Geneva. 8/29/2018
Bon Nuit
August 29 2018
Hoping all is well.. or as well as it can be – as we follow CNN and hear the utter craziness increasing back home.. So now he’s after Google! And talking about “violence” and “poverty” if he is impeached.
Life in Switzerland is calming!
Headed out for breakfast this morning to our favorite little café called Birdie. We ate breakfast here every morning on one trip.. so we headed back. Great hot porridge with milk and apples and honey and almonds and many other things.
Walked back to the hotel and then I headed downtown to meet up with Emma, while Mike did email (I figured I could do all of my emails in the afternoon while everyone else planned to head to what is known as the UN Beach – a private area at the lake’s edge that is reserved for card-carrying UN officials ??!! Since Elizabeth was rather high ranking at W.H.O. she carries such a card and has access.). So the plan had been that I would walk back to the hotel and everyone else would pick Mike up and head to this beach. But as luck would have it, it started to rain so plans changed. Julia and Julien picked us up and we all had a wonderful lunch at our hotel. Then I went to the room to do work and emails; Julien and Hem both had conference calls to take and did that in the hotel and the car. And Mike, Emma, and Elizabeth hung out until Emma and Hem had to get to the airport to catch their plane home to London.
At about 4:00, Mike and I headed out and walked (about a mile in each direction) to see the Smurf Houses (?) – a complex of affordable, subsidized housing located a few blocks from the train station. I had read a little about it and we had never seen it. What a charming surprise! The photos do not convey enough of the fun, the uniqueness, or the fascinating (somewhat Gaudi-esque) structures. Nor do they explain everything going on at this site which includes at least 500 units, with about 200 being subsidized, I think.. The project was designed by Swiss architects Christian Hunziger, Robert Frei, and Georges Berthoud, and it was built between 1982 and 1984.
Included in the project is a child care center, an infant center, a theater, some private offices, including a small architecture office, parking garage, a café, gym, beauty salon, health clinic, art rooms, and more. The large courtyards were filled with kids and seniors and young parents; Swiss, Africans, Muslims, Asians, and more — more diversity than I’ve seen in all the times I’ve been to Geneva.
To set this geographically, the neighborhood is called ‘Les Grottes’, and it is behind the Geneva railway station. It was home to political refugees in the 1930s and considered a very impoverished area. At some point, the city decided to buy the entire area with the intention of demolishing it. But as WWII approached, the project was shut down and nothing happened until sometime in the seventies. At that point most of the houses in the area were vacant and many stores were illegally operated. Squatters were on the site and they refused to give up their homes.. They wanted renovation, not destruction. The authorities finally gave in and brought the area back to life. They created a social and architectural experiment that appears to be quite successful.
Got caught in the rain as we walked back to the hotel… Did some work and met up wit Elizabeth for dinner. We leave tomorrow evening for London.
Au revoir…por le moment…
Fern
Short Journey to Geneva and London: 8/26 and 8/27 2018
Wasn’t sure I was going to write a blog for this trip because it is so family-oriented and probably of less interest to you than the usual travels to more exotic places. But alas, I figured if I get out of practice I may never be able to start up again. So, before beginning, I should alert you to the fact that most of the 300+ posts regarding travel over the past 12 years can be found at https://fernstravelnotes.wordpress.com … I’m gradually finding time to post the photos for each entry (and while I’m short a few entries, it’s coming along).
Anyway, we flew to Geneva on Sunday to visit Mike’s nieces, spouses, grand nephew (now 8-months old) and Mike’s sister-in-law. In addition to seeing everyone, we had planned to scatter Mike’s brother’s ashes. When we were here in December we attempted to do this, but the cover of the urn was pressed in so tightly that we couldn’t open it and decided to wait until summer, (now).
Arrived via London and after settling in our hotel room at the Hotel Tiffany — a 19th century building located in what Geneva calls its Arts district; more specifically, it’s at the edge of the Old Town and has an Art Nouveau style. Staff are friendly and accommodations are good.), we set out to meet everyone at Elizabeth’s house in Carouge. Carouge is a small town within Geneva – it was modeled after Nice and has a Mediterranean flair. Carouge is referred to as the “Greenwich Village of Geneva” — probably because it is home to an assortment of boutiques and art studios and cafes and jazz bars. They prepared a mixed grill barbecue… discussion was lively, especially about the American political situation.
