Life as an expat : lesson 1

Never get too comfortable

And here i thought my routine is finally settled after a full year here. S has a best friend at school. I'm good friends with her mom. We're like minded, stay close to each other (maybe car pooling next year!) and the kids spend at least 2-3 days every week together. And we moms get to do our nights out/shoppping/watching movies etc. And now they have to go and move in July.

Then my book club. I didn't know any of the people there. And they all live so far away- average 20 kms away. Finally plucked up the courage to drive there, coordinated with the hubby that he is not travelling on the days of the book club. Studiously read all the books. Even managed an afternoon meeting with S over at above friend's place and A sleeping in the pram. And now looks like its on the verge of being disbanded since 5 of the 9 moms are moving abroad!!

And keeping fingers crossed for my driving test on July 9th. Things look bad if i were to fail. S school and A's playgroup are not well connected by public transport and it would take 3 times the time to manage the current schedule we have. Am giving the car for repair on Monday and will be car less on Monday and Tuesday and already fretting. On Monday we have S ballet class after which we pick up A from playgroup. It's not possible to manage that without the car so I have to request a change in the ballet class timings to a later class and request to pick up A earlier. Then walk 1.6 km with both kids from A's school and take a train to reach the ballet class. As against 10 mins of drive time. Sigh i think we'll stop all activities and hibernate at home if i fail. Why do they have different driving standards in every country. They should give a reprieve to expats.

And finally the language. Now its been nearly 9 months of German classes, twice a week. So when i went to my neighbour's house for tea i very confidently started the conversation in German thinking i was well prepared. And she was very impressed that i'm making the effort and continued the whole evening in german. I could figure out every other word and nodded politely and tried to respond in coherent sentences which i hoped were not too tangential from what she'd just said!

Lesson learnt. Be on your toes always..

Road trip : Chamonix Mont Blanc and back home

The third and final leg of our road trip was Chamonix Mont Blanc. The hubby figured it was some halfway between Barcelona and Zurich and we would have anyway wanted to go and see Mont Blanc  at some point so we thought we might as well do it in this trip.

The drive

But it turned out to be quite the anticlimax to what was a wonderful holiday. Firstly it was snowing and it felt really funny to drive from sandy beaches to foggy snowy mountains in one day. Secondly we were ill prepared for the snow as we didn't have our ski jackets- i thought it was a beach holiday! The only person who had got their ski jacket along was S and she lost it in Nice. Then it was too foggy for us to actually get a decent view of Mont Blanc. And finally they told us A was too young to take the cable car to the top of Monta Blanc and we should come back when she's 4. So we cut short our trip by one day and spend only one night at Chamonix and drove back to Zurich the next day.

Our best view of Mont Blanc!

The highlights of Chamonix for me were- its a beautiful town and on a bright sunny day the view would be just awesome. The drive was beautiful and the scenery at every curve breathtaking. The food was the best i had on the trip. The veg food that is. The hotel made a mean pasta and the cafe where we had our breakfast had an awesome vegetable pannini.

On our drive back we stopped at a restaurant near Gruyere. Yummy fondue for lunch and the kids played in a park overlooking a lake. There was a collection of cow statues at the restaurant- each sponsored by some company. Pretty interesting.

The Nestle cow- the Cailler factory was nearby

And finally when we reached back home there was a rainbow waiting for us. Home sweet home!

Road trip 2: Barcelona

The second leg of our road trip was Barcelona. The drive from Nice to Barcelona was a looong one. The driving distance was about 700 km and it took us well over 9 hours because of the lunch/coffee breaks and some detours through country roads .
The country roads were beautiful though- we drove through the vineyards near Nimmes and every other km or so we would see a big vineyard and a castle/ chateau.
The girls were much better than i expected on the road trip. We were in two minds whether to buy DVDs for the backseat so that they could watch a movie or something if they are going to be cooped up in the car for such a long time. We decided against it because they would then ask for a movie every road trip we make- even if its a one hour one. The IPad and I Phone helped quite a bit, and they both got so addicted to it that i had to ban it at home for 2 weeks on our return!


I loved Barcelona. I found it really vibrant and beautiful. Full of people, full of energy, so many things going on and so many beautiful things to see.


The first day in the city we started off at the Picasso musuem -  Museu Picasso. The musuem has one of the most extensive collections of artworks by  Picasso. It was Picasso's wish that an exclusive museum dedicated to his works be set up in Barcelone where he spent his youth and which shaped his art career to a large extent. But I was disappointed not to find any of his Cubism paintings, and would recommend a visit only to major Picasso enthusiasts. We did manage to buy some nice wine glasses with artwork on them from a shop next to the museum though! The musuem is in the centre of the city and we walked through the city after. 


We started with the bakery next door and feasted on the Churros. (A churro, sometimes referred to as a Spanish doughnut, is a fried-dough pastry snack. They are  eaten for breakfast dipped in hot chocolate or café con leche.)

Doesn't it look yum! Tasted absolutely yummy as well. S and I were quickly addicted to them. After trying them at the bakery we found that the morning buffet at our hotel also had Churros so it was mainly that for the next three mornings!

After a leisurely tapas lunch we headed out for a stroll on the Ramblas, which is a pedestrian shopping road in the middle of the city. Many artists drawing portraits, caricatures, selling paintings etc. Road side performances, people dressed up as statues, lots of things to gawk at and a nice leisurely walk. 

