Car Crash!

3 February 2009:
I woke up late that morning. I had been having problems sleeping, since I was getting over a cold. Stacy thought that I was taking Tuesday off as well. Since I was feeling much better that day, I was ready to go to work. But it was too late for me to catch my train, and if I took the next train, I wouldn't get into work until about 11:15.

Since the kids were all home sick (all four of them), and I needed to escape the house of virus, I took the car to go to work. Taking the car to work is a pretty rare event, and can turn a 1:15 commute into a 39 minute commute. I only get to do it once or twice a month.

I was headed north on one of the final roads to get the office. Thoughts were going through my mind of the huge amount of work I have ahead of me. I have a large deployment of software, and some pretty tricky work that lies immediately ahead of me.

Suddenly, the car is at a complete stop. The airbag is deployed. The car is turned 120 degrees to the right of the direction I was previously going. There is a smelly, smoky dust floating in the air. The radio was off. The hazard lights were on, clicking away. "Sh%$. I must have been in an accident!"

I had no notice that the crash was going to happen. I had no idea the car was going to impact. I had no idea the car had been destroyed. I was driving along, minding my own business, a clear road in front of me, and then I was in a wrecked car. It is amazing how quickly it all happened. There was no slow motion "OH NO WE ARE GOING TO CRASH" No screeching tires, no dramatic music, no anticipation at all. Just driving, and crash.

I get out of the car, probably faster than I should have. In retrospect, I didn't even look for other traffic. If they too weren't paying attention, I would have been a pedestrian smear on their bumper. I see what must obviously have been the other car, a fair distance away, and go to check on him.

As I walk to his car, I look at the intersection again. My initial reaction was that the accident MUST have been fault, since I am a foreigner, and often am confused by the rules of the traffic here. I looked over to the big white triangle painted on his side of the road, and confirm that I, indeed had right of way.

I'm the first person to the other driver's car as he opens the door. He seems to be all right. His face isn't wedged in the windshield or anything, and I don't see any blood. He gets out of the car without any need of assistance. I ask him if he's OK, in English (I seem to have forgotten German at that moment). He responds that he's OK.

Me? No pain so far. I do notice that my knee feels like I fell and scraped it. It doesn't hurt, though. By now bystanders are showing up to see if everybody is OK. The old guy driving the Mercedes, gets out of his car, and speaks Swiss German to me. I don't really know what he is saying; it wasn't Bernese German, but some other dialect of Swiss German that I don't know at all. The bystanders who rushed to the scene to aid us all spoke French. Maybe it was a mild case of lingual aphasia on my part.

One helpful bystander, who was driving a motorcycle behind me before the accident (and saw the whole thing) spoke both German and French. He was awesome. He translated everything for me into German, and directed traffic, from all the other cars that were starting to get stuck at the intersection, not knowing what to do. The smoldering twisted hulk that was once my car was in the dead center of the intersection, immobile. The new traffic is routed around the broken glass and twisted metal.

The old guy had a pretty deep cut on his right hand, and he goes with one of the bystanders to the hospital. He opens the trunk to get his walking stick, and they are gone. People ask me over and over again, "Are you hurt?" No, don't think so. My knee is a little scraped, but not much else. "No neck pain?" Nope.

I call the wife promptly. "I'm OK. The car is destroyed."

I instant-message my co-worker, Chris, and tell him to come over and see the car wreck. He is an avid photographer, and loves to photograph cool stuff, I am sure that car crashes would also qualify as stuff he likes to shoot.

The police show up. None of them speak German, they are all Francophones. The first officers show up to direct traffic, more show up to take pictures, measure distances, make chalk markings on the pavement, scribble details in their notepads. One officer shows up to me and asks me if I have any injuries.
He has a brethalyzer in hand. "It's protocol to measure all drivers involved in an accident for blood alcohol content" I blow. It's a zero point zero (as was expected). Chris had the presence of mind to snap a shot of the event. It made a pretty funny picture.

I had to retrieve all of the documents out of the car, the license, registration, the GPS, anything I could stuff into my backpack.

The traffic cop who does speak English and German shows up. He tells me that he prefers German, so I go along in German. He drives me back to the police station, where I give my statement.

This was an odd experience unlike any I have had before. The office was a small room with just enough room for a desk with a computer, and my chair on the other side. I had to present all of my documents. My Ausländerausweis (Foreigner's permit), my passport, my drivers license, my title of the car, my proof of car insurance.

We described the events of the accident, as he wrote all of the happenings for me. The final document was half in French, half in German. The first part of the document was in French, the basic information, like the names of those involved, the location, the time, the types of cars, etc. The part where we described the accident was in German. I can't imagine a document in America as being in two languages, but this is Switzerland, and things are different, I guess.


Here's a map of the accident.



