Merry Christmas!

Our first Swiss Christmas tree. Like everyone else in this country, the tree is kind of skinny. :-)

     Since it is almost Christmas, your alien friends are thinking about gifts. Our Nativity Wise Men are travelling across the living room, on schedule to arrive at the manger with their gifts for Baby Jesus on January 6. Our skinny and fake Christmas tree is surrounded by gifts (mostly thanks to Grandma and Grandpa Waggener, recently arrived from the U.S.), waiting to be opened on Christmas Eve. We're headed to some Christmas markets next week to put some final touches on our own Christmas shopping. I asked each family member to share one gift that the past year has brought. Here are our responses.

     Lucas: School. Lucas began school in Geneva with a great amount of trepidation. After being warned that he would probably be beaten up on the playground, he was pleasantly surprised to find the other children at Institut International de Lancy to be kind and welcoming. He has a nice group of friends who get together at each other's houses and support one another on the playground. He can bike or ride the public bus to and from school, giving him an unprecedented amount of freedom. Not only that, he's also enjoying most of his teachers and subjects. I do think that the social aspect has been the real blessing, though.

     Johanna: Learning French. One of the things that Johanna looked forward to most about moving to Geneva was the opportunity to learn a foreign language, and she has worked really hard these first few months. Besides taking French at school, she's joined a running club where most of the kids -- and all of the trainers -- speak only French. I'm sure her determination will pay off!

     Drew: Skiing. This is something that is not a natural sport in Ohio, but here, the second question everybody asks (after, "Where are you from?") is, "Do you ski?" After one lesson and one day on the slopes, we are certainly not veterans, but at least we can answer that question with an enthusiastic, "Yes!"

     Me: More time with family. Since we have arrived in Switzerland, we have eaten more meals together, played more games, and gone on more outings than we were able to with our busy schedules of last year. I love watching the kids play Ping-Ping in the sun room, spending time playing Scrabble and Yahtzee, and taking walks on Sundays.

     Eric: The opportunity to experience a new culture together. We've loved getting to know people from all over the world, experiencing a truly international workplace, city, and church. One thing we've learned is that while a lot of national and cultural sterotypes certainly have a basis in truth, it is also true that people are the same all around the world. Of course we knew that before, but to truly experience it is a gift.

     The greatest gift: For it is by grace that you have been saved, through faith, and this not from yourselves. It is the GIFT of God. Ephesians 2:8

Merry Christmas to all of our wonderful friends and family!

L'Escalade

     In December of 1602 the Savoyards attacked the city of Geneva. As the story goes, a woman poured a pot of boiling soup over the head on one of the soldiers as he was trying to scale the city's walls. This innovative defensive strategy not only killed the soldier, but created a distraction that allowed the Genevans to repel the attack.


      So how does one celebrate an event that includes military history, wall climbing, and soup? Geneva's answer to this thorny riddle is the Fete de l'Escalade, a two-weekend celebration that includes historical reinactments, parades, chocolate, and a race through the city's Old Town, which is hilly enough to deserve the name "escalade" (which means scaling walls). The Escalade is one of Geneva's biggest events. Our family, predictably, chose to take part in the running and chocolate portions of the celebration.

Johanna with a marmite. They come in all sizes, from even smaller than this one all the way up to models that are fit for Hansel and Gretel's witch and cost more then chf 200.



     The chocolate portion of the festival involves marmites, or chocolate caudrons. Every store sells them. I bought ours at Migros, which had a convenient 3-pack of some of the smaller kettles. You then buy bags of marzipan shaped to look like vegetables, and fill the cauldrons. We combined this with a Thanksgiving tradition by having the kids put a vegatable in their kettle each night and write something for which they were thankful. We returned to the Escalade tradition last weekend: What you're supposed to do is break the kettle while crying out, "Thus perish the enemies of the Republic!" Then you eat the kettle and the vegetables. I find this a delightful way to celebrate a military victory, and would advice other governments to try to work out commemorative ceremonies that include chocolate.

     The race portion of the celebration is huge -- more than 28,000 people participate. We arrived in the morning of December 3, having ridden an extremely crowded 19 Bus to the Bastions Park area where the race begins and ends. The park was so packed that we could barely fight our way through the masses of people to the IIL tent, where Luc and Johanna were supposed to meet their classes. They had to leave for the starting line 40 minutes early in order to make it in time. I was very thankful we had signed them up through their school, so I didn't have to find their numbers or take them to the start of the race. Drew and Eric watched from the middle of the race, and I watched at them finish and was able to take some good pictures.

