I got another teaching job!

But first I have to say, what's with this HEAT? It is extremely hot here in der Scheiwz. I wish I had a thermometer at home so I could tell you how hot it really is now. I'm sitting out on the balcony, I dragged my desk chair outside because we don't have outside furniture yet so I'm actually very comfy (it's a good chair :-), and if I use my imagination I can feel a tiny little bit of cooler air. But I think it's just my imagination, that's all. André always says women don't sweat, we just glow. Well I don't think there was any glowing going on today, it was definitely sweating! So Switzerland is not only all about snow. Oh no.

Last week I went for another interview. This one to work only mornings as my afternoons are now all filled with English lessons and the classes are filling up nicely. The owner of this English play school is actually moving to South Africa. Not only South Africa, but to Atlantic Beach Golf Estate in Melkbos! Small world! Her husband is South African and so they are moving back there with their son. She has sold the school to someone else. I got the job to take over the curriculum planning from her and to teach. I spent the morning there today and really enjoyed it. I start next month and I'm looking forward to it. Now I can really settle into a routine and know where I'm going and where the money is coming from! Andre has been such a good husband and taking very good care of his new wife, but it would be good to earn some of my own money again too.

I've had almost a year off now. And I haven't been bored for a bit. I love being at home. But it will be good to work again too. (I just keep telling myself that!)

So have I told you how hot it is? Shame I hear you Cape Tonians are being washed away there by the rain. I've put the cookies I baked into the freezer to have something cool to nibble on. It makes them nice and crunchy.

Ok, let me stop talking nonsense now and sort out Saturday's photos of Bern so I can show you.

This and that

On Saturday we drove to Bern, the capital of Switzerland. It's a beautiful city and we had a great day walking around there. More about Bern and pictures later.

I did some baking again over the weekend. I baked a Hungarian tart. It was delicious and didn't last very long!

I finally bought what I thought would be a non-stick spray as I know it from South Africa (Spray & Cook), but it's not the same. It's just some kind of an oil that is spritzed out, not an even spray. It's not the same stuff inside. Here's a picture of the one I bought.

School started yesterday and so did my English classes. Yesterday afternoon I was back at the little 4 year old girl for her private lesson at her house. I've now also got her younger almost 3 year old sister joining us too. Her attention span is of course not that long so she's just around joining in when she feels like it and at least hearing English while I work with the older sister. She was so excited when she saw me and this got the little one excited too which was a good thing. I was worried how she would react being with me, because her mom said she takes a long time to get used to someone. But it went well.

Today I'm free all day! So good! The two boys I'm supposed to have on a Tuesday after school can't make it this week. And tomorrow I've got my group of six 4-6 yr olds for beginner reading and writing. I've got lots of great stuff prepared for them, but still have some things to do, so that's what I'm going to do now.

Oh oh I forgot to tell you! I finally made a hair appointment! I'm going on Thursday morning. So I'll let you know how it went then. Please hold thumbs that it will turn out well.

It's been soooo hot for days now. It's lovely but it can get a bit much. I'm sure next summer we will appreciate the warm weather more after a proper cold winter. I love these summer evenings though, when it starts to cool down...

Ok, let me go finish my school work so I can get some relaxing time in too later.

Luzern in the rain

My mom and Jürgen (my step-dad) came to visit us last weekend. I am truly blessed to be so close to them again. It's not good being far away from your family. It can't always be helped but after more than 6 years away from my mom (when I was still in South Africa and she living in Germany) I appreciate it so much now being only 4 hours drive away from each other. Just wish my sister could be a little closer too... she lives in California. But she might be a little bored living here after almost 9 years of exciting Hollywood life I think.

Friday evening I made home made pizza. Oh so delicious as always! Mmm... now this gives me an idea for dinner...

Saturday we drove to Luzern. I really wanted to walk around Zurich, but they had a huge parade there this weekend and we didn't feel like being squished between hundreds of people. So we went to Luzern. I really like Luzern. We're going there again this Saturday. But that's because André needs to stop by the archery shop.

It's a beautiful town. I love the bridges with the flowers all along it.

Unfortunately last Saturday was very rainy. It rained the whole time we were there. Us South Africans aren't used to walking around in the rain for fun. When it rains, you stay indoors. I didn't even own an umbrella in SA. When you have to go out in the rain, you run from your car into the building you need to be or park undercover. But here people go on with their business outside as normal.

