27 - 30 September 2009
Sunday - Wednesday~
Heiko (Mom’s foreign exchange student that she had 17 years ago) met us in Hanover almost as soon as we stepped foot onto the train platform. I’d gotten off first, took three large steps straight forward so as to get out of the way of others coming off, set the bags down, turned around to see where Mom and Rhonda were, and saw Heiko giving Mom a big hug. Very nice. He took Mom’s bag and led us out to where he’d parked his van and then drove us to his apartment. It wasn’t far but we appreciated him meeting us and giving us a lift so we didn’t have to drag our bags while trying to find the way to his place.
He also went with us to the ticket office to make reservations for the next day’s train to Denmark. He did all the talking and interpreted for us. Very nice.
We met his girlfriend Hang, a very beautiful Vietnamese girl who emigrated to Czech before the wall fell and then to Germany afterwards. Heiko said there are a lot of Vietnamese in Czech Republic and I recall a lot of Asians there. Hang has a nine-year-old daughter named Josan (Joe-sahn) from a previous marriage and a five-year-old daughter with Heiko named Marlene (Mar-lay-nuh). Only Heiko speaks English with any fluency but cute little girls are cute little girls in any language.
Hang prepared a wonderful Vietnamese meal of a soup followed by rice and stir-fry with shrimp and other goodness. We were offered our choice of fork or chopsticks. Mom went with the safe fork but Rhonda and I tried the chopsticks. We finished with chopsticks, too, but it was hard because we spooned juice with the stir-fry and that made the rice not sticky anymore. We learned that after we were chasing rice around our plates and Heiko explained things to us. So we got more rice to try to sop up the wet rice. I think we only left a dozen grains of rice on our plates. Heiko said bowls are better because there’s something to push the rice against and make it stick together better.
Heiko offered to give us a tour of Hanover by night after supper. We take every chance of a walk we can manage and a guided one tops the list. It was too late in the evening for the girls to joins us so Hang stayed home to put them to bed.
We walked the downtown area first and saw something we hadn’t seen before. Heiko pointed to a building and said it was built 300 years ago. Then he pointed to one right next to it and, indeed, attached to it and said it was built in 1945.
“Bombing,” I said softly.
“Yes,” he replied. “A bomb fell there and not here. Then whht up went a new building. Anytime you see an old building and then concrete, it was a bomb.”
The Germans live every day with the reminders of war visible in front of them. Our reminders are in our memories.
We were at a square that had, among other things, an old church and what Heiko called the Old Mayor’s House. I think he meant city hall but I’m not sure. Anyway, I told Rhonda to look up at the fancy work on the roof.
“That’s how we tell tourists,” Heiko said smugly.
We got him back later. We had our heads craned to better see what looked like twenty small weather vanes peaking every spire along the front of an elaborate building. We wondered aloud if they were, in fact, weathervanes. I noted that they weren’t all facing precisely the same direction. Heiko had his head as far back as the rest of us. He finally said, gently sarcastic, that he’d check their positions over a few days and email the findings to us.
Most of the cafés in Europe (at least the cities we’ve been in) have chairs and tables on the sidewalk. The sidewalks are wide so pedestrians sort of flow around them. We were walking past a pub and saw, on a table of three or four people, a very interesting sort of a pitcher of beer. It was a tall cylinder, maybe two and a half to three feet tall - the top was maybe a little higher than my head as it sat on the table - and four to six inches in diameter. A spigot was positioned on the side just high enough to get a stein under it and there was a filter just above that. Heiko gawked with the rest of us. We got past, Heiko turning for a last look, and Rhonda asked him if that was common in Germany. He said he’d never seen one before. He sounded impressed.
He told us that four years ago, he and Hani moved from where they’d been living in an area of young single people to where they live now. He asked us if we remember about the Stradivari and silver worth around 3 million dollars that had been stolen from a family. I only remember vaguely hearing something about that. He said the police recovered both the violin and the silver. The thief? One of the guys who had lived next door to them at the old apartment complex. He was glad he was raising the girls in a better neighborhood.
My feelings of Hanover were varied. A line of English kings came from this town; the house of Hanover. This was also a country that caused two wars which involved every major and not-so-major country in the world. But those wars were of the government and a minority of the average people; not all the citizens were in agreement with Kaiser Wilhelm and certainly not of Adolf Hitler. These were people who had suffered much but picked up and continued on instead of waiting for others to bail them out. Hard workers.
It was also the only country that had a rather abrupt ticket person. She told Rhonda to keep her shoes off the seats. Later, when she came round again, Mom had her shoes on the seats. Rhonda and I saw that at the same time but weren’t fast enough to warn Mom. The lady was somewhat short with Mom about shoes on the seats.
Hang served us a wonderful breakfast spread. There were two kinds of cold cuts, tomatoes, lettuce, cheese, four kinds of breads (Hang works in a bakery), six kinds of spreads including some sort of herbed cheese thing Hang makes fresh. I had an open-faced sandwich of the cold cuts and lettuce, then tried the herbed cheese spread since Heiko and Hani were piling it on their bread rather thickly. It was spectacularly delicious. I don’t know what went into it or what kind of cheese she used and didn’t even try to find out because of the language barrier. But I made sure she knew how much I liked it.
The girls were in school and Hang had errands to run when it came time to make our way to the train. We walked there, Heiko pulling Mom’s bag, and were in good time for the train. Heiko hung around with us until the train came and then waved us on our way. He’d taken the morning off just to be with us and see us off. What a guy!
And so, on to Denmark.
We’d gotten off to such a good start but, unfortunately, it didn’t end so great. We enjoyed the country-side as it changed from German to Danish and we saw the sea after about three hours. The entire train drove onto the ferry that would carry us across to Denmark and we all had to leave and go up. We went all the way top-side in the brisk wind and spattering of rain. I loved it but Rhonda got pretty chilled after about fifteen minutes and we went inside.
The difference between walking on a moving train and a moving boat is that on a train, you nearly end up in someone’s lap and on a boat, everyone lurches when you lurch and staggers when you stagger so you don’t even bump into anyone.
We saw little reddish-orange jellyfish not far below the surface but no other water life.
The ferry ride took 45 minutes. We all boarded the train and rolled back onto land. Everything was going splendidly and we were counting the hours left before we got to Stockholm (just over two) when the train came to a halt on a siding. After a few moments, we were told that there was a bomb scare at the next station and we were ordered to halt until the police cleared us to go. We waited for about half an hour and were then told to move closer three kilometers and wait. After another half hour, the engineer came out of the cockpit or whatever it’s called on a train….control room? I looked at him; he shook his head resignedly and walked out of the car. A minute later, he got back on the intercom and said that the police had the situation under control but were questioning people and we were ordered back to our last stop.
I was trying to remember where the last stop was all the way back to it. It was where we got off the ferry boat. Two hours and nothing to show for it. They got us buses and drove us to a place called Voldingborg but sounded like the English pronunciation of volleyball, where we boarded a train again. We were two hours late getting into Copenhagen (which they pronounce Co-ben-hah-ven, by the way).
We had told two of our ministers what day and time we were coming and expected them to be there. We just hoped they decided to meet with us the next day instead of having to hang out at the station for us.
They weren’t there and we heaved a sigh of relief. We phoned the hotel and asked for directions. They told us it wasn’t easy to give directions to where they were but could ask anyone to point the way. So we asked a nice-looking young man…who turned out to be a visitor to Copenhagen himself. But he pointed in the direction of a hostel he knew of. So we took off again.
At the next big intersection, Rhonda buttonholed a young lady for directions. She became excited and said that’s where some other girls were headed and to follow them. So we did. For a long way. And found out at check-in that we were at the wrong hostel. There are three Dan Hostels in downtown Denmark and those girls went to one that wasn’t ours.
Not to worry. It’s only five minutes to the other hostel. Go here, turn there, hang a left and then a right but look sharp because the place isn’t well-marked. And was our train delayed, by any chance? Did we expect two ladies to meet us here? One fairly elderly? Oh, yes, they came to the wrong one, also, but we directed them to the right one. So our journey for the day wasn’t over, yet. We went there, turned here, hung a left and then a right, looked sharp and found it. Priscilla and Vibeke were waiting for us in the breakfast room by day/bar by night/reception at all times. Ever meet your ministers in a bar? Where could you find more needy souls?!
We checked in, got our key cards, and tried to open the door to the dorms. Finally, Rhonda saw directions to use the card. Mom observed that when all else fails, reading directions helps.
“Don’t read directions first,” Vibeke advised. “It makes life so boring.”
We got into the dorms and went up to our room. It was a very small elevator so Mom, Rhonda, and I went up first and Priscilla and Vibeka came after. We got out and Rhonda noticed a button next to the elevator that was lit up and said “I fart”. We giggled all the way to our room.
We had a short but very nice visit with the ministers. At one point, they were asking what town we rode the bus to and I told them “Volleyball” because that’s how I could remember it. They cracked up. Then Vibeke (pronounced Vih-bih-kuh), a Dane, gave us a short lesson on pronouncing the Danish words.
“The ‘r’ is silent, you see, but it is still heard,” she said helpfully. “’vorg’ is pronounced ‘voe’ because it has an ‘r’. If it didn’t have an ‘r’, it would be ‘voo’. But it does have an ‘r’ so it’s ‘voe’. Clear as crystal, is it not?”
Uh, yeah. Clear as crystal. Right.
I said that I hoped things didn’t sound quite like I thought they should because we saw a light by the elevator that said ‘I fart’.
“Yes, well, that happens sometimes.” Vibeke said solemnly.
“It said what?” asked Priscilla.
“I fart,” I repeated
“Oh, my! I never thought of it like that!” Priscilla exclaimed and shrieked with laughter. We were all pretty much howling at that point.
“We pronounce it ‘ee fart’,” Vibeka explained. “’I’ means ‘in’ and ‘fart’ means way or movement.”
Glad to know what that meant.
They finally had to leave and we reluctantly said good-byes. Unfortunately, we didn’t get a picture.
We turned in for the night, one or another of us exploding with giggles every now and then, setting the others off.
We woke up and got around just a little too late for the breakfast in the hostel so we set off in search of adventure without it. We headed for the canal and the tour boats there and, in spite of having a map, still managed to get off track by a few blocks. We eventually found it, purchased tickets, and found a little place that had sandwiches. We got back to the boat just as it was loading and hopped aboard.
Fun trip. We had a guide that enjoyed doing her job. Either that or she faked it really, really well. We went under some very low bridges and had to duck; we saw the Little Mermaid; their opera house; the Queen’s residence in Copenhagen; Hans Christian Anderson’s places of residence, and a lot of other great stuff. The guide was incredible. She said everything in Danish, Swedish, English, and German.
From there, we walked to the train station to make reservations for the train to Stockholm. We stopped at a little pastry shop there and had a cup of tea and a…..ahem…..Danish Pastry. Had to have one of those! We walked back to the hostel and, after an authentic supper at a Danish restaurant across the way, had a quiet evening. I taught Rhonda to play Chaos and Gin. Maybe “quiet” isn’t the right word….
Everyone we met in Denmark spoke English, most of them quite well. But it’s the Queen’s English, not the American variety. We heard people using English as the language in common. I mean, when a group of people are visiting and don’t know the other’s language, English is what’s spoken. We heard that several times.
I learned that Denmark is of more temperate climate. They don’t get a lot of snow. In fact, things tend to shut down when there’s an inch of snow. Sort of like the west part of Oregon. It gets cold, but not a whole lot of snow. So I have to change my mental picture of Danes and snow in winter.
We walked to the train station this morning. It isn’t too far if you go the right way. Our train is direct from Copenhagen to Stockholm and we won’t have to change in between. It’s a very nice train with big, plush, seats. Maybe to accommodate some of these very tall Swedes. My goodness, are some of them tall!!
I saw one young man walk down the train towards us who was so tall he had to duck quite a bit to get through the door. The overhead shelves for luggage came to between his chin and shoulders. Rhonda watched my eyes widen and jaw drop as he came closer and started laughing.
Things were a bit of a disaster when we arrived because we needed directions to Audrey’s place but didn’t have much in the way of coins for the phone. We dumped in what we had and Mom got at least the suburb we needed to get to before the phone cut us off. So we rode the commuter train to the community, got some more coins and were at the phone when a very nice young man offered us his cell to use.
Such kind people you meet when traveling!
Audrey is a retired minister that Mom has known for most of their lives. She went on a mission to Sweden 50 years ago and eventually got Swedish citizenship. Mom had been looking forward to this visit very much.
Mom got good directions to her bus stop but we took the wrong bus, anyway and had a nice tour of the area but no stops to match what we were told. We even got off at one that sounded similar and had to catch another back to the station. That time we found the right bus and the right stop and got off just as Audrey was giving up on us coming.
The poor dear had been waiting at the bus stop for nearly an hour for us in 47 -degree Fahrenheit weather. She had a good supper for us but we took so long getting things together that we decided to have a simple Bible study together at her house instead of going to the one down the street a ways.
Maddie and her husband Simon picked us up after their study was over and took us to Maddie’s parents Patti and….is it Olba or Olva? Patti’s parents live in Boise, Idaho, and Rhonda knows them quite well. She’s met Patti and Olba a few times, also, and Maddie spent a summer there with her grandparents.
They have three boys besides their daughter Maddie (Andreus, Robert, and Sven) and run a large greenhouse nursery. The convention in Stockholm is located here. I’ve not gotten to see the place yet but that’s in the plans.
Copenhagen is a great place. Public transportation is widely available as it is in other countries but here they even have a bike lanes about as wide as a car lane. The city is busy but not so busy that you can’t stop someone and ask directions. Nearly everyone knows English (we didn’t meet any who couldn’t speak it) which makes one very confident in getting around. I got a sense of looking forward….meeting the challenges of tomorrow….holding the past precious but not letting it hinder progress. Maybe that was because we stayed in a large hostel with herds of teen-age and older youth.
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Brussels
25 September 2009
Friday - Sunday ~
Friday was a day of travel. We boarded the train in Yverdon, changed trains in Basel, and arrived in Brussels just at dark. We got off the train in Basel, crossed the international line from Switzerland to France, and boarded the next train. I thought we were going to have to show our passports but no one asked for them.
Another couple from Chicago was on the same train and we hadn’t gone very far before three officials came into the car and asked to see their tickets. Then they asked for their passports after which they requested to examine their luggage. Customs officials.
We had our passports out but they passed us by to talk with another couple of people farther up the coach. The lady from Chicago poked her head around and asked why they went through customs and we didn’t. The only answer we could think of is that they were staying in France for a couple of days and we were simply passing through on our way to Brussels.
The city was lit up as if it was Christmas time. Lights everywhere; shining on buildings; shining from buildings; shining around buildings. We gawked like the tourists we are. It was stunning. If you can, find a picture on the internet of Brussels after dark. I didn’t take any because we were whipping by in a taxi.
We were stopped about half a mile or less from our hotel by a roller-derby, of all things. Thankfully, we caught the last tail-end of it and weren’t stopped for more than just a few minutes. Not that we didn’t want to watch….the taxi driver didn’t turn off the meter and it kept clicking over. I tried a few shots of that but only got blurs and bright lights.
