"I skype my girlfriend"

It is a few years now since I first heard this remark and I must say it made me sit up and take notice. "What did he say ", I wondered. Skype , what is that? Do I want to be skyped too ? Those hard consonants s,k and p also make up another word which my mind immediately came up with ; Spank ? Do these two words have anything in common? My mind filled up with all sorts of visions.

Actually this was the reply to a question my colleague posed to one of the candidates at the speaking test and we also learned that the said girlfirend lived in Vilnius , quite far away. In my position as examiner taking notes I could not ask for clarification .

That evening when I went home I found out a little more about skyping ; yes this is the new way of communicating over the computer . It seems to be very popular to skype across countries and my wish came true last year; I could get skyped as my daughter skypes us all the time from her new abode in Europe, somwhat west of Switzerland . It takes a bit of getting used to though . I enjoyed being skyped until the day my cover was blown , No I don't really know everything and cannot say I am a techy. Bringing my laptop to school to show video clips I have researched for my lessons is an attempt to keep up with technology. Unfortunately the skype community have to know that you are not always available to chat. Well yes a few times it has happened to me as soon as I set up my laptop in class someone wants to skype me and knowing how to put on your little hat( to say I can't talk now) is very important! Otherwise students have a habit of expecting new excitement everytime they see me set up the laptop. Where's xxxx29 they ask? They do not even know the identity of my friends ( who are actally female) But just as I have a vivid imagination as you see above so do they.

"I want you back"

This is the first title on my CD Motown 50 , Yesterday , Today, Forever ,which my husband brought home one day earlier this year as a surprise present . Although I try not to get stuck in the rut with music from the past this CD really brings back memories of innocent happy days listening to motown . I love it and it moves me .

Well this first track I want you back is probably on many people's minds right now after the shock which hit us on Friday when we learned of Michael Jackson's premature death. It really came as a shock appearing as a mere factual report on the last page of the first part of the newspaper , together with the news that Farah Fawcett ( one of Charlie's Angels)had likewise passed away.

Suddenly Michael Jackson became the media focus and television news reports showed how the world has gone into mourning for the King of Pop, rather in the same way we went into mourning when Diana, the Princess of Hearts died in a fatal car accident. Both these icons of the 80's were special as they touched us somehow with their charm ,beauty, we were mesmorised by their gorgeous outfits just not for this real world . Both had children bearing the title Prince , and we think of all these Princes and one Princess and how it must be to lose a beloved parent too early.That is another part of the mourning; leaving those children behind.

Much of the Michael Jackson story has been televised and we see this lovely child as above who was a star at an early age. What does this mean for a child? Just recently this was brought home to anyone watching the "Britain's got talent" show. Some of those little ones really moved us with their adult performances and we hoped that they would do well. But what really happened was this; far too much pressure for such a little person , quite noticable with displays of tears and near breakdowns when these little people don't win and this may help understand the Michael Jackson story . Incidently this year's BGT winners Disparity may have been inspired by Michael Jackson . Their dance routines were also fabulous.

It is not easy to know why Michael so desperately wanted to change his skin colour as we think he was a gorgeous young man. Looking at things more closely could it be that he just wanted to get rid of that performing child? Some say that Jackson 5 in their time were considered and treated as no more than a circus act. Some say that the venues for such performances were any other than child friendly and nowadays not at all allowed for children . But that was back then when Martin Luther King and " I have a dream", was just being broadcast ,where all people regardless of colour would have the same status . Did the Jackson 5 get to use the same entry as the guests at these concerts? Perhaps all of this convinced Michael Jackson to redesign himself , it is hard to know .

In contrast his adult home Neverland looks like a dream for a child , something like Disneyland and perhaps this was an attempt to have another go at a childhood as depicted in the Peter Pan story; telling us again children should not have to take on adult responsibilities until they are ready, it is only harmful to their development as somehow yearning for that lost childhood prevents the adult from developing . In the paper today I saw the comment that Michael Jackson has now moved from Neverland into Foreverland just as we see on my CD cover; yesterday, today, forever . That is how the music, dance routines and videos will stay.

