Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow...

We love the snow.

I didn't know we loved the snow, but since Thanksgiving it seems we have had more days than not with snow on the ground, and we are not sick of it yet - not even close. I think back on my childhood now with a sense of deprivation: all the snowmen I never got to make; all the missing snowball fights; the snow angels that never got to be. I did have a few trips to the snow when I was young, but my memories were always of being cold and miserable - now, thanks to technology and a bit of money, we have all the right clothing, so you never get cold! Who would have thought?! Even Eric, who grew up with plenty of the white stuff is having fun. His thinking: there is no wind here, so as long as you are bundled up, the cold is quite bearable...

Now I was told that a White Christmas is quite rare in these parts - but I put my order in early, and old man weather delivered! And talk about winning the lottery: a white Thanksgiving as well - boy, are we blessed! Now I know that not everyone was singing the praises of snow, as many got stuck Christmas week unable to get to where they wanted - be it vacation, getting home, or getting to relatives for the Christmas holiday - hopefully everyone was able to keep their impatience in check and just be in the moment, while we enjoyed the pleasure of the winter wonderland.

As is usual, the time between Thanksgiving and Christmas and New Years has just flown by. We started the holiday season with the Basel Stadtlauf on Thanksgiving weekend - kids (and adults) run through the city streets the first night they light up the old part of town. Quite charming, except it snowed that day, leaving the roads covered in slippery ice and snow that they couldn't clear entirely before the race started (again, something that would never be allowed in California!). I waited at the chaotic finish line so missed the kids slipping and falling - and it took over 15 minutes to find Bennett after he finished in the crowd of parents claiming their kids. You have to give it to the people of Basel, though - they love to celebrate, and despite the cold and slushy conditions, people were out in full force to cheer everyone on.

The next weekend we had a great visit from Sue's cousin Britta - she came down from Frankfurt and we did a treasure hunt tour of Basel with the kids - chasing clues throughout town. We then got an adult night out which included a tour through Basel's Weinachtsmarkt. Nothing like a little Gluehwein to get one in the holiday spirit! We spent the night talking and talking - work, life, retirement - it always great to see her, and we hope to get to see her again soon.

Our next big event of the season was our piano recital. They boys have been taking lessons since October, and it is like fish to water. We had been worried when we decided to move the piano that it would end up just being a piece of furniture gathering dust, but there are days I swear someone is sitting and playing from the moment they wake up until the moment they go to sleep (sorry neighbors!) Our teacher is really proud of their enthusiasm, and they were the only duet at the recital - check it out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRzHlN8W_Zo How can you not be proud of that?

We then took the week before Christmas and went to Austria to do our first real ski vacation. St. Anton is tucked into the Tirol region, and we were blessed with good weather, no crowds and lots of snow that made the week a perfect getaway. The kids took lessons and went from beginners to able to do any hill with Dad. I took private lessons in my quest to just like skiing, and my instructor Tom was perfect - endless patience, with a focus on having fun and feeling safe. He carried my skis, he held a spot for me in line at the lift, he skiied backwards half the time to help me figure it out. How could I ask for more?

Now what was interesting, in my limited ski experience, was that I was used to the standard designations of trails: green for beginner, blue for in the middle, and black for the hard slopes. Here, you don't see green, which made me think blue was for beginners - but actually, when we signed up for lessons, they showed this little chart that includes green as the beginner designation - they just don't happen to have any green slopes at the whole resort... They have also thrown in red between blue and black - I don't know if that makes the red slopes here equivalent to black runs in the US, and then double black diamond equals black here?? It doesn't matter to me - I am not going off the blue for a while...

What was also fun was that every night we would come back to our hotel for a sauna and steambath. The kids had a ball, and we were amused by the robes they got - pink for Karl with ribbons, and Bennett's peach number made him look like a little victorian girl... Karl was pissed, and it was only the allure of the sauna that got him to put it on - Bennett was oblivious to the humor of it all. Can't wait until they are teenagers and everything bothers them...

Finally we got to celebrate Christmas here - the big event is the unveiling of the tree on Christmas Eve - the hotel resturaunt was blacked out all day, and that night when they opened we were treated to beautiful decorations, along with a tree that had real candles - can't say we have seen that before in California!
All the hotel guests toasted each other, and we enjoyed a fabulous four course meal capped off with a beautiful basket of home made Christmas Cookies. It was really homey (for not being at home) as we played games in the hotel lobby until all were too tired to stay up any longer. We ended up doing Christmas all over again on December 26th once we got home, so for us it was the holiday that kept on giving this year...

We hope you and your families had a great holiday season, and are kicking off 2011 with excitement for what will come this year!

Happy Thanksgiving!!

So what does Thanksgiving in Switzerland feel like?

So first, I actually went to work - we had plans to go to a company sponsored holiday dinner, and so with nothing to actually cook, there was so real reason to stay at home. Everyone looked at me strange when I wished them a Happy Thanksgiving - but who can fault them? When was the last time you wished someone a Happy Swiss National Day (August 1st, for those who are interested)?

So after a busy day at work, I drove over to the company's "executive" dining room, where the relocation people had arranged a wonderful holiday dinner for all expats and their families, and I met up with Eric and the kids. So it was a very considerate and thoughtful event, and we actually had a great time. However, a few things came across as a bit strange:

When I got there, I hooked up with Eric only to ask: "where are the kids?" as they were no where to be seen and even not heard. It turns out they had done an incredible job of arranging games and activities for the kids in a separate wing on the same floor - which, I hear every parent out there applauding: what would be strange about that? So what was strange is that they made a separate dinner for them so they didn't even eat with us - basically having Thanksgiving without our kids...

The evening started with champagne and wine - and our company head of HR gave a quick speech to welcome us there and thank us for moving to Switzerland and promoting sharing and learning across the company, etc... this was great - except she spent most of her speech talking about the announcement the week before of headcount reductions at the company and the hard choices and the difficult times ahead, etc....

Really? At a holiday party? I guess you can't ignore it, but should it be most of your speech?

So then up next was a guy who organized the event, who explained the plan for the rest of the evening. He was the one who broke the news that we wouldn't have dinner with our kids; he also explained that they weren't going to serve turkey, but instead holiday dinner choices from Switzerland (veal stew), Portugal (fish stew), and Germany (weiners and potato salad). Now, I don't mean to be American-centric, but where is my turkey? The dinner was billed as a holiday dinner, but if you have it on Thanksgiving evening... Well, we were disappointed, but Eric later found out from a friend there that had been the year before that they had turkey and it was awful - so perhaps they learned from the previous mistake. But Thanksgiving without turkey (or some large bird) just feels a little wrong...

But the food was quite good, and the wine was plentiful (and quite nice) so the missing children and missing turkey were soon forgotten as we met new friends and shared the meal with old friends as well - just like Thanksgiving should be.

