Flash backs

Although we have moved quite a bit north there are a number of things here in Solna which are not all that different from phenomena close to our previous homes. One of the first warm evenings we had this view from our kitchen window:

... and that does remind us of Swiss hot air balloons.

Not long after that Lisbeth met this little fellow:

... and he is quite similar to his American cousin.

One of the local lakes has this fountain:

We believe this must be by Genevian inspiration.

And although there are not quite as many rabbits here as there are ground squirrels in Goleta, we do see them almost every day. Also, we nearly ran one down - just like we had to keep an eye out for potential road crossers on the bike paths around UCSB.

Spring in Solna I

It has to be realised that we moved further north - and thereby got an opportunity to experience spring 2-3 times this year (first in Geneva, a little in Copenhagen and then in Stockholm). Nybodagatan is close to a green area, Skytteholm park, and here it is particularly easy to observe the difference it made when spring came to Sweden shortly after we did.

The House Hunting

Allow us please to take a look back in time - April last year, to be more exact:

We were living in a small room on the upper floor in the house of one of the secretaries from Tue's department in the village Veyrier a few miles outside of Geneva. The secretary in Tue's group had found this room for us as a temporary solution, so we had a place to stay while looking for somewhere else to stay. It turned out the lady renting it out had already made other plans for the future, so we kind of had to find somewhere else to stay during the first month.

Before we arrived we had been warned that houses and apartments were much in demand in Geneva, but no one had explain to us the details of just how fundamentally different the renting market works in Geneva - compared to what we knew from Copenhagen and Santa Barbara. Practically all rentals are handled by a rental agency (so-called regie), where one has to apply for renting. So far so good. We quickly learned that there's at least a score of different such regies in Geneva, as well as a whole lot about in which ways they are different and in which ways they are similar.


Generally, one couldn't expect to have a single person working in their offices who spoke anything but French (good going considering that approximately 1/3 of the people in this city are foreigners). It was also quite general when applying to have to prove having indeed the right to stay in the canton of Geneva as well as having a steady income sufficiently large to pay the rent and not being wanted by the police (the latter demand usually vanished when one could prove that one had just arrived in Switzerland). It was also absolutely required to go and visit the apartment being applied for - this then had to be arranged with the person living there (if someone was still living there) or with the regie. Happily we have repressed the memory of just how many times we arrived wet from the pouring rain to visit an apartment only to learn that the viewing had been cancelled without anyone bothering to tell us... Apart from that it was actually a pretty good rule, especially as we saw a couple of places we didn't want to rent after seeing them.

At certain of the regies it was only allowed to apply for one apartment at the time - which is absurd seeing as one was usually given the rejection so late that by then it would be much to late to apply for any other apartments one had already noticed them to be offering. Some places it was best to keep an eye on their homepage - other places one had to call. Some wouldn't even consider an application without references - other seemingly couldn't care less about references. On top of that they had their own set of ideas of what size apartment with be suitable for who ("No sir, if you have 2 children we will not rent less than a four-room - no, we do not have any four-rooms for 2000 CHF/month").


All in all, we ended up visiting at least twenty apartments of which we applied for at least fifteen - we had a spreadsheet to help us keep track of the details of all the apartments. Not that this prevented us from receiving rejections for apartments we no longer knew which were. And I think there was one we visited which we completely forgot to apply for. When, late in April, we were suddenly offered an apartment (and this did not happen until we starting including with the application a letter from the professor imploring the regies to rent apartments to visiting scholars - otherwise the university couldn't survive) we couldn't very well remember how the apartment had been when we saw it - but we took it (and as you should know by know we were quite happy with it).

All this was of course very time consuming and difficult - not to mention stressing - so when we had to find an apartment in a new city again this year (and had been warned once again by university secretaries that this city could be particularly difficult for housing) we turned to modern tools and got ourselves a sublet via Facebook!

Shopping in Geneve

No, we haven't gone mad and have starting shopping big time while we are trying to sort out which things to keep and which not to keep before moving all of the former to Stockholm. But before it's too late we want to present to you a nice Swiss phenomenon, that is the wheeled shopping bag:


In Denmark it might only be fragile old ladies who drag these bags around, but down here ALL kinds of people have them - men, women, young, elder. Therefore, they are of course available in all sorts of colours and patterns - we have even seen one with pink flowers.

