"I got a popcorn ball!" "I got a rock."

Alex came home from school this morning with the corners of his mouth twitching. "Mom, the silliest thing happened in school today. Today was a day when the teacher had prizes for us all, and we all got turns choosing."

I'm not exactly sure why the teacher does this--if it's part of a reward system, or what--but every once in a while Alex brings home something odd. A marker. A visor. And, once, a little tom-tom, made of real hide and wood.

But today, he held out...well, a little glass jar with three sticks in it.

"Mom, she said that this is sugar, and I'm supposed to eat it, but it doesn't look like sugar to me."

What? Wait...what?

"No, she really did, mom. She said this was sugar. Do you think I should taste it?"

Wait, I don't understand, Alex. Did she give these twigs to everyone? Is it a science experiment? Is there a cocoon in there somewhere?

"No. Some people got glittery magic wands. Some people got golden and silver rocks. But I was the last person to choose, so I go this silly thing! Should I eat it?"  At this point he was really giggling.

I looked dubiously at the twigs.  They didn't look like cinnamon, or anything else remotely edible.  I told Alex that I'd try it for him.  So, and I kid you not, I unscrewed the top of the jar and tried to take a bite of one of the sticks.

"Alex? This tastes like a stick."

At this point, Alex just couldn't help himself: he totally collapsed into giggles. He could scarcely get the words out: "Why...would...she...try...to...feed...me...sticks?"

When he finally got ahold of himself, he told me, "Maybe I can turn them into very useful sticks. Look!  I can turn the jar into a bongo drum!"

"Or maybe they could be teeth for my disguise."

"Or maybe they could be a very bad tic tac toe board."

Oh, I love that about Alex, how he's able to laugh at the ridiculous situations that he finds himself in, here.  He's got such a great attitude, and I think he'll find a lot of happiness in this life.

Ella's reaction to Alex's story was a little more normal.  When she came home, Alex told her about the sticks, and the prizes that the other kids got, and her eyes filled with tears at the injustice of it.  "But...aren't you angry, Alex? Other kids got beautiful sparkling magic wands with lovely streamers hanging from them, and you...you got sticks?"

"Oh, no, Ella. I LOVE my sticks." Said Alex, still laughing.  "See? They're very useful."  And he proceeded to show her the many uses of his three sticks.  By he got to the bongo drum, Ella's tears had dried, and she grinned back at at her brother.  "Alex, I think that is my least favorite use of your sticks. Mom? Do you have any mushy tomatoes?"

Alex came home, too, with a little sheaf of pictures that he drew in Kindergarten. I asked him if he was the only one who was drawing today, or if the whole class was coloring.  "Oh, well, I did these in free time, but the whole class chose coloring and we all colored together....well, everyone except for Marina. She's the new girl, and she speaks Spanish and a little bit of English, but she doesn't speak German. She only knows how to say 'Baby-Ecke,' so she had to play in the Baby-Ecke all by herself.  I know how she feels. I used to have to do that, too, but now I know a little bit of German."

Oh, no!  Poor Marina!

But Alex does seem to be doing pretty well in school.  He's friendly with all of the kids, and he's going to a birthday party on Monday for one of his favorites.  He actually is pretty reluctant about that, though: "Oh, no, mom, I don't want to go," he told me, very matter-of-factly. "Because I'm shy, of course."  And he is, but he eventually changed his mind when I told him I could stay with him for a little bit and get him settled.  It'll be a small party, so I think he'll be just fine.  So this afternoon the boys and I took a field trip to the toy store and picked out a board game.

When Ella got home from school, she rushed through her homework and jumped on the computer, in the mood to play a math game that she hasn't touched for a while.  For those parents out there, though, it's a really lovely program, for grades K-3, developed in Seattle: dreambox.com.  My kids love it, and we shared our subscription with my sister.  To sign into their individual accounts, the kids have to click on their avatars, and for their password, they have to choose on one of a dozen icons: a kitty, a flower, a turtle, and so forth.

Somehow, Ella's cousin Autumn (or was it YOU, Aunt Kathy??) made it through this super-secure system, guessing that Ella's password was the turtle.  And she changed Ella's avatar from the little blond-haired, brown-eyed girl to....gasp! A BOY!

Ella and Alex though this was a wonderful joke, so they spent about a half-hour hacking into Autumn's account ("I've got it, Alex! Her password is....the flower!")  and changing her avatar many, many times until finally deciding that the skateboard dude was the funniest.

Your move, Autumn.

Avast!

The childminders all seemed really happy to see Joey at integration class this morning. My classroom is directly above the courtyard where the children play, and we mothers spend the two hours of class trying to tune out the unhappy wails of a few particular children. But they told me, Joey, he's a piece of cake. Apparently he spends a lot of his mornings pushing around cars and building lego towers that are taller than he. That sounds about right.  Good boy.

Today in class, we had our second session dealing with Swiss schools.  I wrote a lot about the structure of the school system last week: today we focused on secondary schools.  One thing I found particularly interesting was that, as long as a student passes a subject, particular classroom grades have absolutely no bearing on a student's future: they're strictly a tool for communication between the teacher and the student.  Kids are graded on a scale of 1-6, with six being excellent and 3 being a pass: apparently, children who score four or better are encouraged to take the entrance exam for Gymnasium, the highly academic secondary school.  However, all students, regardless of their grades, are allowed to take the entrance exam, and any who pass are allowed to enter.

And, once a student is in Gymnasium, all they need to gain admission to college is their Gymnasium degree. If they have this, they can attend the Swiss University of their choice, automatically, and study whatever they wish.