Mom was able to call Judy Hordyk, one of our ministers in Belgium, and we were invited to their batch in Halle for lunch the next day. We got directions to their place and went to bed.
Rhonda slid under the covers, teeth chattering. She is always chilled! I rolled my eyes and huffed. Mom asked if she needed to borrow a pair of socks.
“I’m already wearing socks!” she exclaimed.
We’d been giggling over Little Liam’s remarks all day and this set us off again. It was hopeless. The lights were out, everything quiet, and I’d remember her “I’m already wearing socks!” and start giggling again. Which would set Rhonda off.
We finally acted like grown-ups, settled ourselves down and went to sleep.
Next morning we set off with a map in hand to explore some of the gorgeous places we’d seen the night before and to hopefully find a music shop where Rhonda could purchase a CD of Lara Fabian. We walked and looked and bought Cds and took pictures…and then had to rush to the train station to get to Judy and Irene’s batch in Halle in time.
We were just a few minutes late but who wouldn’t be with all the architecture there? We walked along a park and turned onto something we thought was a street but it was sort of a…hmm….how to describe it….a wide walkway for pedestrians with stairs down to the next level. We came to the bottom of it and it turned into a sidewalk. We turned to the right (it was either that or left and I wanted to go right) and came through an arch onto one of those big two-acre cobblestoned squares complete with a statue in the middle.
We were hurrying to catch the train and were still umpteen blocks from it so I didn’t race out there to see who the statue was for. Besides, tour buses and impatient car drivers were whipping around it as if it were an English round-about.
Judy (from Washington but in French-speaking Europe for 35+ years) and Irene (from England and in same area ten years longer than Judy) served us a delightful lunch. Corn salad first. Not sure why it’s called corn salad when there wasn’t any corn in it….there were only some sort of leaves, onion, garlic, and vinaigrette dressing.
Main course was a casserole of tomatoes, eggplant, green peppers, and zucchini; boiled potatoes; roasted parsnips; broccoli; and pan-fried fresh-caught fish. All of it was very delicious.
For dessert, we were served fresh strawberries and a cake of some sort made with cheese. Very good.
They urged us on to more and greater portions. Rhonda laughed ruefully and said she understood now what our ministers go through when we serve them wonderful dinners and urge them on to more and greater portions.
All of the things were purchased that morning at what we’d call a farmer’s market. How cool is that for city-dwellers? Go out to the street behind your house and purchase your goods for the week Judy said they are there on Thursdays, so the Catholics can get their fish for the morrow, and on Saturdays.
Irene told us an interesting story of why Catholics eat fish on Fridays. It seems that a few centuries ago the Sicilian fishermen were having a hard time of it in the markets. Sales were very bad and the fishermen were having difficulty making ends meet.
So they appealed to the Pope. I don’t know if he was Sicilian or if he had a soft heart for them or if he was paid but he issued an edict that all good Catholics ate fish on Fridays.
Thus ended the economic woes of the Sicilian fishermen.
Judy took us on a tour of Halle while Irene rested (she had cancer surgery in March and is still taking chemo). We stepped inside an elaborate Catholic church (I know that’s redundant but I had to say it) and then quickly stepped out; there was a funeral service going on. Judy said the person must not have ranked too highly because it was a woman giving the service and they didn’t toll the bell very long. I thought they tolled it once for every year the deceased lived but I didn’t remember that until just now while writing this.
We meandered through a park and learned that Belgium has a king. I didn’t know that.
The sister’s batch fronts a road and across from the road is a canal. This canal is a major water-way from the south of Belgium to Brussels and points north. We saw a barge but were at the table and I could hardly pop up, dash out, and snap a photo.
We were served a very hot cup of tea. I took a first scalding sip and observed that it was a bit hotter than the cup we’d had that morning. Irene and Judy looked at us and Rhonda explained that we had made ours from the hot water tap in our room. Irene looked revolted; Judy dropped her head into her hands and shuddered. We laughed.
Like all good things, our visit had to come to an end. We said our good-byes, took a photo of Irene and Judy, and left for the train station on the other side of the canal.
Irene accompanied us not only to the train station, but back to Brussels and lined us up for the train trip to meeting next morning and the train trip to Hanover afterwards. What a dear, dear woman.
The only language lesson I’m going to give this time is that Dutch is different from Flemish but only a little and Dutch is quite different from German. Where we were in Halle, it’s Flemish country and the people don’t like French much, even though it’s an official language of Belgium. You talk to them in French and they’ll likely answer in Flemish or Dutch.
Sunday was the second time I’ve taken a train to meeting. Budapest was the first. This one stopped at every station between Brussels and Lilloit (Lee-lou-wah) and took half an hour. We had our luggage with us so here we were in Sunday dress, shoulder bags in place, pulling our luggage, and hurrying to make the metro and the train. We were hurrying because we didn’t know the metro schedule and if we missed our train, we wouldn’t make it in time for meeting.
Meeting in Lillioit was at the convention grounds there. I was expecting a larger area like we have here in the states but was unsurprised when it consisted of a large house and a smallish yard. We three sat in a corner of the room and Judy interpreted for us through a whisper microphone. She then interpreted us to them.
Same gentle spirit, same wonderful people. When Rhonda said her last name, they got all excited and chattered in their language. Evidently, they know some people in Canada with the same last name and wondered if they were related to her. The name didn’t ring a bell for her, and they were a bit disappointed.
Judy drove us and a young lady named Maria to the train station in Waterloo. Maria is from Ecuador and is a nurse in Brussels. She accompanied us on the train back to Brussels and pointed out where we needed to go next in the big Brussels Midi station. We’ve had such wonderful help all along from such kind-hearted people!
Yes, the Waterloo we went through is the same Waterloo that Napoleon met his fate. I said that I always thought it was in France and Judy spluttered a bit. I muttered that I was thankful I was sitting behind her in the car and she couldn’t slap me. Splutters turned to laughter.
We did see windmills in Brussels….the modern kind that produce electricity. We didn’t see the old-fashioned kind that you think of when you think of the Netherlands; Belgium isn’t the low-land that Holland is until you get close to the sea.
The train ride to Cologne (Köln in German) was on the high-speed line.
We got up around 140 mph in some places. We were whizzing along so fast that there weren’t many pictures that came out. We were also served a lunch of a piece of salmon; a barley and carrot mix; a salad of apples, celery, some sort of thin-grated cheese or noodles, and some other things we couldn’t identify; two rolls; butter; a soft, spread-able cheese; drink; and tea or coffee. This was the first time we’ve been served a meal on the train except for the one from Vienna to Prague where they offered us pre-packaged sandwiches, dessert, and drink. The train from Köln to Hanover was almost as fast but no meal there.
My impression of Brussels was of solidness. They’ve been there for a very long time. Most of the other cities we were in had an old area and then the newer parts all around it. Two or three dozen square blocks more or less, and you’re in newer (less than 200 years) buildings. Brussels’ old architecture was all over the place. They exude the assurance of international business and neutrality. They’re not there to fight; they’re there to do business and make money. Sober men in long coats and top hats carrying canes walking along discussing a new idea or venture.
Bigwigs, corporations, international trade, money, international government…. We were reading in the paper Saturday about some big international meeting of heads of state that was held there just last week.
Friday - Sunday ~
Friday was a day of travel. We boarded the train in Yverdon, changed trains in Basel, and arrived in Brussels just at dark. We got off the train in Basel, crossed the international line from Switzerland to France, and boarded the next train. I thought we were going to have to show our passports but no one asked for them.
Another couple from Chicago was on the same train and we hadn’t gone very far before three officials came into the car and asked to see their tickets. Then they asked for their passports after which they requested to examine their luggage. Customs officials.
We had our passports out but they passed us by to talk with another couple of people farther up the coach. The lady from Chicago poked her head around and asked why they went through customs and we didn’t. The only answer we could think of is that they were staying in France for a couple of days and we were simply passing through on our way to Brussels.
The city was lit up as if it was Christmas time. Lights everywhere; shining on buildings; shining from buildings; shining around buildings. We gawked like the tourists we are. It was stunning. If you can, find a picture on the internet of Brussels after dark. I didn’t take any because we were whipping by in a taxi.
We were stopped about half a mile or less from our hotel by a roller-derby, of all things. Thankfully, we caught the last tail-end of it and weren’t stopped for more than just a few minutes. Not that we didn’t want to watch….the taxi driver didn’t turn off the meter and it kept clicking over. I tried a few shots of that but only got blurs and bright lights.
Mom was able to call Judy Hordyk, one of our ministers in Belgium, and we were invited to their batch in Halle for lunch the next day. We got directions to their place and went to bed.
Rhonda slid under the covers, teeth chattering. She is always chilled! I rolled my eyes and huffed. Mom asked if she needed to borrow a pair of socks.
“I’m already wearing socks!” she exclaimed.
We’d been giggling over Little Liam’s remarks all day and this set us off again. It was hopeless. The lights were out, everything quiet, and I’d remember her “I’m already wearing socks!” and start giggling again. Which would set Rhonda off.
We finally acted like grown-ups, settled ourselves down and went to sleep.
Next morning we set off with a map in hand to explore some of the gorgeous places we’d seen the night before and to hopefully find a music shop where Rhonda could purchase a CD of Lara Fabian. We walked and looked and bought Cds and took pictures…and then had to rush to the train station to get to Judy and Irene’s batch in Halle in time.
We were just a few minutes late but who wouldn’t be with all the architecture there? We walked along a park and turned onto something we thought was a street but it was sort of a…hmm….how to describe it….a wide walkway for pedestrians with stairs down to the next level. We came to the bottom of it and it turned into a sidewalk. We turned to the right (it was either that or left and I wanted to go right) and came through an arch onto one of those big two-acre cobblestoned squares complete with a statue in the middle.
We were hurrying to catch the train and were still umpteen blocks from it so I didn’t race out there to see who the statue was for. Besides, tour buses and impatient car drivers were whipping around it as if it were an English round-about.
Judy (from Washington but in French-speaking Europe for 35+ years) and Irene (from England and in same area ten years longer than Judy) served us a delightful lunch. Corn salad first. Not sure why it’s called corn salad when there wasn’t any corn in it….there were only some sort of leaves, onion, garlic, and vinaigrette dressing.
Main course was a casserole of tomatoes, eggplant, green peppers, and zucchini; boiled potatoes; roasted parsnips; broccoli; and pan-fried fresh-caught fish. All of it was very delicious.
For dessert, we were served fresh strawberries and a cake of some sort made with cheese. Very good.
They urged us on to more and greater portions. Rhonda laughed ruefully and said she understood now what our ministers go through when we serve them wonderful dinners and urge them on to more and greater portions.
All of the things were purchased that morning at what we’d call a farmer’s market. How cool is that for city-dwellers? Go out to the street behind your house and purchase your goods for the week Judy said they are there on Thursdays, so the Catholics can get their fish for the morrow, and on Saturdays.
Irene told us an interesting story of why Catholics eat fish on Fridays. It seems that a few centuries ago the Sicilian fishermen were having a hard time of it in the markets. Sales were very bad and the fishermen were having difficulty making ends meet.
So they appealed to the Pope. I don’t know if he was Sicilian or if he had a soft heart for them or if he was paid but he issued an edict that all good Catholics ate fish on Fridays.
Thus ended the economic woes of the Sicilian fishermen.
Judy took us on a tour of Halle while Irene rested (she had cancer surgery in March and is still taking chemo). We stepped inside an elaborate Catholic church (I know that’s redundant but I had to say it) and then quickly stepped out; there was a funeral service going on. Judy said the person must not have ranked too highly because it was a woman giving the service and they didn’t toll the bell very long. I thought they tolled it once for every year the deceased lived but I didn’t remember that until just now while writing this.
We meandered through a park and learned that Belgium has a king. I didn’t know that.
The sister’s batch fronts a road and across from the road is a canal. This canal is a major water-way from the south of Belgium to Brussels and points north. We saw a barge but were at the table and I could hardly pop up, dash out, and snap a photo.
We were served a very hot cup of tea. I took a first scalding sip and observed that it was a bit hotter than the cup we’d had that morning. Irene and Judy looked at us and Rhonda explained that we had made ours from the hot water tap in our room. Irene looked revolted; Judy dropped her head into her hands and shuddered. We laughed.
Like all good things, our visit had to come to an end. We said our good-byes, took a photo of Irene and Judy, and left for the train station on the other side of the canal.
Irene accompanied us not only to the train station, but back to Brussels and lined us up for the train trip to meeting next morning and the train trip to Hanover afterwards. What a dear, dear woman.
The only language lesson I’m going to give this time is that Dutch is different from Flemish but only a little and Dutch is quite different from German. Where we were in Halle, it’s Flemish country and the people don’t like French much, even though it’s an official language of Belgium. You talk to them in French and they’ll likely answer in Flemish or Dutch.
Sunday was the second time I’ve taken a train to meeting. Budapest was the first. This one stopped at every station between Brussels and Lilloit (Lee-lou-wah) and took half an hour. We had our luggage with us so here we were in Sunday dress, shoulder bags in place, pulling our luggage, and hurrying to make the metro and the train. We were hurrying because we didn’t know the metro schedule and if we missed our train, we wouldn’t make it in time for meeting.
Meeting in Lillioit was at the convention grounds there. I was expecting a larger area like we have here in the states but was unsurprised when it consisted of a large house and a smallish yard. We three sat in a corner of the room and Judy interpreted for us through a whisper microphone. She then interpreted us to them.
Same gentle spirit, same wonderful people. When Rhonda said her last name, they got all excited and chattered in their language. Evidently, they know some people in Canada with the same last name and wondered if they were related to her. The name didn’t ring a bell for her, and they were a bit disappointed.
Judy drove us and a young lady named Maria to the train station in Waterloo. Maria is from Ecuador and is a nurse in Brussels. She accompanied us on the train back to Brussels and pointed out where we needed to go next in the big Brussels Midi station. We’ve had such wonderful help all along from such kind-hearted people!
Yes, the Waterloo we went through is the same Waterloo that Napoleon met his fate. I said that I always thought it was in France and Judy spluttered a bit. I muttered that I was thankful I was sitting behind her in the car and she couldn’t slap me. Splutters turned to laughter.
We did see windmills in Brussels….the modern kind that produce electricity. We didn’t see the old-fashioned kind that you think of when you think of the Netherlands; Belgium isn’t the low-land that Holland is until you get close to the sea.
The train ride to Cologne (Köln in German) was on the high-speed line.
We got up around 140 mph in some places. We were whizzing along so fast that there weren’t many pictures that came out. We were also served a lunch of a piece of salmon; a barley and carrot mix; a salad of apples, celery, some sort of thin-grated cheese or noodles, and some other things we couldn’t identify; two rolls; butter; a soft, spread-able cheese; drink; and tea or coffee. This was the first time we’ve been served a meal on the train except for the one from Vienna to Prague where they offered us pre-packaged sandwiches, dessert, and drink. The train from Köln to Hanover was almost as fast but no meal there.