Unfortunately we never got around to buying one (having only some 100 yards to the supermarkets and being a household of only two we never really needed one) but we have observed that the trick is to place it strategically near the cash registers so it's easy to get it when all the goods have been bought. Some people apparently are not so trusting of their fellow shoppers, as we see people pushing around these wheeled bags inside common shopping carts!


The popularity is probably due to the fact that almost all apartment complexes here have elevators, making it nice and easy filling the bag up with a gallon of milk and six large bottles of water at Migros, rolling them home, taking them up the elevator, and loading them straight into the fridge door. In Copenhagen this sort of bag would always be unhandy when having the carry the loot three floors up the stairwell!


We are aware that we owe posts from our trip to Italy, but we have realised that they won't be coming until we are done with the move.

Spring in Geneva

Posts on our wonderful pre-Easter vacation to Italy will appear shortly but before we finish sorting through the photos we would like to delight our readers with some photos from our long walk around Geneva today.

While in Italy, spring apparently arrived in its fullest. All the trees along the river we look on to have come into leaf and are sporting the finest pale green leaves.

To particularly Lisbeth's great joy we passed a blooming magnolia tree and that's enough proof to actually pack away the winter clothes, right?

But it is a little surreal to walk around in a park where people are dressed down to bikinis and enjoying the 23 degrees celsius while looking on snow caps on the surrounding mountains.

Decadent dessert

In a fairly recent post on parallel imports we mentioned Danish chocolate turtles. Afterwards it occured to us that we hadn't had any for quite a while. So on her last trip to Copenhagen Lisbeth picked us up a pack of them.

On a reussi

Since October we have been taking French classes two evenings per week. Because a new 3-month session will begin on Monday, tonight was our last time at École du Monde. This last lesson wasn't particularly stressing as we spent the time eating chocolate while going over the answers for the test the we had Monday. Moreover, as he is never there on Wednesdays the manager of the school had already given us our diplomas and our departure gift before the test...

Moving fun ahead!

One of the 'pleasures' of moving is the perfect opportunity it provides for sorting out one's belongings and if we really wanted to make life easier for ourselves - particularly since we currently move internationally with an annual frequency - we would stop adding to our book collection or perhaps even get rid of it. It's doubtful that that will ever happen so we just have to live with the fact that our moves will require substantial energy and more muscle power...

Our book cases was sold Tuesday this week so now our books are piled up on the floor. Hopefully our chests of drawers will also go soon and then we can literally live in a suitcase for the next month!

Bear and Bernese Oberland

According to legend Bern is named for the bear that the founding Duke of the city shot on his first hunting expedition in the region. Therefore, there is of course a bear pit in Bern today. Only a single bear was outside when we walked by but we hope that he has some friends, just as we are happy that they are busy building him a new ... ehr.. pit. He did look healthy though, although perhaps slightly annoyed that we didn't throw him some goodies.

As mentioned, the oldest part of Bern is surrounded by the river Aare on three sides and since this area in addition comprises a ridge, it provides excellent views of water several places around the city just as one can see as far as the Bernese Oberland on a clear day. From the top of the cathedral tower we could just make out the Jungfraujoch where plenty of snow is still to be found.
We would recommend enjoying the view above from the micro brewery with the lovely translated name: 'The old tram depot' (http://www.altestramdepot.ch/htm/home.htm) (OK... that sounds a lot funnier in Danish, the English and German versions are quite similar) where they serve pretty good beer and hearty food in a relaxed atmosphere seated by communal long tables. In the summer time their terrace must be the ultimate spot to enjoy a cold lager.

The various levels in the city produce a need to easily reach one level from another so by the cathedral a public elevator is found. This way one can quickly reach the gorgeous little cathedral park from the river level. We had no desire to leave the sunny areas though so for once we just admired the lovely old building instead of trying out the structure.

Bern

Having lived in Geneva for almost one year we thought it was about time to visit Bern - both because it's only a two-hour train ride from here but also because we fell we can't leave the country again without having visited the capital.

