Switzerland

Switzerland was surprisingly great. We stayed in a chateau/chalet outside of Delemont, in a little village up the hill called Vellerat. The altitude, the mist over the valley, the cows, all reminded me of rural Ach'ara -- what it might look like 200 years from now (with paved roads and modern buildings & cars). We were served 7 kinds of cheese each day at breakfast, with some mystery dried meats. Early in the week, I saw some meat labelled cheval/caballero (horse) in the store, and then there was something very similar looking on the table the next day. I believe I confirmed it was beef, but who knows, really!

Our hosts' house sat atop their restaurant, called the Coq d'Or (Golden Rooster), where we were fed Schnitzel in our first evening. Schnitzel, with thin French fries, a mustardy (but not too mustardy) salad, and a sorbet cake with crumbled bits of berry meringue between the layers. We worked with the high school students every day from 9-4 (just 7 of us) while the rest of the group relaxed. It was rewarding and fun working with the kids, although the day that we taught all day and immediately went into a never ending Balkan dance that got us home at 11, only to get up early the next day to teach more, was a little wearing. Fortunately, the kids picked up the songs really fast, so by the end of the week, we had a morning off.   Almost every morning, there was some kind of media presence -- two TV crews, a newspaper, and a radio station. I was interviewed by the radio station, but who knows if we'll ever hear it. It would be cool to see the TV clips. 

The two being interviewed at the moment are both bilingual -- they did most of the translating for our workshops. 

There were two cats who visited the school every day at lunch and often snuck into the music building: 

The kids were really into their instruments -- in fact, it was often difficult to get them to put them down after our Balkan songs and resume singing. Several of them were very into improvisation, so during Eleno Kjerko (a Macedonian song in 7/8), Julien had a solo on his electric guitar that was not at all Balkan, but was at least quite amusing! 

The students were very interested in our songs, particularly the American gospel songs. They were also pretty geeked when Megan pulled out some US dollars out of her wallet. Everyone wanted to exchange francs for dollars, which was kind of perfect, since her bank card had just gotten eaten by the ATM earlier that day. 

This was our view as we left Vellerat for the long drive to Annecy, France. 

What a beautiful place! I would definitely come back. I'll always have something to remember Switzerland by (at least for the next few years), since I bought a pair of Josef Seibel shoes to replace my Keens which started holding water when we were in England. "Nice shoes!" "Thanks - I got 'em in Swiiiiiiitzerland!" 

Wales

We had a lovely time in Wales. We spent time in Abergele, Penmanmawr, Conwy, and Wrexham. This is the neighborhood where we performed -- this must be Penmanmawr.  

That night, four of us stayed in Conwy (pronounced Conway), about 20 min. away from the rest of the group. Lucky for us, it was a walled city with a castle! It was pretty thrilling to drive through at night! 

It was also great to realize that my decision to stay back from the hike to Mt. Snowden was perfect, since I'd have a day in the walled city. 

After a long shower, and 3 loads of laundry put in and hung dry, I wandered into the town along the footpath by myself.  I had a message from Kimaya and Nicki that they had been dropped off there in the morning (also not hiking), so I knew I might run into my letter-writing-knitting buddies at some point.  It wasn't long before we were up to no good in the visitor center (the only place where I heard an actual Welsh accent). 

We spent a good chunk of time down by the harbor writing postcards and eating fish and chips. Kimaya muttered warnings under her breath to the tourists about not feeding the seagulls -- "don't do it! they'll eat you alive!" 

We ate our fill of chips, and heard familiar fiddle tunes from our friend Lysander down the way. We danced a jig and left some chips in his violin case. It seemed like the perfect payment. Afterwards, we caught up with Adam and climbed the city walls! 

The sky was threatening rain (apparently the weather can vary from minute to minute and mile to mile), but we managed to stay dry the whole time. These were the views from the top! 

On the way back, I had a lovely meeting with three black cats, who were very friendly and curious. The one on the right had 3 legs and a white heart on each paw. 

It was really nice to have a day off with absolutely no plan, and a host who could accommodate us! She made us cottage pie (which I learned is what the US calls shepherds' pie).  Shepherds' pie is actually made with lamb. Someone should tell North America. We were also served steamed broccoli, which was an unexpected (but very welcome) surprise. We've been eating a lot of sandwiches, and potluck foods (quiche! Chips! Cheese!) so it was great to be served homemade food that included real vegetables. 

