tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1237686771878541962024-03-14T09:49:42.419+00:00Cows, Cuckoos and Clichés: Musings on life in Switzerland(Mis)adventures in Switzerland and Swiss reality filtered through Indian eyes. BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.comBlogger18125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-15513657779529101232014-04-21T13:21:00.000+01:002014-04-21T13:21:49.730+01:00Sheep watching in Switzerland<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
We had a fascinating lesson in sheep psychology this weekend while walking along the pristine countryside around Aubonne. (see <a href="http://cowsandcliches.blogspot.ch/2012/12/autumn-walk-in-aubonne.html" target="_blank">Autumn walk in Aubonne</a> for more on Aubonne's beauty).<br />
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Walking along an unfrequented wooded path we chanced upon a flock of sheep grazing. A sight so common that we didn't even give it a second glance.<br />
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However, the sheep had other ideas. We, or perhaps our dog caught the eye of one sheep.<br />
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Of course, what one does the rest must do as well. One after another each of them turned their gaze towards us.<br />
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Soon all of them had their eyes fixed on us in concentrated unison.<br />
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They stood frozen in that position for several minutes and then the same sheep who first began to look at us, decided he wanted a closer look. Sure enough, every one of the others followed. <br />
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They stood a few feet in front of us just staring with almost identically quizzical expressions on their faces. I stared back. We did this for all of three minutes.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxpPcxY6GbdE_OW-XlWY8z32oEOKhn_ljhHVOWv8H-Bkxp1yjL6ipmGIxVImhhEPKq4M8hRwHMQ47eCJjytBu-tVXjaExPHVUUGc7xwxPR8FAbQpjpgPtQWvgNA5LoiTQ3f4dAm3KH0E0/s1600/black+sheep.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxpPcxY6GbdE_OW-XlWY8z32oEOKhn_ljhHVOWv8H-Bkxp1yjL6ipmGIxVImhhEPKq4M8hRwHMQ47eCJjytBu-tVXjaExPHVUUGc7xwxPR8FAbQpjpgPtQWvgNA5LoiTQ3f4dAm3KH0E0/s1600/black+sheep.jpg" height="427" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sheep watching us. </td></tr>
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Then startled probably by a bark from the dog, one turned around, and of course so did the others. They scampered off.<br />
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But no sooner did they retreat a safe distance, once again one sheep (the same one, I am quite convinced!) stopped. Turned to look back at us. As if on cue, each one of the others became motionless, turned their heads and trained their gaze towards us in perfect unison. <br />
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And there they remained, motionless and focused as they watched us walking off into the distance.<br />
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<i>Now</i> I know what sheep mentality means.<br />
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BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-13967231961673778862014-03-15T19:02:00.000+00:002014-03-16T18:21:16.244+00:00 Protons, Bosons and other exotic particles ............a visit to the ATLAS Experiment at CERN<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit; line-height: 115%;">Some 100 meters deep in the
bowels of the earth below where I stand, millions and millions of protons go
around and round in a large 27 km circle that stretches from the Jura in France
to Lake Geneva in Switzerland. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="line-height: 115%;"></span></span><br /><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="line-height: 115%;"></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="line-height: 115%;">They move faster and faster till they are almost
at the speed of light in a tube that is colder than </span></span><span style="line-height: 18.399999618530273px;">outer</span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="line-height: 115%;"> space (with temperatures
that are close to absolute zero). At four points along the circle,
superconducting magnets </span></span><span style="line-height: 115%;">(like the one in the picture) make the protons deviate ever so slightly from their course so that they are likely to have a head on collision with protons that are are going around in a circle from the opposite
direction. The smash or 'event' results in a burst of energy and millions and millions of other particles being formed rather like a glass going up in smithereens
after a high speed car crash. </span></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgDBi5dDbF_k8JKU_7VeRwCt77i0hTlR27fkmTdm2tY6wjHNAVmbeMPqgsdpc-FJyyge_6JCb35Q2ACbYKms8dV6n4o-MU4MBhB7qlZx2XokqdR68flvhX7R2PPvC-S-_QecJTFpQsaT0/s1600/cern5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgDBi5dDbF_k8JKU_7VeRwCt77i0hTlR27fkmTdm2tY6wjHNAVmbeMPqgsdpc-FJyyge_6JCb35Q2ACbYKms8dV6n4o-MU4MBhB7qlZx2XokqdR68flvhX7R2PPvC-S-_QecJTFpQsaT0/s1600/cern5.jpg" height="480" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Add caption</td></tr>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwbbPxcGkswc8WGexfGqdDrY5wMJOTC5rty33dhbQ81bLyquMjzKZwC6F5qrO3q0YA8nGIvKKwABWOzd7q7D46kUo9GzkKiY-D8CujCcIJ_8XU5yfx54aSH715j2JJHUOtOgrS_PMZmRc/s1600/cern16a.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwbbPxcGkswc8WGexfGqdDrY5wMJOTC5rty33dhbQ81bLyquMjzKZwC6F5qrO3q0YA8nGIvKKwABWOzd7q7D46kUo9GzkKiY-D8CujCcIJ_8XU5yfx54aSH715j2JJHUOtOgrS_PMZmRc/s1600/cern16a.jpg" height="111" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="line-height: 115%;">The data produced is massive ..like having 500 billion phone calls in a </span></span><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="line-height: 115%;">second. </span>Hundreds<span style="line-height: 115%;"> of </span>computers<span style="line-height: 115%;"> and high speed cameras (that click 4 </span>million<span style="line-height: 115%;"> </span>frames<span style="line-height: 115%;"> a minute) capture the data, filtering
out all but the most relevant bits. And even then the data generated is massive: as much as 27 CDs every minute. Computers on site share the data with other offsite computers via the web ..........CERN is also the place where 25 years ago this month, the </span></span>world wide web was invented for just this reason ..more efficient sharing of information. </span><span style="line-height: 115%;"> </span></span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Mural on the external wall at depecits the ATLAS detector and the real thing up close (its twice the size of the building)</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: inherit; line-height: 115%;">Not sci fi but absolute reality
and just another day at the ATLAS detector at CERN when its functioning. It is
on a well-earned break at the moment after the mind baffling co discovery of
the Higgs Bosson particle. That and the kindness of a physicist friend who works there is what afforded the opportunity
to go underground for a peep at this man (and women ..there are plenty of women
physicists behind this experiment, so forget any stereotypes) made wonder</span><span style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 115%;">. </span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">The detector surrounding the blue collider tube.</span></td></tr>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHeZGOG4gPnj1sLqr2kjgfl3SVSEKfQAaePIZsI5b2AbEQDvjDAIF1nQIvFpLDlgTAOcAuJ4CDnpr0gzVi_ZD7PuJX8coiak3Yw1rJnMDdQZCrvbCYP0Cpbp4EV_Wim7fSdCv_peDi-4o/s1600/cern4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHeZGOG4gPnj1sLqr2kjgfl3SVSEKfQAaePIZsI5b2AbEQDvjDAIF1nQIvFpLDlgTAOcAuJ4CDnpr0gzVi_ZD7PuJX8coiak3Yw1rJnMDdQZCrvbCYP0Cpbp4EV_Wim7fSdCv_peDi-4o/s1600/cern4.jpg" height="144" width="200" /></span></a><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit; line-height: 115%;">As we
go to the first underground level feeling very important to have donned red
hard hats and walk through narrow cable filled corridors we come to a viewing
platform where we come head on with the detector straddling the blue Hadron
Collider tube. </span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span>
<span style="line-height: 115%;">An occasional scientist is doing some maintenance work on the
magnets and those human figures are completely dwarfed by this machinery which is 5 stories high and weighs as much as the Eiffel Tower. And yet as our physicst guide
assures us, they know the insides of the cables and magnets of this gigantic contraption to the precision of a human hair ! </span></span><br />
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<span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span>
