Monday, September 29, 2003
Munich, Germany
Goodbye, Europe!
So, it's Munich to the Big Apple. And that's another big notch closer to the Rocky's... Denver that is. My flight to NYC has been airborn for a little over 4 hours now... HALF WAY TO THE USA! ... I just wish I were on it.
Hello, Europe... *sigh*
Half an hour before my flight was scheduled to depart, I was happily strolling out of the amazing Deutches Museum downtown. It was just before 3:00pm that I decided to consult my tickets again while waiting for the number 18 tram that would unite me with my big backpack waiting patiently in a locker at the central train station. "Hmmmm..." I thought, "I'm pretty sure that the '15.35' in the 'departure time' section means 3:35pm, not 5:35pm." I sat on the tram for a few minutes and mulled this over. The conclusion was invariably the same: 15 minus 12 is 3.
I tested this theory a few more times until I reached central station where I promply purchased an international calling card. The lockered bag and express train to the airport moved a few notches down the to-do list.
My friend John-Paul, who is hosting the NYC leg of my "'Round the World Adventure," was very understanding. This is most likely because I described this incident more like "bad airline, bad!", and less like "stupid Andy, stupid!"
The nice lady at the Lufthansa help line explained that "vith a vround the verld teeket, you cun just change veeth a deefernt flight." However, there were no other flights that evening, none the next morning, the same flight the following afternoon was fully booked, etc. We settled on a just-in-the-nick-of-time middle-seat confirmation for the flight 48 hours from then, coupled with a are-you-joking spot on the waiting list for a flight the next day. After an uncomfortable pause where she or I should have ended the call, she said, "...oh... thees is a sad thing for you I think, yes?"
Was it possible that she knew I had arrived earlier that morning from a 14 hour train ride because I couldn't change my ticket to leave from Copenhagen? Could she tell that I am quite frightend by the crazed Oktoberfest women running around Munich in beer stained leiderhossen? Somehow she could sense that I had not considered seeing Munich as much more than a pre-NYC cappucino and croissant.
Those things may be true, but is it really a "sad thing?" Naw. All sorts of options (but New York) are now available. After 8 months of this travel game I'm getting pretty resourceful and am excited when something unplanned comes along. In this case, 48 new European hours.
After the phone card's credits ended my calls for me, I knew exactly where to spend that first hour: the central station Burger King. The last time I ate anything substantial was just before leaving Copenhagen (knowing that I'd get all the free "food" I wanted on my flight to the USA). Being as I had 36 cents in my pocket, I went to the cash machine and treated myself to 60 Euros, more than enough for two days. Now some large fries, coke, and a whopper (without catsup) were in my future. Things were working out just fine. Being as I was eating in the huge lobby of Munich's central train station I checked the rather ancient looking departure board. You see, because of some special supper-traveller skills (read: blind luck + lazy ticket-checkers) I am left with two extra days on my Eurail Travel Pass. Why not use them?
I've always wanted to see Berlin. Oops, the train just left. The frinedly conductor guy who shoved them off said that the next one to the Capital would be in 6 hours, and after hearing about my situation, added that "Berlin is not worth the trouble." Hmmmm. Ok.
A train to Stuttgart was leaving in 20 minutes. I met a fun kid who lives there, but that was like a month ago. I called him. Ulrich was studying all week but could plan something fun for the weekend. Just as I finished explaining why that wasn't really possible, the new phone card ended our call. Then I noticed the train had left track 11 anyway.
Ok, Vienna? The departures board kept spinning up new destinations (making a cool whirring and slapping sound) but it didn't go much more than an hour into the future. The tile-based 1960s departures flip chart was neat, but I decided that I needed something more comprehensive.
I went to get a full listing of departures from the info desk around the corner. The information agent quoted the times robotically, "Ween [Vienna], at 1725 to arrive at 2205 or the overnight vagon at 2344 to arrive at 600 veeth a supplementary cost if you choose a sleeping shelf in a couchette or full cabin veeth a bed." I swear she didn't look at the computer screen once. Had she been here long enough to memorize Munich's train timetables to the minute? Personally, I prefer the cooky Oktoberfestians.
Luckily, I got some etherial advice. The voice of Suzie O'Connor (the "trendy little lady from Longueville" as she's known) popped into my brain. In the image she was cradling her coffee cup and smiling while explaining why Prague is the best place on the planet (apart from the Sydney harbour area of course).
Snapped back into reality (infront of an even more perturbed she-bot) by the dramatic shuffling of the overly time-sensitive German school kid behind me. I defended my rightful place in line, I was ready now.