Also, interestingly, the Gymnasium exam is the first standardized test that the students take in their academic career.  Apparently, some kids form Gymni-clubs, to study and quiz each other to prepare for this exam.  In an average class, something like fifteen percent of kids pass the test; in particularly well-to-do areas, the number can be as high as 40 percent.

I asked the teacher what the atmosphere is like among the parents during placement time.  I live in a particularly high-strung section of Kirkland, Washington, where parents begin to coach their children in phonics immediately upon exit of the womb. When it comes time to test children for the gifted and talented program, there's two gymnasiums full of the district's children, per grade, ready to throw their hats into the ring.  All of the children are above average. Walden has nothing on the communities orbiting the Microsoft campus.

I can only imagine what the tension level might be, were the Swiss system transferred to Kirkland.

But no, the teacher said: sometimes parents will send their children to prep classes or summer classes, but this is unusual. Generally, parents are contented products of the system, and they trust that the same system will help their children find a satisfying career.  However, my teacher, herself, comes from an fiercely academic background.  When one of their children was born premature, she and her husband decided to set aside so that they could send him to private school if he didn't pass the Gymni exam. (Which is why private schools are looked down upon, here: they're seen as the ambitious parent's fallback.)

It actually sound like, of the two secondary schools, the vocational track is more stressful and demanding: children, at the fresh young age of twelve, are responsible, themselves, for finding Master craftsmen to serve as apprentice.  They need to fill out applications and present themselves in interviews, and they need to continue to perform at a satisfactory level. The children usually serve in their apprenticeship half the school week, and the rest of the week, they continue their basic education studies.  As they progress through school and towards their career, their classwork becomes more targeted toward their career: they study bookkeeping for math, for example.

When the kids are done with their secondary school, for those who continue on to the universities or technical colleges, the colleges are no more nurturing.  There are no dormitories, and the majority of students continue to live at home.

Anyway, that's that.  Joey and I scuttled home, and when the big kids got back, I pushed Ella to finish her homework as quickly as she could.  Since it's Wedneday, and she had the afternoon off, I wanted to finally take the kids up to the pool.

Since the temperature dropped about twenty degrees from yesterday, and since the rest of Zürich spent the last five days at the pool, we found ourselves in the wonderful position of being four of about two dozen people in the whole aquatic complex.  The kids kept reporting back to me: Best! Day! Ever!

The line at the waterslide has lately been snaking all the way down the stairs and to the pool: today, Ella had the slide to herself.  And she commandeered every single raft and floating mat in the pool and stacked them together to make a giant pirate ship, using kickboards as paddles. My three kids menacingly floated, with cups of water and two beach, er, cannon balls, stacked at one end.  They were armed and ready in case of attack.  

But, when it came to it, my kids were lousy pirates.  Whenever one of the few kids at the pool approached them, they quickly broke off and shared a piece of their ship without the least resistance. Sheesh.

My ongoing battle with declensions

The temperature finally peaked at above 90 degrees today; when Joey and I left to go shopping this morning, it was already well over 80.  That was just fine while we were at the heavily air-conditioned grocery store, but, when it was time to go home, Joey and I found ourselves in a spot of trouble.

The good old days

I'd agreed to let him ride his scooter on the way to the store; at the time, I wasn't really thinking about how much a trip to the grocery store takes it out of Joey.  All those escalators to ride a half-dozen times, and all those aisles to run up and down, and all those cartons of juice and cookies to surreptitiously heft into the shopping cart. Joey works hard at Migros.

But mom, I'm tired.

So, when it was time to go home, Joey had exactly zero enthusiasm for the trip.  He tried to talk me into letting him ride in the shopping cart, which surprised me, since we hadn't done that for about five months. But my cart was full to the brim, so no dice. I tried pushing him on his scooter with one hand while I lugged all the groceries with the other, but Joey soon shrugged me off: "Don't like that."  Finally he heaved a sigh, fished a box of ice cream out of the shopping bag to carry (to himself cool off??), and trudged five feet down the street. And then he stopped, and looked around, and thought about things, hugging his ice cream bars. And, thus, we settled into our half-mile-an-hour pace.

Fine. I'll do it. But I won't like it.

 Of course, he broke into an excited run as soon as he spotted our apartment building.  He was there before I, shaking the front door, singing "Let me i-i-in! I Ho-o-o-ome!  Mo-o-o-omy! Co-o-o-ome!

I'd been toying with taking a trip to the pool, but given Joey's energy level, it seemed we were in for a nap, instead.  All though I never did convince him to sleep; instead we watched the rest of the neighborhood parade past our window with their towels and floaties. Ah well, it was probably too crowded, anyway. And, while at home, Joey learned the joys of warbling into an oscillating fan.

Right after lunch, Dennis and I traded places, he with the kids, and I off to Google for my German class. I stopped going a few weeks ago, having become too frustrated with my instructor's teaching style. I think I was in over my head, too: language placement is one situation in which having a knack for standardized tests is no advantage.

So I requested that they move me down a level, and I started again today.  My teacher this time, Ralf, is the polar opposite of my former instructor.  He laughs excessively and loves a joke.  But, in ways, he's so much more strict, offering absolutely no wiggle room when it comes to declensions. When it became clear that I'm a little foggier than I should be on noun genders, he handed me a four-inch stack of post-it notes and told me to go home and label everything.  And, as I struggled through dative and accusative cases, he gave me little help, just shaking his head until I finally stumbled onto the right article.  At which point I was rewarded with an ear-splitting smile and a thumbs-up...and a new sentence to wade through.