'We' were us and Emilia, who Lisbeth knows from her studies in Rotterdam and who recently moved to Geneva. It's a small world, Europe is even smaller, and Geneva is smallest of all: Emilia is now living in the street behind ours!


It was an incredibly cold and windy day but with a clear sky so when dotting the wander with plenty of breaks for coffee and lunch we managed to spend most of the day outside.

None of us know much about the city before the visit but it is beautifully located on a sharp bend on the river Aare (for once it's not a city by a lake!) and even has a Unesco nominated medieval city centre. Add a couple of interesting museums and some great cafés and you have plenty of reasons to visit.

The parliament of Switzerland is obviously seated in Bern and is located in a beautiful palace-like building which unfortunately was closed for tours this Saturday and which is also completely impossible to photograph on market day.

It is however also the clock tower - Zytglogge - which is the landmark of Bern. We dutifully returned to it just before the hour struck to watch the little figurines do their thing but we weren't all that impressed...

On the other hand we really liked the characters that adorn the tops of fountains scattered around the city (photo below) or sit on projections on the old buildings. Particularly the ogre that eats small children was .. ehm .. interesting.

Btw. we have had a little one...

.. A mini laptop that is!

Since we live parts of our lives online and more than a fraction of that in travelling mode, we invested in this smoking piece of electronic with the aim of increasing our mobility.

Lisbeth bought it when she was in Copenhagen in December but since it wasn't delievered with a protective sleeve, the return trip to Geneva wasn't quite the ease on the cabin luggage as expected.

But subsequently it was duly equipped (in Newcastle - it is evidently a globetrotting laptop!) and the first 'proper' trip through various airports showed that it is exactly as handy as hoped for.

Chère Brigitte

GHI is the free weekly paper of Geneva which we faithfully leaf through every week and thus happily find that we steadily can read more and more of the content. Initially it was primarily the personal adds that we fully understood - and unfortunately it wasn't the section that either of us really needed to get established here - but now we can also follow some of the other events in town.

But recently we discussed the oddity of the paper containing 'Dear Abbey' (here called Chère Brigitte) regarding sexual problems. Brigitte answers questions on anything from infidelity to erectile dysfunctions and since the Genevans seem to have an abundance of problems, it is obviously a fine service but is it really suitable for a weekly paper that otherwise concentrates on classifieds?! Not even in the so-called liberal Denmark have we seen something similar.

Parallel import

The post on imported baking ingredients last week made us think about which other things we are having summoned from other parts of the world. Obviously certain products are not widely available and we feel nostalgic about them (TimTams from Australia, smoked rolled sausage from the butcher in Tue's hometown; Danish chocolate turtles) but we don't actually NEED them. But here we present some of the things where we haven't been able to find similar products or where the found substitutes just can't match the preferred items.

First the stuff we are having sent/bring back from Denmark:

Cheese strings - The Danish/Scandinavian cheese cutter isn't yet globally found so we have to send for spare strings when they snap. Luckily they don't take up much room and a packet of three strings lasts a long time.

Liquorice - because in contrast to all expectations it is almost impossible to buy liquorice here in Geneva. With the proximity to Northern Europe we had expected that it would be easy to find but actually it was easier in California where Trader Joe's carry Panda liquorice (connaisseurs will know what this is) as part of their regular assortment. In Geneva the best option is to go to IKEA but since it's both quite far and they only have a limited selection, we have build a little stock pile after several visits from and to Denmark.

Lypsyl lip balm - Despite the fact that our lip balms states an US address we never succeeded in finding this brand in Santa Barbara and neither here in Switzerland have we seen them. So we make sure to buy them when we're in Denmark because attempts with alternatives have not been successful. Since we also prefer the same type and they are rather small, it doesn't prove difficult.

Books - Both of us like a number of Danish and Scandinavian authors so in order to follow these authorships Danish books are often found on our wish lists. Before Lisbeth moved away from Copenhagen, she attempted to keep Tue up to date on the best new Danish movies but this is an area where we have given up now.