    

     Typically for a Swiss race, Luc ran at 11:50 a.m. and Johanna ran at 12:00, my race was next, at 1:30 p.m., followed by Eric's, which wasn't until 4:15 p.m. Both Johanna and Luc ran 2.5 kilometers, I did close to a 5k, and poor Eric had to do 7k. In between our races were different ages and distances, including the really fun-to-watch Escalade Elites. We also got to see the woman who nearly beat Eric in the Trans-Onesienne. We cheered for her as she raced with the over-50 women's crowd (she was close to the front, of course). The race is beautiful, winding through the cobble-stoned streets of Old Town, right past St. Peter's Cathedral where Calvin preached, and back down to Bastions Park. A huge screen showed runners throughout the race, and huge crowds lined the entire course (which again, typically, we had to do more than once -- I don't know why they like loops so much here).
    By 5:15 p.m., we had been at the race for more than 6 hours, it was dark, and it was starting to rain (apparently it is always cold and rainy for the Escalade -- part of the tradition), so we did not stay for the Marmite Run, which is like a parade where everyone dresses up in crazy costumes and runs through Old Town. Maybe next year.
     Luc's favorite part of the day had nothing to do with chocolate, history, or running, but with finding one of the world's best climbing trees right near the course.

     Drew's favorite was something that I have never seen at a race before -- nor expect to ever see at a race outside Switzerland -- the Alpen Horn players stationed along the course. We watched Eric's race next to them and enjoyed the music of the Alps the whole time!

My Testimony

             We've had some wonderful testimonies this fall at the Bible study I attend. Like all the other groups around here, the study is a truly international group of women, and I've gotten to hear stories from people raised in Lesotho, Jamaica, South Africa, Canada, and Czechoslovakia (when it was still a country), among many other places. Zita's family had to hide the fact that they were Christians in a country where it was illegal. Ruth was among the first missionary women to give birth in a mountain hospital. Jenny participated in a march of reconciliation between blacks and whites in South Africa just before the first free and fair elections. It was my turn today, and I felt a little outclassed. But God work in everyone's life is something to share and celebrate. Since I'm not great at thinking on my feet, I wrote out my speech. Here it is, for anyone who is interested.   

*    *    *

             I’ll begin my story around this time of year, in the late 1970s, when I was 7 or 8 years old. All the students at McGuffey Elementary School, of which I was one, were practicing for the annual Christmas Program. We still called it a Christmas Program then, even though I did not attend a Christian School. One of the songs we were going to sing was, “Let There Be Peace on Earth.” One of the lines in that song is: “With God as our Father, brothers all are we.” During that line, I quietly closed my mouth. I didn’t sing the words. The reason was that I thought my parents wouldn’t like me to say the word “God.”

            We didn’t believe in God in our house. My parents had never told me not to talk about God, but it was clear to me that He was not part of our life. This was not an angry rejection of God. We were just perfectly happy without Him. My mom had grown up in a Christian home, but had forgotten her faith when she married my dad. My dad came from a long line of really good people who didn’t believe in God, and we were like them. We believed in education – my grandma and grandpa had been to college and my grandpa’s sister had a master’s degree, which was very rare for a woman of her generation. My dad was a college professor and my mom was a school librarian. We were educated, and educated people don’t need God. We believed in doing good. When my grandpa’s business partner died, my grandparents took in the man’s three children. They helped revitalize the small town of Rushville, Indiana. We planted trees and took care of the environment. We went door-to-door collecting signatures on petitions for nuclear disarmament. We ate tofu instead of meat in support of efforts against world hunger. We were good, and good people don’t need God. Most of all, we believed in family. My parents were incredibly loving. They read to my sister and me. They took us on long walks. They played with us. They were the parents all my friends wished they had. Our family fulfilled us, and fulfilled people don’t need God.

            We were very happy. But God loved us too much to let us stay that way. I imagine us in a car, driving along, singing, playing games, eating snacks, and having the time of our lives, never realizing that we were headed in exactly the wrong direction. Because if the Bible is true, that’s our situation. We thought that we were fine without God, and if God had not stopped us, we might have continued blithely down that path, happily singing and snacking ourselves straight to Hell. Because if the Bible is true, no one is fine without God. We’re dead in our sins, whether we know it or not. So, though it may seem cruel, the kindest thing God can do for us is to show us the truth – and show us His salvation.