Then we headed back to our hotel…
On Monday morning, we all met up at about 11 am and head to the small village of Bourg-en-Lavaux on the opposite end of the lake (Lac Leman) from Geneva.. I believe it is on the northeast edge of the lake. Anyway, the setting is spectacular, with vineyards as far as the eye can see and also the majestic snow capped alps. Julien (Julia’s partner) had arranged for a private wine tasting.. mostly chasselas (a unique white wine of the region). The vineyards were planted and tended for centuries by monks. After the tastings (about 5 different wines I believe, but I began to lose track), we went to the little Auberge du Raisin for a birthday lunch for Julia. Wonderful food, leisurely, and lots more wine and champagne later we headed to a small beach along the lake and then back to Geneva through Lausanne.
Everyone else had swimsuits except Mike and me… But we enjoyed the peacefulness and the beauty of the area.
Way too full, and with a bit too much wine, we opted for simple salads for dinner.
Tomorrow (Tuesday) will be hectic and emotional as we scatter the ashes of Mike’s brother in the Seleve just over the Swiss border into France.
Best – Fern (and regards from Louis)
23. Milan. Day 7. May 2 2023.
First the really good news…. Mike tested Negative today!!! Just in time to leave Milan, so by the time we leave tomorrow, he will have spent 7 days being in Milan, looking at the four walls of his room… and the weird television shows he’s been watching. Today he said he watched crayfish make in a stream while raccoons were hunting them. But, all is good. We are going out to dinner tonight and then we leave the hotel at 8 am tomorrow morning (Wednesday); we arrive at SFO around 10 pm same day.
Today it actually didn’t rain so I headed out—first to the Shoah Memorial which is located at the Central Station, in the area where between 1943 and 1945—away from the public, where previously mail was loaded and unloaded. In this area, hundreds of deportees, mostly Jews, were forced onto rail cars that had been used for livestock. The cars were filled body to body with Jews and then raised in a railroad car elevator between tracks 18 and 19 and then departed to concentration camps. The area has remained mostly unchanged physically. It is filled now with some of the original rail cars and then with small viewing areas where videos of documentary interviews with survivors are shown.
From there I walked about a 1.5 miles to the Fondazione Giangiacomo Feltrinelli, which is dedicated to social practice art. It’s within an interesting building. When I arrived, there weren’t any exhibits (everything was under construction), but the 5th floor was open and there were good views of the city. Then, somewhat exhausted I took a taxi to Peck—a gourmet food shop established in 1883. Pretty amazing place.
Then a little packing, and off to dinner at La Brisa—a charming little restaurant with amazing food. We started (after two different “gifts” from the chef) with the beef diaphragm tartare which was great; shared the pasta with octopus which was prepared perfectly—octopus was soft and tasty; then we had the crispy pig with some veggies; and finally we had the pear tatin which had a bit of whipped ricotta on the side. I had wine; Mike is abstaining for a few ore days until the Paxlovid is out of his system.
That’s it… gotta pack and get up really early to get taxi to the airport.
Be well –
We’re ready to get home; sorry we missed Geneva, but we will figure out when to come—most likely Christmas.
Fern
11. It’s a Wrap! Last Day in Switzerland. 9/7/22
Greetings on our last evening in Switzerland.
