Fasnact in Basel

Here is yet another story, yet another day, yet another event, of this wonderful winter festival fasnacht.


Today was Basel’s turn to show what they are made of! My host Mum and I awoke at 1.15am so we could catch the train at 2am to Basel. We arrived in Basel at around 3:30am and secured a spot to watch the morning celebration. As we waited for 4 o’clock (the start of the event) to come I looked around me and was so shocked to see so many people. Really I have never seen so many people in the one area in my whole life. Every space of ground had at least 2 people on it, I didn't even realize Switzerland had so may people willing to get up at 2am.






At 4am all of the cities lights turned out. Then there was a roar of people and the music began. Groups of performs marched around the streets holding aloft lanterns while playing their drums or piccolos. Those who had no hands free for their lantern had attached it onto their head. This created an effect of floating lights gliding down the street. Each performer was also dressed in a costume and a hand made mask. The effect was breath taking.








After watching the groups all march through the street we then went for a walk around Basel. The most wonderful thing was that everywhere you went you could here piccolos and drums and see different performance groups playing their music. Each group also had a huge big illuminated banner with a group motto. These looked just wonderful against the dark night sky.





This Fasnacht celebration was a lot softer and calmer than the one I had yesterday in Niederbipp. Yet the effect of this even was just as good. After the celebration we joined the crowds and went and had a Fasnacht onion pie to warm up. We then listed to some more music and then went home....and went to sleep

Today was Neiderbipp's (my town's) Fasnacht celebration. As I have said Fasnacht is a festival used to scare away winter spirits. To do so people form a band and march down the street playing loud music, banning drums and shooting confetti and lollies out of cannons off the side of cars. the People in the street watch this spectacle and get covered in confetti, throw confetti and have a wonderful time. So that is what I have been doing today, watching people play music while throwing.....and getting covered in confetti myself.








After the parade down the street, that was started by three fires of a Cannon, we went to the town hall for the children and adults party. Basically this was an excuse for the bands to play their music again, for the adults to drink, the children to trow confetti at each other and at the adults and the adults also were allowed to act like children as it is fasnacht and throw confetti back at the kids.



After being covered in confetti, and starting a few confetti wars myself,..... my clothes were so full of confetti and my hair so covered that i probably had gained a kilo in weight just from the amount of confetti that was covering my body.








Today was so much fun and i had the best time ever.

School in Soloturne

I have now been at school for 3 days.
My first day I arrived with my host mum and we went to my head of department. The secretary then gave me my timetable and took me to class. Once there we knocked on the door. The teacher came out and had a shock because he did not realize I was coming at all. I was then introduced to my class. My class are the arts stream and they have their Major subject as either music or Latin.

My class were really welcoming and they all seemed like normal and individual people.
The class has about 20 students with 6 of those boys. They all make an effort to try and speak in slow high German so I can understand. When I am totally lost (which happens rather a bit) they will give me a quick summary of what is going on in English before they go back to German.

The classes I had on my first day were Maths, English (which was so good as I was able to introduce my self to them all in English and I could get to know them abit as well in English with out feeling guilty for not talking German),next was choir and this was harder than you think as it was in Latin and the class all just sight read the music and sang with no piano. Then the class has the afternoon off. However I decided to go to the optional drama class and check it out. The class was good, however they were doing a play and I just sat and watch people moving on stage speaking German. It was a good experience but i may not go again until my German is better and I can understand what is going on. Thursday was a similar day. I had such trouble understanding the classes as the teachers talked so fast and as we had History and Deutsch (like our English classes) the subject matter was really confusing. i tried to understand but by half way through I gave up and learnt the body parts instead.

Today was a very challenging and full on day. I arrived at school and went to the office lady to get my student Id card. I then asked her where my class room was as I had Wood work and did not know where to go. She then politely told me that it was not taken at this school but in a school 2 blocks from here. She gave me the directions to this new school and sent me on my way.

