Désalpe

Switzerland, like any country, has its folk traditions.  None, though, is more quintessentially Swiss than the désalpe (also called the cow parade).

This is the day when the cows (and sheep and people) descend from their summer pastures and dwellings high in the mountains (alps) to their winter pastures in the valley.  People and their livestock have been doing this in Switzerland at least since the 4th century.  And the Swiss Alps look the way they look today (no forest, just cleared pastures everywhere except the rockiest peaks) because of this practice, which is sometimes called "transhumance" (a word none of us knew before a few weeks ago).

Yesterday we had the great pleasure of seeing the désalpe in Charmey.  We're not sure how much the désalpe is still a practical act of moving people and livestock (the illusion was shaken a bit when we saw the cows being loaded onto trucks at the end of the parade route), but it doesn't really matter.  Cows still are big, big business in this part of the world (this is the HQ of Gruyere cheese), earlier in our stay we walked through cow herds at higher elevations than they'd be able to stay at all winter (see our post about our Alpen Tower walk), désalpe festivals can be found in many Swiss towns in late September and early October, and the whole thing was super fun, and even moving, to watch.

Charmey's désalpe is a very popular event.  There is just a single, two-lane road into the tiny town, and that road and the only official parking area were both packed.  Neither the road nor the parking area were designed to handle the volume of traffic that comes to town for this festival.  Almost everything in Switzerland is well managed and well organized, but event parking is not one of their strong suits.  To be fair, this is a mountain town with very limited flat space to convert into massive parking lots, but, still, driving into town and parking were kind of stressful.  Fortunately, we got there early enough that we found a spot on a side road about a mile outside the town.  We took that spot rather than sit longer in the bumper-to-bumper traffic heading into town and the one official parking lot, which probably would have been full by the time we got to it.  We're not sure what people did who arrived after there were no more parking spots in the lot or, for that matter, within 2 miles of the town.

Charmey's main street on the day of desalpe

Unlike the parking, the festival itself was super well organized, with a troupe of decked-out cows and their people parading through town every 30 minutes between 9:30 a.m. and 3 p.m. (or, as they say here, 15:00), with music and other fun stuff happening in between.  We arrived just in time to see the first of the troupes making their way into town.

Leading the Desaple in Charmey

Desalpe in Charmey

One of the most amazing aspects of the désalpe was the sound.  All the cows had bells.  Here's a video, with sound.  Wow!

Part of the fun was the cows' dress.  Many of them wore lovely flower and pine headpieces.

Look out Carmen Miranda!

Sheep on parade!

Musicians performed between the parades.  The highlight here was the Coeur des Alpes, a famous group that plays these really long wooden horns (called alphorns) that at one time were used to communicate across the mountains and valleys.  Click on the third picture below to hear the fabulous sound.

Coeur des Alpes getting ready to play

Coeur des Alpes band manager

There also were many stalls with crafts and cheese and bread and wine and leather goods.  Mark bought a belt (with apologies to the cows).

Buying cheese

Sampling fondue

It was such a fun day that we are thinking about attending another désalpe next weekend!

Raclette and Me

Living in a foreign country, I thought I should at least try my hand at cooking the local cuisine.

Sorry folks!  I did not make chocolate.  Some things just need to be prepared by professionals and sold in stores in fancy wrapping.

I have, however, been hard at work with cheese, potatoes, and sausages! Yum!

First, came the sausages.  In Switzerland, sausages come in many makes and models.  It could be that this is also true in the US and I never noticed it before.  But, here I am surprised at all the different shapes, sizes, colors, and fillings.

Real Swiss sausages -- they looked better in real life, trust me!

We eat sausages nearly once a week.  And they are delicious.  Sausages are best eaten with some form of potato.  In Switzerland they like to slice the potatoes (or grate them) and fry them so they are crispy on the outside and soft on the inside.  Easier said than done!  I am getting better at this technique.

Second, I worked on crêpes!  As we are near the border with France, there are lots of opportunities to eat crêpes.  There are whole restaurants that serve nothing but crêpes as well as sidewalk crêpe venders.  I've had both varieties.  Good stuff!

