Photos photos photos

I'm pretty regularly updating our photo albums, so remember to click on the photos link to have a look! There are some new ones there from our recent walk in some hills south of Zurich, some pics of our new flat, some random shots of our life in Zurich, plus lots from our time in Slovakia. Enjoy!

Zürich and all that jazz

On friday night, we boogied our way through performances by the Nils Landgren Funk Unit, Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings and Maceo Parker at the Zürich International Jazznojazz Festival. Whew! After some funky tunes and a short rendition of Ghostbusters (since the guitarist for the NLFU is Ray Parker Jr, who recorded the original), the Nils Landgren Funk Unit had us swaying our hips and grooving for nearly two hours. Thinking it couldn't get much better, we were then treated to the amazing voice and theatrical presence of Sharon Jones, who's a modern-day cross between Ella Fitzgerald and Aretha Franklin. She was awesome! Then to top it off, we experienced nearly two hours of Maceo Parker and his impressive Sax (and not-so-impressive flute). After the first two awesome performances, however, we couldn't help but feel that Maceo and his crew were sort of going through the motions. They were pretty good though, and we went home completely exhausted.

Nils Landgren Funk Unit

Maceo Parker

Family symbiosis

M is affectionately touching other M's buttocks...
M> Stop pinching my butt!
M> I am not pinching it, I am caressing it!
M> Caressing, my arse!

Well, that's what I just said, duh?!?!?!

Switzerland: Chapter 1

Zurich has the most amazing public transport I've ever encountered. We've made use of it right from the beginning, and it's really very very good. There are multiple options for getting to most places, and the connections are awesome. And it's not very expensive, either, despite our fears that everything in Zurich would be ridiculously more expensive than Australia.

In general, our fears about the costs of living and excessive Swiss bureaucracy have been largely unfounded. Don't get me wrong - it's not cheap, and there is a fair amount of seemingly pointless paperwork, but it hasn't been as bad as we thought it might be. The mail system is heavily relied on for the distribution of official documents, and it's about as reliable as you'd expect from the Swiss. Renting is definitely more expensive than Melbourne, but with two salaries we're fine. Eating out is more expensive, though we've found a couple of places that are affordable on a regular basis, and will probably uncover more as we get to know the city better. Supermarket food doesn't seem to be too much more expensive - some things are even cheaper than Australia (like chocolate and yogurt), but the meat prices are enough to make you vegetarian (and since we've been here, we largely are).

All in all, things have got off to a very good start here. We managed to secure the first flat we inspected and applied for, and moved in last week. So much for the tough rental market! We've got mobile phones, Swiss bank accounts, health insurance, an internet connection and we're almost through our fourth week in the new jobs. Now we just need a social network!!

We went out last week to see a crazy Russian punk/ska band called Leningrad with one of Martin's colleagues, which was fun even though I speak even less Russian than I speak German (which is pretty much none!). Being in Europe and surrounded by so many people who easily speak three or four different languages makes me acutely aware of the enormous distance between Australia and anywhere else.

It's getting cold here now. Last weekend we had some snow, and even though it didn't stay on the ground, it did make our bargain purchase of two sets of cross country skis for 20 francs (about 20 AUD) seem well and truly worth it!!

So, that's a first snapshot of life in Zurich...

Slovakia in a nutshell

This blog hasn't got off to a good start, I know. My apologies to everyone who's disgruntled about the lack of regular updates! In my defense, however, it's been a frantic few weeks (and it seems that I'm the only one who will update it!). I'll do my best to keep it more up to date from now on.

So, Slovakia. We spent a great few weeks in Bratislava (and a little bit outside Bratislava too), with a few significant occurrences. Firstly, I met Martin's parents (a very big deal!) and fortunately the crazy Slovak/English/French conversations were sufficient to facilitate communication. With a Mexican exchange student in the house (instead of Martin's brother), there was a little bit of Spanish thrown in too. All very interesting for someone who speaks English well, French a little bit and only enough Slovak to say 'good' and 'thank you'! I now have a very small, and not terribly useful, Slovak vocabulary which I intend to form into something more practical in the coming months.