My impression of Brussels was of solidness. They’ve been there for a very long time. Most of the other cities we were in had an old area and then the newer parts all around it. Two or three dozen square blocks more or less, and you’re in newer (less than 200 years) buildings. Brussels’ old architecture was all over the place. They exude the assurance of international business and neutrality. They’re not there to fight; they’re there to do business and make money. Sober men in long coats and top hats carrying canes walking along discussing a new idea or venture.
Bigwigs, corporations, international trade, money, international government…. We were reading in the paper Saturday about some big international meeting of heads of state that was held there just last week.
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Switzerland Part 2
Switzerland Part 2
24 September
Thursday ~
Today was a leisure day of visiting with Heidi and getting to know the boys better. Hannes (9) and Dylan (7) had school all day but school lets out for a 2.25 hour lunch each day and they come home to eat. School’s out at 3:45.
The village of Donneloye rings a bell at 11:45 to let the people know it’s almost noon - the hour they all hold special. There are no loud noises allowed from noon to 1pm - noises like lawn mowers and such. All the kids in Switzerland go home for a hot lunch except maybe schools in large cities. Supper is usually bread and cheese.
It’s intriguing to watch the boys switch between languages. Heidi talks to them English and the respond in kind. Ralph speaks to them in Swiss-German and they reply with that. They chatter in French with their friends. I heard them talking to their friend in French and answer a question I asked them in English without any hesitation.
They’ll go to their dad and say something in English, he’ll answer in Swiss-German and they’ll continue in that language. They do have some interesting pronunciations, though. They often say a “d” instead of “th” (“der” instead of “there”) and their “r” is more French than English. I can’t explain it but it’s a foreign sound.
Liam (almost 4) was telling me about his school he goes to on Mondays. I asked him what was his favorite thing to do and he answered something that sounded like “klih-klih”. I asked him what “klih-klih” was, thinking it was some sort of food. He looked at me oddly and said, “Not that!”
“Okay,” I said, willing to learn, “What is it?” For all I knew, I’d said a bad word.
“Khlick-khlih,” he repeated.
“Oh!” I said, not willing to try again. “What is that?”
He paused for a moment with an expression as if I’m awfully dumb for a grownup not to know what “khlick-khlih” was. “It means ‘everyone get out the toys and play and run and jump.’”
I can understand why that’s his favorite part.
Heidi was driving us to Yverdon to catch the train to Basel and then on to Brussels and Rhonda slipped one of her favorite CDs into the player. It’s one of Lara Fabian and she was singing in French. A song or two later, she was singing in Italian. “Is that the French lady singing in Italian?” Liam asked from the middle seat.
Fancy an almost-four-year-old recognizing not only the switch in languages but also which languages they were!
The phone rang while Heidi and Rhonda were at the store so Hannes answered it. He started out in English and then switched to French after a couple of sentences. No break in the stream of words.
I know it can’t be easy with three languages in the home and wanting the kids to be fluent in all of them but it’ll be such a boon to them when they get older. German, French, and English are all required in the Swiss schools. In the French-speaking are of Switzerland where these kids are, they start out with French. In grade five they begin studying German, and in grade seven, they add English. At least that’s what I think I remember Heidi telling me.
I’m not going to give a language lesson because it’s French. All you have to do is go down to the bookstore or library and find any word you want to say. That is what a teacher would call “an exercise for the student.”
Heidi’s dear friend Kim, a fellow-American also married to a Swiss, came with her three children and spent most of the day with us. Rhonda had met her when she visited Boise before but got to know her much better when she (Rhonda) came through here last year on her way to Italy.
Kim made a beautiful dessert whose name I can’t recall. It had a base of puff-pastry, then brown sugar and a custard-like filling, topped with fresh plums that were at their peak of sweetness. For added flavor, color, and all-around goodness, she liberally sprinkled sugar all over the top. At least…..she thought it was sugar.
The kids had theirs first. Liam took a bite of his…..gagged…..put it down….looked at it as if it’d betrayed him and said he didn’t like it. Heidi was confused because it’s a favorite dessert of her boys.
Mom, Rhonda, and I took a bite….and only one bite. It was terribly salty. Heidi took a bite next. Kim was busy in the next room tending to her three-year-old son who was calling for a drink of water as if he’d been three days in the desert. Heidi asked if she’d sprinkled sugar over the top. When Kim answered that she had, Heidi asked what container she got the sugar from.
All was explained and Kim took the laughter quite well. I guess she’d made the same dessert - or tried to - when Rhonda was here last year but burnt the bottom. I told Rhonda that she needs to come at least one more time so Kim can make it successfully for her. Third time’s a charm, you remember.
We all agreed that Hannes and Dylan needed to experience it, too, when they got home from school. Hannes was first. Heidi told him there was whatever-it’s-called out on the table on the patio and Hannes headed out there rather quickly. Heidi and I stood at the front-room window overlooking the patio to watch. He grabbed a piece, piled whipped cream on top and took a bite. He spun around, entered the house and met Heidi on the stairs. She said he had a revolted look on his face and he whispered, “Mom, what’s wrong with this?”
Dylan was much funnier. When Heidi told him it was on the back patio, he raced for the stairs and outside. We raced for the window; Hannes included. Dylan moved a few pieces around, yelled that there were no plates and headed back indoors.
“It’s okay, Dylan,” Hannes rushed to assure him. “You can eat it with your fingers.” Dylan raced back outside and Hannes went, giggling, back to the window. Dylan grabbed probably the biggest piece, heaped whipped cream on it, and took a huge bite. He sort of froze for just an instant, then walked purposefully to the edge of the patio and a convenient planter. He stood there for half a second and then violently threw the cake into the bushes. He leaned over the planter for a moment, spitting, and then charged back into the house for an explanation. Heidi was laughing so hard on the couch that she couldn’t get up. She couldn’t really talk, either, but managed to explain what was wrong with it and that she’d done it to Hannes, too. Both boys took it well and ran off to play.
We had a genuine Swiss supper called Raclette. It was delicious! Heidi cooked up a huge pot of potatoes, sliced up some small zucchinis, some tomatoes and onions, diced up bacon, and thickly sliced some raclette cheese. The table was set and in the middle were two machines that are basically portable broilers and had little wedge-shaped pans with handles.
We put what we wanted in the pans and set them under the broiler until they were done as we wanted them. Then we’d dump them out on the plate beside our cut-up potatoes and put a slice of raclette in the pan. I liked to put in some bacon as well. When the cheese bubbled, we took it out and poured it over the potatoes and veggies on our plate. We’d stick another slice of cheese and whatever under the broiler to melt while we were polishing off what we’d already prepared.
Switzerland is a beautiful land but there’s little unsettled land. When we drove to the factories and to the castle, we would travel through five miles of farmland and then come to another village.
The roads are winding and, except for the main roads, narrow. About two cars plus six inches wide. Did they slow down when they met another car? Shucks, no!
Often, the barn part of a house was right next to the road. No sidewalk or grass border. Sometimes, the house was just off the road and there were a lot of stone walls that we seemed to just miss.
I noticed the clocks in Austria and they were just as prevalent in Switzerland. Everywhere you look, there’s a clock. No reason whatsoever to be late.
Beautiful country. So tidy. Not much trash or even overgrown hedgerows or wasteland. Austria was even more well-taken care of. The only roadside trash I saw was around the tracks in the train station. The entire country, both Austria and Switzerland, look as if they’re a park.
24 September
Thursday ~
Today was a leisure day of visiting with Heidi and getting to know the boys better. Hannes (9) and Dylan (7) had school all day but school lets out for a 2.25 hour lunch each day and they come home to eat. School’s out at 3:45.
The village of Donneloye rings a bell at 11:45 to let the people know it’s almost noon - the hour they all hold special. There are no loud noises allowed from noon to 1pm - noises like lawn mowers and such. All the kids in Switzerland go home for a hot lunch except maybe schools in large cities. Supper is usually bread and cheese.
It’s intriguing to watch the boys switch between languages. Heidi talks to them English and the respond in kind. Ralph speaks to them in Swiss-German and they reply with that. They chatter in French with their friends. I heard them talking to their friend in French and answer a question I asked them in English without any hesitation.
They’ll go to their dad and say something in English, he’ll answer in Swiss-German and they’ll continue in that language. They do have some interesting pronunciations, though. They often say a “d” instead of “th” (“der” instead of “there”) and their “r” is more French than English. I can’t explain it but it’s a foreign sound.
Liam (almost 4) was telling me about his school he goes to on Mondays. I asked him what was his favorite thing to do and he answered something that sounded like “klih-klih”. I asked him what “klih-klih” was, thinking it was some sort of food. He looked at me oddly and said, “Not that!”
“Okay,” I said, willing to learn, “What is it?” For all I knew, I’d said a bad word.
“Khlick-khlih,” he repeated.
“Oh!” I said, not willing to try again. “What is that?”
He paused for a moment with an expression as if I’m awfully dumb for a grownup not to know what “khlick-khlih” was. “It means ‘everyone get out the toys and play and run and jump.’”
I can understand why that’s his favorite part.
Heidi was driving us to Yverdon to catch the train to Basel and then on to Brussels and Rhonda slipped one of her favorite CDs into the player. It’s one of Lara Fabian and she was singing in French. A song or two later, she was singing in Italian. “Is that the French lady singing in Italian?” Liam asked from the middle seat.
Fancy an almost-four-year-old recognizing not only the switch in languages but also which languages they were!
The phone rang while Heidi and Rhonda were at the store so Hannes answered it. He started out in English and then switched to French after a couple of sentences. No break in the stream of words.
I know it can’t be easy with three languages in the home and wanting the kids to be fluent in all of them but it’ll be such a boon to them when they get older. German, French, and English are all required in the Swiss schools. In the French-speaking are of Switzerland where these kids are, they start out with French. In grade five they begin studying German, and in grade seven, they add English. At least that’s what I think I remember Heidi telling me.
I’m not going to give a language lesson because it’s French. All you have to do is go down to the bookstore or library and find any word you want to say. That is what a teacher would call “an exercise for the student.”
Heidi’s dear friend Kim, a fellow-American also married to a Swiss, came with her three children and spent most of the day with us. Rhonda had met her when she visited Boise before but got to know her much better when she (Rhonda) came through here last year on her way to Italy.
Kim made a beautiful dessert whose name I can’t recall. It had a base of puff-pastry, then brown sugar and a custard-like filling, topped with fresh plums that were at their peak of sweetness. For added flavor, color, and all-around goodness, she liberally sprinkled sugar all over the top. At least…..she thought it was sugar.
The kids had theirs first. Liam took a bite of his…..gagged…..put it down….looked at it as if it’d betrayed him and said he didn’t like it. Heidi was confused because it’s a favorite dessert of her boys.
Mom, Rhonda, and I took a bite….and only one bite. It was terribly salty. Heidi took a bite next. Kim was busy in the next room tending to her three-year-old son who was calling for a drink of water as if he’d been three days in the desert. Heidi asked if she’d sprinkled sugar over the top. When Kim answered that she had, Heidi asked what container she got the sugar from.
All was explained and Kim took the laughter quite well. I guess she’d made the same dessert - or tried to - when Rhonda was here last year but burnt the bottom. I told Rhonda that she needs to come at least one more time so Kim can make it successfully for her. Third time’s a charm, you remember.
We all agreed that Hannes and Dylan needed to experience it, too, when they got home from school. Hannes was first. Heidi told him there was whatever-it’s-called out on the table on the patio and Hannes headed out there rather quickly. Heidi and I stood at the front-room window overlooking the patio to watch. He grabbed a piece, piled whipped cream on top and took a bite. He spun around, entered the house and met Heidi on the stairs. She said he had a revolted look on his face and he whispered, “Mom, what’s wrong with this?”
Dylan was much funnier. When Heidi told him it was on the back patio, he raced for the stairs and outside. We raced for the window; Hannes included. Dylan moved a few pieces around, yelled that there were no plates and headed back indoors.
“It’s okay, Dylan,” Hannes rushed to assure him. “You can eat it with your fingers.” Dylan raced back outside and Hannes went, giggling, back to the window. Dylan grabbed probably the biggest piece, heaped whipped cream on it, and took a huge bite. He sort of froze for just an instant, then walked purposefully to the edge of the patio and a convenient planter. He stood there for half a second and then violently threw the cake into the bushes. He leaned over the planter for a moment, spitting, and then charged back into the house for an explanation. Heidi was laughing so hard on the couch that she couldn’t get up. She couldn’t really talk, either, but managed to explain what was wrong with it and that she’d done it to Hannes, too. Both boys took it well and ran off to play.
We had a genuine Swiss supper called Raclette. It was delicious! Heidi cooked up a huge pot of potatoes, sliced up some small zucchinis, some tomatoes and onions, diced up bacon, and thickly sliced some raclette cheese. The table was set and in the middle were two machines that are basically portable broilers and had little wedge-shaped pans with handles.
We put what we wanted in the pans and set them under the broiler until they were done as we wanted them. Then we’d dump them out on the plate beside our cut-up potatoes and put a slice of raclette in the pan. I liked to put in some bacon as well. When the cheese bubbled, we took it out and poured it over the potatoes and veggies on our plate. We’d stick another slice of cheese and whatever under the broiler to melt while we were polishing off what we’d already prepared.
Switzerland is a beautiful land but there’s little unsettled land. When we drove to the factories and to the castle, we would travel through five miles of farmland and then come to another village.
The roads are winding and, except for the main roads, narrow. About two cars plus six inches wide. Did they slow down when they met another car? Shucks, no!
Often, the barn part of a house was right next to the road. No sidewalk or grass border. Sometimes, the house was just off the road and there were a lot of stone walls that we seemed to just miss.
I noticed the clocks in Austria and they were just as prevalent in Switzerland. Everywhere you look, there’s a clock. No reason whatsoever to be late.
Beautiful country. So tidy. Not much trash or even overgrown hedgerows or wasteland. Austria was even more well-taken care of. The only roadside trash I saw was around the tracks in the train station. The entire country, both Austria and Switzerland, look as if they’re a park.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Switzerland
Switzerland ~
22 September
Our 10:30am train out of Salzburg, Austria on Tuesday was the latest morning one we’ve caught yet. We were able to wake up at a reasonable time and get ready and packed in a decent way instead of frantically folding and rolling our things and fitting them back into our bag, hoping nothing was being left behind.
As a matter of fact, I was nearly done packing in Prague when Rhonda came into the bedroom and handed me my watch that I’d left in the bathroom. I’d left it right next to my glasses but still missed it. I was so thankful she saw it there on the window sill!
It helps that we don’t have much with us. Each has an airline-approved sized carry-on suitcase and a shoulder bag or backpack. Not much room for extras! I’m the only one who has purchased any souvenirs so far and that’s only been postcards.
I didn’t mention last blog that the Schloss Mirabel was where The Sound of Music was filmed. At least the exterior and garden shots. We didn’t walk the entire gardens because they were huge. We did walk through the Schloss (German for ‘castle’), into the inner court, and out the front entrance. The interior wasn’t open for tourists and I’m not even sure it usually is. The rooms looked more like offices or apartments.
