In Which I Envision My Career as a Swiss Diplomat and Get Covered in Confetti

Last week the University of Fribourg hosted a career information thing that the third-year students from my school and the other two collèges in Fribourg were required to attend. I have the feeling I didn't have to go, but I thought it could be interesting so I went anyways. Approximately half of this ended up being at all useful to me, and the other half described the process of studying certain topics at the university level in Switzerland. I came away with a few possible career paths laid out in front of me: graphic design, pharmacy, chemistry, medicine, and, of course, Swiss diplomacy. As it turns out, though, I would actually have to be Swiss to become a Swiss diplomat, and I don't see that happening anytime soon. So maybe I'll have to see what the U.S. is offering.

This week I have a vacation from school, and the main two goals of this week off are celebrating Carnaval and skiing. I haven't been skiing yet, mostly because of the weather and the fact that I love to sleep in when I can, but I did go yesterday to Plaffeien with my host family for a Carnaval celebration. From this experience, I have concluded that, contrary to popular belief, the main purpose of Carnaval is to cover the ugly layer of slush in the streets with a colorful layer of confetti.

This was the first band of the parade. Also the scariest. Just look at those masks! No matter how many times I told myself there were real people underneath, I couldn't help but be filled with a feeling of dread as they approached and a feeling of relief as they turned off towards the left (my left, their right).

The Simpsons! Just another example of American cultural imperialism. (Thanks, Yoda!) Actually, speaking of Yoda, I just got a new history teacher that looks and talks and gestures just like her. But we won't get into that right now. I really love the Simpsons, though, even though I didn't really discover them until I started watching the show on Hulu, which happens not to work overseas. Curses!

My favorite part of the parade: the walking wind farm! Yay for alternative energy! And though some might describe wind farms as "ugly," I, on the contrary, find them an interesting aesthetic addition to the landscape. And without them, who knows what might happen to that landscape? Again, we won't get into that right now.

The man on the left just threw some confetti at the crowd. After the ground is already covered in it, some people walk around with bags of extra confetti and throw it at people that are looking too clean. Or something like that.

I just really liked this guy's costume. It looks like he put a lot of effort and time into it, and the result is pretty neat.

On the other hand, I wasn't so enthralled with these costumes. Smoking is prevalent here, and I don't think the existence of Marlboro Kid is doing much to stop the cycle. Seriously, it's going to take me a while once I get home to recover from all the secondhand smoke I've been forced to inhale this year.

Confetti! On the left, it's a garbage truck specially outfitted to spray confetti all over everything! On the right, a side view of the truck, complete with Swiss flag and MORE CONFETTI!!!

And here is a short 30-second video of what happened after the parade, namely the Monsterkonzert, in which all the bands that played in the parade combined into one giant band and made lots of noise while the people jumped up and down to try and keep from getting frostbite. (It was a bit chilly.) If you listen carefully, you can hear the leader count to four in Swiss German at around seven seconds in. Warning: it's a bit loud.

A Choral Concert and a Bit of Fasnacht Magic

On Thursday I played the violin in my school's orchestra (supplemented with several hired professionals) in a concert combined with the school's choir. It's the orchestra's first year of existence, so we only have about ten members. The concert consisted of Mozart's piano concerto No. 12 in A Major (K 414) and Vivaldi's Gloria. I always enjoy playing an orchestra part in choral works; it's such a rich sound. And the soloist, a music teacher at my school who also directs the orchestra when he's not playing the solo in a piano concerto, was superb. And with the extra people we hired to play in the orchestra, it was an international event. There were two Hungarians, a Costa Rican (either that or a Puerto Rican, I can't remember which one he said), an American (me), plus quite a few Swiss. The Hungarians and the Costa / Puerto Rican couldn't speak German or French so they went with English, which I am assuming is a second language for them as well as for the Swiss members of the orchestra. I particularly enjoyed the conductor's attempts at giving measure numbers in English during rehearsals. So that was a really fun event. The only downside, really, was that the church we performed in was freezing. Apparently all European Catholic churches are cold in the winter, though, because they have such high ceilings and are basically just built with stone. So it's a really large space to heat and the two radiators at the front didn't quite cover it. As much as I enjoyed playing the concert, I was glad to get home at the end and warm myself up by putting on a few more layers of clothing and sitting on the floor in front of the radiator with a cat on my lap.

Then on Friday I had a rehearsal in Murten. And on the way to my rehearsal, I kept seeing strangely out-of-the-ordinary things. While I was waiting for the bus, a girl came down the sidewalk walking a horse and a smaller pony (Shetland?) and then turned with them down the steep icy hill I usually go down to get home after I get off the bus. Then when I got on the bus, I saw the biggest backpack I have ever seen in my life. I tried to estimate how many fully-inflated soccer balls would fit in it and I think I decided more than 20. I think I could fit in that backpack, probably along with a couple of little kids. Then I got to Fribourg and went to wait for my train, and when the train arrived and the people were coming out, I saw a man dressed in a feathery neon pink full-body costume. I thought that was weird, but then I realized it was actually normal for this particular time of year; it must have been a Fasnacht costume. (Fasnacht is German for Mardi Gras.) My suspicions were confirmed when I got back later at night and the floor of the train station was covered in blue confetti. So I have decided that these crazy things I saw were probably the results of a little Fasnacht magic.