First a few things I forgot to mention yesterday:
The parking garage in Zurich, where we left our car overnight because we arrived in Zurich pretty late and didn’t want to hassle getting the car to the rental return, has copies of art works throughout the garage: paintings, poetry, quotes by famous people who have some relationship to Switzerland, etc. And the garages are all brightly lit, clean, walls painted in primary and secondary colors, and floors painted in near white with white columns. And still on the car topic, when we returned the car to Hertz yesterday, there were three guys, who we think were Saudis (a father and two 20-ish-something sons; with wives, in hijabs, waiting on chairs inside the rental return building) trying to rent a car. As I waited at the counter, I overheard the conversation. The guys wanted a “fancy and fast car.” The Hertz representative listed all the cars available but none of them appeared to satisfy the guys. Then they turned around and saw our Alfa Romeo being returned, their eyes lit up and they said “We’ll take that one!” The representative said they had to clean it but then they could have that car. Then as one of the guys stated “it’s got good pick up and goes very fast” the Hertz rep said… “you need to be very careful and not speed; there are cameras everywhere; you could be stopped and then the car could be taken away….” I don’t think the guys heard a word. And then I was wondering how they were going to fit 5 adults and one child plus luggage into that car. Well, we were gone before we could see how they did that.
Now for today and some summary comments –
We went back to Odeon – trying to become part of the regular crowd and the history of intellectuals and artists. Learned today that some of the other regulars over time included Somerset Maugham and Toscanini. And then we actually went into the pharmacy whose space used to be part of the larger Odeon in its day. I had gotten some kind of rash on my ankles (don’t think it’s monkeypox because it’s not blistery) and I hoped the pharmacist could recommend something and also confirm that it wasn’t serious. Two different pharmacists looked at it and asked a lot of questions. They didn’t seem alarmed and gave me some kind of cream to put on. I think they would have given me some kind of antibiotic if they knew more about my medical history and if I was staying longer. I think the cream is working—but of course way too slowly for me.
We then walked about 1.3 miles to visit Le Corbusier’s Pavilion (which we had seen many years ago). Apparently, it underwent some kind of renovation a few years ago and it is stunning… As wonderful as it was years ago. It’s a gem. It’s about a block from the “Zurichsee” and is at the edge of yet another beautifully maintained and immaculate park. From there we strolled back to the hotel to regroup and figure out the rest of the day. We stopped for a salad at an outdoor café and then of course had to have our daily fill of gelato (which is quite wonderful here and is offered in about 30 different flavors). Me- pistachio; Mike- banana.
By the time we reached the hotel, it was about 4:00 and Mike decided it was nap time… so I strolled alone to a part of the city on the east side of the river, alone. And then I began packing with the goal of finishing all packing before dinner.
… Well I didn’t quite finish packing, but we headed to Kronenhalle for our last dinner in Switzerland (until we return again in January)… Kronenhalle, like Odeon which is just around the corner is a local institution – established in 1924 as a high-end restaurant. It was home to many artists who wound up paying for their dinners (and drinks) with their art. Thus, the restaurant has an amazing collection of Chagalls, Miros, and many other 20th Century painters. There’s a long history here, but I’m too beat to tell it. In any case, it’s rare to be having dinner with such ”valuable” art staring you in the face as you eat your salad. I’m also presently totally stuffed…
As we close up this trip, I am reflecting on the realities of Swiss life—at least as much as one can when one is a visitor and not a resident. And I think about the comments and responses to questions with folks who live here. For us, Switzerland is a very homogeneous country. Everyone (or at least the very vast majority of people) are White. And yet, people here feel the country (especially the cities) are very diverse. They talk about Poles and Spaniards and Greeks living here. For us, those don’t seem like big differences.
And people say that at least 10% of the population of the country is “poor.” But, we have not seen any unhoused people; we have not seen tent communities; we were approached for a handout for the first time today and the young woman looked like a student—decently dressed with a backpack. We haven’t seen any RVs with people clearly living in their vehicle full time; we haven’t seen litter in the parks or on the sidewalks. Still, we’ve seen how expensive it is to live here. We’re told housing is very expensive—more than the Bay Area. We filled up the tank with gas and gas was about $9.30 per gallon (yes, we did the conversion from liters and the conversion to dollars). Our shared salad today plus mineral water was about $35 (yes, we were in a nice location but not at a fancy restaurant).
I certainly don’t have the answers but it’s clear that a strong social safety net system as they have here makes a huge difference; good schools; decent wages help as well, as does a tiny military budget. And while our travels usually take us to developing nations.. we know from other travels that Switzerland is not alone. Finland and all of Scandinavia seem to be able to make life work for their residents, and so do many other countries beyond Europe. While I don’t have the count, and I’m not saying this is the reason…. But many of these countries have female presidents and/or prime ministers.