But I really did enjoy the class, and I came out of it with new resolve. So, when I got home, the kids and I all curled up at the table: Ella with her math, Alex with a first-reader, me with my grammar, and Joey with a pop-up book.

And, while we worked, we rewarded our good intentions with some previously melted, but now refrozen and perfectly fine, ice cream pops.

Wir machen ein Feuer!

Everywhere I go--the pool, the park, the beaches, the woods, the apartment courtyard--someone, somewhere there is building a little fire and roasting a small pile of sausages. It's just what they do here.  So I've developed kind of an itch to do some outdoor grilling of my own.  And since Ella's had some fire-building practice on her school field trips, I thought maybe she'd like to show off her new skills.

I decided we'd have our picnic in Sihlwald: hot as it was today (over 80 degrees), I knew the kids would enjoy wading in the river, and I thought the dense woods surrounding the river Sihl had a chance of being cooler than our apartment.  Oh, and it's usually deserted there, so if we failed to make our fire, few would witness our embarrassment. But the train to Sihlwald leaves only once every hour, just about on the hour, so the best we could hope for was a 1:45 arrival.  We'd have a late lunch, but it would do.

When we tumbled off the train, I instantly had misgivings.  It's becoming increasingly clear that the trains here aren't air conditioned, and, at the end of the ride, Joey was clearly inches from falling asleep.  He planted his feet on the dusty path to the picnic area and glared at me, daring me to just try make him move. But I had a secret weapon: a pair of laughing, excited siblings, running ahead, looking for firewood.  Watching them,  he finally decided it might be worth budging, maybe.

Ella importantly issued orders, telling Alex to fan out and look for firewood. It took me a while to notice that the healthy supply of wood chips that Alex kept coming back with was from the yard of some cows that were kept nearby.  Ella came back over and over with small handfuls of tiny twigs: she wasn't having any luck finding anything better.  The woods were on the other side of the river, and there just wasn't kindling around.

I was confused: I'd been told continually that there would always be a supply of free firewood kept near any public fire pit, gathered and chopped by volunteers, but I just wasn't seeing any piles, anywhere.

Meanwhile, Joey was crying for a hot dog.

So Ella did the best she could and built up a tiny mound, lighting it carefully.  She made an awful lot of smoke and seriously diminished the pile of papers that I'll have to tie up with twine come recycling day, but it soon became clear the sticks the kids had gathered were scarcely tepid.

Just what are they teaching kids in those schools, anyway?

I was just about to break into the bag of marshmallows that I'd packed, distributing them as emergency rations, when I learned a brand new word: Brennholzkiste! Firewood box!  There, kept dry in a coffer by the nature center, was a miraculous supply of carefully chopped firewood and starter sticks.  

So Ella sprang into action: "Alex! Go find some dry grass! Joey....uh, okay. Sure. Draw on yourself with old charcoal!"  And within minutes she had a fire that was, if anything, much too big. I started wondering why I chose the hottest day of the year so far to indulge my pyromaniac tendencies. I'm just smart that way, I guess.

We didn't have the patience to wait for the logs to burn down completely, so our food was flavored with light, carbony undertones. And overtones. And the midsection, too.

The kids didn't really care: the hot dogs were merely something they were enduring (the "healthy food" portion of our lunch...hah!) so that they could get to those marshmallows.

Mmm, tastes like summer camp.

The bag of Rocky Mountain American Style Marshmallows that I found at the Co-op was a little worse for the transAtlantic ware.  They were all kind of moist and stuck together.  So we ended up gouging out little globs of sticky sugar to impale on our sticks. It was, in a word, delicious.


After lunch, we crossed the river and headed for the forest. I'd been told that the best trail for the kids--the one that included games and puzzles along the route--was at the top of a steep ridge.  All three kids managed to scramble up the ridge and had a fine old time with the first activity at the top, a game in which you try to balance a stick on top of a buried branch.  Alex was weirdly good at it, and he and Ella had most of the sticks balanced when Joey went into Hulk mode and knocked everything down.

That, combined with the dawning knowledge that trail continued uphill for quite some time more, sort of quelled their enthusiasm for further hiking.  It seemed like a good time for a swim.

I'd heard that, between the Limmat and the Sihl, the latter is much colder, but the water felt wonderful today.  The water was low and slow, so it was great for all three kids.  Joey stayed close to the shore and watched the tadpoles with the intensity of a cat, while Ella sat on various rocks, singing, indulging her mermaid fantasies, and Alex threw rocks.  All true to form.

When it was time to leave, Ella decided to run ahead...but, since I trying to keep the boys mud-free while they dressed, I didn't notice that she ran off in the wrong direction.  When crossed the river and didn't see her, mild-mannered Alex transformed back into Hero Alex, dashing back across the bridge, bellowing for his lost sister.  She was actually just a little ways down the bank, but she was flustered and worried, herself.

But Alex's concern for her weren't lost on Ella, so we had a companionable, if too hot, ride home. 

Albanifest

Winterthur is the closest major city to Zürich, about a half-hour to the north, and this weekend they celebrated with Feast of St. Albans (the patron saint of the city) with Albanifest, "Europe's largest annual festival in an urban environment."  I was hoping to see something pretty impressive. The map on the festival website indicated that it would take up all of the city's Altstadt: if nothing else, it would be a great opportunity to see the city, which we haven't gotten a chance to do, yet.

On the English tourism website, I was promised that "there are no limits to the culinary delights on offer and, of course music has a part to play, too; often live bands in the festival booths make for high spirits. However the most attention is given to the ludicrous rides, which catapult the high spirited into the air and let all others gaze in amazement."  Bring it!