We walked back to the motel and had a lovely supper. I think we were almost two hours sitting there. I’m thankful we had Rhonda with us to walk us through the European Fine Dining experience. We’d have look as if we were right off the farm otherwise. Nothing majorly different, just little things like: do we eat the salad right now because he set it off to the side (right now); should we ask for more water or let him see the pitcher is low (he saw it); why are there two napkins at each plate (one for tucking into collar of shirt one for wiping mouth); proper use of knife and fork (fork in left hand tines down, knife in right, load up back of fork and transport to mouth with left hand, tines down. Eat entire meal this way); do we ask for the check or will he bring it (we asked for it).
I never before understood what people meant when they referred to European lifestyles as a different culture. There’s enough different to qualify it as a different culture. I learned that when I pay for something, I don’t hold my hand out for the change. There’s a medium-sized tray that they put the money and receipt in and you take it from there. Although the postcard lady in Salzburg waited for me to put out my hand. Maybe it was because I stuck it out there halfway, remembered, and yanked it back.
Another difference is the bathroom lighting. Every single home, motel, or hostel I’ve been in so far (with the exception of here in Switzerland) has the light switch on the outside of the room. You must turn on the light before entering the room or you’ll be in the dark. We were sixteen hours in Budapest before I figured that one out.
Something else they do here that I’m seriously thinking of implementing at home for the kids at least is their method of bed-making. There is a fitted sheet, a pillow in a case, and a duvet folded in fourths sitting on top. The duvet is in a case similar to a pillow but closed with buttons or a zipper or the end folded over. So to make the bed, you fold the duvet back up and plump the pillow. How simple is that?
I’m doing a quantity of writing on this trip between this blog and a hand-written diary I’m keeping. In Salzburg, I stood at the deep window-sill and wrote at the open window in front of me, the cool night breeze gently wafting around with and the quiet city streets four floors below. I took a picture.
That’s another thing different in Europe. Their first floor is called the lobby or ground floor. Floor #1 is up one flight of stairs. So the number on our door key was 301 but we were on the fourth level; the third floor.
Our train went from Salzburg to Zürich and we caught another one that went to Lausanne but got off at Yverdon where our friend Heidi met us. She and her son Liam (nearly 4 years old) drove us to their home in the village of Donneloye (pronounced “Donna-lou-wah) about fifteen minutes away.
Heidi is a native American and she and Rhonda have been good friends for years. She (Heidi) married a Swiss and has been living here ever since. Ralph is a great guy with a wonderful sense of humor. They have three sons and a darling baby girl.
They live half a block from the two older boys’ school and they come home for lunch each day. Switzerland has very good public schools and home schooling is unheard of here. Since this is in the French-speaking area of Switzerland, the boys’ classes are all in that language. Heidi has taught them English from infancy and Ralph has taught them his native Swiss-German, so they’re growing up tri-lingual. Heidi says the two older boys will talk to each other in French and they are all supposed to respond to her in English and to Ralph in Swiss-German.
Little Liam sat on the couch with Rhonda, handed her a book and asked her to read him a story. Rhonda opened it and said she didn’t think she could. He asked if it was in French and she said it was. He encouraged her to try (everyone else he knew could read French, why not Rhonda?) She explained that the only books she could read were ones in English. He quickly offered a Berenstein book about the great honey hunt, ran to get it, and snuggled down for the story.
During the car drive to the house, he asked Mom if she could drive a car. Mom said she could but not in this country. He had trouble with that, too. Every other grown-up could drive a car here, why not her? Mom tried to explain but I don’t think she got anything across.
We haven’t had a chance to get to know the older boys yet because we got here just before chores and bedtime. We know all we need to know about sweet little Alinya….a darling seven-month-old baby girl with a heart-melting smile.
~23 September ~
I’m rather ashamed to admit that we slept in again this morning but at least we got up at 8am instead of 10:30.
Hanus and Dylan had already left for school but Liam came upstairs and visited while we tidied up before coming down. Rhonda and I heard him ask Mom, “Why are you so old”?
“Because I’ve lived a long time,” Mom answered.
“My dad is old,” Liam shared.
“I think I’m a bit older than your dad,” Mom replied. “I’m likely twice as old as him.”
“No,” Liam objected. “He’s forty.”
“Well, I’m seventy-seven,” Mom assured him, “and that’s about twice his age.”
“No.” Liam was staunchly loyal to his dad. “Forty is older than seventy-five.”
Rhonda and I were in the next room trying to smother our howling.
The boys have half days every Wednesday so after they came home for lunch we went on a sight-seeing tour. Ralph and Heidi have a seven-passenger van so we all piled in (except Ralph who had gone to work) and set off for the Nestlé chocolate factory and the Gruyeres cheese facility.
I don’t know if that’s the only Nestlé factory in Switzerland or not or if that was the original factory. What I do know is the very air is perfumed with chocolate. What a place to live in! There is a self-guided tour but you can’t see much of the factory itself. We watched a film of the process and then meandered through the exhibits. The best part is that on your way out, there are trays of samples and no one there to monitor how much each one takes.
There is a gift shop, of course, and I got a couple postcards of Switzerland.
We went a little further to the Gruyeres cheese factory. Again, I don’t know if that’s the only factory or if there are more. For a fee, about 7 euros, we went on a tour. We each had a device that looked like an elongated phone handset as our guide. We typed in the numbers that corresponded with our preferred language and then listened as we progressed from one numbered area to another. We could see most of the process through windows from above.
Liam wasn’t too sure about the salt baths. At first he thought is sounded sort of interesting. Heidi asked if he wanted to be in there for eight days. He decided it wasn’t as appealing as it first appeared.
We each received a sample of cheese that had a slice of cheese aged six months, one aged eight months, and one aged ten months. I had had a slice of eight months aged cheese the day before at supper so I elected to save my cheese for a snack on the train later.
We had enough time to drive up to the Château de St Gruyeres. It’s a fairy tale village with the cobblestone streets, window boxes full of geraniums, and lace curtains in the windows. The dates over the doors tell when the building was built or renovated or something. The oldest date I saw was 1594. Since it was a distance from the castle, I’m guessing it isn’t the oldest.
There is a fountain in the center of the road where we filled our water bottles. It looked decorative what with geraniums planted above it sprinkling the water with their petals and the deep basin beneath. I saw Heidi filling her bottle so when in Rome….. It was cool, clear, and delicious
It looks something like what Williamsburg is; where you can go to see how people lived in centuries gone by. What it really is, is a village where people live and work. There are shops of every kind, motels, and even a retirement home.
We didn’t go into the castle but there was a walkway around it a little lower than the base that we followed. It was a spectacular experience to look out over the valley to our left and then look up at the looming castle walls to our right.
We came back home for Hanus’ soccer practice, supper, and then Bible study. The study starts at 8:15pm here. That makes for less rush during supper but it keeps the children up later. Everyone spoke French at this study with the exception of us three and Heidi. Ralph prayed in English but spoke in French; Heidi prayed in English and spoke in French but then repeated in English. It was very special.
Ralph figured out the problem I was having with accessing their wireless; we visited for about an hour over cups of tea/coffee, and then headed for bed.
22 September
Our 10:30am train out of Salzburg, Austria on Tuesday was the latest morning one we’ve caught yet. We were able to wake up at a reasonable time and get ready and packed in a decent way instead of frantically folding and rolling our things and fitting them back into our bag, hoping nothing was being left behind.
As a matter of fact, I was nearly done packing in Prague when Rhonda came into the bedroom and handed me my watch that I’d left in the bathroom. I’d left it right next to my glasses but still missed it. I was so thankful she saw it there on the window sill!
It helps that we don’t have much with us. Each has an airline-approved sized carry-on suitcase and a shoulder bag or backpack. Not much room for extras! I’m the only one who has purchased any souvenirs so far and that’s only been postcards.
I didn’t mention last blog that the Schloss Mirabel was where The Sound of Music was filmed. At least the exterior and garden shots. We didn’t walk the entire gardens because they were huge. We did walk through the Schloss (German for ‘castle’), into the inner court, and out the front entrance. The interior wasn’t open for tourists and I’m not even sure it usually is. The rooms looked more like offices or apartments.
We walked back to the motel and had a lovely supper. I think we were almost two hours sitting there. I’m thankful we had Rhonda with us to walk us through the European Fine Dining experience. We’d have look as if we were right off the farm otherwise. Nothing majorly different, just little things like: do we eat the salad right now because he set it off to the side (right now); should we ask for more water or let him see the pitcher is low (he saw it); why are there two napkins at each plate (one for tucking into collar of shirt one for wiping mouth); proper use of knife and fork (fork in left hand tines down, knife in right, load up back of fork and transport to mouth with left hand, tines down. Eat entire meal this way); do we ask for the check or will he bring it (we asked for it).
I never before understood what people meant when they referred to European lifestyles as a different culture. There’s enough different to qualify it as a different culture. I learned that when I pay for something, I don’t hold my hand out for the change. There’s a medium-sized tray that they put the money and receipt in and you take it from there. Although the postcard lady in Salzburg waited for me to put out my hand. Maybe it was because I stuck it out there halfway, remembered, and yanked it back.
Another difference is the bathroom lighting. Every single home, motel, or hostel I’ve been in so far (with the exception of here in Switzerland) has the light switch on the outside of the room. You must turn on the light before entering the room or you’ll be in the dark. We were sixteen hours in Budapest before I figured that one out.
Something else they do here that I’m seriously thinking of implementing at home for the kids at least is their method of bed-making. There is a fitted sheet, a pillow in a case, and a duvet folded in fourths sitting on top. The duvet is in a case similar to a pillow but closed with buttons or a zipper or the end folded over. So to make the bed, you fold the duvet back up and plump the pillow. How simple is that?
I’m doing a quantity of writing on this trip between this blog and a hand-written diary I’m keeping. In Salzburg, I stood at the deep window-sill and wrote at the open window in front of me, the cool night breeze gently wafting around with and the quiet city streets four floors below. I took a picture.
That’s another thing different in Europe. Their first floor is called the lobby or ground floor. Floor #1 is up one flight of stairs. So the number on our door key was 301 but we were on the fourth level; the third floor.
Our train went from Salzburg to Zürich and we caught another one that went to Lausanne but got off at Yverdon where our friend Heidi met us. She and her son Liam (nearly 4 years old) drove us to their home in the village of Donneloye (pronounced “Donna-lou-wah) about fifteen minutes away.
Heidi is a native American and she and Rhonda have been good friends for years. She (Heidi) married a Swiss and has been living here ever since. Ralph is a great guy with a wonderful sense of humor. They have three sons and a darling baby girl.
They live half a block from the two older boys’ school and they come home for lunch each day. Switzerland has very good public schools and home schooling is unheard of here. Since this is in the French-speaking area of Switzerland, the boys’ classes are all in that language. Heidi has taught them English from infancy and Ralph has taught them his native Swiss-German, so they’re growing up tri-lingual. Heidi says the two older boys will talk to each other in French and they are all supposed to respond to her in English and to Ralph in Swiss-German.
Little Liam sat on the couch with Rhonda, handed her a book and asked her to read him a story. Rhonda opened it and said she didn’t think she could. He asked if it was in French and she said it was. He encouraged her to try (everyone else he knew could read French, why not Rhonda?) She explained that the only books she could read were ones in English. He quickly offered a Berenstein book about the great honey hunt, ran to get it, and snuggled down for the story.
During the car drive to the house, he asked Mom if she could drive a car. Mom said she could but not in this country. He had trouble with that, too. Every other grown-up could drive a car here, why not her? Mom tried to explain but I don’t think she got anything across.
We haven’t had a chance to get to know the older boys yet because we got here just before chores and bedtime. We know all we need to know about sweet little Alinya….a darling seven-month-old baby girl with a heart-melting smile.
~23 September ~
I’m rather ashamed to admit that we slept in again this morning but at least we got up at 8am instead of 10:30.
Hanus and Dylan had already left for school but Liam came upstairs and visited while we tidied up before coming down. Rhonda and I heard him ask Mom, “Why are you so old”?
“Because I’ve lived a long time,” Mom answered.
“My dad is old,” Liam shared.
“I think I’m a bit older than your dad,” Mom replied. “I’m likely twice as old as him.”
“No,” Liam objected. “He’s forty.”
“Well, I’m seventy-seven,” Mom assured him, “and that’s about twice his age.”
“No.” Liam was staunchly loyal to his dad. “Forty is older than seventy-five.”
Rhonda and I were in the next room trying to smother our howling.
The boys have half days every Wednesday so after they came home for lunch we went on a sight-seeing tour. Ralph and Heidi have a seven-passenger van so we all piled in (except Ralph who had gone to work) and set off for the Nestlé chocolate factory and the Gruyeres cheese facility.
I don’t know if that’s the only Nestlé factory in Switzerland or not or if that was the original factory. What I do know is the very air is perfumed with chocolate. What a place to live in! There is a self-guided tour but you can’t see much of the factory itself. We watched a film of the process and then meandered through the exhibits. The best part is that on your way out, there are trays of samples and no one there to monitor how much each one takes.
There is a gift shop, of course, and I got a couple postcards of Switzerland.
We went a little further to the Gruyeres cheese factory. Again, I don’t know if that’s the only factory or if there are more. For a fee, about 7 euros, we went on a tour. We each had a device that looked like an elongated phone handset as our guide. We typed in the numbers that corresponded with our preferred language and then listened as we progressed from one numbered area to another. We could see most of the process through windows from above.
Liam wasn’t too sure about the salt baths. At first he thought is sounded sort of interesting. Heidi asked if he wanted to be in there for eight days. He decided it wasn’t as appealing as it first appeared.
We each received a sample of cheese that had a slice of cheese aged six months, one aged eight months, and one aged ten months. I had had a slice of eight months aged cheese the day before at supper so I elected to save my cheese for a snack on the train later.
We had enough time to drive up to the Château de St Gruyeres. It’s a fairy tale village with the cobblestone streets, window boxes full of geraniums, and lace curtains in the windows. The dates over the doors tell when the building was built or renovated or something. The oldest date I saw was 1594. Since it was a distance from the castle, I’m guessing it isn’t the oldest.
There is a fountain in the center of the road where we filled our water bottles. It looked decorative what with geraniums planted above it sprinkling the water with their petals and the deep basin beneath. I saw Heidi filling her bottle so when in Rome….. It was cool, clear, and delicious
It looks something like what Williamsburg is; where you can go to see how people lived in centuries gone by. What it really is, is a village where people live and work. There are shops of every kind, motels, and even a retirement home.
We didn’t go into the castle but there was a walkway around it a little lower than the base that we followed. It was a spectacular experience to look out over the valley to our left and then look up at the looming castle walls to our right.
We came back home for Hanus’ soccer practice, supper, and then Bible study. The study starts at 8:15pm here. That makes for less rush during supper but it keeps the children up later. Everyone spoke French at this study with the exception of us three and Heidi. Ralph prayed in English but spoke in French; Heidi prayed in English and spoke in French but then repeated in English. It was very special.