All we know is this; Michael I want you back just as you were .

Modesty versus hygiene

"Just imagine, you will soon be sitting in the sauna! "my husband tried to encourage me to endure the cold with this form of wishful thinking as we sat on the chairlift with our hands cupped over our faces trying to protect them from the fierce wind which was blowing. Yes, we really were absolutely freezing as usual on one of those old types of chairlifts without a hood and we were about to be blown down the slope on our snowboards with the wind howling around us. The thought of the sauna as a form of après ski seemed then very attractive .

Actually I have never really been a particular sauna fan and most often find a way to avoid them for various reasons .....here's why .

Years ago on a trip to San Francisco Hilary ( former colleague and now sister -in-law ) and I were invited to a sauna by some trendy young guys. Of course we had no idea about saunas but were eager to find out so off we went and duly entered the club, changed into our bikinis and waited for the sauna experience. By this time our hosts had disappeared but plenty of other people seemed to be in the sauna area ( without any clothes on).There did not seem much trace of the Pilgrim Fathers amongst this crowd and most likely they were descendents of the Scandinavian side of the great melting pot of cultures which we so love in the United States . At that point our English upbringing which had tried to make us lady like and aspire to modesty did not go that far as to allow us to sit around naked in a club. Oh no... Gradually some of these men came up to us and asked us whether it is usual in Great Britain for people to sit in a sauna in a swim suit (notice the American word here). As we had never been in one before we hastily replied "oh yes, that's the usual thing to do." Well we obvously realised that we were in the wrong film here with all these naked people and decided to make a hasty retreat before getting ourselves into another scrape . Our hosts had already disowned us as two prude English girls .. no fun to be with - definitely losers and definitely not cool enough for this hip SFO scene .

As I related this incident to my Swiss boyfriend of the time ( now husband on the chairlift) he really laughed at the scene of our faux pas and offered to take me to a sauna on my next trip to Zürich. He explained here that it is viewed as most unhygienic for people to sit around in nylon or other types of man made swimwear which will become drenched in sweat. The whole idea is to let the sweat drip out of your skin and then shower it off in cool water . It is cleansing for the body I was told . Although I had some reservations with visions of concentration camp gas cells I decided to have another go this time at Alpamare where there is a separate sauna for ladies so the modesty thing would not be too challenged.

Well now knowledgable about the sauna culture, I hung up my bikini outside and stepped into the little chamber . Of course when I sat down I quickly had to jump up again , the wooden slats were burning hot for my tender bottom . By this time the other ladies were scowling at me .. and I could see they were all sitting nicely on their towels . My towel was somewhere far away in a locker and impossible to retrieve. So rather than admit defeat I stood in the corner with my back to these people and bared it out for about three minutes. Done. Sauna experience over for ever, never again . For years and years I never wanted to go in one again and always found an excuse to avoid them . Modesty ruled and I decided not to part again with my "textiles" as swimwear is referred to in this part of the world. I even saw a sign in a Black Forest hotel requesting guests to enter the area "without textiles " and it always makes me smile . I can't imagine such a sign in an English hotel - there would be an uproar . Or maybe times have changed ? Are there such signs advocating hygiene?

Well times here have changed more recently as more and more Swiss hotels have started to offer spa areas for their guests in a bid to keep the guests from wandering off to Austria where "Wellness" hotels are very much "en vogue" especially for winter holidays.

Nowadays going into a sauna after a day on the slopes seems the ideal way to get warmed up and I have found out the perfect way to keep everyone happy. Let's say you do not have to lose your cultural identity either way. Nobody will wrongly categorise you if you follow these steps. You just leave your " textiles" outside on the peg and wrap yourself up in a big big towel , without offending anyone. The towel should however be big enough to put under your feet, no sweat should drip onto those wooden slats remember -and as the towel is to stretch up to cover you from top to toe it may involve a rather unusual posture. Ah well three minutes is enough to get warm ... Just one thing- don't forget to take off your gold jewellery otherwise you will end up using inappropriate language ! It gets very hot too!