<span style="line-height: 115%;">By now my mind is spinning as fast as the protons in the Hadron Collider at witnessing the vastness of the forces of the universe re created under the city of Geneva ......</span></span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">The CERN dome</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Maybe as an outside
voyeur peeping momentarily into this world, I could be guilty of </span>romanticizing<span style="font-size: small;"> but to me this seems to be one place where collaboration takes precedence over collision (of the human variety) and where petty politics is trumped by
particle physics. Over 3000 scientists, 138 institutes and 38 countries collaborate
on this experiment, CERN sits across and under two countries belonging to both
and neither ……… where countries, people , theoretical and experimental physicists,
the geeks and the layman come together and where cosmic mysteries makes all else
seem petty and irrelevant. What the human brain can create under these
circumstances is as miraculous and as elusive at the Higgs Boson. Seems both
have been found at CERN.</span></span></div>
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BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-56862650612097369932013-08-11T16:42:00.000+01:002013-08-12T12:02:46.318+01:00Fireworks on Lake Geneva ........The traditional close to the Fetes de Genève<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Geneva has a population of less than half million (472,530 to be precise); all of those people and more seem to have gathered around Lake Geneva, Saturday night to watch the grand feu d'artifice that marks the end of the summer Fete. Traditional since 1947 and arguably the largest display in Europe.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The grand finale with the fountain in the centre</td></tr>
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You can buy a 70 franc ticket to be seated on wooden benches that supposedly guarantee a view, spend 200 francs for dinner at an upmarket lakefront hotel, find yourself a friend who owns a boat on the lake or do what most of the plebeian half a million do : try to capture a vantage point for free. Last year, we were naive enough to think we could go there by car, reach there with Swiss precision 4 mins before the display starts and see the show. We were reduced to watching it from the eighth floor of my workplace some 2 km away with the local FM station playing the soundtrack. (And we were by no means the only ones there).<br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-CeS6j7thm2Q/UgeoYM98JtI/AAAAAAAABrI/D5kDcRHHPzM/s1600/fireworks5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-CeS6j7thm2Q/UgeoYM98JtI/AAAAAAAABrI/D5kDcRHHPzM/s1600/fireworks5.jpg" height="248" width="400" /></a>This year, we were wiser. We took the train, along with crowds that makes the Monday morning rush hour pale. Even two hours before the display was due to begin the lakeside was teeming with people, many of whom had camped there for hours along with food, music, wine and books to help pass the time as they stayed glued to the vantage points they had been lucky enough to capture. <br />
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With an immense dose of good luck and some creative wriggling into small spaces we found ourselves close to the waterfront and with an unobstructed front view of the barges that spew the fireworks. At 10 p.m. to the nanosecond, preceded by a welcome message in nine different languages (including Hindi) and all the streetlights around the lake area went off.<br />
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In that enchanted darkness, began a spellbinding 55 minutes of pyrotechnics dancing in harmony to Portuguese melodies (Portugal was the theme of this years' show) ..sometimes slow and languorous and sometimes heating up into a impassioned frenzy that converted the water and the sky into a raging riot of color. <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">the barge the caught fire mid performance</td></tr>
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Almost as remarkable as the music was the efficient organization: the special extra trains to bring people back and forth, the arrangements made for lost children and sick people, the safety precautions ............a barge that caught fire halfway through the show was dealt with in minutes and with a minimum of fuss or disruption ..............and the orderliness of the mass of humanity.<br />
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Undoubtedly expensive (the cost born by the Tourism department and local business); but in a country known for its understated way of life; where extravagance lies in its natural beauty, this once a year burst of artificial extravaganza is a pleasant anomaly.<br />
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BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-20399463435807876662013-05-11T11:07:00.000+01:002013-05-13T12:52:10.037+01:00Fleeting beauty ........the Tulip festival at Morges <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Istanbul tulips by the lake</td></tr>
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Spring is finally blooming on the shores of Lake Geneva in the town of Morges where tulip mania is at its peak in the form of the most well-known tulip festival in Switzerland.<br />
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Growing up in India, I never saw a tulip but every year at school assembly we duly performed a song and dance routine called ‘Holland is the land of tulips’. Exotic, romantically red and very Dutch. My fascination for the tulip grew after reading <i>The Black Tulip</i> by Dumas though I didn't believe for a moment that such a black flower could exist outside of the fictional gardens of Harrlem. <o:p></o:p></div>
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Now eons later, the clichés unravel. Here by the lakeside in Morges, I see the <i>‘Cafe Noir’</i> though it’s more a deep inky purple than black. I see white, brown, 50 shades of pink, lilac and yellow. 300 different varieties to be precise. Serrated, bulbous, lily shaped, tall ones and short ones. With names as exotic as the flowers. From ABBA to Prince; from African Queen to Arabian Mystery; from Lucky Strike to Sensual Touch and from Black Coffee to Brown Sugar with Ice Cream thrown in for good measure .............. <br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7cWRf6uPP0A/UY4QA54OH8I/AAAAAAAABok/MxZ-AW0cVvE/s1600/IMG_3848.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="191" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7cWRf6uPP0A/UY4QA54OH8I/AAAAAAAABok/MxZ-AW0cVvE/s1600/IMG_3848.JPG" width="400" /></a>Not quite in carpets and carpets of colorful riot as they would be in Amsterdam. After all, this <i>is</i> Switzerland! The flowers (all 150,000 of them) are planted in neat and aesthetically manicured and patterned beds, all carefully mapped and labeled, everything growing in typical Swiss picture postcard perfection. <br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5dNJpHzme8E/UY4SPAyi5iI/AAAAAAAABo0/KzwEWvNbofw/s1600/IMG_3862.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="236" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5dNJpHzme8E/UY4SPAyi5iI/AAAAAAAABo0/KzwEWvNbofw/s1600/IMG_3862.JPG" width="400" /></a>Iconic of Holland, the flowers are not really Dutch. They are native to Central Asia and were imported to the Netherlands and the rest of Europe from Turkey (the world tulip is derived from the Turkish word for turban) in the 17<sup>th</sup> century. It appears that they became so popular that there was even a tulip bubble with people willing to exchange acres of land, pay more than a year’s wages or barter thousands of pounds of cheese to get hold of one bulb .. <br />
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And as for my India connection …………aha, seems like the tulip did grow wild in Kashmir too, long before the Dutch knew of it. And of recent years it is now being cultivated there commercially. Srinagar now boasts the largest tulip garden in Asia with over a million tulips sprawling besides the Dal lake. </div>
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The beauty is so ephemeral. Within a space of a few weeks we were able to witness tulips transition from being in their bulbs, to full bloom to a withered not so pretty sight.<br />
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Fleeting beauty, the desire that tantalizes and disappears before you can quite capture and possess it ……..maybe that's what their mystical magic is all about. </div>
