When a ski season goes wrong

At the weekend we realised that we have completely neglected to plan our wedding which is in FIVE WEEKS. So tonight we got started. With a wine tasting. It's really important to get this right. honestly.

Bruno looks like a right beverly hillbilly here, but he just got back from his manly job, and we got right down to the drinking. Doesn't explain the fringe though.

Look! We're even writing stuff down and generally acting like Jilly Goolden. We're so classy. Despite the dungarees.

The racist, xenophobic right wing SVP have lost their seat in the Luzern local elections. Even though the SVP bloke was running TWICE as an SVP candidate and an independent. Although this was only a tiny election, the SVP aren't some tiny group of fanatics. They are currently THE most powerful party in Switzerland. Everybody stop thinking about whether Brown will revert to an Old Labour style of government for a second, and celebrate the good riddance (at least from my town) of the party that brought us this:

(Mass citizenship? NO!)

and this:

Naturalisation made easy? NO!
(This is what immigrants look like don't you know)

Edit: I've just noticed this poster isn't from them, it's from the Swiss neo Nazis. I'm going to leave it though, as the fact it took me several hours to notice because its message is indistinguishable from the one above it speaks volumes.

Another Edit: Now I think I should take this out as I'm misrepresenting them or whatever. Except I'm not.

and this:

(Lose our safety? Lose our jobs? NO!)
These poor people are grappling with the concept that people might get into Switzerland without a visa.

Maybe the subtle imagery went over voters' heads.

**According to Polycell (the people who make polyfiller).

Anyway, in case my last post gave you the mistaken impression that I am less than motivated about our wonderful house. Here are some pictures to cheer us all up. And to prove to my parents that I'm working too, because they keep phoning me to tell me that Bruno should have a rest after working so hard.

Bruno being manly. He deserves a rest.

I'm not being a telly tubby. I'm insulating. Insulation itches. It's called health and safety.

Am I working? Or am I doing a little dance? Who can say.

I wonder what it says about my personality that products and branding regularly form a focus for my homesickness. Aside from the obvious whining about not getting marmite in the supermarkets type thing, I see the Swiss failure to recognise staple brand names as indicative of their alien culture. I get a stab of isolation every time I have to explain to Bruno what something is.

You can imagine the surprise on both our parts when I burst into tears yesterday at having to explain to Bruno what Polyfiller is. I mean, come off it, my mother knows what Polyfiller is. In England we use the word as a verb. Bruno probably knows what Polyfiller is, but he probably calls it Multieinfüllenmittel or something. Either way, the point is that it's exhausting to always have to try to explain something that should be really simple. And the renovation of the house has not made this easier. Let's just say that my whirlwind learning curve of Swiss German in the last few years has not involved much DIY vocabulary.

How I wanted the conversation to go:

"Hey Bruno, you know those gaps between the roofing tiles, we could Polyfill them."*

"OK. I'll pick some up from the DIY shop."

How it went:

"Hey Bruno, you know those gaps between the roofing tiles, we could Polyfill them."

"What's Polyfiller?"

"Well it's like this stuff that somes in a syringe, and you sort of, what's the word for inject?, you sort of push it into the gap and.." (mimes holding a giant syringe).

"um"

Tears.

The trouble is, it's all like this. Don't get me wrong, the house is amazing cool, and it's fun renovating it, but, get ready for the blog worthy honesty... not as fun as it would be in England. Because it all takes a bit more effort, and invariably ends up like this:

"So Zoe, I though we'd first pull through the Bleurgh Bleurgh Bleugh piping through the Bleurgh Bleurgh and then attach the electricity to some unpronouncable probably unearthed bit of the house, and then Bleurgh Bleurgh Bleurgh."

"What? What's a Bleurgh?"

"A Bleurgh. You know, a Bleurgh."

"I don't know what that is. What you just said means nothing to me."

"Well it's probably all a bit difficult for you to understand. After all, I am a carpenter."

