A Trip Down the Garden Path

Hi Everyone, long time no talk. I have a little down time, so I thought I'd fill you in on what we've been up to recently. We had a lovely time with Glen's ma, it was a whirlwind of Brighton adventures, Paris, Bath, Nottingham and London. I know she had a great time too and took home some great little pressies and memories.

We also packed up the flat nearly two weeks ago. We sold everything, and I mean EVERYTHING, even down to the cups and plates and cooking utensils. It was pleasing to get some money for all our stuff, so we had very little to donate to the charity shop. After a morning of cleaning the inspector came around and we were pleased to be told that the flat looked amazing, cleaner than when we got it, had we got a cleaner in? He asked. No we did it ourselves, thankyou...thankyou very much. Chuffed.

So that brings me to the here and now. We've spent a lovely four days in Geneva, Switzerland. It's not as big as I thought it would be, nor is it super modern and super clean, as I also thought. But it certainly is as expensive as I knew it would be, just the general costs of living (accommodation and food). It's the most expensive place we've been in Europe. Take this for instance, a kebab from the dodgy little store on the street is about 9CHF, which is about 9.50AUD. We priced a cheese foundu at an averge looking cafe, 23CHF and a frozen pizza at the supermarket is 8CHF. So it's been variations of ham, cheese, tomato, capsicum and carrot toasted sandwiches for us over the last few days, all cooked up in the hostel kitchen. And of course, lots of Swiss chocolate. There are a gazillion different flavours over here, pistachio, mazipan and coffee are interesting to note. And it's soooo delicious. I read somewhere that the average Swiss person eats 11kgs a year, and I worked that out to be 110 blocks (they're smaller blocks over here than what we're used to). Wowee, and I thought I was a chocoholic. Certainly a lifestyle I could tolerate, oh if I had to.

Here are a few of the things we've done in Switzerland...

Just love how nature looks here, that's all

And here

The UN headquarters. Deals primarily with humanitarian matters, NYC headquarters does other things

One of the conference rooms

This ceiling was a donation from Spain. It represents the sea in all its diversity and reflects the diversity of the nations that meet in the room, awww.....

No smoking of any of the above in the UN rooms, do people still smoke pipes?

An installation to acknowledge those who die from landmines, pretty powerful I reckon.

Cooking in the hostel kitchen. The one night we didn't have toasted sandwiches, but pasta instead

Can you see the price of this watch????

Making the practical imparactical

Swiss chocolate

And more of the stuff, mmmm......

The Jet d'eau, in Lake Leman, around which Geneva is situated. Pretty

Roasted chestnuts

A funny sign on the sidewalk near our hostel, far too much info me thinks...

We took the cable car up Mont Saleve and did some hiking around for the day. This view is looking down upon Geneva

The countryside

We came across this maze outside a Buddhist Monastery on the Mountain (go figure), it was lots of fun. A lot like a giant version of the game Mouse Trap

Watching paragliders (is this the right word?) take off

At CERN, the European Council for Nuclear Research . Here we are exploring the make up of our world

The internet was invented on this computer, cool

I believe this is a display peice of the Large Hadron Collider. This massive tube circles Geneva 100m down and 27km around. In it, scientists speed up the rotation of particles, faster than the speed of light, to recreate the conditions of the big bang and to ultimately find out how our world came into being...wow

Building holding the second exhibition

Inside, an audiovisual presentation that outlines the creation of the earth

Rosti for dinner again, I think not, we're not very good rosti makers. Cheese, yes please.

This is probably the end of the regularity of my posts. I know, I know, I am using 'regular' at a stretch, but you'll see what I mean.  Tomorrow Mum and Dad head home, and they have been kind enough to take our laptop with them (we don't want to lug this around for the rest of the year, including though Africa).  So this means we'll be left with my trooper of an iPad.  Now I can post a written entry fine from this trusty companion, but need to look into getting a card reader so that I can post photos.  Then there's also the internet factor. We'll forfeit our little dongle in a bit, as it only works in UK. So this means WiFi is the new deal, and  I don't fancy sitting in Starbucks and waiting twenty agonising minutes while their snail paced, tapped out internet connection loads a single photo. So you see, becoming a nomad presents a whole new swag of difficulties.  Best bet for me will be to load our photos onto Facebook, the process is much quicker and I can select multiple photos at once (instead of each individually, as Blogger insists must be the way, grrrr...).  So, if you're interested in keeping in touch with us,  check in on FB (and back here every now and again).  Hopefully I'll be able to post from time to time, but only time will tell.

Goodnight!