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BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-23618702190267069592013-04-20T21:41:00.000+01:002013-04-21T10:25:34.467+01:00Remembering Chaplin<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQe6zLHloz_99HDsoifB4twuhtpIUFCk7w2Z9U7bwPIi_z6h6xu7Zzk4zBJUUaubq4NjQ-NqW5g-94lKsDZa2iCr0v3ikc0l8ynnkm_Wf_kreAloxmJOzahFUn_KWLFcvbEwR8V2ci-Zg/s1600/chaplin+in+sepia.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQe6zLHloz_99HDsoifB4twuhtpIUFCk7w2Z9U7bwPIi_z6h6xu7Zzk4zBJUUaubq4NjQ-NqW5g-94lKsDZa2iCr0v3ikc0l8ynnkm_Wf_kreAloxmJOzahFUn_KWLFcvbEwR8V2ci-Zg/s320/chaplin+in+sepia.jpg" width="213" /></a><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Walking by the shores of Lac Léman at Vevey, I can’t help
but notice a diminutive bronze statue that stands on its banks ………..of a tramp
like figure in too small a bowler hat, baggy pants, bow legs, ill-fitting boots,
a crooked cane in one hand and clutching a rose in the other; an endearingly
quizzical look on his mustached face …………yes its Charlie Chaplin born this
month (April 16<sup>th</sup>) 124 years ago. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Vevey or rather </span><span lang="EN" style="font-weight: normal;">Corsier-sur-Vevey (this 3,000 people hamlet
is technically a municipality in its own right) is <span style="font-size: small;">w</span>here Charlie Chaplin spent
the last 25 years of his life in exile from America where he was denied a re-entry
permit following the negative reactions to his movie <i>Limelight</i>. He died and is buried in this town ..at least
I think he is. His tombstone is here in the local cemetery but there is
a story that his body was stolen soon after it was buried there and his widowed
wife was hounded for a hefty ransom. Apparently the thieves were caught and the
body reburied. Sounds like Chaplin was directing events from the other world as
well ……….</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">While the Swiss Riviera is no stranger to celebrity residents
(think Audrey Hepburn, Freddy Mercury), Vevey does take its love for the Little
Tramp seriously. The statue on the promenade, entire buildings that have
Charlie Chaplin <span style="font-size: small;">frescoes</span> on their walls and a local artisan chocolatier who handcrafts
chocolates made in the likeness of Charlie Chaplin’s shoes. The Manoir de Ban where he lived is being transformed
into <i>‘The Modern Times’</i> museum dedicated to his life and works, it will
open in 2015. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Nothing that Vevey does though can quite match the reverence
paid to Chaplin in the far away little town of Adipur in Gujarat, India. This
little town close to the border with Pakistan, probably unheard of Chaplin in
his lifetime, is home to a Chaplin fan club called Charlie’s Circle with over
300 members. Every year for the last 40 years without fail, on April 16<sup>th</sup>
dozens of boys and men dress up like the little Tramp, bowler hat and all and parade
through the town accompanied by camel carts and Indian folk dancers and
musicians. The parade is followed by cutting a cake …shaped like Charlie’s
shoes of course and a screening of his films. </span></span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5l5eavDhfzgQtq7J7ZTc54BrCaExFqFecCSkKbYPVPt68_KWfiPy0hOlhuZExkRxEabvI47s2xuLJOkFHYAJMPsUiYHI0tloiW-EQEnV1W-CXPG-7qFF8r9lwCW4bF44g7Mwrg-24jCA/s1600/chaplin+and+fork.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5l5eavDhfzgQtq7J7ZTc54BrCaExFqFecCSkKbYPVPt68_KWfiPy0hOlhuZExkRxEabvI47s2xuLJOkFHYAJMPsUiYHI0tloiW-EQEnV1W-CXPG-7qFF8r9lwCW4bF44g7Mwrg-24jCA/s400/chaplin+and+fork.jpg" width="250" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">My thoughts wander back to the bronze statue by the lake and
to the Chaplinesque juxtaposition. Just some 100 meters away in the shallow
waters of the lake is a large stainless steel fork all of 8 meters tall. How
this piece of modern art came to be in the lake is another story and unrelated to
Chaplin but I can just imagine the hint of a smile forming on the Tramps face
at this incongruity and I can just picture him taking up this giant fork and
turning it into a dance à la the unforgettable <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=4DLdMa98JdM" target="_blank">fork legs and bread shoes dance in ‘The Gold Rush’</a>. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">As perhaps he himself would say <i>‘ Life is a tragedy when
seen in close-up, but a comedy in long-shot’</i>.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">
</span></span></div>
</div>
BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-11067209994913310072013-02-10T20:02:00.001+00:002013-05-12T10:19:08.167+01:00Waste not, if you are Swiss<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<br />
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To paraphrase the old <i>Police</i> song: </div>
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<i>Every bottle you throw, </i></div>
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<i>Every bag you trash,</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<i>I’ll be watching you</i> ………… </div>
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<br /></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhVSOkr-TTjfaFE4LRZI6ctSj27FeYzENCB9F4ge0boWb0X22CDmp9DQvQWvV8IVrpKNOlz9kEuhmkqO-Frc8PNgYip_FZD7GN6yM-B_y4LG9el3WCvrbPPkWQb60AVuSKHhrCZBEzvno/s1600/affiche_taxeausac_a3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhVSOkr-TTjfaFE4LRZI6ctSj27FeYzENCB9F4ge0boWb0X22CDmp9DQvQWvV8IVrpKNOlz9kEuhmkqO-Frc8PNgYip_FZD7GN6yM-B_y4LG9el3WCvrbPPkWQb60AVuSKHhrCZBEzvno/s320/affiche_taxeausac_a3.jpg" height="153" width="200" /></a>And yes indeed they are watching, and when you least expect
it, nemesis will catch up with you. Nemesis being the trash collectors who also
serve as trash police (I have no idea what their official title is). <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The canton of Vaud where I live introduced strict garbage
disposal rules starting this January. Well German speaking Switzerland has had
them for years (St. Gallen as far back as 1975) but the French speaking areas were
more laissez faire till now (and even now Geneva city is holding back). Household
trash can now only be disposed in special bags issued by local authorities. What’s
special about the bags? Nothing really except the price. An average dustbin sized
bag costs all of 2 Swiss francs. And I am lucky as in some parts of the country
it can cost as much as 6 francs. The price is the ‘tax’ that is levied for
throwing garbage. The more you throw the more you pay, simple as that. But that's
not all. Not only do you have to use the right bags to throw your garbage, you
have to make sure that you only throw what you are allowed to throw …………….</div>
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<br /></div>
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As I said, if you sin and throw what you can recycle, or use
the wrong bags, you <i>will</i> be discovered. We witnessed this in action a
few days ago when we saw the garbage truck stop by at the large bins at the end
of our street. While loading the garbage they found that some of it was in the
wrong type of bags. Well they simply opened up the bags and started rifling
through the trash, taking the odd photograph, until they came across an
incriminating piece of paper (which no doubt had some clue to the identity of
the garbage thrower). Leaving the bags behind, the truck disappeared only to
reappear 10 minutes hence with a red faced man in tow. A long ‘discussion’ ensued
as the bag and its contents were displayed to the man who seemed to grow redder
by the second. An embarrassing 5 minutes later he walked off with his trash bags
in hand. </div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEge7L5TznWNTESGjnbU3d-g5odjmSlqn3uS8kECPOHnEC31zzECl_a-Q7p1Be1fbSfHedC-wSoT36TTph5THY-DGCpnVIdJImiYASOxk79FA59b7-P0L9cy9d87UWWlDHv8_wx6RbxF4R4/s1600/bottles+recycling.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEge7L5TznWNTESGjnbU3d-g5odjmSlqn3uS8kECPOHnEC31zzECl_a-Q7p1Be1fbSfHedC-wSoT36TTph5THY-DGCpnVIdJImiYASOxk79FA59b7-P0L9cy9d87UWWlDHv8_wx6RbxF4R4/s1600/bottles+recycling.jpeg" height="313" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">PET bottles being brought to the recycling point in such large numbers after the new rules that the collection bins have no space for them </td></tr>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
None of the Swiss friends to whom I narrated this, found it
unusual, uncommon or even mildly offensive. If you break the rules, you should
be named and shamed is it not? Well maybe it’s this fear, maybe it's the natural
thriftiness (something that Indians of our parents’ generation had and we have
lost) or their pride in their environment or their civic sense but Switzerland consistently
has the best environment performance index in the world and is the country that
recycles more of its waste than any other country (52% of all recyclable waste <i>does</i>
get recycled). And with us French speaking Cantons getting their act together,
this percentage can only rise. </div>