"Not the CONCEPT you git! The word! I suppose I should just go home and make sure there's a hot dinner on the table for you! (Long lecture (not the first) on how this makes Bruno a mysogynist, no less at fault for being a product of this backward Swiss society), and do you really rate my intelligence so low, and on the threshold of our wedding, and"

Tears.

And so the house is a funny thing. I love it, and spend hours picturing where my future kids' bedrooms are going to be. But it's also panic making. Because it's sometimes exhausting to live here, and homesickness is exhausting, I can't handle the idea that I would live here forever. I can't handle the idea that I'd never live in London again, or that I'd leave it too long to go back, and be an outsider. I might live here forever, but it won't be because I planned it now. What I can handle is the short term. It's easy to be here till the end of the year. It makes sense to hang around at least until the MA is done. At some point it'll probably make sense to wait until my kids have finished the next bit of school. and so on.

But a house, well that's a bit in your face. I know that we didn't just buy a house in order to sell it. I know that we're not going to lovingly renovate it for the next two years just to move out. This is a long term thing. And it's not in London. And don't mention house prices.

Although we do have two front doors.

And soon we'll have a roof with no leaks. It's not all bad.

*To all DIY experts, Yes I know I know, I've thought about it since and I realise plaster of Paris is not waterproof and so not appropriate to stopping drips in the roof. That's not the point.

Dear Lady walking back from the supermarket,

It is no longer the case that women of a certain age are condemned to a blue rinse and cardigans. I applaud the fact that you have chosen to demonstrate your youthful heart through your choice of fashion.

Far be it from me to suggest that your calf length leggins and wedge heels would be more suited to your granddaughter. However, might I respectfully suggest that when said leggins tell the world about your need for the security of tena lady, you are not presenting the hoped for image.

All the best.

Yesterday for my birthday all the people at work, literally all of them, have been giving me three kisses (it's a Swiss thing) to congratulate me. Until this year I've had handshakes.

Unless you know about the Swiss, I can't impress on you how big a deal this is. In the three years I've been here, most of the physical displays of affection that I've received from aquaintances have happened today. I have only just started giving Bruno's mum three kisses. I still shake his dad's hand.

If I get any more assimilated I'm going to have to start cleaning my windows and being scared of immigrants.

Bruno's been hot on the trail of ingratiation into our new street:

While borrowing a ladder from the painter and decorator down the road:
"So do you still use this at your age?"

While at a drinks thing for Franziska and Robert next door, on being introduced to Robert's first wife (as if the situation wasn't already a minefield of etiquette):
"Hi I'm Bruno. Are you Franziska's mother?"

I have been doing more Quaker reading recently, which coupled with spending more than four hours in a Catholic church with my grandmother over Easter (latin, choir singing requiems, incense - you got your money's worth), has plunged me back into theological meltdown over the impending sign up.

However, I have told myself that this is not to happen, and am a woman of my word, so have suitably repressed all thoughts of higher nature to the point that late last night my brain did this:

When I was little, I read or heard somewhere that when you went to hell, the devil would know what your worst fears were, and that's what would happen there. In response, I would lie in bed at night struggling not to let any phobia/fear type thoughts into my head. The logic was that if I didn't think about them, the devil wouldn't know what they were, and when I got to hell, I'd just say, "yeah, eating cake, that really freaks me out. terrified. ooh, get those fondant fancies away, no, no."

Back to the present, and hell not being a big part of Quaker thinking, nor Catholic thinking since John Paul's reassessment of the matter, I relived the magic of childhood by wondering if the same technique would work if I was taken to Guantanemo Bay. I know, don't ask. Fairly safe in the knowledge that George W. couldn't read my thoughts, I suddenly remembered having once written in my blog about my now-not-to-be-mentioned phobia.

This morning I'm still slightly having to resist going back and deleting anything that doesn't involve brown paper packaging wrapped up with string.