Once we got over getting a little wet it was actually quite nice to see Luzern in the rain, with a grey sky and dark water in the river. I like how the rain here falls straight down. Quiet and peaceful. No howling wind like in Cape Town, forcing the rain into every little crack in your house until it comes streaming down the walls inside your lounge. (This really happened to me a few times.)

So here are some pictures of our day in Luzern, some taken by Jürgen and some by my mom. I was just holding my umbrella to stay dry and didn't even take out my camera this time.

Another Summer camp

This time the theme was pirates and water. I don't know much about pirates and they've never interested me. They are bad and violent people and I wouldn't choose to teach kids about this, but if you leave the violent part out, kids do like to play pirates, especially the boys. (The girls enjoyed trying on the jewelry in the treasure chest.)

We had a pirate ship in the one classroom in which the kids could play with a treasure chest with some 'treasures' in, which they could fight over. Each time I would take it away and hide it in a drawer. By the 3rd day they would bring me the treasure chest themselves to hide when a fight breaks out! Proper pirates!!

We made all the accessories pirates need- hats, telescopes, treasure maps and so on with a treasure hunt on the last day. We also learnt a bit about water- the water cycle and fish. Here's the scene from the story "Drippy the raindrop" about the water cycle.

There were 22 3-5 year olds from 8:30 - 16:30 with 2 teachers and an assistant. Again it was a bilingual course and I of course did the English part. The assistant was a great help and could speak perfect English too.

I did enjoy it but am glad it was only three days. On Tuesday evening I was totally exhausted. André laughed at me because all I could do was sit and stare. Went to bed early and just lay there! I couldn't even hold up a book to read!

When I woke up on Wednesday morning I was wondering why my legs felt as though I've done a really tough gym class, sore muscles like when you've had a proper workout. Then I realized it's from bending down all day long to these little kids and squatting on the floor beside them!

I am really appreciating the day off today! I had a lazy morning, didn't even walk with André to the station this morning. André cleaned the whole house on Tuesday when he was home (and he does a better job than I do actually) so I don't even have house work to do. Such a good husband I have :-)

Hairdressers in Switzerland

My biggest worry before we moved to Switzerland was who was going to do my hair! (And it still is.) I had lots of highlights. Lots. My hairdresser spent about 4 hours every 5 or 6 weeks to keep my hair looking naturally blond.

I started going to Dalene when I was 8 years old. That's 21 years at the same hairdresser! And I never had to sit there worrying what my hair would look like when I walk out of her salon. She's good. If you're ever in Table View/ Cape Town area and need a hairdresser, ask me for her number. But try to book ahead, I'm not the only one who thinks she's the best. Here's a picture of us in her salon. She's doing my hair for my wedding here. *sigh* I miss those wedding days... And the blond hair...

There are so many hairdressers here in Switzerland. Today I counted them walking back home from the grocery store and I counted 9! Nine! And the grocery store is not far. Only about a 5 minute walk. There's a coiffure on every corner and more in between. Here's the newest addition, Tessie's Coiffure, which is just around the corner from where we live, the first one I pass on my way to the shops.

But even though there are so many to choose from I still have not been to a hairdresser since we moved to Switzerland. It's been 4 months now... Oops.

But don't worry, my hairdresser back home did some magic before I left and my hair still looks good enough. I said good bye to half of my highlights before leaving South Africa and Dalene replaced them with darker streaks, actually the exact same shade of my natural colour. So even after 4 months you can hardly see the re-growth, it blends in really well.

Dalene said I must not worry. Swiss hairdressers are very good. They are known to go through a lot of training. But neither of us knew then that most of these many hairdressers aren't Swiss. Tessie on the corner here is Asian. And at the place André went to they're all Turkish. Not that I mind where they're from, but does it then mean they're as good as the Swiss? And as good as Dalene?

If I had the kind of money where I could just fly anywhere, I would fly to Cape Town to go see Dalene. So she can do my hair for me. I really really don't want to go to anyone else. But I will have to. Eventually. Soon. Very soon. My hair is getting quite long now and one of these beautiful summer mornings I know I'm going to wake up and it's going to be too long. It's going to bother me. And then I'm going to cut half of it off. And keep my eyes closed while they do my highlights and pray that it turns out well.