Well, we got home early (remember my birthday party: things end in Switzerland when they say they will end)and Eric and the boys watched Thunderball as they had vacation the next day, but with work the next morning I retired early and was fast asleep in short order.

The next thing I remember was being abruptly woken to the sound of screaming...

"SNOW!! SNOW!! SNOW!!!"

It was probably close to 10 pm, and Karl was screaming at the top of his lungs at our first ever snowfall since we have moved here - the boys and my first-in-our-lifetime for snowfall at our home. Eric dragged them outside in their pajamas to document the event. A white Thanksgiving - something to be quite thankful about.

So we woke up this morning to a beautiful white blanket of snow - enough to make snowballs in the backyard and coat the trees, but not enough to make it dangerous to get out and take a morning run. With the temperature at just freezing, it was just about as great as snow can be. We spent the morning renting my skis for the season, and then after Eric and the kids dropped me off at work, they went and got the rest of our winter necessities: sleds, snow boots (those little feet grow so fast!), shell jackets for skiing... Hey Winter: the Somervilles are ready for you!

However, best of all, waiting for me when I got home from work:

A turkey dinner, complete with garlic mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, gravy, and pickled red cabbage (we had to throw in a little bit of Switzerland)! It was heavenly - possibly the best turkey I have ever had. What made this also funny is that the original plan was to get a goose - but the only ones they had at the store were frozen, which Eric knew would not thaw in time for our one-day-late Thanksgiving. They did have one fresh turkey left over, but at 10 kilos was much more than we could ever eat - even if we invited over the whole block. So the butcher suggested cutting it in half - right down the middle... So we had 1/2 a turkey - maybe that was the trick that made it taste so good...

Asia out of nowhere!

Eric gave me a complete surprise today - the kind that seemed trivial and non-important to him that was really earth-moving for me:

We were sitting around this morning enjoying the nothing-to-do-ness of this Saturday, when I told Eric I had taken some time while he was shopping to post a blog. And then he says, out of nowhere:

"You know I have an electronic version of all the emails we sent when we went to Asia in 1999 - see, they are right here..."

What???!!!

I knew that two of our friends, Dana Mulligan and Jeanne Virca, had given us amazing gifts upon our return from Asia of binders with reprints of our emails from the trip. And I had also known that one of them (was it Jeanne? Dana don't get mad if it was you) had also included a disk with an electronic version of the letters. Now, in our perpetually disorganized life, my plan was to come across that disk when Eric and I were in our 80s clearing out the attic for our move into the retirement home. But no, Eric blows me away that they are in a file, on his computer, ready for viewing and posting.

And so, with a hot cup of tea, I just spent the last hour or so setting them up in their own blog:

http://ericandsue1999.blogspot.com/

Feel free to visit and read at your leisure. Hopefully it will inspire you to travel as well!

We are not in California anymore...

So Fall is here, with an explosion of color and leaves. At home, people always talked about the Fall colors on the East Coast, and I always felt we had our fair share of Fall action where we live in California - trees turn colors, leaves fall, etc... However the difference here is clear: leaves fall in epidemic proportions; you are ankle deep or more for weeks, and no one bothers to rake them because they are replaced the next day with more. The leaf drop is also partnered with crisp weather, so the mix of crunch beneath your feet and heavy coats really signals a season change.

Eric got a chance to go and visit his family in Ohio for a week, and I took over responsibility for getting the kids where they belonged, while getting my job done at the same time. Eric had left me a great schedule with support from our friends here, so it actually all worked out well.

While Eric was gone, the boys and I got a last minute visit from my Uncle Wolfgang and Aunt Dagmar who came down from Germany to spend a Sunday with us. We had hoped for good weather to go on a hike in the local hills, but we instead had a cold, wet day to contend with. We decided when they arrived to do a walking tour of the city which was quite pleasant until the kids got chilled and bored with window shopping. We stopped for a coffee / hot chocolate (two coffees, two hot chocolates, and one cappuccino for 25 CHF - lord help me, I will never get used to these prices...) but this only appeased the boys for the duration of the chocolate. So I made a bold decision.

Parents in California, please make sure you are sitting down.

I gave Karl the house keys and put them both (age 7 and 9) on the tram by themselves to go home. That is right - no parental supervision to make sure they get off on the right stop, no one to help them across the two streets they have to cross to get to our house, no one to supervise them when they got home that they didn't burn the house down.

And even better: I didn't worry at all that anything would go wrong. I didn't worry that people would stop them and ask where their parents are. This choice was totally normal for Switzerland, and actually when we describe the helicopter parenting of California, people here wonder what is wrong with us. I actually have thought about this a lot since being here, and need to do a bit more research - as kids we had the same freedom that kids have here, but something must have happened in the 70s in the US, because a shift took place that tightened control on our kids, stopped a lot of trick or treating, and drove a paranoia of child abduction and torture that has made us stop allowing our kids to grow up and take care of themselves. If you know or have an opinion, please drop a line...

My aunt and uncle then took our time strolling through the city, enjoying the sites and the shop windows, talking about life choices like where to live, what to accomplish, what really matters, etc. When we got home an hour or so later, they kids were comfy on the couch watching age appropriate TV, and everyone was happy and content. The visit with Dagmar and Wolfgang was really great, and we made plans to meet in the Black Forest in the future for hikes and outdoor fun along with getting Eric in the mix.

A few days after Eric returned, rested and energized, we got to celebrate my first birthday in Switzerland. We had a lot of anxiety - what was the appropriate ettiquette for who to invite, how to invite (would people open an Evite?), would it be too crowded, what to serve to eat, what to serve to drink - we set up the invite as an "apero" which is the Swiss equivalent of a cocktail party, so that the pressure to have a full dinner wouldn't be there. However we stocked the tables with open face sandwiches, butter pretzels, cut vegetables, a platter of cheeses and a pot of lentil stew on the stove. We haven't found a party rental place (yet) so it was plastic wine glasses and paper plates, but we felt well stocked for all possible outcomes. Eric even ordered a birthday cake from a local bakery (no way were we going to trust our continuous bad luck at cooking and baking on a cake).

So, unlike California, everyone arrived at 5:30 pm exactly - just like the invite said. There was actually a line out the door for people to come in. Lucky for us and our party anxiety we were ready on time, so the tsunami of guests was not problematic. We did hit some snags in that the guys who work in my group all wanted beer, where Eric and I decided it would be a wine and champagne party. We scrounged through our basement stock and came up with 12 or so beers, but the mistake was well noted for our next bash. People also commented on the blue birthday cake - I guess color is not common here - but it did not stop people from digging in.

The party then ended just as it started, with everyone streaming out at exactly 7:30 like the invite said - except the Americans who assumed that was only a suggestion - and some Americans who actually arrived at 7:30 to start the party... So we stayed up and partied further until 10:30 or so with a smaller more manageable crowd picking at the food leftovers, and the amazing apple pie our friend Terri brought over (complete with "Sue" cut into the crust).