View Larger Map

I am coming from the south, heading north on Route de Chandolan. You can see the cross-street, Route de Petit Moncor, where the other guy was coming from the west, headed East. If you look closely at the satellite photo, you can see the white triangle painted on the road. In America, this would be a stop sign, but here, it is simply a "give-way", meaning, you have to yield to the oncoming traffic. There is no need to stop if there is no traffic. His view up the street probably couldn't see me so well, as the sun was behind me, and the street was wet. When looking back up the street, the sun and the wet road lined up just well enough to shine very brightly.

I have gone down this road a few times more, and my view of the oncoming traffic from the left is very limited. Limited both by the car wash, on the southwest corner of this inter section, along with lots of parked cars, and snow banks piled up high, preventing a view of the oncoming traffic from the left. In addition, every car has this blind spot just in front and to the left of the driver, where the frame of the left side of the window blocks a small part of the view of the driver. These issues combined are probably why I never saw this guy coming.

Here's my pictures (with comments) on Facebook:

Here's some more pictures:

From Blogger Pictures

From Blogger Pictures

My Daily Commute (by Train)

Many people in Virginia ask me, "What's it like in Switzerland?"

That is a huge question to answer. So I can break it out into small chunks. How about I describe my commute? Yes? Ok.

Northern Virginians can talk long and passionately about traffic. In Northern Virginia, the population has exploded in the past 2 decades, and the roads have not expanded to meet the challenges of the increased population. The state government in Richmond gladly takes the increased revenue from the growing economy of Northern Virginia, and promptly redistributes this wealth immediately to the impoverished back-water sections of Virginia. Thus, the life of a Northern Virginian can be described as "brief periods of life separated by long hours in traffic. "

There are days when I feel like my life in Switzerland could be described as "memorable periods of life separated by long hours on the train." This is mostly because I live in Bern, and work in Fribourg, and I hardly ever get the joy of driving to work. This would be a commute that most Northern Virginians would reply, "Your commute is 36 minutes by car with no traffic? That's pretty good! I wish I could do that."

Depending on the day and my mood, my commute could consist of many combinations of walk, tram, train, bus, walk; in that order.   I can be enthusiastic about this daily ritual, but after too many days of doing it, it starts to wear thin on me.  I really would like to live 10 minutes from the office for once in my life.  I haven't had such convenience since I lived in South Riding and worked in Chantilly. 

One day in the middle of September, I took along my camera, and documented all the steps along the way.  This was a day when I got out on time, but spent too much time goofing off and taking pictures for your benefit, so my timing on all the connections got messed up.   Let's start. 

I recommend you read through the timeline, then watch the slide show in full screen mode.  There is also a map showing where I took all my pictures along the way, if that can help you visualize. 

7:55.  I have to promptly leave the house at 7:55.  If I leave just a minute later, I jeopadize making the train in Gümligen.  One cool thing about the trains being nearly always on time, is I learn how to cut it close.  If I leave any later, I have to bike to work, or take the tram.  I prefer to have the 30 minute walk along the top of the hill, it is much more scenic, and I get a good bit of exercise, a little time to clear my mind and prepare for the day ahead.  My office has a competition where we track the number of miles we walk, and I have logged over 250 miles since we started in August. 

The trip starts out in a small patch of forest, and has me head uphill past a horse farm.  At the horse farm, there is this big black German Shepard that always comes out and barks at me.  I have yelled at it at the top of my lungs, and that usually stops him from barking at me.  When the mean dog is not around, usually there are two early 20's or teen-aged girls helping out on the farm, and they always say good morning.  Since nobody else is manly enough to do a hike up this hill every morning, I guess I have become sort of a regular thing for them. 

The path takes a steep turn up a gravelly rocky road where cars and motorcycles are not permitted.  There is evidence of regular horse riding, as there are many "road apples" along the way.  Some mornings the hill is more forboding than others, but as I do this commute up the hill more, the hill gets easier.  The hill is steep enough that one could not dream of riding a bike up it, and just simply walking up this hill with a bicycle in hand is also a dreadful thought.  Maybe the Swiss don't think it's so bad; maybe I'm just out of shape, or maybe I am just not used to the hills any more. 

By the time I get to the top of the hill, the gravelly path has joined a small one-lane road which has very little traffic.  Usually I see only one or two cars every morning.  The rest of this part of the journey is a gentle downhill slope which makes the walk to work easier.  Biking back up this hill going the other way is terrible.  I have biked this way home only once, to get home a sloppy sweaty mess, out of breath for a good 10 minutes after arrival. 