After our stay in the US we are also relatively dependent on certain non-Danish things:

Biotherm cleansing foam - Yes, it is possible to buy Biotherm in Switzerland but not the specific foaming soap that an insistent sales woman in Nordstrom, Seattle made Lisbeth try and then prefer. So on his recent visit to the Netherlands poor Drew had to bring several bottles across the Atlantic.

Gillette clear gel - It is not just Lisbeth who is particular about certain beauty products because when Tue on his arrival to Geneva realised that he couldn't buy the special Clear Gel version, he promptly imported 6 sticks from the UK. And since that's plenty for maybe another year Drew didn't have to go shopping on Tue's account.

Excedrin tension headache - Drew was however also delegated to bring Lisbeth more Excedrin since her stock ran out in November. But since he brought a huge jar (250 count - no, there is no reason to hide one's medicine consumption) she should be covered for a long time now.

American magazines - Desired British and American books are relatively easy to locate here in Geneva and if not, we are keen customers with Amazon but Lisbeth really misses Border's wide selection of magazines. Bon Appetit was one of the few favorite magazines which it was possible and affordable to sign up for an overseas subscription of so every month we test the efficiency of both the US and the Swiss postal systems (so far we have received 2 out of 3). Other magazines can be bought here in Geneva for astronomous amounts of Swiss francs which is why she is starting to do without...

We have no immediate expections for the need to import Swiss stuff when we move again but we guess we won't know until later just how dependent on Gruyère Salé we have become!

Better Mornings

.. it just is a better morning when one can enjoy the morning coffee (or tea) drinking from one's recently purchased cow-mug (or mountain goat cup). They lift our spirits.

Kalundborg Radio

Hey, is that an old-fashioned radio (note that it is possible to tune in to Kalundborg Radio!) there in the middle of Plainpalais? Nope, that is just one of the many nicely painted electricity boxes around Geneva.

Since Geneva seems to be short on interesting additions to the mailbox theme, we will instead present a sample of the many painted electricity boxes that we have seen around the city:

Some of them bear a relation to their location; for instance the bumper car box is situate right next to the square where travelling fun fairs are set up, but this is more the exception than the rule. Although the giraffe below seems to be nibbling from one of the surrounding live trees there is no zoo in the area or even in Geneva.

A few has a more direct relation to Geneva, such as Jean Henry Dunant, the founder of Red Cross:

And of course the noble mountain goat that is gracefully reminding us of the Switzerland outside of the asphalt covered urban areas:

Although most of the unpainted boxes are covered in graffiti, rather few of the decorated ones have been 'tag' sprayed, so we wonder if all subcultures appreciate the ornamentation or if Geneva spends a lot of money on cleaning them. They are certainly fun to spot and a lot prettier than the boring grey ones.

Baking day

For once we made home-baked buns today which led to considerations on desired ingredients. We wonder why, when we hear of Americans who miss particular American products. Well, not if it's particular ready-made products such as Dr. Pepper (well, maybe a little anyway...) that aren't widely available in Europe. But we've heard of people that bring shortening (which essentially is just a non-perishable version of margarine that can very well can be substituted by ... margarine!) and Clabbergirl Baking Powder (yes, baking powder that is easily replaced by European... baking powder!). We attribute the latter to people's lack of inclination to experiment with other products in their cooking/baking and this is probably also where the reason for the lugging of the huge amounts of semi-processed convenience foods such as cake mix, macaroni and cheese mix, taco mix, soup mixes, guacamole mix across the Atlantic is to be found.

While we personally think that these semi-processed products are silly since the food is just as easy to make from scratch (often with better taste, cheaper, and not least with less fat, additives, and colouring agents) we fully understand the need for products when it's not possible to find a proper substitute or when it's not feasible to make the product from scratch. We certainly missed a few Danish/European ingredients while we were in the States. These were primarily for baking since most other 'speciality' foods are possible to make at home (e.g. liver pate, "cold bowl", rusk, remoulade) albeit involving a bit of detective work from time to time. So we did our share of parallel import: mainly leaf gelatine (indispensable for the great unbaked cheesecake) and vanilla sugar (possible to make yourself but also very easy to mail from Denmark) + liquorice obviously - but that's a whole other story.