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</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEP814UAwcj5Nn3kaEp8NQGXod10bcQELx_XWc_CaHQmp3Vv1md0SQnoCVKb36g_O0iDMK6mDiL1WgUrKH9L3HcHL9S8lyD4uhbijZ53tGqZbjKjVkuCk03kxU1yZtF91_Ep-drcMf6dg/s1600/IMG_4896.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEP814UAwcj5Nn3kaEp8NQGXod10bcQELx_XWc_CaHQmp3Vv1md0SQnoCVKb36g_O0iDMK6mDiL1WgUrKH9L3HcHL9S8lyD4uhbijZ53tGqZbjKjVkuCk03kxU1yZtF91_Ep-drcMf6dg/s320/IMG_4896.JPG" height="179" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I suppose cleanliness comes at a price. As for me, I have
now become rag picker of my own garbage way before it leaves the house and Saturday
mornings are devoted to ‘sanitizing’ my trash. You get used to it. Hmm …I know
there are places to throw green bottles and white bottles and brown bottles …but
what do I do with my little blue one? Is dog poo legitimate trash? Oh and I brought
myself a paper shredder to get rid of all my identifying and incrementing junk ……except
that I don't know where to throw all the paper confetti that the shredder keeps
generating! </div>
</div>
BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-60285331488091901042013-01-05T07:16:00.000+00:002013-01-05T09:06:14.789+00:00Chocolate heaven<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<br />
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It's only a 30 minute walk to heaven. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well a steep, uphill 30 minutes but who said the road to heaven is easy?</div>
<br />
<br />
The heaven in question is the village next door. Bougy Villars has a population of 450, a narrow little center street not quite the 'Grand Rue' it is called. It is a hamlet that is barely on the map. It does however have a stunning view of Lake Geneva. And it has this ...........<br />
<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCjYaVNYrABXBg8E99atwOo3ZTRbzI6rOQD5XC8-XsZBN2ial7IysSOswmqIJVvR_NriNmufJ9hJhdniOshfaaSaI9pwgK2YucTCwd-jhtmOOR5zo19nAKaUAGsLqJjPsX-zb3meXpTN0/s1600/IMG01338-20121224-1426.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCjYaVNYrABXBg8E99atwOo3ZTRbzI6rOQD5XC8-XsZBN2ial7IysSOswmqIJVvR_NriNmufJ9hJhdniOshfaaSaI9pwgK2YucTCwd-jhtmOOR5zo19nAKaUAGsLqJjPsX-zb3meXpTN0/s1600/IMG01338-20121224-1426.jpg" height="286" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The shop at Christmas time</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Depending on who you ask or what you read, the Tristan chocolate shop has been variously dubbed the best artisan chocolate in the region, in all of Switzerland and even in the whole world. Whatever superlative you want to use, there is no question that the Truffles, Plaques and endless other variations (chocolate with pepper for e.g. or green tea chocolate), all home made by Tristan and his family, often with help from other villagers are completely exquisite and exotic. And expensive. Though that hardly stops the locals or the expats from driving long distances to wait patiently in queue outside his tiny shop.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">chocolates in Tristan's shop</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Whether its special chocolate like Tristan or the store brought mass produced varieties, the Swiss do eat a lot of chocolate. As in a kilo a month or 11.9 kilos per person per year. That's a 120 bars of chocolate each year. That makes them the world's largest chocolate consumers (Yes, someone collects such statistics).<br />
<br />
Well all the chocolate does not seem to make the Swiss fat but apparently it makes them a lot smarter. In a recent rather unusual article in the New England Journal of Medicine, the author, Franz Messerli, saw a close correlation between a country's per capita chocolate consumption and the number of Nobel prizes per 10 million people. <i>(I cant link to the article as its not open access but if you are interested you can find it in NEJM 367; 16; Oct 18 2012 issue).</i><br />
<br />
The Swiss have the most Nobel prizes relative to population size and also eat the most chocolate. Simple as that. There is even a biochemical explanation it would seem to explain the possible link: the flavinoids in chocolate (in dark chocolate in particular) improve the mental faculties. The author goes on to estimate that for every 400 gram increase in the per capita chocolate consumption in a country, there will likely be one more Nobel laureate in that country!<br />
<br />
Hmm, that's something I can resolve to do for my country this new year....drive up its chocolate eating statistics (though I wonder ........would my chocolate eating boost India's Nobel Prize chances or Switzerland's?) . I do hope the Nobel committee is keeping its eye on this blog site ........<br />
<br />
Tristan, here I come. Can heaven get better than this? <br />
</div>
BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-8644866401854842642012-12-24T18:30:00.000+00:002012-12-25T16:11:52.368+00:00Santa in Switzerland<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span lang="EN-US">Well, truth be told there isn’t one. Well
at least not the roly poly ho ho ho ing Santa from the north pole that slides
down chimneys on Christmas eve. There is of course, Samichlaus who comes in
from the forest on December the 6<sup>th </sup>and rings the doorbell. He is
really St. Nicholas, the Bishop of Myra and the patron saint of Children. His
presents are always small : chocolates, nuts, oranges. He is sometimes
accompanied by his friend; a soot covered figure called Schmutzli who it is
said chastises kids who have been bad. Well, actually it is assumed that all children
will have been a little good and a little bad and this is the time of the year they
are rewarded for the good, take stock of their not so good and promise to try
harder the next year.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Santa decorations
are not seen often, and the ones I saw, the Santa was always lean, carries a
backpack rather than a sac and is clambering in through a balcony or window
rather than a chimney. </span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWBj1R36O-VSTdxfHnXe04mit249gch4wpwDlMouxfixb5SUSTAYuqhU1LTCAYlC6Yv5EcFICF9I5MklLx5OgmTDX9XFOoXuhavdVhss9E1m8SBBWseIxEVmERdXTzyqUIUKLhkLO8kOE/s1600/santa1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWBj1R36O-VSTdxfHnXe04mit249gch4wpwDlMouxfixb5SUSTAYuqhU1LTCAYlC6Yv5EcFICF9I5MklLx5OgmTDX9XFOoXuhavdVhss9E1m8SBBWseIxEVmERdXTzyqUIUKLhkLO8kOE/s1600/santa1.jpg" height="360" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Santa making somewhat precarious attempts to get in through the windows</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Montreaux Christmas market</td></tr>
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<span lang="EN-US">What is perhaps most striking is the
relative absence of a commercial Christmas. Here it is not about <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>mega malls outdoing each other with the
largest and brightest and fanciest glitz, not about retail frenzy, but about street markets selling local
goods and lots of food. </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">It’s less about over the top celebrations
and extravaganza and more about people retreating into family mode. It’s more
about carols, mulled wine (always plenty of that), cookies, communities and
Christmas traditions. </span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">nativity scene at our local library</td></tr>
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<span lang="EN-US">Muted, mellow ……………and as you sit in
picture postcard Montreaux with the ethereal lake framed by snow capped mountains,
the smell of cinnamon cookies wafting by, faint strains of church bells in the
distance and as you chance upon a mother sitting with a glass of mulled wine
huddled up to a toddler eating roasted chestnuts both listening to a
grandfatherly man narrating a French Christmas story, the mellifluous French
not needing to be understood to grasp its meaning……………….. you do not need to be
Swiss, you do not need to be religious, you do not need to be Christian, you do
not need to be a child ……….for those few moments, despite the incredibly
troubled world we live in, you cannot but believe in magic, in humanity, in
hope.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The hope that perhaps the Samichlaus
in us can take precedence over the Schmutzli. </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">Season's Greetings to all. </span></div>
