Switzerland

Originally posted 9-30-2003

Well I’m back in my yellow room in Grenoble thinking about  how much I love the transition from summer to autumn, the grey skies, light rain, cool air and falling leaves.  It makes me miss Virginia.  I also love that every time I walk home from Centre Ville I can go a different way and see new parks and new little cafés and shops.  I don’t think I have gone the exact same way twice.  But I guess I should be talking about my weekend in Switzerland with Brooke.

Bon, allons-y.

Friday morning Brooke and I met at the train station at about 9:00.  We caught our train to Geneva and rode in excitement.  We couldn't stop talking about what we were going to do and the beautiful countryside we were passing.  Also, trains are THE BEST - so comfortable, smooth and scenic.  We got to Geneva and had about 45 minutes to kill before our train to Zurich.  We stopped at a little shop for some food then at the café by the station for a tea.  We almost missed our train.  Fortunately, we rushed on just as the conductor was blowing his whistle.  We passed beautiful Swiss lakes and went through Bern which looks like a really cool city.  Everything in Switzerland is the most healthy, vibrant green.  And there’s nothing that looks unsightly or dirty in the countryside.  We passed Lake Geneva and tiny colorful boats speckled the glassy surface.  The clouds were resting low on the lake and at one point you couldn't tell where the clouds started and the lake stopped.  The mountains in the distance semi-disappeared and the sun’s rays pierced haphazardly through the mist.

We arrived in Zurich with no problems and headed to the hostel.  It was in the center of the old town which is a good 20 minute walk through winding and hilly streets from Hauptbahnhoff which is the main Zurich train station.  So we are hauling our backpacks with hiking shoes hanging from them and trying to read this map to get to the hostel, looking like the biggest tourists ever.  We get to Martahaus only to be told that the only rooms they have left are 150ChF (Swiss Francs – approx. 120 US Dollars).  We had planned on paying 25ChF.  That was the price quoted to us in our trusty guidebook.  We decided to try the backpacker’s hostel a little bit more into town.  They had nothing available for under 164ChF.  Both places told us to check back around 7pm to see if they had any cancellations in their dorms (those are the cheap beds).

We had come to Switzerland with the impression that hostels always have cheap beds and you don’t need to make reservations, especially once university is in session (mid-September).  The guidebook hadn't prepared us for what to do if the hostels were booked or only offering exorbitant rates.  It was four o’clock and we decided to wait until 7pm to make a final decision on accommodations.  We walked down Limmatquai a little bit to two of Zurich’s large beautiful cathedrals that boast windows by Chagall and being founded by Charlemagne respectively.

Pop culture reference for Chagall, he’s the guy who made the blue windows that Ferris and Sloan kiss in front of at the Art Institute of Chicago in Ferris Beuller’s Day Off.  Unfortunately, there was a concert at  Fraümunster that night so my pictures were limited by lighting structures and microphones.  I did manage to get a couple good ones of the windows.  Großmunster was better on the outside than it was on the inside.

We were still toting all our gear around and we were worn out.  We decided since it was only 5pm, we would go to the train station and check at the tourism office for  info about places we wanted to go on Saturday and then walk around until 7pm.  They had lockers where we could dump our stuff for a while.  We waited in a ridiculously long queue.  We got in line at about 5:30 and weren’t out of there until 6:30.

It turned out to be well worth the wait.  We inquired about the chocolate factory that we had planned to see and found out it is closed on weekends and it’s just a museum, not a factory.  We crossed that off the list of things to do.  We asked about other things to do and got a ton of maps and suggestions.  Most importantly, we asked if they knew of places to stay that were cheap, and the woman found us a room at a hostel a little outside city center for 35ChF per night, breakfast included.  For two people who had been thinking about sleeping in a park or train station, this was very wonderful news.  We got the last two beds in the place.  We had an hour to get there so we stopped at a grocery store and bought dinner, then we headed to the hostel.  It turned out to be a lovely, sparkling clean place.  We were up on the top floor with a  nice roof/terrace overlooking Zurich.  The floor is set up as a long hallway of 7 partitions, each with two beds and a curtain as the fourth wall.  There was one shower, two bathrooms, and two sinks.  Our beds were clean and came with sheets, which is something you usually have to pay extra for in hostels, and the bathrooms were absolutely immaculate.  We were about a 20 minute walk from city center.  After we ate our dinner we hung out and talked on the terrace and watched the sun set. Then we decided to go see what Zurich night life was like.