After 12 days here, it’s easy to say, “Shame on the US,” but maybe the bigger point is to truly learn from other countries and just to rethink priorities.
See you stateside, beginning tomorrow-Thursday.
Next travelogue will be in December/January (Ethiopia, Egypt, Jordan, and Israel).
Hope you are all doing well.
We began our day today with breakfast at Odeon—a café down the street from our little hotel. But Odeon is more than a typical café.. First it’s truly beautiful and in operation since 1911, with many art nouveau features. Second it’s been a gathering place for intellectuals, artists, musicians, and political folk (of every ilk, it seems) for more than a century. The bar was a hangout for everyone from Mussolini to Lenin to James Joyce (who spent 5 years in Zurich) and Einstein (obviously not at the same time). In the early years it was also a hangout for artists like Hans Arp and Sophie Tauber and some say it was the birthplace of Dadaism. During Hitler’s era, Odeon became a sort of ‘center for emigrants.’ One supposedly true story about a regular at the café is that there was a rather well-known Swiss surgeon who was there nightly and consumed huge amounts of champagne. Public pressure made him stop drinking whole bottles of champagne… supposedly… but in reality his regular waiter merely brought him a large coffee pot each night.. but there wasn’t any coffee in the pot; it was filled with champagne. I’m sure there are lots more stories within the walls of Odeon..
From there we began our trek to the west side of the river (we are staying on the east side) – and headed to an area called the Viadukt… an early 20th Century three-story-tall arcade of stone buttresses, supporting steel train trestles, still actively in use. The ground floor level is now filled with one story shops that are glazed on both sides so you can see through from one side to the other— really nice shops that were quite tempting, but I was well behaved..
Scattered throughout –- where the trestles spanned larger distances, there were no shops but rather little parklets that supported various activities from outdoor cafes to ping pong and play areas. There’s also a large market in the arcade at the site. We stopped for a simple lunch of mussels and fries in that market… and then suddenly the rains came so we wound up lingering in the market for a while, until the rain stopped and then we headed to the Freitag Tower—a stack of shipping containers about five containers tall, which housed little shops including a large one with Freitag bags. This was all adjacent to an outdoor court with a funky set of cafes and outdoor spaces (Frau Geroldsgarten) filled with all sorts of found object sculptures and a great red Citroen reformed as a giant planter.
Then we strolled to the 40-stoy Prime Tower (an office building) which had a restaurant/bar at the top called Clouds, where we had a drink and took in the view. Continuing on our walk, we strolled through several other neighborhoods and then went through the Zurich train station which is quite impressive… and eventually made it back to the hotel – 18,150 steps later!!
As we got close to the hotel, we were drawn to symphony quality Mozart wafting through the air…. Two young female musicians—one violinist and one flautist—playing along with a recording of a symphony orchestra coming out of a Bose speaker. The acoustics coming from the tall stone arcaded porch underneath a 19th Century building, magnified the sound which was incredible… a lovely way to end the walk.
We quickly changed and headed to dinner at La Bottega di Mario, which was good, but not great (although highly recommended in several guidebooks). But the ambience was quite good and very reelaxing.. Then walked back to the hotel…
Tomorrow is our last day here.. we head home on Thursday.
All the best
Fern
Happy Labor Day!
After breakfast at Christie’s, we left Geneva and headed to Zurich where we need to return our car (we’ll walk and use public transit and taxis here in Zurich for the next two days) and from where we will leave for SFO. Fortunately, the bellman at the Tiffany Hotel in Geneva offered to get our car!!! Which saved us the nasty task of having to navigate getting the car out of the tight space and out of the very very narrow garage lanes. As we were leaving town, we got word that Emma suddenly developed the same stomach issue that Finn had, but she persevered and flew back to London. By the time they all landed and as Hem dashed to a client meeting he had developed the same stomach flu; as he was about to call his client to cancel the meeting, he got a message that the client had to cancel because he tested positive for Covid. It’s a crazy world. I believe everyone is OK by now.