Overall a great party - one of the highlights was the "clinical suppply" leckerlei cookies (very traditional Basel) I got from the global trial coordinators in my group at work. Find a Swiss person to help you translate the label - my favorite line is "keep out of reach of children and your husband"...

Herbstmesse

Fall is here, and in Basel that means the Herbstmesse (translation: Fall Fair). This is quite an event in this town - 7 locations throughout the city are set up for two weeks with carnival rides and food stands: from pony rides to the 66 meter drop Power Tower; from bratwurst to raclette to sauted liver; from cream fudge to chocolate covered fruit to cotton candy. It is quite literally every child's dream come true with all the neon and music pulsating, people screaming their heads off as multiple thrill rides run in close proximity, and a multitude of sweets is never more than a stones throw away. And like I said - this is all over town, so it just goes on, and on, and on..

Now like any good fair, you aren't going to get away without dropping some cash - but did I mention that a single ride can cost 12 CHF (that is over $12 in today's exchange rates!)? Luckily Karl and Bennett were too short to go on those rides so we stuck to the 3-6 CHF range. The corn in the picture is 6 CHF an ear - would you pay $6 for an ear of corn?? Work friends visiting from California went out with me and the kids one night, and for the rides we did go on, the whole heartedly agreed that no 7 year old would be allowed on them back at home. Ah, yes, we live in the land of few lawyers here...



It really has been a blast (once I let go of the money we were spending) - our favorite ride was the mini Power Tower - a 50 ft or so high tower that raises you up and then drops you in a free fall only to catch you and take you back up to do over and over again. Bennett surprised me with having a liking for the scary spin-me-around rides (isn't he a bit young for those?) and we got in a bit of bumper car action as well. Come to think of it, I haven't seen bumper cars in California in quite a while - this is the place to be for rides that have been banned in the United States...


Now the downside to the fair for me was that the main location was right outside my office building. Mostly that was actually quite cool, as I could look out my window on the 19th floor and space out on the rides going around and around when I needed a break from some intense Power Point - you could actually hear the screams from inside the building! No, the downside was that every day at lunch I would justify for myself why it was OK to again eat fair food for lunch. Bratwurst today,
raclette tomorrow - but walking by the sweets stands proved too much for my willpower, so I would take a bag of fudge or candied nuts with me back to my desk. "Only eat one..." would turn into "try and take some home" and for the most part it didn't happen. I need the fair to leave so I can STOP eating and start losing some weight in preparation for all the Christmas goodies...

And speaking of the holidays, we did get in some Haloween fun...



But the leaves are almost all off the trees - my guess is within the week they will all be done. And I heard there might be snow on the hills on Sunday - let the winter begin!

Canary Islands Part II: The Hotel Buffet and the Naked People

So the hotel we stayed at in the Canary Islands had a daily breakfast and dinner buffet, and so for a modest 80 euros we got breakfast and dinner for each of us for a whole week - we couldn't turn that deal down...

Well, it turns out, our children were OBSESSED with the buffet. It became the focus of their life - what could be better than their own control over what they eat and how much they eat - I am sure it is hard to remember what it was like to have someone decide for you what you eat and if you don't like it having them tell you that you can eat it or go hungry...

So every morning it was the same routine: do they get a pot of hot chocolate or tea?; Bennett would get cereal, followed by eggs (either made to order omelet or standard fried egg) where Karl would go straight to the crepes with chocolate sauce - I swear he ate at least 4 if not 8 every morning - and usually with a course of vanilla yogurt thrown in the middle. They loved to make a ceremony out of the tea or chocolate (I imagine it made them feel quite adult) and if we were lucky we snuck in a piece of fruit.

Toward the end of the trip, when I finally read the travel book, I tried a thing at the cereal buffet called Gofio - it is toasted grains ground into a flour: corn, wheat, barley, etc. - you mix it with milk to make a paste, and then add dried fruits for an incredibly filling breakfast. Bennett starting eating it too, as it kind of tasted like Wheatabix that we eat every morning at home - if you put it in the blender. So enamoroued that I had found a food I had never seen before, we bought up 4 kilos to take back with us to keep remembering the "vacation" experience. Apparently, the wonderful web has a bunch of different recipes to try, so we will be busy with Gofio for a while (caution if you come over to our house to eat, guinea pig...).

So that was breakfast. Dinnner was a bigger deal. First, Karl would whine incessantly all day if we could not go to the buffet at exactly 7 pm when it opened. I don't know if he had visions of food shortages and hoards of people eating everything up - I think most of it was just an excitement of all the possibilities... When we finally got there, the waiter would take drink orders, then the excitement would begin. Each night some of the selections changed, so each boy would stroll around looking at all the options: salad choices, pasta choices, grilled meats, hot dishes, vegetables, and of course a review of the dessert buffet to see how much room to keep. Bennett actually got quite organized and starting bringing down a note pad and pen, and would write down his "order" which upon returning to the table became my job to go get for him. Karl liked the system as well, and so by the last few nights I was doing it for both of them. As much as it sounds like I was their maid-servant, it actually was fun, and made me eat slower, so all was good. Karl was a straight pasta guy - Bennett, on the other hand, would get so creative: beets, cucumbers, pasta with butter, cheese with the orange rind, bread with butter, and a sliced apple...the boy knows what his body needs...

So one night, after serving the boys and having them finish well before me, Eric took them over to the disco to catch the daily awards show, and I sat with my red wine and slowly finished my dinner.

Watching the people that night was probably one of the highlights of my trip. The hotel guests ranged from honeymooning couples to young families to a lot of older middle age couples who left the kids at home, and then a fair showing of senior citizens. The nationalities were mostly English and Spanish, with some Italian and German thrown in - I am sure there were a few Dutch and Scandanavian as well, but probably too few to really count. What made this people-watching so fun was the diversity: I am sitting there in a old wrap skirt, Gap t-shirt, and flip-flops - probably normal fare for a Fairfax cafe; others had obviously packed their "resort wear" and were decked out in formal dresses complete with rhinestones and high heels. It is not that I was out of place - there was everyone on the continuum between me and them. I found the two inch stacked orthopedic flip flops with the rhinestone bling a fascinating choice; and of course all the women who have grown larger than their short skirts and low cut blouses...the tables ranged from couples sitting formally, virtually not talking (even the kids found it strange how many people just sat there and did not talk to each other) to loud boisterous parties of families traveling together. I just loved soaking up all the people and imagining what all their stories were...