Ralph figured out the problem I was having with accessing their wireless; we visited for about an hour over cups of tea/coffee, and then headed for bed.
Monday, September 21, 2009
Prague and Salzburg
Prague ~
First of all, please note the link to my pictures on the sidebar to the right. You’ll need to sign up with Snapfish to view but it’s free and easy to do. I’ve captioned all the pictures and you can see them as a slide show.
The camera program was simple to get. I slid Mom’s camera card into the slot and Windows grabbed what it needed from the internet. How easy was that?
Friday was a long day of somewhat frustrating travel after a short night. We were met at the Prague train station by Jeff, the man of the home where we stayed the weekend. Bless his kind heart, he came all the way to the station to escort us to his home. It involved a seven-minute walk from his house to the bus stop, a fifteen-minute ride on a bus, and a fifteen- to twenty-minute ride on the metro to get to us. Then we rode the metro back to the bus, the bus back to his stop and then the seven-minute walk up to his house. Whew! I think it was about 11pm when we hit the beds.
Next morning, I woke up to hear Mom talking with Debi, the woman of the house, and thought, “Mom’s always first one up early,” and checked my watch. 10:30am. What?!
We had a bite to eat and did computer stuff; blog, train schedules, hostels, email, etc. At a late lunch, Debi asked if we wanted to tour Prague and offered to guide us. Rhonda and I jumped at the chance. Mom’s been here before and wasn’t interested in sore feet and aching legs. It was a beautiful afternoon and a beautiful city.
We rode the bus and metro to the National Theater (I called it the National Museum in the pictures and will change that) where you see the big horse statue. The long avenue down from there is Wenceslaus Square which you see in pictures of Soviet parades and student demonstrations in Prague.
From there, we went to another square that I don’t remember the name of but that’s where the Apostle Clock is. You ought to look that up, too. Interesting clock and interesting story about the man who designed it.
I can’t do the buildings justice. They were very old. Centuries old. Under Communism, they weren’t kept up very well and they were painted dull grey. Prague is now in a constant state of restoration. One of the pictures I posted has a huge advertisement across the front of a building. Debi told us that they figure if the building is going to have a great cloth covering it during restoration, they may as well put an advertisement on it.
Most of the buildings now are quite colorful and look in great repair. Rhonda and I gawked like the tourists we are.
We didn’t get to the castle because time was running out but what we saw made us want to return some day. I’m awed by the sheer passage of history that I saw before my eyes. I tried to grasp that where I stood, kings, nobles, and peasants had also stood in centuries gone by. The cobblestones on several streets were polished by a thousand years’ worth of horse hooves, nobles’ boots, peasants’ shoes, and wagon wheels. My footwear has very thin soles and I delighted to feel the smoothness beneath my feet. I would sort of twist or slide a little whenever we stopped just to feel it again.
Czech history is as varied and bloody as any European country. Their King Charles IV was the first Czech ruler to be made King of the Holy Roman Empire (which was neither Holy nor Roman, by the way). He was good for the country and made it prosper.
He rebuilt the Judith Bridge spanning the Vltava River and it’s now called the Charles Bridge. We crossed it - foot traffic only - and there were people performing with a box in front of each one for donations. One singer had a vibrato that I didn’t particularly enjoy but another young girl sang a stunning rendition of Ave Maria. Her pianist is blind and they sometimes sing in duet while the older one plays.
Also on the bridge is a sort of good-luck piece where legend says if you touch it, you’ll return to Prague. I don’t think my future depends on what I touch, so I passed by.
We wanted a flavor of Prague, so went into a little bakery sort of place and had an ice cream. Debi wasn’t too keen; she said the Czech version of ice cream is pretty much milk whipped as it was frozen and didn’t taste all that great. But she was pleasantly surprised by this one. Said it was much better than what she’d had before.
We had a very special Sunday worship meeting with Jeff and Debi. Dan, a Business English teacher from Nova Scotia, was also there for a total of six. Dan stayed for lunch afterwards and kept us entertained with his stories and provocative political questions. He told us of how he was escorted out of Germany last July by two policeman because his new driver’s license had no picture. He had his old, expired one with a picture but the two together weren’t enough. When Jeff asked how they could do that, Dan explained that they had the guns and he didn’t. He had quite a few stories to tell and we enjoyed hearing them.
Sunday afternoon was quiet and slow. Some napped, some took a walk, some worked online, some did all of the above. We had a good time getting to know Jeff and Debi who left their families and homeland (Washington State) to come to Czech Republic so the ministers here could have a home base instead of a dinky apartment. Just like what Don and Dudu are doing in Hungary.
Rhonda and I stayed up almost long enough to meet Peter, one of the ministers here in Czech Republic. He was an hour late getting in because the train before him had hit a person. I don’t know any more of the particulars than just that. He was coming from Vienna and walked in the door around 10:30pm. But not to worry. He got up at 5am when we did, walked us down to the bus stop, and saw us off. So we got to know him just a little.
I’m getting pretty good hopping on and off public transport and reading train/tram/bus schedules. My balance is better on the busses where the driver…well…..drives…..and the passengers stagger around.
Quick note before I move on: We’re on the train to Salzburg, stopped in a town called České Budéjovice. There’s a man on the platform sweeping it clean….but sweeping toward the wall of the building. One wonders why he doesn’t sweep it all off the edge of the platform onto the rails…
České Budéjovice, by the way, is where Budweiser Beer originally originated….or so I’m told by a reputable source. I guess the water is special there and makes for a good beer. I wouldn’t know. I don’t like beer.
Another first:
Purchased something in a language I cannot speak. Never mind that the lady was used to tourists, I purchased two postcards for 16 koruny - about one dollar. The exchange right now is $1 USD = 18 Koruny. They call them crowns in English. So each rather nice postcard was about 50 cents.
Now for the language lesson:
I figured the marks above the letters meant a different sound than without the marks. I was right. A line (or accent mark although it doesn’t mean to accent the syllable) means to draw out the sound a little longer. A mark like a carot pointed down over a “c” (č) makes it say “ch”. Over a “t” makes it say “tyuh”, over an “s” makes it say “sh”, over a “j” makes it say “yoi”, over a “z” makes it say “zh” (like a soft “j”), and over the “r“ makes a “zh“ sound together with a rolled “rr“ as in Spanish. There’s one over an “e” but I didn’t ask what it did. A “c” alone makes a “ts” sound like the German “z”; a “ch” makes a “hyuh” like the German “ch”.
Once you figure out what each letter makes, it’s easy enough to pronounce the words. Knowing what they mean is a whole kettle of fish of another color.
Also, Prague is only pronounced that way by foreigners. They and the surrounding countries pronounce and spell it “Praha”. They also pronounce and call their country Česka Republika.
“Yes” is “ano” and “No” is “ne”. I didn’t ask for any other words although I should have.
We rode the metro long enough that I’ve memorized the words that sound like Peet-soo Anat-soo. It means “get on” and get off”. They say the phrase “The train is leaving, so get on or get off.” When I asked Debi what they were saying, she told me, “Get in or out, Stupid!” Which, I guess, is what really is being said when you strip off the politeness…..
Jeff and Debi live in a suburb north of Prague called Prúhonice (I’m pretty sure that’s how you spell it) and pronounced “Pro-hoo-neet-say.
We rose at 4:45am to make the 5:30 bus and rode it back to the metro station. We caught the metro in good time and rode to the train station where we had to wait for about half an hour before our train information came up on the reader board. That gave me plenty of time to people-watch - my second-favorite pastime (reading being my first).
When we were on the metro, Rhonda unobtrusively pointed to a lady’s shoulder bag by my feet. I looked down and saw a small dog’s head through the zipped mesh closing the bag. A small dog was inside the equivalent of a canvas shopping bag!
There were a couple of drunks asleep on a bench in the train station a short distance away from us. Sound asleep, leaning forward, arms on thighs, and I wondered why they didn’t topple head-first onto the concrete floor. Why do drunks have better balance than the average sober person? Any sober person would have long fallen off it they tried to perch like those guys did. Along came a couple of young police and stopped in front of the one closest to us. They addressed him and got no answer. They spoke a little louder. No response. One of the policemen kicked his foot. The guy exploded awake looking for a fight, saw the uniforms and quickly subsided. A couple minutes later, I noticed he was dozing off again, slumped forward, arms on thighs but not falling off the bench. He was still there when we left.
I’ve read about derelicts and imagined what they’d look like. I saw one this morning in that station. Longish white hair, beard, and moustache going every direction, rheumy eyes, shaking hands, unsteady gait, too-big pants held up with a belt (or it might have been a bit of rope), and worn-out shirt. I was so amazed that I didn’t have a chance to look at his feet before he was past us and around the corner.
We traveled through some bee-yooo-tiful country on the train from Prague to Salzburg. I took a ton of pictures. Same deal as from Vienna to Prague. I looks like it could be Anywhere, USA but there’s something different that I can’t put my finger on.
We are now in Salzburg, Austria and will stay the night. There is internet here but it costs 1 Euro/hour. Not a bad price. The Cyber Café charges 3 Euros/hour. So I may decide to be on the internet for three hours, but not more than that.
We walked the old part of Salzburg. Again, it was amazing to think that Mozart likely ran down this street right were I was standing
We also walked across the river twice (to old town and back) and we went to the Scloss Mirabell. I have no idea how any family could live in a house (castle) that big. You’d need servants for the servants! The formal gardens there are just beautiful. Box hedges, dusty miller, marigolds, begonias, fountains, statues…..wow.
We leave tomorrow around 10am and go to Yverdon, Switzerland by way of Zürich. I’ve been in three large European cities now and they each feel different.
Hungary seems a little more scrappy. A little more “things could happen here so hang on to your purse and passport”. Still awakening from the stupor of Communism.
Prague seemed steeped in history and struggle. Of a people freed to become what they aspire to be.
Salzburg seemed to me to have more of a small-town feel; a place of music; gentleness.
Three great cities - three people having a great time.
First of all, please note the link to my pictures on the sidebar to the right. You’ll need to sign up with Snapfish to view but it’s free and easy to do. I’ve captioned all the pictures and you can see them as a slide show.
The camera program was simple to get. I slid Mom’s camera card into the slot and Windows grabbed what it needed from the internet. How easy was that?
Friday was a long day of somewhat frustrating travel after a short night. We were met at the Prague train station by Jeff, the man of the home where we stayed the weekend. Bless his kind heart, he came all the way to the station to escort us to his home. It involved a seven-minute walk from his house to the bus stop, a fifteen-minute ride on a bus, and a fifteen- to twenty-minute ride on the metro to get to us. Then we rode the metro back to the bus, the bus back to his stop and then the seven-minute walk up to his house. Whew! I think it was about 11pm when we hit the beds.
Next morning, I woke up to hear Mom talking with Debi, the woman of the house, and thought, “Mom’s always first one up early,” and checked my watch. 10:30am. What?!
We had a bite to eat and did computer stuff; blog, train schedules, hostels, email, etc. At a late lunch, Debi asked if we wanted to tour Prague and offered to guide us. Rhonda and I jumped at the chance. Mom’s been here before and wasn’t interested in sore feet and aching legs. It was a beautiful afternoon and a beautiful city.
We rode the bus and metro to the National Theater (I called it the National Museum in the pictures and will change that) where you see the big horse statue. The long avenue down from there is Wenceslaus Square which you see in pictures of Soviet parades and student demonstrations in Prague.
From there, we went to another square that I don’t remember the name of but that’s where the Apostle Clock is. You ought to look that up, too. Interesting clock and interesting story about the man who designed it.
I can’t do the buildings justice. They were very old. Centuries old. Under Communism, they weren’t kept up very well and they were painted dull grey. Prague is now in a constant state of restoration. One of the pictures I posted has a huge advertisement across the front of a building. Debi told us that they figure if the building is going to have a great cloth covering it during restoration, they may as well put an advertisement on it.
Most of the buildings now are quite colorful and look in great repair. Rhonda and I gawked like the tourists we are.
We didn’t get to the castle because time was running out but what we saw made us want to return some day. I’m awed by the sheer passage of history that I saw before my eyes. I tried to grasp that where I stood, kings, nobles, and peasants had also stood in centuries gone by. The cobblestones on several streets were polished by a thousand years’ worth of horse hooves, nobles’ boots, peasants’ shoes, and wagon wheels. My footwear has very thin soles and I delighted to feel the smoothness beneath my feet. I would sort of twist or slide a little whenever we stopped just to feel it again.
Czech history is as varied and bloody as any European country. Their King Charles IV was the first Czech ruler to be made King of the Holy Roman Empire (which was neither Holy nor Roman, by the way). He was good for the country and made it prosper.
He rebuilt the Judith Bridge spanning the Vltava River and it’s now called the Charles Bridge. We crossed it - foot traffic only - and there were people performing with a box in front of each one for donations. One singer had a vibrato that I didn’t particularly enjoy but another young girl sang a stunning rendition of Ave Maria. Her pianist is blind and they sometimes sing in duet while the older one plays.
Also on the bridge is a sort of good-luck piece where legend says if you touch it, you’ll return to Prague. I don’t think my future depends on what I touch, so I passed by.
We wanted a flavor of Prague, so went into a little bakery sort of place and had an ice cream. Debi wasn’t too keen; she said the Czech version of ice cream is pretty much milk whipped as it was frozen and didn’t taste all that great. But she was pleasantly surprised by this one. Said it was much better than what she’d had before.
We had a very special Sunday worship meeting with Jeff and Debi. Dan, a Business English teacher from Nova Scotia, was also there for a total of six. Dan stayed for lunch afterwards and kept us entertained with his stories and provocative political questions. He told us of how he was escorted out of Germany last July by two policeman because his new driver’s license had no picture. He had his old, expired one with a picture but the two together weren’t enough. When Jeff asked how they could do that, Dan explained that they had the guns and he didn’t. He had quite a few stories to tell and we enjoyed hearing them.
Sunday afternoon was quiet and slow. Some napped, some took a walk, some worked online, some did all of the above. We had a good time getting to know Jeff and Debi who left their families and homeland (Washington State) to come to Czech Republic so the ministers here could have a home base instead of a dinky apartment. Just like what Don and Dudu are doing in Hungary.
Rhonda and I stayed up almost long enough to meet Peter, one of the ministers here in Czech Republic. He was an hour late getting in because the train before him had hit a person. I don’t know any more of the particulars than just that. He was coming from Vienna and walked in the door around 10:30pm. But not to worry. He got up at 5am when we did, walked us down to the bus stop, and saw us off. So we got to know him just a little.
I’m getting pretty good hopping on and off public transport and reading train/tram/bus schedules. My balance is better on the busses where the driver…well…..drives…..and the passengers stagger around.
Quick note before I move on: We’re on the train to Salzburg, stopped in a town called České Budéjovice. There’s a man on the platform sweeping it clean….but sweeping toward the wall of the building. One wonders why he doesn’t sweep it all off the edge of the platform onto the rails…
České Budéjovice, by the way, is where Budweiser Beer originally originated….or so I’m told by a reputable source. I guess the water is special there and makes for a good beer. I wouldn’t know. I don’t like beer.