Then we were off… it was a late start, so we opted for the motorway rather than the smaller roads as we had over the previous drives last week. And even with that decision, it was a beautiful drive just didn’t get us into the thick of all the little villages along the way. But we decided to stop briefly in Fribourg for a snack. Fribourg is home to a major university and has a large medieval center. We parked in a public garage underneath the city and walked around for a while… and had some pizza because all restaurants were already closed since it was past the traditional lunch hours. We realized we had better get back on the road (after having some great gelato!) so that we’d get to Zurich before dark; there had also been a lot of construction on the road, and it looked like we’d suffer some more delays on the remainder of the drive (which we did).
We walked back to the garage and stopped at the pay station. Mike inserted the ticket and then his credit card and then we waited.. and waited.. and waited. We tried to stop the transaction, but nothing happened. We didn’t get the credit card back and we didn’t get the exit ticket. We then noticed that there was a handwritten note taped to the machine well above where you insert your ticket and off to the right side—that we think pretty much said that the machine was not taking credit cards— good information, seen too late. So we pressed the “call” button and a recording came on in German… we began to talk to the robot… and finally a human got onto the call, but didn’t speak much English. Eventually he understood and said, “I come now.” So, we waited again, and waited and waited. Then we pushed the call button again, and once more spoke to the robot and the same guy got on the call again; he hadn’t left yet. We stressed that we needed to get to Zurich and he repeated “I come now”.. About 10 minutes later (which seemed like 10 hours) he arrived and opened up the machine and after some monkeying around with parts, the credit card was retrieved… but we didn’t get an exit pass. He said something and we figured out we needed to get into the car and head to the exit and deal with the exit card once we were at the exit.
We took the elevator down two levels (the garage went down 6 levels) and easily found our car (unlike when we were in Malta), and headed to the exit. There we waited a few minutes with our lights blinking to alert other exit-ers that we’d be sitting there. The guy appeared and opened the exit arm… and off we went. Never paid for the parking!! And now Mike’s credit card is all curved.
We then drove straight to the Helmhaus Hotel… a small 24-room place about a block from the river and very centrally located. It’s sweet and convenient. By now it was after 8 pm, and we still had the car; and we wanted to go somewhere for dinner. We figured that if we returned the car before dinner, we’d never have dinner and we were really hungry. We actually had a reservation at 8:15. We called to push it to 9:00 (which was the last possible time to arrive at Widder Garden). So we decided to keep the car overnight and return it in the morning. But we needed to find a place to park the car overnight. The hotel explained where the nearest public garage (our favorite place) was, and we drove there – It’s a pretty huge underground garage so we’re hopeful that we will find the garage again… and that we will find the car… and that the payment situation will be a little smoother than today.
Then we headed uphill and then downhill and across the river to Widder Garden which turned out to be a really delightful outdoor restaurant… steak tartar… gazpacho… grilled salmon sitting on risotto.. And some alcoholic drinks. All good ways to end a somewhat stressful day.
Tomorrow we will stroll Zurich.
And now we wait to hear about this special master.. what a sham. And what a delay this will be. Seems like this delay and likely other delays will make this whole thing go on and on and ultimately #45 could just slide by again. So unfair. I hope DOJ appeals and wins… Must say watching all of this from afar is pretty strange. Somewhat akin to watching the Democratic Convention in 1996 from Machu Pichu in Peru.
All the best.. We head home on Thursday.
Fern
8. Quiet, Old Town, Sun, Parks, and Finn. 9/4/22
Today was a quiet day…. Post wedding day.. started out late… quick breakfast at our now regular café down the street from the hotel – Christie’s. Turns out that the owners and bakers are Ukrainian. Lots of wonderful decorations highlighting support for Ukraine. Turns out we really missed the big bash after the wedding—at the Cotton Pub where about 25 of Julia and Julian’s friends partied until after 1:00 a.m.! Mmmmm must be getting old since we opted not to attend that part of the celebration.