I made the tactical error of telling the kids that, since we missed our movie yesterday, this festival could be their treat instead, and that they could spend the price of their movie ticket on games and rides.  Alex immediately made the logical leap: "Mom, could I save my money instead and keep my $20?" Well, that wasn't quite in the spirit of the day, but I admired his frugality and foresight:  I told him maybe he could save a little of the money. Ella and Alex immediately began discussing the possibilities as we walked to the train station. If they saved just half of their money, they could still keep $10 each.  Think of all of the candy they could buy for $10! And candy would probably be much cheaper at Migros than at the festival.  Better to save all of the money that they possibly could. How much do you think Mom would allow...?

As you might gather, St. Albans was a Christian martyr,
decapitated for his faith.  Apparently, he also enjoyed
a good party.

I hated to burst their bubble, but I explained that they absolutely would not be spending $40, or $20, or even $2 on candy.  We went around and around on negotiations, the kids scheming on how they maybe they could save money by going on rides together, and wondering how Joey's portion of the ticket money factored into the equation, until Dennis wisely just said, "Enough." So today was demoted into just a normal day out, in which mom and dad had all power over tickets and pocketbooks.  And I think we all enjoyed ourselves a little more, that way.

Joey has discovered the joy of utensils, and carefully cut
each of his french fries into a half-dozen little slices, to
distribute around the table.

First up at the festival was to find some of those culinary delights on offer.  We were immediately overwhelmed when we walked out of the train station: people everywhere, and tents filled to bursting with people having lunch and listening to bands comprised of accordions and horns.  We took a risk and avoided the crowded tents, instead finding one that was almost empty and in a doubly shady section of trees.  It had an unlikely menu: the only two items on offer were pork schnitzel and panang curry. But we decided to have some of each, and while the schnitzel could have used some salt (we've become connoisseurs), the curry was absolutely wonderful.

Back at home, Thursday is Thai day, an evening for dinner and board games with friends, and Dennis and I have really missed both the company and the availability of delicious Thai takeaway food. So it was really nice to have a little familiar treat.

Raclette is a Swiss tradition: you take a big block of cheese,
melt the top of it with a hot iron, and then scrape the melty
part onto a piece of toast.  A little like Welsh rarebit.

Although, as we started walking through the festival, I began to regret having a big meal, instead of eating our way through the booths.  Many of them sold the same sausages and rosti and raclette that are staples at all of the Swiss festivals. But there were also many things I'd never seen before: the stand that sold long kabobs of beef (the only food-on-a-stick that I saw today) covered with a melty herb butter had a line that snaked across the street.  There were stands from food all across Asia, and ice cream and soft serve at every corner.

I would have petitioned to stay for supper, but today was the hottest day we've had so far this year, well over 80 degrees. With the heat of the sun, combined with the crowds and the heat of the grills and the pavement, we clearly didn't have so many hours of energy in us.  So we decided we'd best go see some of those ludicrous rides, while we still had the ambition for it.

I haven't been to an American fair in years, but the rides
here definitely get more altitude than any I ever remember
seeing in the carnivals in the states. I wish I could still
do this sort of thing.  Dennis missed his sister, his
favorite riding buddy.

Ella almost rode one of the grown-up rides, one of those large, spinny, lose-your-lunch sorts of rides. We even bought the pass for it, but she panicked at the last minute, and so we took a refund and headed over for the kiddie section, where we stayed.

Actually, the kids probably had the most fun in the shady city playground that was off to the edge of the kids zone. But they had a good time on an aerial ride that probably broke ten different kinds of copyright laws.

And they teamed up to ride the bumper cars.  Poor Alex: I'll probably have a similar expression on my face, the next time I sit behind the wheel of a car with Ella.

And Ella really wanted to try the climbing wall, although she got spooked halfway up.

But we spent a lot of our time just walking around the city, eating ice cream.  It really was impressive, how many tents and people were drawn there.  And how much junk they had for sale for the children: another staple of the carnivals are the toy-and-candy trucks, that sell pick-a-mixes and have all kinds of flimsy toys for sale, most of which are neon weapons of some sort. (Last night, when I went out for a walk around the neighborhood, I couldn't believe how many free-range kids were running around with little swords or bows or pop guns.)

We got to see a little of the city as we walked around, and Dennis
spotted what might be my favorite gargoyle of the year.

When the kids were sufficiently wilted, we headed home, with a promise to take them to the pool when we got back.  NochElla showed up at our door, not five minutes after we got home.  She informed me she'd been keeping an eye on our house all day.  So I offered to take her, too, since I would be leaving Joey at home to rest with Dennis.


The Migros store chain was giving out free beach balls at the pool--NochElla said that the baby pool area had thousands, all over the water and grass, when she went there this morning with her family.  There were still hundreds left when we arrived, and so Ella and Alex each had a souvenir to take home.

And Dennis and Ella used them to create a new game: Mayonnaise Ball.

Movie FAIL

Dennis was feeling a little better today: not great, but well enough to get out of the house.  A couple of days ago, the kids finally filled the House Cup, a little wine glass that I chuck jewels into whenever the kids seem to need a little positive reinforcement for cleaning their rooms or eating their healthy food or getting along.  I'd told them that we could go and see a movie when they filled it: a major treat, considering the cost of movie tickets.

When I was small, my mom would give my sister and me a similar treat for good behavior over the summer.  She'd drop us off at the dollar theater with a total of $4 and two heavy sacks of candy from Mr. Bulky's: some of the happiest rainy days of my life.

But here, it costs about $100 to take our family of five to the movies, and that's before popcorn.  Gasp.