Well we've had a fantastic month, super busy, but fabulous. Here are a few reasons why:

1. My ma and pa have been here.  It's been so lovely to see them again after 9 months away.  I know some people are ok to go years just talking to their family on the phone, but we're all so close knit, that 9 months seemed like forever, thank goodness for skype! Mum and Dad have had a ball.  We've taken them to Paris, and then over to Ireland and they did a tour through England, Wales and Scotland.  I think they're tickled pink to have seen so much in such a short time. And I am very proud of them being able to catch the tube around London all alone.  Gonna miss them heaps when they go home. We're a bit spoilt though, Mama Harkes comes in a few weeks time for a visit.  It will be lovely to see her and we'll zip around to a whole heap of sights again, can't wait. 

2. A little baby will be born soon, very soon, maybe at this moment, it's possible :) any day now Glen and I will have a little niece, hang in there Lozza! We're all dying to meet little Peachy girl!

3. We bought a new camera, splurging big time!  Our little compact camera was starting to get a bit insufficient: just too unreliable at night, slow to respond and not so great on the zoom.  We figured we've taken a gazillion photos on it already, and it's had a good run, we needed something that would do the job a bit better to take a gazillion more photos.  Enter the Canon SLR 550D. It looks very flash, takes amazing pictures, and has heaps of settings - we have a lot to learn. 

4. We've given notice to conclude the lease of our flat, on the 27th of this month to be exact. We're getting the ball rolling in the process of selling our basic furniture and packing up all our goodies in some boxes to ship home. It's gonna be a mad rush to get it all done by the end of this month.

5. We've booked our tickets home. We arrive on the 10th of January. Can't wait to see eveyone! So much has happened in a year. There are dogs to hug, family to kiss, friends to catch up with, sunshine to lap up, open spaces to enjoy. All these things are waiting for us. I am even looking forward to getting back into work, yes really.

6. We visited Poland for a week, staying in Krakow.  I don't mean for this to sound morbid, but I really wanted to see one of the WW2 concentration camps. I've learnt so much about the war, read for my own interest, taught at school, even learnt at school myself. It was such an interesting and humbling experience.  The atrocities carried out by the Nazis in WW2 are unfathomable.  How brave those interned at the camps had to be,  and how very, very sad it is for the loss of all those lives. I can't believe the Nazi regime believed their actions were justified, how disgusting. May we, as citizens of the world, never forget this tragedy.  A few pictures for you to see...

Entry to Auschwitz

The buildings, this haunts me more than inside the buildings, maybe because it just seems to natural and normal for a place that has a history far from these things

Inside one of the buildings

A horrible picture - those who have just arrived on the trains...

Lots and lots and lots of glasses.... there was also a room of shoes, prosthetic limbs, suitcases, a pile of brushes and a huge collection of bowls (families leaving for a better life, cook a big meal to last them the long journey to this 'better place'). Awful, makes me feel sick

Watch tower and barbed wire

View of the train tracks into Auschwitz Birkenau,

Our tour guide's Great Uncle was interned in Auschwitz - they never found out what happened to him. It's so sad to think that each person in the nation of Poland (and many other countries too, of course) has been touched by this horror in some way. It is a nation still very sore from events of the past.  Schindler's Enamel Factory was another amazing visit.  It's been turned into a museum, and is probably the best one we've ever been to.  If you ever get the chance to go there, allow 2 or 3 hours. This Mr Schindler represents all those people who fought their own battles against the Nazi regieme.  And the special thing is, he was a German.  It's good to know there were some who were brave enough to make a stand, even if it is in the most discrete way possible. These are the good stories that should be told too.

Our time in Krakow wasn't all about WW2.  We visited this amazing salt mine, hundreds of metres under the ground and hundreds of kilometres long.  One of the special chambers we visited is below, and it's entirely carved out of salt! The chandeliers included.

Much of this carving was done by workers

The last supper, in salt!

A highly salinated pool, more so than the red sea!

The immensity of this chamber is highlighted by the pylons holding it up!

While it no longer functions as a proper salt mine, you can go for therapeutic sessions there, and of course buy their salty products.

 

Hello, hello! I'm back. No stories this time, I promise. It's not uncommon for me to think up a crazy idea and give it a red hot go.  Ask Glen about my forays into dinner banquets, loom knitting, novel writing, candle making and bonsai growing, just to name a few. Glen calls them my fads. I call them positive skill building opportunities. Whatever they are, there's nothing crazy about this post. This is a proper, normal post, as straighty one eighty as it gets.

In fact, this is probably the simplest, most serious post I've ever done. Minimalist style I guess you could say. In fact if this post were a light (yup, bulb, shade and all), it would be a down light, that simple, no nonsense, pleasant glow you get on your kitchen benches.  All the while I'm surpressing the urge to switch on the flashing disco lights, dance under the strobe and crack the glow sticks.  Rest assured, that by no means is this minimalist style my desperate attempt to get my blog up-to-date, no, not at all. So here it goes...

Visiting a 'champagne' house in Spain.  Excpet it's not Champers, it's Cava, only bubbly made in France is allowed to be champs, true fact!

Tate testing

Arrived in Valencia, here's a sotre selling all your Paella making needs.

Outside my favourite store, El Corte Ingles.  Ready to head home.