Now however we have found the answer to the modesty versus hygiene debate we are on to the next question which adds a further dimension to the whole experience . Here it is.

" Just imagine sitting here in this sauna and not being able to open the door to get out", mused my ever imaginitive husband during our melting down phase one evening. We were looking at the thermometer registering almost 90 degrees . Yes, unbearable really, totally crazy to do something so extreme .

As we airliners know safety is the number one priority and our wish is please sauna builders construct a safety button inside the sauna to alert the outside world of melting / fainting guests !xxx one not so resilient but willing to try out sauna user or Kluser !

Have you ever tried rainbow cake?

We are just back after a refreshing jog up through the woods to the next village where we went looking for a beaver's lodge. It has just snowed and the scenery looks exactly as though dusted with icing sugar , just like the cake which is on the table downstairs which we will be tucking into very soon as it is that time of day on Sunday . Well my chocolate and cherry cake looks perfect, just like any other Swiss gugelhopf and so it should be- it is baked and shaped to perfection following a Swiss recipe and helped along with all my kitchen gadgets which I seem to love buying or ordering from Betty Bossi. My love of gadgets though will have to wait for another blog . Of course this conventional cake is nothing like the one I tried the other day fondly known as "rainbow cake" and lovingly baked by a rather unconventional American colleague. She had generously brought the cake along to a farewell party and I have to say here I myself would never have been brave enough to do such a thing fearing those typical Swiss comments on our rather less sophisticated cooking in the Anglo Saxon world. Well this colleague does not burden herself with such worries and that's why she is so loveable. When she handed the cake around I looked at it and saw this was not rainbow cake but psychedelic cake! I did not see a bow but more a kaleidscope pattern of twerling colours . I asked myself whether it merely appeared to have the colours of the rainbow because of what we may have unwittingly consumed beforehand. You know what I mean San Francisco and all that? Well I tried the cake and it was good and it was a great feeling to have actually tried rainbow cake . An achievement in fact, compared to our visit to Amsterdam in summer when we didn't get to trying THE CAKE!"
After mentioning at a party last summer of our plans to visit darling daughter in Holland , a former colleague launched into these tales of the adventures he had had "trying the cake " in the coffee houses of Amsterdam . In fact he seems to have lost a day or so of his life after being really stoned on the contents of these "cakes ". So apart from wishing to add to our cultural CV with all those three "H" ( historical , horticultural and one other! ) must do visits in Amsterdam, we put coffee shops on our list.
Ah well when we got there those coffeeeshops were not like the hip jazz cafés which we are used to in Switzerland or America , no they didn't look inviting at all. The clientèle looked pretty uninspiring actually so in the end we gave them a miss. Maybe that was a pity .
Well I've just got my work schedule for the spring and summer and see a few nice weekends where we can fit in a visit back to darling daughter and this time I'm inspired. We'll go to a coffee shop and I'm looking forward to the reaction when I step in and ask for a piece of rainbow cake! Maybe somebody will have to take a chill pill there !!

Last plane home

This is one of the songs I went home singing after watching a once again great performance of all the stars who help to make Art on Ice one of the main highlights of our year . It treally is true , Zürich is a wonderful host city to all these ice skaters and musicians who fly in from all corners of the globe. Perhaps the WEF in Davos could learn from this ecstatic atmosphere, invite a few such artists and the world would be a happier place.

Well that's a slight digression from what I started out to say but the opening line of this song was certainly relevant for me; it goes like this:

"I can't believe I missed your birthday again " which Daniel Powter wrote in dedication to his daughter whose birthday he has missed a couple of times because of being on tour, composing songs etc.