8:20. I get to the Schützenhaus der Gemeinde Müri, which has a very nice water fountain for me to get my hydration levels back up.  This is where the forest breaks, and there is either a grey sky above me (the usual scenario), or on this day, the sky turned into a brilliant blue.  There are more cars along here, but not so many that I fear for my life.  The Schützenhaus is where the Swiss, who own guns, do shooting practice.  There is a target range that you can walk under the live fire when they are shooting.  I have never been here when the shooting range is active. 

8:33.  If I make a good enough walking pace, I can grab the S1 line that takes me directly to Fribourg.  The train ride on the S1 is exactly 55 minutes long, and this is the fastest way to get from Gümligen to my office, bar none.  It also is one of the more uncomfortable rides.  The S1 is packed, so I don't get to sit until we get to the main train station, and most of the people get off.  I usually don't take this train.  I really have to walk quickly and not slow down for anything to make the S1 in 38 minutes from my front door. 

8:38. The S2 that goes to Schwarzenburg arrives at Gümligen.  I usually take this train to the Bern main station, where I then take the intercity to Fribourg.  This gets me to Fribourg 8 minutes later than if I was to take the S1.  So if I miss the S1, it is not a tragedy.  I have a back-up plan. 

8:40. If I manage to miss the S1 and the S2, there is a third fall-back.  There is a tram that leaves Gümligen and shows up in downtown.  A very brisk walk after the "G" tram makes it into Bern Zytglogge can get me to the 9:04 train at the main train station. 

This morning, I was so busy taking pictures for you, that I blew it, and missed all three connections.  This almost never happens.  i got distracted by taking some pictures of cows and mountains, and sights along the way, that I didn't realize that I had fallen so far behind schedule.  Oh well. This gives me an opportunity to show you what standing around the tram stop in Gümligen looks like, so you can get a glimpse of my everyday life.  Since I missed all three of the above connections, I also missed the intercity train to Fribourg that leaves at 9:04.  So the commute will take even longer now. 

Most of the Swiss spend their time on public transportation reading the free newspapers.  They are not the paragon of journalistic integrity, but they pass the time.  The articles are written in simple enough German for me to read (I have a really hard time reading the real newspapers, that use lots of words I never learned, and I would spend all my time reading the dictionary to get the meaning of the articles.)  Here, this day's newspaper describes the Stock Market meltdown, and also describes the new uniforms of the Swiss Ski team. 

The tram trip is pretty slow going, and is only a few minutes faster than it would be to drive downtown.  I get off at Bern Zytglogge, where the "G" tram ends.  In order to make the inter city train, I have to walk to the train station, about 8 minutes walk away.  Sometimes, I grab the #3, the #5 or the #9 tram, which all take me straight to the train station.  Since I have a lot of time to get to my 9:34 train, I decide to walk it and show you some of the pictures along the way. For those who don't know the rules of pronouncing Swiss words, "Zytglogge" is pronounced kind of like "TSEET-glock-kah" Along the walk from Zytglogge to the Bahnhof (train station), there are many shops along the way.  A few clothing stores, like H&M, Vögeli, and a butcher/deli.   I never do any shopping, so I don't have much idea what is actually in these shops. 

9:16. I arrive at the main train station.  I have no idea what Bern looked like before the great construction of 2007.  In 2007 through May of 2008, all of this area around the train station was a huge mess of construction and blocked roads, pedestrian paths re-routed, trams stopped.  They managed to finish all the work for the revamped train station just about a week before the UEFA soccer tournament began. 

A part of the massive construction that was done includes a new wing of the underground mall, where they now show some of the old city walls, enclosed in a glass display, showered with pink light.  There is no escaping the worldly influence of McDonald's, as there is one that is never empty right inside the train station.  I get to the train station meeting area, where there is a big blue display showing all of the trains that arrive and depart from Bern.  I already know what train I am taking, as do most of the people here this morning.  There are occasionally tourists studying the departure board carefully, or asking for directions.  There are also the locals waiting around for a friend to arrive; they use this area as a meeting point. 

My train to Fribourg is the nice train.  This train comes once an hour, at the bottom of the hour, instead of the top of the hour.  This is the double decker train, with a very nice restaurant on board.  At 9:04, the train that goes to Fribourg is not nearly as nice, but still much more comfortable than the S1 that stops about a dozen times between Gümligen to Fribourg.  On the adjacent track is the Cisalpino train to Milan.  I have not had an opportunity to take this train yet, but will probably sometime in the next few weeks for a business trip to Turino. 

When the train arrives, there is an orderly shuffle without proper queueing to get into the train.  Many of the Swiss stand too closely to the door, as crowded passengers coming in from Zürich attempt to get off.  Since this is such a late train, it is not nearly as crowded as if I had gotten on this train an hour earlier.  I usually get on the car close to the restaurant, there are usually more seats further up the train, but it is never a problem trying to find a seat toward Fribourg. 

