On the Lam in Zurich

Rugby is an easy game in which to keep score, especially if your child is on the Pitch.  Either he walks off the field without help (a victory) or he is carried off (a defeat).

The past two days were reminders of recent posts combining my travel misadventures with my son’s impossible to find Rugby matches in places far and away.

Perhaps this time the scheduling was my fault, a 10:00 AM flight from London City Airport to Zurich, arriving at 12:30, a 1:30 client meeting and 2:30 rugby game.  Distances on maps don’t look very far, even Google says not to rely on their travel estimations.  But I had little choice.

It starts with trying to get to City Airport.  Why am I flying out of City Airport on SwissAir, because my son is flying out of Heathrow on British Air.  And while he didn’t tell me not to fly with him and his team, he did say I was the only parent coming to the games (Untrue).

The plane was full of the world’s worst parents and the world’s most patient flight attendants, a toxic combination.  We managed to take off on time, but land 20 minutes late, and I forgot to factor in things like customs, and passport control.

By an act of G-d I get through customs and am first in the taxi line which takes me to my client meeting in record time (way faster than Google said).  I sweep into the office at 1:30 with perfection.  I tell them I need to be out of there at 2:30 and again, clockwork, we finish our discussion, have a walk around their picturesque office overlooking Lake Zurich complete with sailboats, swans and birds aflutter. 

My new cabbie tells me we’ll be at the game in 20 minutes, could this be happening?  This cabbie name Yunis tries hard in his broken English to communicate.  I’ve made a friend.  Although he manages, I would later learn, to gladly take my Euros at his own special conversion rate (I have special rate for you Mr. hurried American businessman who doesn’t speak German and forgot that Switzerland isn’t part of the Euro-Zone)

Twenty minutes later he announces we’ve arrived, I’ve only missed half the game.  I look up to see a small house at the end of a small lane.

“What is this?”

“We are here?”

“This is not it,” I tell him.  “I am looking for a Rugby Pitch.  The Zurich International School and again I show him the address.  He shakes his head and pulls over to ask a local.  They speak in quick Swiss German which I don’t understand (I don’t understand slow Swiss German so it didn’t matter) but I do recognize the slow shaking of the head that suggests I am about to miss the match.

I take out two pieces of paper and show him the address and little did I know that Eichweg 2 Adliswil is different from Eichstrassse 2 Langnau.

He tells me he thinks he knows the way and miraculously I arrive in the middle of nowhere, which turns out to be a Rugby field, I see some orange jerseys off in the distance and then my son’s little head running down the way and I want to hug my cabbie, my new best friend.

He agrees to return in an hour, which he does and takes me to my hotel.  We also agree that he will pick me up the following morning take me to the game and then bring me back to the hotel.  He was there in the morning, dropped me off, we made a deal on the round-trip fare, but he doesn't return.

The European tolerance for late cabs far exceeds mine.  In all cities they tell us, “just five more minutes,” but they do this five, six, seven times.  So I wait five, ten, fifteen minutes and still nothing.  I wait 20 and then five more and still no sign of him.  But I am in the middle of nowhere, so what are my options?

I start walking toward town, and walking and walking until I find a hotel.  The hotel calls a cab and soon I am back in my hotel.  For the next two hours while I hunch over my laptop in my room working I await the knock at the door, broken down by the Polizei who are waiting to take me away because of the 30 Francs I owe the cabbie.  And I will tell them I waited and they will ask how long and then they will say incredulously, “only 30 minutes” and into Jail I will go.

But no police come and I even walk the streets although I have this running fear that I will be shot from an apartment window.  I made it to the airport without incident, although I almost confessed my guilt when they asked at customs if I had anything to declare.

Zurich is another place, very different from the economically challenged countries we’ve visited so far.  With 3% unemployment, 65 degree weather and a perfect sun reflecting off Lake Zurich, you’re hard pressed to find someone complaining.  Mostly I saw couples walking along the water, young couples in arms, older folks enjoying the sun, a band of middle aged men playing the accordion and general harmony.

I watched my son’s two games and took enough pictures for a rugby career, because these may be his last.  He scored a try and I saw it.  He made some great tackles and they are on film.  He high fived his teammates and stayed with a Swiss family who offered him ham and cheese breakfast-lunch and dinner. 

One player ended up in the hospital with internal bleeding.  “We thought he broke his pelvis, but it was just bleeding,” the coach told me.  Another 9^th grader had a concussion and I could see from the stands his eyes rolling around his head. 

And while his team didn’t win, getting to watch him run off the field was a victory for this parent. 