As promissed, within two minutes the transaction was finished. In only a few hours, courtesy of the Czeck Republic, I'll get somthing I haven't got in a long time: another stamp in my passport. Exciting. :)
Goodbye, Europe!
So, it's Munich to the Big Apple. And that's another big notch closer to the Rocky's... Denver that is. My flight to NYC has been airborn for a little over 4 hours now... HALF WAY TO THE USA! ... I just wish I were on it.
Hello, Europe... *sigh*
Half an hour before my flight was scheduled to depart, I was happily strolling out of the amazing Deutches Museum downtown. It was just before 3:00pm that I decided to consult my tickets again while waiting for the number 18 tram that would unite me with my big backpack waiting patiently in a locker at the central train station. "Hmmmm..." I thought, "I'm pretty sure that the '15.35' in the 'departure time' section means 3:35pm, not 5:35pm." I sat on the tram for a few minutes and mulled this over. The conclusion was invariably the same: 15 minus 12 is 3.
I tested this theory a few more times until I reached central station where I promply purchased an international calling card. The lockered bag and express train to the airport moved a few notches down the to-do list.
My friend John-Paul, who is hosting the NYC leg of my "'Round the World Adventure," was very understanding. This is most likely because I described this incident more like "bad airline, bad!", and less like "stupid Andy, stupid!"
The nice lady at the Lufthansa help line explained that "vith a vround the verld teeket, you cun just change veeth a deefernt flight." However, there were no other flights that evening, none the next morning, the same flight the following afternoon was fully booked, etc. We settled on a just-in-the-nick-of-time middle-seat confirmation for the flight 48 hours from then, coupled with a are-you-joking spot on the waiting list for a flight the next day. After an uncomfortable pause where she or I should have ended the call, she said, "...oh... thees is a sad thing for you I think, yes?"
Was it possible that she knew I had arrived earlier that morning from a 14 hour train ride because I couldn't change my ticket to leave from Copenhagen? Could she tell that I am quite frightend by the crazed Oktoberfest women running around Munich in beer stained leiderhossen? Somehow she could sense that I had not considered seeing Munich as much more than a pre-NYC cappucino and croissant.
Those things may be true, but is it really a "sad thing?" Naw. All sorts of options (but New York) are now available. After 8 months of this travel game I'm getting pretty resourceful and am excited when something unplanned comes along. In this case, 48 new European hours.
After the phone card's credits ended my calls for me, I knew exactly where to spend that first hour: the central station Burger King. The last time I ate anything substantial was just before leaving Copenhagen (knowing that I'd get all the free "food" I wanted on my flight to the USA). Being as I had 36 cents in my pocket, I went to the cash machine and treated myself to 60 Euros, more than enough for two days. Now some large fries, coke, and a whopper (without catsup) were in my future. Things were working out just fine. Being as I was eating in the huge lobby of Munich's central train station I checked the rather ancient looking departure board. You see, because of some special supper-traveller skills (read: blind luck + lazy ticket-checkers) I am left with two extra days on my Eurail Travel Pass. Why not use them?
I've always wanted to see Berlin. Oops, the train just left. The frinedly conductor guy who shoved them off said that the next one to the Capital would be in 6 hours, and after hearing about my situation, added that "Berlin is not worth the trouble." Hmmmm. Ok.
A train to Stuttgart was leaving in 20 minutes. I met a fun kid who lives there, but that was like a month ago. I called him. Ulrich was studying all week but could plan something fun for the weekend. Just as I finished explaining why that wasn't really possible, the new phone card ended our call. Then I noticed the train had left track 11 anyway.
Ok, Vienna? The departures board kept spinning up new destinations (making a cool whirring and slapping sound) but it didn't go much more than an hour into the future. The tile-based 1960s departures flip chart was neat, but I decided that I needed something more comprehensive.
I went to get a full listing of departures from the info desk around the corner. The information agent quoted the times robotically, "Ween [Vienna], at 1725 to arrive at 2205 or the overnight vagon at 2344 to arrive at 600 veeth a supplementary cost if you choose a sleeping shelf in a couchette or full cabin veeth a bed." I swear she didn't look at the computer screen once. Had she been here long enough to memorize Munich's train timetables to the minute? Personally, I prefer the cooky Oktoberfestians.
Luckily, I got some etherial advice. The voice of Suzie O'Connor (the "trendy little lady from Longueville" as she's known) popped into my brain. In the image she was cradling her coffee cup and smiling while explaining why Prague is the best place on the planet (apart from the Sydney harbour area of course).