(possible tip for future Catholic happiness: next Easter, don't go to the Good Friday sombre mass to look at Jesus on the cross under a cloth because of MY SINS, show your face for Saturday Vigils with candle waving where he's still in a bad way because of MY SINS, and then miss the happy Easter Sunday mass where everyone's thrilled to bits because he got up again).

How to get through security at Heathrow:

Step one: Have a glorious weekend in London. Don't go to the greek tutorial you came for, instead go to Primark and do your best to clean them out of all their shoddy but affordable stock.

Step two: Sit on tiny suitcase to shut. At Heathrow, become indignant at suggestion that you will either have to put your handbag into your suitcase or check the suitcase in. Fail to pursuade security staff that a handbag doesn't count as one piece of hand luggage.

Step three: Open suitcase. Remove clothes.

Step four: Insert handbag.

Step five: Put on all the clothes complete with tags, including the t-shirts and two jumpers that you bought for Bruno.

Step six: Waddle through the metal detector.

Step seven: Remove excess clothing and restore packing to original arrangement.

And here we are again with another winning example of "How to Make A Sale". Swiss Style. Remember, here in Switzerland you can't just fail your GCSEs and get a Saturday job. Here, you have to go to sales assistant school for several years. This is what you learn:

Today in Zürich, I made my way to Manor, a department store not unlike John Lewis. Looking for an air mattress in case of occasional guests, I made my first mistake, and foolishly went to the bed and bedding dept. Luckily I found two friendly ladies to help.

"Excuse me, I'm looking for an air mattress..."

Lady folding pillow case: "No. We don't have them. (To her folding friend) "blow up mattress? She's looking for an air mattress."

Friend: "No. (This was that special smirking no, which involves breathing out a laugh just before the 'N'). We don't sell them."

"But I phoned earlier today, and a woman told me that you have them in stock." In fact, she even took me uneccessarily through all the different measurements, equating their size to a normal bed. Point is, I knew they had them.

There now followed several minutes of them insisting that I was mistaken, if not lying, and demanding to know the name and department of this so called woman I had spoken to.

Friend: "No. We don't sell them. IF, I repeat, IF, we have them, (sic) they'll be in Sports. But we don't have them."

At this point the two break to share an undisguised and unsubtle laugh at my absolute foolishness in thinking that one of the largest department stores in Switzerland may have the product which I had phoned ahead to confirm they had in stock.

At this point Pillow lady starts suggesting some of their competitors who may stock blow up mattresses.

"I'll just try the Sports section first then. Thanks so much for your help."

And so off I go, wandering on the way over to the householdy bit, as we're thinking of having our wedding list here. As I pick up a special offer wok, the friend follows me over.

"They don't have them here either. We don't sell blow up mattresses."

"I know. I'm just looking around."

She waits.

"Are you suggesting that I should leave the premises?"

At this she does an about turn and stomps off without another word.

Luckily, I made it safely to what turned out to be a HUGE range of air mattresses, and went over to happily complete my purchase. It seemed the pillow ladies did not deign to work the tills, so I had high hopes. However, my second mistake had apparently been to pick up some delicate papery butterfly ornaments while on my unauthorised rampage through household wares.

"Hello. Do you have a bit of tissue paper or anything to wrap these up in?"

"No."

"Nothing? Anything just to protect them a bit?"

"No. What, like wrapping paper? No. Hans, do we have wrapping paper? No."

"Well, could you give me a few little plastic bags and I'll wrap them myself..."

"No."

"No? You have no plastic bags?"

"No."

"You have no paper and no plastic bags, nothing at all in which to put my goods."

"No." Puts the mattress in a plastic bag.

"Like that bag; could I have another one of those?"

"What, a plastic bag?" Half heartedly chucks a bag at me. (I can only assume it was half hearted, what with the nature of a plastic bag blowing about as it lands).

And so I left the shop, grateful that security didn't take my elbow to escort me out.

Customer service - invented in Switzerland.