Rome with 3 kids....not our brightest idea.

When our family agreed to our 2 year adventure in Switzerland, we knew it would have it's ups and downs, and that after it was all over, we would look back and appreciate the fact that we were able to live abroad for a brief fraction of our lives. That doesn't change the fact that about once a week, Bryan or I text each other something along the lines of....."I really hate this $@&# country today! Who the hell do these people think they are?!?!" But in general, we love the craziness of living in a foreign country and I often look at Bryan and say, "We are so freakin' lucky, aren't we!?!" Yes, perhaps I am bipolar, but living in Switzerland is often a love/hate relationship.

But apparently we love it more than hate it, because as we saw our 2 year mark rapidly approaching, we both began to panic a bit. How did 2 years here go so fast? There is so much more we want to do and see in Europe before we move back to our supersized, super convenient, reasonably priced land of America. And although we knew there was a chance Bryan's contract would be extended for a third (and final) year, we decided it was time for our obsessive compulsive family travel agent to get busy booking some whirlwind trips. And one place I decided I couldn't possibly miss experiencing is Rome. So after spending about 17 straight hours in front of the computer over-analyzing every aspect of the trip, I booked us a flight, found us an apartment, and started to imagine our fabulous 4 days in one of the worlds most romantic cities. Not surprisingly, taking 3 young kids to Rome left zero time for romance, and lots of time for, "What the hell were we thinking?" moments.

Before I get into the details about our trip from hell, I need to preface this by telling you that, as a family, we have become pretty good travelers. We've learned a lot in the time we've been here. We know that the 3 most important items to pack for any trip are Legos, sanitizing wipes, and a corkscrew. We know that sometimes it makes sense to pay a little more for an apartment because you know there won't be prostitutes hanging out in front of it. Really, we've come a long way since our early days of ghetto apartments and 9 hour rides in a car that smells like urine. But sometimes, we get a little over confident and we need a trip like our 4 days in Rome to remind us that we're still bumbling idiots.

In order to maximize our time in Rome, I booked an early morning flight out of Zurich which required us to be on a train to the airport at 5:30. I was on top of things making sure the kids were in bed early, their clothes were laid out, and toothbrushes were prepared for brushing before being crammed in our suitcase as we ran out the door for the train. What I wasn't on top of was double checking that my husband had set his alarm correctly so we would wake up in time for the above mentioned early morning flight. By some miracle, I woke up in the middle of the night and couldn't fall back asleep. I layed there for about 45 minutes wondering how much longer until the alarm would go off. We don't have a clock in the bedroom so Bryan uses his blackberry as an alarm clock. I finally let curiousity get the best of me and I staggered out into the kitchen to see what time it was. I stared at the 5:15 for about 10 seconds before I switched into lunatic wife and mother mode and started frantically hollering, "EVERYBODY UP!!!!! YOU DIDN'T SET THE DAMN ALARM, BRYAN!!!! WHAT THE HELL ARE WE GOING TO DO!!!!!". All while simultaneously brushing my teeth and inserting my contacts. Fortunately, the voice of reason in the family (who apparently doesn't know how to set an alarm), decided we would drive to the airport unshowered, and still make the flight in plenty of time. The little voice in the back of my head that kept whispering, "This isn't a good sign of things to come", was drowned out by my annoying real voice that kept asking Bryan, "What ungodly amount of money are they going to charge us to park at the airport for 4 days? We're going to have to sell one of our kids to pay our parking fee!" And with the whiney voice in the back seat complaining about not getting breakfast, it was going to be easy to pick which one would be sold to the highest bidder.

We arrived at the airport in plenty of time, and eventually I relaxed when we had gotten through security and the kids were eating their 8 franc croissants. "We're going to Rome, you guys! Isn't this exciting? We're going to see the colosseum where the Gladiators fought!" I gushed as I tried to increase the kids enthusiasm. We'd been reading some children's books about Rome and Gladiators in an attempt to get the kids excited about going to a city with almost nothing to interest children other than pizza and gelato. Z took the bait and had been asking questions about gladiators and the Roman Empire for the past few days. The other 2 looked at me blankly before asking if I'd remembered to pack the Legos.

After an uneventful flight, we arrived in Rome, where a van had been hired to take us to our apartment that was located right near the Colosseum. Marmi, the lovely woman who rented the apartment to us, was waiting for us at the front door and kindly took us up to our apartment, which was perfect. The kids had their own room and there was an outdoor patio where Bryan could enjoy a bottle of wine after the kids went to bed. Marmi insisted that she walk us around the neighborhood so she could show us the market, the bus stop, and the restaurants she recommends. While on our nieghborhood tour, we stopped at a nearby bank to withdraw enough Euros to pay for the apartment, but the machine wouldn't dispense cash. Marmi assured us it would be no problem to pay her the remaining amount when we checked out so we added "find ATM" to our list of things to do that day. She spent a few minutes warning us to be alert when using the ATMs because pick pocketing is a real problem in Rome. Gotta love foreshadowing......

When Marmi finally left us to our own devices, we quickly bought some groceries, fed the kids lunch, and planned our afternoon of sightseeing. On our list was Trevi Fountain and the Spanish Steps. The kids were showing signs of their early morning wake up call and at this point, a nap would have been a stellar idea. But with only 3 full days in Rome, I decided to take my chances and drag our crabby kids out into the general population. Yes, after 20 months of traveling with the kids, I should know better. But in my defense, so should my loving husband and he didn't stop the madness. Somehow being an unrealistic parent seems much more acceptable when you have someone equally as unrealistic following your lead.

