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.