One of the nights, two funny things happened:

We sat at a table next to the dessert buffet, and we saw a girl probably no older than three toddle up to the bar. Now, it was pretty clear that she should not have come there alone, but each family has different limits - and hence as it was past our limit, Eric and I could not take our eyes off of her, fearing something here may go wrong. So she takes the serving spoon to serve herself some of the strawberry mousse, and inadvertently puts a scoop the size of a bocce ball into her bowl. After evaluating the situation for a few seconds, she did what logically made sense to her: she took that bocce ball scoop of stawberry mousse in her hand and threw it back into the mousse bowl. Eric, horrified, jumped up and started to help her by taking the bocce ball scoop back out of the mousse bowl and back into her bowl, and then gently pushed her on her way.

Then, if that wasn't enough action at the dessert bar, Bennett went up to get some ice cream. He was very proud that he could scoop it himself, but unfortunately the toppings and sauces were a bit out of his reach. So before we could catch him, he had climbed up onto the dessert bar to serve himself to some chocolate sauce. What made it funnier was that before we could get up an older lady walked between us and the dessert bar, saw him up there, and then turned back toward us and said something in Spanish that I could interpret to be something like :"don't parent's have any limits anymore??"

Speaking of limits, the other funny thing about the vacation was the "naturalists" on all the beaches. Eric and I have both traveled a lot before, so running into topless sunbathers in Europe was no surprise. But we were a bit taken aback our first day at the beach to find so many TOTALLY naked people - and, as my friend Randy pointed out, it is not the people you want naked who have their clothes off. I would say easily 20-30% of the people were in their birthday suits, with most of them being over 50 and most being as brown and leathery as shoe leather. They played paddle ball naked, they went down to the tide pools to feed the fish naked - it was really not a pleasant site at all. Karl and Bennett noticed, but were mostly oblivious - definitely strange, but nothing to get goofy about (thank god). What was funny on our second day at the beach is that we were walking down trying to find a good spot to lay our towels, and every time we thought we found a good spot, there was a naked person next to us. Whoops - keep going, only to find the next spot with yet again a naked person there, too. Finally on about the 4th try we found a nice spot with only harmless topless people...

Alas, the vacation is over. Fall is full swing in Basel, and the leaves are rapidly falling off the trees - winter here we come...

Canary Islands: Land of Volcanos and Sand

So the kids had a week and a half break from school in October, so this summer we started talking about where we should go on vacation - something rich in culture and learning? Somewhere warm to get out of the oncoming Switzerland cold? Something with fantastic natural beauty? We wanted to pick a place that we normally wouldn't go from the US due to distance, taking advantage of our central Europe location. On the list, but didn't make the cut:

1. Ireland - after consultations with others, it was deemed to risky to be cold and wet the whole time
2. Kenya / African Safari - upon review (and again advice of others) it seems most tours with kids might not let them out of the jeep due to their "snack" size - which we thought might be frustrating for them and would be better off waiting until they are older
3. Egypt - now this seemed to fit the whole bill: a bit of history, a bit of sun and relaxation, some amazing natural and manmade beauty. However, due to our late planning, the plane tickets alone were going to cost something close to $8000 - ouch! So Egypt is still high on the list, but just postponed until we plan ahead next time.
4. Greece - we had just been there
5. Istanbul - heard it is better without the kids
6. Southern Italy - no guarantee it would be warm enough

So we began to be paralyzed by all the choices in the world - truly pathetic. I think in retrospect our attempt at making everything "perfect" was in turn narrowing us to such a small space that nothing could meet the requirements.

So we thought a little harder, and came up with the Canary Islands.

Now the Canary Islands is one of those places both Eric and I had heard about before, but if you had asked us to point to them on a map we would have been hard pressed. It is one of those places that we never thought we would ever go in our life. After a bit of research, and great prices due to a multitude of tour operators that send British people here for sun burns, we knew we had a great choice for a vacation.

Now a bit of geography and history for the often world-knowledge challenged Americans (no offense to any individual - but when eductated friends confused Switzerland and Sweden before we left the US, we knew we had trouble): Canary Islands are actually owned by Spain, and were a stopping off point for a lot of explorers on their way to the Americas (Columbus stopped here on his way). The name has nothing to do with birds, but actually is translated to be "Islands of the Dogs" - which was probably a reference to monk seals that no longer exist here due to overkilling from early settlers. They are 7 main islands, with the furthest east located about 100 km off of Africa, right at the Morrocco / Western Sahara border.

Eric, after much research, picked a resort in Fuerteventura, the most easterly island, for us to stay for the week. The mix of reviews and family friendly hotel advertisement made it seem suitable for us. All the islands are volcanic, but Fuerteventura, and its neighbor Lanzarote, are virtually void of all plant life - it looks like Mars. Eric and I have been loving the green of Switzerland, but we have to say that the remote, rugged landscape was really cool - gave us a whole new appreciation for the Southwest US and why people have such an attraction to the desert.

The resort has been quite comfortable, with nice rooms, pleasant pools, mini club for the kids, tennis and ping pong, swim lessons, and a nightly disco that proved to be the coolest thing ever for the kids. They got swimming certificates, Eric won the ping pong contest, and Sue just sat around the pool and did nothing - just like vacation should be.

We did journey out on occasion - we spent a whole day driving around Lanzarote - visiting a spectacular cactus garden as well as a cave with the best optical illusion Eric and I have ever seen (sworn to secrecy by the tour operator - you have to go there yourself to see it...). We even tucked in a very touristy camel ride - and for those of you who want to complain about animal cruetly hold your anger - these camels had muzzles and halters, where the camels we rode in India years ago were led around by piercings in their nose - ouch. So torture and cruelty are all relative...



We also got a chance to explore Fuerteventura (though getting the bum off the pool lounge chair wasn't easy). There is a whole set of big sand dunes just south of the town we were in that were just amazing. The story goes that the sand blows in from the Sahara due East, but there are differing opinions on the internet. Believe what you will, they were incredibly picturesque. The beach was equally beautiful, with enourmous sand dunes in the background of clean turquoise waters. Paradise found...

For next time: the great hotel buffet and all the naked people....

something bad finally happened (well, almost)

So when Eric and I traveled through Asia we sent email to our frends (1999 - this was in the days before blogs even existed) and our motto at the time was "the worse the situation, the better the story". So here in Switzerland I have been waiting for something "bad" to happen so I could tell a good story. And I have been waiting, and waiting... and life here has been, well - normal. We are making new friends (thanks to Eric, the social king), having people over for dinner, Sue goes to work, the kids play with kids in the neighborhood, the take piano lessons, and blah blah blah... So it has been hard to muster up a good story to tell without boring myself, much less someone else who would care even less (except the grandparents - they want to know everything).

Well last week I finally had my chance. Eric calls me on Tuesday to let me know that he can't find Bennett's passport. This would be OK, except for the fact that we are leaving on Saturday for vacation in the Canary Islands - and we can't go anywhere without that passport. So I tell him to remain calm, we will find it - a motto in our family is that "we always find everything" - which we do, though I think we are in contention for the "Most Lost Things" award. I swear we could get so much done if we just stopped having to always look for everything...