So I thought I'd try my hand at it.  I found a good (easy) recipe, watched a YouTube video, and I was set!

My first few attempts were spongy (too much batter).  Eventually,  I got the hang of it.   I ended up making two kinds: cheese crêpes and ham and cheese crêpes. 

Here comes the tricky part -- flipping the crêpe!

Ta da!  Julia Child would be proud!

My family was really good about this.  Mark actually claimed to like them, but the boys said they were just OK.  I’m not sure this will be a regular menu item at Chez Ami.

Next on the culinary frontier was Raclette.  This really is a Swiss dish.  I don't think this is made anywhere else, and it's the main dish we've come across here that we hadn't even heard of before.

The basic idea behind Raclette is you take Raclette cheese and melt it and pour it over boiled potatoes.  No problem!  Again, I consulted the internet for a recipe and a YouTube video (there were a strangely large number of Raclette “how to” videos). And, to boot, our local grocery store had a whole Raclette isle with the special cheese, meats, and special Raclette potatoes.  They take Raclette very seriously here!

Table-top Raclette maker.

As you can see, to do this properly you need the specially designed Raclette making machine--basically a little table-top, two-tier broiler with special little cooking pans.  Fortunately, our apartment came with a fully equipped Raclette maker.

Making Raclette was easy and pretty fun but very hot, and the food was very rich.  This is clearly a dish that should be made in the dead of winter when the temperatures dip below freezing.  It's Swiss comfort food.

Ami pouring the melted Raclette cheese over boiled potatoes.  Yum!

I think we all liked the Raclette.  Even Christopher, who is not a fan of cheese, said it was OK.  The table-top cooking reminded our guys of a cook-on-the-table  Japanese steakhouse (the kind of place where you sit around a large u-shaped cook area and a chef (sometimes Japanese, sometimes not) cooks your food, does dazzling things with knives, and generally puts on a show).  While fun to cook on our own table, the guys said they still preferred the Japanese steakhouse to Raclette.  Oh, well; it's hard to compete with a flaming onion volcano.

So, I did it!  I cooked the local cuisine!

Where is the fondue, you ask?  Isn't that, after all, the most famous of Swiss dishes?  Quite right.  The problem, however, is that, even though our apartment's kitchen was equipped with a Raclette maker, it didn't come with a fondue pot!  And I have not had the courage to take this on in our everyday pots.  The funny thing is that we have two fondue pots back in Durham.  Maybe we should have packed those instead of the tennis rackets?

Ah, well. Live and learn!


PS.  I realize I am wearing the same outfit in all of these photos.  Cut me some slack! Remember, I only brought four outfits with me!

A Day in France

One aspect of our sabbatical in Switzerland that we have been excited about from the beginning is the ease with which we can get to other European countries. Switzerland is of course a small country right in the middle of Western Europe.  From our home in Lausanne we can get to all kinds of places fast: Paris (5 hours by train), Milan (3 hours by train), etc.

In planning our time here, we envisioned multiple weekend jaunts to different countries.  But we have learned two things since being here (more than two, of course, but two in particular are relevant here).  First, there are tons of fun and interesting things to do IN Switzerland.  To be honest, Switzerland was never really on my radar screen as a potential vacation spot.  Our time here has really changed my perception.  It is a lovely country that I can’t believe I almost missed.  So now we have our list of things we must do and see in Switzerland before our time runs out.

The second thing we learned is that we don't quite have the energy to do as many weekend trips away as we anticipated.  Our weeks are full with school and work, and just as we of course don't go away every other weekend when we're at home, it's clear to us now that we're not going to be doing that here either.  We'll go to Italy for our fall break, but the upshot is that we've basically decided to prioritize experiencing Switzerland and all it has to offer.  Oktoberfest in Munich can wait for another trip.

All that said, we look at another country every single day from our balcony (from which, recall, we can see across Lake Geneva to France), and at the top of our Lausanne list has been to take a boat trip across the lake to France, just for the day.  So that's what we did this past Sunday.

The weather was perfect:  sunny but not too hot, after the prime tourist season but not yet winter.  There are dozens of potential Lake Geneva boat trips to choose from, everything from your run-of-the-mill commuter boat to an old fashioned three-hour tour on a paddle-wheel steamer.  

