A Well Kept Man

The weather has finally made a turn for the better here in Switzerland. The familiar signs of Spring began a few weeks ago, but over the last few days have become much more abundant. The first sign of Spring we noticed is the lake level (of Lake Geneva) is much, much lower than normal (if you look closely at the fork in the water, you can see the normal water level on the tines...). We have postulated as to the cause, and have deduced two and only two possible solutions: the snow has not yet melted from the Alps to replace the water that dissipates due to the dry winter air; or the water bottling factory in Evian has started using lake water instead of natural alpine springs (if it's the latter, I'm sure they filter out the duck poo).


The second sign of Spring is the emergence of the first flowers such as tulips, crocuses, and other flowers such as yellow and purple ones (that is the official name, yellow and purple...can you tell I am not the botanist?).


The final sign of Spring is the emergence of the winter dork from his hibernation. Hopefully we can capture more pictures of him striking a pose in his natural habitat...

I just put our weekend guests on the train yesterday morning so things are quiet once again in our apartment...Alli's cousin Tina and her husband Kevin visited us on the front end of their European trip which gave us an opportunity to catch up with them, as well as see a few things in the area we haven't yet been able to see. On Saturday, we all braved the cool Spring rain to go to a chocolate festival near Geneva in Versoix. Local artisan chocolatiers were handing out samples, as well as showing off their chocolate skills by making various Easter shaped chocolate treats such as eggs and bunnies. If you like chocolate, this was the place to be...we also enjoyed a nice pork sausage and fries lunch under the tent, rode on the the chocolate train, and admired chocolate art. The entire tent smelled of chocolate, which is either bad or good depending on your mood...thankfully we already consumed lunch so it was appropriate for us to sample (our favorite was a lime flavored chocolate that only came in 6-inch bunny size, even though I asked in French for something smaller).

We also drove up to La Gruyère to check out their castle, as well as have lunch at the only open restaurant on Sunday (McDonald's...fountain Coke always tastes sooooooo good). The castle wasn't as spectacular as some of the others we have visited, although at this point of the adventure most of the things we see tend to rank much lower than they should due to Europe fatigue (it's not that we don't think things are cool or unique anymore, it's just that after a while everything starts to look the same...our visitors on the other hand loved the experience...). We drove up into the Pre-Alps to give our guests a sense of how much it has snowed this winter, and then spent the afternoon along the lake visiting a food museum and wishing for the sun to make an appearance. The weekend seemed to pass by quickly, which speaks to the fun we experienced with each other. The last adventure took us back to Lausanne where I surprised everyone with a trip to a zoo in the city with farm animals...none of us really knew what to expect but the highlight was seeing the baby pigs causing all kinds of trouble. I didn't realize pigs could get so hairy (I thought they were dogs from a distance, perhaps you can tell why). Nevertheless, it is always nice to have visitors but sadly our time here is fading and our last few visitors arrive in the middle of next month.

I just got back from my French lesson...nothing interesting to report, except:

The highlight of our week of ski hands down was the Snow-Balancer adventure on the second-to-last night we were in Zermatt. Our group spent the better part of many months our time leading up to this trip trying to determine what exactly the Snow-Balancer would be...most of us figured it would be some sort of toboggan or 3-legged device, but everyone pretty much concluded that it would resemble a sled more than anything. So when the big day arrived we were greeted at the hotel by the hotel's owner who would be taking us on our adventure (along with her husband) and our Snow-Balancers. We were all a bit surprised to find out that the Snow-Balancer is basically a seat attached to a ski with a shock absorber mounted between the ski and the seat (and by seat I mean a piece of durable plastic with two holes strategically placed to hold your bum still while you rocketed down the mountain).

We also didn't realize that we would be taking the actual ski runs down to the base of the mountain (we all figured it was just going to be a few runs on a bunny hill or something). Wrong!! Our adventure began at 2939 m (9642 ft...almost 2 miles) and finished at 1620 m (5314...just over one mile), meaning we rode this thing vertically for eight-tenths of a mile (the actual length of the course is still being calculated by my independent auditing firm). The basic principle is to sit on the balancer, balance on the ski, and hold on tight as you attempt to turn your torso enough to carve gentle S-curves while hurling down the mountain. The more you leaned back the easier it was to control, but this lifted your feet further off the ground which may present a problem if you needed to quickly stop as your feet were the only brakes.