Now the fact that the passport was missing was not so strange in itself. Bennett, destined for life as a spy or a CIA agent, has been caught previously playing with it - making photo copies and crafting fake passports (that is along with photo copying money, which we explained is a federal offense). So he played with it, and we just have to ask him where he put it...

So with Bennett still at school, Eric, who always gets a bit anxious before we travel due to all the logistics, starts to really panic. He sends me emails during the day that he has looked everywhere; he called the consulate and found out we would have to go to Bern the next day to get a replacement with no guarantee of timing - and it would have to be all of us so I would have to skip work; and then he finds out that we would need to have a police report to file for a replacment which means we need the police to come over on Tuesday night... so I, who really believe that we find everything, start to panic myself a bit. I send him a list of places to look for the passport: in the kitchen drawer, under Bennett's bed, in the kid's safe, under the carpet in their room - I am coming up with anything I can think of, because I know if Eric can't find it quickly he will just explode with stress.

No luck, no passport found by early afternoon. So Eric is off to school to pick up the kids, and I reassure him that Bennett will know where he put it. I sit at my desk at work and start speed dialing Eric at 3:20 so I can hear that all is well and Bennett knows exactly where it is... I finally get through, only to find out that Bennett does not know where it is.

So now I start to panic.

I have been looking forward to this vacation for months - a warm beach break from increasingly cold Basel. I am starting to mentally rearrange my meetings for the next morning so we can go to Bern - and then there is figuring out how we find the police department that is open late so we can file the police report - all the time knowing if we just look further we will find it. But what if we don't??

I had a pretty intense work meeting from 4 to 6 pm - but the whole time I am distractetd on what we are going to do if we don't find this passport. I want to get home so I can help look and get this behind us. And all during the meeting I keep checking my email in the event that Eric's luck turns.

And the email comes: "Found it. I am a loser."

Relief floods my whole body - vacation is on! It turns out it was exactly where it should be: in the desk drawer. It turns out in his haste, Eric did not see the passport as it was separate from the others and tucked between two pieces of paper.

Moral of the story: We always find everything...

Next stop: Canary Islands....

Zahnfee

So we just finished a great visit from Eric's friend Larry. He stayed for two weeks and got to experience some of the great European lifestyle (we packed him home with reusable shopping bags and he was eyeing our electric water kettle...) and got in a lot of bike riding.

We actually took part in two Slo-Up bike events - one in Basel and one in Zurich, where they shut down sets of streets for the day and you can bike with the kids with the freedom of no cars going by. We did 41 km in Basel in perfect weather - kudos to Bennett who has the highest bike weight to body weight ratio!

Zurich the next week was a bit wet, but had a lot more swag - couldn't go more than a few kilometers without hitting free drinks, granola bars, or water bottles - the kids were besides themselves, as nothing in life is better than free stuff - and despite the distractions got in a good 35 km as well. We snacked on wurst with mustard and bread mid ride (note the big wurst in the picture)- nothing better. Bennett always complains to get out of the house for a ride, but then on his bike actually sings to himself the whole way - and really never gets tired. I LOVE biking with the kids and am thrilled that we all have so much fun getting out in the fresh air...


Related, Eric and Larry took a overnight trip to France to bike up the Alpe d'Huez - an apparently infamous climb in the Tour de France. On that night I had the kids to myself, and low and behold Bennett comes home with a tooth gone. Luckily the tooth was found and carefully packaged by the teacher - so now the question was, does the tooth fairy come to Switzerland?

A little Wikipedia search shows that yes, the Zahnfee as he/she is called in these parts does make an appearance at night. So Karl and Bennett were finishing their go-to-bed activities, and when I asked for lights out Bennett jumped up and stopped me, saying he had to write the Zahnfee a note. He, clever little guy, then proceeded to write a note in broken German(because heaven forbid the Zahnfee can't read English and screws up the whole process). I have looked high and low for the note - when I find it I will post it because it was so funny - but to paraphrase: please leave me 1000 CHF (about $1000) and can I please keep my tooth?

The kid is bold. Remind me to tell you about how he finally got in trouble at school by locking all the the boy bathroom stalls with a paperclip...

So low and behold, the Zahnfee did come. He/she left a 5 franc coin, so not quite 1000 CHF but nothing to sneeze at - and the tooth was left as well. Nice to know some things work all over the world.

What we love (and don't love) about Switzerland

So at dinner tonight, I asked everyone what they like and don't like about Switzerland - here are some of the responses:

Bennett: He likes the chocolate, and the cows. When probed on the cows, he commented that they make such good milk here. We asked if the milk tasted any different, and he said no. Perhaps just the fact that he has met cows here (which you don't often get the chance to do in California) now makes the milk a bit more personal.

Karl: Trams. Actually, on our ride home today, Karl asked to stop so he could take the tram the rest of the way, that is how much he likes it. He can quote any tram # and describe it's route - he has amazed us when we are in the middle of a part of town we have never been before but he can tell us exactly what tram line runs through.

Eric: He likes that the pace of life here is a bit slower - and it really feels nice. It is puzzling, but somehow being on the hamster wheel of life you don't often think there is any other option but to keep on spinning. Eric also commented previously how much he likes our house here. We finally did the final push to unpack - see Bennett lost among the boxes - and now it really feels like home.




Sue: She loves the walking - that you walk everywhere, and you find the time to do it. At home the Safeway was a 10 minute walk from our house and we would rarely think to do it (because we were on that hamster wheel - can't get off - too much to do!), where here she has frequently walked to work (30 minutes) - even in the rain! The other thing she loves is the outdoors - the forests, the mountains... here is a snapshot from a recent weekend hike:



The nature is really breathtaking, and we can't wait until winter to do it all with snow as well!

For the things we don't like, Karl mentioned cheese, which is just a continuation of his cheese ban from California. Bennett, a cheese lover, chimed in that what he does not like about Switzerland was the cheeses he doesn't like - can't argue with that reasoning. But the winner of things not to like in Switzerland, with resounding agreement among all of us is the smoking. Even though it was just banned in restaurants in April, it is still common and prevalent at tram stops, walking down the street, and any teenagers hanging in a doorway. And to make matters worse, one of our childhood memories is here:



Candy cigarettes! Karl and Bennett are fascinated by them, and beg for them often. They will chant until the cows come home how bad smoking is for you, but the allure of the candy cigarette - a little naughty without being harmful - is this a habit in the making or a passing fad?