Snapped back into reality (infront of an even more perturbed she-bot) by the dramatic shuffling of the overly time-sensitive German school kid behind me. I defended my rightful place in line, I was ready now.
As promissed, within two minutes the transaction was finished. In only a few hours, courtesy of the Czeck Republic, I'll get somthing I haven't got in a long time: another stamp in my passport. Exciting. :)
Wednesday, September 24, 2003
Camera' Busted: Not Fixed
...my camera is busted and I haven't got it fixed yet. That's it really.
...my camera is busted and I haven't got it fixed yet. That's it really.
Monday, September 22, 2003
Normandie
21/September/2003
Jerome grew up in Normandy, in the north of France. He invited me to go with him this weekend to visit his sister and nephew in Caen and then we could go to the beaches where the Allied troops landed on D-Day, which were only a few minutes away from Caen.
It was awesome. A vintage US tank in the square of each tiny village, each person with their own story about the the liberation on June 6th, 1944. Jerome's father vivdly remebers a US soldier giving him a piece of gum while his division swooped through their coastal village.
We spent quite a bit of time on Omaha Beach where the US Cemetary is. This is a special niche of solemness in an otherwise pretty hectic tourist area.
I also went to Honfluer, a small coastal village that I visited when I was 5 years old. I even recognized the restaurants and shops surrounding the square quay in the center of town from photos in my childhood album.
It was quite lqte when we started to head back to Paris and we weren't exactly sure how to get to the highway the fastest, so Jerome asked a man and his wife walking to their car to clarify it for us. In what Jerome described as a "strange Italian accent" the man told us to "forget everything you've been told" and to simply follow him. Ok, so we did. After we turned the opposite direction of three or four signs indicating the way to Paris we flashed the highbeams at the car in front of us to make sure he knew we actually were intending to go to Paris tonight.
After pulling over, he looked at Jerome and explained that the highways were a mess with traffic (which he says we could have also noticed if we were looking over the bridges we were crossing) and this way would be faster in the long run. "But, this time," he stressed, "follow faster, ok?!" Ok, so we followed... faster. It wasn't exactly easy keeping up with the new Mercedes while we pushed this older Renault to its limit, but we managed. We were flying through the countryside. Huge fields of crops glowing in the moonlight with whisps of fog rolling around the hillsides. We had to dodge only one rabbit who never moved, even after nearly took it's ears off.
The chase ended in a non-descript intersection in the middle of no where. The man, whom we found out was actually Greek (explaining the wierd Italian accent), and his wife were continuing on the same direction, but he gave Jerome some directions through a small wooded area and said that we would pop out right at the entrance to the main Paris motorway. At the time it seemed highly unlikely that this road would lead anywhere near where we wanted to be. But, ok, we followed his directions and five minutes later we were at the very begining of the motorway, which was not clogged at all. We had to maneuver a bit to get in line to the on ramp to the toll way, but we saw a string of cars going all the way down the main route from Normandie which we just avoided. Who knows how much time we saved, but, as a native from Normandie, it clearly blew Jerome's mind.
Tonight I've learned a valuable lesson about accepting driving directions from shifty looking Greek men in France. And how often do you get a gift like that.
Paris
15/September/2003
Wow. So it is great after all. I admit I've been a Paris skeptic for a long time. Someone would mention how they had a great time in Paris and I would say, "But, hey, have you been to Bangkok?!" And regardless of their answer I wouldn't really be satisfied that they really knew what I was saying. The truth is that I didn't know what I was saying. (Apparently this is a bigger issue for me than I've previously been aware.)
I always imagined Paris to be a EuroDisney minus the colorful costumes. Just another big European metropolis chasing the tourist dollar: cool old buildings coupled with the latest this and that. Not true. Parisians are pretty individualistic, off doing their own thing. First, unlike most very tourist centered cities there is no "Parisian message" being crammed down your throat (ie: "the most beautiful city in the woooooooorld" or "Romance: just add Paris") like you see in some mega-tourist towns across the world. Other than restoration of the buildings and bridges, there seems to be very little management of the city's façade. They seem happy to leave that to the people of Paris.
What's more, there are colorful costumes everywhere! (You see, I was wrong on both counts.) Street performers are all over the city. An elderly couple weaving scarves through the air, a man wearing rainbow colored parachute pants rolling large balls around his body, troupes of comedians banging sticks and drums in a conga line; Paris is a city filled with children and adults laughing in the streets, laying in the grass, shopping at stores, and smiling in cafes.