For a somewhat poor comparison, imagine being on inline skates going down a big hill and you suddenly find yourself in grass...if this has ever occurred to you than you know that if you fail to start running (in spite of the wheels on your feet) you will fall flat on your face as the grass prevents your wheels from doing their job. This principle is very similar with the balancer as the second your feet hit the ground you either need to stand up and start running, or be prepared for white-out conditions in your face as you have just turned into a snow plow without windshield wipers. I think I managed a few times to either impersonate Superman or a snowball sliding not-so-gracefully down a steep hill. Alli had no problems but somehow she wound up with lots of bruising on her legs (definitely not from falling on top of the snow-balancer).

In spite of the apparent danger of this activity (we even signed a waiver in German, I am sure that regardless of what happened we still had some legal recourse...Ich spreche kein Deutsch) we had a great time. I for one couldn't stop giggling every time I launched off a mogul and managed to stick the landing like Mary Lou Retton (although the German judges didn't give me a good score). In spite of my being unable to sit normally for the next few days, I would do it again if I had the chance. The only negative was as the event progressed I noticed a damp chill on my posterior that I soon discovered was caused by me leaving my back pockets on my snow pants open, allowing all of the snow encountered on my various slides down the mountain to enter my pants where it immediately melted. Hence, we have this picture from our dinner (which we consumed at the midpoint of our journey...cheese fondue and air-dried meats, delicious!!) of me trying to dry out my assets. As far as I could tell, everyone had a great time and found it much easier to balance on the contraption after their tummies were filled with cheese and wine (not to mention the fact that it was pitch black and we had lights attached to our heads so we could see our way down in the dark).

Last Saturday, we traveled with Alli's dad and his significant other by train to Zermatt, Switzerland. Alli's sister and her German boyfriend were also in attendance, although they arrived later as they were traveling by rail from Germany. Zermatt is home to the world famous Matterhorn peak, which stands alone at 4,478 meters (14,692 feet) above sea level. Even though it isn't the highest peak in Switzerland, it is certainly one of the most recognizable and heavily photographed (I think Alli's dad took no less than 75 pictures of the peak). Zermatt is a unique ski town that is only serviced by a train to outside visitors, which means you don't have to worry about cars and street noise (except for the electric carts that furry people back and forth from hotels and taxi stops to train stations and restaurants). We pretty much stuck to walking through the city as it is rather compact and the weather was pleasant.

We skied every day from Sunday through Friday, usually starting with breakfast at 7:30am sharp (because that's when it opened and we couldn't possibly wait any longer), followed by getting our ski gear on and out to the train by 8:45am. (The train was the easiest way to reach the slopes, not necessarily the quickest...one could take a tram that climbed through the mountains to reach the ski area in about 10 minutes, but that required a 15 minute walk, or you could take a taxi to one of the other gondolas or cable cars, but that would require spending more money...so we stuck to the train). Susie's boyfriend Felix was the leader of the group which enabled us to not worry about whether or not we were about to ski off a cliff or into terrain only suited for the chamois (really just a mountain goat, but nevertheless we managed to see a few dozen of these guys). By the end of the week, Felix decided he had enough of constantly stopping to wait for the group so he went off on his own to finish his week on a strong note.

I tried to keep up, but I failed to have my skis tuned before we came to Switzerland so I wasn't as fast as I could have been (although to be honest I probably would have ran into something if I went much faster as I was already feeling out of control at times). Alli and her sister were usually right behind Felix and myself, with their dad and Judi coming shortly thereafter. We tried to ski from the moment we arrived on the mountain (usually 9:30ish) until 1 pm or 2pm to take advantage of the better skiing conditions in the morning, as well as to avoid the lunch rush. If there is a negative of Zermatt it has to be the cost of things...where else can two people spend 43 CHF on lunch and only have 2 brats, some hash browns, and a large Coke (ok, besides Disneyworld)? After sitting for lunch (which lasted anywhere from 45 minutes to 2 hours depending on soreness and day of the week), we would all ski until 4pm before trying to find our way back to the hotel for a jacuzzi, nap, and then dinner. So really a full day filled with a lot of exercise and good food.