I went down the road as she said and turned left. However I could see no new school. At this point I was feelign a little overwelmed, tired and frustrated. I Told myslef I would walk 2 blocks and I did not find the school go back tot he office lady and tell her I could not find it. After walking 2 blocks i tutned and went back. When I was almost at teh school doors 2 girls from my class bummped into me. They said that hey had come to find me as they did not know if I would find the new school on my own. How nice is that. SO after feeling totally overwelmed I suddenly felt really good as they had gone out of their way to help me. The rest of teh day was just liek the day before. Wood work looks good fun. They are in teh midle of making mirrors at the moment so I just wtched for today and then the teacher said he will get me to start on a new project soon. I also had Geography, chemistry and phisics. all of these classes were so hard I just learnt all of the easy emaotions instead, like happy sad etc. In the afternoon we had sport. This was so good to be doing spot again. The class started off more like a gym classs with exercizes etc. we then played badminton...and anyone who knows my sportig hand eye co-ordination will know htat I was usless at it. Next they had swimmin, I did not have my bathers however so went for a suposed run,which ended up as a wlak with some of the others who also "forgot thier bathers".

So school is good. My german seems to be gettign a little better and I am so lucky to have a friendly class.

Rotex Winter weekend in Grindelwald

Last weekend I had my Rotex winter weekend in Grindelwald. Rotex is a branch of Rotary but for younger people. It is basically a group of ex-exchange students who plan and organize activities for all of the new inbound exchange students and will also assist there own outbound before and after their exchange.

I woke up at 7:30 to catch my 4 trains so that I could be in Grindelwald by 12:30. On the way in Bern I was swept up in a crowd of exchange students, new and old , and we all hopped onto the train. After a frenzy of pin swapping and card giving we arrived in Grindelwald.

The accommodation was that of a bomb shelter and I think that may be what it I was used for, that or boot camp. The bunks were 3 beds high and there were about 100 bunks in a room the size of a normal bed room. However this was really fun and so very different.

After we all unpacked out bags we got split into two groups; people who want to go swimming and those who want to ice-skate. I decided that I can swim at home in Australia so opted for ice-skating. This was so much fun, we ripped up the ice skating rink and I tried backward skating and I am proud to say I only feel over once (and that was when I was going forwards).



After Ice skating myself and my Deutsch class friend Lindsay and an oldie (well she came in August) American girl called Mary went for a walk around the village. We went into every souvenir shop we could find and had the best time. We also saw the oddest gum ball machine I have ever seen. I thought it was so cool I took a photo.




That night we had planned activities. The activities were not what one would call normal activities. Once again we were split into two groups, but this time at random. The groups then had people randomly selected to do a task. The first task was to have gummy bears thrown into your mouth off a spoon and you had to catch them and eat them. Next task was to eat an apple with your hands tied behind your back, sounds easy but it was not as the apple was in a bowl of cold water and you had to eat the apple in the water. The ext task was the funniest to watch , they had to first fish a smarty out of a bowl of water and eat it, but with your face and on hands. Next you had to then try and eat 7 smarties from a bowl of flour, now as you know water and flour turn to glue so let’s just say the poor people had a fun time getting flour glue out of their ears, eyebrows and noses.

After the activities we went for a walk. We walked to a hill and then were handed these huge big woven wax poles that were on fire. We then had to march around the village with these fire sticks. It was so much fun and it was so funny to see people’s reactions to a group of people carrying these huge fire sticks.




The next day was my favourite day of the two. We went sledging down these huge mountains. Before we went sledging however the Rotex decided that it would be fun to march us up a snow hill and then make us run/ fall down the hill and then run back up in a relay. And actually it was so much fun, I just love the snow
Sledging was so much fun however I thought that is would be a 2 minute down ride then pull your sled up and do it again kind of thing . But this was not the case, it was more a 100km an hour (well not that fast but it felt it at times) sled down a hill for about 10 or so minutes. It was so much fun. As most of you know my love for speed I zoomed down the slopes and only zoomed over the barricade and crashed into the snow once (and this was good by the way as there was a crash that resulted in a huge big pile ups of people and sleds, but luckily no broken bones.)



(Me relaxing at the bottom of the slope)



Once at the bottom it took us half and hour by bus to get back up to the top.
The view from the top of this mountain was so amazing, The Alps jutted into the sky and the sun reflected off the snow creating a sparkling mountain.