Next the aquarium which was excelllent. The attraction was a 180 degree view of the fish. You stand on a level escalator and that takes you literally through the fish tank. There are fish on both sides and on top. We'd seen it in Singapore as well but this was much longer and the first time S was seeing it and she found it totally captivating. We could see the underside of the sharks,  sharks swimming right next to us. There was also a tank where you could stroke the sting rays and a tunnel to go inside the tank so you could see them swimming up close. Many children interactive activities in the aquarium and one could easily spend half the day there. 

At the port near the aquarim

Our reflection on the top mirror at the entrance to the aquarium

I want to touch the fish..

Somehow we were not tired after all these activities so we headed out to the Fontana Magica which is the musical lit fountains in Barcelona. Beautiful though we ended up catching only the end of it


The next day we spent at the hotel beach. We  were again lucky with our hotel as the view from the balcony was amazing. It overlooked a water body - the hotel wing was built around the water body which then stretched out to the sea. After a leisurely breakfast we set out to the beach, sand toys in hand. It was too chilly for me and A in the water but S and the hubby got in. A was busy with her sand toys and then S was busy picking up sea shells. It got too hot for us by afternoon so we managed a quick siesta and then headed back to the beach again in the evening. We went to a seaside tapas place on the beach for dinner. There were many seafood delights for the hubby but only potato and fried chillies for me !

On the third day we were back in Barcelona. We were unlucky at the Park Guell which has the interesting structures by Gaudi (http://www.barcelona-tourist-guide.com/en/gaudi/park-guell.html). The park was overcrowded as the Easter crowd had picked up and we didnt get any parking. So the hubby and i took turns to go and have a quick look around. Interesting stuff, would have been fun with the kids. We then headed to the city centre and S insisted on going on the Disney carnival set up there. She went on the carousel, the fast merry go round with cars (A was not so thrilled) and the bouncy castle and was most reluctant to leave.

Lunch was again tapas and i was ready to throw my hat in- only potatoes and chillies for the vegetarians and i was even willing to have the bland spaghetti and tomato sauce popular in Switzerland. In the afternoon we drove to Montjuic mountain where there's a lovely fort with an amazing view of Barcelona city. The kids were asleep in the car so again the hubby and i took turns to go into the fort.

The carousel where S was sprayed with glitter on the top!

View of Barcelona from Montjuic mountain

 S unfortunately woke up with a earache so we spent the evening walking around Ramblas looking for a hospital (the pharmacy would not prescribe any drugs without a doctor's prescription and unfortunately the directions they gave for the hospita were wrong so we spend quite some time walking up and down looking for a hospital!) When we got back to the hotel we went to the ayurvedic doctor there who looked at her ear and said there was no problem that some warm food and a good sleep would not cure. And it did, so next day we were fit to be off on the final leg of our journey to Charmonix, Mont Blanc.

Such elaborate planning for a simple dinner

So finally we hosted our first proper dinner party last night. We've had people over before but it was really informal and  basically we would just feed them what we were eating or make dosas which are a big hit! The Diwali party last years was a potluck and my contribution was curd rice so that doesn't count.

So the entire morning went in cleaning the house. It didn't help that it coincided with the shifting of S bed and toys into her bedroom and shifting of the study table and book case into the dining room. Much lugging and pushing and carrying of books and toys and backbreaking work spilling over most of the day.
And the food planning was quite exhaustive for me. I've always relied on my cook, or else ordered from outside so planning starters and main course, including stuff for children was quite a challenge.

So the menu turned out as follows
Starters: Vegetable puffs, Egg puffs (yes i made these myself. But it's not a big deal, you get the puff dough here so you just need to roll it out, make the inside stuffing, fold it and bung it into the oven).
Main course: Chicken biryani (made by the hubby), Bhindi raita to go with the chicken biryani, Vegetarian lasagne, and Bisibelebath
Desserts: No energy for this so it was just plain simple ice cream. That's the one good thing about Zurich, the ice creams are so good here you can never go wrong with them. Actually the cakes and ice creams have to be good here, none of the other food is!

The party was fun and it didn't turn out to be that tiring. The kids enjoyed playing together,  and kept running around the house and when it was getting late and they were getting cranky it was the I Pad to the rescue. It was so funny hearing their conversation. They are discussing what games they have on their IPad and they are 4 years old. Its like, I have this on my IPad and I have this on mine. Firstly it's not their I Pad! and secondly when i was growing up it was more like my pencil is sharper than yours or my pencil box has a shiny sticker. These kids these days...

All grown up

My little baby is growing up. And it feels so fast. First it was the playdates without me. Earlier when we were at her friend's place and I had to go and pick A up from her school then S would insist on coming along with me. Now she happily asks to stay with her friend. The other day i had to go for a couple of hours to my book club meeting in the middle of the day and we were in the park with her friend and she said she didn't want to come with me and that i could pick her up from her friend's house after.
And then the afternoon naps. They are more or less gone. During the week there's no time for them and sometimes if I'm lazy in the weekend I get her to take a small nap as well. But it's mostly off to sleep at 8:30 -9 pm at night, straight till 7 in the morning.
And now she's finally asked for her own room. Her two good friends have their own room and when she saw it in their house she also starting ask for her own room. So finally over the weekend we moved her car bed out of our room and into the study. shifted the study stuff to the dining room and brought the toys to her bedroom so now she has her own room where she sleeps. And fingers crossed she's started going to sleep by herself in her room and is very excited about it. She comes to our room in the morning, but that's fine for now. I thought she would intially get upset about A continuting to sleep with us but she's cool about it.
Sigh how quickly time goes by...from August she'll be in school from 8:30 to 3:15 everyday. I still have A for company though...:)