So we hopped on a city bus and headed towards our sightseeing destinations with map in hand. When we hopped off at our stop, we checked the map and headed towards Trevi fountain. Trekking around Rome with kids is similar to playing a real live game of the the old school arcade game "Frogger". Crosswalks? Optional for most Italian drivers. And coming from Switzerland where 5 year olds literally walk to school by themselves and drivers would NEVER consider making a pedestrian wait for them at a crosswalk, Italy was an adjustment. So we put our death grips on the kids and and began darting through Rome. We made it to Trevi fountain to find that somewhere between a jillion and a zillion other tourists had beaten us there. My vision of getting some well posed pictures of the kids standing in front off the fountain, tossing in their coins, was clearly unrealistic. We managed to elbow our way to a spot way to the left of the fountain and took a couple pictures with the kids perched precariously on a railing. I then decided we were not going to come to Rome and not get up close to the fountain so we began our battle towards the water. There is a wide set of stairs leading down to the fountain and in my estimation, half the population of Japan was taking pictures of each other in front of it. As we started down the stairs, I made the kids stop each time someone was trying to take a picture. After about 3 minutes, our big American heads were probably smack in the middle of a number of photos because to be honest, people take too damn long to snap a picture. Particularly the ones who found it fun to try and jump up and get a picture of them in mid air. Really. You'd be surprised at how popular many camera toting tourists find this ridiculous pose.

When we finally found our way down to the water, each of us got a coin to throw in. Apparently, the Romans say that if you throw a coin over your shoulder into Trevi fountain, you will return to Rome some day. I threw a couple extra over my shoulder and asked the Gods at Trevi fountain to make sure my next visit would be sans kids. And soon after the coins were tossed, the melt downs began. The kids wanted to push through the crowds and make there way over to the side of the fountain where you could climb up and sit next to the fountain. It never ceases to amaze me how much my kids like to climb things. Rocks, statues, Roman ruins. They are pretty eager to climb anything. That is, until we expect them to climb up a flight of stairs. Then they are searching for the nearest elevator.

This is when the family smackdown began. I don't remember who was climbing what, or whose foot happened to kick whose head, but as C sat happily perched next to the fountain, E began her "I'm 3 and you've had me up for 12 hours" tantrum because apparently, she desired to be perched where her brother was. Things went from bad to worse and at one point there was an actual wrestling match atop a portion of the fountain that nearly ended in C taking a swim. I gasped as I grabbed him by the shirt to prevent him from tumbling into one of Rome's biggest tourist attraction, and then proceeded to whisper scream at E and drag her kicking and screaming back through the camera happy crowd. Good times.

Clearly, this was a sign that we should head back to the apartment and put an end to all of our misery. But damn it, we hadn't checked "The Spanish Steps" off of our to do list for the day, so off we went, with ill behaved children in tow, towards the Spanish steps. After winding our way through streets and traffic, we arrived at the Spanish Steps to find it overflowing with tourists waiting for the sun to set. Yes, the Spanish steps at Sunset is beautiful, except for the fact that my kids don't give a rats ass about sunsets or Spanish Steps. And when informed that they were going to climb the Spanish Steps, they didn't hesitate to express their lack of enthusiasm. So of course, we dragged them up the Spanish Steps anyway. Yes, in hindsight, probably not our best parenting moment.

After snapping a few pictures, and oohing and aahing, we decided it was time to head home. The kids were fighting over a bottle of water like they'd been dragged through the Sahara, and I was pretty sure all hell was going to break loose at any moment. So we began our descent, back to the bus stop. On the way there, we passed a bank and Bryan quickly withdrew enough money to pay our apartment rental woman and our tour guide that we would be using the following day. And then we were on our way. We pushed our way onto a ridiculously crowded bus and Z and E scrambled to grab a seat in the luggage rack. Not the safest option, but rather than argue with 2 overtired kids, Bryan kept one hand on them to keep from catapulting into the crowd each time the driver hit the breaks. C and I stood by the window and I clung to my purse like a paranoid bag lady. We'd been warned about the professional pick pocketers and I knew we looked like tourists with our 3 loud American kids and our camera bag. But I'm no sucker. If someone was going to try to grab my purse, they were going to have to drag me down the street with it. I was on high alert, so when a suspicious looking man leaned up against me carrying a suspicious folded up paper bag, I gave him my best "woman teetering on the brink of insanity" look and clutched my purse to my chest.

When we arrived back to our neighborhood, we sat down in one of the restaurants that Marmi had recommended and immediately flagged down the waiter to order a well deserved glass of red wine. It was going to take more than one glass to make my kids incessant fighting more tolerable, but it was a start. As I began chugging......I mean, sipping my wine, for some reason Bryan reached into his front pocket to find something. When he pulled out the contents of his pocket, I heard him mumble, "No $@%ing way......". I stared at him with my wine glass to my lips and waited nervously. "You've got to be kidding me......." Hmmm....this didn't sound good. Perhaps we should have just ordered a full bottle right off the bat. He then frantically started going through all his pockets before he uttered the words no one ever wants to hear. "The money is gone." As you may know, I can be somewhat frugal, so the unexpected loss of money doesn't sit well with me. So I immediately found my happy place called denial. "No. You must have put it someplace else. Check again, honey." This was followed by him repeatedly going through every pocket at least 15 times before we both faced the reality. We (read: he) was the victim of a front pocket pick pocket. Seriously? I tried to remain calm and compassionate and not at all accusatory. In my head I was screaming, "HOW THE HELL DO YOU NOT FEEL SOMEONE'S HAND GOING IN YOUR FRONT POCKET!!!!" But clearly the dirtball who did it was a smooth operator. Not only did Bryan not feel him put his hand in his FRONT pocket, but the guy was so slick that he took all the cash, and left all his credit cards and I.D. I'll spare you the details of how much the scumbag lowlife took us for, but we'll just say he was probably able to take a brief sabbatical from violating tourists to live off his loot.