            This is how God showed us that we really did need Him. My mom, as I said, was raised in a Christian home. Her mom – my Grandma Elsa – never stopped praying for us. When I was 10 or 11, my mom went to visit Grandma Elsa. While she was there, she had a vision that terrified her. It actually wasn’t anything scary. She just saw a man standing at the foot of her bed, talking. When she opened the Bible on the nightstand, she read, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” That experience somehow brought back to her all her Christian upbringing. She started to read the Bible hungrily, and she came home a recommitted Christian. My dad thought that she had lost her mind. I was angry with her. We had this wonderful, loving, perfect family, and she had to go and bring strife into it by becoming a Christian? Because strife is what her conversion brought. All of a sudden, she and my dad disagreed in a major way on something very important. She took my sister and me to church. My dad didn’t complain, but he didn’t come. I could hear them talking sometimes at night, arguing. I was terrified that they would get a divorce. But they didn’t. God used one of the very things that had kept us from God to bring us all to Him. My dad had been raised to believe in the importance of family. Not only that, he deeply loved his family. And he was going to wrestle with God for his family. But God wasn’t going to let my dad win. Basically, what he showed my dad was that the family belonged to God, and if my dad wanted to be united with his family, he was going to have to submit himself to God as well. My dad has told me since that one night, he was awake for hours, in agony, pleading with a God that he didn’t really believe in. One of my dad’s biggest obstacles to belief was his intellect. He had always thought that Christians were kind of stupid. This was a problem for a highly educated man from a highly educated family. After this night of pleading, he happened to turn on the radio. What he heard was the pastor of the Oxford Presbyterian Church. Pastor Harris was a brilliant man and a gifted speaker. My dad thought, “I could listen to this man.” And that’s what he told my mom when she woke up.

            We started attending the Oxford Presbyterian Church, and God used Pastor Harris to lead my dad to faith. By this time I was a young teenager, socially awkward, nerdy, introverted – so it wasn’t too difficult for me to see my need of God. Both my dad and I were baptized when I was in seventh grade. God used youth workers and pastors at that church to grow my faith. He has continued to put people in my life who have taught me more about Him: professors at Calvin College, good friends, and my husband and his family.

            I have now been a Christian for more than 25 years. I’ve been to a Christian college and I can write you a one-pager on the Reformed Worldview without batting an eyelash. I’ve taught at a Christian school, and I can tell you all about the Intertestamental Period and recite questions and answers from the Westminster Catechism. I’ve read the Bible through, and I even know the names of most of the kings of Israel and Judah. My family doesn’t miss church unless we are seriously ill. And I find that the trap I fall into now is exactly the same one that my family fell into all those years ago. Sometimes, religious people don’t think they need God. I am very thankful that God loves me enough to not let me be happy in my religion, and that he continually puts people and events in my life to remind me that my religion will not get me to heaven or even help me get out of bed in the morning or make my children turn out right. God continues to show me that it is the relationship with Jesus that is both necessary and sufficient. I need Him.

           

Thanksgiving

The multinational group of guests -- united by Olay and the willingness to try dessert made from a vegetable

     I am thankful to God for many things this year. Reflecting upon Saturday's somewhat tardy Thanksgiving celebration, however, I have to say that the internet is near the top of the list. Separated from supportive family and friends to shepherd me through the art of producing Thanksgiving dinner, not only did I Google "how to cook a turkey" and "how to make gravy" (and found websites with helpful pictures and step-by-step instructions), but I also leaned heavily on the Fahrenheit to Celsius converter and Wikipedia (the latter to figure out what red berries I had purchased at the grocery -- currants -- and if they might reliably substitute for cranberries -- worth a shot).
     I have a renewed appreciation for all the grandmas, aunts, and moms who have filled tables on the fourth Thursday in November through the years. Thanksgiving can be a lot of work. First, there is the shopping. I visited Aligro, Migros, Coop, Aldi, Denner, Jim's British Market, and Carrefour before I found all the ingredients I needed. Some things, like turkey, stuffing, and sweet potatoes, aren't available just anywhere. I have great gratitude for the British this year for supplying the first two of those three items. Other necessities, like canned pumpkin and cranberries, were nowhere to be found. It turns out that if you put enough sugar and orange pieces with currants, however, they taste pretty much like cranberries. For pumpkin pies, I cooked up a bunch of butternut squash. On the other hand, a few items, like good pie crusts, are much easier to find here than in the United States.
     Then, there is the cooking. My dear family took care of cleaning the house and the yard (and Johanna made lovely placecards for everyone). I hung out in the kitchen, accompanied by Thanksgiving tunes from Grooveshark (thanks for the internet again!), and cut, boiled, mashed, baked, stirred -- and even lifted up the skin of the turkey to rub butter and herbs all over the meat (that's what the folks at howtocookathanksgivingturkey.com recommend, and with a website address like that, they should know).

The turkey, thanks to Jim's British Market and howtocookathanksgivingturkey.com.

