Flash Fountain! |
Water Conservation: Drink water excess , becomes dog water. |
Aussie at the public BBQ (pronounced Barbie) |
Flash (fancy) BBQ station. |
Flash Fountain! |
Water Conservation: Drink water excess , becomes dog water. |
Aussie at the public BBQ (pronounced Barbie) |
Flash (fancy) BBQ station. |
Fortunately, Darrell’s cousin (Jen – our last US visitor to Switzerland) had a long career in the Army. She told us that the Army talks to soldiers coming home after a long deployment about what to expect. It was good for her to frame that for me and just let me know that there is a process to being home again. We clearly are not the same people we left as. I mean, we are still fun-loving energetic, and lovable :) , but with such a different view on life and living. I’ve been home since August 25th now and have had some time to try settling.
It has been hard to say I am happy to be home without any caveats because there is still a lot of work ahead of us to get settled. We’ve just been going through tasks for so long now. Lately, it has been get cell phones (we have new numbers if anyone needs them), turn on utilities, go to a wedding, visit our neglected property in eastern Washington, start cleaning and moving back into our house, thinking about house projects we need to do, weeding our out of control garden….
But we are settling, and there are lots of things in the works here now. I’ve ordered a raclette maker and we are looking at espresso makers so we can stop using our drip coffee pot (friends in Switzerland were always amazed that we would drink that “stuff that you leave in a container”). We have plans for a firepit outside so we can do regular grills with wood instead of with our gas grill – which is for sale now. I am also excited to say that we now have a home carbonation system so I can drink wasser mit Kohlensäure (carbonated water) any time I want. I’m planning to sit in on the university German classes and am trying to figure out how to make regular visits back to German speaking countries so I can practice.
I am also excited about some of my favorite Bellingham things like social exercising (runs and bike rides with girlfriends), a 25K run in January on Orcas Island that I just signed up for, spontaneous and frequent get-togethers with friends, our killer Farmer’s Market, NPR at the right time of the day, and good American micro-brewed beer (after giving Swiss and some German beers a serious chance, I have to say that it really doesn’t get much better than American micro-brews for tasty beer). I am happy to say though that at our first meal with friends, I said en guete (enjoy your meal) without thinking about it.
I suspect that there will continue to be things that strike me as interesting or odd, but there are already some to talk about.
There is only one more thing to happen that will make life complete… and we are in the process of that right now… stay tuned.
Moving is always hard and time-consuming, but an international move (at least the way I did it) has some unique considerations – for me, the luggage was the challenge. The cheapest way to get our household goods back to the U.S. was to check them as excess baggage – and Iceland Air had the best price for that, which is why I flew Iceland Air and decided to throw in a stopover for two days.
Darrell had already left with the fully packed ski bag (thank goodness!), my fold up bike, and a box of things – plus his check-ons. That left me with 2 boxes of things, 2 boxed bikes, 2 suitcases, and 3 backpacks – does that add up to 8 plus 1 carry on??? Yup, that’s it. The challenges – pretty simple – how to get all of that to the check-ins without ever leaving it unattended, which is impossible without help. Fortunately for me, people popped up to help. In Frankfurt (where I flew out of), I got two baggage carts (2 Euros each, but refundable when you returned them – that part is important). As I started to load them, a man came by and said something about helfen – which sounds enough like help that I knew he was asking if I needed help. To make a long story short, he was Polish and his name was Sebastian. He made a living by cruising the airport looking for bottles with a refundable deposit and baggage carts that he could return for the 2 Euro refund. He spent a lot of time with me- which was a bit creepy, but ultimately, I was very thankful. After all of my luggage was checked, he left with both of my carts and a handful of Euros from my change purse (which I gave him).
OK, step 1 completed. The next problem was in Iceland. There isn’t on-site storage for baggage at the airport, but I had researched and found a place just off-site (500 meters away, which can be VERY far when you have this much luggage) that would store my luggage for a fee. I went through customs pushing my two carts overflowing with luggage and boxes – with a little help from the customs guard. When I called the off-site baggage storage, the woman was quite no nonsense about me having to get there on my own… so I got two carts and started pushing them out of the airport. The route started with a sidewalk, but turned into a road. To be exact, it was the only road that leaves the airport. Fun.
