We will be returning home in a few days, and I have decided to update my blog! Since we have been in the apartment the Internet is much slower, and I can't seem to upload anything, so I guess you will all have to wait to see my pictures until I get back. I'm going to try to keep this brief or I would be here all day!
If you have been following on face book you may have seen that Jesse and I visited Italy for lunch last weekend, and caught the Bernina Express. It is an amazing train ride that has been in operation for 100 years this year, what a special experience.
The weekend before we spent the weekend in Munich during their annual city founding festival, luck timing I guess. Since we went all the way, we did spend most of one day going the little bit farther to visit Dachau. Jesse and I defiantly learned a lot in that visit, not even including that sense of reality that sets in when you actually see a place you have only ever heard of. Not to make little of war, or the atrocities committed especially in WWII, but growing up secure and safe and so far removed I don't think these places or events were any more real than words on a page until I was actually standing there.
I'm not sure what the last post I made covered so forgive if I repeat myself. The weekend prior to Munich we visited Lucerne and Bern, both of which are beautiful and best understood with pictures.
All along we have booked our own train tickets, except to Munich and the Bernina Express. For those trips we paid a travel agent to help us book our tickets, international train travel, then a fully booked train/bus package required the extra attention. We have found the trains easy to use, clean and comfortable. Jesse's only complaint is that we have not travelled in a sleeper car yet, I think we will be saving that experience when we have more time to commit to the journey itself. It seems like everywhere in Switzerland is only about 2 hours or less by train from Zurich!
Speaking of Zurich, I have some errands to run that will take me into the city today, and since I need to get back early so Jesse and I can meet some of his co-workers for a World Cup game and Bar-B-Q tonight, I need to wrap it up and get on with it. Love you all and will see you soon!
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Friday, June 4, 2010
Lazy Days
So I haven't updated in the last few days, mostly because I haven't had much to say. The rain has kept me mostly pinned down. Today is beautiful so I will go out for a walk in the sun today. LOL I'm listening to a live radio feed from Portland and as I typed the last, the lyric was "I just wish I had known to go out walking in the sun." Synchronicity right? Anywho before I go let me tell you what I've been up to.
As always I'm collecting addresses for the invites, and yesterday I cut, stamped and hand wrote on 200+ wedding favors! I got a little cooped up yesterday after all that so I wondered around and took some artistic plant pictures.
On Wednesday I went out and purchased my Museum Pass and visited three different museums. The first one I went to was the Oskar Reinhart Museum am Stadtgarten. Oskar Reinhart was an art collector in Winterthur and there are actually two Museums in the city that house his collection. The one I visited was an art museum in his lifetime and usually houses work by German, Austrian and Swiss artist from the 18th - 20th centruries. The other is the Oskar Reinhart Am Romerholz, which is the collector's former home. This one houses a lare collection of Old Masters as well as important French paintins from teh early 19th and 20th centuries, most notable is the colloction of early impressionist. The later museum is closed for renevation and part of that collection is on exhibit in the museum I visited. The works are presented "In Dialouge," you are incouraged to compair and contrast the technique and approach of artist to simular subject matter. It was interesting and educational, and I was able to see some amazing art!
The second museum I visited was the Villa Flora, another art museum, this one is much smaller and in the home of the couple who collected the art usually on display there. Usually the works on display are French Impressionist. Catching on to a theme? Well the exhibit was the first instilation of intirely sculpture! The exhibit compaired two Swiss artists who produced female nudes at about the sametime. Very informative and interesting. I didn't get any postcards from there since they didn't have any of the sculptures I really liked.
The third museum I went to was the Lindengut Museum. This is local history museum with rotating exhibits that focuses on the daily lives of families in Winterthur, and include a large toy collection. Well when I arrived the man on duty, who spoke very little english told me that there was no exhibit until five days from now, but if I wanted to wonder around feel free. So I look around at empty shelves, storage crates and holes in the walls where art must have hung recently. The building itself was beautiful with painted panels and tiled stoves.