And it goes without saying that one of the things we don't like about Switzerland is that all of our family and friends are not here! We are slowly making new connections, definitely helped by school starting again - but nothing replaces old friends! Don't forget us, because we are not forgetting you!

a new era of Monopoly

So - this has nothing to do with Switzerland, except for the fact that if we had been at home, we would have had a TV and might not have had to find other ways to entertain ourselves. See, we seem to have had bad luck with our electricity conversion: first blew the cable converter (actual smoke came out) by plugging things in the wrong order (we actually still don't know what we did wrong, as we thought we understood electricity but obviously don't). Two weeks later, for no apparent reason, our TV then stops working as well. So now we are here with no TV, no videos, so what do we do...

Someone had the bright idea to bring out the board games, and we played Monopoly.

Now I have not played Monopoly in years - might be decades. Last I remember playing Monopoly was in high school at Greg Flynn's house with Bob Miller and possibly Keith Porter - up until 5 am making alliances and destroying people. I remember the game being long, and you had to make the right alliances or you were out fast.

So what surprised me is how my boys, age 9 and 7, could pick up the rules so fast and quickly understand concepts like mortgages and rent. Of course mom and dad helped a little with the strategy, and made deals happen in their best interest (to the point that they always won) but after a few games they started getting that, too. They have become obsessed - who can play Monopoly every night?

The other funny thing is that we actually read the rules, and again it could be time, but I don't remember half these rules: three doubles and you go to jail? You can only borrow money from the bank? I was just reading an opinion piece by Jon Carroll of the SF Chronicle where he discusses the concept of Monopoly "house rules" - and now, after reading the real rules, realize that most of our alliance making and deals that I had assumed were how the game was played was actually our version of the game. What is even funnier is how quickly "house rules" become part of the game - one of our visitors played with the boys (as we were exhausted after game 7 in one week) and he introduced a "house rule" of getting $500 every time you landed on Free Parking - and the kids felt so cool - like it was their personal game.

Already the kids are developing their Monopoly "norms": Karl hides his money so know one can know what he has; Bennett loves to make the stacks of money in order for everyone at the beginning of the game, and during the game surrounds his stack with all his properties in a sort of fortress formation. It is also great to play with Eric - who grew up with a whole other set of strategies and house rules - way more aggressive than I remember, and truthfully he hasn't won yet...

So if you haven't played in a while, or thought your kids were too young to play, think of dusting off the game and play one night. Would be curious to know your "house rules"...

And the photos that wouldn't fit...

Let's not forget the Zecs...And now a picture from the Casendinos...

Photos from our visitors this summer

Yes - we have had seven different families come by this summer - here are some great photos from their stays. We don't have any of the Casendinos, but hopefully they will send snaps from their camera after they return to the US later in August...

Hope you had a great summer too!

So who did Uncle Ben sleep with?

I feel horrible that it has been so long since posting. Really. Life has been a hectic whirl here: we moved locations and are now in our permanent residence in Basel, went on vacation in Greece (actually ended up doing that the same time as we moved - longer story), traveled to California for work, and tomorrow will mark the arrival of our 7th family arriving to visit - that's right, 7 in the last 7 weeks. We have been blessed with lots of friends from California who had plans to come to Europe anyway, and were able to swing by for a day or two and hang out in Basel and the surrounding areas - if you want to know how we are doing, just roam around Corte Madera or Larkspur and you are bound to run into someone who visited.

Eric has done most of the entertaining, but Sue has been able to free herself from late night meetings and travel to join in most of the time as well. We now have a standard city tour down pat, but we had the chance to take people floating down the Rhine, watched a lot of World Cup Soccer, visited a few museums, got out on a fair amount of hikes, lots of time at the Bottmingen pool, and our favorite: grilling in the forest. Eric actually said he is sick of meat and grilling - and we have been eating vegetarian all this week. We will see if we can muster up the "meat" energy for the Zecs who arrive tomorrow.

It has been fun to share our house (still in a state of being unpacked) and connect again with what is going on in California. The boys have been thrilled to have new playmates every week, and it really has made it feel like San Franicsco is not so far away.

One thing people have asked is what we miss from home. Hmmm - this is really hard, as you can anything you want here. Mexican ingredients? They have it. Peanut butter? No longer a foreign item. We even found a asian market that would give stores in Chinatown a run for their money - every spice known to mankind and things with no english that look like they are fermenting in the jar - things that are probably illegal to sell in the US (we will have to see how adventurous we are feeling...). But one thing has absolutely alluded us...

Long grain white rice.

I don't really care if it is from California - just some good old plain long grain rice. When we first got here we bought rice assuming it was long grain (it is hard to tell how long a grain is if you don't have another grain next to it to compare it to). When we got home and made it, it became quickly clear that it wasn't the right stuff - and further inspection of the label showed that it was...par boiled...rice.

Yuck.

I don't want to pass judgement if you happen to like par boiled rice. I just don't. The rice is off-white and all rolls around on the plate with each grain separate, and it really tastes like all the life and vitamins have been stripped away. I want the white stuff that kind of sticks together and feels really heavy(keep your brown rice vitamin talk to yourself. I like brown rice, too, but white rice is what I am focusing on). The asian market did have jasmine rice which isn't a bad alternative - but it isn't long grain. My last pass at the supermarket actually showed that the whole rice aisle was Uncle Ben's rice. Rows of red boxes with Ben smiling up at me - who had the marketing savvy to knock all the other rices off the shelf? Do the Swiss know what they are missing?

So last time I was in California, I, like all good Japanese tourists, bought myself 10 lbs of California long grain white rice. If you are reading this in California, realize how lucky you are. If you plan to come and visit, be sure to throw a bag in your suitcase for us!

World Cup Baby!

So life here has been racing along. Sue works long hours; Eric and the boys have been busy with school, after school activities, and getting wet in the rain. Moods have gone from high to low for each one of us, and the days when everyone is dipping make no fun for anyone.

However, what has brightenend our mood, along with most of Europe and the world outside of the US, is that it is World Cup time! The Somervilles have been gearing up since May when we bought our Panini sticker books, and started the (apparently) multi generation tradition of spending a few hundred dollars on little packs of stickers in hopes of filling up the book with all 600 or so stickers. There are stickers of the teams, each player, each stadium (takes two stickers to get the whole stadium picture), each team emblem...

It was actually working quite well for disciplining our kids, as we finally had a stick and carrot worthy of changing behavior. How many of you have been at your wits end that nothing you can think of to take away from your kid really does the trick to stop them doing what they are doing: Silly voice for too long? Too loud in the car? Want to have your sticker book taken away? Played nice with your brother? Helped set the table and clean up without needing to be asked? Hey, I think you get to have a packet of stickers...

Well all was going well with the stickers - they would get a pack every other day or so, we would slowly open them and get them in the books - when one day I come home, and every pack of stickers has been opened. "What the heck happened here?" I asked Eric. He had a slight panicked look in his eyes - "They started trading at school - we need to get all of our stickers in our books and know which ones we are missing, or else we will miss out on the trading and end up with none of the cards we need..."

Really?