The double-decker train InterCity Express is incredibly quiet and smooth.  There is one car named "the quiet car", which is so quiet you can often only hear the rustling of newspapers.  There are usually tourists who get into the quiet car and inconsiderately start talking.  I seem to be more Swiss every day, as I usually give these rude talkers a very dirty look, but say nothing. 

The train arrives in Fribourg 27 minutes later, but this day, there was a seven minute delay.  In August 2007, there was some sort of landslide that caused the rails between Wünnewil and Flamatt to be unusable.  There has been construction on this line ever since.  In one small place on the line, there is only one track for both directions, which will require us to wait for a service in the opposite direction to pass.  The train I took on this day had to wait, and it caused a seven minute delay. The delay in this direction does not bother me much; especially since I have had so many other delays this morning, what is another seven minutes? 

I exit the train with nearly everybody else. A sea of people exit the train, and walk at an average walking pace down the ramp to the rest of the train station.  At the exit of the station, I hang around at the bus stop. It is usually only a 2 minute wait, but since we were seven minutes late from the rail construction, I waited longer than usual. 

The rest of the commute is not that interesting.  I take an empty bus to the edge of town, and walk another ten minutes to our office.  The morning is started by a fresh cup of coffee, as delivered from our Nespresso machine, which I adore.  This machine is great, especially as it does not give my coworkers the opportunity to be rude and finish off all the coffee in the coffee pot without refilling it.  Insert a capsule, put a cup in place, and press the button, and a great cup of coffee comes out. 

The amount of time I put into the daily commute does start to drain on me.  Emotionally, it has taken a serious toll in me, especially in this past week.  Time can be shaved off here and there; if I take my bicycle from the house to Gümligen, I can do the trip in 7 or 8 minutes.  I have to be walking out the front door by 8:25 at the absolute latest to bike to Gümligen and make the 8:33 S1 train.  In any event, I probably will remember the commute when I think back on my time in Switzerland. I might even look upon it favorably.  However, I will never look back memorably on my Virginia commute by car. 

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Fribourg to Basel to Amsterdam

I have safely arrived at Amsterdam. I am currently working on about 3 or 4 hours sleep. I'm all messed up! I'm doing pretty well, though, all things considered.

The taxi ride from the airport to the hotel costs too much, and I didn't have enough spare change to contact the hotel. I started with 3.00€. I used the stupid pay phone, and ate up 3€ with about 90 seconds of phone time, including two wrong numbers to a law firm in Amsterdam. What a rip off. I tried to use the credit card, but the telephone didn't like any of the ones i presented. (didn't give it my Exxon Mobil card. :) )

The Stupid American Does Not Know How To Use Phones
If you're not familiar with phones in Europe, let me give you some advice. Learn how to interpret a phone number written down. The string of digits that somebody writes down is not necessarily the string of digits that you need to use to get to that destination. The Europeans are tricky and will assume you know when to leave off a country code, or when to add the secret "0" to the beginning of the number. I have not deciphered this secret code yet, so I can not share the secrets yet.

I do know that the number written on my itinerary for the hotel says: "31-206-075555" I do know that if you pick up a phone here in the airport, and dial those numbers, you don't get anything. I also know that if you leave off the '31', then you get this law firm, with a very nice lady who, after I called her back the second time, took the effort of finding the phone number of the hotel, and she gave it to me. 020 607 5555. Uh. But that's not the number on my itinerary. D'oh. The random extra zero gets me every time.

In 2003, I once had a Swede explain it to me (when i was in Sweden and suffered similarly) but it made about as much sense as describing colors to a blind person, I guess.

I looked around and decided that maybe the laptop would be the best attempt -- found a wireless for 10.-€ for a full day's. Now that I'm paying for a full day's, (and I got what I needed), I felt the need to "get my money's worth" and send some e-mail. The cell phone doesn't work here, either. I think I needed to ask for some sort of "super-secret-International calling code" for my phone.

Using the Internet, found a bus station route that costs 3.50€ instead.

I guess I should have done a little research about this last night, but last night I was reserved to use cash to pay for a taxi. I converted 150 dollars in traveller's checks to Euros and only got just over a hundred. With a trip to the airport and back at 45.00€ each, that doesn't leave much left! I know the company would reimburse me, but it's the principle of the thing. Now using Taxis in New York is much easier on the pocketbook. Taxis everywhere else seem to be way too much.

I got up earlier than I was supposed to. I set my alarm for 0600, but woke up at 0515 instead. Found myself lounging around the bedroom looking for ways to kill time. I had everything packed, and wasted time. Unfortunately, breakfast didn't get started until 0700, and my train out of Fribourg left at 0704. :( I really enjoyed the breakfasts there. The hotel was very cheap. I paid like 600 chf for a week there, including two meals. I think I will spend approximately the same at this hotel in Amsterdam for only two days. (!)