On a related note, Dennis was looking at an infograph about the distribution of millionaires across the world. Switzerland has the third-highest concentration of millionaire households in the world: over 8%.  We're not among them. But we still felt like taking our kids to the movies. And we've sort of gotten used to the fact that we'll be paying twice the American cost of anything we buy.

We decided that, if the kids were going to be sitting in a theater for a couple of hours, we really should get them out and into the sunshine this morning.  Looking sadly at my diminished bowl of the World's Best Cherries, we decided to go back to the farm this morning, to see if there was any chance that they had anything left.  We packed up four scooters and a stroller, and raced to the bus, and then to the farm.  Ella and Alex were feeling independent and raced ahead, running across a field that looked fallow but had actually just been planted with beans. So we got a due scolding, making us all kind of grumpy.  And, although they did have cherries left, the two kilos I bought were more on the sour side.  Hmph.  So maybe the trip was a little ill-fated.

Dennis split off on the way home to get pick up some groceries and medicine.  I tried so hard to get him something from the Apothecary yesterday, using everything I learned in Chapter 2 of my Berlitz Language book. Halsschmerzen! Kopfschmerzen! I was all over it! I explained all of Dennis's symptoms to the pharmacist, and she listened solemnly and questioned me, and then regarded the shelves.  I was pretty excited to see what she came up with: a little part of my mind hoped that maybe they have something different and better here in Switzerland than I can find on the shelves of Target.  Maybe something that wasn't quite FDA-approved, that would instantly, mercilessly, kill all those sore-throat germs.

She handed me a little bottle of throat spray and a little box of pills, explaining carefully that Dennis was to take one pill three times a day, and that it would help him considerably.  So I left the shop with my wonder drug, feeling pretty proud of myself, until I actually looked at the label and realized that I'd just bought a very expensive little box of ibuprofen. Dennis wasn't impressed.

So he went and tried himself, and came back with some cough drops.  Literally.  He has a little bottle of cough suppressant liquid that he's supposed to shake out, thirty drops at a time.  Everything's a little bit different.

The kids were all excited to go to a 2:30 matinee of Kung Fu Panda, and they bounced up and down as I tucked some chocolate bars in my purse.  This was gonna be good.  But when we got to the theater, and went to lay down our money, the man looked askance. "Aber sie sind zu klein!" They are too small!

He explained that here's a rule here, in all theaters, that moviegoers must be at least 6 years old.  I suppose if people are going to lay out $20 for a movie ticket, they don't want any chance of their movie experience being interrupted by crying, squirmy kids.

But I'm a little incredulous: the Swiss insist that four-year-olds are old enough walk to school alone, but they're not to be trusted in a movie theater? Actually, of my three kids, I'd actually vote eight-year-old Ella as the most likely to talk loudly (she's not really a whisperer, especially when she's excited about a plot point) or to cry (she sobs loudly during the sad parts, like the last thirty minutes of Toy Story 3. Ugh).

Whatever: my kids were crushed.

I'll have to ask around, to see if G-rated movies are treated differently.  Maybe we can try again with Cars 2 comes out.  I can tell you with all certainty, there's no risk of any of my children making a single peep during that movie.

Anyway, Plan B.  Dennis and Joey had a nap, Alex made super-secret forts, and Ella made a pretty book out of the meadow flowers that she's been pressing. And, at dinner time, we pulled out the pizza and microwave popcorn and a Wallace and Gromit video that Aunt Stephanie sent. (Thank you!!)

Honestly, the kid were probably just as happy.

Ella's Schulkonzert

Dennis stayed home today, sick with the boys' cold. It's probably not fair to Dennis to call it a silver lining, but because he was home, I was able to leave Joey with him so that I could watch Ella's open dress rehearsal for tonight's concert.  She ran of to school this morning, so pleased with her new outfit, calling for me to please come watch if I could.

When I arrived at school, the playground was a swarming mass of tiny beatniks: Ella had mentioned that they would have no shoes for the concert, but I wasn't expecting to see everyone barefoot on the playground pavement.  The bell rang almost as soon as I got there, and a shrill, excited squeal went out, as all of the black-clad second graders made a mass charge to the door, to the stairs, to the music room.

I tucked myself in a corner with my camera, as all of the first graders and one class of Kindergarteners (but not Alex's) filed in.  It was really cute, watching the second graders striding around purposely and wiggling with excitement as they adjusted each others' headbands. It was so clearly a big deal to them, this concert. I tip my hat to the teachers, giving them this experience.

There are two classes of second graders, and each is split in half, with a red group and a blue group. Each of these four groups had two songs that they performed alone: one song, and one dance. And, in the middle of the show, some kids performed solos on their instruments: a scratchy violin, a cello ("She's been playing less than a year!"), a squeaky recorder.  And then, of course, the grade sang a few songs all together. It was pretty cute.

Ella's group sang that version of "Are You Sleeping" that I mentioned before, with Ella doing her solo.  She said she wasn't nervous at all, a confidence which she clearly doesn't get from me.  And if I do say so myself (and, as her mother, darn it, I'm entitled) she sounded very sweet. Although, from the tone of the song, I really fear that Bruder Jakob won't be waking up any time soon.

The dance for Ella's group was an odd little faux martial arts thing: it reminded me a lot of the old guys who exercise in People's Park in Berkeley.  I'm posting the video here, but please don't feel obligated to watch: Ella was bored, herself, even as she was performing the thing.

I'm going to post a little bit of the rest of the concert, for those curious souls out there, and particularly for my mother, who used to be an elementary music teacher and for Dennis's mother, who was a grade school teacher and then a principal.

