My life reeks of faux spontaneity. The moves I’ve made, jobs I’ve taken, and places I’ve traveled to make my over-strategized Instagram account portray me as a risk taker (not only by how often I eat ice cream sandwiches from The Good Batch and pizza from Luigi’s) who lives life to the fullest without fear. Well, let me tell you Internet Journal That Is Available To The Public To Make Me Feel Important, I’m a nervous nelly. I can hardly stand flying on a plane… while it’s still at the gate…Yet somehow, with two weeks notice, I have ended up living for a short time in a small country far away from my brand new home. Because I’m exciting. And spontaneous. A risk taker. And also because there was the promise of good foreign food.
It was my day off and I was strolling through Facebook (after once again promising myself I would delete it during election season, but Christa Baxter your posts are too good, darn you) and I was mulling over the fact that I was in a job whose pros perfectly match its cons. I loved the location, the bus was unreliable, I loved the store, the hours were two-years-into-your-Medical-Residency long, I liked the work, it wasn’t working out. And so, when an opportunity was presented to me in the form of a friend’s Facebook status, I acted fast, responsibly, and decided to run away from my problems. A friend of mine has an aunt who lives in Switzerland who needed a nanny for the summer. I was sold. I messaged her a resume and an overzealous attitude and heard back quickly…eventually I got around to telling my husband. He was cool with it.
When the kids said, "let's go to the park!" I wasn't expecting this. Now I ask them to take me.
So I bought my tickets, packed less than an appropriate amount of clothes for the amount of time I’d be there, and gave my two weeks notice. I listened to more than my fare share of relaxation meditations to prepare me for a flight on my own (I am NOT a flyer, friends) and I kissed my husband, and cat, a lot. Then I just left.
The situation itself was perfect. The family needed a nanny for two weeks in July, they would then be on vacation for two weeks, and then need a nanny again for the last two weeks of summer. That time in between I would house sit, water plants, and enjoy living the simple life in Switzerland. It also worked out to have Christian join me. Which made the whole thing much more possible for this ever love-struck barely blogger. I flew in, was less than inspected at the friendliest Customs in the world, found a train that said Luzern, and ended up in the city. When I got off the train I was picked up and thrown into the life of my summer family. The information started pouring (way harder than the rain I was promised in this country, so far it was sunny skies) and I tried to keep up. But let me tell you, it’s no easy thing to keep pace with an American-turned Swiss Matriarch and a sweet and spunky 7 year old on these ancient cobblestone streets.
My faaaavorite gloomy cool part of Lucerne, paintings of The Dance of Death across this entire medieval bridge.
Our first stop was the city itself. Working for a tour guide has some serious travel time perks. I was shown around the old town Luzern with a group of exciting expat friends of the family. Many had lived here for years and still took the time to enjoy the history of the city. It’s that interest and love for the location that made me love it, and them, instantly. Because this city is worth loving. But I’m the one at the keyboard which means this is no real blog post where I talk travel tips and must sees, I want to talk about how hard it is to grocery shop.
Let’s move on from sun kissed cobblestones and shingled roofs to the florescent-lit sausage isles of Liddle, the grocery store where I learned how to grocery. In Switzerland, a country whose worst crime is occasional smiley-face graffiti, there seems to be this universal fear that grocery carts will be stolen by the truckload if not locked together like a massive human centipede (or just like a bunch of grocery carts locked together with a chain). I was handed an absolutely foreign object, it looks similar to a dog tag if it had a second smaller license melted to the top and wasn’t used to locate Lassie but was instead used as a key to unlock your oh so desirable two wheel drive, four wheel steer, one speed grocery cart. When the key is inserted into the handle of the grocery cart, it unlocks the handle from the cart behind. The key is then trapped inside of the cart until you finish shopping and push a lock from another cart back into the back of the handle, releasing Lassie’s license. It’s a system.
Unfortunately, I forgot to take any photographs of the grocery store. These city shots will have to do.
After getting past THAT initial shock and awe, I made my way to the bread isles and basked in the fresh baked carb-induced coma I was already summoning to my summer body. Fresh baked bread abounds in the isles of the simple store. All welcoming me into the country of its origin, wanting nothing but my satisfaction as I tear it open and smother it in locally sourced happy cow butter…this daydream was real. It was also interrupted as a 7 year old girl jumped onto my special grocery cart and started rolling toward the refrigerated section. I woke back up and rushed after the cart before the little one rammed into the sausages I had yet to drool over.
After bagging our groceries ourselves in environmentally friendly reusable bags and returning our trusty cart to its tiny locked up cell, we drove through tiny towns, through treacherous two-lane roundabouts, made it up a mountain and into their home.
Since then I’ve mostly been sleeping, trying to adjust to the time difference. I’ve also climbed waterfalls, rode gondolas, eaten chocolate, toured historic cities, eaten more chocolate, hiked alps, and watched The Bachelorette. I’ll write about that fun stuff tomorrow. Probs.
A short stroll from the village of Ennetbürgen will bring you here, Bouchs. They got the flags.