Fortunately, I was in Iceland and not the US; this road had traffic, but it wasn’t a highway and the traffic wasn’t consistent. My plan of attack was to leap-frog the carts. I pushed one about 50 meters, then went back for the other, pushed it 100 m, then went back for the other, and so on. At one point, the cart waiting for me up ahead flipped over spilling everything onto the shoulder. Damn it. Then the one I was pushing dumped. At that point I shouted out a cussword – which I am sure is what led to the two young people to come ask me if I needed help. The landscape here was pretty barren with no people around except one worker tending the airport lawn and these two young people hanging out talking to him - I was lucky they were there. The rest of this journey was cake with their help!
After storing the luggage, it was a nice bus trip to Reykjavik (from the airport in Keflavik). The highlights of the stopover were:
The rest of the luggage handling was much easier. I asked the people at the luggage storage to drive me back to the airport, and they happily obliged. In the U.S., a customs agent helped me through the final check, and then Darrell was there to help with the last leg to our car. My first thoughts – gosh, Americans are so nice. I was heartily welcomed back by the man at passport control, had help from 3 customs agents with baggage, and talked to a nice lady on the train about her son. What struck me most, is that Americans smile a lot – this is good. Yup – I’m back…
Mt. Rainier welcoming me home as I flew into Seattle.
Pontrasina, Engadine |
Zurichbad, ZH |
Old Slate Fountain, Tirano IT |
My last day was today and I am sad to leave. I gave a final presentation of my work conducted at Eawag and am happy to say that it is a solid bit of work – this year was a smashing success professionally. We followed the presentation with an Apéro later in the day and then some time at the local lake for a Bar-BQ.
One thing we talked about in earlier posts is how neat it is that here the custom is for you to bring your own cake for your birthday, and by the same token, you have your own party when you are leaving. Most of the parties at work are in the form of an Apéro – which was great for us because we were able to use lots of food from our Swiss pantry. At the Apéro , I was surprised to have some gifts from the people in my department (UTox). A lovely book of Switzerland from the two group leaders I was working closest with (because they knew how much I loved their country), a recycled water bottle and glass from the department chair (because what is better than that when you work at an Institute of Aquatic Studies?), and a scrap book from everyone.
The scrap book is awesome. Basically, anyone who wanted had a page with a picture they added. For example, Flavio added his famous tiramisú recipe (although it is in Italian and I won't get the translation until next year when he comes to visit!), Adi added pictures of the ICP-MS for me (so I could remember the instrument that he worked so long with me on), and David had a note written in English that he held up in his picture (he spoke Swiss German, and by the end we had worked out our own wonderful way to communicate with each other, it often involved me drawing pictures and one of us running off to a computer to look up a word). There were lots of pictures of activities from the lab and from outside adventures with my closest friends there.
Maybe best of all is the name on the front. It says Les Ambassadeurs. If you’ve been following the blog, you know we called our dog, Fiona, the Ambassador. Honestly, with all the emotion of leaving and stress of moving out, and a touch of sadness still for loosing Fiona, this caused me to cry. I have to say though, that I am honored to be considered Ambassadors ourselves. As our friend explained, not only was Fiona an Ambassador, but so were we – simply put, we gave our European friends a different sense of what an American is. I really really am honored. Thank you.
The lake was nice – it was a place I went in the early spring with some of the PhD students and post-docs to just hang out on a sunny Saturday. It was great to do that one last time with them and with some other friends - this ended up being our last good-bye with many of them.
As Darrell said when I was looking through my scrapbook the next day… it is like I just came back from camp. I made so many wonderful friends, learned so much, and just had fun. Add to that my huge accomplishments with research, new skills I am bringing back to my U.S. university, and European colleagues I hope to work with in the future... I couldn’t have asked for more and will cherish this time and these memories forever.