HKGslp

I'm alive in the Hong Kong Airport, but tired as. 


For those of you that don't know, I'll be in Shantou, China for the next five weeks. I'm here with 20 other engineering students from the U of C and we have 20 Shantou students in our class as well, that will be taught by Dr. Hugo, a professor from Calgary.

The good news is that on the flight here I had the full three seats beside the window to myself, so I could lay down to sleep. I slept pretty solidly for a couple house and then just laid comfortable for the other time. I watched Sherlock Holmes, the Hangover 2, one episode of Mr. D, and part of a new Jim Carrey movie about penguins. 

When we arrived in the airport I found that I could stuff my day bag into my big backpack, and it wasn't really heavy, so I decided to carry it around the city with me. I thought we were just going to train into Hong Kong, grab a bite, and then train back. We ended up doing a lot of walking with it, and I found the places where the padding isn't ideal on the bag.

The bad news. When I went to take out money from an ATM, it immediately spit out my card when I put it in. I tried my other card and it did the same. I've tried at about 4 different ATMs tonight, and I tried at the machine in McDonalds (Dr. Hugo just took us there to eat, as I think he is weary of most Asian street side restaurants). Different ATM machines have let me go though the full process and enter my PIN and select my account and the amount and stuff, but then when the transaction begins to take place and money should be coming out, it tells me it's not approved or something. Luckily I'm with a big group, and I've been able to borrow money for food and water, but tomorrow I'll try to my bank and figure out what's up. I've checked and made sure that the ATMs I've been using have had Cirrus on them, but still no go.

After wandering Hong Kong and viewing the downtown region from across the inlet we came back to the airport and everyone picked up their bags. We're randomly sprawled out on chairs, benches and floor (the benches have arm rests, so I'll be choosing the floor).

Our flight is at 11AM tomorrow, and then when we arrive in Shantou a bus will pick us up, take us out to lunch, and then take us to get settled at the uni dorms. Hopefully the internet is working on mainland China, and hopefully I can get my money situation figures out quick.

Chow now

ADVENTea PANCAKESnowINTER CAROLSinging

It's that time of the year and I like it.

We decided it would be cool to do some carolling at the seniors retirment home here and the long term care facilities, but I don't know if that is going to happen now. We have about 12 people (interns) that are interested and we were going to do a practice and then sing next week because alot of the interns are leaving to come back to Canada early and have different office parties on different nights, but on the night we wanted to do it the senior home is going for a Christmas shopping spree in town. So we might not do it now.

I bought a bike because in the winter it gets rainy and I can't skateboard in the rain. My bearings rust and the tires slip and bad things happen. So I bought a bike. On rainy days I was taking the bus and I didn't like having to base my working times around bus times and prefered the freedom of coming and going whenever I wanted on my own schedule. So I was anxious and just bought the first bike I could find. It was for 144chf (same as $) and it is a really sweet racing bike. It has clip-in pedals (the guy's shoes fit me and he gave me them for 6chf) and the gear shifters are on the the bike frame rather than the handle bars and it is sweet and blue. The only negative thing is that it has tiny little racing tires. And the thing is that it also snows in Switzerland. It snowed pretty heavy for a couple days a couple of weeks ago, and has stayed around since then. Apparently this a rarity for this area. I have been told usually it snows, then melts the next day and such. So I have been been carefully navigating my way through snow piles and avoiding ice and have only lost traction a couple times with no falls yet.

I'm looking forward to skiing (snowboarding for me, but it's easier to talk about it as 'skiing'). Since the end of October I have had some of my friends going every weekend. At the start there were only glaciers that were open so the skiing was pretty crappy, but now areas are starting to get good. I have 5 weekend skiing trips scheduled in between January and March. I also bought a helmet, as I figured that my figure is aging (and feeling the effects of Swiss chocolate and German beer) and I won't be able to rely on my looks to get me by in life and so I should protect the head area.

This weekend my was my weekend off, and I enjoy them. I had been traveling for the last five straight and it's nice to just sit. Yesterday I ended up biking and touring a couple of the neighboring villages looking for fenders for my bike (hard to come by because it is a racing bike) and went through Baden's Advent market. It was outside on pedestrian streets around a big church overlooking the river. There were lots of knitted stands(toques and scarves and mittens), wooden toy puzzle things, candles, fancy candle holders and wood work and jams. The food stands were bratwurst, or raclette and glogg. People here love their big meat portions. It comes from the southern Bavarian Germans that just eat big chunks of bratwurst or variations of other big meat portions. I think I had talked about raclett before, but it is just melty cheese on bread. More cheese than bread usually. The stands here had a big pickle you got too. I don't know if they acually called the glogg "glogg" here. It's 'mulled wine' or 'hot wine' or whatever you want to call warm wine with spices that you drink in the winter. I actually haven't had it in Europe yet (will probably try it one of the next two weekends in Germany) but I have tried it in New Zealand a couple years ago and when we were in Copenhagen a couple weeks ago they called it 'Glogg' there.

Last night I went to a church and watched a choir. I had seen a sign on the church during the day that said there was something going on at 20h (8pm) and I guessed it would be something involving Christmas and some kind of singing or performance. It turned out to be a 55 person choir with a drummer, two guitar players (one acoustic & one classical), a xialaphone and a flute and a conductor. It was really cool. It was sister act style with lots of high and lows and choir harmonies and different people coming out and doing solos. And it was all english. For different songs there were special 5 minute guitar solos (they would do like a dueling guitar back and forth and then join together) and some sweet drum solos.