The guy who sat next to me on the train from Fribourg to Bern wore WAY too much cologne. I guess that's better than the WAY too much body odor that I was sporting earlier in the week, when I realized that all of the stores were closed, and I didn' t pack any. the train station from Fribourg to Bern was very busy. I don't have any idea what it is like going the other way.

I guess I'm going to have to get used to that train station, eh? I will most certainly be stopping in Villars sur glane, as the train is a direct route from Bern to Fribourg, without any intervening stops. I guess I'll have to get myself a nice little scooter. Maybe there is a bus that will connect me to a point close enough to my new office.

On the way to Bern, the train car I chose was a "quiet please" car, and it was more quiet in that train car, than it would be in the desert. The only noise I heard was the occasional shuffle of the newspapers around. No talking was permitted, and they even had a little diagram that asked you to not use your IPOD, as that would be considered too loud. The trains are very well protected against the noise, and they are amazingly quiet.

The train ride from Basel (north of Bern, right on the French border) was delightful. I switched trains in Bern, and spent a nice quiet ride looking at the scenery, and reading my book that the people from Network Relocation gave me.

The airport at Basel is considerably larger than the airport at Bern. The Bern airport is about the same size as Champaign-Urbana. Just big enough to start pretending to be a real airport, but bigger than an airport without any scheduled commercial services. The airport at Basel would be ... I guess on par with Norfolk or Richmond International.

The flight over was nice, I spilled my orange juice all over myself, and the bulk of it ended up in the seat-back pocket -- which was surprisingly water proof! The orange juice sat in the pocket and slowly leaked out the corners. I felt awful about the mess. It happened as I was reading a duty free magazine (Boy that's boredom), and knocked over my orange juice with the magazine.The flight attendant was very nice about it.

For snack, Swiss Air served a very nice sandwich consisting of a pickle, some mayo, and some swiss cheese. I know my wife wouldn't like it, but I sure liked it. And it was surprisingly filling.

The announcements for landing -- this is weird -- I can't remember if it was English or German. I'm getting that comfortable with German again, and now I'm spending most of my time thinking in German, instead of thinking in English. I knew it wouldn't take me long to re-adjust. I was just surprised it would take only a week. there are a lot of words I don't remember. Like the word for "spill", and the word for "slap", take, become, include, guess. I bought two full sized dictionaries, I figured my wife might need one every now and then.

At the Duty Free airport, I purchased some chocolate. I realized that the chocolates I really wanted were all chock-full of nuts. So I put a lot of them back. I searched for some nut-free chocolates, and then I realized that nearly all of the chocolates have nuts in them. The M&Ms seemed safe, but there's not much point in buying those in Switzerland.

I had to do a very detailed search to find some that didn't have any nuts at all. I found some finally. I got a value pack, too, which had a variety of them, so hopefully the family enjoy the different flavors. I guess it's a good thing that these people like their nuts in their chocolate! It will make that bakery next door not so terribly tragic about the amount of chocolate I would otherwise be destined to eat.

All right my bus is coming, I'd better go now.

Directions from Bus station to my Hotel

Day Four -- A Very Busy Day

I awoke at 0730 to the breakfast at the hotel. I received a note from the hotel management that I was to meet the relocation coordinators at 10:30. I lounged around my hotel room for a few hours, waiting for the appropriate time. For the first time, I turned on the TV, and watched some of the local programming.

The first 25 channels or so were all French. the next 15 or so were German. I didn't have much of a hard time figuring out the German TV, and the French had enough going on for me to figure out what was being said, although not every word was understood. I watched Cartoon Network, and enjoyed seeing the cartoons in French. There was one cartoon where they went back in time, and met George Washington, who spoke perfect French, and if not for the white curly hair, he would have looked like Napoleon. He sure sounded like Napoleon.

I was expecting to meet Michael, but was met by a lovely English woman named Claire, who was Robert's wife. We set out to the car, where I met Heidi, a local Swiss German from Bern, who was to be the relocation consultant who drove.

They had a busy agenda for me, and at the beginning of the day, I was quite gung-ho about living in Villars-Sur-Glane, or Moncor, or Fribourg; a comfortable bike from home to work. However, the International school is in Bern, 25 km away. I might be comfortable, but the kids and wife would be forced to commute.

We visited two apartments in the neighborhood around the place of work. One was a very nice apartment that had lots of space, and was located on the third floor. It had no stairs, which would suck on grocery time. It had a nice big basement room to store bikes. It had a laundry room, but also a schedule attached to the laundry room.