Oh, sorry I have no pictures, but my memory card was full because of some viola audition videos I had to record to send to Italy. I'm applying for a chamber music camp in Cremona this summer and I have to send the DVD this week. Wish me luck!

I'm going to miss this domesticated zoo.

I'm changing host families next week, as per Rotary rules. We exchange students are supposed to live with three different families during the year. I think the idea behind this is to present us with a few different portraits of family life. It's especially true here around the bilingual city of Fribourg, because there are some important cultural differences between French-speaking and German-speaking Switzerland. My first host family lives in Zumholz, a tiny town featuring a few blocks of houses, a gas station, a restaurant, a car repair shop, and an astounding view of the pre-Alps. When the weather is warm enough, there are cows to be seen as well as smelled. Here the elevation is higher than in the city so there is usually more snow. And of course they speak German.

My next host family lives in Épendes, a town about half as far away from Fribourg as Zumholz is. This will, in theory, allow me to sleep quite a bit later in the mornings by reducing my morning commute from 40 minutes to about 15. I am excited for this. The new family speaks French instead of German, has two boys instead of two girls, and has no animals that I am aware of.

The experience of living with my first host family here in Zumholz has been a chance to see what it's like to have pets. Growing up, my pet ownership only extended to fish and Sea Monkeys, which are just glorified brine shrimp. I always wanted a furry friend, but we never had one, for various reasons including allergies. So living here with three cats and a dog has been a lot of fun for me, and I'm really going to miss it when I move.

I'm going to have to guess how all the animals' names are spelled, because, well, I've never seen them written out. On the left is our dog, Daka, slipping around on the ice outside the side door. On the right, me and Wiki (pronounced like Vicky but spelled phonetically and therefore cooler), the cat who has attached herself to me and my room and my bed. She is often sleeping on my bed when I come home from school and then she will come sit on my lap and keep me company and keep me warm. I never let her stay in my room at night, though, because if I did she would climb on me while I'm sleeping and wake me up. Instead I kick her out of the room before I go to sleep (not literally, of course) and block the otherwise easily-opened=by-a-cat door with my heavy violin case, but even so she sometimes wakes me up at night with wailing and scratching. Despite this, it has been nice to have a warm fuzzy companion, especially in the winter. The other two cats are Félix (not pictured here) and Speedy (whom I have never successfully photographed).

So that's the domesticated zoo that I will so miss when I move next week. Oh, and I might miss the people here as well.

Wow.

Wow! It's been a really long time since I last posted. I guess I'm just getting used to living here or something and forget that I have to share my adventures with my loyal readers. I hope my sporadic posting habits aren't throwing you guys off.

What I have been doing a lot of recently is skiing. One of the coolest things about Switzerland is that there are so many different ski areas within a morning's train ride from where I live. There is even one that's only twenty minutes away by car, although it is pretty small. This first picture is from the second time I went skiing here. I met two other exchange students and we went to a ski area called Crans-Montana. It was Katelyn's first time on skis (she's from Arkansas), and Katie and I tried to teach her. Katie was really the one teaching, actually. I just tried to give helpful suggestions, because I'm not actually that great at skiing. My host uncle gave me his old skis and boots (we have the same shoe size!) and I was thrilled to discover that the color of the boots matches my coat.

This second picture was taken at Grimentz, which is where I went last week for the winter sport days with my school. Skiing isn't the only option for winter sports: I could have also done self defense, dance, hiking, or any number of other choices. But I was lucky and my host Rotary club agreed to pay for me to go to one of the ski camps. All the students that choose to ski are split up between four different ski areas. My group went to Grimentz. It was an interesting combination of lots of people I didn't know and one person I did: Katelyn, another exchange student at my school. Needless to say, we probably spoke more English in those three days than we should have.

I also got a chance to speak German with some other people from my school, though, which was nice. Most of the people I know at school are French-speakers, but all the other girls on this trip were in the German section. It was a good opportunity to make some friends on the other side of the school and I found it really enjoyable to meet everybody over the course of the three days. Since Katelyn and I were the least experienced skiers (which stands to reason, since most Swiss start learning how to ski around the age of three or so), we were carefully watched over and instructed. It was nice to get some tips and instruction from people my own age. And I think that I received this instruction in all three of my languages at some point. It was a really neat experience to ski in the Swiss Alps with Swiss friends.

Oh, and we ate fondue for lunch on the last day. Jealous?