Today was just church and then a relaxed pancake breakfast with some people that came over. All my roommates are gone, so it was just others that were over. I had thought about going for a walk this afternoon along the ridge of a hill overlooking the town and then sledding down, but that switched for crip and hot chocolate and Christmas carols (Abba is playing right now).

So it is slow and relaxed and I feel that this is portrayed in my tone of this post because I don't feel very enthusiastic.

Next weekend I am going to Berlin (pray we don't get bombed on), and the following weekend I am going to Cologne (bother cities are in Germany) to stay with the German girl that lived with me in residence at university in Calgary last year. To get to Cologne I am doing mitfahrgelegenheit. This translates into 'ride sharing', and it is like an organized hitch-hiking. People post what routes they are driving and you get in touch with them if you want a ride for that same route. So I am doing that. It will be a long drive. Cologne is 500km from where I am, and the guy I am traveling with drives this route every weekend and said last week it took him 7 hours. I hope that was just because of snow because I would have thought that with the German Autobahn we would be able to do it in less than 4 hours (last time we took the autobahn we probably averaged 170km/h over the 2.5 hour trip and did 220 for about 5 minutes straight at one point).

I will be in southern Spain for Christmas day, and shortly after taking a ferry across to Morroco where I will spend the rest of the week before returning to Geneve on New Year's Eve.

I'm over half way through my year here. Trips that I did 3 months ago seem like just last weekend, but by Wednesday I usually don't remember where I was the weekend before. It's a different lifestyle of catching a train to an airport every Friday night to fly somewhere and spending the week planning my next hostel and bike rental. There are a lot of things I like about Europe and I think I could live here. More and more, from seeing new places, I am forgetting about missing Canada (places and lifestyle, not people). But at the same time I am starting to get cravings for hockey.

I think the next 6 months will go by slower as I will have more weekends skiing, but I do have three week long trips (Egypt-Israel-Jordan, Greece, Canary Islands). I guess we will see, but it seems like I will be transitioning in my travel style at least and not touring as many cities.

Anyway I'm going to go try to snowboard down this little hill outside our house and see if I can do 180s and 360s on my board for the first time. My introduction to inner city riding.

Take care and enjoy the holidays.

without wax

ben

Bordeaux Blue (Why not?)

This started as an e-mail to my 'Grama June', but then sprawled into something long and inspring and stomach rumbling so I though I would finish strong and post it for lack of other productivity.

Hi Team

Thanks for the birthday wishes, I had a great birthday (birth-week (and birth-month)).

On my birthday I bought fresh croissants for the 4 members of my team at work (Combustor Cooling for gas turbines) and then also a bunch for my other intern friends. Here on your birthday it is tradition that you bring treats for other people, rather than people bringing you a cake or something. Also people shake your hand and look you in the eyes and say congratulations which is kind of strange.

I wanted to bake something because I've been experiment with some baking (pizza dough, tortilla shells, foccia bread) but the night before I ended up buying a bike and going to pick it up. I usually ride my long skateboard to work, but now it will be very rainy in the winter so I wanted a bike. I ended up getting a racing bike just because it was cheap and in good shape and availible. It's really cool, but it has skinny tires which might not be best in snow. We will find out tomorrow i guess.

Anyway after work I went out for supper. I had talked to all the other Canadian Interns (there are just under 30 here) and 21 of them came and joined me and we trained to a little town in Germany (I live 30 minutes from the border) and went to an all you can eat sushi place. You sit at your table and there is a double decker conveyor belt that goes buy with little plates of food on it. One carries hot food and the other cold food. I don't actually eat that much sushi there. Probably about 10% of what I ate was sushi and then they have tons of other rice and noddle and chicken and duck and pork plates and such and fresh fruit and jello and ice cream. I'm sure you will believe me when I tell you that I got my money's worth.

The next day after my birthday we went to a free event that our town puts on for new residents (my one roommate is good working his way into free events and he helped all of us with this one). So we had a welcome with wine and some snacks and they talked (all in German so we just nodded and said "Ja" a couple times in agreement. After that they took us through a walking tour of the city (the town just lit all the Christmas lights they put up that night, and everything looks so nice). Apparently the big clock tower used to be used as a prison, as late as the 1980s and it wasn't hooked up with plumming and the prisoners were given 2 buckets each day. One filled with water to drink and use, the other to do their business. This was happening 30 years ago. So crazy.

After the walk we had a free meal (pretty weak, but it was free so I guess I can't complain).

Then the next day I left from work and caught a train to Basel (1 hour away) and flew to Bordeaux (city on the west coast of France). At the airport I was picked up by my couchsurfers (couchsurfing is a website where people post that they okay with travelers staying with them for a night or two, and so the travelers come and hang out and sleep on their couch or the floor or wherever and have a visit usually and head off a couple days later. It is a lot cheaper than staying in a hotel (it's free so...like 100X cheaper) and good way of having cool local cultural experiences with local people).

My hosts were named Pascal and Isabelle and they were 55 years old and both teachers and had one daughter who was working in Amsterdam doing Website Design. They live close to Bordeaux, but they have a house in a summer village area right beside a little surf town called Lacanau Ocean. This is a huge tourist spot in the summer with 80000 people, but in the winter it turns into a ghost town with 3000. So we drove out there and got into the cold little cabin and turned the heaters one. The next day I went into town with Pascal and rented a surfboard and then we parted for the day. He had a wetsuit that I had borrowed. I surfed in the morning, then got out and wandered the town and had some lunch and then again in the afternoon. It was cold and windy and rainy off and on and the surf was pretty terrible and I only rode a couple of waves that weren't very good, but I still had fun.