Another first:
Purchased something in a language I cannot speak. Never mind that the lady was used to tourists, I purchased two postcards for 16 koruny - about one dollar. The exchange right now is $1 USD = 18 Koruny. They call them crowns in English. So each rather nice postcard was about 50 cents.
Now for the language lesson:
I figured the marks above the letters meant a different sound than without the marks. I was right. A line (or accent mark although it doesn’t mean to accent the syllable) means to draw out the sound a little longer. A mark like a carot pointed down over a “c” (č) makes it say “ch”. Over a “t” makes it say “tyuh”, over an “s” makes it say “sh”, over a “j” makes it say “yoi”, over a “z” makes it say “zh” (like a soft “j”), and over the “r“ makes a “zh“ sound together with a rolled “rr“ as in Spanish. There’s one over an “e” but I didn’t ask what it did. A “c” alone makes a “ts” sound like the German “z”; a “ch” makes a “hyuh” like the German “ch”.
Once you figure out what each letter makes, it’s easy enough to pronounce the words. Knowing what they mean is a whole kettle of fish of another color.
Also, Prague is only pronounced that way by foreigners. They and the surrounding countries pronounce and spell it “Praha”. They also pronounce and call their country Česka Republika.
“Yes” is “ano” and “No” is “ne”. I didn’t ask for any other words although I should have.
We rode the metro long enough that I’ve memorized the words that sound like Peet-soo Anat-soo. It means “get on” and get off”. They say the phrase “The train is leaving, so get on or get off.” When I asked Debi what they were saying, she told me, “Get in or out, Stupid!” Which, I guess, is what really is being said when you strip off the politeness…..
Jeff and Debi live in a suburb north of Prague called Prúhonice (I’m pretty sure that’s how you spell it) and pronounced “Pro-hoo-neet-say.
We rose at 4:45am to make the 5:30 bus and rode it back to the metro station. We caught the metro in good time and rode to the train station where we had to wait for about half an hour before our train information came up on the reader board. That gave me plenty of time to people-watch - my second-favorite pastime (reading being my first).
When we were on the metro, Rhonda unobtrusively pointed to a lady’s shoulder bag by my feet. I looked down and saw a small dog’s head through the zipped mesh closing the bag. A small dog was inside the equivalent of a canvas shopping bag!
There were a couple of drunks asleep on a bench in the train station a short distance away from us. Sound asleep, leaning forward, arms on thighs, and I wondered why they didn’t topple head-first onto the concrete floor. Why do drunks have better balance than the average sober person? Any sober person would have long fallen off it they tried to perch like those guys did. Along came a couple of young police and stopped in front of the one closest to us. They addressed him and got no answer. They spoke a little louder. No response. One of the policemen kicked his foot. The guy exploded awake looking for a fight, saw the uniforms and quickly subsided. A couple minutes later, I noticed he was dozing off again, slumped forward, arms on thighs but not falling off the bench. He was still there when we left.
I’ve read about derelicts and imagined what they’d look like. I saw one this morning in that station. Longish white hair, beard, and moustache going every direction, rheumy eyes, shaking hands, unsteady gait, too-big pants held up with a belt (or it might have been a bit of rope), and worn-out shirt. I was so amazed that I didn’t have a chance to look at his feet before he was past us and around the corner.
We traveled through some bee-yooo-tiful country on the train from Prague to Salzburg. I took a ton of pictures. Same deal as from Vienna to Prague. I looks like it could be Anywhere, USA but there’s something different that I can’t put my finger on.
We are now in Salzburg, Austria and will stay the night. There is internet here but it costs 1 Euro/hour. Not a bad price. The Cyber Café charges 3 Euros/hour. So I may decide to be on the internet for three hours, but not more than that.
We walked the old part of Salzburg. Again, it was amazing to think that Mozart likely ran down this street right were I was standing
We also walked across the river twice (to old town and back) and we went to the Scloss Mirabell. I have no idea how any family could live in a house (castle) that big. You’d need servants for the servants! The formal gardens there are just beautiful. Box hedges, dusty miller, marigolds, begonias, fountains, statues…..wow.
We leave tomorrow around 10am and go to Yverdon, Switzerland by way of Zürich. I’ve been in three large European cities now and they each feel different.
Hungary seems a little more scrappy. A little more “things could happen here so hang on to your purse and passport”. Still awakening from the stupor of Communism.
Prague seemed steeped in history and struggle. Of a people freed to become what they aspire to be.
Salzburg seemed to me to have more of a small-town feel; a place of music; gentleness.
Three great cities - three people having a great time.
Friday, September 18, 2009
Budapest
Budapest, 15 - 17 September
I still don’t have a camera program but I will write and then post the pics whenever I get them. We’re at a place in Prague that has wireless so I should be able to get something.
After I posted the last blog, we went back to the hostel and waited for our ministers who are working in Hungary. They took us on a tour of Budapest…or as much of one as a person can get when the weather is akin to the Pacific Northwest in winter only as warm as fall. The rain came down gently but thoroughly, running down my forehead, into and out of my eyes, off the end of my nose, down my cheeks, dripping off my chin and ear lobes and wriggling its way down my shirt front. The ministers had umbrellas and kept trying to shield me from the worst but in reality, the umbrellas were the smaller, fold-up size and the rain ran off the edge of it and onto my head, down my face….
Mom and Rhonda both had hoods on their coats so the weren’t as soaked as I was. Anyone who knows me knows that I’d prefer the rain to a hat or hood and I had no problems with the rain except that my glasses kept getting fogged up and water-streaked. I had a hood on my coat, too, but didn’t remember until it was pointless.
Two more of our ministers met up with us at the….oh, I can’t remember the name of the coffee house but it was built in the very beginning of the 1900s and very elegant. Quite high-brow. We came in one door, inhaled deeply as we slowly goggled our way through and left out the other door.
We went to a spa that had been built by the Romans. There are four different kinds of water there and doctors in Hungary actually prescribe sessions at a particular spa. You can also pay the equivalent of $15 for a day in the waters and massages. That may also include saunas, too, I didn’t ask. The building was built around the end of the 1800s, was magnificent outside and stunning inside. It is illegal to take pictures inside, so we didn’t. The grounds were beautiful with well-manicured lawn and flower beds.
We saw quite the stocky dude in a Speedo there. I got a picture of him.
The Hungarians love flowers and they lined the city streets, windows, and sidewalks. I got pictures of that, too.
We viewed the king’s castle on a hill overlooking the Duna (Danube) on the Buda side and saw most of the parliament building on the Pest side. Our hostel was on the Pest side of the river, by the way.
I learned that there are actually three parts of Budapest, not two. Old Buda, Buda, and Pest. Old Buda was the extent of the Roman conquest to the south of the city.
I also learned how to properly pronounce Budapest. It’s not like describing a particularly annoying monk but “Booda- pesht” The “s” alone makes the “sh” sound. Followed by a “z”, it makes the “s” sound. I also learned how to say ‘yes’ (Phonetically:‘eegan’) and ‘no’ (phonetically: nem). Goodbye is Viszontlátásra; Thank you is Köszönöm; Hello (Good day) is Jó napot kívánok. Don’t let the marks scare you. Each mark makes each vowel say a particular sound and only that sound. The hard part comes when you learn that ‘a’, ‘e’, and ‘I’, makes only two sounds (one with and one without the accent) but the ’o’ and ’u’ each make four…for a total of fourteen vowel sounds. And you complain about learning to spell in English!
We went to “the coffee house in Hungary” and had an elegant bowls of tea, coffee, lovely cakes, and great visiting. Those cups of tea were as large as my cereal bowls at home only shaped more steeply on the sides and had a handle. Two more ladies joined us there; one more minister and a visitor from New Zealand. We were nine sitting around two tables pushed together.
If ever you feel like spending money like a rich man - dealing in thousands of monetary units - come to Hungary. Their forint is the base. There is no fraction like we have fractions of our base dollar. So a public transport ticket good for 24 hours cost 1,500 forints. Our hostel room was around 11,000 forints for one person for two nights. One dollar will get you about 180 forints, so the subway ticket was just over eight dollars and the hostel was around $61 for two nights.
Some of you will wonder who the ministers are. I only use first names on this blog and they are Ann, Jessedith, Bree, Rachel, and Heidrun. When I told them that I don’t use last names, they exploded with laughter and exclaimed, “ ‘Sisters from Hungary’ says it all!!”
We left there and traveled by train north to a home for supper and mid-week Bible study. Dessert came after the study and the man of the house drove us back to the hostel so we wouldn’t get lost on public transport.
You really have to ride public transport to get the true feel of the lower side of life. We were beset by fast-talking ladies trying to sell women’s underwear, of all things. One lady had her hands inside the undies to better show off the superb cut and quality of cloth. I was somewhat tempted just to have a souvenir.
A man got right in our faces at the self-serve train ticket kiosk. I didn’t understand a word he said but I knew he was begging for money. The ministers acted as if he didn’t exist and he left to badger someone else.
We were going through one subway when I got distracted by a Korean yelling to the crowd, kicked a nearly-empty bowl (large sized) of some sort of foodstuff, slid on the remains in an unplanned split, and very nearly landed on my kiester. I was saved by the convenient arm of one of the ministers. I can’t remember who it was but I thanked her profusely.
There was a well-dressed young lady on one of the surface trains that I know for a fact wasn’t wearing a bra. She had both her blouse and her leather jacket unbuttoned to four inches above her belly button.
I was talking to Rachel on a tram when she suddenly interrupted me asking me to stand still so she could get something off my face. What she attempted to wipe off my face was my mole. I told her that; she apologized and explained she thought it was some pollution and wanted to get it off my face. Pollution?? It’s so bad there that it lands on your face?
What else? You really should look up Hero’s Square, the Shoe Memorial, and Lady Liberty. The internet can do far more justice than I can recounting their symbolism and history.
(Rhonda’s notes)
We hardly noticed the rain with all the visiting we were doing with the ministers which make up many English colonies. All communication was made in various forms of English. Sweet, unforgettable fellowship. A highlight for sure! Dudu and Don are Canadians who felt moved to purchase a home in Budapest for the ministers to have a place to stay. They are very useful there and stay 6 months in Hungary and the other 6 months on Vancouver Island. Their life and generosity is inspiring. Mom and her girls are getting along fine enjoying this adventure that’s full of opportunities to laugh or cry. One of these nights we’ll get a good rest. In the mean time the train rides are soothing and relaxing. After a Eurorail mishap this morning we are on our way to Vienna with purpose. Hoping to get our Eurorail passes in hand and get up to Prague before day’s end.
6:00pm Friday, Sept 17th ~
We have been on the rail line from Vienna to Prague since 4pm in first class. Wow! First class! I think the second class from Budapest to Vienna about did Mom in what with sharing a six-compartment cubby with two other women and the air conditioning being more miss than hit in this muggy weather. It sure was a new experience, though. Ever ask someone if they want to change seats and help someone get their luggage down with neither of you saying a word the other understands, yet communicating completely?
One of the ministers gave us advise when we were in Czech Republic. “Don’t cough, spit, or sneeze,” she cautioned, “you might be saying something without knowing it.”
Czechs have even more marks above their letters than the Hungarians do.
The scenery looks like Anywhere, USA except for the buildings. The crops are planted a little differently here, too. I can’t describe it much more than that the fields are narrower with different kinds of vegetations planted next to each other. It just feels different somehow.
I just looked out the window and saw what looked like bunkers or tunnels of some kind. They seemed more bunker-like than tunnel-like. A reminder of the years the Czech Republic spent under the Iron Fist.
More firsts for me:
*First time on a tram.
*First time on a subway (metro here).
*First time standing up holding on to those straps on the tram and metro. It’s a little harder than it looks! One tram started before I was quite ready and I almost landed in Mom’s lap, complete with two suitcases and my shoulder bag.
*First time purchasing something (a bottle of water) totally in German. And he understood me just fine.
*First time paying for something in Euros. Not the first time paying in foreign currency because I’ve done that in Canada. Euros are worth $1.40 each but it still seems as if I’m using Monopoly money.
We are in Prague now, safe in the home of some friends. We had a long metro ride (there were some classy dressers), a longer bus ride (those doors beeped more annoyingly than the ones in Budapest), and a work-out of a walk to Jeff and Debbie’s four-bedroom house. It’s 11:40pm on Friday night after a long day that started at 6am on top of those bowls of tea plus the cup after Bible study.
I still don’t have a camera program but I will write and then post the pics whenever I get them. We’re at a place in Prague that has wireless so I should be able to get something.
After I posted the last blog, we went back to the hostel and waited for our ministers who are working in Hungary. They took us on a tour of Budapest…or as much of one as a person can get when the weather is akin to the Pacific Northwest in winter only as warm as fall. The rain came down gently but thoroughly, running down my forehead, into and out of my eyes, off the end of my nose, down my cheeks, dripping off my chin and ear lobes and wriggling its way down my shirt front. The ministers had umbrellas and kept trying to shield me from the worst but in reality, the umbrellas were the smaller, fold-up size and the rain ran off the edge of it and onto my head, down my face….
Mom and Rhonda both had hoods on their coats so the weren’t as soaked as I was. Anyone who knows me knows that I’d prefer the rain to a hat or hood and I had no problems with the rain except that my glasses kept getting fogged up and water-streaked. I had a hood on my coat, too, but didn’t remember until it was pointless.
Two more of our ministers met up with us at the….oh, I can’t remember the name of the coffee house but it was built in the very beginning of the 1900s and very elegant. Quite high-brow. We came in one door, inhaled deeply as we slowly goggled our way through and left out the other door.
We went to a spa that had been built by the Romans. There are four different kinds of water there and doctors in Hungary actually prescribe sessions at a particular spa. You can also pay the equivalent of $15 for a day in the waters and massages. That may also include saunas, too, I didn’t ask. The building was built around the end of the 1800s, was magnificent outside and stunning inside. It is illegal to take pictures inside, so we didn’t. The grounds were beautiful with well-manicured lawn and flower beds.
We saw quite the stocky dude in a Speedo there. I got a picture of him.
The Hungarians love flowers and they lined the city streets, windows, and sidewalks. I got pictures of that, too.
We viewed the king’s castle on a hill overlooking the Duna (Danube) on the Buda side and saw most of the parliament building on the Pest side. Our hostel was on the Pest side of the river, by the way.
I learned that there are actually three parts of Budapest, not two. Old Buda, Buda, and Pest. Old Buda was the extent of the Roman conquest to the south of the city.
I also learned how to properly pronounce Budapest. It’s not like describing a particularly annoying monk but “Booda- pesht” The “s” alone makes the “sh” sound. Followed by a “z”, it makes the “s” sound. I also learned how to say ‘yes’ (Phonetically:‘eegan’) and ‘no’ (phonetically: nem). Goodbye is Viszontlátásra; Thank you is Köszönöm; Hello (Good day) is Jó napot kívánok. Don’t let the marks scare you. Each mark makes each vowel say a particular sound and only that sound. The hard part comes when you learn that ‘a’, ‘e’, and ‘I’, makes only two sounds (one with and one without the accent) but the ’o’ and ’u’ each make four…for a total of fourteen vowel sounds. And you complain about learning to spell in English!