After sledging down my final mountain we had a huge snow fight at the bottom. I was having so much fun and then I was suddenly picked up by one of the Rotex boys who then pinned me on the ground and had all of this snow shoved down my jacket and all in my hair. So after a cold bus ride back to the accommodation and a quick change of clothes I cam home after a wonderful day.

Luzern

Today my Host mum and I went to Luzern. It is such an amazing city; it actually reminded me of home. It is situated on a lake and has mountains in the background, a bit like how Hobart is on the river with the mount Wellington in the back.
The difference with Luzern however is it is very old, like Middle Ages kind of old.
It also has a gorgeous wooden bridge over a narrow part of the lake. It is so beautiful and looks like a fairytale bridge, there were even Swans swimming around.


As you walk along the bridge there are usually old pictures, however today there were festival posters covering the pictures. My favourite had a picture of a kangaroo with the band in its pouch.



After a walk around the old part of town my host mother and I decided to go on a little boat trip around the lake. The best thing was that with our GA (travel pass)meant it cost us nothing (so thankyou again Swiss Rotary) . The trip was just amazing; there were huge Alps in the background and small green hills with little Swiss houses in the foreground. It really was a picture perfect cruise and day. The sun was out and it was a clear crisp winter day. I was told by many that today was more like autumn or early spring than winter, however I though that this was great as today was the best day for a boat trip. And as I said the view really was spectacular.



After our boat trip we went and met up with one of my host mum's friends. She then showed us some nice places around the town and we had a coffee on the side of the river. She then took us to a building that like many of the other buildings in Luzern was painted. This one was different however as it was not painted with a biblical or traditional Swiss scene, it was painted with a festival scene. This looked almost scary in it’s vibrant and powerful manner



Next stop was the festival. Today was not a big day in the festivals program. The big days are more on the weekend, however seeing as I miss out on this as I am on my Rotary winter weekend we saw the warm up acts and the battle of the bands I guess you could call it in the market place instead. This really was great and I think was just as nice as the big Festival days .Possibly even better as we could get up close to the big bands and have a good view The costumes and music are so entertaining. The big band sound is so tremendous and I love the feel of the drums vibrations going through my body.

A day with my God mother in Kandersteg

Today my host Mum and I caught 3 trains so that we could go to Kandersteg in the Alps. The reason for this trip was to visit my God Parents and their 3 children who are staying there on Holiday from England. We arrived at around 12 o'clock and then walked to the hotel where my God mother was staying. After many welcome hugs we trundled up to the bottom of the slopes to collect the kids from ski school. We then went to a nice rustic Swiss cafe for lunch. Once again I picked out the most Swiss thing I could find on the menu. So I had Rostti with egg and ham and cheese. When my meal arrived I was so surprised to see a plate with a meal on it so big it could have fed all of us. However after a long train ride I was hungry and once again surprised myself as I finished off the whole plate of food.

It was so nice to be able to talk to My god mother Elizabeth and her Husband Ted again.It was also nice to be able to just be silly and have fun with the small kids

I must say though that at first I found it a little strange speaking in full English with out having to think of the German words. I found myself thinking of the things I wanted to say in bits of German and then having to tell my self that no I don't have to peak German but English. This was very strange and actually really nice as it made me feel like I was really getting a hold of this German language.

After a really nice lunch we went back to their hotel and I played with the kids while the parents talked for bit . We then had a coffee (myself and the adults)while the kids went for a swim in the hotel pool. After the coffee it was time to head back to the train.

It was such a lovely day and we started to finalise plans and dates for me to visit them in England with my host sister Olivia in the holidays.

Bern

Today we changed our schedule and went to Basel after pottery instead of going there on Friday. The reason for this is that we wanted to fit the festival in on Friday (Friday coming) before I go on my Winter Rotary weekend.

Oh talking about changing plans.....we did not end up going ice skating on Friday for Language course because rain and an out door skating rink really don't mix. But what we did I thought was much more amazing. We went to the Historic Museum. A museum, I hear you say, how is that interesting….. well it was all Swiss history and the stuff was so old, like 6 hundred plus years old, kind of old. There here rooms all made up like the old Swiss houses, and parts of them were original and had been moved into the museum piece by piece. Everything was so different to anything I have ever seen. Just wonderful. Now I would show you the photos of this ...but I forgot my camera, how stupid of me! So one of the other exchange students took pictures and will email them to me later, so when I have them I will show them all to you!