For those of you who aren't interested in watching a second grade musical concert, truncated though it might be...well, I don't blame you.  But I will make you listen to a few observations. I could totally understand why Ella had dance-envy: all of the other groups got to perform cute little folk dances. One group did a little country-western-style dance, and I was amused to see that, for their costumes, they had to wear either cowboy hats or baseball caps: six of one, apparently. I get the sense that the cowboy is very much the stereotypical American, here.

Although they dipped heavily into the stereotypes when they portrayed their own country, as well: for the song, "In de Schwiitz," for a solid minute, I watched the kids silently pantomime hiking in the mountains with walking sticks, greeting one another with enthusiastic handshakes.  And then they transitioned into a little half circle, where they pretended their sticks were alphorns as they sang.  They ended with a yodel.

I wanted to give Dennis a quiet house when I got back, so after lunch I took Alex and Joey out for a trip to the Meyer Obstgarten.  Susannah had reminded me that it was high cherry season, so we went hoping to get something good from the farm store.

I let the boys ride their scooters all the way, and they were thrilled to ride on the wide, smooth, long paved path to the farm.  When we got to the farm, the little store, which had just opened, was already crammed with customers, although the only things on the shelves were a few crates of cherries, a few dozen fresh eggs, a crate of potatoes, and a freezer full of veal products.  Oh, and some bottles of homemade kirsch, which were seriously tempting.

But I only had money for cherries today, and I'm so glad that's how I spent it.  Guys, these were the best cherries I've ever had in my life.  Although they were delicious, eating them was bittersweet: I think cherries are now ruined for me. As we approached the farm store, we rode through the little cherry grove, and they were clearly picking the very last of the harvest: this is it for the year. So ephemeral.

I think I remember writing, when we first moved here, that the produce selection in the grocery stores was depressingly small and expensive.  My hopes that this would change in the summer were founded: apparently even the largest chain stores stock mostly local Swiss produce.  What's in season is cheap and fresh and so tasty.  And then it's gone.  I'm already noticing very few strawberries on the shelves, which is too bad for Alex, who would happily eat a whole quart for lunch.  But the blueberries are appearing.  As long as something's actually in season, it's a really nice way to eat.

On the way home, the boys took off on their scooters, flying down the path, until Alex noticed that a car, one of the farmers, was inching behind him.  He jumped into hero mode, flinging his scooter to the side of the road, screaming for his brother, and them picking him up bodily, scooter and all, and carrying him to the side of the road.  Joey was completely indignant, kicking and screaming ("I walk myself!") but Alex didn't let go until the car went past.  So I made a big fuss over him: he was the hero of the day.  Alex told me that he would really like it, now, if you all referred to him as "Hero Alex."

Ella's concert wasn't until 7:00, so I was really happy that Joey fell asleep for a nap on the way home, giving me hope that he'd behave himself in the audience.  Ella paused at home only long enough to say hi, and then ran off to nochElla's house to do her homework.  The girls have taken to doing most of their work there, which I think is just wonderful.  I thanked nochElla's mother profusely for all of the help she's been giving my daughter, and she was so kind about it.  She said that she scarcely does anything: the girls just sit together at the table and help each other. And they have fun, which is nice, since they have so much work to get through.

Ella came home for a quick dinner, and then nochElla came and grabbed her so that the two of them could run off, giggling, to get to school on time.  The rest of us were pretty close behind: the music room, where the performance would be, is very small, and we wanted to make sure we got a seats, let alone a good one.

We got held back a little because, as they were leaving, Ella called for me when she noticed a little one-year-old, standing in the road outside our house, crying, all alone.  I know they encourage independence in children here, but that seemed to be a little excessive. I ran out and scooped her up, which stopped her tears, but I had no idea how to find her mother, or to call for help.  Finally, after about five minutes of trying to ask this little girl what her name was, eventually with the help of some passersby, her flustered mother showed up, poor woman.

Ella and her group mates

It turned out that, although we were later than we planned, we were still plenty early.  At ten minutes before the start of the show, we were still four of only a dozen people in the room.  But, when the show started promptly at 7:00, the room was packed, with children sitting all over the aisles and at our feet.

Joey...well, he mostly behaved. Although he did chirp an excited "ELLA!" whenever he saw his sister.  Ella thought this was a hoot, and kept waving to her little brother, giggling and telling him to hush.  It might have distracted her a little.

Her other brother was more subdued.  No one clapped louder than he did whenever she was on stage, but he fell asleep about two-thirds into the show, curled up across Dennis's lap.

"Shh, Joey, I'm right here!"

The kids closed the show with a group song: the teacher dimmed the lights, and they all got to wave flashlights in the air as they sang.  But Ella quickly discovered that the flashlight she grabbed was actually a headlamp.  She was standing in the far back, and she was well aware of how obstructed she was from the audience.  I was watching, though, and could see her face change as she examined her light. She got the exact same look her Aunt Kathy and I get we're about to start being ridiculous.  I braced myself and watched her slip the light on her head and do a silly little dance, to the giggles of her classmates. Yes, yes, I'm so proud.

But she did a great job during her solo, again, and after the show I introduced myself to her teacher, thanking her for giving Ella a special moment.  Ella always tells me of her "she looks really normal, but when she opens her mouth, she has the voice of an angel." She certainly knew how to talk sweetly to a parent, telling me what a beautiful voice my daughter had, and how she really needs to start playing piano, how she has a great talent.

Oh, do go on, teacher!

But, seriously, Ella doesn't get so much positive reinforcement in school: judging by her ebullience, getting to shine just a little tonight meant the world to her, and I'm grateful to the teachers for realizing that.