For those that ski, the slopes were very nice...Zermatt is mostly intermediate (red slopes in Europe, blue in the U.S.) although I would say they are a little more difficult than most of the blues I have been on in the States. The few black runs (most difficult) were challenging, but not so much so that you pictured yourself being airlifted to the nearest hospital with a broken leg. The majority of the resort is serviced by high speed chairlifts, gondolas, and cable cars, although there are a few pull ropes, t-bars, and plate lifts (the kind that goes between your legs). In full disclosure I managed to fall off the plate lift after riding it for about 10 minutes (and maybe 2 minutes from the top), which due to the grade of the mountain required me to ski back down to the bottom (after overcoming the constant jeers from my skiing party) and reattempt the endeavor. Zermatt also is interesting as you can ski from Switzerland into Italy and vice versa (which we did twice). The Italian side (called Cervinia) seemed less alpine (less trees, yodelers, and no Ricola) but provided some of our more memorable runs. One just needs to be wary of the time and weather as not to get stuck there should the lifts back to Switzerland close down before you have made it back (apparently this happened to quite a few people on New Years, requiring a 6 hour bus ride all the way around the mountains to get back to their respective Swiss resorts as there is no direct route).

Shh! Alli's tired from six days of skiing, don't wake her up (she also managed to get a cold from her dad, for which she is very thankful)! I will provide details of our trip over the next few days, but for now I have to do laundry and clean up the apartment as we have more visitors coming this weekend.

We are spending the week in Zermatt skiing around the Matterhorn with Alli's family so there won't be any new posts until next week.  If you need to get in contact with us, we will be staying at the Hotel Simi.  Hopefully the snow will be epic, the fondue melty, and the jacuzzi bubbly...

One of the highlights of the Salon de Geneve (Geneva Motor Show) was Asimo, the robot created by Honda. Some of you may have seen him in action, but for those that have not please enjoy the following videos I filmed during the auto show. I apologize for the German commentary but they didn't have an English translator, although the robot only spoke in English (which I found odd considering he is Japanese). The first video is Asimo doing field sobriety tests, the second video is Asimo dancing (although to be honest, I wish I could dance that well). I found the robot to be a little bit creepy, but the level of sophistication of the robot is clearly beyond what I expected. Alli and I agreed that Asimo was the most exciting feature of the auto show (sadly, none of the cars turned into robots, otherwise that would have been the highlight...make next year). I can't wait to get my own personal butler robot, perhaps I will ask my wife for one for Christmas.

After leaving the Sistine Chapel, we proceeded through the tour group exit (a shortcut we learned about through our extensive research which allowed us to avoid having to take a 15 minute walk plus endure the security lines again) and found ourselves down in the crypt of St. Peter's Basilica. Many of the popes are entombed within the crypt, which seems more like a museum than a cemetery. There was a noticeable crowd praying around one tomb, that of the recently deceased Pope John Paul II. People were mostly praying or stopping briefly to pay their respects, but there were some attempting to take pictures which is strictly forbidden (two security guards were very vigilant for this activity). After passing by his tomb we stopped briefly at St. Peter's tomb, where his bones were buried and the altar of the church was built upon. After this we opted to head up to the church to tour this lovely (and massive) building.

The Pope's Swiss Guards were out guarding the various entrances and exits, ensuring no unsavory characters made their way into an area they weren't allowed. It took a bit of explanation but I finally convinced Alli that these guards are indeed Swiss and are among the elite of Swiss military. There are many doors that go into St. Peter's Basilica, however the most interesting is only opened once every 25 years (the Holy Door). This is interesting enough but what I found even more intriguing was that on the other side the door is cemented closed. (Are they really that concerned about some sneaky bishop coming in the middle of the night and opening it for giggles?) After finally deciding on entering an open door we were amazed to walk inside and see the massive basilica. The central nave has inscriptions on the floor as you walk towards the altar showing where other basilicas and churches around the world would end in they were placed inside St. Peter's. Let's just say this basilica is very large compared to the rest (no need to brag).

There were many works of art, statues, and architectural details that were not to be missed. Among the art is Michelangelo's La Pieta, which is now behind glass due to a previous admirers efforts to destroy the statue. The basilica seemed to be large enough to contain its own weather system, which might explain the large canopy over the main altar...one could spend many hours in St. Peter's and still not see everything it has to offer. Outside of the basilica are many other sights, including the main plaza which surrounds a fountain an Egyptian obelisk (the Romans liked to bring back the spoils of war to remind themselves of all of the foreign lands they conquered). We also utilized the Vatican Post Office to mail some letters, which I found exciting for some reason (the Vatican Postal System is one of the most efficient in the world, but the Italian Postal System is not, which is why we mailed things from the Vatican and not from Rome). We chose not to ascend to the top of the dome as we had already been in the museum, Sistine Chapel, and Basilica for almost four hours and needed lunch...I guess that means we have something to look forward to for our next visit.

