for dinner the other day--Henry stopped at a shop where the number of grams of fondue cheese you request is grated for you on the spot. Just add wine and garlic and melt the cheese, and the delicious dinner is ready! Also, the Swiss apparently don't believe in skim milk. It's tough to find even low fat milk and yogurt, no less non-fat!

Back to School

The last time I was in school was in 1976. Now, I'm the oldest one in my German class, and I'm starting with the least knowledge of German than anyone else in my class. I signed up for four weeks, and I'm spending a few hours every afternoon/evening studying to keep up! Some things never change--I'm still taking school seriously! But, it's fun, and I hope to engage in some German conversation by the end of the month. Some interesting side notes about the class--the 9 students in the class are from 9 different countries (USA, France, Romania, Serbia, Brazil, Venezuela, Ireland, Italy, and Eritrea). The teacher speaks German virtually the entire time (no surprise), but the default language is English. Of course, that's not a problem for me, but it is for some of the others in the class. It will take me a while to get used to the mixed up way (to me, anyway) that words and sentences are constructed in German. For example, with numbers higher than 20, the number in the ones column is said before the number in the tens column--e.g., 64 is spoken as vierundsechzig (four and sixty). While I wait to hear what's in the tens column, I miss what's in the ones column! During the breaks, students go outside to smoke--again, no surprise, but while I know that more young (and old) folks smoke in Europe than in the US, I am pleasantly surprised that cigarette smoking does not appear to be as widespread here as in other European cities. What a relief!

A few more miscellaneous observations--Food and most everything else is very expensive here. Chicken breast (skinned and boned) is about $16/lb., and whole chickens or chicken parts are not much less. And, as in the US, beef costs more than chicken. Also, enjoy your fruits and vegetables at the relatively inexpensive prices in the US! Nevertheless, a wide variety of products are readily available, and shopping is very convenient. Underneath the main train station is a huge mall--the shops are small, but numerous. The best part about shopping there is that I can walk around inside, instead of outside in the snow! Also, instead of walking back up the hill to our apartment along the switchbacking streets or on the icy steps that cut through from street to street, I can take a cograil car to the end of our street. Our monthly bus pass includes all types of public transportation--busses, trams, trains, cog railways, and boats.

I'm looking forward to the weekend, when it's supposed to be bright and sunny!

Thanks for all of your comments and emails! (And, hi Chip! What's your email address?)

We've arrived!

Hi, everyone,

We've arrived in Zurich! In case you don't know, it's cold here! No glitches in our travels and no problem meeting Brett and Sara at the Zurich train station on Wednesday afternoon. Our apartment is great--three bedrooms/one bath--plenty roomy for Henry and me, and enough room for guests. The two extra bedrooms have twin beds, but there is also a couch in the living room.

Brett and Sara enjoyed their ten days of sisterly bonding as they traveled in Italy and France before training to Zurich. Not only were they still talking to each other, they gave each other big hugs when we saw Sara off on her train to Paris today. Sara starts her winter quarter in Paris on Monday. She's done very well with her German, and seems to pass easily between French and German. I'm hoping to achieve the same result after taking an intensive German class for 2-4 weeks. We stopped by the language school today--it wasn't open, but at least we know it really exists. I'll be there bright and early on Monday morning. With Brett leaving for the airport at around 7am on Monday, I should be able to make it to the school in plenty of time!

We had quite an adventure on Wednesday night. Figuring that we would have the car for only 24 hours (to drive from Munich to Zurich) and with no snow in sight, we opted against paying extra for a winterized car rental. Unfortunately, it started snowing as we arrived at our dinner destination. By the time we returned to the car to drive back to the apartment, about 3 inches of snow had fallen. The was enough to start the front wheels spinning and the entire car sliding as we tried several times to make it up the hills to the apartment. Eventually, we took a more circuitous route home, driving up streets with more gradual inclines. Brett and I got out numerous times to push the car up and away from the sidewalks and other parked cars. Sara did her part, keeping Henry company as he steered the car. If there was any tread on the tires to begin with, there was virtually none by the time we arrived at the apartment! Luckily, the streets were clear enough the next morning for Henry to drive to and return the car at the airport. Now, we're all set with our monthly bus/tram/boat passes.

We're getting settled and getting used to the area. Once I start learning some German and Henry starts his work, I'll be venturing out and about the Zurich area and beyond.