In the midst of my non confrontational husband discussing the pleasure he would get from kicking Mr. Pickpocketer's back side, my charming little angels began bickering about God knows what. "Seriously? Mommy and Daddy are VERY upset because someone stole something from Daddy's pocket. Now is NOT the time to misbehave!" I then reached across the table to remove Z's glass from the edge of the table so it wouldn't get knocked over. In the process, I knocked my own 1/2 full glass of red wine all over the tablecloth, Bryan, and the only long sleeved shirt he had packed for our trip. Ahhh..... just as I had imagined our first magical day in Rome.

Check please....

That night, Bryan and I went to bed early, leaving an unopened bottle of red sitting on the kitchen counter. There aren't many days that a couple glasses of wine and a good laugh can't improve on, but this was one of them. Thank tomorrow was a new day.

Day 2 was an improvement and we started the day by meeting up with our tour guide to see the Roman Forum and the Colosseum. Giuseppe arrived with a lovely European Carryall and the inability to look either Bryan or me in the eye. With a name like Giuseppe, I had pictured him walking up the street tossing pizza dough and singing "That's Amore!". He had come recommended for being "child friendly" and I knew we were about put him to the ultimate test. Child friendly is one thing, but if this guy was going to be able to handle keeping a 3, 5 and 7 year old interested in what they affectionately referred to as "a bunch of old broken buildings", he'd better bring his A game.

Giueseppe was friendly and certainly knew his stuff. He had 3 hours to give us a basic tour of ancient Rome and we hit the ground running. The first few minutes were a little uncomfortable while we got used to the fact that he rarely looked at Bryan at all, and when speaking to me, kept his eyes focused on my chin. I initially thought perhaps I had developed a heinous zit on my chin. Or maybe remnants of my breakfast remained on my chin and my husband had decided not to mention it. But after multiple, casual attempts to remove whatever distraction might be hanging from my chin, I decided eye contact just wasn't Giuseppe's thing.

Our first mishap occurred about 90 seconds after beginning our walk to the Roman forum. We realized during our first spectacular day in Rome, that while walking on the sidewalk, you needed to keep your eyes open for piles of dog crap. They're everywhere. The kids took this job VERY seriously and announced it to everyone within a 50 foot radius when they discovered these lovely landmines along our route. Well, apparently E was a little too focused on dog poop duty, because she walked smack into a light post and began wailing. For most mother's, I think maternal instinct would cause them to spring into action and rush to her side. But for me, it immediately put into action my inability to suppress laughter when people fall or bump into things. I'm not proud of this horrible flaw in my personality, and I usually manage to sputter an, "Are you okay?" before erupting into fits of hysteria. Fortunately, my husband was able to tend to E, and I'm relieved to tell you I only found it humorous after I was sure she was unharmed. What can I say, unintentional physical humor hits me in the funny bone. And more often than not, I'm the dumbass doing the falling and running into things.

Eventually, we made it to the entrance of the Forum and Giuseppe stopped to give us a brief history of what we would be seeing. The kids listened to about the first 3 words out of his mouth before they scattered and found some old rocks to climb on. Giuseppe seemed a little taken aback by their lack of interest and then continued to share his vast knowledge while staring at my chin. He had a very thick Italian accent so I had to really concentrate on his every word. Not any easy task when you are also trying to make sure your 3 kids aren't causing an international incident by climbing on 2000 year old ruins.

Throughout the morning, the kids would gather around Giuseppe and really try to be attentive in small spurts. Because of his thick accent, I was worried that they weren't understanding what he was saying. So I found myself repeating key point right after Giuseppe said them. He would say something like, "zees eez vair zee Emporer leeved"(okay, thats more a French accent, but you get the point) and I would feel compelled to say, "Did you hear that guys? This is where the emperor lived!". I can only imagine how insanely irritating this was to poor Giuseppe. But in my defense, Giuseppe had a few annoying habits of his own. Throughout the day, in an attempt to keep the kids engaged, I would ask them about things we had learned about Rome, like, "Do your remember who the 2 brothers were who founded the city of Rome?". E and C would stare at me like uninterested deer in headlights. But Z, my people pleasing smarty pants, would be about to answer when Giuseppe would quickly chime in, "Romulus and Remus founded Rome!". Yes, Giuseppe. Seeing as how we're paying you 50 euro an hour to share your wealth of knowledge about Rome, you ought to be able to answer my silly questions.

But for the most part, Giuseppe was a great tour guide. I gotta say, the guy was enthusiastic about "old broken buildings". I really tried to stay interested in the history of ancient Rome, but my attention span is only marginally better than my kids. I hung in there for about an hour before I realized I needed to let Bryan concentrate on what Giuseppe was saying, while I kept an eye on our bored stiff children. Bryan and I are very different people. He's more the "I'm gonna kick your ass at trivial pursuit" kind of guy. And I'm more the, "Aware of my surrounding and never let anybody pick pocket me" type. (Yes, a low blow. I know.) Needless to say, he was much more into the history of the sites than I was. I kept counting the minutes until could relax at an outdoor cafe with a glass of wine. We complement each other well.

The remainder of our stay in Rome consisted of a very child unfriendly visit to the Vatican, a RIDICULOUSLY long and argument filled walk to Villa Borghese, a brief and exhausting ride in a bicycle built for 5, and lots of stops for gelato. Each of these outtings were full of pitfalls, but I'm not sure my post traumatic stress disorder can handle reliving the details of these events for your entertainment. But as I look back at the pictures, there were a few successes thrown in during our trip. I'll never forget seeing the Sistine Chapel and in hindsight, my kids were perfectly quiet and well behaved for that 10 minutes of our trip! The whole family enjoyed visiting the Colosseum, and the boys managed not to kill each other with their wooden souvenir gladiator swords. Sometimes it's the little successes that we have to see in the midst of a generally challenging adventure. Occassionally, family travel comes down to sheer survival, and survive we did. I don't suspect Rome will rate in our top moments of family togetherness, but we managed to laugh at ourselves most of the time.