This is actually quite normal in Europe. Say for instance, you have 6 families living in an apartment building. Family 1 gets Monday, family 2 gets Tuesday, etc. You don't get to just waltz downstairs and use the laundry room if it's not your day. (Unless you arrange it with your neighbor). The clothes dryers were weird, but seemed to be kinda cool. of a your normal machine, where you insert clothes (and maybe money), turn it on, spins around, dry clothes come out. Instead of that, there is a big room with clothes lines. you hang up your clothes, and turn on the heater, which blows hot dry air onto the clothes. I guess this is more energy efficient.

We went to a second apartment that was on the 1st floor. It had a very small elevator, and much more convenient stairs. The apartment hadn't been occupied for a year. It had a large living room with a wonderful view of the valley, and the Alps in the distance. It would be a perfectly nice apartment.

We travelled to Bern, to see another apartment. This apartment we were visiting is owned by an American couple, who are going back to the states for a few years. The apartment is on the north-western side of Bern, and not very far from the International School of Bern. Not far from the glider-port, either. in fact, I think I may have seen the neighborhood from the air, when I was flying on Saturday.

So why would I change my mind so quickly to move to Bern, which increases my grumpy drive? I figure that one man's quiet misery is much less awful than 1 wife's misery and four children's misery. Sacrifices must be made!

Third day in Fribourg

BONG BONG BONG BONG

I am rudely rousted from my deep slumber. I was too busy staying up late last night Blogging, and I didn't even finish writing up day 2's events in Switzerland.

BONG BONG BONG.

The thing I didn't consider when I chose this hotel, situated right next to the Cathedral, is that if you stay over the weekend, you're bound to be awoken by church bells.

BONG BONG BONG

The bell rang forever. I pulled the extra pillow over my ears, trying to muffle the noise. Man, those Catholics are really excited about the announcement of their mass. I managed to sleep through the incessant bonging. Christianity is trying to call back its heathen son. My response is increasing the number of pillows heaped over my ears.

Noon. I can't believe I slept until noon. Half my exploration time is wasted now.

I opened my e-mail to find the list of places that Stacy wanted me to visit. Check out the neighborhoods. I mapped them all out in Google Maps. Google Maps has a new feature where you can put multiple destinations. I had figured out my whole strategy. From east of the river (where they speak German), to Villars sur Glane.

I didn't have any way of printing out the document, so I decided to go downstairs and try to print from there. Printer broken. I mistakenly closed the tab with my itinerary. Google Maps didn't remember my trip. I was angry and hungry, so I just set out without any plans. On my way out, I asked the concierge if there was any way for me to rent a bike for the day. That would be the most effective way for me to see the whole town without an expensive taxi ride.

I walked down the street to where all the restaurants and shops are, and found that, as everybody had warned me, EVERYTHING is closed on Sunday. I went to a restaurant, the attendant spoke no English, no German. She asked a friend, a customer to help her out, and I got a broken German response that there was no food on Sundays, just coffee. Tummy say foood. So I moved on.

I eventually found a nice Falafel joint that was always closed on Fridays, but thankfully, open on Sunday. It had several local families eating their lunch, and I had to grab the only standing table outside. I had a Falafel Sandwich, and my French conversational skills to order my Falafel would impress the entire cast of Cirque du Soleil.

Me: "Falafel San-WEE; Cola laEET"
Him: (something unintelligible)
(I think he's asking me about the sauce to put on it)
Me: "Oui"
Him: (something unintelligible) (I think he's telling me the amount.)
Me: (handing over the money, thankfully listed on the cash register)
Him: (something unintelligible) (I think he's thanking me or telloing me to have a nice day.)
Me: Merci

I wandered the streets pretty aimlessly. I found some interesting street signs. This one, pictured to the right, tells you that women and children are mercilessly run over by speeding motorbikes. They are run over so thoughtlessly, that tire tracks are sure to run right over both child and mother. Horrible. The evidence that they are motorbikes and not cars is the single tire tread mark.

I assure you, men are safe there, and I managed to get out of this dangerous area alive to bring you this tale.

I believe I bumped into one of the places that Stacy wanted me to look at. But the bad news is that I could only get this location to come up once on the Google map search. I think I typed in the information incorrectly.

After a very long and thirsty walk around town, my need for liquid replenishment was nearing emergency levels. I started to think about drinking from the public fountains while none of the locals were looking. If it's not proper, I wouldn't want them to think badly about the badly dressed American. I watched several people walk by the fountains. Some would put their hands in the water to cool off. None drank. I feel silly to ask somebody and get that crazy look of "Are you insane? (nobody/everybody) drinks out of those fountains! Did you think the water looked (disgusting/safe)? That would be (perfectly normal/absurd) to drink that water!"

The green lushness of Fribourg started to turn into the appearance of a desert. Even the bars were closed. A beer would be nice. I walked past the Cardinal beer factory. I couldn't smell the hops. Maybe that's good. I walked past a Thai grocery store. I didn't think how odd that was, I only noticed its non-thirst-quenching-cause-its-closed status.