After brunch we strolled to Geneva’s old town – Vielle Ville – an ancient maze of small streets and squares filled with restaurants, little hotels, galleries, and historic buildings that have pretty great masonry facades. The old town is about 80 feet higher than the lake so it’s a bit of a climb. It was a picture perfect day… about 70-75 degrees, crisp bright sun, so it was very pleasant to walk. Saint Peter’s Cathedral, from the 12th Century, is the major building around which much of the old town is situated. We strolled around for a while and then headed back toward our hotel, stopping a few times to take in views.
Then we headed out again and walked to the little island in the middle of the river (Rhone)… and just wandered for a while. Then we headed back to Christie’s to pick up some wonderfully yummy desserts to bring to Elizabeth’s for dinner. One of the pastries we bought was a perfect cube covered in chocolate powder, making it look like a solid chocolate box (about 2” x 2” x 2”).. but the surprise was cutting into the chocolate cube. It was filled with a perfect half yellow and half blue marshmallow-y cake that clearly represented the Ukrainian flag. The other pasties were: four quarter cakes that sat together to form one bigger cake—1/4 carrot cake, ¼ cheesecake, ¼ red velvet, and ¼ black forest…. !!
Given all the goodies we were carrying, we opted for a taxi to Carrouge where Elizabeth lives and where Emma and Hem and Finn are staying. We had a lovely dinner and the desserts were a big hit. Finn seems to have emerged from his stomach crisis (which prevented him and Hem from attending yesterday’s wedding). He was bouncing around and in pretty good shape. They are headed back to London very early tomorrow morning. And we are headed back to Zurich tomorrow but don’t have any definite departure time since we are driving.
Tomorrow morning’s challenge will be getting the car (that Alfa) out of the garage to head out of town. Not yet sure the route we’ll take but we’ll figure it out tomorrow.
All the best.
Happy Labor Day!!
Fern
7. The Wedding: Geneva. 9/3/22
After a quick brunch at Christie’s a wonderful little bakery (which we learned is owned by Ukrainian bakers) we got ready to head to the wedding.
All 70 guests gathered at the century-old Mairie de Troinix (little town hall in Troinix, a village that is about 15 minutes from downtown Geneva, and where Julia and Julian purchased a house about 18 months ago). Once the bride and groom arrived, we all headed to the top floor of the old building—climbing the winding wooden stairs to the third floor—where the ceremony would be held. The bride and groom and the “witnesses” (Julian’s best friend and Julia’s sister, Emma) sat in the center of one side of a very large “conference-style” table that probably had about 25 chairs around it. Guests then filled in at the other chairs and the remainder of the assembled guests sat around the room. The brief ceremony was conducted by the officiant (maybe like a justice of the peace). After about 10 minutes, they were married.. and signed all the official documents. The ceremony was completely in French so I can’t tell you too much about what was said, but I’m told she talked about destiny… how people meet and how if not for destiny they might just miss each other and never meet! Julia and Julian’s two children were adorable although I’m not sure they really knew what was going on. Ella (nearly 3 years old) managed to crawl under the table when she wound up on the opposite side of her parents and decided she needed to be with them. The under-table route was clearly the most direct one to take. Louis (about 4-1/2) sat more quietly than I have ever seen him before.
I should say that we arrived by taxi which was a bit harrowing … we gave the driver the address and he took us to a little square with a café.. and we were sure it was the wrong place. Then he asked in French if we were going to a wedding. I responded in the affirmative.. and so he immediately turned the taxi around and took us to the neighboring church!! After a quick call to Elizabeth, we went back to that little square with the café. The “mairie” was next door to the café.. and that was the location we needed. Guess the driver just assumed weddings take place in churches.
After the ceremony and some champagne in the courtyard everyone headed to Julia and Julian’s house for a great array of foods and lots of drinking. The weather prediction had been rain but it’s like the clouds just disappeared, and the weather was perfect…. However, at about 5:00 there was a lot of wind and the skies turned dark as a squall blew in with heavy rain for about 20 minutes.. Everyone gathered inside the house, and many stayed out under the tents. We left the party at about 7:00 and from what we know the “young” crowd—30s and 40s– (which comprised about 85% of the guests) were headed to a club for lots more partying with the groom. Julia was headed to the hotel where Julia and Julian will spend two days. He would come a few hours later.. Given that Julia is 5 months pregnant, the idea was that she would be able to rest and avoid what I’m sure will involve a lot of alcohol at the club scene.