In the midst of all of that I took myself out to lunch. I had seen a mexican restaraunt, I know I know, but I really wanted some nachos! LOL Well I didn't get the nachos when I saw that they were nearly CHF30!! So instead I opted for the daily lunch special, which the english speeking waitress told me was somekind of beef with sause and a rosti. (which you may recall is basically hashbrowns). For half the price of the nachos the special also came with soup! So I had my soup, which was egg flower. (ok so I'm in Switzerland, in a mexican restaruant, eating chinees food?!?) Then I get a wiff of something awful and look around to see my lunch being served to me. It was liver, so rare some of it was still bleeding, in a garlic wine sauce. In my whole life I don't think I ever did not eat something of what was served to me at a restaraunt. I ate some of the rosti, but the smell of the whole thing was awful. I ended up putting it on the table as far from myself as I could. The waitress returned and asked if there was anything wrong and as I have never done before, I told her that my lunch was not good. She asked if she could get me anything else and I informed her I had lost my appetite. So yeah, not so good food adventure! At least she didn't make me pay for the lunch I didn't eat!
When I got back that evening and told Jesse about my day he tried to sympathize since it sounded like I had a pretty lousy day, I was out in the rain for hours, I had a bad lunch, went to an empty museum and didn't get to see the French Impressionist art I was so looking forward to. I was shocked, I thought I had a great time! It's true your attitude is everything.
I have been enjoying everyone's comment on facebook I'm not feeling too homesick. Today I'm going to look into going on an overnight trip to Luzern this weekend, so I'm doing some internet research and then I'm walking to the tourist info office at the train station. But right now it's past my lunch time so I should run.
Oh before I do I should update you about cooking on the hot plate. Not easy, messy, and so far I've only cooked pasta. I think I will stick to pasta unless someone has any bright ideas! and here is a pic of our no cook breakfasts (the things that look like limes are eggs, we bought them already boiled and colored)
As always I'm collecting addresses for the invites, and yesterday I cut, stamped and hand wrote on 200+ wedding favors! I got a little cooped up yesterday after all that so I wondered around and took some artistic plant pictures.
The second museum I visited was the Villa Flora, another art museum, this one is much smaller and in the home of the couple who collected the art usually on display there. Usually the works on display are French Impressionist. Catching on to a theme? Well the exhibit was the first instilation of intirely sculpture! The exhibit compaired two Swiss artists who produced female nudes at about the sametime. Very informative and interesting. I didn't get any postcards from there since they didn't have any of the sculptures I really liked.
The third museum I went to was the Lindengut Museum. This is local history museum with rotating exhibits that focuses on the daily lives of families in Winterthur, and include a large toy collection. Well when I arrived the man on duty, who spoke very little english told me that there was no exhibit until five days from now, but if I wanted to wonder around feel free. So I look around at empty shelves, storage crates and holes in the walls where art must have hung recently. The building itself was beautiful with painted panels and tiled stoves.
In the midst of all of that I took myself out to lunch. I had seen a mexican restaraunt, I know I know, but I really wanted some nachos! LOL Well I didn't get the nachos when I saw that they were nearly CHF30!! So instead I opted for the daily lunch special, which the english speeking waitress told me was somekind of beef with sause and a rosti. (which you may recall is basically hashbrowns). For half the price of the nachos the special also came with soup! So I had my soup, which was egg flower. (ok so I'm in Switzerland, in a mexican restaruant, eating chinees food?!?) Then I get a wiff of something awful and look around to see my lunch being served to me. It was liver, so rare some of it was still bleeding, in a garlic wine sauce. In my whole life I don't think I ever did not eat something of what was served to me at a restaraunt. I ate some of the rosti, but the smell of the whole thing was awful. I ended up putting it on the table as far from myself as I could. The waitress returned and asked if there was anything wrong and as I have never done before, I told her that my lunch was not good. She asked if she could get me anything else and I informed her I had lost my appetite. So yeah, not so good food adventure! At least she didn't make me pay for the lunch I didn't eat!