         Turns out, it's awesome.  We walked into the area near the Limmatquai, the quay that runs along Lake Limmat, the body of water that bisects Zurich.  It’s full of narrow, old streets and buildings which have been turned into hip bars and cool restaurants with lots of al fresco seating.  You can sit in the street and observe the numerous performers and artists going to work when the sun sets, the lively international mix of businessmen, students, and scruffy backpackers, while having some fondue or a beer.  Brooke and I watched an American street performer juggle everything from bowling pins to fire, and we watched an Armenian spray paint artist do an intricate rendering of the Matterhorn in about 15 minutes.  The scene exuded energy and intrigue, we just sat there and soaked it in.  We were exhausted though, so after our leisurely promenade and a drink, we decided to retire to our serendipitous lodgings.  We crashed almost immediately.

Since our chocolate factory plans were busted and we had already seen the two big monuments, we were deciding on what to do when we got up the next morning. We thought about going to the zoo, and we also contemplated going to this art museum at the other end of town that had an exhibit of album cover art.  I wish I had gone to that now, but what we did was pretty good anyway.  I had seen that there was an outdoor flea market at the end of the quai just before the harbor.  I thought that would be fun and Brooke and I decided to go.  We checked out of our hotel and walked to the train station to stow our gear in some lockers.  We also stopped at the tourism office to see if they could book us a room for Geneva that night.  They weren’t supposed to, but they did anyway.  So with the comfort of knowing where we were going to sleep that night in our minds, we headed off to see Zurich.

       We started at the flea market where Brooke saw a ring she liked and bargained for it in German.  She was able to talk the woman down from 100ChF to 70, very impressive considering she doesn’t know the language.  Proud of her purchase and riding the high of successful bargaining, we decided to walk down fashionable Bahnhoffstrasse.  This is the main street in Zurich lined with designer boutiques selling, among other things, watches.  We waded through luxurious corridors eyeing Dior, Chanel, Yves Saint Laurent, Cartier, Rolex, Tiffany’s, and Luis Vuitton.  The Cartier window had an 11 Carat diamond ring on display.  11 Carats.  It was ridiculous.  It also cost more than a new Porsche.

So we continued down Bahnhoffstrasse gawking and dreaming when we hit upon a treasure: the Sprüngli store.  Floor to ceiling, counter after counter of chocolate and pastry delicacies.  I was intrigued by these things that looked like tiny hamburgers, that came in flavors like strawberry, mocha, champagne, chocolate, pistachio and peach.  The “buns” looked like meringue, and the filling had some sort of mousse-like substance holding them together.  I decided I had to try it.  I got a champagne flavored one for Brooke and a mocha one for me.  The ensuing taste experience was unforgettable.  The “buns” were slightly heavier and more moist than meringue, but still maintained the airy texture and crunch, and the filling was delicious: not too heavy, not too light.  What blew me away the most was the accuracy of the flavor.  I have had mochas, but this was the best mocha I have ever tasted.  The champagne flavor was dead on. You could taste the bubbles and they were perfectly complemented by the creamy dark chocolate filling.  It was a good thing we had already left the store when we ate them or I would have blown all my money on those things.  I don’t even know what they’re called. *

 Getting a little tired of being surrounded by pretty things I can't afford, I decided I wanted to go to the art museum where I can just appreciate beauty for beauty’s sake.  We entered and saw an exhibit by a former English cartoonist named David Springley.  His work was ironic and cutting.  Some of it was abstract and some obviously social commentary.  I enjoyed most of it.  The rest of the museum housed some beautiful works: Giacometti, Monet, Warhol, Pollock, Chagall… the list continues.  I realized that I have a hard time appreciating most contemporary art, but I’d be content spending days staring at impressionist studies of hayfields in different lights and seasons.

After the art museum it was time to go to the station to catch our train to Geneva.  For lunch I ate a gigantic soft pretzel with mustard.  This might be the perfect food.  I didn’t have big expectations for Geneva.  I’m not sure why I decided to go there.**  I had already been to Lucerne and Bern just didn’t occur to me.  So we arrived in Geneva and walked to our hostel to check in.  It turned out to be an old house right on the main quay. We could see the famous Jet d’Eau from our window.  A couple owns the residence and turned it into a lovely, unique place to stay.  We paid a little more than average, but it was still a good deal.  Our room had high ceilings with ornate molding, antique fixtures, an incredible floral smell, a view of Lake Leman, and the quaintness that comes with staying in a small place run by the owners.   We got to meet them and talk to them as they showed us around.  They had funny notes about using the toilet and the shower that were humorously translated.