By the way, we took a taxi because the garage where our car is parked (about a block from the hotel) is so tightly laid out that it takes about 15 minutes to get the car either in or out. We decided it was best to just leave the car in the garage for our entire stay. And also, that meant we could drink as much as we wanted and not worry about driving.
We opted to head back to the hotel and then get a snack at about 10 pm… rather than to go to Elizabeth’s because little Finn (Emma and Hem’s 3 year old) developed some kind of stomach problem last night and was really not feeling well. So he and Hem never made it to the wedding. We figured there was enough going on at the house and we didn’t need to complicate things any further.
That’s about it… definitely, the day was focused on the wedding which was truly lovely.
We did have a few interesting conversations and learned that the language (which is spoken throughout northern Switzerland) referred to as “Swiss-German” is very different than German (which they call “high-German”). And we’ve been trying to understand how people can afford to live in this country. Prices are totally outrageous. At restaurants you are always asked if you want water, but you always have to pay for the water. In some places it’s a flat amount–$5 for each person at the table, regardless of whether or not everyone at the table wants to drink any water; in other places you pay by the glass. It’s next to impossible to get out of any restaurant for under $100 per person. We know that the minimum wage is something like $23-$27 depending on what “canton” you live in; housing is incredibly expensive—about 30% higher than the Bay Area. Everyone thinks they pay very high taxes but frankly they seem to be pretty much like the US or maybe even lower –depending on one’s tax bracket, from what we can tell; and the more important issue is that they get a lot for their taxes – free quality education, including university, excellent healthcare, good roads and public transportation… and only a very very small part of taxes go to national defense. Quite civilized, I think.
Fern
6. Bern Old Town and Bern to Geneva 9/2/22
This will be short as it’s late and it’s been a long day. In brief, we started the day walking (once again) in the old center of Bern which is about as charming as it gets. It’s the medieval center and has retained all the character of the period. Bordered on three sides by the river it’s actually very compact. There was a fire in 1405 and much of the city had to be rebuilt. Because of all of the rivers you are constantly finding yourself crossing one bridge or another. The river is like a horseshoe as it wraps around Bern. It sometimes splits with little islands in the middle. It never seems to be wider than 200 ft. but is often only about 50’ wide.
We stopped again at Einstein Café for a snack, and this time realized that the café is on the ground floor of the building where Einstein lived during the two years he worked on the theory of relativity. We made a quick stop in the cathedral and checked out whatever arcaded streets we hadn’t explored yesterday. One interesting feature of several of the Swiss cities that Mike especially liked is the fact that the cities have lots of red chairs scattered about plazas and shopping streets so that people can sit, rest, have an ice cream cone or whatever. Just overall, very humane values that are exposed in planning, design, and overall concern for the population.
Unfortunately one health issue hasn’t seemed to have hit the Swiss — they are still smoking! Yes, well- educated, well-employed Swiss of all ages are still smoking—something that truly amazes us.
After a quick lunch, we said goodbye to Bern and headed on the fast route to Geneva for the pre-wedding dinner. Our real purpose in coming to Switzerland this trip (especially since we had been here only four months ago) is to attend Mike’s niece Julia’s wedding. She and Julien have been together for about six years and have two children (and another on the way). Tonight’s event was a chance for the families to meet (although we had already met part of Julien’s family at various Christmases and other events.
But, I digress— the first hour of the drive from Bern goes through beautiful ag land, forests, and pastoral areas. The highway consists of scores of short tunnels on top of which there are animals grazing or parks or crops, or just grassy areas or trees. Where we in the states would probably blast through and create heavy retaining walls, they have preserved the landscape and ag land and only tunneled through. Strange to drive through a tunnel and see corn growing above.
After checking into our hotel – one we have stayed at many times before (but which suddenly seemed very worn and ill-equipped after our stays at such amazing hotels as the Bellevue Palace and des Balances), we quickly headed to the location for the pre-wedding dinner in the town of Carrouge (adjacent to the city lines of Geneva) and where Elizabeth (Mike’s sister-in-law) lives.