Zurich Gone Wild

If you haven't gotten the idea from some of my past blog posts, Switzerland is a beautiful country with lots to offer our American expat family. And really, we love it. But I'm guessing you've also read between the lines to recognize that it's not exactly a place where you are free to "let loose". You know how every year someone does a "Top 10 Party Schools" list, and we all read it, secretly hoping maybe our college might, at the very least, get an honorable mention? Well, with Amsterdam being the equivalent of the #1 party school in Europe, Switzerland would be more equivalent to, well, a 1950s Catholic elementary school. You really need to be on your best behavior, because there's always a "Sister Mary" right around the corner, ready and willing to use her paddle.

So when a friend told me about a Zurich street parade that happens in August, I imagined cute little Swiss women dressed in traditional Swiss clothing, maybe a herd or 2 of cows with fancy bells, and if we're lucky, some good old Swiss yodeling. Because honestly? That's what every other Swiss celebration we've encountered has been. Quaint, heartwarming, and very G rated. But on this particular Saturday in August, I was in in for one hell of a surprise.

Apparently, once a year, the people of Zurich and the surrounding areas release all their pent up naughtiness, and flock to the streets of Zurich to see how anti-Swiss they can be. The official documented excuse for having the parade is to celebrate Gay Pride in Switzerland. And since I've been to a couple really fun and crazy gay pride parades in the States, I knew it wouldn't involve yodeling and cow bells. But surely Switzerlands Gay Pride parade would be a very watered down version. I imagined lots of rainbow flags and signs advocating love and acceptance of all lifestyles. Maybe some interesting fashion choices and probably a few drunken crazies thrown in for fun. But to my surprise, I saw VERY little in the way of gay pride. Hardly a rainbow to be seen. It appeared that the entire canton of Zurich uses the Zurich Street Parade as an excuse to toss their Alphorns aside, and rebel against all things orderly, cleanly, and in many cases, sane.

So on a Saturday in August, we hired a babysitter for the afternoon, grabbed our camera, and headed downtown on the train. Our fun and crazy friends from California are never ones to shy away from a celebration and we planned to meet them at the parade. The train was packed and we sat facing two matronly, old, greyhaired ladies that looked like they were on their way to a church potluck in their nylons and polyester suits. Across the aisle sat their polar opposites and the first sign that today was no ordinary day in Zurich. A couple of heavily pierced gentlemen (I use the term loosely) were wearing matching T-shirts advertising a Swiss website. I had to do a double take when I read "SWISSF____ERS.COM". And I assure you, the F word they were proudly wearing was not a shout out to Swiss Farmers. I have to imagine their choice of attire broke at least half a dozen Swiss rules and that the 2 fashion trendsetters would most certainly be receiving a fine shortly. Little did I know that F bomb t-shirts would be the least of the Swiss authorities problems......

When we got off the train, it looked like Mardi Gras, a strip club, and a horror movie had all exploded in the middle of our otherwise stuffy city. I actually saw an entire family dressed completely in black, skin tight, shiny vinyl. The Dad was wearing buttless chaps, and his 2 young children didn't seem to be horrified by this fact. I'm all for having some crazy, silly, family fun, but the minute somebody's butt is showing, I know a line has been crossed. I was too horrified to think about pulling my camera out of my purse to snap a picture, so I'll just have to leave it to your imagination. Trust me, your imagination can't make it any more disturbing than seeing it live.

It was at about this time that I received a text from our friends, that read....

HEADED TOWARDS U.
ALREADY HAD BEER ON FEET AND GENITALS IN FACE.
WATCH OUT FOR ALL THE PEE

Hmmmm.....Perhaps this should have deterred Bryan and I from heading closer to the party zone. But I figured since I have a good 6 inches on Crystal, I was probably safe in the "body parts at eye level" department, so we followed all the freaks towards the fun. And rather than try to explain to you the sights of Zurich gone mad, I'll let the pictures tell the story.......


I'm not sure what's more disturbing, the girls in their underwear, or the guy in front of them.

It looks like the golden girls forgot their blouses.

I wonder if he realizes he's run his hose?

"Honey, we're not in China anymore!"

This guys was going for the Chippendales meets Mr. Rogers look.

Hey, is that Gene Simmons?!?!?!

"I LIKE BLUE BUTTS, AND I CANNOT LIE!"

This lovely lady was carrying a camera to snap some pictures of the other people who were letting it all hang out.

Which one of these parade goers received an atomic wedgie earlier in the day?

That cardigan wasn't quite long enough to cover his bum.

I like how he's looking judgmentally at the guy in neon like he's made a fashion faux pas.

There are no words for this photo. At least not any appropriate ones.

Somebody missed the memo regarding casual attire for "Guys Night Out".

Pretty woman.....walking down the street.....pretty woman......

His name was Lola, he was a showgirl.......

This guy was partying on a bridge over the Limmat River. Probably a wise clothing choice.....

This has "messed up childhood" written all over it.

Something tells me she's had a few appts. with a plastic surgeon....

It's not everyday you get to see a rabbit being chased by a peacock.

There were good butts..........

.........and there was some missing dental floss.

"Come on Thelma, let's go change into our g-strings and show em how it's done."