In Brussels

Our first impression upon arrival was, where is everybody?

At 1:00 on a Tuesday nobody is on the streets.  No smokers lining the sidewalks, shoppers, people returning from lunch, tourists?

At our first client meeting we ask about the empty streets:  “Nobody lives in Brussels.  Everyone lives outside.  We have the most beautiful towns 30 minutes from here, Bruges, Gent.   So the reverse is happening here, the price of properties in the city are going down.  It’s becoming a place for the poor to live.”

The major technological advancement we saw was the elevator had no buttons.  Halfway down the hall you punched in your floor number on a pad on the wall and it told you which elevator to go to and it took you to that floor when you arrived.  The building which currently houses 3000 employees was made for 2000, so this system improves the elevator wait time.  

I noticed our client, who spoke English to us, spoke French to someone in the hallway and then Dutch to the woman at the conference desk. 

“Which language do you speak around here?”

He told us everyone has to be fluent in all three because he will speak to clients and hear presentations in all three, all day long.  He said his brain is tired at the end of the day switching back and forth, but the real challenge is marketing, his main job.

Imagine having to create a marketing campaign in two languages, French and Dutch.  And if you send the marketing piece in the wrong language to the wrong person, not only might they not understand it, they are offended and will cancel the service. 

Beyond that they need to come up with product names and since the Dutch speakers want nothing French and the French don’t want Dutch, you have to find a meaningless words that interests and attracts without offending.

Hence products with a name like Bizz.

City of Festivals

If Paris is the City of Light, London is the City of Festivals.

Like most large cities the powers that be assume we need a reason to get off the couch and go shopping.  So they create a variety of festivals, events and gatherings that give you something new to do in a city with a million things to do.

Last weekend it was the “International Chocolate Festival” which I think was just a bunch of people trying to sell chocolate.  But they had some cool things, like an expensive entrance fee, a wall of chocolate where you could carve your name and melted chocolate with a paintbrush so you could paint your name on canvas, in chocolate.

Once inside Vinopolis just outside of Borough Market, it wasn’t just a bunch of people selling chocolate.  You also had people who trained you in smelling chocolate, tasting chocolate, and of course eating and drinking chocolate.  The girls loved it, there were more free samples than China Town.

This week we schlepped to Kentish Town on Saturday morning to jump into the world’s coldest pool.  Beyond that, however, we were taking part in a world record attempt at having the most people treading water in one place for one minute.

Two children joined me for this excursion (my wife seemed to have made it to the Chocolate Festival, but I got the iceberg swim).  We jumped into the frigid water and spent the time trying to avoid being kicked and then helping a drowning man to the side because the life guards were too busy counting the number of people in the pool to see if we broke the record.

It was very official, we even had to sign release forms for our photos in case we made it in and the Mayor of Camden pressed the starting button.  I counted about 150 people, the number we needed was closer to 300.  We did receive a certificate which, if you read closely, congratulated us on “attempting” a world record.

And then there are the big events.  For example, this was the weekend for the one and only American football game at Wembley Stadium.  Friday night we sat with Cuba Gooding Jr and a few thousands folks to watch the movie Jerry McGuire outdoors in Trafalgar Square.  They sold plenty of Bears and Bucs hats and shirts but the intermission interview by a local radio host revealed how little our hosts know about football.  And then on Sunday we took the train out to Wembley to watch Chicago and Tampa Bay.

While the purpose of the event is to introduce American football to the Brits, what it has become is a chance for expats to dress up in their hometown gear and root for a good play.  A chance for grown men to wear those cheeseheads and Viking helmets they dragged here from the States.

We waved our Bucs flags and enjoyed some of the British questions (try explaining a safety and why they punt the ball afterwards), but it’s a beautiful stadium and real enthusiasm for a game where very few care who wins.

A couple of very British things while we were there:  At halftime there was an announcement that the game will “re-commence in five minutes, please make your way to your seats.”  There were signs to text the word “issue” to a certain phone number if you see “anti social behaviour.”  And while the Brits laugh at the Americans for our patriotism (they think playing the Star Spangled Banner at the start of games is hokey), when they sang God Save the Queen, at the start of the game, the place exploded in song.

Death on a Train

OK, I had an Ugly American moment this week as I sailed along on the star of Europe, the train between London and Paris, or in my case, London and Brussels.

At 5:15 Monday evening we boarded what looked like a normal train, no star quality yet, but once we got moving you felt like you were gliding along on air, a veritable magic carpet from London to Brussels in two hours. 