Oh we also got our test results back and I was not the worst...neither was I the best...I fitted in in the middle (of my class that is I am not sure where I stand against the other students yet.) I received 167 out 0f 200. Now this is good as the lowest score anyone has ever gotten on this test is 20 points and the highest is about 180ish.

So on to today... My host Mum and I trundled off to pottery at about 9 o’clock. We went to this lady's house where she has a kiln in her basement and does classes there. My Host mum is not really a student. It is more a social gathering where you make pottery. I was so proud of my self as I managed to make a bird. I don’t have a photo of it yet...you just have to wait until I paint and glaze it!

After pottery we caught the train to Bern the Capital of Switzerland. We arrived at the train station in Bern and I was wondering what these huge bits of sandstone were doing in the middle of the station. My host then explained to me that they are the remainder of the old wall built in the middle ages that surrounded Bern. The reason that they are in the station was that they were found when it was being built and instead of knocking them down they built around them. Cool hu!




Our first stop in Bern was Einstein’s house. Did you know that Einstein actually changed from being a German citizen to a Swiss one? Did you know that he made his theory of relativity in Bern when he was living with his wife who also was into physics. Did you know that many people say that his wife helped him with his theory but got no credit because she was a woman....no you did not know this....well neither did I until today!



This is Einstein’s desk were he made his theory on relativity.



this is his suit!



We then went and had a bite to eat. I had a Swiss potato and meat bake (it is called this but just in Swiss German). It was really good.

After lunch we went to the Bern Munster. (A Huge church). It was just amazing. What makes this church so amazing is that on the outside it has a picture about the day of judgment. It shows people going to hell and people going to heaven. Look closely and you will see that every face is different.




It also had a huge big satin glass window. This is really special and is called teh dance of the dead. The point of it was to show the poor that even the rich die, and that death does visit everyone. Why such a huge window for such a simple message. Well back in the Middle Ages the poor could not read and they thought that the rich were invincible. So to show them that they are all the same and all have to die and hence go to heaven and hell was meant to be an important message.





We then climbed up to the top of the tower. Guess who we saw on the tower...noe other then the Swiss District man and his short term exchange student from Taiwan. And Guess what her name was...Angela! He also told us where my host brother and sister are going on exchange. Olivia is going to Japan and Benjamin to Taiwan....but shhhhhhhhhhhhh we are not allowed to tell them until they have their country giving ceremony thing.


The view as you can see from the tower was amazing Bern is just so beautiful.





After looking around the church we went to visit the bears. The bears is not a place or anything oh no...it is actually a pit in the middle of the city with bears in it. The bears are very special to Bern because as the legend goes ....back in the middle ages the head of the city wanted to name it. He declared that he would go out hunting and what ever animal he killed first would be the name of his city. And I bet you can guess what animal he killed....yes a bear...hence the name "Bern", the crest for Bern is also naturally the bear.







After visiting the bears we went for a walk along the river that surrounds the city.



We then hopped onto the train and came home after a wonderful day.

Saturday

Saturday was a wonderful day.
First off I had my God mother from England drop by with her Family as they were on their way to skiing. This was such a lovely visit. It was so nice and really did feel like a visit form home. We had apple or cherry tart with apple cream. Now may i just say Apple cream again! "Apple Cream" the reason I am pointing this out is not because it is the yummiest thing I have ever tasted, oh no it is because I helped cook it and it turned out well! Once again this is another achievement for me as I really have b cooking skills what so ever. So we sat down and had our feast. Then Elizabeth(my God Mother) gave me some clothes that she had bought me so that i would not freeze in this cold winter weather,and while I was not freezing I could look trendy at the same time. I received some lovely clothes and my favourite was a pair of winter boots. Now boots really for some are not that exciting but when they mean that you will have dry warm feet for all of the winter that are like gold. These boots look like black uggboots but are made out of water proof material and have good thick soles.