The table, with Johanna's fabulous placecards



The pies (and my favorite kitchen decoration -- thanks, Nancy!)

    

     At about 5:30 p.m. the guests arrived. This is very early for a dinner party in Geneva. It's pretty late for Thanksgiving dinner, though, so it seemed like a reasonable compromise for us aging Americans. We invited several of Eric's co-workers, and ended up with a comopolitan group hailing from England, Belgium, France, Greece, and Spain (where I think 5:30 is more like lunch time). One of the greatest things about guests in Europe is that they never arrive empty-handed -- so we are richer by several boxes of chocolates, bottles of wine, and an adorable mini-poinsettia (to kick off the decorating for the Olay Christmas party at our house next week . . . but I'll take a few deep breaths before I think too hard about that). Another great thing about living here is that we have increased at least tenfold the amount of Ping Pong we play (by we, I mean the rest of the family, as I can still barely return a serve). To work up an appetite (in French, they say "open" the appetite), we kicked off the festivities with a Ping Pong tournament. Unfortunately for Eric's hitherto unbroken tournament record, one of the guests turned out to be some kind of Belgian Ping Pong champion, and he soundly defeated the lot of them. (Drew and Eric did better later at Around the World, but Sebastian still proved unbeatable). We also played an ice-breaker game in which everyone took a coin and had to say what they were doing during November in the year the coin was minted. It was instrctive for Eric and me that we were the only ones able to use coins minted before 1980.
     Then came dinner. Eric had watched a You-Tube video on how to carve a turkey (that extremely helpful internet yet again), and he succeeded admirably. The guests were game to try stuffing and sweet potatoes -- strange for some -- and cranberries and pumpkin pie -- strange for most. Nick (from the U.K.) even said that while he would have ordered apple pie in a restaurant as the familiar choice, if he had to have seconds of something, it would be the pumpkin pie. For those attempting to cook their first Thanksgiving dinner, I highly recommend an international guest list. I think the food came fairly close to the mark, but the wonderful thing about our guests was that, not being familiar with the typical American Thanksgiving, they wouldn't have known if it hadn't. No one complained that the stuffing wasn't quite like their Aunt Bea's or that the apple pies didn't have the same spices as the ones Grandma used to make, or that the cranberry sauce was all wrong. That is certainly something for which to be thankful! We also learned how to say the equivalent of "help yourself" in at least four languages. One never knows when that will come in handy.
     We finished the evening with a round of charades so raucous that I was a bit afraid the neighbors might call the police, which I understand is quite common in Switzerland. Our own children, of course, were by far the loudest. Put Lucas and Johanna on opposite teams and there's a duel to the death every time. The neighbors didn't call, apparently, but if the police had come, we could have introduced them to pumpkin pie as well.
   

Some of the guests were kind enough to pose with the Alien.

 

Recipes for Butternut Squash (really, that's all it is!)

Thanks to Grandma Emy and my mom for the recipes!

Squash Pie

2 c. cooked squash (you can bake it in the oven until it is soft)
2-3 eggs
1 c. half and half or carnation milk
3/4 c. sugar (brown, white, or a mix)
1 t. cinnamon
1 t. ginger
1/4 t. cloves
1/2 t. nutmeg

Line a pie pan with homemade or prepared crust. Prick the crust with a fork. Puree squash in a blender with the eggs. Bring milk or half and half to a boil in a small saucepan and add to squash mixture. Mix in sugars and spices well and pour into unbaked pie shell. Bake at 350 for about 45-50 minutes.

Squash soup

3 large onions
1 cup chopped celery
1 clove garlic
2-4 T butter
3 c. chicken broth
2 c. cooked, mashed squash
1 t. dried rosemary
2 c. heavy cream or any milk, even skim
2 T. chopped parsley
Salt and pepper
1 dash nutmeg

Saute onions, celery, and garlic in butter. Add the chicken broth and the cooked, mashed squash. Add the crushed spices. Cook until heated through. Puree in the blender. Return to the pan on the stovetop and add cream or milk, heat through. Add salt, pepper, and nutmeg to taste. You can garnish with parsley, chooped spinach, or a dollop of sour cream just before serving.

