School was full of play dough making, report writing, and general mayhem. Stuart picked the kids up after school so I could go and get the needed materials to make more play dough. I also went to get the sweeties needed for our rugby club event that was nearly two weeks away.
Once I was home, we all went to the club for rugby. Immediately after we came home and the kids went to bed. I fell asleep on the sofa and the day was a wrap.
Monday seemed to be a long day. We had more play dough making, a Year3/4 show, and some report writing. One of the students, while making play dough, ate some and consequently threw up on the table. I had to clean it up and nearly barfed myself. That was the nastiest part of the day. But, I am proud to say I finished all of my reports!
Jack had a football match after school. He blocked a goal and scored a goal. Sadly, I didn’t get his score on video, which in his mind made me an utter disappointment. How can you win with kids? I ran the kids home after his match and ran to the bank to renew my bank card. It’s a bit of a hassle since no one has an address. Everything has to be couriered or collected from the post office. So going to the bank and collecting things from the bank seems to be the least time consuming way to approach things. I went into one of the three branches that is open after 4 pm. I was in for a wait because there were three people in front of me and only on customer service person working. The person being served was finished so the next man in line got up to do to the desk. Just prior to that a lady walked in who was clearly a local lady. The customer service worker, let’s call her Puppet, said to the gentleman, ‘VIP just came in so you will need to wait’. This generally means a member of the royal family has walked in. This confused me. Why would anyone from the royal family ever need to go to the bank. I would assume the bank would come to them. But we all just sat there and waited even longer. The man didn’t. He stormed out yelling something in Arabic. I can only assume he wasn’t happy. I finally got things sorted out, but it did take longer than was necessary. Efficiency is not their strength.
Once I was home, Stuart was off to training and I sat in front of the television with the kids. I’m already on holiday mode and we still have two more weeks before the winter holiday. Jack stayed up until almost 9 to finish watching a movie. When Stuart got home we attempted to watch television, but as usual, you guessed it, sleepy, sleepy on the sofa.
School on Tuesday was hectic as we were trying to sort out what needed to be done before the following day when we would celebrate our National Day. The kids were a bit feisty, but manageable. My team was supposed to have a holiday evening at a local restaurant, but most of the team was sick and so we decided to postpone it. Instead, I went with Stuart and the kids to the club for Jack’s training. We ordered food to bring home and Cathy came over for a while.
Wednesday morning we didn’t have to be at school until 9 am. I thought I would sleep in. However, since Stuart had to be to work at the normal time, his alarm went off and I decided to go ahead and get up. I had some last minute packing to do anyway.
The kids were up just before 7. Jack did some of his homework and then I made them bread sticks for breakfast. They had it with butter and were happy little campers.
National Day celebrations require fancy dress.
The kids also got in the spirit.
Play dough was our enterprised item.
Jack was a salesman and Nic is the House Master for Ryle. The day of celebration was great. I didn’t get to enjoy the festivities in the back of the school, therefore I didn’t get pictures of the kids riding the camel or any of the dancers, but we profited 1300 dirhams for Ryle House, so that was a success.
Once we left school, we stopped to get McDonalds for lunch and then headed home. I showered and finished packing. Millie came in countless times and told me how much she was going to miss me. We all just kind of lazed around until around 5 pm when kids showered and ate dinner. Cathy showed up just before 6 pm. She had said she would stay with the kids while Stuart took me to the airport. When Cathy got there, Millie started crying. Jack hugged me but didn’t cry. I couldn’t decide what upset me most, Millie crying or Jack NOT crying.
We headed out and I arrived at the airport just as Gina’s flight landed in Abu Dhabi from Saudi. The whole checking in process was a dibacle. The lady at the check in line told me I could check in until 6 hours before my flight. Garbage! I finally got in line at 8:05 pm, knowing the line would take at least 30 minutes. My assessment of the situation was correct and I was at the counter at 8:35 pm, which was exactly 6 hours before my flight. It wasn’t 20 minutes later and I was enjoying a snack and a glass of wine in the Al Dhabi lounge with Gina. We sat and talked for a few hours then went to our gate.
The flight was uneventful. I watched three movies so didn’t sleep. Well, I may have knodddd in and out of the movies, but not quality sleep. We arrived at 7 am and then, after 10 minutes going through customs and collecting my bag, we were on a train to the center of Zurich. Easy!