After lunch they had to leave and be back on the road. I said goodbye, but not for long as I will most likely visit them by train on Wednesday.


The next wonderful thing I did on Saturday was head off with my host sister to "The winter festival party, also know here as Fuschnut party". We hopped on our bikes, well I hoped on my host Mum's Bike and peddled like mad down to the train station to pick up one of Olivia's friends. We then peddled off together to one of Olivia's other friends house to get ready. Lots of laughs and a few dresses, head scarfs, beauty spots and necklaces later we were ready to go. Now this festival is to ward off the winter spirits. To do this they play loud music and everyone gets dressed up in some costumes...hence the dresses etc. We rode our bikes there....and not very quietly may I add... a more more "loud girls riding their bikes singing out songs at the top of their lungs" image comes to mind. Once we arrived I knew that I would love it. The music was all live and done by people all dressed up playing their brass band music. The music was so much fun I had a blast. After 4 hours of dancing and very tired feet later Olivia and I rode our bikes home.





I am so excited for the rest of the Festival. Each town has big parades down the street etc. what I went to was a warm up for the start of the festival, like a party to kick the whole thing off. So for the next 3 or 4 weeks I am going to be danced and worn out....from so much festival fun!

Deutschkurs

I have now finished what has been a very full on 3 week language course. I have learnt so much and have met some really nice people along the way. I can now introduce myself, use most of the verbs correctly (by conjugating them), I can talk in past and present tense, order things in a Cafe, use the right gender for most objects etc and have small conversations.
The course was really good, however a little full on at times. We had our HUGE test yesterday. I wont say that it was easy as it was anything but....however I managed to complete it (well most of it anyway) and what I could not do, no one else could do either. I will get my results on Monday, so fingers crossed. Monday technically is my last lesson however we get our results back and then we go ice skating in an outside ice skating rink. I am so excited

After the test on Friday a group of us from the Deutschkurs (Language School) went bowling. We left school and then and went and had a highly nutritious dinner at MacDonald's. Now while I am on this subject of MacDonald's I will just let you know how expensive food is here. One Medium MacDonald's meal cost you $12.80, and this is in Swiss CHF by the way,how expensive is that for really not all that much!
So we had our expensive meal and then went off to bowling. I must say my enthusiasm compensated for my talent as I got a strike. Now for most people this is no achievement, but if you have ever seen my hand eye coordination skill you will know that this is a miracle. How ever this miracle did not last long as my usual self came out and I had 6 gutter balls in a row.


We then went back o the train station. Ont he way back we saw these massive big lights. i thought they were so cool and so myself and Lindsay (one of the Aussies in my Deutschkurs) posed of photos in front of the lights. This looks awesome...well i think it does as you can mostly only see our shadows.

Just a little Story!

Yesterday my Host Mum called out to me in English "bye ,have a good day, see you in the afternoon" as I was heading off to language school . I was about to say ..."Auf Deutsch bitte" (in German Please)... but then I realized that she had actually spoken to me in German and not English at all! The reason that I thought it was in English was because I had understood every word and had not had to think about what she was saying. I was very proud of my self. It was a nice moment because I finally felt like my German was improving.

SKI DAY

Yesterday we went skiing. I awoke at 6:30 so that I could be ready to leave at around 7. When i went upstairs to have my breakfast I looked out at the sunrise. It was the most amazing and beautiful sunrise I had ever seen. The Alps in the distance had turned this beautiful purple colour, and the sky was a mixture of pink and orange. A plane flew through the sunrise and it's trail turned a deep red, making a huge red line across the sunrise sky. It was just amazing. After breakfast we packed all of our ski gear into the car and set off on our hour and a half our journey. The car ride was allot of fun as Olivia and I sang along full note to all of the songs we knew. The view from the car was just wonderful. There were hills with little wooden houses just sitting all alone on the slope. There were a few cows just wondering around. We then arrived at our ski destination and hopped out of the car. This was the most amazing place I had ever been. We were in a village covered in snow, with the alps standing tall all around. I felt like I had just jumped into a Chocolate box lid or a postcard. Even the view from the car park was awesome.