I will let you know after I've been. I'm thinking maybe next week. (But I said that a few weeks back too...)

André's Birthday

Yesterday was André's birthday and we went for dinner at Zeughauskeller, a restaurant in Zurich. It's not far from the Hauptbahnhof, a nice stroll down Bahnhofstrasse.

The building used to be an armoury (where weapons were kept) and was rebuilt in 1487 after a fire destroyed it. Many old weapons are still on display in the restaurant and according to an inventory of arms dated 1644, even William Tell's bow was on display here.

The food was really good. They have a very big menu with one whole page filled with different sausages. I had the smoked sausage from the Engadine valley and it came with potato salad, my favourite salad! André had the spicy beefsteak tatar and he said it was really good too. Then of course we had dessert too since we were celebrating his birthday! André had the "Walnut Parfait made with sugar-roasted walnuts and frozen nougat-crème. Topped with real walnut liqueur (a rarity!) and garnished with whipped cream. Highly recommended!" And I had Tiramisu with vanilla ice cream.

I was surprised how full the restaurant was on a Wednesday evening. It's quite a big restaurant with tables outside too. Outside was already full when we arrived so we sat inside. Most of the tables are big so you might share a table with other people. They have these trolleys which they use to serve from and clear the tables which I thought was very clever.

The service was really good and your food comes out very quickly after you've ordered. Usually we don't ask for English menus in a restaurant, we manage to understand the German. But last night I got a bit frustrated because the menu is so big. In the end André got me an English menu which helped! Our waiter spoke a good English and we heard a lot of English spoken in the restaurant by the other people there. The owner is around all evening, dressed smartly but with an apron over, checking on everything and helping where needed which I thought was nice too.

It was such a perfect evening. Even when we left it was still warm outside. We walked back to the station with a quick stop at the apple store (André can never resist!) and with over full tummies!

Swiss National Day at Murg, Walensee

André and I drove to Murg this weekend. It's a small village on the Walensee in canton St. Gallen. At first we missed the turn off because it's such a small place! We stayed at the Loft Hotel which used to be a spinning mill, but was converted into apartments and the hotel a few years back. It's very modern. There are even two biker rooms where you can drive your motorbike into your room! We stayed on the first floor where we had a beautiful view over the lake. The lake is stunning with the mountains right against it on the opposite bank. It's amazing waking up in the morning and seeing this view when you open your eyes.

I've made a short video of our pictures from the weekend. No descriptions with the pictures in the video so I'll tell you a bit more here first. The pictures start with our drive to Murg. We set the navigator to avoid the motorways so we had a really scenic drive through all the small towns and right along the Zurich lake. I still can't get enough of all the GREEN here!!

Then there's our room at the Loft Hotel and the view from our room. We had a little reading corner (or TV watching corner) and I loved that couch/ bed!

Then there's lots of pictures down by the lake. There's a camping site which looked great. We used to enjoy camping back in South Africa so maybe next summer we'll try the camping here. So with all the campers there was great atmosphere on the beach. A pile of wood was there since early on Saturday which was lit when it got dark.

For lunch we went to the hotel's restaurant just down the road, also on the lake. This restaurant was booked for a wedding that evening so I'm glad we got to try it for lunch. Before dinner we tried the hotel's other restaurant which is a more casual place, selling pizza and salads. We had some cocktails there before going to the beach where the fireworks were going to be. There were stalls selling food and drinks. I got a pizza and burnt my mouth terribly because I couldn't wait!

We sat on the beach watching the fireworks display. Beautiful! And we had perfect weather too. André had a swim in the lake earlier in the afternoon. Apparently it is one of the lakes with the cleanest water in Switzerland and André reported that he felt really clean after his swim!

Ok, watch the video now and enjoy the fireworks!

Swiss National Day at Murg, Walensee from Anneliese Mostert on Vimeo.

Oh, I just noticed for some reason the video is not playing here on the blog. Don't know why. You can go see it here on vimeo.

On Sunday, before heading home we drove up to Flumserberg. We're looking for places to go skiing this winter and I've read about this place. Any other skiing recommendations Swiss readers? I've never tried skiing and am even scared of going in a ski lift so it must be a beginner friendly place!!

Flumserberg