The need for fresh yeast was less easy to solve so here we had to change the recipes to procedures suitable for dry yeast. Great was our joy then when we saw fresh yeast stacked up in the supermarkets here in Geneva, and leaf gelatine and vanilla sugar were also just to be picked from the shelves (see photos) - luxury!

But here ten months later we can count on one hand how many times it has been necessary for us to buy said fresh yeast. When the bread in the supermarket is absolutely fantastic there just isn't the same need to make one's own as when we were in California and had a loooong way to bike to Trader Joes to buy the good (no, not fantastic as the Swiss bread but yes, good, and certainly much better than the boring bread in nearby supermarkets) bread.

The albino spider

One of the first days in the new year we discovered this little (approximately the size of a dime, including the legs) creature on one of the chairs in our living room. It stood still long enough for us to take a picture, but afterwards it quickly disappeared. Some days later we saw it on the bookshelf, but by now it has been quite a while since we saw it last. It's the first time we've seen such a pale spider, but google of course swiftly brings up pictures of even paler paler spiders...

Parc aux Animaux

After living here for about half a year we discovered that inside one of the nearby parks there's a small animal park with rabbits, little ponies, chickens, peacocks etc. After a couple of visits we even found the enclosure with mountain goats (one might opine that we are a bit slow on the uptake...) and by now our Sunday strolls sometimes passes by them. Apart from being some pretty remarkable animals in and off themselves, we also want to acknowledge them for being considerably more active than the wild boars we so far have only seen lying still and snoring very snug in their hay.

The mountain goats have a very nice area with lots of boulders, different levels and projections, and some heavily tested trees where they are hopping around. It seems to be an extended family with a couple of males, some females, and a couple of kids. All of them have horns, but they vary quite a bit in shape and size:

And that horns can be very usefl was demonstrated last Sunday by this goat - although we think that exquisite motor control is strictly required:

If the mountain goats weren't particularly delighted by exactly our visit, we felt very welcome when we met another acquiantance there - the apparently resident cat in the park, approached us meowing happily and was pleased to be scratched a little in his furry profusion:

The referendum of today

The EU discussion has been raging here in Switzerland for many years, and the latest most tangible result was that the Schengen agreement came into force in December 2008. This was particularly to the joy of all holders of non-European passports who are now able to go to France, for instance, without applying for a visa.

Today the Swiss are once again voting on the bilateral mobility agreement with EU as a consequence of the EU expansion of January 2007 to include Romania and Bulgaria. A yes would mean that the common agreement with EU on the mobility of the workers would continue and thus also include Romania and Bulgaria while a no would mean that Switzerland would withdraw from the bilateral agreement with EU. The latter would have significant consequences for all the non-Swiss working here - both the resident non-Swiss and the cross-border commuters, e.g. all the French that commute daily from France to work in Geneva. Obviously Switzerland will most probably enter agreements with each country instead but it will be much more complicated than just keeping the bilateral agreement with EU.

The Yes-sayers argue that it is economically necessary to continue the bilateral agreement while the No-sayers claim that it would be economical suicide to open the Swiss borders to workers from Romania and Bulgaria.

These are the same arguments that other countries in Europe have struggled with but what has surprised us the most is the No-sayers' crude graphic expression and their explicitly phrased aversion to Romania and Bulgaria: The Yes-sayers use much more sophisticated arguments for their recommendation but they have also expressed their point-of-view in a very comprehensible illustration:

We're very excited about the result of today's referendum. Unfortunately the No-sayers have been gaining grounds in the last few years, so ...

UPDATE:
We've just learned that 60% voted yes to keeping the bilateral agreement. Sanity prevails!

Snow patrol

Even though the mountains have been covered in lots of snow for a while now (cf. the last post on sledding), we've had very little snow here in Geneva. Not even the icy cold days around New Year brought snow, and thus we've only had a couple of days with a bit of snow falling in the morning but only staying on the ground for about an hour.

So we were excited when we woke up to the most beautiful snowy weather this past Sunday. It continued to snow most of the day giving us plenty of time to get outside and enjoy it. By now all is melted away again and today's weather has resembled spring, so maybe Sunday was THE day of snow in Geneva this winter...