Tomorrow afternoon is the wedding – more after that.
Disappointed to learn on CNN that Trump is still a free guy and is likely to still be out in the public when we return on Thursday.
Best – Fern
5. Paul Klee, Cats, and Bridges: A Day in Bern 9/1/2022
BERN!!! Yet another totally charming, well-preserved city…with a population of about 150,000. We started our day with a very light breakfast at Einstein Café. There are a lot of references to Einstein here in Bern since he lived here for about two years but supposedly developed his theory of relativity here. We sort of stumbled on the café as we walked through another area of arcaded streets as we headed to the Paul Klee Museum. The glasses have various mathematical formulas on them harkening to Einstein’s work.
Then we began our marathon walking day; roughly 20,000 steps and 9 reported flights (but I think there were a lot more than what the iPhone recorded)… and a lot of uphill paths. Our destination was the Paul Klee Museum, which in addition to having a delightful show of the artist’s work, complete with a lot of areas for visitors to participate in creating their own Klee versions of geometric patterns and other activities for kids—is a phenomenal work of architecture. The building was designed by Renzo Piano. Apparently, Klee’s daughter-in-law donated most of her inheritance of about 700 works by Klee to the city of Bern.. and other documents were donated by other family members. Klee was very enamored of children and their art.. and seeing so many of his works in one place really conveys that. Klee had a very beloved (and big) cat who is in a lot of photos of the artist. So the curators had a delightful silhouette of a cat scattered at the base of several walls almost sneaking around the space. A good form of whimsy.
The building is a series of three undulating steel “hills” or “waves” that “emerge” from the ground and blend into the landscape. I’m generally more interested in more urban museums and have problems with buildings that are unto themselves “sculptures.” But this one really stands out and yet is modest in the way it becomes part of the landscape. Even if you’re not a Paul Klee fan (which I happen to be), the building is spectacular enough to warrant a visit. The inside includes wonderfully expansive exhibit space, places for concerts and dance performances.
The walk – which was pretty intense was worth it, although perhaps we should have just taken the bus from downtown. No… definitely worth the walk.. which included an elevation change of about 400’ (40 story building). The walk took us through some beautiful (yet more) neighborhoods and vistas from bridges. Lots more red-tiled houses and complexes. The location of the museum is on the outskirts of the town with some commanding views of the local terrain.
From there we walked to Rosengarten Restaurant which is situated in Bern’s Rose Garden – with spectacular views of the Old Town – and a life-size sculpture of Paul Klee seated on a bench – you can sit next to him—which many people did to take selfies (not us!) We had lunch out on the terrace and then braced ourselves for our walk (downhill this time) back to town. But then we decided to head to Dampfzentrale which is a former power fossil fuel power plant that has been transformed into performance spaces and other art venues. Apparently, the city was going to demolish the building but there were a lot of protests regarding preservation and artist demand to create a cultural venue. The artists took over the building and squatted for some time and the authorities eventually relented.
The walk eventually took us down to the river where once again people were swimming and floating on rafts and totally enjoying the water and the weather (By the way, we have really lucked out thus far…. No rain, a lot of sun or partial sun and temperatures in the low 70s – perfect travel weather…. But we think we will hit rain and hotter temperatures in Geneva tomorrow.)
Then as we headed back to the hotel—once again uphill—we reached a point with a pretty steep incline and were totally exhausted. Thought we’d never make it up… But then we spied a funicular and hopped on—with everyone else who needed to get to the top of the incline!! Saved!!
Arrived back at the hotel exhausted… but then it was time for dinner which we decided to have at one of the hotel’s three restaurants. We picked Noumi— the hip restaurant whose menu is focused on interesting fusions of gastronomy. Should have taken notes, but in general we had the Lebanese beef tartare with all sorts of spices and herbs… the second starter was dumplings prepared in a Filipino style. The main dishes we chose included cod prepared with pomegranates and some other goodies… and charred salmon with some lemony butter sauce and yet more goodies.
Okay – ending now.. More on Bern tomorrow and our drive to Geneva.. Onward to the wedding.
Fern