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BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-35230830360309104952012-12-12T08:39:00.001+00:002012-12-16T20:50:11.336+00:00Inducted into cooking<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">I discovered the day we moved into our new house some months ago, that <i>I could not cook.</i> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Actually, I could not even put on the stove. The gleaming black 4 plate surface looked like the one I had in my old apartment but no matter what I did, I could not get the plates to become hot. Handyman husband (self proclaimed) was called in, all he could come up with was <em>'you must be doing something wrong'. </em></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">I began to harbour visions of a conspiracy between owner, previous tenants and the <i>Regie</i> (agent).......... but given that we had signed off on the house inspection and faced with the possibility of being reprimanded for our carelessness, not to mention the thought of several thousand Swiss francs evaporating before my eyes, I duly squashed such uncharitable thoughts. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">But two days into the house, six hours of google translate with the French and Italian instruction booklet, three cereal for breakfast, three cereal for lunch and three cereal for dinner meals later, it was time for action. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">I called the previous tenants. No doubt taken aback, the lady politely offers to take me through the steps. You press the button on your left, you wait for the red light, then you select a number from 1 to 9 ………<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">No, this does not work. She assure me it does. I assure her it does not; biting back the urge to ask if it ever did. Back and forth. Frustration rises on both sides. Finally she asks ‘<i>Are you sure you have the right vessels?</i>’ . Wondering whether to take offence, I answer “<i>What do you mean?” I have a perfectly good frying pan. Its Swiss I might add. 25 years guarantee”.</i> She persists: <i>Yes, but is it the right kind?</i><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">And so I am initiated into the hitherto unknown to me wonders of induction cooking. </span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Cooking which works through direct transmission of heat from the hob to the pot through magnetic waves. Its becoming increasingly the norm in newer houses and apartments in Switzerland. Its as precise as gas cooking, more energy efficient and safer. The only drawback is that it works only if the cookware is ferromagentic. </span></div>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">Not all vessels are. Pan after pan, pot after pot, beautiful cookware inherited from my mother, my 25 year guarantee Swiss pan, my cheap <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>new to Switzerland collection from IKEA, my specially brought pressure cooker from India ………none worked. I had a modern kitchen and nothing to cook with!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">But after the initial shock, it was excitement all the way. How often in life can one indulge in a guilt free, husband endorsed revamp of all the cookware one owns?? </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">I love this type of cooking now and find it easier to use than the gas stoves I have grown up with. Whats more, I discovered a great fact: if you put a paper between the stove and the pan, the pan gets hot, not the paper!. So i often cook with a newspaper spread under my pots and save myself cleaning up my messy spills. Whats more, I never fail to start a most amazing dinner conversation by showing off this trick ...............</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">the water boils ..my 80 francs are unharmed!</td></tr>
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Information tip : For those of you in Switzerland, the Swiss Government has a fact sheet and a list of rules, dos and donts (is there anything for which there are no rules in Switzerland?) for induction stoves at this link : <span style="color: blue;"><a href="http://www.bag.admin.ch/themen/strahlung/00053/00673/03156/index.html?lang=en#sprungmarke3_25" target="_blank">Induction Hobs</a> </span></div>
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BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-52949622130050679172012-12-02T22:35:00.001+00:002012-12-02T22:35:36.423+00:00Autumn walk in Aubonne<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Every expat in the Lake Geneva area has heard of Aubonne. Every expat in the Lake Geneva area has been to Aubonne. It <i>is</i> after all, home to the ultimate expat pilgrimage center ......IKEA. The store that unifies the diversity of our expat origins and homogenizes our homes with an unmistakable stamp that cries "hey, look I am new to Switzerland".<br />
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But Aubonne, nestled between the lake and the Juras is more than IKEA!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_tK9qr1j_mPJfzQ4cLJjUCd5AciXorabqBvzNG6xivtvmF7ty899FAsCh2qU0DDLe3OmPXNopPHoxnAyUEvU7qs7IkxQNavSwgK4ZY0s10YvlAuu6niiYmUUkoGCLK2nnoGhyphenhyphen48Ab_5s/s1600/IMG_4655.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_tK9qr1j_mPJfzQ4cLJjUCd5AciXorabqBvzNG6xivtvmF7ty899FAsCh2qU0DDLe3OmPXNopPHoxnAyUEvU7qs7IkxQNavSwgK4ZY0s10YvlAuu6niiYmUUkoGCLK2nnoGhyphenhyphen48Ab_5s/s1600/IMG_4655.JPG" height="224" width="400" /></a></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; text-align: center;">The Aubonne River just beyond the hydroelectric plant</td></tr>
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A pretty town, beautiful rolling hillsides (walking along which a certain Monsieur Mestral found inspiration in the burrs that became attached to his clothes and went on to invent Velcro), the river Aubonne and a large arboretum (the first in Switzerland). </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Aubonne castle framing the mountain peaks with the fresh snowfall</td></tr>
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This weekend as we had our first December snowfall (which vanished almost as soon as it fell) we gave IKEA a miss and went walking around near the outskirts of Aubonne besides the Aubonne river. A few pictures. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Autumn turning to winter</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Aubonne is largely an agricultural community</td></tr>
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BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-75724105114717671632012-11-26T08:07:00.000+00:002012-11-26T08:12:55.489+00:00The Chandigarh Connection<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHtggT4TuwIYho6x2NK4S_3xPXcncdpTWNzrgj2OJyn6gCbBkZPOZXAQKmXYvFieMc0wCOGSWph5cqT_MuSfmpsr2gyP_h3FOWXG2K813RF11FmHmwjCwxL3Jy1eEhNedbeqvB9a4ivhc/s1600/IMG_4613.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="177" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHtggT4TuwIYho6x2NK4S_3xPXcncdpTWNzrgj2OJyn6gCbBkZPOZXAQKmXYvFieMc0wCOGSWph5cqT_MuSfmpsr2gyP_h3FOWXG2K813RF11FmHmwjCwxL3Jy1eEhNedbeqvB9a4ivhc/s200/IMG_4613.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">So what does Swiss money and India have in common? And no, I am not referring to secret Swiss bank accounts and scandals……………… </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><i>Chandigarh</i>! The back of the Swiss 10 franc note (in use since 1997) carries a schematic representation of Chandigarh’s city center .<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Unless you look at it knowing what it is, it’s not easy to link the geometric rectangles, half rectangles and I shapes that one sees to anything but a random computer generated pattern………..but once you know, it falls into place. Much more easily recognizable, is what’s on the other side of the 10 franc note, the image of Le Corbusier.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">A<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> picture </span>who anyone who went to school in India, knows as a familiar figure in text books as the man who designed India’s <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>‘first and only planned city’. I always thought he was French and he <i>was</i> by citizenship but he was born here in Switzerland and the Swiss do like to claim him as their own. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">He was born in the little town of La Chaux-de-Fonds (Ok, ok, the Swiss call this less than 40,000 people place a large city) in the Jura mountains near Neuchatel and a hop and a skip from the French border. </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh99vtI-3JBmZ0G_JY6IzWSNUac60GeqRXMOXW2XsCs881xrvJpNkUWEM8GFKWbhBNfoz61DDFd1o1n2su7-GlWExusrwgQFw5H2jBkW0CsIL14NGVx362MGuzlB5tByS52Hzv5QReizgU/s1600/IMG_0212.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh99vtI-3JBmZ0G_JY6IzWSNUac60GeqRXMOXW2XsCs881xrvJpNkUWEM8GFKWbhBNfoz61DDFd1o1n2su7-GlWExusrwgQFw5H2jBkW0CsIL14NGVx362MGuzlB5tByS52Hzv5QReizgU/s1600/IMG_0212.jpg" width="261" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif; font-size: small;">La Chaux-de-Fonds</span></td></tr>