That night we had the most epic supper. These people knew their food and their wine and they knew how to do it right. Supper wasn't just a quick meal to rush through to watch TV after or a means of refilling your body, but instead an experience to be enjoyed. They said they often planned their meals around the flavors and aromas of the wine they would be having with it. It's hard to describe in words how good the meal was

1st Course: Fish soup. From the local market. Just a thick broth, but really deep flavors and really good and warm after a day of cold water surfing.

2nd Course: Open a white wine. I don't even remember the kind because more talk was about the actual wine maker which they had gone to and met or something. They just knew everything there was to know about wine (it has 4 aromas apparently and you can tell different things about it if you smell it 10 minutes after the first smells). Out of the fridge came plates with crab, prawns and some other little shell fish thing that I didn't know what it was and they couldn't find an English name. I thought he was going to start cooking them, but he had cooked and spiced them earlier in the day and we ate them cold.

3rd Course (main): A big plate of cooked mussels (started cooking them as we were eating the crab) covered in a white sauce made from cream and blue cheese (a milder blue cheese (we would have the stronger one later))

4rd Course. Cheese. We had three different types of cheese. We opened a 8 year old bottle of some local wine for the first two cheeses but then had to eat the third cheese with this other special cheese. The third one was a really strong blue cheese, so we needed to be drinking a really thick sweet wine because the flavor complimented each other really well.

5th Course. Dessert. Because most of the people are only at these houses in summer, the people that go in winter all know each other, and one of the guys that lives there year round is the baker at the bakery in town. He is friendly. So earlier that day he had brought over a fresh Apple Pie thing that he had made. It was delicious. He had also brought over these funny little bullet shaped things (but the size of your big toe (I can't think of anything at the moment that is that same size but would be a better use in the context of appetizing food)). Sometimes when they filter wine they use the egg whites to help filter out sediment and so they have all these extra yolks that they don't use. So someone started making these little treats and they are a real delicassy and are apparently really hard to make (Isabella said she had tried and couldn't make them very well).

Such a good meal. It lasted almost 3 hours and a lot of time was spent going back and forth in a French-English dictionary to try and find the right words.

The next morning I slept in, then had a casual breakfast and then went for a surf. It was better and I got a couple waves, but still not on my list of good days. Then I came home and we had another delicious meal.

1st Course. Fresh Oysters. Pascal showed me how to use an oyster knife and pop the shell off. He told me about how lots of people screw up and cut their hand open and end up in the hospital, and then he handed me the knife. But I still have all my fingers today, so it ended well.

2nd Course. Cod. Baked in an olive oil and white wine sause with tons of big white grapes with it.

3rd Course. Cheese (sames ones)

4th Course. Dessert (last half of the pie and more of the strange egg yolk things)

After lunch we packed up the house and drove towards Bordeaux. I fell asleep on the drive because I was exhausted from all the surfing and eating. I woke up and we at a winery. We were there doing tasting of 12 wines for about 1.5 hours. We would usually spend like 3 minutes with each glass just discussing (Pascal talking and me listening) where the wine is from and some interesting facts and then the 1st and 2nd aromas and what food it would go with and various other things, and then finally we would sip it.

After the wine they dropped me off at the airport and we said our goodbyes.

Our plane was delayed an hour due to snowstorms in Basel, and so when we finally landed we had to run through the airport and caught a bus as it was just leaving and then made it to the train station to catch the last train home to Baden (if we missed that train we would have slept in the train station (I've slept in an airport 6 times and a train station once)). When we got to Baden all of the trains and busses to Wettingen (the neighborhood i live in) were done for the night so I walked the 30 minutes in the snow to get home.

I saw a fox in town and it made me smile.

Today I woke up and it was still snowing and I was still smiling.

This weekend I have off (meaning no travel). I plan to sleep in, play guitar, bake a big pancake breakfast and possibly go cut down a Christmas tree (this may be illegal here (probably) so I'm going to check and make sure I can do it and won't get deported).

In the past three months I have been to 12 different countries. I'll have about 8 more new ones before I finish my job at the end of May, and then will go to another 6 knew ones when my friend Dawson comes and travels with me in June. I'll be home in July. Looking forward to it, but enjoying everyday here.

Hope you are enjoying your winter, as I am looking forward to beginning my ski season on the Alps.

Love you all and hope you are smiling.

without wax

benwa

Egypt Trip

I had one weekend where I started typing a post out, then left to do something out and saved it somewhere but haven't gone back to it yet. So one day I will catch up on the past weekends. Probably not with stories, but at least an update of what has been done (also probably stories, because who am I kidding, telling stories is what I do (thanks for that Pop)).

Anyway this is what I just spend my night doing. Planning our 12 day itinerary for Israel, Jordan and Egypt at the end of January. We did some good planning and have a pretty fetch itineray with a ton of stuff and places packed in and I had just e-mailed a friend who recently toured there to ask for her input. But I thought I would share the itinerary with you as well. Also if you have input that is lovely. I suggest looking at the cities on a map and seeing the glorious splendor of our route.

So this will be Ben January 18-February 8:

Day 1. Fly into Tel Aviv at noon, tour city, sleep there.

Day 2. Bus to Jerusalem in the morning, tour city, sleep there.

Day 3. Jerusalem, sleep there (thinking of a possibility of day trip to the dead sea. worth it? or should we just stay in the city)

Day 4. Half day in Jerusalem, but to Eilat in the afternoon, sleep there.

