The flight to Zurich was better than I expected. Both kids were asleep before the flight took off and slept through a large part of the flight. I cheated and gave a sedative to A- I was in two minds but two things made me decide on it. Mainly I didn't want A to keep crying and wake up S as well (and lately she had started waking up in the night and crying for a couple of hours on and off), and then I'll have two crying kids and one lap only, and also some of my friends and my husband warned me that co passengers in business may not look too kindly on having their expensive nights sleep ruined by wailing children. Looks like i was needlessly worried, business was full of infants and many co passengers stepped up to help me out when they saw me struggling- once when I had to get both sleeping children to the seats after giving the pram at the aeroplane gate..I couldn't carry both with me at the same time alongwith the hand luggage. So I left S sleeping in the pram at the gate, took A in, left her on the seat while a helpful lady watched over her and then went back picked up S and gave up the pram. Another was at baggage claim, I was able to lift the suitcases on my own from the pickup, but the silly trolley here had a belt on top so you need to lift up the suitcases and slide them into the trolley and they were far too heavy for me. Luckily a guy with a young kid saw me struggling and helped me even without me asking for it.
The hubby was waiting at the exit and S was terribly happy to see him. A was confused by all the changes and clung to me.
Overall the travel was better than I expected. My dad had come to Bombay to drop me off and that was really helpful, could not have managed without him. Really grandparents are such gems.
We stayed at the hotel for the first two days as our shipment was delayed and our bed was arriving only the next day from the shop. But we went to and fro the flat quite a few times. The first day itself we went home, boiled the milk, watched it spill over and then fretted about whether the stain would ever go from the induction heating top. I managed to make rasam rice for the kids with the pressure cooker and rice cooker I had carried with me, and was quite proud of my achievement!!! The first day being a Sunday we didn't do much, just got back to the hotel after the kids lunch, slept, I took the kids to the downstairs park while the hubby worked on a presentation for work (its so strange usually I'm the one working on the weekends while he chills out :)) and we had a nice dinner overlooking the Zurich lake.
Monday was hectic, we went early to the flat as the furniture guys and light guys were coming. They don't provide lights in the flats here, you need to buy the lights/lamp shades yourselves and get it fitted!! And people charge a bomb to fit the lights and assemble furniture - I should have taken a electric/carpentry course before coming here. The air freight also arrived on Monday which included some of the provisions (though I had smartly packed all the vessels in the shipment) and so by Tuesday we were set to move into our flat with the bare neccesities in place.
And so we slowly started settling in, and its so different here I don't know where to begin...
Firstly having to do everything yourself. In Bombay I was completely spoilt with a battery of help for the cooking, cleaning, driving, laundry, looking after the children and with the amazing home delivery there I could sit in the house the whole week/month and not have to step out for a single thing be it milk/medicine/fruits/vegetables/groceries/movies/wine. And its just absolutely the opposite here. I've already had to run to the grocery shop nearly every other day as either the milk is running out or the bread or the diapers! I need to be much more efficient here. But it is also difficult doing the grocery shopping alone with two kids and using public transport as I have to carry all the groceries back in the bus, while carrying A and making sure S gets on and off the bus safely. And then there's the two sets of staircases to climb before collapsing into the house. So its usually the bulk shopping in the weekends where either the hubby comes with the car, or else I can leave one of the kids at home and manage it a bit easier. This is still supplemented by trips to the grocery shop in between/calls to the hubby to pick up something or the other.
And other than the groceries, there is the cooking. For me even the simplest of things take time, and luckily the kids are obliging. So its the same fare for them everyday for breakfast and lunch, and dinner time I try to make something new- aloo paratha, biryani, chole puri, sambhar rice, bisibelebath and the saviour-mixes to which you only need to add vegetables! But overall its the thought that after you've gone out, done shopping/some sightseeing you still have to come home and cook and feed the children which is tiring. Especially when contrasted with food set at the table for us, and someone else to feed the children! But really I should not crib too much, the kids have been very obliging (keeping fingers crossed that they don't change as soon as I post this) so its not difficult to cook for them, and for our dinner we get a variety of pastas, sauces, frozen stuff here so if I don't want to cook a particular day if I don't want to. The bread is just amazing here, and many days I just have bread and cheese for lunch. I'm a big bread fan, and though I haven't been able to step into a bakery yet, even the large retail shops have an entire bread section where you can pick up freshly baked bread.
And then we come to the cleaning. Things do get dirty here (I was under the misguided impression that they don't)- ok not as much as Bombay, but you need to sweep/vacuum the place at least once in two days especially with two young kids who keep dropping crumbs all over the place. The weekly cleaners started yesterday, and I had signed up for four hours for the appartment which seemed quite a long time for just an appartment. But after four hours the mopping was still not done and the lady ran away like Cinderalla for her next appointment. I spent the next hour finishing off the cleaning and am pretty sure the house is going to be dirty again in a couple of weeks. Sigh...
And then the language of course. Everything is in German from the road signs to the ingredients in the shops to the signs in the park. Today i went to a new park near the house and there was a big sign outside which mentioned some restaurant and some park. There was a slide and sandpit next to a restaurant but I couldn't figure out whether the play area was only for customers of the restaurant or for everyone. I just took the kids and went since we had come all the way. Then in the shops i don't know what is half the stuff I am buying. The other i bought some frozen quiches where the cover looked vegetarian since there was some green stuffing on the cover. Before cooking I asked te hubby to check the ingredients on the iphone application for languages and it was spinach and bacon! Sigh again, at least one of us is non-veg in the house and the food wont be wasted. The hubby's solution is that i keep checking the iphone application in the shop which is what he does, but he doesn't have two children -one wriggling in the trolley and the other running around the shop searching for lolliops/snacks to tie him down. I just want to get in , buy the stuff and get out asap. And its also very difficult to ask for directions. People are quite helpful, but sometimes they just don't know English so you can get pretty stuck. And even in the large shops most of the cashiers dont speak English and are very surprised if you don't speak German, so its very tough if you have some query (we were trying to figure out home delivery in a furniture shop and had to wait for an English speaking customer to translate for us!)
On the positive side, and there are many but its so much more fun to crib, the public transport is great. There's a bus stop just outside the house and the city is extremely well connected. I can get to the city centre in 15 mins using the bus and the tram, and the frequency is also great. Its not usually crowded during the day and the kids quite enjoy going in the bus/tram/furnicular etc. The parks are also very nice- there are many open gardens for children to play and the parks are uncrowded mostly. There are so many activities for children to do here, and I've just started reading up on a couple of them. If we wanted we could do something new every weekend! The drives are also nice- we drove to Rhine Falls last weekend (will write a separate post on that) and the roads were almost empty. The hubby is enjoying his car, an SUV which I practically don't think I will every be able to drive.
But I am missing company, especially friends and family. Being able to just call up someone you've known for ages, or make a plan to meet them for an hour somewhere, or go to Bangalore for a long weekend- well those are some luxuries which seem very remote. Hopefully I should settle in, mentally and as well as physically soon.
1 comment:
wow. That is quite some transition you are going through! Very proud of all the effort you have put in so far.
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