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<span style="line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">When we went there last year to see the watch museum for which it is better known, it did not seem different from other towns in the region (except that all the trees in the city are trimmed so that their tops are exactly at 1000m above sea level) but coincidentally, this town has the honour of being the only planned city in Switzerland and is itself built in a chessboard like grid pattern. Maybe some of what became Chandigarh drew inspiration from his childhood town. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">For those living in the area or planning<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>to be, Chaux-de Fonds is celebrating Corbusier’s 125th </span></span></span><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">birth anniversary this year and there are numerous exhibitions, walking tours, book launches and events running till January 2013 and one of his earliest works the Villa Turque<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>will be open to visitors . Ironically, while his birth town celebrates, newspapers in India have recently been carrying stories of how the house in which Le Corbusier lived for 17 years in Chandigarh</span> is itself in a state of ruin and many of Chandigarh’s buildings are facing a similar fate, neglect and worse still theft. Equally ironically, while Chaux-de-Fonds is a UNESCO World Heritage site, Chandigarh is still to attain that status. </span></span></span><br />
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<span style="line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">I confess, though always wanting to and despite all the years living in India, I have never managed to go to Chandigarh but at least now I can say I have made the pilgrimage to honor a man whom I have admired since class 6. <o:p></o:p></span></span></span></span></div>
<span style="line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif'; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif'; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"></span></span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-63179772445598090502012-11-20T14:29:00.001+00:002012-11-21T02:34:33.109+00:00The most expensive school in the world....in my backyard!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Le Rosey from the other side of the fence</td></tr>
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When we moved from the outskirts of Geneva to the little town of Rolle some 30 km away a few months ago, I was excited about everything except the long and rather expensive train commute to work for me and to school for my daughter.<br />
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A colleague offered a helpful suggestion ...that I think about transferring her to the very nice English/French school right in my own little town. Excited about the idea of a neighbourhood school even in this small town of less than 6000 people, I explore further. I realise that the school is just a 5 min walk away, almost my backyard. </div>
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I download the prospectus. Oh, oh. Like the disclaimers on cigarette packs, it carries a warning <em>"We would advise you to read the financial conditions below before proceeding with the application". </em><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Ah, dreams meet reality. The school fees alone (forget the extras) ...hold your breath ........CHF 99,300 (105,000 dollars) per year ! More expensive than a university education at Harvard or MIT or indeed the most expensive colleges in the world. </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Even in the land where everything costs more than anywhere else in the world, this seems a bit over the top. </span><br />
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But then, as I discover; Le Rosey <em>is</em> the most expensive and arguably the most elite school in the whole world! Sometimes called the <em>'school of kings' ,</em> its where the Shah of Iran, the King of Belgium, Aga Khan IV, the Rothschilds studied and where the future king of Bhutan, Hollywood star children and I believe Russian millionaires still do .......... </div>
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Befitting royalty I suppose, the school has 10 tennis courts, 3 football pitches, 2 swimming pools, a shooting ring, an archery range, a sailing centre, an 18 hole golf course, an equestrian centre, a circus tent to amuse the little ones ...I am sure they also have classrooms of course. And if that's not enough, come winter, the whole school moves itself to a winter campus up in the mountains and closer to the ski slopes! </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; text-align: center;">A momentary glimpse into the elite world</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">but these gates shall forever remain closed</td></tr>
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As my husband and I and the dog walk past the school gates some evenings, the teenagers that seem to emerge in and out at times seem to look like 'normal' teenagers and i suppose they struggle with homework, acne, and teenage angst too ..........though in my mind its hard to imagine 'normal' in this insulated bubble world. </div>
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As my morning train glides by the football pitches and archery ranges, I feel relived to be a mere plebeian. And the 1,300 francs I pay for an annual train pass for my daughter to commute to her school in Geneva begins to feel like a wonderful bargain after all. </div>
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BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-70557152461023157072012-11-15T17:02:00.001+00:002013-02-11T08:52:55.410+00:00Swiss Stupa: The Bhutan Bridge<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">So here we were at a camp near Susten (check the post on Swiss camping sites <a href="http://cowsandcliches.blogspot.ch/2012/10/camping-swiss-style.html">http://cowsandcliches.blogspot.ch/2012/10/camping-swiss-style.html</a> ) making our escape from the 5 star luxury and taking a walk through the Alpine woods. Pristine forests, the ubiquitous cows, Swiss hikers with their walking sticks. Every cliché one expects .........until we take a bend in the road that is. Voila ........is that really what i think it is ............</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">What <i>is</i> a chorten (stupa) doing in the middle of Swiss German countryside? My eastern sensibilities intrigued and excited I venture closer and there in front of me is a long bridge lined with little prayer cloths fluttering in the breeze ............</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">As I soon discover, this is the<i> Bhutan Bridge,</i> a 134 meter long, 1 meter wide suspension bridge that traverses the Ilgraben trench in the Pfyn forest in the Valais. It is quite new, having been built in 2005 as a gift from Bhutan. It was designed by a Bhutanese architect to be in line with the suspension bridges that have historically lined rivers in Bhutan. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">It should have been no surprise really. Bhutan and Switzerland share a special bond. Landlocked and mountainous, of almost exactly the same size and similar in their wealth of natural beauty. Despite their vast differences in monetary resources both are among the 'happiest countries' of the world <i>(trivial aside: the happiest country of all is Denmark).</i> Switzerland has been a major source of development aid to Bhutan as it has opened to the world.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">The bridge is meant to symbolise friendship and to traverse the<i> Rosti divide</i> as well ...the legendary divide between the German speaking and French speaking parts of Switzerland. Now, I think it would take more than a gently swaying bridge from the east to close that gap! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">The incongruities are there ....the picnic table within 10 meters of the stupa and occupied by a family enjoying beer and sausage, the almost total absence of color (white seems to be a Swiss obsession), the original prayer clothes long gone to be replaced by just pieces of cloth ............. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">But still , as the white cloths flutter gracefully, their sounds mingling with the distant Swiss cowbells in almost perfect melody ...........east, west, German, French........it all seems irrelevant. So much for clichés about Switzerland.</span><br />
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the bridge casting a shadow over the Ilgraben</div>
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BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-54692079456791869532012-11-07T09:51:00.000+00:002012-11-08T03:52:38.972+00:00Turning Swiss in Scotland<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Edinburgh castle from the street where i turned Swiss</td></tr>