Like I said, there are no words that can explain Zurich Street Festival as well as the pictures. We spent most of the afternoon camped out underneath an awning to stay out of the rain, and happened to have the perfect spot for freak watching. But it's funny, after awhile, you start to feel a little left out of all the fun. So after a couple (read: several) 6 franc Heinekens in a can, I decided it was time to partake in the festivities. And fortunately, there was a wig salesman who had set up shop right down the street. When I first suggested the wigs, Bryan and Co. responded with nervous laughter. But by the 14th mention of wearing wigs, Derek was the only hold out. "No! I'm not wearing a wig, Heather. Seriously, someone might see me. You are not going to get me to wear a wig. End of story"

He's no match for me and my brilliant ideas. Bryan actually really liked his fro. For those of you who know Bryan, he's probably the last guy you'd imagine would walk around town sporting an afro wig. But on this particular day, it happened to be raining. And apparently he hates getting raindrops on his glasses more than he hates looking like a nut. So he put the wig on and literally, didn't take it off until dinner.

Derek (aka Carrot Top) wore it to appease me and wore the same ridiculous look on his face all day. Although, after stopping to use the Ladies room at Starbucks, we returned to find Derek had made some new friends and apparently felt much more comfortable in Crystal's wig.....

We used a new babysitter for our street parade outing and thought it was a good idea to check in with him a few times throughout the day. As you might expect, the parade was noisy and we had to sneak away from the main thoroughfare to be able to hear above the noise of the partygoers.

Nothing says, "responsible parent" like your husband chatting up the babysitter while wearing an afro wig. And although Bryan swears the woman in the above photo was not flashing him while he talked to the sitter, it sure looks suspicious. And really, who could blame the woman for wanting to tempt such a stud?!?!? Clearly the ladies love afro-Bryan.....


So it was a crazy fun day, and I think I can speak for all 4 of us, when I say that it was refreshing to see a little craziness in Zurich. It can feel a little suffocating sometimes when the Swiss openly glare and shake their heads at you for small infractions like recycling on a Sunday. But I've come to accept their often rigid ways and realize that they probably find my American ways just as annoying as I find some of the their Swiss ways. I give the Swiss a lot of credit for taking advantage of their one "let loose" day of the year. They make the most of it and have a good time showcasing their crazies. And for one brief afternoon, these nutty Americans were proud to help them celebrate.

Picture this

Now that we have been residing in Switzerland for over a year, I have fewer ridiculous Swiss encounters to blog about. I still abhor the recycling program here, but I now have a "system" in place to get all my fermenting bottles and jars in the appropriate recycling areas. I still want to bitch slap the rude people who stare at my children like they should be locked up in my cellar rather than accompany me to the grocery store. But I've learned to live with these little "speedbumps" in my daily life and don't let them take away from all the fabulous parts of living in the middle of Europe. But earlier this month, I dreamed about setting fire to a Swiss government building while in the process of renewing our residency permits and figured, surely, this must be an occasion to blog.

It all started several months ago, when I was leafing through my mail. In the States, I would check the mail box every afternoon and casually sort through the mail, enjoying the 18 daily catalogs we received. Here, our mail can sit in our box for up to a week because I avoid it at all costs. Sorting through the mail here means having to sit in front of Google-Translate to find out what kind of intimidating notices we received written completely in German. Without fail, there is always at least one piece of mail per week that requires us to fill out a form, go to the bank, or avoid our landlord. On this particular day, there was indeed a letter from some government office in Zurich that apparently was reminding us that we need to renew our residency permits at the local Gemeinde House. The Gemeinde House is kind of the like the town hall, but full of people who want to make you miserable.

Bryan nagged me for weeks about finding time for us all to go into the Gemeinde House and renew our permits. And because I am an abiding wife, I ignored him until our permits were expired and Bryan had to leave the country on business. Apparently this whole residency permit is kind of important, because if we don't have it when we travel outside of Switzerland, they won't let us back in. This actually didn't sound like such a bad thing after a few days of dealing with our permit renewal debacle.

Because I was such a slacker, Bryan decided he would go in and take care of his permit so he wouldn't lose his job due to inability to travel. He filled out the paperwork, grabbed his passport, and headed into the Gemeinde house to make the 100 franc transaction that would allow him to leave and reenter the beautiful country of Switzerland. He returned later announcing that his new permit was in the mail and that the whole process was, as my kids would say, "Easy, peasy, lemon squeezy". Hmmm.... hard to believe anything related to the Gemeinde house could be that cut and dry. But sucker that I am, I figured I could handle it with the kids, and scheduled an hour after school to put this task behind me.

I picked the kids up on a Wednesday afternoon and headed to the Gemeinde house. I reviewed my list of items I would need to have with me to make this a flawless and simple procedure. Paperwork that my loving husband ASSURED me was filled out correctly? CHECK. All 4 passports? CHECK. Expired residency permits? CHECK. Several hundred francs in cash to pay the lovely lady at the Gemeinde house? CHECK. Three rambunctious American kids with lots of pent up energy? CHECK.

What could possibly go wrong?

I parked the car at the Gemeinde house and my 3 kids and I traipsed through the office where a stone face woman appeared to be waiting for her next victims. I sat down in one of the 2 chairs in front of her desk and my 3 trusty sidekicks all sprinted to the only other empty chair available. They then proceeded to have an all out smackdown in an attempt to claim they were there first. So before I even have the chance to kill this lady with kindness, I have to physically separate my little angels so they don't kill each other under the watchful eyes of some very stern looking government workers. All the while I'm whisper screaming at them while trying to keep a pleasant look on my face.

When the wrestling match was resolved, I smiled at the emotionless woman and let her know I was here to renew our permits. This is when she asked me for the kids updated passport photos to put on their new permits. Crap. I cursed my loving husband and dragged the kids back to the car to find someplace to have their photos taken.

I vaguely remembered a photo booth outside the train station in town and thought it would be a quick fix to my problem. I'd be staring at the unfriendly face at the Gemeinde house in no time. After all, the name on the photo booth read, "PRONTO PHOTO". And I'm no dummy, pronto is definately German for fast.



I parked the car, high tailed it over to the photo booth, and begin reading the instructions. You'd think after more than a year here, I'd expect everything to be written in German, but apparently I'm a slow learner. Pronto, my ass. This was going to take awhile.

