A Slow Day
Zurich has a different vibe than New York. New York made me feel like I needed to spend every minute of every hour of every day doing something. If I wasn't on the run, I felt unsettled. Here in Zurich, so far I've been sleeping in longer and taking my time doing the little things. Today, I had to buy a fan. The air in Zurich is very still so even though the summer is not very warm 80 degrees or so usually, it feels much warmer. Last night we dragged the small mattress on to our balcony and slept outside for a while because it was too still and warm in the apartment.
My routine in Zurich has been to wake up around noon. Eat breakfast while watching some Sopranos and blogging. Then I do the "hotel room" workout that my trainer and I put together. 100 each of pushups, situps off the workout ball, dips off of a diningroom chair, and bicep curls with the exercise bands. Then it's a shower and I'm out the door at the crack of 3pm. They do call it vacation for a reason.
I decided to walk to bahnhofstrasse in a different way today and I stumbled upon the Swiss museum.
Inside the swiss museum courtyard there were a bunch of cannons, so I couldn't resist the urge to play Age of Empires.
Fire!!!
I decided to check out the shops under the bahnhofplatz and wandered into the middle of their farmer's market.
There was so much fresh cheese there. I could have bought 10 different gruyeres. They even had raclette (a dish similar to fondue poured over potatoes) for only 8.50, but unfortunately I wasn't that hungry. I picked up some dried mangoes (which I can't help buying even when I'm not hungry) and went on to the main shopping drag to buy a fan.
Apparently the Swiss Culture book I read wasn't kidding about the Swiss and their superstition about drafts. It claims that it is a commonly held Swiss superstition that drafts are the source of colds, bad luck, almost anything that can go wrong. It seems silly, but it was really hard to find a fan. There are no box fans in Switzerland at all. Few buildings, even commercial ones, have air conditioning because public ordinances prevent people from adding them. Their only option is to build a house with a special roof designed to trap the heat, which works well for the big stores, but isn't a feature in many apartments (including ours). Well I bought the biggest rotating fan I could find, so we might not have to camp out from our own apartment tonight.
My routine in Zurich has been to wake up around noon. Eat breakfast while watching some Sopranos and blogging. Then I do the "hotel room" workout that my trainer and I put together. 100 each of pushups, situps off the workout ball, dips off of a diningroom chair, and bicep curls with the exercise bands. Then it's a shower and I'm out the door at the crack of 3pm. They do call it vacation for a reason.
I decided to walk to bahnhofstrasse in a different way today and I stumbled upon the Swiss museum.
Inside the swiss museum courtyard there were a bunch of cannons, so I couldn't resist the urge to play Age of Empires.
Fire!!!
I decided to check out the shops under the bahnhofplatz and wandered into the middle of their farmer's market.
There was so much fresh cheese there. I could have bought 10 different gruyeres. They even had raclette (a dish similar to fondue poured over potatoes) for only 8.50, but unfortunately I wasn't that hungry. I picked up some dried mangoes (which I can't help buying even when I'm not hungry) and went on to the main shopping drag to buy a fan.
Apparently the Swiss Culture book I read wasn't kidding about the Swiss and their superstition about drafts. It claims that it is a commonly held Swiss superstition that drafts are the source of colds, bad luck, almost anything that can go wrong. It seems silly, but it was really hard to find a fan. There are no box fans in Switzerland at all. Few buildings, even commercial ones, have air conditioning because public ordinances prevent people from adding them. Their only option is to build a house with a special roof designed to trap the heat, which works well for the big stores, but isn't a feature in many apartments (including ours). Well I bought the biggest rotating fan I could find, so we might not have to camp out from our own apartment tonight.
posted by sfphotoblogger at 10:05 PM
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