At night we can see the lights of one of the more famous French towns on the lake:  Evian, home of spas and bottled water.  But we opted for a trip to Thonon-les-Bains, partly because it looked charming (in the guidebooks), and partly because it would give us a somewhat longer boat ride (about an hour) and the boat ride itself was part of the point of the excursion.

Aye, Aye! Captain!

We had a great time.  The boat trip was lovely.  The boys really got a kick out of being on deck, at the front of the boat watching the waves, below deck eating croissants, and getting closer and closer to France.

Guys on the boat with France in background

Vive La France!

The boat makes a quick stop at Evian on the way to Thonon.

Thonon-les-Bains is a charming fishing village.  We played in the waterfront park, rode the funicular up to the old village center, and walked back down for lunch.

The Port of Thonon-les-Bains

The village at the top of the hill

We had an excellent lunch.   It's maybe a bit cliche that the best restaurant meal we've had since we've been here is the one meal we had in France, but there you have it.  

Lunch in Thonon

Mark and I opted for the “plat du jour” while the guys opted for "nuggets de poulet"  (no joke).  The plat du jour was the chef's selection of viande (meat).  Our only concern was to be sure that we were not ordering cheval (horse), which is very common here both on menus and in supermarkets.  I am sure it is just fine, but I, for one, am not eating Mr. Ed.  So we asked our waiter (in French) what kind of meat was in the chef's special.  He said a word that sounded an awful lot like cheval, but he assured us (in English) that it was not horse but "the papa of Bambi."  Bambi aside, we're fine with venison, but we checked our French-English dictionary just to be certain.  The French word for deer is "chevreuil," which is awfully close to "cheval," at least to our American ears, so I don't think we should feel too bad about our French that we at first mistook chevreuil for cheval.  And the dish was delicious.

After lunch we walked the quai (harbor-side path) until it was time to catch the boat back to Lausanne. Near the park we noticed several signs with the date August 14, 1944.  We assumed this had something to do with WWII.  Christopher and Matthew had all kinds of questions about the war and this gave us a bit of an opportunity to talk about WWII with them.  (And it's not that easy trying to explain the French Resistance on the fly with actual French people within earshot.)  But it wasn't until we arrived back at the apartment when we had a chance to look up the date to find out the real story.  August 14, 1944 was the day when the French resistance fighters took over key ports in Southern France. During the WWII, Thonon was occupied by the Italians and later by the Germans. Evidently, the repression of the resistance movement was harsh and the liberation of the town was difficult.  Clearly a date worth commemorating.  A sign said that the battle on the square we walked through took six hours.  We've commented before on all the ancient history we've encountered, and of course there are no WWII sites in Switzerland, but this was a reminder that European history didn't stop with the Reformation.

As we were heading to the pier to catch our boat back to Lausanne, the sky grew dark and the lake choppy.  The rain drops started to fall just as our boat pulled up.  Fortunately, this was a commuter boat which was largely enclosed and only took 27 minutes to get us back across the lake to Lausanne.

The trip back to Switzerland

And that was our day trip to France.

Everyday

We've been here in Lausanne for more than a month.  Hard to believe how fast time is going!

Our time here has the feeling of a mix between vacation and everyday life.  It is at the same time both a vacation and everyday life; yet not really either.

While we have posted on most of our vacation-like moments, we have not said much about everyday living. Our everyday life here is a lot like our everyday life in Durham, only very different.

Housing. We live in a lovely two-bedroom, 1.5 bath apartment.  This is much smaller than our home in Durham.  When we were contemplating renting this space, we wondered if we would end up killing each other in such cramped space.  Turns out, no.  We are doing just fine.  The guys are sharing a bedroom without any problem.  Mark and I share a work table without any problem.  And we've already shown you the view from our balcony.

Our Living Room

Christopher and Matthew asleep at last.

The only spot that feels cramped is the kitchen.  I like to cook and thus end up spending a lot of time here.  And you know that phrase "too many cooks spoil the . . ." Well, it simply cannot happen here.  There can be only one cook in the kitchen.