Past fields and sheep, and then some places that looked more like New Jersey than London.  We were sweeping along until we weren’t.  We paused and then stopped.  The conductor announced we would be moving five minutes.

I closed my eyes and dreamt of Brussels and the meetings and the squares and lunch with some friends in the Belgian government.

I awoke 30 minutes later to an announcement that we would moving shortly.  And then “we will be moving in 10 minutes.”  And then, “there was an unauthorized exit, we need the police to investigate.”  And then, “We need to wait for the police.”  And then “we need to wait for completion of the investigation.”  And then, “there is free water in the club car.”  And then after 4 hours of these small meaningless announcements, “we are heading back to Ashland to switch trains.”  To me Ashland could be next to Brussels, but alas is it backwards, toward London. 

And finally, once the train starts going in reverse and we stop in Ashland they tell us to exit the train, “we will be heading back to London.”

The train is perfectly equipped with a colicky, croupy, crying babies, snoring old men and foul smelling people.  Someone is going to pay for this.

The announcements come in English, French and German.  I notice the ones in English are much shorter than the others.  My co-worker, who speaks all of those languages, gets a quizzical look on his face when the French announcement is made.

“Suicide,” he whispers.

“No, don’t do that, it’s only a missed train,” I tell him.

“No, the reason for the delay.  Someone jumped off the train.”

In English they called it an “unauthorized door opening.”  I guess that’s one way to put it.

We arrive back in London, it's now eleven PM, the St Pancras train station is barren, the gate agents who are supposed to help us are not helpful and they announce:  “We have no vouchers, but don’t worry, you’ll be reimbursed for hotels and cabs.  Come back tomorrow and we’ll find a train for you.”

This cannot stand!  How do I know there will be seats, I’m not going to come back without a seat, an assigned train, some assurance.  But everyone else listens and they smile and they make a queue for the free chips and orange juice and they call their spouses/partners/parents/hotels/colleagues and tell them of this “funny journey” they’ve been on.  I storm off along with a Spaniard who mumbles, “No sandwiches, just bloody crisps?”

They tell us the first train is at 6:15 the following morning and then every hour after that.

I re-arrange some meetings and plan to arrive the next morning at 8:30, take the 9:15, we lose an hour on the train ride and will arrive at 12:15 in time for lunch with the embassy and then on to our 2:00 meeting.

The next morning the station is teeming and again I rush to the head of the line, “I was on the Brussels train last night, yada, yada,” and the very sweet lady says, “Oh yes, quite a night, sorry about that, do you want to get on the next train?”

“Oh, indeed I do, thanks so much.”

“No problem and here is a food voucher.” 

“Great, this is so much better than last night.”

“OK, the next train boards in two hours.”

“No, no, no, I want to get on the 9:15, the one that leaves in 30 minutes!!!”

“There is no 9:15, just the 10:57”

“They told me there is a train every hour.”

“Who told you that?”

“The guy last night”

“He was mistaken.  Next!”

Most of the others who were stranded the previous night smile and say, “Let’s get some coffee” as they hurry off for a Capuccino.  I sit and steam myself.

We call our meetings, cancel some, re-schedule others.

It would be nice not to care.  It would be nice to view a suicide jumper and a five hour train ride to nowhere as a “funny excursion.”  It would be nice to view mis-information and cancelled trains as an extra chance for an espresso. 

But alas, I am not quite there.

The story of our fateful train ride made the news.  An Albanian man was refused entry to the UK and took the first train back to Belgium.  It was unclear if he was trying to escape or kill himself.  See below:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2050378/Eurostar-passenger-jumps-train-dies-refused-UK-entry.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

Million Dollar Moment

Since most expats we meet came here for the husband/father’s job, there is an immediate connection amongst the husbands/dads for either bringing their families to this Nirvana or for being voted worst father/husband of the year.

Another common thread amongst the expat dads is our shared complaint about the costing, as the Brits say.  If I followed my wife’s advice and just assumed a dollar is a pound, then everything would be mysteriously 60% more expensive than I expect.

So while we complain this is costing “millions” to live here, the truth is we have this secret code because we keep having “million dollar moments.”  Those moments that no matter how much this costs, it’s all worth it. 

I’ve written about many of them, the everyday moments of walking the kids to school or having the opportunity for those tube-ride conversations. They are happening in bigger settings now:  Hearing about how they managed the Tube by themselves on the way to meet friends at lunch, how they signed up for that class they never would have at home, or the new friends they made and the skill they used to insert themselves in a clearly uncomfortable social situation.

