Winter Resorts Full With Travelers

With a portrait like this from Grindelwald during the winter festival of 2005, who wouldn't want to hit the slopes of Switzerland.

Switzerland is reporting a better than expected season thus far for the winter resorts. With a hefty reported snow fall in Switzerland, resort managers say great snow conditions and an improved economy have contributed to bringing tourists back on the slopes. Many of the ski resorts were operating at or near capacity over the new years holiday. Of course, the man made stuff has helped the ski hills too.

The good news is some of the resorts in the Bernese Oberland which have really had bad years previously have reported the best snowfall in nearly a decade. Resorts including Grindelwald, Gstaad, Wengen and Adelboden say they were nearly all booked out. Adelboden will host the World Ski Cup this weekend actually, so I'm sure there won't be a lack of people.

I've been to Gstaad and one reason why we did not stay there was because of the lack of snow at the time. Gstaad reported to have a quarter more skiers tackling the slopes and 58 of its 62 slopes open.

This certainly must be great news for many skiers and snowboarders. I just wish that good fortune happened while I was there and wanting to hit the slopes. Oh well, there's still the future to look forward to.

School in Switzerland

One of the most fascinating things for me while I was living in Switzerland was learning about how kids go about school each day. There was a great article in Swiss Info today which reminded me of some of the differences in a Swiss School. Here are some of the differences I've noticed.

Swiss school hours are still quite odd for my standards. Kids walk home for lunch. However, Bern is the first city to begin daycare during school hours. Can you believe this is a first for them? Growing up in the US, it's a bit odd, but since I lived in Switzerland I realized this was part of every day life.

Kids take off their shoes while in school and trade them in for slippers. This is one concept I'd love to see everyone do because it sure would cut down more on dirt and clutter. From what I've seen here in Canada, the places to put your backpacks and coats are the same as in Switzerland.

Kids in Switzerland and France for that matter usually go to school on the year round calendar. It makes for easier vacations and less time out of school. It's something I think all schools should follow because it forces kids to be ready for school all the time.

So the biggest change that is happening in Switzerland is that kids are starting to have more supervised after school care. It means that more parents are probably working today compared to years in the past. Many Swiss schools are large and quite recognizable buildings such as the one in the photo above. If I'm not mistaken, most kids might still be on break. But I guess we will just have to wait and see on this one.

What 2006 Brings

I'm not one for making new years resolutions nor is P but I certainly can look ahead for what the future will hold for us this year. Of course I've had a lot of life changing things happen in this past month because we are married now.

Since we are married, we are finally going to be living closer to each other, more like in the same apartment. Finally! It's been a hard time basically living in another city during the week and only seeing P on the weekends. So by the end of the month, we will finally have our own apartment together. I should be able to surprise P a few nights by making him dinner but that all depends when I get off work which is later than him.

We also will be sending in the Permanent Residence application for Canada. I started the process back in October by sending out my finger prints to the respected countries. There's still a tie up with two of these countries, so let's hope this get back to me soon. I'll be applying for a work permit which doesn't have limitations attached to it. I'll have freedoms which I haven't had since 2001.

It's been a long time since I've actually felt like any other person from the country I was living in. I hope for this dream to come true by the end of summer. I'll be free to live where I want and be part of a community. It's what I've dreamt of doing since I left the US in 2001. So there will be a lot of busy times in the next month or so, but it's all a welcomed change for what is ahead for the future. I know some of you will have big changes as well in your future and I can't wait to read about them as they unfold.

Berchtold's Day

Tomorrow is Berchtold's Day which occurs on January 2. The day honors Duke Berchtold V, who founded Bern, the capitol of Switzerland, in the twelfth-century. According to legend, he left on a hunt declaring he would name the city for the first animal he killed, which was a bear, or Bern in German. I'm glad I looked this one up because I had no idea what the day off was really for. I'm just happy I get it off too.

Happy New Year

As I turned on the comfort tube this morning, all I hear about is the year in review in a bit of a sarcastic way. I'm not sure why everyone seems to like to portray the recent year this way but it seems, the internet is another mode of sarcasm as well.

Here in North America, you can experience anything from a recap of the year through cartoon humor or wondering why they don't really announce to many new born baby stories any more. At least one thing is for certain, there were a lot of people today that woke up a lot later than the previous day.

I think the most exciting thing for me is that I know I'm off from work tomorrow. :)


Happy New Year! Hope your year is full of happy times and an exciting future.