Well , unfortunately despite all my good intentions at the start of the year I am thoroughly ashamed to say I missed some important birthdays in January .O h dear suddenly I looked in my diary and realised yet another birthday had gone by and I had forgotten to send my greetings . ( I should add work sometimes causes this inexcusable forgetfulness)To all those princesses and prince to whom I sent belated greetings just that you know I went to itunes this morning, downloaded this song for my ipod and will learn my lesson . I won't forget your birthdays next year and it is here in print to remind me .Well yesterday I cannot say "I had a bad day" ( another of Daniel Powter's hits!) in fact it was a perfect day! I did not forget the most important birthday in January and to celebrate this we sat mesmorised watching all those princes and princesses on ice whom I would have liked to have put in my handbag to take home with me before they all took the last plane home . As every year I am already thinking about who will come and enchant us next year. One true Art on Ice in zürich fan xxx

I've been waiting

Yes, this makes me think of Diana Ross, and Motown who celebrated 50 years of music last year .
Actually I have been waiting for 40 years for someone to carry on from Robert F. Kennedy , the first politican that I really took an interest in. Looking back it might seem strange, but the whole senseless murder of this wonderful man really broke my heart at the tender age of 11. I could not believe how this could have happened , and later, watching an interview with Sirhan Sirhan , the Christian Palestinian assassin, I believe he himself must have lived in hell when he realized what he had done , not only to the Kennedy's but for his own people. Did it do any good to anyone? What can we see in the Middle East today ?A small part of the world continually occupying major front news headlines.Will there ever be peace? Forty years have passed now without any really inspiring U.S. president who could ever ever motivate as the Kennedy's could. Well now this week we have all become motivated again as Barack Obama stepped in as 44th President of the United States .He is truly wonderful and watching a documentary of his life story I can only say the waiting was worth it .
signed here one loyal Barack Obama fan xxx

above sea level

Yesterday I learned an interesting fact and it seems that using above sea level as a meaurement of land height can lead to costly mistakes if the sea is not stipulated . I t seems that the Swiss take the Mediterranean as their reference point whereas just across the border, the Germans refer to the North Sea. Apparently these two seas have a difference in level of about 27 centimetres, a fact which showed up quite clearly when the Swiss and the Germans each from their respective side of the Rhine, decided to build a bridge to connect with each other at Laufenburg. Oh dear , what a shock when they reached the middle over the Rhine and found a gap of 27 centimetres.That's hi-tech engineering for you . xxx

Fische haben Knochen

"Kippers for breakfast?No I don't think so, they have too many bones. " This was my reply to a German lady who had recently been to Scotland and wanted to know if I also eat fish for breakfast.
We were having dinner at Carmen's, a German friend , who naturally had mostly German friends seated at the table.
"Was, Fisch haben Knochen?" Fritz, the husband then yelled out in amazement" Kein Wunder wir kommen nicht weiter in der EU. Aber ehrlich , haben englische Fische Knochen?" I had never really thought about this before . As far as I know this is what we say in English and from across the table , Andy an English guy , with Scottish roots, was nodding in agreement ." Yes, that's right " he confirmed, "We say bones. " Our German friends wanted to know why we don't have a word for "Gräte", which is the German word to describe "fish bones." After, this Fritz went on enlightened."No wonder the English can't become fully integrated with the EU. They would never be able to comply with the "Fisch grät " regulations. "After thinking about this I can see that the German language really is descriptive, and sees bones as part of an animal( mammal?) . Perhaps here we English really have to say our language isn't always as descriptive as we like to think, despite being known as an international language. Now learning from our friends, we could decide on a new word here to add to the dictionary, We would be stretching out the hand of friendship and just think how many German speaking tourists the world over would be able to enquire about the fish menu. No way do German fish ever have bones and I expect Fritz and his wife Thea, as well as all the others must have been having the wildest visions of these English fish which live in the same North Sea but being much sturdier because of their strong bone structure .