Well, this started hours of work on spreadsheets with the cards we needed (they are all numbered), spreadsheets with cards we could give away, daily trading in the school cafeteria and multitudes of emails of who had what and who needed it. There was the sad story of the boy (sorry forgot his name) who finally got #172 (I don't remember exactly, just humor me), the last card he needed, and then he lost it - total devastation! There was the dinner we had a Tony's house, where you would think it was the NFL draft or something, with Eric and his (whoops - Karl and Bennett's) cards on one side of the table, and Tony and his (whoops - Josh and Brandon's cards) on his side of the table, with two hours of dealing: "Well, I can give you 422 if you can give me 112 and 565"...

In hindisight, Eric probably timed the trading just right. Both Karl and Bennett are now proud owners of full Panini sticker books to remember the 2010 World Cup and Switzerland with. Now if Switerland can just keep up their winning streak...

Videos of our trip to Italy

A little late, but thought you might enjoy these videos from Italy:

http://www.youtube.com/user/essomerville#p/u/1/okrSQB7YJao

http://www.youtube.com/user/essomerville#p/u/2/60-ANIhWqzQ

hanging out and chasing lizards

Sorry for not blogging sooner - life is just flying by here. We have been to Geneva (or thereabouts), Italy - Sue even got back to California in the mix. There were so many funny little stories to tell, and yet nothing so exciting that it had to be told. We have tucked in lots of hiking and lots of eating, lots of biking and lots of sleeping. Sounds like we never left California...

Being here is different,though. We had a nice picnic in the park with a set of parents and kids from the school: a couple from Toronto (husband here for some banking job) and another from Houston (husband in the shipping business). They had been here 9-12 months, and said that you never really feel like you are here. I don't know if that is a function of thinking this is temporary, or not fitting into the culture, or the fact that it feels like vacation everyday because you are surrounded by people who talk a foreign (to you) language and hence you logically conclude that you must be on vacation. I have hope that when we move to our "permanent" housing in July that we will feel more settled - but then the parade of California friends will start arriving, bringing on that vacation vibe - practically the entire summer. So maybe, in September or so, when everyone is gone and the kids are back in school, maybe then we will start to feel settled in and "at home"...or maybe...

Our friend Aslam drew a graph on a piece of paper the other night. He said he had gotten the chart from a friend who had been an expat a while back. Imagine a line drawn from left to right showing time marching on, with a little hill at the beginning, followed by a huge trough at least 5-10 times as big as the hill, followed by an flat line that is a small amount higher than where you started. He said this is your mood on an expat assignment - excitement at first, followed by a long, large deep depression, followed by some level of acceptance that makes you a tad happier than you were when you arrived but not as high as the high you had on the little hill when you first got here. It was actually quite depressing because I could imagine it isn't far from the truth - isn't this supposed to be the adventure of a lifetime, this amazing life experience you can't have just staying at home?

Well, when we went for a bike ride this weekend, we passed by a set of garden plots. It is quite common here, as so many people live in apartments, that they can rent a piece of land (probably 20' X 30' or so) and have a nice garden, often with veggies, flowers, an occasional pond and most often a shelter with table and benches and a grill. So as we passed the garden plots, we saw group after group - be it family or friends - with wine and beer and the grill going, out for a Sunday meal together. That to me, was witness to an amazing life experience. Getting together with friends and family to eat and celebrate nothing more than the joy of another weekend is really as good as it gets - anywhere in the world.

But wait - I finally rememberd a story worth telling - and I have a picture to boot. On one of our great hikes in Italy (props to the two boys for being good sports and keeping up) we found a bright green lizard with a bright blue head. You would have thought we were in Costa Rica or something - what is a technicolor lizard doing in Northern Italy? Anyway, Eric and Karl became obsessed chasing this lizard to get the perfect picture - they must have spent 15 minutes chasing it from one bush back to another - you could see the poor thing breathing its little lungs out from exhaustion (I was praying it was not some rare almost-extinct species). Finally they chased it up the tree, and - wala - our nature photography at its best.

Anyone who can ID the lizard for us gets a prize!

Ciao!

The Three Year Old Man and the 1017 CHF Parking Garage Fee

In the last few weeks we have really begun to settle down and start a routine: Eric getting the kids to school, Sue getting to work, dinner together in the evening, homework and then off to bed. A quick yet welcome disruption to our routine was the final arrival of our air shipment. It had been delayed for a week or so due to the volcano, but finally arrived bringing a series of Christmas-like events of toys (for the kids) and shoes (for Sue) that had been absent for the last four weeks. Now it is surprising how once you don’t live with something for four weeks, you really don’t miss it anymore (except shoes). So we are now in a mix blessing state of liking all the new things we are rediscovering traded off with the fact that more stuff needs to be put away and more stuff needs to be cleaned up. It is amazing how little you can actually live with…

One of the recent trips we took was up to Schwieberdingen (outside of Stuttgart in Germany) to visit Sue’s cousin Michael Hatbauer, along with his wife Iris, 6 year old daughter Sina, and 3 year old son Tom. Michael had spent the summer with us when we lived in Emeryville, so we have the close relationship with him that comes from having lived in tight quarters for longer than a few days. So we were welcomed with open arms, but only seconds after arriving, Michael had an announcement to make: die ganze Wochenende sollen wir nur auf Deutsch reden (the whole weekend we only speak German!)! Eric protested, but again Michael knows Eric – so there was no arguing. About half way through the weekend Eric had a bit of a breakdown, and he admitted that he felt like a 3 year old man with his struggles with the language (though truthfully Tom was speaking better German than Eric). To his credit, Eric did a great job, and the kids even joined in the German fun – Eric is more committed more than ever to learning German – and as he is using it everyday we expect fast progress.

The weekend with the Hatbauers was a ton of fun. There was lots of eating, and lots of Kaffee und Kuchen! We went to traditional May Day festivals in the town Iris grew up in – complete with May pole, little girls dancing and weaving ribbons around the base, and an umpah band right out of the Music Man with men fashioning handlebar mustaches. Perhaps our little town of Corte Madera should erect a May Pole??? We then spent Sunday on a great hike through towns to a Besenwirtshaft Festival – effectively a farmer’s cooperative / wine inn which once or twice a year throws a weekend festival of bratwurst, French fries, and potato salad along with big beers and local made wine. All was good except Bennett’s non-stop whining on the hike, but you can’t blame the kid as it was raining slightly and was his fifth or sixth big hike (>2 hours) in less than three weeks. Mom and Dad – can’t we just stay in and watch TV once in a while?