During our time in Slovakia, we went to two weddings, a few shopping centres with stupidly large supermarkets, spent a day in Vienna, rode bikes along the Danube, visited ruined (and not so ruined) castles, learned to drive on the right hand side of the road, met family and friends and went on a trip to the famous reconstructed mill (more below) and the Tatra mountains. All in all a pretty nice trip!

Our venture out of Bratislava was too brief, but enough to realise that I can't wait to go back. The mill was beautiful - it's an old wooden sawmill in the north of Slovakia that over recent years (mostly since the end of communism) has been painstakingly restored by a bunch of volunteers (including Martin and to a more serious degree, his friend Pedro). You'll have to check out the photos in our albums (see http://picasaweb.google.com/mirandazoe). We also went walking in the Tatras - my first experience of real mountains - and it was gorgeous! So impressive, and we had the most glorious autumn weather.

To cap off the start to our european adventure, we also decided during our weeks in Slovakia that we're going to get married in Bratislava in September next year. Woo hoo!

Adios Melbourne!

After all the preparation and anticipation, all that remained was to say goodbye to our friends, colleagues and family in Melbourne. Some of it was serious. Some of it was silly. Some of it was made a little easier with a shot of vodka. Europe, here we come!

Life in a box

Packing everything you own into boxes is a great way to a) force you to get rid of all the stuff you don't need b) realise how much CRAP you accumulate without even trying and c) cause you to resolve to consider all future purchases much more carefully. It's all done now, and our boxes of stuff are floating their way towards Switzerland (on a ship, we hope).

A nerd's guide to packing

In trying to decide how to send our excess stuff to Switzerland, we've had a look at a few different options. To compare them, Martin made a beautiful graph demonstrating which option is the cheapest for different quantities of stuff. Since the graph looks so beautiful, and it's highly likely that readers of this blog may one day need to send things, I've uploaded the graph. The 'excess baggage' option is calculated for Qantas, PFS = Professional Freight Services (www.pfs.net.au, takes 7-10 days), and 1m3 = ship (Kalgin: www.kalgin.com.au, takes ~53 days). Whoo hoo! Happy packing.

The countdown

So much has happened since I last wrote here. It's now just 15 days until we leave Melbourne! Martin will be submitting his bound thesis this week, and it's now 7 weeks since I submitted mine for examination. I've got a postdoc lined up at the ETH (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology) working with Annette Oxenius. Martin's circumnavigated the country in his trusty Pajero (with me on board for a couple of weeks through the Kimberley) and now it's all about packing and saying goodbye. Until a few days ago, I was chugging along concentrating on all the things we have to do, but now I'm starting to realise that saying goodbye to Melbourne and all the people here that I know and love is going to be really hard. Two years is a long time to be away - so much will change in that time. It will be very exciting though! I can't wait to be in the middle of europe, hearing different sounds, smelling different scents, watching different views and meeting new people.

Welcome to Switzerland

Zurich is in the central northern part of Switzerland, well nestled in the German section. I'm told it's about 20km from Germany, so we'll have to pop over the border for lunch some time!

A beginners guide to Europe

For those of you who aren't quite sure where Switzerland is, here's a map. Switzerland is the orange blob wedged between France, Germany, Italy and Austria. Slovakia is also on the map - a mere 700kms from Switzerland!

Big changes are afoot

While amidst the piles of paper, hours in front of the computer and endless drafting and redrafting of a PhD thesis, Martin was offered a post-doc in Zurich, Switzerland. Of course, I'll be going too! It's now three weeks since we found out, and I've been sending my CV out to potential post-doc supervisors in Zurich. I've got an interview over the phone tomorrow, which hopefully will lead to something concrete and relieve me of the constant low-level anxiety I've been feeling since we found out that Zurich would be our next home. It's all very exciting, and just a little scary!