Sunday, September 16, 2007

September 12-14

I'll start rambling about my adventures now, starting on Wednesday. Please forgive me for spelling and grammatical errors. The spell check I'm using is for French, not English.

I fell asleep before the plane was off the ground in Omaha, and slept all the way to Dallas. I didn't have to wait too long in Dallas. I ate lunch at Popeyes. I had red beans and rice with a biscuit. The flight to Zurich was good, but I only slept for one hour. I think I was just too excited to sleep. I ate vegetarian meatloaf for dinner on the plane. Kind of a contradiction of terms. It was alright; better than I expected. It kind of tasted like a bean dip actually. The lady I sat next to was going to visit her mother in Zurich. She has lived in the US since 1966, but her mother (who is 96 years old!!) still lives in Switzerland. She was nice, but she got a migraine, and then threw up. Luckily it was in the bathroom. I felt bad for her, she was kind of miserable for most of the time.
The two people who sat in front of me were a couple from Arkansas. Sonny and Linda. Sonny owns a pick-your-own berry farm. They were going to Lausanne to visit there son (who is working here for 5 years), daughter in law, and two grandchildren. They had 3 suitcases that were all half-full of gifts and toys. I rode the train with them from Zurich to Lausanne as well. Very interesting people. Sonny was quite talkative. The sun was rising as we passed over London. It was very clear and I could see all of the city lights. The horizon was redder than I've ever seen it. It was one of the most beautiful things that I have ever seen.
I had some tea with my breakfast. It was awful. It was too strong (probably trying to cover the flavor). It looked like coffee. When I arrived in Lausanne I had to wait about an hour at the station because I ended up taking an earlier train than I told my landlord I would. Also, I was not sitting in the part of the station that she thought I would be. It was ok though, I watched people while I waited. The first person who ever talked to me in Lausanne was a strange man who came up to me while I was standing outside with my bags, and asked me in French "Am I the one you have been waiting for?" He was trying to hit on me!! Very strange indeed.
Florence, my landlord, had an appointment after she picked me up, so her son, Christophe drove me to the apartment. I like it a lot. The view is beautiful, I can see the city, the lake, and the mountains. The family is very nice and have been very helpful.My french is not terrific
yet, but they speak english. I find it much easier to understand the two sons French.
I ate lunch with Christophe, unpacked, took a shower and a nap, and then walked to a grocery store. I bought Nutella, apples, bread, cheese, pasta, band-aids, and a hair dryer. Then I went home, listened to music for a while, ate some dinner, and went to bed. I got up early Friday morning to go to campus. I took a bus and the metro (train) to get to campus. When I got on the bus I asked the driver how much it cost, because I thought that I'd have to pay on the train. I was actually supposed to buy a ticket at a machine at the bus stop. The driver told me to get off at the next stop. I thought he was kicking me off, but actually he got off with me and showed me how to use the machine. I was shocked that he did that. It was very generous. When I got back on the bus, a nice man expained to me a little better how things work.
When I got downtown, I was supposed to take the metro to campus. I walked around for almost half an hour looking for it. It's a good thing I left really early! I almost took the wrong train, it would have taken me far away from where I needed to be. At the last minute, I thought I should check upstairs at the metro stop, and sure enough, the train I needed was up there. I had orientation, but my schedule did not list a building for the first part, so I had to search around and ask a couple people where to find it. I finally found it. I made friends with a girl named Gwendolyn from Carnegie-Mellon in New York state. She's a Mechanical Engineering student as well.
I ate lunch at the campus restaurant. It was surprisingly reasonably priced. Cheaper than a cafeteria lunch at ISU. I ate pasta with vegetables. There were carrots, brussel sprouts, yellow beans, and a vegetable that I didn't know, but found out later was white asparagus. It is apparently common around here. After orientation, I walked down by the lake. It was beautiful. Very picturesque. Everything is still so surreal. I can't believe that I can look out my window and see a beautiful lake and mountains anytime I want. After walking around the lake, I took the metro downtown to by my metro-bus pass. Now I don't have to by tickets every time.
I came home and talked to Florence for a while, and made some dinner. I had some delicious
yogurt. The food here is great. It's not pumped full of hormones, fertilizers, preservatives, and pesticides, so it looks more real. Also, the milk comes in liter boxes (like a giant juice box) and doesn't have to be refrigerated until after it is opened. This is very strange to me. I like my milk ice cold, so I don't know how I feel about this.

5 comments:

Mandy said...

It's awesome that you were able to meet people on your flight. I'm always cranky when I fly, so I never interact with people.

Krista said...

hehe... i think in germany they dont have to refrigerate milk either, so when I arrived, my roommate had left hers out on the counter... i was amused.

Krista said...

also, your website just knew my name with out me having to sign in or anything... i'm confused by this. is your site psychic??

Kimberly said...

Pretty much, yes it is psychic. In other words, it is powered by google. You were probably logged into gmail, so with the powers of google combined, it knew you.

Shelly said...

Aw, I'm so happy for you, you seem to be doing so well! It's so like you, and it totally cracks me up that you fell asleep before your plane took off from Omaha!