Day 5. Day trip to Petra (how long does this take to get there and how long do we stay there? are there just the couple things to see or is it an all day affair? the last bus from Eilat to Dahab leaves at 3, so we didn't know if we would be able to make this or if we would have to hire a taxi to drive us) , bus from Eilat (or do we have to walk across and then bus from Talab) to Dahab, sleep there.

Day 6. Scuba (reccomend a spot or specific dive? probably do a half day double dive), visit painted canyon (or valley or whatever it's called), sleep there.

Day 7. Visit St Catherine's Monestary, go to Mt Siani and climb it for sunset (also possible go there first at 3am and try to summit it (we read 3 hours, have you done it) for sunrise and then go to the monastery after), bus back to Sharm, sleep there.

Day 8. Fly from Sharm to Luxor early in the AM, tour Luxor (I had never heard of it until tonight. Apparently a big deal? Valley of Kings or something? tombs? have you been?) night train to Alexandria (sleep on train)

Day 9. Tour Alexandria (I had heard of this one but know nothing about it), bus to Cairo late evening, sleep in Cairo

Day 10 & 11. Tour Cairo (pyramids, egypt museum, market, city of dead. any other must see or do things for two days or good city advice?)

Day 12. Fly from Cairo to Sharm early in the AM, fly from Sharm back to Swiss

Rack up the let

Tea makes me hot. Or maybe it is people in the house, but since I've been at home sick for the past couple days I feel good most of the day, but during/after supper I start sweating like a Sweed in a sauna but my roommates are just normal.

Tomorrow I'm going back to work.

Today I got my voice back. I played the guitar and sang for quite a while. Maybe not the best way to help a recovering voice, but I enjoyed it. I also took to baking being home sick. Last night I made tortilla shells to go with the fajitas i cooked. It was just a dough mixture that I rolled out and then fried in a hot pan of oil. They were delicious, but when I was telling my friend today that I had just baked my first thing, they said technically it wasn't baking since it didn't go in the oven. I think I consider anything that requires mixing flour and using measuring cups to be baking. (Other than pancakes this was the first time I had done this with my cooking). Anyway today to proceed in the baking world I made some fococcia bread with olives and zucchini in it. It was good, but I think I liked my fried bread better. Only time will tell what I will make next, but I am excited to join into the baking world and put away my fear of measuring cups.

After weekend 8:

I went to a concert in Basel. The band's name is Kings of Convenience and they are a duo from Bergen, Norway (I went there as you will hear about in posts to come). Both are tall and very good at guitar and just play and harmonize kind of like Simon and Garfunkel (except Garfunkel was useless and both of these guys played guitar). It was a pretty good show except Swiss people are super reformed and up tight and no one got into it really. They would try to get the crowd involved a bit and dancing, but everyone was just standing there with a confused look on their face thinking why would we do anything but stand here and be all organized and Swiss and stuff.

Anyway I had fun.

Also looking back, Canyoning was only weekend 7, so

Weekend 8:

There is a group here called IAESTE. If I had to guess right now I would say it sounds for International Association Equipping Students on Technical Exchanges.

Now I will look it up...

International Association for the Exchange of Students for Technical Experience

I'm impressed how close I was.

Anyway they are the ones that got me my work permits and papers (all be it they screwed up and I was delayed coming here and I probably wouldn't do business like that with them again). But their main contact with students in Switzerland is organizing weekend trips. And so I did one. 3 days in Ticino, the Italian part of Switzerland. Switzerland has four official languages: German, French, Italian and Romansch. I don't know anything about Romansch. Until now (when I looked it up) I always thought it was Romanian. Maybe I will go to an area that speak it and check it out. Anyway so the trip..

Day one, meet at Zurich train station, train through mountains. They are building this long tunnel through the alps to save trains from having to go over them. The tunnel is 151 km (Gotthard Base Tunnel) and is supposed to be super sweet and epic and we stopped at a little info museum about it on our bike ride. Anyway they are still building it. But until then the train still goes up and over the alps before coming down on the other side. So what we did was get off at the town at the top on the back side of this mountain. Then we rented bikes and biked down to the bottom. It was 41km, but pretty much downhill all the way. If it wasn't for some headwind that we hit towards the end, we would have barely had to peddle at all. It was so sweet. I always enjoy the train in Switzerland. I don't see it as a hassle to have to take a 3 hour train, but more of a three hour enjoyable experience of watching the beautiful scenery pass by. And all the waterfalls. There are tons of waterfalls everywhere. I don't know why our mountains don't have as many. We have mountain, and we have glaciers, but waterfalls are still something cool and to write home about in Canada. Where here, there is an epic waterfall every couple kilometers. Anyway, I enjoy the train rides, but to get out on the pavement and be biking through this epicly beautiful place was just so good. Fresh mountain air in my lungs, sun in my beard, o man it was a good cruise.

So we biked (more like glided) till we got to the town in the bottom, then we trained to Lugano. Lugano is a nice little town on a lake. On the one side of the lake is a little chunk of land that is actually owned by Italy. There is some fancy word for it that I can't remember at the moment, but there is a little chunk of land with some houses and a casino that is considered Italy and falls under Italian law, but then all of the land (hills) around it is part of Switzerland. That night we just had a big group meal (there were 30 other students on this trip, from countries all over the world, but all of them working doing some type of technical internship in Switzerland) and then wandered around the town along the edge of the lake.