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I was in Edinburgh last weekend, finding my way from the bus to my hotel. Being somewhat map challenged and also somewhat unable to always tell the difference between my right and left, I found that I could not figure out how to walk 50 m to the right, take the first left after the first light on my right and 200 meters more around the bend ....oh dear, time to stop and ask for directions. </div>
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So here I am on a street called Earl Gray, at the foot of Edinburgh castle and Scottish history, outside a pub called The Red Blazer or some such, stopping a burly Scotsman with a pipe .....and i go "<em>Excusez moi, </em><span a="undefined" c="4" class="short_text" closure_uid_a5jh8a="123" id="result_box" lang="fr"><span class="hps" closure_uid_a5jh8a="162">où</span></span><em> est la ootel pooaa</em> (The Point Hotel)". Me who, still needs a calculator to convert quatre vingt dix huit into a number, me who still goes to the hair stylist and blithely asks her to please <em>couper mon cheval</em> (horse) instead of my cheveux, me who still begins every conversation in Switzerland with a <em>"Parlez vous Anglais</em>?" ..................</div>
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The Scottish gentleman looks at me perplexed. A very identifiably Indian woman, in the heart of Mother England (well ok Scotalnd is not quite England but you get what i mean), attempting to sound French.<br />
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"Whats that you said Lassie" goes the poor fellow ...........and i reply with 'pooa, ootel ,poooa ....trying variations in pronunciation trying to sound more French ..........while he says. "lady, you speak English?" <br />
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Voila! Reality dawns........I giggle, he looks even more bewildered. I manage to mumble ' Ah, yes, I should speak English, shouldn't I? I mean the Point Hotel, you know, Bread Street' .........I continue to giggle, he continues to look at me with a look of disbelief but points me in the direction I need to go. </div>
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I find my way to the said hotel and as i sit in my room and look out at Edinburgh castle, I realise that Suisse Romandie has really seeped into me. The next time someone in Geneva asks me <em>'Parlez vous Francais</em>?', I shall proudly say <em>'Mais, oui. but only in Scotland!' </em></div>
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BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-32749820240218422912012-10-26T09:52:00.000+01:002013-02-02T06:36:54.183+00:00The North face of the Eiger : Mannlichen without the crowds<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Repairing the Grindelwald- Mannlichen gondola with the North Face in the background</td></tr>
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Mannlichen, a little village in the Bernese Oberland, 7,600 feet in the sky. In the summer it overflows with tourists and hikers and in winter with skiers but go there as we did on a week day at the end of October and see it revert back to a sleepy hamlet with more cows than people. <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sun and fog playing hide and seek at Grindelwald</td></tr>
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The route to Mannlichen begins at the famous tourist resort of Grindelwald. A must on every tourist itinerary, it seems to be a frequent haunt of the Japanese given the large Japanese information centre in the town centre and the unusual spectacle of several signs being written in Japanese as well as German. Grindelwald is the start of the 6 km 30 min gondola ride up to to Mannlichen, in what used to once be the longest ropeway in the world. But there is a bus that offers a cheaper option. And of course the fit and daring can bike or hike up. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRkSjtDloLLOaTjOcCTFUCp6UgtRtGx9VClyaXf846rjOQM_7SPbJCQkZe2YgM1FXQ6nsqpt_EYrTAF6IAgiDGdwXxB17-3gGYYEpm6hY73LAtWP5Q4F9M0JlEdijyGDwMk1y-OqTEqRc/s1600/walking+in+mannlichen.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" oea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRkSjtDloLLOaTjOcCTFUCp6UgtRtGx9VClyaXf846rjOQM_7SPbJCQkZe2YgM1FXQ6nsqpt_EYrTAF6IAgiDGdwXxB17-3gGYYEpm6hY73LAtWP5Q4F9M0JlEdijyGDwMk1y-OqTEqRc/s200/walking+in+mannlichen.jpg" width="139" /></a>Our day began with a dose of Swiss hospitality. At the outskirts of Grindelwald, we stopped at a hotel to ask directions. The friendly waiter did his best with the help of a German map and his limited English and was nice enough also to give the aged parents who were with us on the trip, permission to use the restroom. No sooner did they go in however, out came the grim faced owner who in an accusatory don't you know this already voice told us that we should not stop in front of her hotel as it was not allowed and that her restrooms have to be kept free for guests at all times. That there were no guests of any kind for miles around and that the little road in front was more likely to see a cow than a car seemed not to matter. Suitably chastened we proceeded upwards.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jungfrau as seen from Mannlichen</td></tr>
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But ruffled feelings were soon forgotten amidst the symphony of the tingling cowbells and the majesty of the Eiger, Monch and Jungfrau looming before us. The North Face looked every bit the 'murder wall' and both its allure and its treachery that has taken the lives of so many were not hard to imagine. Mannlichen provides incredible views of these three Alpine giants. <br />
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I don't know what the village feels like when full of people but seen as we saw it, framed by its mountain magic, endless walking possibilities, the restaurants all closed, and human company limited largely to the occasional farmer chopping wood is Swiss beauty at its pristine best ..........the kind that makes you want to say 'If there is paradise on earth, its is here, it is here'.<br />
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BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-81573695342007968252012-10-24T20:30:00.000+01:002012-11-17T08:26:50.120+00:00Camping ...Swiss style<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A tent in the wilderness, you against the elements….a river to bathe in, a wood fire to cook rice and boil eggs after a long day out walking …………basic, back to nature. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Armed with tent and these romantic clichés of camping trips back home in India, we set out on our first camping adventure here in Switzerland. But there <i>is</i> no raw wilderness and unexplored expanses in the middle of nowhere in this country. And even if there were, you would not be allowed to camp in them. Well, though I know a few people who did<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>end up camping in the woods; trying anything that could conceivably be illegal, takes a lot of expat courage in Switzerland so we felt morally compelled to limit ourselves to designated campsites. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So there we were, tent in hand at a four star camp (yes camps here have star ratings too) in the Valais, our romantic notions still largely unshaken. An hour later we find ourselves on a small square pitch of land on a street lined cheek by jowl with orange, red and green contraptions (some with multiple rooms) on either side and separated by a narrow ‘street’ to park cars.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Washing hanging out to dry, kids running amuck. </span><span style="font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif'; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">An incongruous, inappropriate, irreverent thought flashes past my mind before I can stop myself <i>.. ‘Dharavi, Mumbai’</i> …….. (for those unfamiliar with this, according to Wikipedia, this is a locality in Mumbai where nearly a million people live in an area less than 1 square mile). </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif'; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"></span><span style="font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif'; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It didn't take us long to discover the other luxuries that lay in wait ………</span></span><br />