We celebrated Karl’s birthday this Monday – the big 0-9! We went out to dinner (now a special treat – I still gag at ordering a $5 soda for the kids) and Karl got his Swiss Army Knife (don’t you give your kids knives on their birthday?) but he really lit up at getting a cactus – just like his Oma! After dinner the family headed to Sue’s work as she had taken the car that morning to drive her boss around. She parked in the nearby garage, but had gotten an exit ticket from her admin so we could leave cost free. We were all a bit tired and bordering on cranky but got to the car and started driving out of the garage – only to find that the ticket would not let us exit, but that we owed 17 CHF. With a heavy sigh, Sue backed up the car and parked next to the exit and Eric got out to pay the ticket so we could just get home.

Time passed. And passed.

It must have been close to 15 minutes when Eric finally came back, with one of the garage attendants. You could hear Eric getting friendly with the attendant in German:” mein Sohn Karl hat Geburtstag heute!” echoing off the garage walls as he approached. “You won’t believe this “, he started as he got to the car. Turns out he found the kiosk and put in the ticket, and then followed it with a 20 CHF bill to pay the ticket – turns out that it then asked for more money – 997 CHF as a matter of fact. So our little exit ticket must have been another exit ticket I had from entering the month or so before – asking us for 1017 CHF, instead of our naïve assumption of the bargain price of 17 CHF. The kind attendant, probably mystified by the outrageous ticket as well as tired from Eric’s broken German let us out for free. Nice to know there is a limit to how expensive things can be, even in Switzerland…

This weekend it is off to Geneva to visit Suze and Didi – old friends from Genentech. And stay tuned - Eric will tell you tomorrow about the tram wreck he was in…

The Art of Garbage

Now one of the first things that really changed us already was garbage. The rules here around garbage are so extraordinary, that if this system was implemented in the US it would change the country overnight. What could possibly change the way you think about garbage? Well, let me explain...

First, food here is really expensive. Eric was notorious at home that if he wasn't in the mood for leftovers, he would eat what he wanted and throw the left overs away. Here, with basic meat for a meal costing $30 or more, you can virtually see little $$ on each bite. We are getting used to the prices slowly (Sue will probably go crazy next time she is in a supermarket in the States), but it still makes you cautious to eat everything. The other reason you don't want to throw it away is...

Here in Switzerland, you do not have a monthly fee for garbage service - you pay for every bag. In Basel you actually pay 2 CHF (about $2) for each special garbage bag (the little kitchen size bags) - here in the suburbs you can buy plain old trash bags, but you have to put these tax coupon stickers on each bag. So even though at home you pay a monthly fee that probably adds up to about the same, when you put that sticker on the bag, you are completely concious of the money you are spending to throw things away - so you do everything you can to not throw things away. There is less packaging that comes with food, so that helps. I think in the first week we actually only used one bag - much less than we would use at home. In the US when you have a whole garbage can to fill, you don't even think about it. Heck, if you make more than your can full, you go to the neighbors and borrow some space from their can - not here, no way.

And that brings us to recycling. Obviously, with the concern here about garbage, recycling is a big deal, too. Now in the US they come to your house and pick up the recycling - it is probably the only way we would actually do it. Here, remember, you don't want it in your trash because you would have to pay more - so they don't come to you - you have to bring it to recycling "stations" around the city. It isn't quite clear what to do, as each recycling station may only take some things - glass only, no plastic; glass and cans, plastic bottles only. So we have had a pile building up in the kitchen, that once in a while gets smaller when Eric can find a place to take those things - inevitably some things come back home as we can't find the place to drop them off.

The best, though, was the recycling section in the "Welcome to Basel" book we got from the relocation people when we got here. They have 5 full pages of items listed in alphabetical order, so you can read where to take it. Quite handy, and useful to figure out where everything can go. It covers the gamut, from electronic equipment, to car tires to the basics like glass and plastic bottles. But the best part of the directory was the added commentary regarding how you should lead your life - let me give you some of the best examples (word for word - no editing on my part):

Cans: Try to buy seasonal fruits and vegetables as much as possible. Take cans ot the metal collection or give them to the metal collector.

Battery Recycling: When possible use carbon zinc batteries. Avoid alkali/manganese batteries - they contain more mercury. Purchase rechargeable batteries and a recharger. Also consider a plug in AC/DC adapter or charger to use with appliances. Return old batteries to the store.

Disposable Diapers: In the garbage, never the WC. Here is another case where avoiding the use of something is better than disposing of it. The routine use of disposable diapers on most babies today is one of the major causes of hte growing refuse problem. Cloth diapers, while intensive in terms of human energy are still cost effective and environmentally friendly.

Wow, think what disposable diapers costs in terms of garbage tax coupons!

tulips. volcanos, and fire

Tulips

So spring has sprung here in Basel, and it is amazing. We can grow anything in California, but we can't grow tulips like they have here in Switzerland. Not only are people's yards full of them, but the city medians and tram stops are full of the most amazing arrangements - Corte Madera Beautification Committee, eat your heart out. To go past just tulips, the magnolia trees and other trees are all in crazy bloom - it is just wow wow wow everywhere you go. As there has been little rain and no wind, it seems like it will last forever, but today was the first day I saw the beginning of the end - tulips starting to open wide; leaves starting to show up on the trees - I need to keep enjoying these bulbs and spring blooms as I can tell that they will pass soon.

Volcanos

Some people e-mailed asking us if the volcano was affecting us - so here is the update: we couldn't see any ash here in Switzerland, but truthfully I don't think you could see it anywhere (except maybe Iceland itself). The impact was huge, though - not only for Sue's company (drugs don't ship either when planes are not flying) but people at her company (stranded for a week), and our friend Rob, our official first visitor, had to take a train from Brussels instead a plane. But he got here nonetheless, and we were thrilled with his second visit, on the way back from Milan, because he couldn't get a flight back to Frankfurt to get back home. It was also an amazing sight to NOT see any planes flying all weekend - ala September 11th - made us all realize how little control we really have sometimes...

Fire

Now this is the best part. Some people have asked us what feels different - well, let me tell you, it is the joy of fire. Switzerland is every boy's dream come true - there is fire and the possibility of fire EVERYWHERE. We have gotten out frequently to go hiking - there are amazing trails everywhere, and just 10 minutes from our temporary housing there are great woods to go hiking through. And every 10 minutes or so in the woods you find fire pits - some like campfires at campsights - nice and official; some just spots off the trail where someone could not contain themselves and had to build a fire.

You think I am joking, but I am not - ask Rob - he saw it, too. He actually helped us stoke an old set of coals back into a fire.

The official fire pits are for people to come and grill and picnic - and the signs say it is ok to collect wood as long as it has fallen down (no chopping down your own trees) - but it is hard to imagine for a California girl that it is ok to start fires in the middle of the woods!

So the kids had fun adding to the stoked fire - closing it out with a pee-ing ceremony as you should put out any fire that you start. Next time we will have to make an official grill out and bring along the picnic.

What else is going on? Bennett celebrated his 7th birthday (got a Swiss Army knife), Karl is excelling at German class, and Eric lost both of their backpacks on the tram one day. All in a day in Switzerland...