Alli's favorite highlight of our trip to Rome was the Sistine Chapel. To get to the Sistine Chapel, you have to wind your way through the Vatican museum admiring the various works of art collected by the Catholic church over the years. Also there were many statues of granite and marble, a map room where the walls were covered in maps painted directly on the walls, and beautiful courtyards for evening strolls with the Pope and his bishops (all of which could technically be considered as art, I suppose). Some of my favorites included an octagonal courtyard that contained statues of Greek gods, and paintings by Raphael (yet another Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle). I also appreciated some artwork that had I not been exposed to as a child, I probably would have just zipped by without much notice. The art was by a Japanese artist named Sadao Watanabe whom my grandparents became admirers of while they lived in Japan (Grandpa was in the military, while Grandma became the inspiration for my current lifestyle as A Well Kept Man...don't read too far into this).

After winding our way through the museum, we finally arrived at the packed Sistine Chapel where we found some seats on the periphery and listened to a one-hour podcast about Michelangelo's (again, another Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle) most recognized work of art. I never fully appreciated the various aspects of the chapel, as the only nuggets that really ever lodged in my brain were that his back was probably sore from painting the ceiling as well as the more famous scene on the ceiling of God reaching out to create Adam. It also contains many other images from Genesis such as God creating the world, the Temptation in the Garden, and the Great Flood, in addition to various Saints and Biblical prophets.

The wall behind the altar is perhaps one of the most moving as it is a painting of the Last Judgement where Christ comes back to judge the living and the dead (with a self-portrait of the artist himself).

The ceiling was cleansed a few years back allowing the originally beauty of the ceiling to be witnessed by a new generation. The restorers left a small section of the ceiling as it was to enable a comparison of the way the ceiling looked prior to restoration. Unfortunately photography was not allowed inside the chapel, but fortunately it seems that rule is not enforced (it seems that it is really the flashes they don't want). Now I'm not saying the pictures in this post are from my camera, I'm just saying I have some photographs whose origin will remain nameless. They were more strict on dress-code and noise in the chapel in effort to maintain reverence for the space (it is a church after all). This chapel is where the bishops pick the popes, and vigilant Catholics wait outside for the signal of black or white smoke from the chimney indicating whether or not a new pope was selected. It is not easy to see the chimney in question, but I have included a surveillance picture of the roof with an arrow pointing to the pipe. The Vatican Museum and Sistine Chapel are well worth the time (plan to spend at least two to three hours visiting), plus at the end you get to visit St. Peter's Basilica (stay tuned...).

I would like to interrupt this series of posts on Rome to tell you about one of our adventures this weekend. On Saturday, we drove into the Alps (Les Mosses) for a unique experience of watching sled dog races...it was much more fun than either of us thought it would be so we were very glad we went. After having trouble finding the site of the races, I finally gave up and listened to my wife which enabled us to immediately locate the venue (weird how that happens). The first group of racers were competing in skijoring, a form of cross-country skiing where one attaches a leash to their waste and is aided in their skiing by a dog (although recently we heard of a similar event that involved horses, but something about skiing behind a horse just doesn't sound safe to me). I don't really care for cross-country skiing as it requires too much physical effort (which of course leads to sweating), so I'll stick to gravity-aided downhill skiing.

The main event was the dog sledding, which involved a racer on a sled pulled by five to eight dogs. The breed, age, and number of dogs pulling the sled determined in which group you were competing. Most of the dogs were what you would expect, Siberian Huskies, Alaskan Malamutes, and Greenland Sled Dogs, but there were also German Shorthairs, Vizlas, and others that I failed to classify (I never quite finished my online dog breed identification degree...). The races were all Sprints with lengths varying between several kilometers and several kilometers times two (if only it would have been 20 km, I could have used the word "score," instead, I am stuck confusing my readers with odd terminology...er, races varied between about 7 km and 16 km). The dogs were quite vociferous, many jumping all over the place vying for attention from their owners.

The dogs attached to the sleds are the starting line also were extremely anxious to get going. I was amazed at how strong some of these dogs were in their ability to pull a person and sled with little perceived effort (I guess that's what momentum is all about). The common experience however was no matter how hard or fast the dogs started the race, they mostly returned to the finish line with their tongues dragging on the snow and at a pace more aptly described as a saunter or light jog. A few of the dogs immediately rolled around in the snow after finishing, while others had snow dumped on them to help cool them down...which they appeared to enjoy immensely. The weather was perfect for the races, and the sun provided ample heat to make the mountain air comfortable (we also managed to avoid the yellow snow, which was probably a good idea).

(P.S. Don't forget to click on the pictures to enable you to view them in a format that doesn't require a magnifying glass or bifocals)