I also observed in Wales that the Welsh are crazy about their tea. Every concert we did in Wales involved a hearty tea break for up to a half an hour, with long queues for everyone to get their "proper" tea. It was a miracle we even started the second half at all on some nights. It was also amusing to see signs in Welsh and English, which made it feel much more like a foreign country, even though almost everyone we met was English and had moved there.  Our host schooled us on letters like 'ff', which is just /f/ and 'f' which is /v/, and 'w', which is a vowel that sounds like /oo/, and 'dd', which is /TH/, of all things. 

I would definitely go back to northern Wales. It would be great to see more of it at some point. Someday! 

Last bits of Scotland

We left Moniaive, and headed to Dunbar, Scotland. Before we left, we visited Andy Goldsworthy's Striding Arches. There was a big drive up lots of bumps that reminded me a little of the drive in Merisi, Ach'ara, except we weren't riding in military jeeps and no one was hanging on for dear life! Our hosts happened to have the key to the path up to the arches, since they work for the forestry service, so we were able to go by car most of the way up, and then hike the last 20 minutes. 

We went from there to Edinburgh, where it was wonderful to meet up with members of the Georgian choir, whom I've met on various trips to Georgia and Scotland. 

We were fairly spread out around the city for our housing arrangements, but it was nice to meet up together in this flat where we had our workshop and concert for cooking of shared meals, and Nutella mochas from the coffee shop downstairs. 

From there, we went on to Dunbar, which was definitely a place I would visit again! 

We stopped for a windy lunch by the sea in Belhaven. There may have been epic naked kelp battles in the waves, and there was definitely great shell hunting and collecting. I'll let you imagine who did what. 

Dunbar is a quaint little town by the sea. 

It is also, apparently, the sunniest place in all of Scotland, which we were fortunate to experience. 

This was the view from the house we stayed in on High street, with a direct view of the sea! I commented to my host that it was a spectacular view and he retorted, "well, sometimes, but it's also grey and unchanging." 

Scotland!

We're in Scotland now, in a town called Moniaive (pronounced Mo-nee-ive), which no one in England has heard of. It was fun riding in the cargo van with Emily and Gretchen, with about a jillion roundabouts, each time with the van stalling and asking to shift gears at strange times (like in the middle of several roundabouts), and seeing the changing landscape immediately after we left England. Suddenly there were way more sheep and low brick walls and thistles - oh, the thistles! 

That's my hand, playing Iso and Sam's new game, which involves putting your hand in a new state or country and yelling out, "FIRST ONE IN SCOTLAND!"

After that, we rode through lots of small roads that looked like this: 

and rode through the little passing ditch on the side. It was my job as the passenger on the left to announce when we were too close to the hedges on the side, since our driver on the right couldn't tell. Moniaive looked like this when we arrived. I wish I had caught a pic of the big blue "YES!" signs on the way in, saying that people were Indies/Independents voting for an independent Scotland.

Larry's first workshop song this afternoon was "I woke up this morning with my mind on freedom", and someone pointed out, we DID wake up with our minds on freedom and we didn't get it! I'm very curious to have conversations with my host families now that we're in Scotland, since I got a variety of opinions when we were in England, like "Britain should be able to vote on this matter, too" or "as a Scot living in England, my heart says yes, but the accountant in me says no", etc. 

Last night and the night before, we were at the Sage at Gateshead, where we were treated like rockstars and presented with ham & leek pies, cooked vegetables and individual chocolate mousses. 

The students there are in a program called "Community Music", which involved making music accessible to everyone, particularly in rural areas.  

Now, we're in a very rural area, with a primary school that has only 52 kids. We did a small concert at the primary school and a workshop with the P6 and 7 class (age 10,11 so like 5th/6th grade for us).  They were very shy, and had thick, thick accents. At the end of the concert, the P1 teacher asked the kids, "Do you know what 'harmony' means?" and in the cutest little accent, one girl said, "it's laik a tchune ware tew parrts seng tuhgehtherr tuh make bewtihful musik!" 

This was on the cover of the newspaper this morning... 

Norwich.

Norwich is lovely -- lots of open air markets, shops, and civilization. Like stationery stores! I was on my way to the Cathedral, when I saw a sign in the window for Stabilo pens -- a pen that I was given as a gift in 2008 that has been the best pen and has held up since then. I'm not sure where Stabilo is made, but I haven't seen them anywhere in the States since, so I was very happy to get some smooth writing utensils. Since I missed back to achool shopping this year, I was very happy to do some in England -- especially since they are light and useful on the journey. The maple walnut fudge from the creamery down the road in Vermont may not prove to be so useful. It probably won't make it all the way back to Seattle and is just weight at this point. 

We stopped for fish and chips on Lower Goat Lane. So good! 