Now, it is more than a bit touristy. I haven't met or heard more Americans outside of the US than here in Paris. And let's not forget the jumbles of Japanese in their tourist groups. Oddly, all these tourists are something special too, full of smiles and amazement. An extended family equally fascinated with the sights and sounds of the city.
As usual though, I really don't like to be a tourist. I much prefer to stay with a friend and get the local flavor of a new place. So Jerome, my friend that I met in Belgium, is hosting my week in Paris. He's got a great apartment very near the center of Paris but even closer to Montmart (where most of Amelie was filmed).
He dedicated the first three days of my stay as an introduction to Paris. We rode his scooter just about everywhere. We visited almost all of the twenty different sub districts in Paris, most of them with a unique character or style, and passed by dozens of famous and not so famous monuments. One of the latter was an unexpected visit to the tacky memorial at the highway tunnel entrance where Princess Diana crashed and died. I suppose this is what you do when you visit Paris now.
Jerome was working most of the rest of the week so I went back to the parts of Paris I enjoyed the most and sat in parks in cafes just talking and reading. (I’ve nearly finished the 'Tales of the City' series by Armistead Maupin.) Reading and relaxing has been the perfect Paris combination for me.
La Ciotat
8/September/2003
My first trip to the Mediterranean Sea. The weather has been perfect since I arrived here at my friend Miriam's house, which is a one minute flip-flop walk to the beach. I'm only going to be here for a few days until I head up to Paris, but I think I choose a good time to come. Miriam says that only a few days ago there was no room to lay down your towel on the beach. But because all the French tourists have started work this week there's a nearly uninhabited stretch of sand the whole way down.
Miriam is half French and half Vietnamese which has led to some really tasty food combinations. When I met her about a month ago and told her that I was (A) going through France soon and (B) that I loved her cooking and company, she invited me to come and have some one-on-one lessons in La Ciotat if I wanted to. So, here I am.
Lyon
5/September/2003
I've arrived in France to an incredibly beautiful place! Lyon is tops. The youth hostel is fun and boisterous with a great view overlooking the town, the public transport is really well done, the main station is pretty impressive and the staff there are helpfull AND friendly. In short, it was not at all what I was told to expect to find in France.
Here's to discovering France without blinders.
21/September/2003
Jerome grew up in Normandy, in the north of France. He invited me to go with him this weekend to visit his sister and nephew in Caen and then we could go to the beaches where the Allied troops landed on D-Day, which were only a few minutes away from Caen.
It was awesome. A vintage US tank in the square of each tiny village, each person with their own story about the the liberation on June 6th, 1944. Jerome's father vivdly remebers a US soldier giving him a piece of gum while his division swooped through their coastal village.
We spent quite a bit of time on Omaha Beach where the US Cemetary is. This is a special niche of solemness in an otherwise pretty hectic tourist area.
I also went to Honfluer, a small coastal village that I visited when I was 5 years old. I even recognized the restaurants and shops surrounding the square quay in the center of town from photos in my childhood album.
It was quite lqte when we started to head back to Paris and we weren't exactly sure how to get to the highway the fastest, so Jerome asked a man and his wife walking to their car to clarify it for us. In what Jerome described as a "strange Italian accent" the man told us to "forget everything you've been told" and to simply follow him. Ok, so we did. After we turned the opposite direction of three or four signs indicating the way to Paris we flashed the highbeams at the car in front of us to make sure he knew we actually were intending to go to Paris tonight.
After pulling over, he looked at Jerome and explained that the highways were a mess with traffic (which he says we could have also noticed if we were looking over the bridges we were crossing) and this way would be faster in the long run. "But, this time," he stressed, "follow faster, ok?!" Ok, so we followed... faster. It wasn't exactly easy keeping up with the new Mercedes while we pushed this older Renault to its limit, but we managed. We were flying through the countryside. Huge fields of crops glowing in the moonlight with whisps of fog rolling around the hillsides. We had to dodge only one rabbit who never moved, even after nearly took it's ears off.
The chase ended in a non-descript intersection in the middle of no where. The man, whom we found out was actually Greek (explaining the wierd Italian accent), and his wife were continuing on the same direction, but he gave Jerome some directions through a small wooded area and said that we would pop out right at the entrance to the main Paris motorway. At the time it seemed highly unlikely that this road would lead anywhere near where we wanted to be. But, ok, we followed his directions and five minutes later we were at the very begining of the motorway, which was not clogged at all. We had to maneuver a bit to get in line to the on ramp to the toll way, but we saw a string of cars going all the way down the main route from Normandie which we just avoided. Who knows how much time we saved, but, as a native from Normandie, it clearly blew Jerome's mind.