<a name='more'></a>dozens of sparkling clean toilets within 100 meters, shower rooms with running hot water, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>washing machines, hot water basins to wash vessels. Every little camp pitch is complete with heavy duty electric plug points and of course you are <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>wifi connected. If you don't want to rough it out enough to pull out the electric BBQ or your coffee machine, there is always the camp restaurant. And if nature isn’t enough entertainment, the site comes complete with ping pong tables, a tennis court and swimming pool. And of course, bouncy castles for the brats.</div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif'; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif'; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Nevertheless, we were not daunted by Swiss perfection ……having pitched our tent, we went for a walk got caught in a thunderstorm and returned wet and cold only to find we had left our tent flaps wide open and the tent floor, our change of clothes and our sleeping bags were soaked. Moreover we found that our tent (not Swiss, I might add) had developed a leak <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>…………here we were in 5 star luxury, with damp clothes no sleeping bags and a puddle for a tent !<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And so, two adults, one sulky and smelly (wet dogs always smell!) dog and three sulkier teenagers, spent the night cramped in the car, squished into near immobility and a total ban on trampling arms, legs and dog tails which made getting out to pee somewhat impossible. </span></span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif'; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif'; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif'; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif'; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Well unless you get lucky, your camping experince is likely to be tamer and more 5 star. Though washouts for real campers, Swiss campsites do offer an excellent and often cheaper alternative to hotels especially when you have a car, kids and pets. Choose un starred or smaller family run campsites for less luxury, more unpredictability and a more rustic charm. </span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif'; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif'; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><br /></span></span><span style="font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif'; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif'; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: SimSun; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">All in all, I guess there<i> is</i> something to be said for waking up in the pristine alpine air and finding that a 30 meter walk brings you to fresh croissants and cappuccino and then sipping it sitting outside you tent watching the laundry dangle, pets pooping (of course very meticulously cleaned up after their owners) and the birds singing .........<o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><o:p> </o:p>Have you been camping in Switzerland? What were your experiences? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-28863628248226515672012-10-13T17:08:00.000+01:002012-10-14T21:13:48.457+01:00Wine not water ........<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My cuppeth run over ..the steel barrel where the wine ferments</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">I came drunk to work last week ………well ok I didn't swagger, stagger or sway. I suppose I could have counted from 10 to 1 backward had I tried. I didn't slur, except of course when trying to pronounce Rolle in my French class …………………but I reeked of the stuff. Wine to be precise. Fine La Cote Chasselas, I might add. Strange looks from fellow commuters while I bore a sheepishly stoic look<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>but hey at least I got ample sitting place on the train that morning!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Drinking binge at 6 am on a Wednesday, you ask? Mid week office blues notwithstanding, I did no such thing. I only slipped and fell on my way to catching the usually 30 second late train (for which I was 45 seconds late) …………Well, big deal, people all over the world slip and fall into puddles when they run for trains. Except, that in Switzerland, puddles of water are passé. If you fall, it needs to be a lake of wine …<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">My run to the station takes me through a winery. At this time of the year it is abuzz with activity: harvested grapes being de stemmed and crushed and the juice being pressed, crushed and left to ferment in several story high large steel barrels that line the courtyard. Invariably, the barrels overflow and it was into one of these pools that I unsuspectingly fell! A quick change of clothes (I always keep them handy at office in case of alcoholic accidents you see) and I was sober. Well, maybe not quite ………well they do say that alcohol does get absorbed through the skin. So my first drunken experience …………and I don't even drink!!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-123768677187854196.post-938482790861897722012-10-13T10:59:00.003+01:002012-11-17T08:26:07.930+00:00swiss trains are never late ...or are they?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4weoFvYxFMuG9Mb7o8eSUhed9KoC-z6VOsL1adMzucJfUH0Y-mIoE83ZV-sfSovmSQyH1zEse9VCsCJxcXqTacUuOpEell5QQrVYtxilfgOTB0hIgVA4o2YYQnV3i7KBBXQBYFrxaPMc/s1600/IMG_6066.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="133" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4weoFvYxFMuG9Mb7o8eSUhed9KoC-z6VOsL1adMzucJfUH0Y-mIoE83ZV-sfSovmSQyH1zEse9VCsCJxcXqTacUuOpEell5QQrVYtxilfgOTB0hIgVA4o2YYQnV3i7KBBXQBYFrxaPMc/s1600/IMG_6066.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjraxq7Y6BicboV0LGxxWKPPUT8zUZT3hiIyzeN0-BtFMfEQBD4neVrGupckLNjIa79E6LYPjfuIoFb9wJISamZ19x8S6aWpIyRlPn-O97t2C-u8G6cyMCZWwsoMFJ5VpoYxiqbR_WePvk/s1600/IMG_6066.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjraxq7Y6BicboV0LGxxWKPPUT8zUZT3hiIyzeN0-BtFMfEQBD4neVrGupckLNjIa79E6LYPjfuIoFb9wJISamZ19x8S6aWpIyRlPn-O97t2C-u8G6cyMCZWwsoMFJ5VpoYxiqbR_WePvk/s1600/IMG_6066.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"></a><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Trains in Switzerland are never late………. You can set your clock by them. Not quite ……..at least not here in Geneva. Being a commuter, I know this only too well. Where I lived before our recent move, my daily routine consisted of taking a train that arrived at my little one track station at 7.37 am (or 7.38 or even, god forbid, 7.39), getting off 17 mins later to dash for the 7.58 bus that took me to office. Four minutes …………. perfectly timed for the average Swiss citizen, to athletically take long quick strides to the bus stop and reach there with all of 24 seconds to spare. Catch is ……the timetables are probably made by makers of Swiss clocks, no accounting for real people or real life. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Not only was the train often a minute late to start with, we picked up delays along the way. At that hour the train is filled with college going kids. Surprise of surprises, Swiss youngsters are no different from their counterparts the world over. At every stop we would have young people ‘keeping the automatic doors open’ for friends who were still making a dash for the platform, for those there were still buying tickets and often for a friend who was trying to finish a smoke!. And just when you hear the doors starting to close and you look at the nano second hand on the watch with relief ...........………….whoosh, they open again; while an obviously helpless sounding announcer repeats in ever increasing cresendo of frustration<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>‘ dégager les portes s’il vous plait’ . <o:p></o:p></span><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">I mastered the art of using the compartment closest to the exit point at the station, standing at the door so that I could be the first to tumble out when they opened (a full 18.2 seconds shaved), doing cardio practice to up my running pace, never mind the occasional unbecoming falls on black ice or the embarrassment of my shoe heal being caught in the grill of a vent covering …………..but at least once a week, nothing helped and I would reach the stop to see the almost evilly blinking back lights of the #28 gliding gleefully past, signaling a 17 minute wait for the next one. Us poor stranded passengers would while away the time grumbling about the inflexibility of Swiss transport. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Calibri','sans-serif';">A few months ago, I related my train woes to a friend back home in India and she said 'oh thats like India. Thats a cliché bursted. So how late are they?’ ……….'Oh 2 mins. Maybe sometime even three full minutes’ …………She gave me an incomprehensible roll of the eyeballs and burst into laughter. ……….i know, I know …………..I guess, Switzerland has started to seep in!!</span><o:p></o:p></div>
BGhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13246666342327505786noreply@blogger.com1