We then put on our ski boots and hopped int eh cable car. we went up and up and up and up. When we arrived at the top of the Mountain the view was so stunning. The huge mountains covered in snow ,with perfect pine trees scattered along their sides.




We put on our ski gear and off we whooshed. Well Olivia and my host mum and I put on our Ski gear. Benjamin and my host dad had both hurt their feet or ankles so could not put their ski boots on. They went walking around the alps instead. So I whooshed off. It was a really long flat run to get to the slopes. My feet were hurting like crazy. My boots had this knack of finding a part of my foot and rubbing and jabbing into it. However the view and the slope (once we arrived at it) was just so much beautiful and so much fun that I decided that I Will just have to put up with sore feet. After a lot of runs and a lot of fun my feet were happy when it was time for lunch. Lunch was so good. I really think Swiss food is just awesome. I had Macaroni and apfel (apple) sauce. This really does sound horrid, but it was anything but. The pasta was covered in the best cheese I have ever had. There were little bits of potato and onion mixed in with the pasta. You then put apple sauce on the pasta and ate it all together. It was so warm and so good.


(Olivia Benjamin and I at lunch)

We then went back down the mountain in the cable car so that we could have a walk around the village. On the way down int he cable car I was so shocked ot see a frozen waterfall. Now I may sound stupid, but I had never once thought about waterfalls freezing. I don't know what i expected them to do in the cold, but I just never thought of them frozen. It was just so amazing to see and it was so beautiful.




we then walked around the village. It was just so swiss and so cute.



We found a souvenir shop and I bought a some sew on patches for my blazer and a mini cow bell. The patches are of the ski village and one of Switzerland. On our walk we saw the most amazing building. It was a wooded building and all of the front of it was carved with cows and bells and pictures.


Next was time for a hot drink. I had apfel punch. It is so good and warm. It is like hot apple drink with cinnamon and other spices and sugars in it. It really is my favourite Swiss drink so far.<


After our drink it was going home time. we hopped back in the car and went home after a wonderful day.

Up on the mountain.

Today was a Saturday so it was an hour of cleaning in the morning. I really like this system. What we do is you get up about 9, and then you do your hour of House work. You are finished by 10 (the time on a Saturday I would normally get up at anyway).
We then went and picked up my skis from the rental shop. They cost me $150 to hire for all of the season (so until may) I thought that was a really cheap price for about 5 moths of hire. We then had lunch of past and sauce and then decided to go up the mountain for a walk. We drove up the mountain, the view was just amazing. It looked like thousands of little leggo or Lilliput lane houses where below us. They looked so fake and perfect. We arrived at the top (1000 m or so high) and it was a little chilly. We walked along a path for about and hour. I was informed that this path leads all of the way to Geneva. However it takes about 2 weeks to walk. The cute thing is that you can stay in farm houses along the way for about $10 a night. I thought that is was really good. If/ when I come back to Switzerland I want to do this walk, as it is so beautiful and different.



So we walked for about an hour and arrived at a farm house restaurant. The Farm was a cute little building and they had lots of Cows.




I think they must have been champion cows as they had award winning cow bells in the little restaurant room of the farm house. I thought that this was so awesome, as cow bells are so Swiss. I have totally decided that I am bringing a cow bell home with me!



After a coffee and a nice Swiss Biscuit, it tasted like a Gingerbread house, so good!
We walked back to the car. By now it was getting colder and the sun was going to bed. I saw the cutest houses and a really lovely horse that was walking around in the snow.






We then came home and I talked to Benjamin for a bit. He gave me a Swiss pin and I gave him a Hobart one (Yes I am a true exchange student!) . I also gave him a 50cent coin that was made for the Millennium. I gave it to him because he collects coins. He then gave me a 1cent Swiss coin. This is really special as they no longer make them anymore. We then made dinner. It was meat and a risotto style rice. After dinner we had some festival cake. It is not really cake, it is more a thin sugary fried dough thing, and boy is it yummy. I love the festival even though it has not started yet, the food is so good. It is coming so soon to Switzerland and it is to ward of the winter spirits. Everyone dresses up and dances around the street. I am so excited as it starts in as few weeks.