The next morning was kind of a slack day. It was August 1 which is Swiss National Day and so they were going to have fire works on the lake that night. So the trip we were doing was usually (past years that IAESTE had done the same things) a 2 day trip, but since Swiss National Day fell on a Sunday they decided it would be good to stay in Lugano for Sunday night and so they stretched it into a three day trip and we had to take Monday off for more activities. So anyway they didn't have a ton of stuff to fill our day on Sunday, so it was fairly chill. We went paddle boating on the lake in the morning. Now paddle boating doesn't sound like something that would interest me as an activity. Maybe as a means to go fishing or a nice way to explore a quiet mountain lake at sunset or something, but this lake was big and open and we weren't allowed to go very far so I thought it was going to be quite lame. However, when there are 7 boats with 4 people in each of them and most of them are rowdy people from foreign lands, things get funner. So I actually enjoyed the morning doing bumper paddle boats and playing pirates (ie jumping into other people's boats and trying to throw them out but ending up breaking the chairs instead). After boating we went for a nice picnic lunch in a park and then I went for a further walk with an Australian guy (some one who equally enjoyed my barefootedness and joined me in it) and a guy and a girl from Belguim. We wandered along the lake to a ritzier part of town exploring and I jumped off a bridge a couple times at one spot where we found some kids jumping. I didn't do a back flip off it though. I got psyched out and couldn't do it. After we got back to the hostel, everyone left together and we took a train to the base of nearby mountain and then took a funicular (a special train for going up steep hill so all of the seats are on an angle so that you can sit and look at the view at a normal comfortable angle) up to the top of this mountain. We cruised around at the top of this mountain for a while and enjoyed the nice 360* view over Lugano and the lake and surrounding mountains and area. After we went down we walked through the old town to a nice little pizzaria. Now for the meal we had each been budgeted 21chf (the meal was included in the whole fee that we had paid for the weekend trip, but since it was at a restaurant it wasn't unlimited). So what I decided to do with Morten (Norwegian guy I will talk about more later) was to split to pizzas so that we maximized our money. So we got one fairly normal pizza for 17chf, and then we got one high class pizza off their premium menu for 25chf (chf=Swiss Franc, which is pretty much worth the same amount as a Canadian Dollar). This second pizza was one of the best I had ever had. It was some random name with some topping listed in Italian that I didn't understand, but then said dried beef. Meat is really expensive (I haven't eaten steak since I have been here) in Switzerland, especially beef, so I was excited to get some beef even if it was dried.

Well it wasn't dried.

It was chunks of steak.

Cooked nice and medium rare.

O man..

It was layered with three types of cheese, one kind of textured like cottage cheese but with better flavor, then a mozza like cheese, and then shaved parmesan on top with some rocket salad as well.

O man was it good.

I should go back just for that pizza..

Anyway after I had finished sharing (regretfully) the two pizzas we headed down to the water and found a nice spot to watch the fireworks. I have to say, the Swiss do fireworks pretty well. It was only a couple weekends earlier that I had seen firework shows in Zurich for Zurichfest, and again these ones were pretty spectacular. After the fireworks we made our way back to the hostel. The next morning we left early and it was just starting to spit rain. We trained, then switched to another train, then switched to one more, then made it Lucarno (I don't remember if these names are the actual names, but they sound right in my head). From Lucarno we started walking, for about 1.5 hours, until we got to the Verzasca Dam. This is a famous Dam. Do me a favor and look up James Bond in Goldeneye. Watch the opening couple minutes where James jumps off a dam in 'Russia'. Well it's not Russia, it's Switzerland, and Pierce Brosnan isn't the only one who jumped off it.

I Ben McDonald did the highest free falling bungee jump in the world, all 220m of it.

I was the first one to go out of our group. This was kinda the main reason for the whole trip for me. I wanted to see the area and the bike ride ended up being really amazing, but this is why I came. When we signed up they told us that if 10 people did the jump then we would get a group discount and it would only be 170chf for the jump, rather the regular price of 190chf. When the weekend started there were only 6 people confirmed as doing the jump with a bunch of maybes. So all weekend I was working my charm (as I do) to get 4 more people to join so that we would get the discount. Jump time comes and there are 13.

I did well.

Now for those of you who don't know, I have bungee jumped before. In Australia in 2006 I jumped 4 times all of the same jump stop (a special deal they had for unlimited jumps in one day). That bungee jump was only 50m, and I was scared feces-less on every jump. But since then I have worked and increased my heights and jumping enthusiasm. So coming into it I wasn't so much scared, as I was eager to do the highest one and be able to look down over the edge and jump with all my might. And I did. And it wasn't scary at all. It was really fast, but it was over quick, and I have to say that I enjoyed my Australia jumps more. This one was still pretty cool, but without the fear element it loses a lot and was kind of just old hat.

But I still did it and can say that I did, and every time you watch Goldeneye and see him falling with all that hang time, you can think of Ben and smile.

After the jump we bussed upstream on the river that was being dammed until we came to a nice little town on the edge of the creek with a sweet little swimming spot and sweet big boulders. There was a bridge there that they had told us about that was 13m (42ft) above the water. Now me being me and just coming from a 220m jump, I knew that I was for sure going to jump. The water was cold, but it was one of the sweetest little swimming spots I have been to. Not alot of swimmers, but lots of watchers just lazing around on rocks enjoying the day and seeing the kids (and bigger kids (me)) jumping off rocks. So I had climbed down to the creek before we got to the bridge and was working my way up jumping off different rocks and doing flips and stuff. I jumped off some bigger rocks (about 6-7m) right beside the bridge. All the while still sure I would jump off the bridge. Then I went up onto the bridge and...

Holy Crap It's High And Scary.