After we dropped our stuff off, we decided to walk around the town, see a few of the sites like the flower clock, and get a closer view of the Jet d’Eau.  The latter is the largest fountain in the world. Seven tons of pressure shoots a 146 foot column of water straight into the air for 16 hours every day.  You can see it from almost everywhere in Geneva.  We walked for a long time exploring more swanky  boutiques and colorful harbors.  We thought about going out that night but the nightlife just didn’t look as promising as Zurich’s. We stayed in and watched a horrible French made-for-TV-movie.  We were asleep by 10pm.  I awoke at 12:30am to the sound of a major thunderstorm which was apparently part of the reason for the major blackout that occurred in Italy. I went back to sleep and woke up to a much cloudier Geneva.  I went running through a long stretch of botanical gardens on the Quai de Woodrow Wilson.  I saw a strange assortment of fauna mixed in with  the flora: grouses, flamingos, ibex, ducks, sheep, yaks,  and deer.  I noticed the same thing in Tours, France when I was living there.  In a park near my house they had cages with llamas, peacocks, chickens, and ostriches. It made for an interesting run.   I had been thinking about bagging the trip to the United Nations headquarters, but on the run I decided that subconsciously it was the reason for my being in Geneva.  I have heard about it in class after class: League of Nations, Geneva accords… blah blah blah.  I figured I should see it while I’m here. Brooke wasn’t interested so she walked around the old town near the Cathedrale of St. Pierre while I took a bus to the other side of town and  toured the European Headquarters for the UN.

I am so glad I went.  I learned a lot about the organization.  Basically Geneva does the “dirty work”.  New York deals with writing the policy, Geneva carries it out.  The UNHCHR (United Nations High Commission for Human Rights) works in Geneva and goes abroad yearly to see what needs to be done and to ensure the implementation.  Lots of the UN’s entities like ILO and WHO and UNHCR (High Commission for Refugees) also have their headquarters in Geneva.  I really loved the tour.  It sort of validated all those notes I took in International Organizations class.  After that I met up with Brooke (I was a half hour late because I didn’t think the tour would take as long as it did and it was raining outside…she was not pleased) and we went to the Cathédrale de Saint Pierre.  We climbed the north tower and took some amazing photos of the city.  But the coolest part of the visit was the archaeological site/museum that they have below the cathedral.  You go underneath the building and you take an audio tour showing the different stages of construction and reconstruction that it underwent.  You can see the layers of rock that the city is built on, you can see the ruins of an ancient civilization, then layers of compressed stone and sand, then the layer of a Roman road, then more sand and rock, then they have the ancient mosaic floor of the Bishop’s receiving room.  The cathedral was started in the second century.  They have excavated a crypt but that isn’t open to the public yet.  You could trace the progression of the rite of baptism through the architecture of the baptismal basins.  They started out as very wide when they used to do immersion/spraying, and then they got smaller when they reconstructed because they no longer practiced immersion, they simply poured consecrated water from a smaller basin over the head.  You could see Greco-Roman remnants, skulls, the fascinating ancient foundations of a building that is over 1800 years old.

After that we headed back to the train station to catch our ride back to good ol’ Grenoble.  We met an Aussie backpacker named Steve.  On the first leg of the train ride to Lyon I was sitting next to a very large woman reading a sappy French romance novel and she bawled the entire way from Geneva to Lyon.  I asked her if she was okay but she didn’t answer me.  She just kept reading, putting it down and sobbing, then picking it back up again.  Steve and I thought it was because of the story.  From what I could gather it was a lot like a Danielle Steele book.   Steve and I made up a fake story in the style of what we thought she might be reading.  Had a lot of fun with that.

I was happy to get home. It was a long weekend but fun.  Things I learned about traveling in Europe: 1) In the off-season, you don’t need to reserve a seat on a train, you can just buy one the day of.  You can also just take a different train, earlier or later, as you please, no one cares as long as it’s not full.  After the near catastrophe with lodgings though, I’ll probably always opt to reserve.  2) It’s better to make plans for accommodations before you arrive in the city you’re headed to.  3) Art museums are always a good bet.  4) Guidebooks don’t know everything and their information can be incorrect. or out of date.  5) The Office of Tourism is the best stop you can make in a given town.

 I highly recommend Zurich, Geneva… not so much unless you’re an IR major.   Provence is next weekend, then Marseille.  Talk to you all soon.

* I found out later that they are called macarons or macaroons, but have nothing to do with the macaroons in the US that most of us are familiar with.  But the original macarons are becoming a new dessert trend here in the US.  My friend just sent me a box of the little jewel-like desserts for my birthday and, while lacking the sheen of first discovery, remained as beautiful and delicious as my first taste in Zurich.

** Eric Weiner in his book, The Geography of Bliss wrote about the swiss saying Geneva "is a great place to live but you wouldn't want to visit" and that its incredibly boring.  Too bad I read that book in 2009.  Lesson learned.  I hope Brooke has forgiven me for dragging her there.