My first dilemma was inserting the money into the machine. At 8 francs a pop, you'd think they'd give me the option to insert my 100 franc bill (that I'm carrying to pay the evil woman who has sent me on this task), but no, coins only. So I drag the kids to the Kiosk around the corner and use my 100 franc bill to buy a single lollipop thereby receiving change to use in the machine. The 3 kids who have been following me around during this little adventure begin to get excited at the site of a store filled with junk food. Fortunately, they are smart enough to realize the look on mommy's face meant there wasn't a chance in hell they were getting any.

C was the first to be photographed. I lovingly guided him into the booth and attempted to decipher the directions. Inside there were LOTS of pictures showing examples of what you should and shouldn't do when having a passport photo taken. The one that was the most intimidating showed pictures of people smiling just slightly with a big red X through it. Apparently when trying to become a Swiss resident, you need need to look the part. NO smiling. So after 6 years of teaching my kids to smile when they are having their picture taken, I explained that they had to look miserable in this one. I anticipated one of the little smart alecs replying with, "Kind of like you look right now, Mommy?" But again, they're smarter than they look and kept their mouths shut.

Inside the photo booth there is a stool that you can spin to raise and lower it. I raised it as high as it would go and plopped C down on it. Once seated, you were supposed to line your face up with an oval on the screen in front of you, so that your face would be positioned just so for the official picture. C is a pretty tall 6 year old, but even on the highest setting, his cute little face wasn't positioned quite right. So after much adjusting, he managed to kneel on the stool, line up his mug, and look miserable. We previewed the picture, printed it out and voila! One terrible picture of C.....




Z was next and proved to be a bit more challenging. I lowered the stool a bit, set him on top of it, and told him to squat. "Higher....higher.....looooooower........lower....little bit lower.....STOP!" I instructed as his contorted little body teetered on the little stool. He managed to get his face in the oval and I quickly hit the button to click the photo and closed the curtain until I could see the bright flash of the picture being taken. When I previewed the picture, half Z's face was missing and only his eyes and hair were peeking out from the bottom of the frame. DELETE. The next try resulted in Z tipping over and I when I opened the curtain he was wedged against the corner of the booth. The picture captured him mid tip, but to his credit, he did have the whole "look miserable" thing down. Again, I hit the DELETE button. Clearly he wasn't going to be able to keep his head in the oval without a little help. So on the third attempt he scrunched himself up on the stool, and we got his face in the oval with the help of me supporting him and keeping him in place. I hit the button to snap the picture and kept the curtain open in order to hold his teetering little body in place. We eagerly waited to preview the picture and finally saw a picture with his miserable little face placed exactly in the middle of the frame, but half his face was overexposed because I didn't shut the curtain. I looked on the list of "don't"s listed on the booth, and sure enough, overexposed pictures were a no-no. DELETE. Hmmm......DELETE. For some reason the delete button didn't seem to be working this time. After attempting to hit the delete button about 43 more times, I heard the sound of the 8 franc picture being printed off. Noooooooooooo!!!!!!!! Apparently I missed the instructions that would have informed me in German that you only get 3 attempts at a good picture. Fabulous. But when I looked at the finished product, it looked a little less overexposed in the actual picture and I decided to take my chances. So I let Z out of his photo cage and summoned my next subject.



At this point, E is looking a little disheveled after playing a heated game of, "Try and catch me!" with C. While working on Z's photo shoot, I had intermittently had to scream over my shoulder, "Knock it off!" as they ran in circles and shrieked under the disapproving eyes of passers by. Knock it off? Seriously, when did I become my mother.....

Anyway, I perched a sweaty E on the stool and began the process of getting a picture of her looking miserable. The whole idea of being perched on anything more than 3 inches off the ground seemed to terrify E. She gripped me arm with one hand and held onto the side of the photo booth with her other hand. After finally positioning her so her head was in the oval, I had to coerce her into letting go of the side of the booth so her arm wouldn't be sticking up in the photo. After much whimpering and fussing, she finally let go and I pushed the picture button and shut the curtain while keeping my arm in her death grip. And as I expected, her face was nowhere near the center of the oval when the picture was taken. DELETE. Now we're down to 2 chances and I'm starting to stress.

I hollered at the boys who were taking full advantage of the fact that I was completely ignoring them. They were pushing all the buttons on the vending machines and appeared to be deciding how they could retrieve their preferred items without paying for them. I could just imagine hearing the crash of the vending machine tipping over as I sat with my head stuck behind the curtain of the photo machine.

I decided to change my approach in trying to balance E on the stool. This time I climbed into the photo booth with her, crammed myself between the stool and the wall, and held her somewhat in place, all the while crouching so I wouldn't be in the picture. God only knows what people were thinking when they saw the spectacle that was us. As I was getting ready to press the picture button, I kept drilling my poor 3 year old, "IS YOUR FACE STILL IN THE OVAL?
IS IT? HUH? MAKE SURE IT'S IN THE OVAL!" She's 3. She might not even know what an oval is. But I was a little crazed at this point and wondering what my little 5 and 6 year vandals were doing unsupervised outside the booth. She whimpered as I hit the button and I'm sure she just wanted to get out of the booth and away from the scary lady she calls mama. The result of her photo shoot is probably the funniest picture I've ever seen of any of my kids. To fully appreciate the ridiculousness of the photo, a before and after picture is needed.....




















Yes, she looks like she is usually locked up in our cellar and doesn't quite know what to make of being released out into the general population. I swear we've never battered her, but based on this picture, that's a really hard case to argue. And although I'm not going to share MY residency permit picture, I definately look like her unfit mother in mine. You know those mothers you see at Walmart who are screaming at their kids and spanking them in public? That's what my picture looks like. A friend of mine believes the picture resembles the mug shots you see on the news of the mothers who leave their kids locked in the car while they go gambling away their grocery money at the local casino. And I can't say I disagree.