The Trans-Onesienne or The Aliens Try to Figure Out What Makes the Swiss so Fast

      Here we have the start of the Trans-Onesienne, which was our family's foray into Swiss road racing. You can see Eric over toward the bottom right. You can't see me because I seeded myself way in the back. One reason for that self-seeding is that I am truly not very fast. Another is that I would much rather pass than be passed as the race progresses. And the third . . . you will see as the story progresses.
     In the interest of orderliness, I will begin with some differences between racing in Switzerland and racing in the United States. First, in Switzerland, the races begin in the afternoon, presumably so the participants can enjoy a good night's sleep. In the U.S., races begin before dawn, presumably so that by the time the participants truly wake up, they are finished with the run (that's how I look at it, anyway). Secondly, in Switzerland, they have race(s) -- that is, more than one. So in this case, the smallest children could run at 12:45 p.m. with their parents, then the next age group, and so on. Furthermore, the races are different lengths. If you are a poussin or poussine (which is a child under nine, but I think translates literally as "chick") you run 1 kilometer. If you are a VI Femme or Homme, as Eric and I apparently are (I'm not sure what "V" stands for, but I have a sneaking suspicion that is may be "vielle/vieux," which means "old."), you run 11k (in this race -- others are different distances). So, Johanna and Lucas, being "ecoliers" (schoolchildren), ran 2k at 13h45, which is what they call 1:45 p.m. around here. Eric and I didn't run until 15h30. All of this made for quite a long day. The saving grace was that the race began and ended less than a kilometer from our house, and Eric and I actually passed our house THREE TIMES during the race (more about that later).
     We were totally prepared for this race. Johanna and I walked her course, we ate a good breakfast, and we showed up half an hour early. Drew, who would have been our cheerleader and photographer, had gone to France to play soccer with his buddies there. (This, incidentally, is why most of the pictures we have are of Eric. We only have them because his friend from work was on the course, and Eric was the only member of the family that Francois recognized.) What we were completely unprepared for was the third important characteristic of racing in Switzerland, which is that with racing, as with so much else, the Swiss are NOT KIDDING. At 1:30 p.m., the poussins took off for their loop, and the second those little chicks were out of the way, the ecoliers jammed themselves into the narrow starting gate and spent the next 15 minutes jockeying for the best position. Johanna and Lucas, not understanding that elbowing, shoving, and stepping on toes are Swiss race etiquette, were quickly shunted to the rear of the scrum, and when the starting gun went off, they lost more ground in an effort to avoid trampling younger children (which is also perfectly acceptable, apparently). In case it's not already clear, this is why I seeded myself way in the back for my race! Given the bad start and the fact that neither alien offspring seemed to be feeling well, they finished okay. Johanna was fourth in her age group, and she now knows to bring a cattle prod when we run the Escalade in two weeks. We won't share the places of any of the other runners in the family. Suffice it to say, while we were initially disappointed by Johanna's place, her finish looked better and better to us as each of the rest of us completed our course.
     So, the ecoliers portion of the festivities out of the way, we returned home briefly, then zipped back to the starting line for the old folks race. My stomach was churning with nerves. I don't usually get nervous before a race, but seeing how speedy the school children were, I had some serious apprehension that I might well be dead last in my race. I know someone has to be last, and I know that it's a blessing to everyone else if it's me, but that doesn't stop me from fearing it, all the same. Just before the start, an elderly man asked me how many times we ran around the course. I told him I thought it was twice. He said, "Do you mind if I ask someone else?" (He was clearly correctly interpreting my lack of French acumen to translate into a lack of acumen in general.) He did ask someone else, and then informed me that no, we would be running the course three times. This was bad news, because I had practiced the course and knew that there was one long and steep hill. Now, one long and steep hill in an 11k is no big deal. Two hills, which is what I had been anticipating, is a bigger deal, but still not a problem. Three long and steep hills, however, begins to look like a pretty hilly course. The other minor issue was that I had told Eric that the course was two loops, and, since he was up towards the front of the pack, I had no way to correct the misinformation I had provided. If there's anything worse than a third long and steep hill, it has to be a surprise third long and steep hill.
     The gun went off, and everyone back in my neck of the woods shuffled along until we could cross the starting line and begin to run. I will spare the reader a blow-by-blow, and offer some impressions instead. One yells, "Allez! Allez!" or "Courage!" to runners during a race. There is no water on the course (Francois informed us that of course there wouldn't be for such a short race). 11k is at least twice as long as 10k (at least that's how it felt to me). We actually ran one small loop four times, and the big loop with the hill three. I was not last, and I even passed some people on the hill of deja vu. The winners of the race (about the top 20) lapped me. No elderly ladies lapped me, but some certainly finished the race before me. Eric says he narrowly outsprinted a woman in her 60s near the end. Eric was a little irked about the three hills, but I think he has forgiven me. Look how great he looked at the end.

     Especially as compared to me! If I look tired, it's because I could barely get a breath by this point.