And then there is going to the Royal Albert Hall for a concert with your wife.  A concert with a singer who most people don’t know, but who is a great talent and explained to the audience how this venue is much better than Congregation Beth Shalom on Long Island, where she got her start. 

It’s about walking into the most stunning building I’ve even been in, struck how every view is better than the next, how Marvin Hamlisch conducted, how grateful she was that the audience was there and how grateful we were to be there.

It wasn’t just dinner at the small club nearby, or the walk by Hyde Park on the way home.  It was all of it.  And as we left the auditorium the other expat husband looked over at me and said, “A million dollar moment.”

A Pub in Dulwich

The Pub in Dulwich reeks of stale beer and makes me warm with memories of the Sammy fraternity house of 20+ years ago.   The seats are crushed red velvet.  A piano sits in the corner, light brown wood, fairly banged up and looks like it hasn’t been played since the war.  There are saloon doors that are nicked and scraped, maybe a knife fight relic.  In the back there is a garden with tables and patrons, picnic tables out front with people sitting alone and in groups talking and reading despite the chill and the darkening sky.

I ordered a lager and tried to scratch out a few words in a notebook.  How did I get to this village seven miles south of London, but a world away?

Heading to my son’s first JV Rugby game (at Dulwich College) I take the over-ground train, with the advice of an office-mate, to West Dulwich.  Trouble is when I get to the train station there is only East and North Dulwich train stops.  I am late, as usual, so I excitedly email and text my office-mate, but of course Blackberry is down (I don’t yet know this) and none of this is getting through.

I get on the train toward Dulwich and she calls and advises North Dulwich is best, should be a five minute walk to Dulwich College, which you can’t miss because the campus of this near 400 year old school lays across acres of perfectly trimmed gardens and fields (Founded 1619).  I arrive at North Dulwich and a schoolboy advises me it’s a five minute walk to the right.  Five minutes later a lady with a dog advises me to turn around and walk to the corner and it’s “a good 40 minute walk.”

I begin to run, all the while texting my son, but again, nothing it going through, although I don’t know why.

Twenty minutes and a full sweat, in my office suit, I get to a fork in the road.  I ask a young mom with two kids.  “Take a left at the fork and it’s right there.”

I go left and continue running, still nothing.  An old man on a bench tells me it’s another 10 minutes on the right, but the pitches (fields) are on the left.

I arrive at this monstrosity, walk into the school and ask the janitor which field is the game on?

“We have 16 fields, you need to go to reception.”

At reception a frazzled woman with frizzy hair behind a large desk asks if I can wait.  I tell her I can’t and I need to know the pitch for the ASL rugby game.  Three wrong folders later she tells me pitch 6 and points me in a direction.

I run across the campus, through the parking lot, behind the dorms and arrive at pitch 6.

Sweating, tired, but relieved I see my son on the sideline.  He runs to me, big smile.

“My game was cancelled.  Did you get my text?”

I realize, as the rain begins to fall, that this is not his fault, nor anybody elses, but I still want to run on the field and tackle one of the players and ram him into the ground.

“No, I didn’t get your text.”

“Yea, not enough players.  The Varsity team is playing, though, I might get into that game.”

Two hours later the game ends.  He did not get in, but seems content with the ball game he and the others played on the sideline.  By then I have cooled down both physically and emotionally.  He heads to dinner and then back home with the team.  I start my journey to the train.  This time I don't run through Dulwich, I walk.  Past Roger Pope and Partners Independent Dispensing Opticians, past Art the Stationer and the Green Village Toy Shop.  And then of course the Pub.  Where I rest before the final leg.

My Blackberry springs to life with a ring. It’s home.  “Are you almost here?  We’re ready to eat dinner.”

I inform them that I'm in no rush.  "I'll be awhile."

Two Sides of Love

When your children are born all you care about is that they are healthy.  Everything from their Apgar score to the day they walk it’s about their physical health.  Are they breathing, are they crawling, are they walking.  And OMG are they doing it on schedule?

Once you pass that hurdle it becomes more complex tasks, are they holding a fork, a pencil, are they throwing, kicking, speaking?

And at some point it morphs into concern about their emotional health.  Are they happy?  Can they make friends, share, converse, love?

Crossing this last hurdle is different.  When they walk, talk, use the potty there is relief, and some satisfaction about the way it changes your life.  But when they love, the platonic love of friendship, someone outside your family for the first time you are proud and leery.  Because you know just as love gives, it takes. 