Now that I had all my updated photos, we drove back to the Gemeinde House and again traipsed through the office to the same robot woman who had "helped" us before. I instructed the boys to sit in some seats on the other side of the room and brought E to sit across the desk with me. I handed the lovely woman our photos, our expired residency permits and our paperwork and waited in anticipation for her to tell me we were all set. This is when E decides she's had enough and wants to leave. She expresses this decision by melting into a complete tantrum. One of those 3 year old tantrums that isn't going to go away, regardless of what you do. So as I attempt to ignore the wailing mess that is my daughter, this lady starts informing me that the paperwork is incomplete and needs to be signed by my husband's work with a copy of his employment contract. I smile and tell her that my wonderful husband was just in last week with the same paperwork, and a nice gentlemen accepted his paperwork, took his 100 francs, and told him his permit would be in the mail. She glares at me, asks for his name, looks him up, and tells me he has not renewed his permit. While restraining my screaming 3 year old, I assure her that he did. She then tells me that it would be in the system, and no, he hasn't. At this point I was tempted to join E in her meltdown, but instead told her I would return with my husband, grabbed my paperwork and ridiculously miserable and overpriced photos with one hand, grabbed E by the wrist with the other hand, and dragged her kicking and screaming out of the office with boys in tow. We were quite a site and I must confess I was not speaking in a loving tone to my daughter at this point. I proceeded to get in the car, call Bryan, and very irrationally tear his head off. Thank God he took that "for better or worse" part of our vows seriously.

Without further boring you with my tirade, it took 2 more family outtings to the Gemeinde house, with Bryan, to complete the process of renewing our permits. And both times, the same lady at the Gemeinde house, waited on us and made it clear that she remembered us from our previous visits. The other two times, I think even E was embarrassed to have to show her face again. She was a complete angel, and by the time everything was sorted out, the Gemeinde House lady almost cracked a smile. Almost.

So now we're officially residents of Switzerland for another year and I hope to avoid having to step foot in the Gemeinde House again until we are notifying them that we are leaving the country. Sometimes I question whether these day to day frustrations are worth it. But when the whole family is staring at the Leaning Tower of Pisa, or skiing in the Alps, or marveling at a site we never thought we'd see, the irritating, inconvenient crap seems much less irritating and inconvenient. And as for the Pronto Photo booth? Well, we're all a little scarred from our experience. I'm not sure what you call an irrational fear of photo booths, but based on the way we all visibly shudder when we catch sight of one, we've discovered a new phobia for the books.

Dumpster diving Swiss style

It's been a while since I blogged about recycling, and I think in a past blog I may have even promised that I would never blog about recycling ever again. But today, I must go back on my word, because today, I got down and dirty with the recycling process. I know I should be embarrassed to share with everyone my debacle at the local market, but blogging about it is cheaper than therapy. Plus, I don't want to have to go through the harrowing process of locating an English speaking shrink. So here goes...

The day started with some dear friends of ours flying in from Madison, Wisconsin to visit us for the week. Anytime someone comes to visit from the States, we feel very blessed and really try to make the long, expensive trip over here worth their while. We were so excited to see them and share with them what life is like here in Switzerland. So seeing as it was the Saturday of a 3 day weekend, and the markets would all be closed for the next two days, Sandy and I headed out to our town market to stock up on groceries. She thought it would be interesting to experience a Swiss market. She had no idea....


As I've said before, grocery shopping here in Switzerland is not the mindless activity that it is in the U.S. It starts with getting your ticket for the parking garage, and making sure you put it somewhere where you will be able to find it when you are ready to leave the parking garage. Second, while looking for a safe spot to place the parking ticket, you need to remember to grab your empty grocery bags, as well as your bag full of drippy, sticky, plastic bottles to be placed in the recycling bin inside the store. Third, while doing all this, you need to make sure you have your 2 franc coin so that you can retrieve a grocery cart in which to place all your bags and recylables and take them up to the grocery store in the elevator. No, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to manage all this, but apparently you have to be brighter than I am to do it while catching up with an old friend you haven't seen in 12 months.


We were chatting away while riding up the elevator, and proceeded to dump our big bag of bottles into into the large recycling bin. Usually, you have to place each individual plastic bottle through a small hole in the wall, but when they are expecting lots of customers, they make it a little easier (read: less annoying) by leaving a big bin for you to just dump your recyclables in. So we carelessly dumped and went about our shopping. Sandy and I chatted and caught up as we threw the overpriced swiss groceries into our cart without a care.


After paying for the groceries, we headed over to the customer service desk to buy garbage bags. For some God unknown reason, the garbage bags are kept hidden behind the counter like contraband and must be paid for only in cash. I promise I don't make this stuff up. Next, we stopped at the floral department for some fresh flowers because it's one of the little luxuries I splurge on to try to add a little color to our otherwise sterile white apartment. Poor Sandy has now been awake for over 24 hours but is still powering through all of our tasks with a smile on her face. Finally, we head back to the parking garage with our cart full of ridiculously expensive crap, and start loading up the car. At this point, I get the feeling that something isn't quite right. I don't know how to explain it, but I felt like something was missing. So I reached into my purse to feel for my parking ticket, and found it right where I'd left it. No problem. I'll just return my cart, pay for my parking and get Sandy and me on our way home.

This is when our pleasant shopping experience took a turn for the worse....

I reached into my purse to grab my keys. Hmmmm......they aren't in the pocket I usually put them in. Must have fallen to the bottom of my purse.... Nope, not there either. Wait, did I use them to unlock the car as we were walking towards it? That's strange, I must have left the car unlocked. But I ALWAYS lock my car. Unless of course I'm deep in conversation with a friend.....