(Don't worry, I snagged some chips from the loads and loads that were purchased by the group!) 

Journey to England.

We've just arrived in England. It turns out, the trip to Iceland from Boston is just a short, hop over the pond... Shorter than it is from Seattle to Boston, even. Super short and easy flight, with a miniature layover -- just enough time to locate puffin paraphernalia, some black licorice chocolate candies that I remember from 4 years ago, and a volcanic rock necklace. I've been needing some big gaudy jewelry for performance (cough cough, Dunava) and I figure if I have to wear it, it might as well have some -earth- in it! Plus, I'll have a piece of Iceland with me whenever I perform: 

Also, note the woolen spirals! They remind me of crafters in Sighnaghi, where I bought them as gifts and didn't keep any for myself. So, that's done. Multi purpose art jewelry is always a good thing. 

I've finally made the switch over to shoes and socks, after wearing sandals all over New England for everyday wear and for performance. It feels very strange, especially since I usually have this feeling when I go back to school in the fall. Fall in England, England isn't as cold as I thought it would be... The sun is out and it's probably around 72. Maybe all those extra wool socks won't be necessary yet. 

8/17 Now we're in Norwich. We had our first concert in England last night in Castle Acre, at St. James Cathedral. 

There are parts of the church built in 1450. There were gravestones inside the church (or I don't know what you call them... Mausoleum plaques?), one of which was for a woman who died in 1786 at the age of 33. I took note that it was the wife of Ross Jermyn, whose name was quite large (while the wife's name, who the plaque was actually for, was quite small). The "toilet" was outside, and you had to pass through a spookily lit graveyard to get there. It felt a little like Halloween in the mist.  Right before our concert, Adam asked me if I wanted to see the priory, so we ran through the cemetery and the hedges to a clearing, where the runs of the priory, built in 1140 or so, were there in the twilight. It was quite magical. I didn't have my camera, so I just took a mental picture. I hope we'll have time to go back there tomorrow before we leave Castle Acre. Also, before the concert, a few of us wandered around the castle keep... Built in 1140, which are pretty much just ruins now. 

We met this chap, who was walking around the ruins. He grew up here, and said that he and his friends would have the best snowball fights in this place. Three would be inside the castle (where they are standing) holding the keep and three would be outside storming the castle. How fun! It seemed like there should be some Game of Thrones reenactment and there wasn't nearly enough bloodshed. Probably plenty of bloodshed in history, though. 

A jolly time was had by all. Kimaya also shared with us how she fell in the moat when she was there last year. Luckily none of us fell in on the trek up the goat path to this place. We also walked around the town on the way to dinner, which didn't involve cold quiche, as was foretold. Plenty of delicious warm quiche,

though. 

Philadelphia.

We had a great time in Philadelphia. We stayed in Germantown, a historic section of town with large stone houses built in the 1880s.

It turns out, the Philadelphia School for the Deaf, which is the third oldest school for the deaf in the US, was right down the street from where we stayed, so my host kindly drove me there and waited in the car while I ran in. Since it was the first week of school, it seemed unrealistic to expect a tour of classrooms, but I did meet with the Head of School. She happened to be from Seattle and had a Sounders flag in her office!  Her office was George Washington's office during the battle of Germantown. Everything is so old and there's so much history -- right here in our own country! 

After visiting the school, I went to an Eastern European market that had the most important item for our Georgian supra later that evening: 

They had quite a selection of Bulgarian juices, including a really good one called "Exotic". They also had packs of giant cucumbers-- 3 bread loaf sized beauties for $1.50! I bought cucumber, tomato, onion and feta for 35 and made 2 giant bowls of Shopska Salata to add to our supra. Thank goodness for this place: 

It was originally owned by Georgians, which is why my host took me there (plus, she saw my eyes widen when she served us Bulgarian mango juice). Juice and huge vegetables for 35 people, for $40. Not bad! 

The house we stayed in was built in 1882, and had rooms and rooms of interesting art and musical instruments. 

The owner of the house played these interesting modern steel pan-like instruments called "hongs", made in Switzerland about 10 years ago. They are played by lightly tapping the divots and the ball in the middle, which is tuned to G. 

 The woman of the house is a master knitter, so she got my knitting project started. If I'm diligent, I'll finish this purple hat, and the rainbow one I got the yarn for. We'll see. Knitting in the car hasn't been something I've attempted yet, since I'm usually very actively combatting motion sickness with ginger pills, ginger chews, and Sea Bands. 

These two have gotten much farther with their projects! 

We're now arriving in NYC for a Bulgarian workshop with Pepa, then a concert in SoHo.