We went to “the coffee house in Hungary” and had an elegant bowls of tea, coffee, lovely cakes, and great visiting. Those cups of tea were as large as my cereal bowls at home only shaped more steeply on the sides and had a handle. Two more ladies joined us there; one more minister and a visitor from New Zealand. We were nine sitting around two tables pushed together.
If ever you feel like spending money like a rich man - dealing in thousands of monetary units - come to Hungary. Their forint is the base. There is no fraction like we have fractions of our base dollar. So a public transport ticket good for 24 hours cost 1,500 forints. Our hostel room was around 11,000 forints for one person for two nights. One dollar will get you about 180 forints, so the subway ticket was just over eight dollars and the hostel was around $61 for two nights.
Some of you will wonder who the ministers are. I only use first names on this blog and they are Ann, Jessedith, Bree, Rachel, and Heidrun. When I told them that I don’t use last names, they exploded with laughter and exclaimed, “ ‘Sisters from Hungary’ says it all!!”
We left there and traveled by train north to a home for supper and mid-week Bible study. Dessert came after the study and the man of the house drove us back to the hostel so we wouldn’t get lost on public transport.
You really have to ride public transport to get the true feel of the lower side of life. We were beset by fast-talking ladies trying to sell women’s underwear, of all things. One lady had her hands inside the undies to better show off the superb cut and quality of cloth. I was somewhat tempted just to have a souvenir.
A man got right in our faces at the self-serve train ticket kiosk. I didn’t understand a word he said but I knew he was begging for money. The ministers acted as if he didn’t exist and he left to badger someone else.
We were going through one subway when I got distracted by a Korean yelling to the crowd, kicked a nearly-empty bowl (large sized) of some sort of foodstuff, slid on the remains in an unplanned split, and very nearly landed on my kiester. I was saved by the convenient arm of one of the ministers. I can’t remember who it was but I thanked her profusely.
There was a well-dressed young lady on one of the surface trains that I know for a fact wasn’t wearing a bra. She had both her blouse and her leather jacket unbuttoned to four inches above her belly button.
I was talking to Rachel on a tram when she suddenly interrupted me asking me to stand still so she could get something off my face. What she attempted to wipe off my face was my mole. I told her that; she apologized and explained she thought it was some pollution and wanted to get it off my face. Pollution?? It’s so bad there that it lands on your face?
What else? You really should look up Hero’s Square, the Shoe Memorial, and Lady Liberty. The internet can do far more justice than I can recounting their symbolism and history.
(Rhonda’s notes)
We hardly noticed the rain with all the visiting we were doing with the ministers which make up many English colonies. All communication was made in various forms of English. Sweet, unforgettable fellowship. A highlight for sure! Dudu and Don are Canadians who felt moved to purchase a home in Budapest for the ministers to have a place to stay. They are very useful there and stay 6 months in Hungary and the other 6 months on Vancouver Island. Their life and generosity is inspiring. Mom and her girls are getting along fine enjoying this adventure that’s full of opportunities to laugh or cry. One of these nights we’ll get a good rest. In the mean time the train rides are soothing and relaxing. After a Eurorail mishap this morning we are on our way to Vienna with purpose. Hoping to get our Eurorail passes in hand and get up to Prague before day’s end.
6:00pm Friday, Sept 17th ~
We have been on the rail line from Vienna to Prague since 4pm in first class. Wow! First class! I think the second class from Budapest to Vienna about did Mom in what with sharing a six-compartment cubby with two other women and the air conditioning being more miss than hit in this muggy weather. It sure was a new experience, though. Ever ask someone if they want to change seats and help someone get their luggage down with neither of you saying a word the other understands, yet communicating completely?
One of the ministers gave us advise when we were in Czech Republic. “Don’t cough, spit, or sneeze,” she cautioned, “you might be saying something without knowing it.”
Czechs have even more marks above their letters than the Hungarians do.
The scenery looks like Anywhere, USA except for the buildings. The crops are planted a little differently here, too. I can’t describe it much more than that the fields are narrower with different kinds of vegetations planted next to each other. It just feels different somehow.
I just looked out the window and saw what looked like bunkers or tunnels of some kind. They seemed more bunker-like than tunnel-like. A reminder of the years the Czech Republic spent under the Iron Fist.
More firsts for me:
*First time on a tram.
*First time on a subway (metro here).
*First time standing up holding on to those straps on the tram and metro. It’s a little harder than it looks! One tram started before I was quite ready and I almost landed in Mom’s lap, complete with two suitcases and my shoulder bag.
*First time purchasing something (a bottle of water) totally in German. And he understood me just fine.
*First time paying for something in Euros. Not the first time paying in foreign currency because I’ve done that in Canada. Euros are worth $1.40 each but it still seems as if I’m using Monopoly money.
We are in Prague now, safe in the home of some friends. We had a long metro ride (there were some classy dressers), a longer bus ride (those doors beeped more annoyingly than the ones in Budapest), and a work-out of a walk to Jeff and Debbie’s four-bedroom house. It’s 11:40pm on Friday night after a long day that started at 6am on top of those bowls of tea plus the cup after Bible study.
Thursday, September 17, 2009
New York to Budapest
10:17 pm PDT ~
It’s 10:17pm in Oregon, 1:17am in New York, and 7;17am in Budapest. How do I keep the times straight? I have clocks on my desktop. Nope, no cheating….being smart.
We left JFK airport on time without any stewardesses cracking any whips. We weren’t in the air more than fifteen minutes when the pilot told us he expected to shave an hour off our flight time because of “favorable tail winds”. A nine-hour flight shortened to eight hours? Fine with us!
This plane has odd sized overhead bins and we had to struggle a little to get Mom’s and my bags in there but we did it.
There is a young boy, maybe two years old, who howled for the first two hours or so. It was better than two hours now that I think about it because he was a pill when we were boarding and he only howled louder as the movie played and supper was consumed. His mom’s method of dealing with him was to “shhhh” him. The only effect it had was to make her sound as if she’d sprung a leak. He eventually fell asleep (thank goodness!) and slept for a couple of hours. Then we got into some pretty fun turbulence again and he’s just woken up. Oh, joy.
I’ve never been overseas so have nothing with which to compare but we’ve had periods of pretty calm flight interspersed with nice, exciting bouncing. The pilot turned on the seatbelt sign shortly after supper and it hasn’t gone off yet. Mom, the experienced international traveler, says this is nothing.
I decided I was thirsty a couple of hours ago (before the Star Trek movie. Mom asked why on Earth those boys seem to keep getting into fights?) Mom had filled my water bottle when she filled hers at JFK and I took it out of my bag to, well, get a drink. This water bottle is a Nikken which has a filter inside and a silicon straw to suck it out with (yes, I know that was un-grammatical. It’s late and I’m tired) The bottle has a flip-top lid that bends the straw over and keeps it from leaking. Now, back to the story.
I pulled the bottle out of the bag and flipped the top over…..and got a miniature Old Faithful down my shirt front. Note to self: When you fill a bottle at sea level, it WILL spew at 33,000 feet elevation. Mom said I had and Old Faceful.
I just happened to look out the windows and saw it’s dawn and brightening up pretty fast. The sun tends to come up quickly when you’re flying straight into it. We still have about three hours inside this metal can with a yelling child.
I was thinking a while ago that an airplane is sort of a world unto itself. We can see by the map (when a movie isn’t playing - they don’t have individual screens on the backs of the seats here like they did the last flight) that we’re flying over, say, Newfoundland or that we’re south of Reykjavik and coming up on Ireland but in the dark, we may as well be flying to the moon for all the connection we have with the world under us.
2:40 Budapest time (4:40 Oregon time) ~
We landed in Budapest at 10:25, a full hour and 5 minutes early. As we came in, my first thought was that the roofs of the houses looked different than they do back home. A lot of them were red-orange and I’m guessing they’re made out of tile. I think you’d get the same effect coming into Spain or another Mediterranean city.
We went through customs and I got the first stamp on my passport. Yay! Hmm….I haven’t looked at it yet, just slid the passport back into my holder and got out of the way of the next person….oh how disappointing! It looks as if they’d nearly run out of ink and the black part is unreadable but he red date stands out clearly. Let’s hope the Czech Republic’s is better.
We’re at the hostel now and I’ve had a number of firsts besides the first stamp in my first passport. Let’s start with all the firsts that came with my first taxi ride…
I’ve heard all kinds of stories about how the taxi driver raced through side streets where cars are parked in a solid wall on both sides and maybe six inches to spare on each side of our car. Well, I lived it this afternoon and Rhonda got a picture from the backseat. How we escaped with nary a scratch is a mystery to me. I found out that yellow lights mean speed up and red lights only count if you see them before you go through the….intersection.
I hesitated because lights don’t occur only at intersections. Sometimes they appear in the middle of the street. I finally noticed broad, dirty white lines painted on the street going with the traffic, not across like our cross-walks would. Those are pedestrian crossings. I understood why they have these special areas for foot traffic when I kept bracing myself expecting the car to stop when people were at the curb and the driver would just plow on. Pedestrians certainly don’t have the right-of-way here!
We were stopped at a light when all of a sudden a dirt bike - at least that’s what it would be called here - came off the curb beside us, cut between us and the car ahead of us (there might have been 18 inches), made a sharp right between that car and the one beside it, and disappeared in a roar and a cloud of grey exhaust.
Rhonda pointed out the strings of parallel parked cars that had - I’m not kidding - four inches or less between their bumpers and the hitch of the one in front of it. Mom wondered how on earth they got out of there, voicing my thoughts before I could speak. Rhonda explained that they go forward until they bump, reverse until they bump, and keep doing that until they’re turned enough to get out.
At another light, I noticed a convertible with Florida plates. Rhonda thought it was a high-end Nissan. I stared at it for a while before I realized what I was seeing. Then I had the weird sensation of my head trying to be in two places at the same time.
We saw a man with his forearm in a cast…painted in some way to make it look like a Holstein cow.
We saw some wonderful buildings. They had to be pre-communist and they looked pre-Victorian, too. They’re built of brick and/or concrete, about six stories tall, filled a city block, and are topped with fancy furbelows. One building had a doorway overhang that was held up by two carved concrete men. One of them had quite a grimace on his face. I would, too, if I’d had to hold up a concrete overhand for a few hundred years.
We’ve checked in to my first hostel. Did you all know I’m a card-carrying member of the Hostel Community? “That explains so much,” you all say. We have a three-bed room to ourselves with an attached bathroom/shower. It’s really a bathroom/shower. The room is rectangular, tiled throughout with the toilet at one end, the sink nearby, and the shower at the other end. Two drains, no curtain and the toilet is tall enough to please a family of professional basketball players.
We didn’t go directly to the hostel. The taxi driver took us to the Budapest Hotel instead of the Budapest Hostel. Quite a difference between a Youth Hostel and a four-star hotel. Yikes!
Added to my list of “I can’t believe I forgot to do this!” was to install a program to take pictures off of the cameras. How brain-dead was that? No, don’t answer. I’m sure I can get something off the internet but in the meantime, you have to slog through my writing when a picture can explain so much.
But pictures can’t give you the complete alien-ness of voices talking around you and not being able to understand a single word. There are cars of different design, buildings of unusual architecture, and incomprehensible street signs without words but what really makes me feel isolated in this great city of hundreds of thousands of people is not being able to communicate. Pantomime only gets you so far. I challenge you to walk into a motel where the receptionist doesn’t speak English and ask if you can use their wi-fi service.
It’s 10:17pm in Oregon, 1:17am in New York, and 7;17am in Budapest. How do I keep the times straight? I have clocks on my desktop. Nope, no cheating….being smart.
We left JFK airport on time without any stewardesses cracking any whips. We weren’t in the air more than fifteen minutes when the pilot told us he expected to shave an hour off our flight time because of “favorable tail winds”. A nine-hour flight shortened to eight hours? Fine with us!
This plane has odd sized overhead bins and we had to struggle a little to get Mom’s and my bags in there but we did it.
There is a young boy, maybe two years old, who howled for the first two hours or so. It was better than two hours now that I think about it because he was a pill when we were boarding and he only howled louder as the movie played and supper was consumed. His mom’s method of dealing with him was to “shhhh” him. The only effect it had was to make her sound as if she’d sprung a leak. He eventually fell asleep (thank goodness!) and slept for a couple of hours. Then we got into some pretty fun turbulence again and he’s just woken up. Oh, joy.
I’ve never been overseas so have nothing with which to compare but we’ve had periods of pretty calm flight interspersed with nice, exciting bouncing. The pilot turned on the seatbelt sign shortly after supper and it hasn’t gone off yet. Mom, the experienced international traveler, says this is nothing.
I decided I was thirsty a couple of hours ago (before the Star Trek movie. Mom asked why on Earth those boys seem to keep getting into fights?) Mom had filled my water bottle when she filled hers at JFK and I took it out of my bag to, well, get a drink. This water bottle is a Nikken which has a filter inside and a silicon straw to suck it out with (yes, I know that was un-grammatical. It’s late and I’m tired) The bottle has a flip-top lid that bends the straw over and keeps it from leaking. Now, back to the story.
I pulled the bottle out of the bag and flipped the top over…..and got a miniature Old Faithful down my shirt front. Note to self: When you fill a bottle at sea level, it WILL spew at 33,000 feet elevation. Mom said I had and Old Faceful.
I just happened to look out the windows and saw it’s dawn and brightening up pretty fast. The sun tends to come up quickly when you’re flying straight into it. We still have about three hours inside this metal can with a yelling child.
I was thinking a while ago that an airplane is sort of a world unto itself. We can see by the map (when a movie isn’t playing - they don’t have individual screens on the backs of the seats here like they did the last flight) that we’re flying over, say, Newfoundland or that we’re south of Reykjavik and coming up on Ireland but in the dark, we may as well be flying to the moon for all the connection we have with the world under us.
2:40 Budapest time (4:40 Oregon time) ~
We landed in Budapest at 10:25, a full hour and 5 minutes early. As we came in, my first thought was that the roofs of the houses looked different than they do back home. A lot of them were red-orange and I’m guessing they’re made out of tile. I think you’d get the same effect coming into Spain or another Mediterranean city.
We went through customs and I got the first stamp on my passport. Yay! Hmm….I haven’t looked at it yet, just slid the passport back into my holder and got out of the way of the next person….oh how disappointing! It looks as if they’d nearly run out of ink and the black part is unreadable but he red date stands out clearly. Let’s hope the Czech Republic’s is better.
We’re at the hostel now and I’ve had a number of firsts besides the first stamp in my first passport. Let’s start with all the firsts that came with my first taxi ride…
I’ve heard all kinds of stories about how the taxi driver raced through side streets where cars are parked in a solid wall on both sides and maybe six inches to spare on each side of our car. Well, I lived it this afternoon and Rhonda got a picture from the backseat. How we escaped with nary a scratch is a mystery to me. I found out that yellow lights mean speed up and red lights only count if you see them before you go through the….intersection.