And I couldn't jump. I stood there and I stared at it and I was scared and didn't want to climb up onto the bridge. I was in swimming trunks and most people there were families enjoying the day, so when I went to go across the bridge in my shorts everyone knew my motive and stopped to watch, so pressure was on, but I couldn't jump. I even got heckled by some guy who was beside me on the bridge, and although it was all in Italian and I didn't understand a word, I knew what he was saying. But I couldn't jump. So I went down and joined the rest of the IAESTE people and relaxed and waited and took some pictures and wondered why I couldn't jump. Then the call went out that we had about 10 minutes before we had to go, so I went up to the bridge (wearing a shirt) to take some pictures. The whole way along the bridge, it looks nice and jumpable, until you reach the very highest point where jumping would be best, and there it doesn't look so appetizing. So I would look from there, then walk away a couple steps (only moving down a couple feet) and it would look alot better. I stood on that bridge for about 8 minutes. Staring and contemplating jumping. Being about to do it, telling myself I wouldn't get hurt and there was nothing to be scared of, but then not jumping. And then planning on doing it again. And then not. Finally the rest of the people we packing up to walk for the bus, but I still couldn't do it.

BUT THEN I JUST THREW OFF MY SHIRT AND CLIMBED UP ONTO THE RAIL AND JUUUMMMPPED (splash).

It was good. I quickly squiremed up onto the big rock beside the bridge (6-7m) and did a big backflip off it. Then I scrambled to get my stuff and ran to catch the bus. The whole time, with a grin ear to ear (and I think you all know I can put on a pretty good grin). I was so happy and excited and successful. Who would have thought that in a day of doing a 220m bungee jump and a 13m jump into water that the 13m jump would be the one that scared me, and the one that I enjoyed the most. But them are the apples sometimes. And it was so good.

So we bussed back, then trained back, got back to Baden and that was the weekend.

That was a lot of words on one weekend. I think I know how I got sick. To many nights planning on going to bed at 11pm, but ending up still sitting at my computer typing at 1am. But I enjoyed writing this and listen to a new worship leader (Sean Downs) on the ihop.org prayer room webstream.

I hope you enjoyed as well.

Following Ben's Travels posts will inform you about my amazing hike in the Austrian alps where I summited a mountain at 5am to watch the sunrise, me getting bastised, a 9 day trip that encompassed surfing in Portual and a tomato fight in Spain before finishing in Barcelona, and most recently a 59km bike trip through the mountains and lakes in the Norwegian wilderness before ending at a...you guessed it...FJORD. I love that word.

Tomorrow I may be leaving to go hike for two days around Zermatt (where the Matterhorn is), or I might be here and just go down there for one day on Saturday. Depends on what we find for Couch Surfing accomidation.

I love you all and hope the best for you and hope you have a wonderful day and find joy and find out something new about God's love for you.

without wax

Fjordy Fjorderson

So having Laryngitis is a good reason to spend some time on a computer, because I can't talk at all.

This past weekend I was in Norway and I started getting a bit sicker each of the three days. Yesterday my voice started deteriorating and by the evening I was just squeaking like Mickey Mouse. This morning I stayed home from work to sleep and drink tea. Because I was home alone I wasn't talking, so it wasn't until the afternoon that I realized that I couldn't talk at all (some would say a good thing). So tomorrow I will go to the doc to have him throat me with a stick.

Ok, so I am going to try and go back and pick up from like the middle of July where I had stopped before, but there is a lot so it is likely that I won't get things caught up to the now...

Weekend 6:

Two of the past interns that had been here told us of this hype hike. They had done it the previous year and it was one of their highlights of Switzerland and so they wanted to do it again. So I was sweet lets do it. There were about 13 of us that did it I think. So caught an early morning train from Baden and switched a couple times and got to this mountain. It was a phenomenal hike. The mountains in Switzerland are pretty similar to the mountains in Canada, but still different and cool. One of my favorite things about them is the meadows. There are huge green grassy meadows along the mountain slopes with yellow and purple and white wildflowers growing in them. The cows and sheep just wander the mountainside, all of them with big bells around their neck. Now the bells are something I question. Why so many? I haven't personally looked, but some of my friends have looked up the cost of them and they are pretty expensive, but their are fields with 100 cows that have them. Also, can the cows hear them or have they just completely blocked out the sound because that is all they hear all the time? I don't know these things yet.

Anyway the hike was supposed to take 6 hours. Our destination was the Wildstruble Hut. This is a mountain hut that had accommodation and served a big supper and breakfast the next morning.