     Upon reflection, Eric and I concluded that the reason the Swiss are so fast is that everyone in this country is in good shape to begin with. They walk. They bike. They ski. No one needs to enter a race as motivation to get in shape or lose weight. The people who are racing here are people who take running seriously and are truly competitive. That's certainly not a bad thing. Another not-bad thing about the Trans-Onesienne was that rather than being given a t-shirt, participants were given a commemorative jar of local honey, donated by the Geneva Apiary Society. As much as our family loves honey, that was a wonderful souvenir for us. The best thing about the day, though, was something that we found to be the same in Switzerland as in the United States. The running community in both cultures is made up of truly friendly and "gentil" people who are encouraging to one another and enthusiastic about sharing their love of the sport.

The Bus to the End of the World and Subterranean French Hysterics

The Bus to the End of the World

    One might think, knowing our family, that one of the first orders of business upon our arrival in Geneva would be to find a running group or team or club or gang or something. After all, we are annoyingly enthusiastic about the sport. I did, upon finding out we were moving to Switzerland, do a little poking around on the internet. Finding, however, that any searches for "cross country" turned up skiing sites, I allowed myself to be distracted by other concerns, such as packing. When we reached Geneva, we found that sports are not organized so much by the schools as by local sports clubs. None of the ones around us seemed to have anything called "track," "cross country," or even "running." So the autumn slipped by in a haze of figuring out church, school, buses, grocery shopping, and other essentials.
     It turns out that in my search for running, I was looking for the wrong thing (as so often is the case in a stange place). If you want to join a running team in Geneva, you have to look for "athletisme." I only found this out by accident, when one of Eric's co-workers offered to help us get in touch with the Stade de Geneve, which is an actual place, but also the name of a running team. We enthusiastically signed up and headed for practice (in truth, I enthusiastically signed Johanna and Lucas up, and they -- less enthusiastically, but still willingly -- headed for practice). My thinking was that the kids could get some exercise, meet some friends, and be forced to speak a little French. The only obvious problem with the whole setup was that the Stade de Geneve team practices at the end of the world. Literally, the name of the bus stop where the kids disembark is "Bout du Monde." It made me feel very Harry-Potteresque to be riding the Bus to the End of the World!

      Only Johanna attended the first practice, and, despite the fact that no one there spoke English and the workout was really hard, she ended the evening happier than I've seen her in Switzerland (and she hasn't been unhappy). The second evening a really nice girl showed up who speaks English (unfortunately for the learning-French portion of my plot). The real trouble came in week two -- last Monday -- when Lucas came along and we met the Really Mean Swiss Coach. We arrived early, and only one coach (a man) was there, so I took Lucas over, introduced him, and explained that he was new.

      "Quel age?" the coach barked. I told him.
      "Cinq heures!" (It was now six -- not five -- and I was pretty certain that six was the time I was supposed to be here.)
      "Six heures?" I ventured timidly.
      "Non. Onze ans. Cinq heures. Cinq heures! Vous etes trop tard!"
      I tried once more, asking if possibly Lucas couldn't practice with Johanna, since he was here now.
      "Non! Il est trop petit. Elle est trop grande!" He said with not a hint of irony about calling Johanna too big for anything.
      I was going to ask if maybe a different (I wasn't going to say "nicer") coach would be showing up anytime soon, but the man turned and started yelling at some adults (who looked as terrified as I felt) something that sounded like "Six trop!" Six trop!" which made no sense to me. So, deflated, I left with Lucas.

       We returned on Wednesday, and I was determined not to let the Really Mean Swiss Coach scare us off again. So we bravely huddled in the corner and waited for a different coach to show up. It didn't happen, so just before six, I tiptoed over to the coach, clutching a printout of Luc's registration, which indicated that he was, indeed, signed up to practice at six o'clock. I smiled sheepishly, said, "Bonsoir Monsieur," and tried to explain the situation, showing him the printout. He took a cursory glance, sniffed derisively, and informed me that what he was holding was Johanna's registration. I was going to embark on an explanation of why this was not the case, but found I couldn't remember a word of French. A teenaged boy sitting next to the coach asked (in English) if he could help. I explained the situation and he shrugged apologetically and suggested I wait for another coach. Shortly, a young female coach showed up, and I noticed that several boys about Lucas' age were walking over to her. Upon asking how old these boys were, I received the baffling but welcome response that they were all 11 -- the same age as Lucas. Luc joined the group of boys -- who had been standing right in front of Mean Coach when he told me this was not the time for 11-year-olds -- and off they went. It would be a happy ending, except that Lucas decided that he didn't like the team (I don't think the mean guy helped), and so now Johanna takes the Bus to the End of the World alone.

