Swissventure!

Last weekend was my first of three long weekends. As I am currently living and working in Switzerland, I thought it best to travel this country before going further afield. Also, let’s be honest I don’t have much money and a two for one  train pass was too good of a deal to turn down.

My friend and I started our journey in Zermatt. We had four day and unlimited train travel and in a country that only take four hours to travel tip to tip, we wanted to cram in as much as we can. 

I chose Zermatt because I wanted to see the infamous Matterhorn. I must confess Disneyland did have a part to play here. After a three hour journey form geneva we arrived at the region of the Alps that boarders Italy. The village of Zermatt was an expensive ski resort and what seemed to be a misplaced fantasyland. I know of course that fantasyland is based on Swiss resorts but this was the first time in a repeating theme. I know im at the orginal but why do I feel that Switzerland is a period of its self?  The reason we had ventured to this resort clique was that I wanted to “climb” the kline Matterhorn. Now, I am not in good enough shape to climb any Matterhorn no matter how kline.  What I  took instead was a series of cable cars up 4000 meters to the top of the alps where I could feast my eyes on the real Matterhorn. The was around a half hour in total and I did feel like a complete cheater however, I arrived at the top of the alps. I was extremely lucky and was greeted with a perfectly clear sky. Now I have been many pretty places in my life but this one blew them all way. It was touching the void without the Boney M, it was awe inspiring, it was the highlight of my trip around Switzerland. Not to say it was all downhill from there, I mean it was literally not figuratively.  

The next stop was Interlaken the tiny city in between two laken.  We really only had time to walk around the city and look for the one mountain I promised Id see for my Father. The elger! And here  it is behind a apartment complex! Sorry for the poor framing Dad.

The next morning it was off to Bern after a breakfast of bread and yogurt from the nearest Migros (see finances above).  Bern is the capital of Switzerland and make my heart skip a beat for one reason and one reason only. It was here that Albert Einstein first thought up relativity while staring at the town clock on a bus home from the Swiss patent office (see pervious post- Science rules). My heart was shortly broken when I discovered that Eisenstein's house was closed due to water damage. After a few beers around the Parliament building (Did I tell you I love you yet Switzerland?) and then we decided to jump on the train and head to Basel. 

Basel, like all Swiss towns have all sights around the train station. We browsed old town sights including a children's choir, more damn clocks and my future coffee porch. 

After Basel we ventured on to Luzern. Home of more lovely Gothic towns, the worlds saddest lion, and people who had no idea how to politely stay in a hostel. YOU DON"T TURN THE LIGHT ON WHEN YOU COME IN AT ONE AM FOO! But.... It was nice. I really liked the Lion Monument and have 40 blissful seconds with it before an Indian tour group swept trough and blocked my view. 

I saw more Indian tourists than I have ever seen in my life touring Switzerland. I think Bollywood movies are to blame Not that I would ever blame my favorite art form. 

In the morning we moved on from Luzern to Lichtenstein, As a fan of the absurd I insisted upon a overnight stay in this tiny principality which has the highest GDP in the world. Once arriving I climbed the hill to the castle hoping that the Prince would take pity on me and invite me in for a BBQ. Despite that his live there, I had no such luck.  

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 As lovely bike ride by Lichtenstein day turned into Lichtenstein night, we ended up in a street fair.  This entailed crashing a hen night, eating pretzels and  watching this band. You might like him now but wait until he steps out from behind the keyboard unveiling fantastic lederhosen.  

After a crazy night in my 19th country, we traveled to our final destination the city of Zurich. This was a Sunday and I'm going to have to be honest here... Zurich scared me. There where no people on the street other than my friend and I. It was like that chapter in a Wrinkle in Time when Meg realizes everyone is bouncing the ball at the exact same time. You know what I mean. And if you don't... we're not friends.  I understand that there is so much more to Zurich that you cant see in a four hour walk around the Train station but I was tired and sick of clocks by this point. 

Makes me feel relieved I never bought a watch.

Well that was last weekend, this weekend PARIS!