I hesitated because lights don’t occur only at intersections. Sometimes they appear in the middle of the street. I finally noticed broad, dirty white lines painted on the street going with the traffic, not across like our cross-walks would. Those are pedestrian crossings. I understood why they have these special areas for foot traffic when I kept bracing myself expecting the car to stop when people were at the curb and the driver would just plow on. Pedestrians certainly don’t have the right-of-way here!
We were stopped at a light when all of a sudden a dirt bike - at least that’s what it would be called here - came off the curb beside us, cut between us and the car ahead of us (there might have been 18 inches), made a sharp right between that car and the one beside it, and disappeared in a roar and a cloud of grey exhaust.
Rhonda pointed out the strings of parallel parked cars that had - I’m not kidding - four inches or less between their bumpers and the hitch of the one in front of it. Mom wondered how on earth they got out of there, voicing my thoughts before I could speak. Rhonda explained that they go forward until they bump, reverse until they bump, and keep doing that until they’re turned enough to get out.
At another light, I noticed a convertible with Florida plates. Rhonda thought it was a high-end Nissan. I stared at it for a while before I realized what I was seeing. Then I had the weird sensation of my head trying to be in two places at the same time.
We saw a man with his forearm in a cast…painted in some way to make it look like a Holstein cow.
We saw some wonderful buildings. They had to be pre-communist and they looked pre-Victorian, too. They’re built of brick and/or concrete, about six stories tall, filled a city block, and are topped with fancy furbelows. One building had a doorway overhang that was held up by two carved concrete men. One of them had quite a grimace on his face. I would, too, if I’d had to hold up a concrete overhand for a few hundred years.
We’ve checked in to my first hostel. Did you all know I’m a card-carrying member of the Hostel Community? “That explains so much,” you all say. We have a three-bed room to ourselves with an attached bathroom/shower. It’s really a bathroom/shower. The room is rectangular, tiled throughout with the toilet at one end, the sink nearby, and the shower at the other end. Two drains, no curtain and the toilet is tall enough to please a family of professional basketball players.
We didn’t go directly to the hostel. The taxi driver took us to the Budapest Hotel instead of the Budapest Hostel. Quite a difference between a Youth Hostel and a four-star hotel. Yikes!
Added to my list of “I can’t believe I forgot to do this!” was to install a program to take pictures off of the cameras. How brain-dead was that? No, don’t answer. I’m sure I can get something off the internet but in the meantime, you have to slog through my writing when a picture can explain so much.
But pictures can’t give you the complete alien-ness of voices talking around you and not being able to understand a single word. There are cars of different design, buildings of unusual architecture, and incomprehensible street signs without words but what really makes me feel isolated in this great city of hundreds of thousands of people is not being able to communicate. Pantomime only gets you so far. I challenge you to walk into a motel where the receptionist doesn’t speak English and ask if you can use their wi-fi service.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
From Portland to New York
15 Sept 200
And we’re off!….like a dirty shirt….
Our flight (Delta #744) left on time from Portland. Rhonda believes it’s because the stewardesses are from New York and crack the whip quite professionally. They were on the PA system about every 45 seconds telling us that they can’t close the doors until every bag is stowed, the overhead bins are closed, and everyone is sitting down with seatbelts fastened. Then they tell us that we want to depart on time so passengers can make connecting flights. You could almost hear the whip sizzling through the air..
According to the in-flight tracking map on the back of the seat in front of me, we are just south of Kennewick and only 40 minutes into the flight. We are going 535 miles per hour and are at 31,044 ft. in the air. The flight has been a little rough the past few minutes but things are smoothing out now.
Cameron and Serena drove up to Cottage Grove with Richelle and me to meet Dianne and catch a ride up to Portland with her and then they drove back home. We got to Mom’s in time for supper and some good laughs and went to bed around 10pm.
You know, 4am comes pretty early. But we were up and leaving by 4:45. Dianne and Richelle took us to the airport and we arrived in good time to go through security and were at the boarding gate fifty minutes before the flight was scheduled to leave.
It seemed like a lot of “hurry up and wait”. Rush to have things ready to go through security; hurry to find the boarding gate; sit and wait for the boarding call; rush for the line; inch towards the door; fling your bag into the overhead bin; wait for everyone else to do the same; wait our turn to take off….and, finally!….screaming down the runway.
9:50 PDT ~ We’re north of Rapid City, South Dakota traveling 526 miles per hour at 35152 ft elevation. I look out the window and see frost on the wing. Well, at a temperature of -65° F, I can understand why.
This is starting to sound like a documentary and that’s just not how I write. How about I describe the itsy-bitsy bathroom where you could use the toilet, the mirror, and the sink at the same time? Or about the cutest little blond, curly-haired 11-month-old baby girl sitting in front of us who peeks over and grins at us every so often? Right now, she’s off with her papa getting her diaper changed. Then there’s the 6 foot tall stewardess with what looks like a military hair-cut and another stewardess who was impressed with our assortment of dried fruit and almonds that Mom brought along for snacking.
2:35 PDT ~
We’re in the JFK airport terminal at the gate where we will be boarding the plane to Budapest in another two and a half hours. Mom is sitting on my right with a word-search book in hand - Rhonda is sitting on my left, earphones in her ears, writing a letter. At the rate I’m getting internet service, her recipient will get the letter before you all read this on the blog.
Our plane from Portland was late landing in New York in spite of the inspirational stewardesses. I’m not sure why; we had a tailwind the entire way that reached speeds of 89 miles per hour towards the end. There must have been a stack of planes because we made a large figure “8” and then another circle before we landed. The pilot said there were a number of international flights that took up the terminals so we were directed a distance away and a bus came to transport us to where we were supposed to be.
Well, I've wasted about 45 minutes trying to get my blogger password.....because I wasn't smart enough to bring it with me. And, as Mom says, "The hurrier I go, the behinder I get." We've only about forty minutes to download the flight pictures from my camera and upload them here. We'll see what I can do
And we’re off!….like a dirty shirt….
Our flight (Delta #744) left on time from Portland. Rhonda believes it’s because the stewardesses are from New York and crack the whip quite professionally. They were on the PA system about every 45 seconds telling us that they can’t close the doors until every bag is stowed, the overhead bins are closed, and everyone is sitting down with seatbelts fastened. Then they tell us that we want to depart on time so passengers can make connecting flights. You could almost hear the whip sizzling through the air..
According to the in-flight tracking map on the back of the seat in front of me, we are just south of Kennewick and only 40 minutes into the flight. We are going 535 miles per hour and are at 31,044 ft. in the air. The flight has been a little rough the past few minutes but things are smoothing out now.
Cameron and Serena drove up to Cottage Grove with Richelle and me to meet Dianne and catch a ride up to Portland with her and then they drove back home. We got to Mom’s in time for supper and some good laughs and went to bed around 10pm.
You know, 4am comes pretty early. But we were up and leaving by 4:45. Dianne and Richelle took us to the airport and we arrived in good time to go through security and were at the boarding gate fifty minutes before the flight was scheduled to leave.
It seemed like a lot of “hurry up and wait”. Rush to have things ready to go through security; hurry to find the boarding gate; sit and wait for the boarding call; rush for the line; inch towards the door; fling your bag into the overhead bin; wait for everyone else to do the same; wait our turn to take off….and, finally!….screaming down the runway.
9:50 PDT ~ We’re north of Rapid City, South Dakota traveling 526 miles per hour at 35152 ft elevation. I look out the window and see frost on the wing. Well, at a temperature of -65° F, I can understand why.
This is starting to sound like a documentary and that’s just not how I write. How about I describe the itsy-bitsy bathroom where you could use the toilet, the mirror, and the sink at the same time? Or about the cutest little blond, curly-haired 11-month-old baby girl sitting in front of us who peeks over and grins at us every so often? Right now, she’s off with her papa getting her diaper changed. Then there’s the 6 foot tall stewardess with what looks like a military hair-cut and another stewardess who was impressed with our assortment of dried fruit and almonds that Mom brought along for snacking.
2:35 PDT ~
We’re in the JFK airport terminal at the gate where we will be boarding the plane to Budapest in another two and a half hours. Mom is sitting on my right with a word-search book in hand - Rhonda is sitting on my left, earphones in her ears, writing a letter. At the rate I’m getting internet service, her recipient will get the letter before you all read this on the blog.
Our plane from Portland was late landing in New York in spite of the inspirational stewardesses. I’m not sure why; we had a tailwind the entire way that reached speeds of 89 miles per hour towards the end. There must have been a stack of planes because we made a large figure “8” and then another circle before we landed. The pilot said there were a number of international flights that took up the terminals so we were directed a distance away and a bus came to transport us to where we were supposed to be.
Well, I've wasted about 45 minutes trying to get my blogger password.....because I wasn't smart enough to bring it with me. And, as Mom says, "The hurrier I go, the behinder I get." We've only about forty minutes to download the flight pictures from my camera and upload them here. We'll see what I can do
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Europe
Most, if not all, of you know one of my sisters and I are going to Europe with our mother. I've been preparing since July but haven't allowed myself to get excited too soon. This time next week, we'll be in the air above the western edge of Europe so I think I can now allow myself to start getting excited.
I've never had a passport so that was first on my "to do" list. Then I had to put "Get certified copy of birth certificate" on the list above "passport". I was getting a little antsy because the passport website said to allow six to eight weeks and I thought I'd need a couple of weeks to get the birth certificate first. It turned out that my certificate only took a little better than a week and the passport came in two weeks and two days after I submitted it at the post office.
Then I needed to arrange care for Richelle since she's homeschooled. I talked with local family and they were willing to pass her around but I didn't like that idea too much because that would be a lot of effort for them. I talked with Kimberly and she was quite happy to have Richelle visit for one of the weeks. They also homeschool so that's works out perfectly. Then a close friend of the family (my bil's sister) offered to take Richelle for the remainder of the time. Things are falling into place so nicely, it's almost scary!
We fly out of Portland to JFK in New York at about 6:30am Pacific time Tuesday, Sept 15th on flight #0744. We leave JFK at about 8pm Eastern time on flight #0098 and arrive in Budapest at about 11am Wednesday Budapest time. If I've done my math right (and I think I have) that means we land in Budapest at 2am Pacific time Wednesday.
We don't have a solid itinerary - or if we do, I'm not aware of it - but we will travel by Eurorail from Budapest to Czech Republic, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium, Denmark, and Sweden. I understand that we'll be passing through France on our way to Belgium.
The big challenge is that we're not checking any luggage so must live out of a carry-on and a large purse for two and a half weeks. I'm glad I've had years of experience in Scouts of only taking what is essential!
I will try to post every day while in Europe and include pictures and will probably post at least once before we leave.
It still seems unreal that I'll be going to Europe but I'm getting excited anyway!
I've never had a passport so that was first on my "to do" list. Then I had to put "Get certified copy of birth certificate" on the list above "passport". I was getting a little antsy because the passport website said to allow six to eight weeks and I thought I'd need a couple of weeks to get the birth certificate first. It turned out that my certificate only took a little better than a week and the passport came in two weeks and two days after I submitted it at the post office.
Then I needed to arrange care for Richelle since she's homeschooled. I talked with local family and they were willing to pass her around but I didn't like that idea too much because that would be a lot of effort for them. I talked with Kimberly and she was quite happy to have Richelle visit for one of the weeks. They also homeschool so that's works out perfectly. Then a close friend of the family (my bil's sister) offered to take Richelle for the remainder of the time. Things are falling into place so nicely, it's almost scary!
We fly out of Portland to JFK in New York at about 6:30am Pacific time Tuesday, Sept 15th on flight #0744. We leave JFK at about 8pm Eastern time on flight #0098 and arrive in Budapest at about 11am Wednesday Budapest time. If I've done my math right (and I think I have) that means we land in Budapest at 2am Pacific time Wednesday.
We don't have a solid itinerary - or if we do, I'm not aware of it - but we will travel by Eurorail from Budapest to Czech Republic, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium, Denmark, and Sweden. I understand that we'll be passing through France on our way to Belgium.
The big challenge is that we're not checking any luggage so must live out of a carry-on and a large purse for two and a half weeks. I'm glad I've had years of experience in Scouts of only taking what is essential!
I will try to post every day while in Europe and include pictures and will probably post at least once before we leave.
It still seems unreal that I'll be going to Europe but I'm getting excited anyway!
Convention 2009
A couple clips from the memory files of Convention 2009:
Before we left, I was giving orders to Richelle right and left - sometimes not even giving her time to complete one before giving her another. "Did you get your coat?" "Remember to put in the mirror." "I need you to take out the garbage." I didn't even give her much of a chance to swallow lunch and was giving yet another "must do" when she silently pointed to a sticky-tab affixed to her shirt. It read, "Out of Order".
Kimberly came Friday with her girls and I'd saved room on our bench for them. Richelle sat between the girls and Kimberly sat at one end while I sat at the other. Kimberly jotted a note down on her tablet during a meeting and passed it along with her pencil to one of her girls. Kayla wasn't paying attention when she took the tablet and the pencil fell to the floor next to my foot. She glanced at it, read the note, replied with her own pencil, and passed the tablet back to Kimberly. Kimberly motioned that she needed her pencil back and Kayla looked up at me as if to ask if I'd get the pencil off the floor for her.
"I can't reach it," I very quietly whispered. "I'm too fat."
Oh, my! The smothered giggles that exploded from Kayla...! Kimberly looked at her sternly and Kayla frantically signed for the tablet. Kimberly passed it to her, Kayla retrieved the pencil from the floor and, shaking with giggles, wrote what had happened. She had to pause several times to let waves of laughter pass by but when she got the the part "...said she was..." she dropped the pencil into her lap and her face into her hands while the bench vibrated with her quivering.
Before we left, I was giving orders to Richelle right and left - sometimes not even giving her time to complete one before giving her another. "Did you get your coat?" "Remember to put in the mirror." "I need you to take out the garbage." I didn't even give her much of a chance to swallow lunch and was giving yet another "must do" when she silently pointed to a sticky-tab affixed to her shirt. It read, "Out of Order".
Kimberly came Friday with her girls and I'd saved room on our bench for them. Richelle sat between the girls and Kimberly sat at one end while I sat at the other. Kimberly jotted a note down on her tablet during a meeting and passed it along with her pencil to one of her girls. Kayla wasn't paying attention when she took the tablet and the pencil fell to the floor next to my foot. She glanced at it, read the note, replied with her own pencil, and passed the tablet back to Kimberly. Kimberly motioned that she needed her pencil back and Kayla looked up at me as if to ask if I'd get the pencil off the floor for her.
"I can't reach it," I very quietly whispered. "I'm too fat."
Oh, my! The smothered giggles that exploded from Kayla...! Kimberly looked at her sternly and Kayla frantically signed for the tablet. Kimberly passed it to her, Kayla retrieved the pencil from the floor and, shaking with giggles, wrote what had happened. She had to pause several times to let waves of laughter pass by but when she got the the part "...said she was..." she dropped the pencil into her lap and her face into her hands while the bench vibrated with her quivering.
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