So when the best friend gets off that international flight and the girls hug and hold hands and smile, smile, smile, you know in your mind that there is also going to be a day like this morning.  The day the best friend goes back home and your child goes back to school and there is the drama of the complete collapse.

And so today she didn’t learn how to love, but we now know she understands the two sides of love.  And her heart breaks, and so does ours.

A Fake Day

Where is the thrill?

While the real Paul McCartney was being married literally down the street, I was in line behind a Frenchman asking the real “tour guides” of Madame Tussauds, whether Justin Bieber was inside.

“Oh yes, he’s on the third floor, right near Britney Spears.”

And the friends high fived.

I wanted to tell them, “they’re not really here.”

Nonetheless the crowd of thousands paid $50 a person to walk the mammouth halls of these five floors so they could get their photos taken with a mannequin. 

Walking with children ages 11-15 they swept past John Wayne, Audrey Hepburn, James Dean.  “Who?”

At Alfred Hitchcock they knew it was something scary, one person asked, as she stood under a Bates Motel sign, “Is that Jack the Ripper?”

In a room off to the side there was an odd mix of politicians.  It sounds like the start of a bad joke, but what do MLK and Hitler have in common?  Someone felt they belonged with JFK, Castro and Ghaddafi for photos.   Do Lady Gaga, Gandhi and Nelson Mandela really belong in the same space?

Pope John Paul?  The Lama?

While some people didn’t know the superstars of old, Robin Williams and Schwarzenegger were lonely, they practically trampled us to get a picture with Michael Jackson, who clearly hasn’t lost any of his…luster.

It doesn’t count as a real day.  Everything was fake, from the people, the excitement, and especially the gift shop where they will put your name on a fake academy award.

But what is it about this place?  In every language they run to get their photos in some odd poses with a wax figure of Tom Cruise.  First I became angry at the crowds for their lack of civility and sheer stupidity.  Then I got angry at the creators of the exhibit for failing to at least give some history lesson to this most captive of audiences. 

Until finally there was a section on the real Anna Maria Tussaud who created death masks of famous guillotine victims of the French Revolution.  And these masks turned into an exhibit and it allowed people to see what Marie Antoinette or Robespierre looked like. 

However that need no longer exists.  I don’t need a wax figure to see what Lady Gaga looks since I can download a naked picture of her while waiting in line for my ticket.

Missing Home

Distance is making the heart grow fond for certain things, but mostly for our beloved sports teams.  Watching a baseball/football/hockey game is exciting, but there is nothing like the exquisite tension of reaching for your Blackberry at 6:30 in the morning to see the headlines of how your team fared.

And the success of the teams definitely amplifies the interest:  The Detroit Tigers are in the midst of their best season since 1984, the Lions are having a run they have not had in MY LIFETIME, and the Michigan Wolverines seem to be back where we expect them to be in the Top 25 (and I would be remiss if I didn’t mention my son’s happiness about the Redskins 3-1 start and the Nationals 3^rd place finish).

When you don’t live in the place where you grew up, certain aspects of your hometown teams bring back the warmth of childhood:  the color of Lion blue, the wheels of the Red Wings, the D in the Tigers cap.  And whether it’s a memory of Olympia or Cobo Arena, or the newer instances shared with the next generation at the Palace or the new ballpark, the one with the Ferris wheel, there is real joy.  Not just sentimental, but true shared joy in their success which somehow becomes our success. 

While my son’s biggest complaint about London is the time difference (a problem I cannot fix, but my wife is looking into) there are those moments each week, when the games start too late and he bursts into our room first thing with the following:  “Can you believe they won” or “Don’t tell me what happened, turn on SportsCenter” or the rarely uttered  “Tell me what happened Dad?”

And while we are not at Fedex Field or Comerica Park, or even staying up late to watch Monday Night Football, we are linked to their success with our own moments, our own highlights, our own connection that is no less memorable.

Third World

Stomach ailments and sinus infections in our house continue unabated.  Then a ferocious smell consumed our bedroom and we're convinced there is a mold problem.  The plumbers arrive with their equipment and find moisture, but no signs of "serious mold."

There is a discussion of a possible dead rodent in the ceiling, "Wait ten days or so for it to de-compose, nothing we can do."

Then our neighbors ask if we have covers on the cisterns? 

“Cisterns, as in water drums from biblical times?” 

"Yes, you don't drink the water in the upstairs bathroom do you?"

"All our bathrooms are upstairs?"

"No, you've got to use bottled water.  The water is rain water and there are no covers on them so birds bathe in them..."

But they've cured the plague, right?