In other sports news: The Alien and her husband will run the Trans Onesienne road race on Saturday, Nov. 19. If it's at all interesting, amusing, or embarassing, rest assured you will find the full report here.

The Alien attempts to sign her son Drew up for tennis lessons during the wrong season in a foreign language. Success has been, predictably, limited, but next week he will start a "physical conditioning" class -- whatever that is. We skipped the "mental preparation" option. Perhaps we will regret it.

Subterranean French Hysterics

     This incident is pretty old by now, but it is too good to leave out. A few weeks ago I went to drop off some quince jelly at Luisa's house. For reasons which were important then but aren't important here, I drove the car. By now, everyone should realize that that was Mistake Number One. Traffic wasn't bad, so I reached Luisa's neighborhood quickly. Unfortunately, I could find absolutely nowhere to park. I drove around for a bit, then spied the welcome blue "P" that means public parking. I pulled into the underground lot marked for the Charmilles Shopping Center, parked my car, found Luisa's apartment, handed over the jelly, and zipped back to the car, by now running slightly late for my next appointment.
     What should meet my eyes when I entered the parking garage but a solid metal door, blocking the entrance to the lot where I had parked. I now could see clearly that the Charmilles Center parking was to the left, and I had inadvertently pulled into private parking, on the right. The door, which I hadn't noticed because it had been up, was now quite firmly down. And, as one could predict in cases such as these, I had left my cell phone in the car. As I paced nervously about, a car pulled up and the driver asked if I had forgotten my key. I tried to explain, and said something like: "I drive in. The door is open. I come back. The door is closed. I thought this was Charmilles Parking, but it is private!" She laughed and drove away. In her defense, I will say that I was probably not very clear -- and what was she supposed to do anyway? I pressed the call button on the conveniently located machine that opens the door, but nothing happened.
     Glancing hastily around, I noticed a telephone number on the door and decided to write it down and see if I could find a telephone somewhere. Perhaps the number would connect me with someone who could 1. Understand what I was babbling about; and 2. Come and help me. Somehow in my search, I ended up not in the shopping center, but in an underground office space. As I turned to leave and continue looking for a phone, a nice young man noticed my distress and asked if he could help. So I lauched into toddler-level explanation of events, "I drive in. The door is open. . . ." ending this time with: "Je suis tres stupide!" He took me to his telephone and when it became obvious that I was unable to explain adequately to the person who answered, came to my rescue there as well. Unfortunately, though the situation was now perfectly clear to the party on the line, he was just the man fron the surveillance company, and could do nothing about opening the door. He suggested I press the call button on the machine by the door. I had done this, of course, to no avail. Trying to control my mounting panic and supress visions of my car being impounded by the Swiss police and -- worse -- having to tell Eric about it, I told the man whose phone I had used thank you and that I would go press the button again. He must have noticed that I was quickly losing my grip . . . and perhaps feared what other trouble this imbecille foreigner might get herself into if left loose in the city, because he offered to go with me.
     He used his key to get into the elevator, and when we reached level -2, there was the car. It seemed like progress to be on the same side of the door as my vehicle, and I felt myself relax a bit. We walked up the ramp and saw that the door was, indeed, firmly shut. My new friend, however, noticed something -- bumps on the ramp floor that, if one drove over them, would activate the opening of the door from the inside. He explained this to me, using very small words. I thanked him about a gazillion and one times, climbed into the car, and drove effortlessly over the bumps and out of the private parking garage, thanking God for sending help and vowing, once again, to NEVER DRIVE IN GENEVA IF I DON'T HAVE TO!

In other French-language news: The Alien Visits the Elderly Swiss Lady with the Jelly Jars (happening tomorrow -- say a prayer if you think of it)

The Alien Attemps to Improve French Comprehension by Watching Internet Cooking Shows (I now know how they make brie and butter, and can reliably recognize when someone is talking about cows, milk, or cheese. This is sure to come in handy next time I lock my car in a private parking garage,)
   

The Great Quince Jelly Bash



The Fruit of Our Labors

     It was a warm day in late October when the alien loaded up the Versa (the smallest 7-seater car we could find) for a rare crosstown drive. Normally, of course, I would take the bus or bike the 4 miles to Cologny, but I had to transport five grocery bags of quince, two large kettles, six bags of sugar, 16 jars, and assorted other accoutrements, so clearly, this was an occasion to use the family vehicle. I had sweet-talked four friends into exploring the world of jelly-making, a world with which I, at least, had no familiarity. I however, have excellent jelly-making genes on both sides, so I was sure -- much like the kings of old -- that heredity would carry me through where experience and knowledge failed. Some of my friends had actually made jam or jelly before (though not with the strange, bitter, rock-hard quince). Our ace in the hole, however, was Claudia's housekeeper, Elena. We were going to try the jelly at Claudia's house, mostly because she has a steamer oven, which she had heard could be used for quince jelly. As an added bonus, Elena had actually made the jelly before, and was going to act as advisor.