Place your seat in the upright position

"Ladies and gentlemen we are ready for take off , we kindly ask you to place your seat in the upright position and put it in the overhead compartment" announced Manuel , our maître de cabin.
We looked at each other rather puzzled as to how we should achieve this .It must be new. Well of course our full sympathy was with Manuel who had just had to deal with a rather difficult lady in seat 1a. Of course as there was no seat in front of her where she could stow away her bag, Manuel had taken it to put in the aforesaid overhead compartment . No , difficult lady had no intention of parting with her bag and , of course stood up, retreived her bag and placed it on her lap.This was not really what Manuel wanted and in his attempt to assert his authority he swept the bag from her and again placed it overhead. Unbelievable how this elderly lady behaved .I don't think she can have been English , I hope not anyway, I would feel so ashamed of her .
For us two rows behind, of course, it was let's say, entertaining ! Most of all when the poor Swiss guy told her off and said he didn't like her any more and he was very cross with her . Well he won't have to wait long before customer services hauls him in for a slap on the wrist about how he dealt with her and also confused all the passengers with his flustered instructions .
Working with passengers can be wonderful , especially if they know who they are and are comfortable with themselves. Unfortunately too many passengers, normally respectful citizens, become monsters the moment they set foot in the terminal buildings. Training instructors will tell us that this is due to fear.Especially if they belong to the group of people labelled green in motivation theory.These are supposed to be emotional and we are supposed to understand this and help them overcome their anxiety . Well I don't know about this. How about
"Ladies and gentlemen , we are ready for take off. If you are sitting next to an obnoxious passenger, please, for your own safety place him or her in the overhead compartment "
Enjoy your next flight !

Safe journey

"Have a safe journey!" This is how our waitress wished us on our way , after a short stop in the"Little Chef" en route for Woodhall Spa for Christmas.
" Well she would wish us that wouldn't she? "remarked darling daughter Kathrin and continued "especially as you told her you don't know how to turn the lights off on the car! She really does hope we make it home safe and sound."
Just after our arrival at the restaurant our waitress had come over to our table hurriedly to tell us we had left the lights of the car on, to which we had replied "Thank you" and done nothing about it , as we didn't want to waste time looking for the manual in the dark. Of course this is just one of the drawbacks of hiring a car at night. In a hurry to set off you may not really check out how everything works , concentrating much more on adapting to driving on the other side of the road. You also in your hurry never check for those little dents and scratches which the car company will claim you have made on your return and then insist on charging you for..
Well on this occasion I had reserved a fairly small car as the last time in England I was upgraded to a "Chelsea tractor " which although spacious was a nightmare to park. On considering the amount of luggage for 4 persons ; two travelling in from Rotterdam to LCY with extra equipment for the onward stay in the Engadin as well as two normal adults with cases full of presents I was gently urged to order a bigger car.
"Oh no need " I replied airily"Carrie says it's always best to order a small car which the car company will no longer have available , when you arrive, especially late in the afternoon.Then they have to offer you a bigger car at no extra cost " This is my younger sister's recipe for success and thriftiness and nobody ever messes with Carrie.
As we have , on principle blacklisted so many car companies we were now new customers with Hertz, and so as we started our car rental transaction I casually asked for a bigger car.
" Yes, certainly, Madam, we can offer you a ( big big car)£35 extra per day. Is that what you had in mind ?" enquired our rather stiff rental agent.
"Well, have you anything a little smaller ?" I asked and so it went on.
It was dark by now , Mum's welcome dinner was surely long waiting at home and so off we drove , never stopping to figure out the lights. We always end up with a bigger car which we don't really need and just this once, couldn't Carrie's ploy have worked ? Of course not , next time I'll have to travel with Carrie and see exactly how it works .I can't imagine anyone sniggering at her and calling out "have a safe journey!"
xxx