Geneva Open Cellar

Yesterday I enjoyed a yearly Swiss tradition of Open Cellar. This event is when all of the local wineries open their cellars and give out free tastings. The are over 95 wineries outside of Geneva. Not all are open their cellars but yesterday I sampled ten different wineries whites, reds and champagnes. It was great fun and despite the slight drizzle Swiss wine country is stunning.

While wandering around I ended up joining a large group of people from Columbia, the UK, Australia, Moldova and  France. It was a great group of other students and interns. Meeting people from all over the world and having first class conversation with relative strangers was something I dearly missed from traveling.

I have a short work week this week and then i'm off on a train journey around Switzerland. I am planning on seeing Zurich, Bern and, most exciting LICHTENSTEIN!!

Science RULES

On my 26th birthday I decided I wanted to celebrate by visiting the world famous scientific laboratory CERN. I was a little nervous that I wouldn't get a walk on spot on the tour so I showed up two hours early just in case.  A move that proved to be over kill. 

CERN or "The European Organization for Nuclear Research"   is world famous as a physics lab and for its particle acceleration. These accelerator tubes run under parts of France and Switzerland including where I am living in France. While I knew I would be unable to see the Large Hadron Collider nevertheless, I was super excited. After putting my name on a list and entertaining myself with a few different exhibits, I was added onto a tour. *CERN Tip* these tour book up three months in advance however, if you show up early, smile nicely and say "science rules" the tour guides look the other way and let you tag along. 

The tour started in typical European fashion. A 20 minute eight year old video during which the screen was blocked by a overhead projector. How can everything in Europe be simultaneously  better and worse than North America?

After the boring movie the fun started. A handsome young physicist  (They do exist!) led our tour telling us about the different projects that were being studied here. Including the Atlas project at the LHC. The general question the Atlas project is trying to answer (and there are many of them) is to prove or disprove the Higgs theory of particles gaining mass. Other questions that could be answered include the possibility of other dimensions and the nature of dark matter. Really exciting stuff. 

After explanations and questions abound, we continued on into the control room for the Atlas project. It was here that the proton neutrino collisions are registered and then sent to labs all over the world. As we tourists took pictures of the scientists like rock star, I wondered how many labs worldwide have tours much less tours with three month waiting lists. The control room wasn't much, just computers hooked up to laptops hooked up to more computers. What was interesting was to think about was was going on under our feet. Although its happening under my feet as I write this as well.

After the lecture in the control room we went upstairs to watch a 3d movie about the LHC which was underwhelming. As we left the building, we were ushered into this really neat museum/ planetarium which had interesting artifacts like.. THE WEB. Well the first web server that is. My favorite part of that exhibit was the note at the top of his thesis  "Vague but exciting", now if only I could get away with that in grad school.

First World Problems

I have been a bit patchier with correspondence than I might have liked lately. This is for two reasons, one, that the internet at hasn’t been working consistently at my flat and two, that I have been planning.I have two four day weekends over the course of my internship and unfortunately they both fall in May. Further more both of these weekends fall before my first payday at the end of the month. I have the tricky task in font of me of planning two budget trips...in Europe. I am no stranger to travelling cheaply however; Europe presents a new challenge that can’t be over come by hours on Skyscanner and Kayak. Europe also lacks the freedom of Asia were all you need to do is find a bus and hop on. I thrived on the chaos aspect of traveling. Well after two weeks I THINK I have it figured out. The first weekend I plan to explore Switzerland including a hike around die kinder Matterhorn. (ie the base) and the next weekend I will bus off to Paris, the city of light! I was going to go to Rome but for  200 euros at ticket...I can't afford that on an interns salary! Either way I am super excited for the month of May.




Last night, I went to Genevas equivalent of First Thursday,  I enjoy Portland's much more however Geneva's did have a small upside. We where walking around the lovely streets of old town when I spied that one of the galleries had an  artist whose work I saw at the Vancouver Art Gallery a few months a back. As I walked up to the gallery I cried out "Oh! I know this Shit!". Then not even two feet away from me an Asian man in glasses and a nice suit stares at me. My friend then proceeded to shush me with a shocked look on his face. "That's him! That's Ken Lum!" I then proceeded to turn magenta. Mr. Lum proceeded to roll his eyes in my direction as I posed with his art. 
Here is a picture of me with the shit piece in question.