The boys at breakfast in our kitchen

All things considered, we like our apartment very much, and we're very comfortable.  It makes us think we have obscenely too much space back home, and makes us wonder if we should downsize when we get back.

Playing. Fortunately, our apartment building has a nice yard with a largish grassy area that the kids can play in.  They go out most days after school to play soccer.

The boys playing soccer in our yard, as seen from our balcony.  We are only
three floors up, though it seems higher from this perspective!

And we are really fortunate to have several parks nearby.  One of our neighborhood parks has an area where the guys play "the owl game."  This is a game they invented in which the boys play as a team against Mark.  If they kick the soccer ball and hit the owl they get a point; if Mark kicks the ball beyond the lovely carved logs and into the grass, he gets a point.  It is quite fun.  The boys have won more games than Mark.

Owl Game

A major difference in everyday life is that we are much less tightly scheduled here.  No little league, piano lessons, chess classes, basketball, choir, etc.  We have signed up for a Saturday morning soccer camp, but that's all.  We are enjoying the slower pace and wondering if we should try to reduce our usual mix of scheduled activities when we get back.  But that'll be way easier said than done.

Shopping. Shopping is a major adventure.  The only real shopping we've done is to the grocery store (our local chain grocery store is called Migros).  Here, as in many (all?) European cities, when you go to the grocery store you bring your own bags.  We forgot the first 2 or 3 times we went to the store (which was embarrassing and difficult -- my purse is big, but not that big!) but after just a few shopping trips bringing bags became automatic.   And we are still working on mastering the art of the small shopping trip.  This is an important skill to master because our refrigerator and kitchen storage is limited.  And fresh-baked bread really is better when eaten the same day that it's made.  So we find ourselves at the store with some regularity. And we really do love the fresh bread.  Sometimes we refer to it as cake; it is that delicious.

A number of people have asked us about items we have not been able to find here.  Shopping is a funny experience.  So many of the things are the same, and yet also different.  It was hard to find maple syrup, chocolate chips (though there is a whole aisle of chocolate bars), fresh spinach, or canned soup, to name a few.  And Goldfish do not exist here.  But we've made do.

Eating.  We eat differently here.  Beef is massively more expensive than at home, so we have eaten it just once since we've been here.  We eat about as much pasta, and more pizza, poultry, sausage, cheese, chocolate, ice cream, and potatoes.  We haven't eaten seafood since we've been here.  The price differential here between eating in and eating out is way larger than at home (with the cost of takeout close to the cost of eating out), so we eat homecooked meals basically every meal (compared with 2-3 meals out per week at home, counting takeout).  We do miss Thai takeout. 

Getting a Hair Cut.  Getting a hair cut is just one of those things that must be done.  It cannot wait the five months until we are back.  So we got out our French-English dictionary, chose a place to get a cut (of which there seem to be several on every block in the city -- the coiffure business is really big here!), and ventured forth.  This first trip to the beauty parlor was just for the guys.  I am waiting for my hair to get really out of control before subjecting myself to the scissors.  And we did OK.  We maybe should not have said, “coupe court”  (short cut), as the gal really took it to heart.  The upside is that the guys will not need haircuts anytime soon!

Coupes courts!

Transportation. Lausanne has amazing public transportation.  We can hop on a bus a half block from our apartment (never waiting more than 5 minutes for one on a weekday) or walk 3 blocks to a subway station.  (Lausanne is the smallest city in the world with a subway system.)  We take the kids to school on the bus or train, so we ride it twice a day every day.  We almost never drive when we go somewhere in town, including to the University, downtown, to the Lake, to a museum, or to the office supply store on the other side of town.  The only exception is that we do usually drive when we go grocery shopping (since, as noted above, we still have not mastered the art of the small shopping trip).  And we also walk many places.

All in all, we drive very little here, which is very different from our day-to-day life in Durham.  We had a long debate before we arrived about whether or not we should lease a car here.  We did.  I think at the end of the day we are glad we have a car, even if we don't use it that often.  Besides grocery shopping we mostly use our car for weekend outings out of town.  The car is especially nice to have for the weekend outings, though even for some of those (like to Geneva) we take the train.