The Limmat

I've been absolutely fascinated by what I've heard about river swimming here in Switzerland.  One of the first things I saw about Switzerland was a BBC spot about swimming in the Aare River in Bern.  Essentially, the city has sectioned off a segment of the river, and it's a popular summer tradition to jump into the very swift river at the top of the segment, float or swim to the bottom, and then crawl out of the river, walk back to the top, to do it all over again.  I actually remember doing something similar in an Ohio river once: maybe my mother remembers where.  And I understand that people do the same in Zürich's Limmat River, too.

I know one little girl who would enjoy this very much: she adores the lazy river in water parks, but, too often, they look like this, or worse:

How much fun it would be to enjoy the fast floating without the bumping bodies.

My little bus buddie

Today was much too cold to think about swimming, but I thought maybe Joey and I could take a walk to the river, to judge how safe and child friendly the river swimming would be.

Joey, looking longlingly at the larger swim area: this one
might have been a quarter-mile long from end to end, and
had a fun looking rest area, with lounge chairs and tiki
torches.

The smaller swimming area: this one seemed
less child friendly

It turns out that the city has diverted the Limmat so that part of it flows through private swimming areas.  These are operated by the same organization that runs all of the city pools, and so they include the same facilities (including snack stands, lending libraries, changing areas, and a life guard) that the municipal pools and beaches offer.  The water in the swimming area seems a little shallower and slower than the Limmat, but it's still quite fast. And it's surprisingly warm, no colder than our local swimming pool. Despite the cold weather and the early hour, there were a small handful of people there to demonstrate just how fast you move.  They appeared to be exercising, but it seems to be cheating, a little, to swim along with a current.

My suspicions that this is kind of novel, even for Europe, were confirmed when a German businessman stopped and asked me what on earth we were looking at.  I explained, and he looked surprised.  Both the swimming areas I saw were about a half mile from the Hauptbahnhof and the heart of Zürich. And they're right on the bus line that leaves just outside our apartment complex.  It's totally possible, although I think I might want to get Ella a life jacket or a floaty, first, mermaid though she is.

From an underwater photography
session that I won in a drawing last year.

I spent the afternoon playing with some very silly boys, sneaking outside whenever there was a pause in the rain.

When Ella came home at lunch, she announced that she would need new clothing for tomorrow's concert performance at her school.  And I had an instant flashback to all those years, from fourth grade on, that my mom and dad had to make sure we always had black pants and a white blouse in our wardrobe.  Ella's music teacher is a little more artsy: she requested that the children wear all black.  "And no shoes! In school!" Ella reported gleefully.

We made a plan to go shopping right after dinner, but Ella came home with a page-long essay to write, in German, in addition to all of her other daily chores (flash cards and daily reading).  That took much longer that we would have liked: she put the final period on it at 7:00.  But she'd been so excited about a little mommy-daughter shopping trip that I took her anyway, and we bought the only black clothing that we could find at the mall (squeezing in time for a cone of gelato, to make it a real occasion). "Oh, mom! This feels just heavenly! Oh, I feel very grown-up." She told me when she tried it on.  She thinks she looks really good.  Dennis raised his eyebrow when he saw the rhinestones, and I tried to keep a straight face. Darn it, she's growing up.

Swiss schools

Ella came home today totally indignant. "MOM. Did you know that summer vacation is only six weeks long here??"  Well actually, I know that it's five weeks long, but I decided not to share that information just then.  After the first week, all the days start to blend together, anyway, if you're doing it right.

And actually, I now know quite a bit about schools here.  Alex played up his coughing and sneezing enough to convince us to let him stay home one last day, but Dennis came home from work so that I could take my own self to class this morning.  My integration course topic this morning was on primary schools: of everything on the syllabus, today's class seemed the most important for me and the family.

And, since it's fresh on my mind, I thought I'd lay out for you what all I've gathered about the schools here. I'm sure it's mostly true.

Mandatory school starts with Kindergarten at age 4, although there is also state-subsidy for daycare (Kinderkrippe), as well.  Depending on the parent's income, these can cost between 15 and 70 francs per day. To help defray the cost further, working parents are given an automatic monthly allowance of 200 to 250 francs (included in their salary, distributed out of tax dollars) to use as they see fit.  Have I mentioned that Switzerland is child-friendly?

Kindergarten is decidedly play-based.  We watched a video in class today, and the teachers seemed oddly defensive of this curriculum. Personally, I love it. Along with the play, there is also a firm emphasis on learning to be a well-behaved and disciplined student, which I'm sure makes all the following years much easier.

The two years of Kindergarten children are mixed together: in Alex's classroom, they are called Raupen and Schmetterlinge, caterpillars and butterflies.  The butterfly release that his class did was actually something of a ceremony: school is coming to a close in three weeks, and now they're all butterflies together.

As a second-year Kindergartner, Alex is going to have five days of school: three half-days (of four hours in the morning) and two full days (with an extra two hours after lunch) on Monday and Thursday. On those days, he'll actually be in class longer than his sister.  We also learned that he'll have a new teacher next year.  Not new to the profession, but new to the school.

Conversely, today I learned that children always have the same teacher for first through third grade (Unterstufe).  In Ella's case, she'll have the same two teachers.  "But," Ella informed me, "there's no advantage. They're just like you and Dad.  They always agree about all of the rules." Excellent.

Primary school here lasts for grades 1 through 6. After sixth grade, there are just three more years of compulsive schooling.  By they time they leave primary school, children are tracked into a rigorously academic path, leading to six years of academic secondary school (Gymnasium) or, otherwise, to the second track, the Oberstufenschule, which lasts three years.