So we hiked for the first two and half hours until we got up to this little lake where we were going to stop for lunch. I was soaked in sweat (this was my first big hike of the year and so I wasn't in the fittest shape yet) by the time we got to the lake and wanted to go for a dip. There is more of a long story about the swimming process, but the just of it is that I went for a nice skinny dip to cool off and after I came out three of my friends thought it was a good idea but they were shocked by how cold it was and immediately climbed back out. It had been nice and sunny all morning, but just as we were finishing our lunch it started to rain super hard and then hail for a bit out of no where. We quickly ran to this little hut beside the lake to take shelter. The rain stopped in like 10 minutes and then we continued back on the hike. So this is where things got off track, but not where we noticed it. You see the interns that had done the hike before thought that they would remember it so they didn't bring a map. The rest of us that were joining them thought they knew what they were doing so we hadn't brought anything or looked into the hike much. So as we start walking along the path, a heavy fog comes in and slowly these two guys start saying that things don't look that familiar to them. But we are walking on a path and it is foggy and they didn't seem that sure about anything so we just keep going. At one point we come to a sign that says Wildstrubel so we think we must be on the right trail even though they still say that they don't recognize anything. So we walk for another three hours from the lake, all in heavy fog, and we are starting to think more and more that something isn't right. Because there are 13 people, there are different fitness levels. So the fitter people are pushing on ahead, but the slower people can't keep up and are stopping to take more breaks. But because the fog was thick we didn't want to split up. So the fast people would hike for five minutes, then stop and wait for five minutes for the slower people to catch up, and then wait another five minutes for the slower people to rest. We recognized that we weren't sure if we were going the right way, but that we wouldn't make it at this pace even if we were. So 3 of us (me included) decided to split off from the group and go ahead faster to try and see what we can find. If we hike and the trail ends then we would come back, but hopefully we would find the hut and then come back and tell the others to follow. There had already been talks of turning around and going back, but I had been fighting them as much as possible because I was determined to get to this hut. So the three of us hiked past the others for about an hour until finally we hear some voices over this ridge. Two French people were coming down. So we meet them and I say 'Wildstrubel Hut?' and point to where they just came from and then nod but kind of uncertainly. So I motion out hut for a place to sleep. And then they say no Wildstuble top (as in the summit). They then explained to us that we were like 8km away from the hut, and it was on a different mountain on the other side of a glacier from where we were and we couldn't cross it without gear. Apparently we had started on the wrong trail right from the lake. As for why they named it Wildstrubel Hut when it isn't on Wildstrubel Mountain, I'll never know. So we turned around and hiked back and by the time we got to where we had left the group, they weren't there. So we decided they must have turned around and went back down so we continued down. We caught up to them at the lake. One of them had phone reception and one had our GPS coordinated on his watch, so they had called someone and asked them to look up the GPS coordinates of the hut and realized that we were on the wrong mountain.

So we hiked down to the bottom of the mountain, but because it was like 7 in the evening by this point, the local bus had stopped going so we had to walk back into town to catch the train. We had asked a lady we met on the mountain and she said it would be a one hour walk. I walked for about 45 minutes with one guy, realized that we were still super far away and then decided to hitch hike. We got picked up by about the 4th car and they drove us right to the train stop, getting there about 2 minutes before the train left.

So it was a long day, and not the day we had planned, but a good day. I will definitely do the hike again, but next time I'll take a map and actually get to the hut. I loved it.

Weekend 8:

After Wildstrubel, I was loving the Swiss countryside and wanting more. I had booked to do canyoning with some other interns. Canyoning is an extreme way of getting down a river

ASIDE: I just went and got another hot water with honey and lemon to go along with my baby crackers. Once I finish it I am going to bed to sleep because I'm feeling worn down and want to get over this sickness.

So canyoning is a combination of climbing down waterfalls, repelling down waterfalls, sliding down waterfalls and jumping down waterfalls.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpD3lAyZQSg&feature=player_embedded

Anyway, so we had booked to do an 8 hour canyoning trip Sunday and had booked accommodation for Saturday night, so I went down to Interlacken (two in between two lakes that is like the adventure capital of Switzerland) early Saturday morning and did a hike by myself. Again I was blown away. I just loved the little towns in the steep mountain valleys and the clouds sitting at different levels as I hiked up through and past them. One of the notable enjoyable parts of the hike was when I got to the top after hiking for like 4 hours (very strenuous, going up 1.5km in elevation I think) and it was misty out and I had to go to the bathroom so I went up to this big square building to look for toilets and I find...a dairy barn. Now of all the places to put a dairy barn, I don't know why a person would pick the top of a mountain, but the Swiss do make some of the best cheese and chocolate, so maybe I shouldn't be questioning their methods.

That evening when I got into the town area of Interlacken I found out that the river levels were two high from rain and that it wasn't safe to do the canyoning and that it would probably be canceled. So the next day they confirmed that it was indeed canceled and so I adventured on another hike in the area with another guy this time. We rode a crazy powerful little train up the side of this mountain. We went up 1km in elevation and so it was super steep the whole way. I was impressed with the train. From where we got off, we walked along the plateau overlooking the two lakes and Interlacken and the valley on the other side for the next 6 hours. It was mostly a flat with only a couple of little ups and downs. Again, amazing views and beautiful meadows and some cows.

So that concludes July weekends. Today it is Sept 14, so I still have some catching up to do, but hopefully I can do a recap of my August weekends. Tomorrow I will go to a doc to ask him what to do. I wanted to play guitar tonight, but it would have been hard not to be able to sing at all.

Ta

without wax

Double Doozer

Haha. I made a great supper tonight. I was quite pleased with it. Two of the interns that have just finished up their one year internship were leaving tomorrow, so we went out to lunch with them today to an all you can eat Thai restaurant. Only 16.50CHF, which is fairly cheap. Anyway I didn't find out about this until just before lunch. One of the things I have loving so far is grocery shopping. I shop after work so it's later in the evening and the grocery stores are about to close (they close at 7 or 8 depending on the day). Anyway I think that about 50% of the stuff that I buy, I buy when it is 50% off. Because it is the end of the day or about to expire, they start going around putting the 50% off stickers on stuff. And I follow those people. I know all the spots in the store where they put their clearance stuff. I think my favorite of these spots is the bakery one. I get random things that are sweet in my mouth and cheap in my pocket and I usually have no idea what they are. Case in point, tonight I bought some kind of rhubarb pie like substance. Goodness in my mouth. I will probably go eat some more when I finish this. Anyway, yesterday I found some sushi that was half off. It was just a little package with a couple rolls, but it looked very good and the sushi here is usually expensive so I bought it. So when I found out that they were going for a last day Thai, I thought I should go but I thought it wasn't the best idea to leave my clearance sushi for to many days before I ate it. So I went with them, but just ate my food. But I tried some of the leftovers and it was really good Thai. So I decided to make Thai for supper tonight (again mostly coming from clearance goods). Anyway I was very pleased with the result and thought that it was some pretty legit tasting food that I would have been pleased with at a Thai restaurant. Afterwards I had some chocolate (I go through about one large chocolate bar a week, sometimes more, but hey I'm in Switzerland) and some of that delicious pie like goodness that I just mentioned. So I sat down to write this post and was smelling my finger thumb because it had a strange smell and I was thinking about what I was going to write. As I was thinking I realized I had smelled my finger numerous times. And I laughed. And that is where it all came from.