When I got back that evening and told Jesse about my day he tried to sympathize since it sounded like I had a pretty lousy day, I was out in the rain for hours, I had a bad lunch, went to an empty museum and didn't get to see the French Impressionist art I was so looking forward to. I was shocked, I thought I had a great time! It's true your attitude is everything.
I have been enjoying everyone's comment on facebook I'm not feeling too homesick. Today I'm going to look into going on an overnight trip to Luzern this weekend, so I'm doing some internet research and then I'm walking to the tourist info office at the train station. But right now it's past my lunch time so I should run.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Lazy Days
So yesterday and today I'm doing very little. I got us settled into our little apartment. Biggest challange will be cooking for two on a hotplate with one pot and one set of dishes. I think Jesse called it when he said it will be like camping.
Today I will be hanging out in the apartment again since we don't have phones, (we are not using our cells, there is no phone in the apt, and Jesse doesn't have a phone at his desk at work) and we only have one set of keys. Jesse is comming by during his lunch so he can meet the landlord and we can both get info like where is the laundry room and what do we need to do with our garbage. After that we will both have a key, and they will be bringing by an other bed, since this room only has a single. In the mean time I can do some reading and address more invites! And contintue to try to get my photos uploaded.
I'm thinking tomorrow will be a nice day to spend at the museums. Our new apartment is more centrally located and will make it easier for me to get a full day in before I meet Jesse for dinner. Dinners to be attempted on the hot plate this week: Mushroom stroganoff over egg noodles, and Spaghetti Bolognese.
We are really enjoying our breakfast, and today we put it together ourselves in our room. Coffee, Yogurt, Museli, fresh bread with either nutella or herbed chesse, meat slices, boild egg and a peice of fruit. Part of what has been enjoyable is the time first thing in the day to sit down together. We have both been trying to find time in our day for worship and have discovered that a word over our morning meal sets our hearts for the day. I'm thinking prayer is a powerful tool in living together in these close quarters.
I'm a little all over the place today! We haven't been getting our morning jogs in the last two days, and I'm starting to feel those effects. I'm getting to my blog later than usual, and in fact I'm still in my PJ's! Scandalous! So I should get moving along, tomorrow expect a report on laundry and one pot cooking.
Today I will be hanging out in the apartment again since we don't have phones, (we are not using our cells, there is no phone in the apt, and Jesse doesn't have a phone at his desk at work) and we only have one set of keys. Jesse is comming by during his lunch so he can meet the landlord and we can both get info like where is the laundry room and what do we need to do with our garbage. After that we will both have a key, and they will be bringing by an other bed, since this room only has a single. In the mean time I can do some reading and address more invites! And contintue to try to get my photos uploaded.
I'm thinking tomorrow will be a nice day to spend at the museums. Our new apartment is more centrally located and will make it easier for me to get a full day in before I meet Jesse for dinner. Dinners to be attempted on the hot plate this week: Mushroom stroganoff over egg noodles, and Spaghetti Bolognese.
We are really enjoying our breakfast, and today we put it together ourselves in our room. Coffee, Yogurt, Museli, fresh bread with either nutella or herbed chesse, meat slices, boild egg and a peice of fruit. Part of what has been enjoyable is the time first thing in the day to sit down together. We have both been trying to find time in our day for worship and have discovered that a word over our morning meal sets our hearts for the day. I'm thinking prayer is a powerful tool in living together in these close quarters.
I'm a little all over the place today! We haven't been getting our morning jogs in the last two days, and I'm starting to feel those effects. I'm getting to my blog later than usual, and in fact I'm still in my PJ's! Scandalous! So I should get moving along, tomorrow expect a report on laundry and one pot cooking.
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