What followed was a futile hunt through the entire car, and it's contents, for the missing keys. We searched, and re-searched, sure that we'd stumble upon them and laugh about the ridiculous place I had put them. After 15 minutes, I assure you I wasn't laughing.

Feeling like an ass, I trekked back into the store, all the while racking my brain as to where the village idiot might have placed her keys. We retraced our steps through the grocery store, checking all the bins in the produce section where we had stopped on our first pass through. I imagined how we'd laugh when we found my keys wedged between the tomatoes and the kiwi. But no dice.

I then headed towards the customer service desk where I had earlier purchased my contraband garbage bags. Knowing the woman spoke no English, I typed the word "keys" into the translation app on my iphone and waited to see the German translation to inquire about my lost keys. FYI, the German word for "KEYS", is, apparently, "KEYS". Thank God for my awesome translation app. So in my best German accent I said, "KEYS?" in a loud voice, because I'm fully convinced she will understand the English language better if I speak it really loudly. Once again, no dice.


I check out the floral department counter as we walk past it, and then suddenly I spy the recycling bins. Nooooooooo......... I'm not that ridiculously absentminded am I? But even as I'm thinking this, I know it to be true. I suddenly recall hearing a strange sound when I dumped in the plastic bottles and thinking, "Oops! Must have mixed a glass bottle in with my plastics!" But rather than look to be sure, I decided to get the hell out of the recycling area before someone comes and yells at me for an improper recycling infraction. Clearly, after 13 months, I'm still scared of the recycling police.

I sheepishly share my realization with Sandy and we start peering through the 6 foot tall plastic bag hoping to see my keys. I figured since the bag is see through, I would be able to see them and could casually rip a little hole in the side to retrieve them. Of course, that would have been too easy. The keys were nowhere to be seen. Sandy and I debate what to do as more and more people dump their empty plastic bottles into the bag that I am really praying holds my keys. Suddenly, a Coop Market employee walks up and starts wheeling away the plastic bag, and quite possibly my keys. In a panic I try to tell him with ridiculously exaggerated pantomimes of me starting my car, that I believe my keys might be in the recycling bag. He offers a lengthy response in German, making it clear he will be of no help. When I use my limited German to ask if he speaks English, he proceeds to yell something in German across the room to one of his coworkers. I don't know what he said, but I imagine it was something like, "You gotta get a load of this! This lady either really wants to play charades, or she's a freakin' moron and threw her car keys in this recycling bag!" Three of his fellow Coop Market employees came over and had a brief discussion in German. I can only imagine what they are saying to each other. One of them speaks some English and seems to understand my predicament, but doesn't seem to know how to handle this unusual situation. I'm pretty confident that this doesn't happen every day.


Finally, a pleasant older gentleman who works there, joins the small group of employees discussing the problem and proves he is the brains behind the organization. He enters a door that leads into the secret world behind the recycling wall and quickly returns with a cart and an empty six foot tall recycling bag. We play another quick round of charades so he can show me that he wants me to empty the full bag of dirty plastic bottles into the empty bag. Excellent.

I looked at Sandy who still had a smile, but now it looked a little more delirious from lack of sleep, and said in my peppiest voice, "Welcome to Switzerland!" Only I could manage to have our out of town guest sorting through garbage within 3 hours of her plane landing.

To make the situation even more mortifying, the recycling area is located right at the entrance to the store. Everyone entering and exiting the store had to walk within 10 feet of our key retrieval mission, which means that on the busiest shopping day of the week, I was spotted elbow deep in dirty plastic bottles by several hundred people. No one called my name or stopped to chat, but I'm pretty confident I wasn't someone you would want to claim to be an acquaintence of on this particular day. Fortunately, I maneuvered the 6 foot tall carts to provide a bit of a privacy wall for myself and and left poor Sandy to perform for the crowd of shoppers. No, it wasn't nice, but I figured she'd never see these people again and my reputation among townsfolk really doesnt' need any more tarnishing.


Anyway, we sorted....and sorted.....and sorted. Sandy commented on how the Swiss are quite diligent about cleaning out their bottles prior to recycling and even mentioned that one of the cleaning product containers had a "nice" smell. Remember, she hadn't slept in WELL over 24 hours at this point. About midway through our search and rescue mission, Sandy inadvertantly knocked me in the head with a bottle. At least I think it was inadvertant. Although who could really blame her if it was intentional. A few minutes later she looked at me and casually said, "This probably isn't what you want to hear right now, but there is some white stuff in your hair." She was absolutely right, that wasn't what I wanted hear and I proceeded to use my sleeve to frantically wipe at my hair like a cat on crack. I felt a little better when we realized it must have happened when she knocked me in the head with the detergent container. I may end up with a big bleached streak in my hair, but at least I wasn't wearing someone's curdled milk.

After about 15 minutes, and several hundred bottles, we were almost to the end and still hadn't spotted my keys. Dear God, if I subjected poor Sandy to this disgusting task for no reason, I will die. Really, I will just crawl into this giant bag of stinky plastic and die a pathetic death. Then suddenly with only about 50 bottles left, I spot something dark in the very bottom of the bag. Could it be!?!?!?!? I reach down and pluck my ring of keys out of the bottom of the bag and without so much as a WOOHOO!!! say to Sandy, "Let's get the hell out of here!". But as we were heading for the elevators, I quick decided it would be worth the humiliation to stop and snap Sandy's first picture of herself in Switzerland. Don't ever try to tell me I don't show my out of town visitors a good time....


Yes, just another story to add to my ridiculous adventure. At this point, all I could do was laugh at the situation and thank God I had a partner in crime to share in the experience. Oh, and it helped knowing that the next bottle I would hold in my hands, would without a doubt, be a bottle of chianti.