We wandered around and found our hotel. We had purchased a Zurich pass, which granted us access to the tram system around town and other discounts that I’m pretty sure we won’t use. We checked into the hotel, but our room wasn’t ready. We ended up walking down to a cafe and having a coffee and a snack.
In front of the cafe.
My cappuccino.
Just a beautiful walk way between the buildings.
We then started walking around town and having a snoop for the Christmas markets.
Our view along the river.
More beautiful buildings along the river.
My usual stop at Starbucks in every country to get a Starbucks mug of the country.
None of them were open before 10 so we decided to get on a tram and ride around the city. We got a bit lost, but then I discovered the tram route was on the back of our city map, so we started to sort out where we were rather quickly. Gina finally commented that she always believes I know where I’m going because I’m so convincing. Yet she knows I have a crap sense of direction so isn’t sure why she always believes me. Stuart feels the same way!!!! I feel I’m most famous for getting lost and not really caring.
We finally got to the Christmas markets at the main train station and ended up buying a few things.
This tree was covered in Swarovski crystals. This picture does not do it justic.
We headed back to the hotel around 1 pm but our room still wasn’t ready. In fact, they didn’t have us set up in the correct room. So in the end they upgraded us to a suite of sorts. It wasn’t fancy, but there was more room for us, which was nice, and it had two bathrooms. We had a bit of a rest and got settled. Gina showered to warm up, although the weather wasn’t as cold as in Vienna last year. The wind wasn’t blowing, which is what was so brutal last year. After our rest we headed to another market just at the top of the lake. These next pictures will give you a glimpse of what we saw and what we did.
Each market has its own name. This one was Zucher Wienachtsdon.
Chestnuts roasting on an open fire! Finally!
This was a little market set up for children. It was right next to the Zurich Opera House.
From the top of the children’s market, looking at the market stalls.
The tree in the middle of the market was gorgeous as the sun was setting.
These fire pits were all around.
We sampled a few foods. This was called Rocahti. It was fried potatoes with roclette cheese melted on top. It was so incredibly rich and greasy and yummy!
Although we didn’t eat these sausages, I had to take a picture of them for Stuart.
This was a mulled wine stand made to look like a giant Swiss ornament. I’m sure it has a name but can’t seem to figure it out.
While we were in Zurich this is what Stuart and the kids were doing, separately of course.
Millie and Jack stayed with Claire, and Cathy did crafts with them, while Stuart spent the weekend in Dubai, playing for the Al Ain men’s vet team. He should have scored a try in their second match on Thursday, but he didn’t and his punishment for this was to wear this netball dress for the rest of the day. Lovely!
He seems a bit too comfy in that get up.
Friday morning we got up and lounged around the hotel for a bit. We went down for a delight, very filling breakfast around 10 am.
This view was from a bridge just across from our hotel.
Another architectural view.
The clock is attached to the church.
We were off to visit the church where Marc Chagall’s famous stained glass windows were, Fraumunster Church. On the way we found the most delightful shop. We eyeballed some things and decided we would go back later because we didn’t want to carry anything with us into the church.
We headed into the church. There was a delightful audio guide that helped us to learn more about the history of the church and the gorgeous stained glass. Gina and I so badly wanted to take a photo, but it was strictly prohibited. We are rule followers, but on this particular day I really wanted to break the rules. Just google search it and you will understand.
When we came outside of the church it was drizzling. It wasn’t anything we couldn’t handle. We had brought umbrellas, but we decided they were more trouble than they were worth. We carried on and tried to find another market, which ended up being on the other side of the river. We decided to go back to the first shop we visited and buy the items we wanted, then we would carry on back across the river. We visited a little souvenir shop before going to the markets. That souvenir shop was run by some Chinese people and it had your typical tat that was from Switzerland. Anyway, it’s the place you buy your kids something because they love cheap crap. Sadly, my kids got nothing from there.
We went to the old town markets, but didn’t find anything other than food. We were going to stop for lunch, but the place where we stopped let us know they were closed. So we decided to go to Delish, the little cafe connected to our hotel. It was only about $10 for each of us to eat, which was fine by us.
We then went up to the room for a bit of a rest. I decided to video chat with Millie to make sure she was okay with Claire since Jack had gone for a sleepover at Adam’s. When we spoke, she seemed totally normal, which made me feel better.
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