      I will complain only briefly about how long the 4-mile drive took (I had planned on it, so it wasn't a big deal), and jump to the point where the jelly-making commenced. In addition to their other unusual properties, quince are furry, kind of like peaches, except the fur rubs off easily. So Claudia diligently scrubbed each quince to rid it of fur, while Carol and I used razor sharp knives to slice the fruit into smallish pieces (we did have a certain amount of debate about the size of the pieces, which Elena settled by telling us -- a bit impatiently, but nicely -- that it didn't really matter. She also told us to leave the seeds in and skins on, making the whole process much more simple.). Some quince cooked in the steamer oven, others boiled on the stove. By this time, Luisa arrived, and a few minutes later, Jo. Team Quince was complete.

Carol checks the stovetop quince. Actually, she didn't really -- she's just posing for an "action shot."

      When the quince was soft, the real fun began. To make quince jelly (as opposed to jam, which one can also make), one uses quince juice, not quince pulp. We experimented with a variety of methods of extracting the juice from the pulp. One website said to put the pulp in a pillowcase, tie the pillowcase between two chairs, and let the juice drip through all night. Since our children all needed to be retrieved from school at 4:15, we obviously did not have time for this amusing exercise. Plus, Elena told us that the only advantage to that method was that the jelly would be pink. Pink jelly sounded fun, but not worth the wait. After trying a wire strainer with minimal success (the pulp slipped through), we used a large kitchen towel. We wrapped the mush in the towel, twisted the ends tightly closed, then squeezed the towel so that the juice came out. It was sort of like milking a cow, except that it was definitely a two-person job. Also, it was quite a workout (I understand that for the inexperienced, milking cows can be as well). Nevertheless, the kitchen smelled lovely. (I read that quince have been used for perfume and air freshener since ancient times.)

Jo and Claudia milk the quince.

Luisa looks on with a bowl of mush.

     

      Of course, everything always takes twice as long as planned, so by the time we had extracted three kettles full of juice, most people had to leave for school pickup. Since my kids are older and can take the bus alone, I stayed behind to bond with Claudia over the final step: The gelification of the juice. This is accomplished by adding a truly astonishing amount of what, in French, is called sucre gelificant (I'm not sure what it is in English). Quince is kind of like rhubarb, in that it is so repulsive on its own that the only way it can be eaten is to sweeten it beyond recognition. At least the leaves of the quince tree aren't poisonous. I think.
      So we added the sugar, boiled and bubbled, and poured the scalding liquid into our pre-sanitized jars. As a novice jelly-maker, I found it particularly satisfying that the lids of the jars did indeed seal as the liquid cooled, just like they were supposed to. Now I have a pantry full of quince jelly, which is my new favorite spread. The world, however, is not a perfect place. Not only do I have three bags of quince left (not rotting I hope) in the garage, but it turns out that no one else in the family even likes quince jelly. What I have to say is, too bad for them.

  * * *

      This story has an interesting epilogue. Eric and I were at the grocery store buying more jelly jars, when the elderly woman ahead of us in the checkout line began pointing at our jars and talking to us in French. I thought I understood something about her telephone number, but not much more than that, so Eric and I did our usual smile and nod in a friendly way. Nevertheless, the woman persisted, and we finally understood her to be offering us a bunch of jelly jars that she was going to throw away. One does not usually run into friendly and talkative people in Swiss grocery stores (they are perfectly polite -- just not friendly and talkative), and I decided to accept the jars. She gave me her telephone number and I actually succeeded in reaching her on the phone and setting up a time to pick up the jars. I went one afternoon, and she greeted me warmly at the door of her eighth-floor apartment. We had a friendly chat in German (her first language, of which I understand about 10 words, including "Wo ist der Bahnhof," which was pretty useless in this context), French (in which she is fluent), and English (she had a French-English dictionary right by the door in anticipation of my visit). She gave me the jars, kissed me on both cheeks (Genevans do three kisses, but she's from the German part of Switzerland, so it was only two), and sent me on my merry way. I am delighted to have had a real visit with a real Swiss person, and am trying to work up my courage to call her and set up another visit. The jars will be very helpful when I get around to cooking up the rest of the quince, as well!

Paris Pictures (More than 200 Pictures! Enter at Your Own Risk)