I started to walk more slowly. Must. Drink. I was wandering so slowly that Dr. Stephen Hawking passes me in his wheelchair. Ok, maybe it wasn't really him, but it sure did look like it from behind. I didn't get a good look at the front because he approached and passed me more quietly than a whisper. I usually walk pretty quickly, and I was rather surprised by the velocity of this electric wheelchair.

I made my way back to the train station and found myself buying the biggest water bottle I could find. I rushed the conversation with the lady (Lucy) who insisted on speaking French with me. Yet again, my incredible French speaking skills saved the day: I figured out she was asking me if I needed a bag or not. Actually, I cheated and played sociologist. I watched the guy in front of me in line. I carefully imitated each of his expressions and moves. Yes! Water! I chugged.

Oh noes! It's carbonated water! I wasn't expecting it, didn't even notice the explosive "PFIPP" when I opened the bottle, and nearly exhaled the carbonated water out my nose; which would have been even more painful than chugging water seltzer when not expecting it.

The water replenished me quickly, and I headed back to my hotel room for some rest.

Check out the picture to the right, detailing my walking around, and the sights along the way.

Walk in Fribourg

Here's a Google Maps picture of my journey this afternoon. The first walk was in orange, the second in blue. The Orange trip goes counter-clockwise, the blue, clockwise.

All of the pictures I took on my walk are available on this link in my Picasa folder.
Click on the slideshow to go to a full-screen slide-show, with slower advancing pictures, and readable captions.

First Day in Switzerland

I arrived in Berne/Belp, after an uneventful journey. The flight only included various quantities of restless shifting in my seat.

For the first leg of my journey, I flew from Dulles to Brussels, sitting adjacent to a 19 year old Brussels native, who was living in Connecticut. She was visiting relatives in the US, and was looking forward to returning to her home-town after three months abroad. The food onboard was your typical international selection in coach -- Pasta or Beef. (I chose beef). Marie, sitting next to me turned her nose up at the delicious Asian ginger salad dressing, and made a small butter and lettuce sandwich with the dinner roll and the remains of her salad.

Upon my arrival in Brussels, I quickly realized that I did not review my itinerary carefully enough, and found myself with only 30 minutes to go from one side of the airport to the other. This connection was going to be a tight one. Thankfully, the flight out of Dulles was an on-time departure. My connecting flight with British Airways to Berne/Belp was a very long walk from where I landed. There was no time for me to ask if I needed to go through customs or not, (I hope I don't!), and I ran to gate B95.

This was not your typical airport gate --It was a gate with a bus; there was no plane to be seen. Oh sure, there were the handsome 777s, and gargantuan 747s for the other gates, but mine was aircraft-absent. By the time I arrived, the bus had 3 passengers on-board. The flight attendant posted at the gate was clearly waiting for me, and asked for me by name (this is never a good sign). One more late straggler got on the bus, and we drove to the plane.

This plane was quite the puddle jumper. Although it had two pilots, and one flight attendant, the passengers only slightly outnumbered the crew by two. The low population of passengers were all contained on this shuttle bus, and we were on our way. I wondered if my luggage made it, but never checked. (Do you see a foreshadowing event?)

An hour and half through the air over the French countryside, with only a small glimpse of any mountains was interrupted only by a delightful European breakfast on-board. Some nutty-looking bread (it could have been sunflower seeds, it could have been walnuts. I wasn't going to try), runny strawberry yogurt, a roll of poppy-seed bread, and coffee. Delicious.

We landed in Belp, and as we taxiied, I looked about for the gliders that were also stationed there. I could see them in the distance. This was by far the smallest customs/passport control I have ever seen. The five of us went to the passport control, there was no discussion -- I handed him my passport, he stamped it, I was on my way. The passport control included the red and green zone, but there was nobody in attendance. I guess that means green.

There was a token luggage carousel, but it was not running. I asked for my bag, and waited for the luggage-claim lady to come help me. What was impressive about this whole exchange is that for the first time -- IN MY LIFE -- I have ever gotten the opportunity to use German to a native-German speaker in his country. And I think I fared pretty well. The conversation went something like this:

Airport Personnel: "Is there something you need?" clearly sensing that I'm waiting around for no other good reason.
Me: "Yes, I need my hand-briefcase" (Not remembering what the word for luggage was).
AP:
Me: "Yes, I have bag number one", pointing to my laptop bag, "number two" pointing to my emergency supply bag, the just-in-case-my-luggage-is-lost-again bag, that my wife was so thoughtful to pack. "And number three, I don't know where it is. It is possible that this bag still waits in Brussels."
AP: huh?> "Wait here, I will get somebody"


A very nice airport representative comes and welcomes me into her office. We start speaking English, but I can tell that she's not comfortable with it. Well that's fine, I'm not comfortable with German yet. Well, let me rephrase that, I can say whatever I want, but usually "I can not understand the words commin' outta yo mouth!"