Tonight I've learned a valuable lesson about accepting driving directions from shifty looking Greek men in France. And how often do you get a gift like that.
Paris
15/September/2003
Wow. So it is great after all. I admit I've been a Paris skeptic for a long time. Someone would mention how they had a great time in Paris and I would say, "But, hey, have you been to Bangkok?!" And regardless of their answer I wouldn't really be satisfied that they really knew what I was saying. The truth is that I didn't know what I was saying. (Apparently this is a bigger issue for me than I've previously been aware.)
I always imagined Paris to be a EuroDisney minus the colorful costumes. Just another big European metropolis chasing the tourist dollar: cool old buildings coupled with the latest this and that. Not true. Parisians are pretty individualistic, off doing their own thing. First, unlike most very tourist centered cities there is no "Parisian message" being crammed down your throat (ie: "the most beautiful city in the woooooooorld" or "Romance: just add Paris") like you see in some mega-tourist towns across the world. Other than restoration of the buildings and bridges, there seems to be very little management of the city's façade. They seem happy to leave that to the people of Paris.
What's more, there are colorful costumes everywhere! (You see, I was wrong on both counts.) Street performers are all over the city. An elderly couple weaving scarves through the air, a man wearing rainbow colored parachute pants rolling large balls around his body, troupes of comedians banging sticks and drums in a conga line; Paris is a city filled with children and adults laughing in the streets, laying in the grass, shopping at stores, and smiling in cafes.
Now, it is more than a bit touristy. I haven't met or heard more Americans outside of the US than here in Paris. And let's not forget the jumbles of Japanese in their tourist groups. Oddly, all these tourists are something special too, full of smiles and amazement. An extended family equally fascinated with the sights and sounds of the city.
As usual though, I really don't like to be a tourist. I much prefer to stay with a friend and get the local flavor of a new place. So Jerome, my friend that I met in Belgium, is hosting my week in Paris. He's got a great apartment very near the center of Paris but even closer to Montmart (where most of Amelie was filmed).
He dedicated the first three days of my stay as an introduction to Paris. We rode his scooter just about everywhere. We visited almost all of the twenty different sub districts in Paris, most of them with a unique character or style, and passed by dozens of famous and not so famous monuments. One of the latter was an unexpected visit to the tacky memorial at the highway tunnel entrance where Princess Diana crashed and died. I suppose this is what you do when you visit Paris now.
Jerome was working most of the rest of the week so I went back to the parts of Paris I enjoyed the most and sat in parks in cafes just talking and reading. (I’ve nearly finished the 'Tales of the City' series by Armistead Maupin.) Reading and relaxing has been the perfect Paris combination for me.
La Ciotat
8/September/2003
My first trip to the Mediterranean Sea. The weather has been perfect since I arrived here at my friend Miriam's house, which is a one minute flip-flop walk to the beach. I'm only going to be here for a few days until I head up to Paris, but I think I choose a good time to come. Miriam says that only a few days ago there was no room to lay down your towel on the beach. But because all the French tourists have started work this week there's a nearly uninhabited stretch of sand the whole way down.
Miriam is half French and half Vietnamese which has led to some really tasty food combinations. When I met her about a month ago and told her that I was (A) going through France soon and (B) that I loved her cooking and company, she invited me to come and have some one-on-one lessons in La Ciotat if I wanted to. So, here I am.
Lyon
5/September/2003
I've arrived in France to an incredibly beautiful place! Lyon is tops. The youth hostel is fun and boisterous with a great view overlooking the town, the public transport is really well done, the main station is pretty impressive and the staff there are helpfull AND friendly. In short, it was not at all what I was told to expect to find in France.
Here's to discovering France without blinders.
Thursday, September 04, 2003
Big Bill
He's a good friend of my fathers, and has been ever since they met in the early '80s. Back then my father was a hard working Harley-Davidson dealer in Alabama and Bill would occasionally come in to my father's shop and order a half dozen motorcycles to be shipped to Switzerland. He would tell us stories about his European customers who were eager to feel the wind in their hair as they sped down the Autobahn at 220 decibels.
That seems like a long time ago, and Bill has stayed with my family enough times now that he's much more of an obscure German speaking uncle than my father's business associate. Both my father and brother reminded me earlier in my travels this year that I am the only Nicholas who hasn't come to visit Bill in the Alps.