Students who have been tracked into Oberstufenschule begin, at the age of twelve, an apprenticeship for a profession: these vary from baker to to carpenter to mechanic to IT specialist.  After completing the three years of Oberstufenschule, students can proceed to three years Gymnasium, or, otherwise (depending on the profession) they can continue on to a technical college to further their training in their field.

All student students with Gymnasium diplomas can continue on to four years of university, finishing with the equivalent of a Master's degree.

The Swiss are fiercely proud of their public education system. Their attitude toward public school is completely opposite that seen in America.  Here, private school children bear a stigma: private schools are not as good, and private school students are suspected to be lacking in some way, in terms of behavior or academic ability.

I'm a little wary of the concept of tracking and professional training at such a young age, but at this point I do have one observation that I want to share.  I've never seen such professional pride in blue-collar workers, ever, as I've witnessed here.  Particularly with the gardeners and construction workers, as these are most visible to me.

Right now, the streets in front of my house are being lifted for some water pipe repair.  I'm not going to complain about the noise, however, because the constructions workers have provided endless hours of fascination for my youngest.

He and I have spent a lot of time looking out the window, watching the three men who have been busy on our street for the past several weeks.  Once in a while, while they're driving by, one might throw Joey a wave and a smile, but generally they're all business, and they never stop moving: hefting, driving, digging, sweeping. Not until the well-earned lunch break that most of the city observes. In America, it seems that, in most constructions crews, there's often one man working and four standing around, watching him.

My integration teacher says that because of this system, because all professionals are so highly trained, their is no class snobbery in Switzerland: plumbers and politicians and professors are all perfect social equals, she says.  I can't tell you if that's true, but wouldn't it be lovely if it were?

And now, to go along with the theme of the day, I thought I'd share a little video of the kids, hard at work.  Everyone was just so peaceful: it was very sweet.

Still home, still sick

Well.  Waking up to the boys' constant, throaty coughs and projectile sneezes, I had to come to peace with the fact that we'd be spending another 80-degrees-and-sunny day at home.  And, with the house completely clean, there was nothing to do but attend to my increasingly squirrelly boys.

I had to get them outside to have a little exercise and sunshine, at least, although I was really reluctant to take them anywhere public.  Not only were they all kinds of diseased,  but also there are really strict truancy laws in Switzerland, and I didn't want to have trouble for keeping Alex home.

You see, aside from illness, parents are allowed to withdraw their children from school only two days per year.  Permission for these so-called Joker Days must be applied for at least a week in advance.  Apparently, the consequence for unexcused or excessive absences is a court fine commensurate with your salary: several hundred francs, at least, per day.

Joey, in our "yard," which Dennis compares to the
 of the opening scenery of The Natural

So we stayed very close to home, just playing around our empty courtyard.  But that was enough for the boys, who joyfully rode on their scooters.  At one point Joey fell down and scraped his knee; before I could reach him, a gardner, who I'd noticed scowling at the shrubbery, was instantly there at Joey's side, his weathered face transformed by a smile, brushing my son off and pulling up his own pant leg to distract Joey with a scrape of his own, and making faces to cheer him up. Sometimes help comes from the most unexpected places.

And Alex made me proud by doing everything he could to help his little brother win races, too.  At one point, as he raced along, he gave a running commentary that went something like this: "Oh, no, Alex takes the lead! But he crashes and Joey shoots ahead. Alex is up and is chasing him! Oh, no, Joey stops and is going the wrong way, so Alex stops and waits for him to figure it out..."  It was a real nail-biter.

And here, for grandparents and aunties and uncles, is a little movie of the boys showing off their mad-crazy scooter skills:

So we played outside, scooting and painting with water at our fountain, and making flower-petal-and-stone stew, until Joey's eyes started to droop. 

Mmm-mm-mm

We moved ourselves inside where, after lunch, I just about exhausted my little bag of mommy tricks.  We played Angry Birds, old-school style:

And gave our cars new and interesting roads to travel:

And, just as I was putting Joey to sleep (wouldn't you know it), the doorbell rang, and we received a big fat box for Alex.

I know I'm repeating myself, but it bears repeating: when in Kirkland, my kids go to the best preschool, ever.  All my convictions were totally reconfirmed when Alex opened the package, sent by his beloved Teacher Pam, and dug out funky fake teeth

 and rattlesnake eggs. (You know what I mean.)

Teacher Pam raised two boys of her own: she knows what they like.

And she also enclosed photos from school, and an honorary diploma and mortar board, and, (wonderful woman!), art supplies, including paints and Alex's favorite meltable beads.  So that saw us through the rest of this afternoon.

Alex made a ring toss game out of his melty beads, and, proud as he was of it, we played well beyond the limits of my concentration.

Pushing me forward through this long day was the knowledge, tucked away in the corner of my mind, that Dennis would be coming home at 5:30....and that I'd be able to leave at that point, out for an evening with my friend.

Of course, even though it was hot and sunny all day, thunder struck as soon as I left the house, and the rain started. Honestly, I didn't care.

Free, free, we fled to a mall for books and ice cream and then, when the summer storm stopped, walked back and forth across Zürich, enjoying the longest day of the year.

The church of Enge, which we climbed up to for a
beautiful view

Lured by clanging bells, we found some of the
fuzzier residents of urban Zürich

When I got home, I found the evidence that the kids energy and enthusiasm hadn't slacked in the least, in my absence.

A worn-out daddy was further evidence.  I know just how he felt.