She had me fill out the paperwork for lost luggage. If there is anybody who is familiar with this procedure, it is me. I seem to have angered the luggage gods long ago, and they spite me at every opportunity. 1999, Oslo Luggage MIA. 2000- Lost luggage in Newark; 2003, Dulles; luggage lost and showed up a week later. 2004, Luggage lost, and I had to drive to the airport to fetch it. Jan 15, 2007 - lost luggage in JFK, Jan 21, 2007, lost luggage in JFK -- AGAIN, this time it was missing in action for three days.

After my loss of luggage in Newark, I decided to paint "the skunk stripe", a hideously yellow stripe of ownership. Nobody would ever wish to steal this ugly-ass bag, or would ever wish to be even seen with it. Even the thieves who decorate their car with neon-green windshield wipers would say, "No way, man I'm not stealing that ugly ass bag."

That bag has fallen the fate of too many journeys and too many hands. It fell apart and began to leak items out of the holes (lost something on the way back from Toronto because of this). The bag was replaced by new luggage that my wife purchased. No yellow stripe this time. See where it has gotten me?

Anyway, I was having a very nice conversation with the lady at the airport, and she showed me to the bus that took me to the train station, Belp Bahnhof. The bus fare was 3.90CHF. Here I am, at the train station, realizing that I didn't prepare myself nearly as well as I should have. But my lack of preparation was not due to a lack of foresight, it was pretty much on purpose. It was sort of a sociology experiment on myself, I wanted to see how well I could 'figure it out' for myself without asking for help.

My cell phone will not get a signal here. Apparently, I didn't ask for the super-secret decoder chip, when I was in the US. Oh well, at least the NOC won't be calling me. Unfortunately, this means no email from the cell phone.

I discovered the train map, and the schedule, and which lines I needed to take. I managed to purchase my ticket, only using German. I read the sign that says, "Don't cross the train tracks, you fool!" or something to that effect, and found the underground steps to the other train track, which would take me to Bern. To get to Fribourg from Belp, one must take the S3 or S33 line from Belp to Bern. (this is shown as green on the map). Then, switch to the S1 or S11 line to Fribourg. To me, the Bern train station is huge, but not as big as the Tokyo train station, Nihonbashi.

At this point, I'm really tired, and kind of stinky, too. I get on board and relax. I wasn't really able to tell the difference between first class rail pass and second pass rail class, and sat in the wrong section of course. The train conductor informed me, in French, (and somehow I knew what he was saying), and I moved to the smaller, more cramped seats of second class. Mental note. First class seats are red and blue, the second class seats are teal with black speckles.

I sat next to a Francophone who was doing a crossword puzzle (in French) (that must be hard), and a very androgynous, uh, guy I think, doing a crossword puzzle.

Upon arrival, to Fribourg, I decided that I did not want to replay Chris Curtis's Taxi in Fribourg escapade. Chris arrived, tired and cranky from a journey over the Atlantic, and grabbed the first taxi. "I know where that is!" the driver exclaimed excitedly. The taxi pulls forward 100 feet, and stops again. "That will be 12 francs please!"

I wasn't encumbered by luggage, so I set out on my journey to find the hotel by my wits alone. Again, I wasn't as prepared as I should be. I have seen the Hotel de la Rose (The pink hotel?) on a map, but I wasn't paying as much attention as I should have. I pulled the itinerary, and found the street address for the Hotel. Rue de Morat is right next to the Cathedral. And if it's 1 Rue de Morat, then this means it's at the beginning or the end of this not-so-long street. I turned left out of the station, and headed down the street.

The hotel was not hard to find, and I checked in. I made it to my room and showered immediately. It was pretty humid, and I had that "yuck I've been wearing these clothes on a plane" feeling. I did not use any hot water, and that shower/bath felt SOOOO good.

I checked my email, and my wife had already logged in. It was 6:44 back home, so I'm amazed that she was on-line. We used Google Chat to talk over the plans for the day. I was supposed to rendezvous with the other Verisign Ex-pats to view the International School of Bern. (you mean I have to go back to Bern now? )

We were supposed to meet at noon, but I didn't have any such luck. I tried to call Stacy, but got some French operator speaking very quickly, and I hung up. I don't remember what happened after that, and I awoke 2 hours later feeling much refreshed.

Since I've blown my only appointment for the day, I set out to see what this town looked like. I got dressed in my smelly I've been in the airplane too long clothes, and set out to see the city. I brought along my camera, and shot everything along the way.