So, here I am, on the flip side, seeing the Harley operation in Subingen, Switzerland. It's a small classic American motorcycle sales and repair shop with 2 bikes in the workshop and about 10 bikes in the showroom. When I asked how large of a region his shop catered to, Bill threw up his hands and said that he's now in heated competition with at least 3 other similar shops just in this small hamlet of about 2,700 people.
Bill's not too concerned though. He says that some people prefer the other guys - noting that he "can be grouchy... like an old bear," but his reputation as a fair salesman and quality mechanic is tops, and, with a shrug of his shoulders, he adds that, "I just use it to survive anyway."
From my point of view, he's surviving pretty well. Yesterday he picked me up at the train station in his enormous new silver BMW, complete with onboard everything. He pushed a few buttons on his steering wheel and - presto - we were watching a portion of Indiana Jones - And The Last Crusade dubbed in Swiss-German on the in-dash TV.
And then there's the homestead. He and his partner Suzalee just finished remodeling their home - originally both a home and a barn - a year or so ago. Apparently, before this remodeling which divided the home into two halves, the house hadn’t seen any major changes since it was built in the 1400s. Today, one side of their home is dedicated to leather chaps, new and used chrome thingies, and a fancy motorcycle sales floor and workshop, while the other half is devoted to Bill, Suzalee, their cat Peebo, and unimaginable amounts of gourmet food and wine. Not a bad combination if I say so myself.
I popped into the shop this morning after a hearty Swiss breakfast - muesli, yoghurt, espresso, twisty bread, and three different kinds of pungent smelling, but excellent tasting cheeses - to find that Bill had just finished working on a client's bike who is coming in this evening from Basel, a much bigger Swiss city about an hour away. Careful not to smear the bike with his grease-blackened hands, he maneuvered the bike from the lift to the drive and left it gleaming in the sunshine. Chalk up another one for Bill’s enviable kind of survival.
He's a good friend of my fathers, and has been ever since they met in the early '80s. Back then my father was a hard working Harley-Davidson dealer in Alabama and Bill would occasionally come in to my father's shop and order a half dozen motorcycles to be shipped to Switzerland. He would tell us stories about his European customers who were eager to feel the wind in their hair as they sped down the Autobahn at 220 decibels.
That seems like a long time ago, and Bill has stayed with my family enough times now that he's much more of an obscure German speaking uncle than my father's business associate. Both my father and brother reminded me earlier in my travels this year that I am the only Nicholas who hasn't come to visit Bill in the Alps.
So, here I am, on the flip side, seeing the Harley operation in Subingen, Switzerland. It's a small classic American motorcycle sales and repair shop with 2 bikes in the workshop and about 10 bikes in the showroom. When I asked how large of a region his shop catered to, Bill threw up his hands and said that he's now in heated competition with at least 3 other similar shops just in this small hamlet of about 2,700 people.
Bill's not too concerned though. He says that some people prefer the other guys - noting that he "can be grouchy... like an old bear," but his reputation as a fair salesman and quality mechanic is tops, and, with a shrug of his shoulders, he adds that, "I just use it to survive anyway."
From my point of view, he's surviving pretty well. Yesterday he picked me up at the train station in his enormous new silver BMW, complete with onboard everything. He pushed a few buttons on his steering wheel and - presto - we were watching a portion of Indiana Jones - And The Last Crusade dubbed in Swiss-German on the in-dash TV.
And then there's the homestead. He and his partner Suzalee just finished remodeling their home - originally both a home and a barn - a year or so ago. Apparently, before this remodeling which divided the home into two halves, the house hadn’t seen any major changes since it was built in the 1400s. Today, one side of their home is dedicated to leather chaps, new and used chrome thingies, and a fancy motorcycle sales floor and workshop, while the other half is devoted to Bill, Suzalee, their cat Peebo, and unimaginable amounts of gourmet food and wine. Not a bad combination if I say so myself.
I popped into the shop this morning after a hearty Swiss breakfast - muesli, yoghurt, espresso, twisty bread, and three different kinds of pungent smelling, but excellent tasting cheeses - to find that Bill had just finished working on a client's bike who is coming in this evening from Basel, a much bigger Swiss city about an hour away. Careful not to smear the bike with his grease-blackened hands, he maneuvered the bike from the lift to the drive and left it gleaming in the sunshine. Chalk up another one for Bill’s enviable kind of survival.