Our car.  It's a Dacia.  Not sure its country of origin.

Washing.  I don't mind laundry, but it is not my favorite chore either.  Here I find that I do not mind laundry at all.  I attribute this to two features.  First, the distance between the dirty laundry bin and the laundry machine is very short -- another virtue of a smaller living space.  Second, we brought so few clothes that, at most, we can only do three loads of laundry at a time, which is amazingly easy to do and does not take that long to fold!  Basically, it's clear that, just as we don't need as much living space as we have at home, we also don't need as many clothes.  Another adjustment to consider when we get home.

Our washer and dryer.

Reading. We read a lot, and we wondered how we were going to manage getting enough English-language reading material here.  This has been solved for us in some traditional and non-traditional ways.  Upon our arrival, our landlady generously brought us three bags of Enlish-language children's books that her children were willing to share with us.  She provided us a great selection of non-fiction and fiction books.  And, for the non-traditional solution, we have become huge users of our e-readers (Kindle as well as ibooks).  Kindle has been great for me, Mark, and Christopher.  The ibooks reader (on the ipad) has been great for Matthew.  Through these devices, we've been able to get (almost) all the books we've been interested in, not to mention reading U.S. newspapers every day on the internet.  And none of this reading material will weigh down our luggage when we return!  I do feel a little guilty about not patronizing the local book stores (we hear there is an English-language bookstore in town, but we haven't had a reason to track it down), but on the other hand we are saving many trees!

Speaking of Kindle and ibooks, this experience would be very different in a lot of ways were it not for all of our gadgets and the internet that enhances their power.  This is one area of packing we did not hold back on.  We brought three laptop computers, an iPod, two ipads, an internet phone (with headset), two DSIs, a GPS (with European maps), and two Kindles.  Upon arrival we bought a printer and two cell phones.  Our apartment came with hi-speed internet access.  We spend so much time using one or the other of these gadgets that it's very difficult to imagine this experience without them.  Maybe we'd be spending more time hanging out in cafes speaking French and asking local people for directions.

Our gadgets

Other random things we are glad we brought:

Calculator. Christopher chose to bring his calculator in his carry-on luggage.  This little machine has come in super handy--from calculating exchange rates (which we try not to do too often, as it is painful!) to learning about the concept of "power of..."  And Christopher discovered this neat little fact:  1, 2, 3 is the only three-digit combination (or, at least, the only one we could think of) where the numbers multiply to the same number that they add to.  That is:  1 +2 + 3 = 1 * 2 * 3 = 6. Very interesting!

Band-Aids.  I always have a little bag of Band-Aids with me.  It is just a feature of having two young, super active kids.  In addition to my usual stash, I added a bunch to our luggage.  And, in just a month, we have blown through them all.  I guess Band-Aids are a high-use item in our household!

Tape. When I threw a roll of scotch tape in my carryon bag, one might have thought that was a strange addition to our luggage.  However, Matthew loves, loves, loves to make creations out of paper (masks, paper trains with tracks, scrolls, daggers, people).  These often require lots of tape.

DSI. Under any other circumstances I would not be praising the virtues of the kids' DSIs (these are electronic handheld games that suck any hope of conversation out of the room when they are on), but I feel the need to mention their value. They have come in very handy -- as alarm clocks!  Our apartment has no alarm clock, nor did we bring one.  Turns out the DSI has a very effective alarm function that we use daily.  It even has a snooze feature.  Who knew?

Uno.  Just as we were heading out the door for the airport, Kathy George (our friend and former nanny) suggested throwing the Uno cards in Matthew's bag.  I was skeptical about the value of carrying them across the ocean, but they have come in very handy.  Not only do we find ourselves playing Uno on some of those afternoons and evenings when we are not rushing off to a basketball game or finishing homework (which the boys don't have here -- see our post about the first day of school), the non-English speaking children of our friends Joerg and Denise knew how to play too!  We knew soccer and chess were international games, but who knew Uno was as well?

All in all, everyday life here is very pleasant.  It makes us question some of the ways we live when we're at home, which I suppose is part of the reason for living abroad for a time.