For those that are following, you just got a story about clearance food to get to the sushi to get to the thai lunch to get to the Thai supper to get to the afterwards food to get to my finger to get to my laugh. That really just happened.

Weekend 4:

So the weekend after my last post I didn't end up doing a "Blind Booker" flight. On Friday I didn't have anything planned but decided I wanted to do something so I went through Couch Surfers (I don't remember if I told of what it was in my last post but I think so) in Switzerland. That is all I searched, just anywhere in Switzerland rather than a specific city, and then I just went through scanning profiles and sending a message about coming to stay with them for the weekend. I think I sent about 20 messages to people all over Switzerland. That afternoon I got one reply, and that was where I staying that night, Bern. When I got home from work I made supper and then I caught a train (free for me because it was after seven and I have the "Gleis 7" which gives you free rides after 7) to Bergendorf I think it was called. I met my man at the train station and we proceeded to have a quick look at his appartment before he took me for a tour of the local brewery and discussed our different travel adventures. He has traveled a lot of Europe and Australia via hitchhiking. It first started when he was with another guy in western Australia and they were talking about buying a buss ticket to get to a different town and the other guy says "I'm not going to pay just to get a ride to that place". And that's how it began. I asked him about how long he usually waits and some questions to kind of scope it out for myself, and told him that he probably wouldn't have much of an easy time doing it in Canada because I am the only one I know who has picked up hitchhikers (I've only picked up a handful in my days). He told me that usually people stop and he gets in and they tell him that hitchhiking isn't common and that no one would have picked him if they didn't. That's what everyone says. So maybe it's a good thing that hitchhiking isn't common. Anyway the next day he drove his parents off for a vacation they were going on (Canada ironically) and I caught a train into Bern. There are bears in Bern. Also Einstein was living there when he came up with his theory of relativity (E=mc^2). So I wandered the little old town area (really nice city and I think I could live there), and then I met up with him for lunch as we joined one of his football friends. It was 33degC I believe that day, and so after lunch we went and floated down the river. It was flowing really fast, so we had the great idea of setting our stuff down in the public swimming area on the edge of the river and then walk up the river and float back down to our stuff. We weren't the only ones with this idea. The walking path along the river was packed, shoulder to shoulder traffic for the full 20 minute walk up the river we did and the river was full of people already. It was pretty sweet. We did it twice. The zoo in the town is along the other side of the river, so for part of the float you could get some free zoo glimpses.

That night we went to an English pub to watch the World Cup consolation (Germany won). I decided there wasn't alot to do in Bern the next day, so I caught the last train back after the game was over. I was beat (probably from the heat and bears) and so on the first train ride I asked the people beside me to make sure to wake me up at my stop, because I had to switch trains once on my ride back to Baden. I was awake however, and switched okay. The first ride was about 2/3 of the journy, but some how I fell asleep as soon as I got on the second train. I woke up while we were driving and thought that we must be close, right before we pulled into Zurich. Zurich is the end of the train line, 20 minutes past the stop I wanted. So I got off the train at midnight, and went and looked at the giant train departure board and couldn't see one going back to Baden. I checked and asked and the only thing I could find was the one leaving the next morning at 530 and I didn't want that to happen. Finally I saw that there was a night train leaving at 1. So I went and sat at this obscure platform trying my hardest to keep myself awake for an hour. I stayed awake, I made the train, and I arrived in Baden.

Weekend 5:

I just went back and added the weekend headers and then decided to check my calender and I actually missed a weekend. Weekend 4 was Zurich fest (Bern should be 5). It was kinda cool. Like the Calgary stampede with lots of vendors and stuff going around the main area of the city and sweet 30 minute firework shows over the lake at night. Not a lot of exciting things to talk about though.

So real weekend 6:

Two of the past interns that had been here.........

I started uploading pictures onto facebook and then started writing this, then went back and stuff had gone down and it wasn't working so I tried again and then my computer got mad at me and then finally I took a long time and got them all up, but it hadn't rotated them so I had to go through a rotate and throw in some commentary, and now it's 1:22am and I should go to bed, so I will continue on the Wildstruble hike. The pictures for that one are posted on facebook now if you want a sneak peak, but I also thing I say what happens so that might ruin the surprise and drama.

This weekend I am going to Ticino which is in the southern Italian part of Switzerland for a 3 day weekend with IAESTE (international student organization that organizes trips). The first day we do a 40km bike ride, but it only take about 3 hours and is all down hill, then we also do some hiking, some site seeing, and....the bungee jump that James bond does in Goldeneye. That's right, it's not actually in Russia. 220m of free falling goodness. I'm stoked.

Have a good weekend.

without wax

O and I think it is some kind of mechanical grease or something. The smell on my finger.