Can't say one thing correctly in Italian class but when I'm trying to haggle with someone it's only then that I know how to conjugate verbs

Give-a me-a a dizcount
da bike you sold me is le crappy!

Got stopped by the security guard at work today. I was like UH I WORK HERE stop targeting me by my appearance. I said who I was and walked away but she was all "Wait!" and called someone to confirm my identity. What, lady?! SCUSATIMI! Then I realized hours later after listening to many long winded scales and arias that there were auditions today. Yeah duh, I'm just PRETENDING to be an intern to infiltrate the opera auditions. But actually, those theater people are crazy so I forgive her. Maybe I'll slip in and try to sing some of what I heard last Wednesday when I saw Tosca. Namely, "WAHHH wah wah wha WAHHH whaaahhh vittoria WAHHH."

Switzerland, or Cheating Death With Every Day

Switzerland!! Such a great place. It was actually hard to make ourselves leave because it's so fun and cozy there. This was my first time traveling overnight on this trip so far and it was really fun to go to a whole new country. Coming from America, Europe feels like the mini world exhibit at Epcot, we drove for a few hours and were in that short amount of time we were in an entirely different place.

We got there at 4:30 in the morning which was rough even if you did manage to sleep on the coach bus which was seemingly designed for nine year olds or people without legs and we had to wake up at 7:45 to sign up for what activities we wanted to do the next morning. So obviously after three hours of sleep we were somewhat unenthusiastic to wake up. Until we opened our blinds and saw the view. Suddenly we couldn't wait to get out there and play on the mountains! The funny farm was surprisingly nice, we even had a balcony and a view!

The view from our balcony
Funny farm delivers on all counts

Why call it that? Why have that be the design?
What went wrong here?!

Funny Farm giant dog named Schlep or something
This picture doesn't do him justice, he's the size of a small car

Breakfast may have been toast eveyday
But it was the best toast ever

Finally, a fireplace and some cozy things

It was actually really nice being somewhere northern after being in Italy for so long. For one thing they have heat there because they're not in denial that winter exists and for another, they have COFFEE. Like in a mug. That you can drink for like five whole minutes. Also, even though German is not English, sometimes it sounds like funny English and in general it feels a lot more like Vermont than anything in Italy feels like America. Also it's really pretty there and it's nice to see little wooden houses with doily window shades and little puffs of smoke coming out of the chimney. I don't hate winter or the cold, I just hate it in a place where they refuse to acknowledge it's existence!! With the backdrop of the beautiful mountains and lakes, everything is just so beautiful and quaint.

Snow and train tracks, beautiful combination

Because it was 7:45 and I hadn't gotten nearly enough sleep, I let Liz talk me into canyon jumping. You can only do it in two places in the world (here and New Zealand) so I figured I might as well. New Zealand's...really far away. I signed up with out having any idea what it was and I was scared of heights but there's not much oxygen in the mountain air so I was pretty unconcerned. We hopped on the bus at 11:30 and went off into the mountain

Yikes....

The hike up Gridelwald
and up and up and up

Finally we got there and I was terrified!! It was so peaceful and beautiful up there that I didn't really care but it seemed like a long way to fall...

Our first view of the jump...

Looking down from the platform
You pretty much fall the whole way....

Liz and I, harnessed and afraid

It was so scary watching everyone go before us. You literally just plummet like 10 stories or whatever then just as you're about to hit the ground go shooting across the canyon to the other side where it looks like you'll hit the other wall and then you swing back and forth there for awhile before they pull you in with a rope. After the first two people went, they gave us helmets because they were worried about falling icicles...right because this 1 centimeter thick piece of plastic will definitely protect me in the face of 7 foot long ice daggers. But Liz went first and didn't die so I figured I might as well.

I seriously don't know how I looked so serene

Why was I smiling?? I don't remember smiling!!

This is where I had a fear blackout and don't remember anything

Swinging
This part was really pretty over the snowy river

I swung around on the rope at the end doing acrobatics which was fun

Picture of me from where I jumped from
Can you find me?

Getting reeled in like a fish

 I was on such an adrenaline rush but a calm one, and after I felt surprisingly serene. And we didn't die wohoo!!

The next day we decided to go skiing because it's the alps!! It was such a confusing place, the base of the ski mountain is like already up a mountain so you get to the start by gondola...so different. Also the trail map was really confusing and I suspect we may have only skied on one part of an enormous mountain that we just couldn't find the rest of but it was SOOO BEAUTIFUL that who even cares. It was pretty steep though. We all feel a lot more than we expected to and were glad we invested in helmets.

Whatta View

Ski/board pros

Skiied past these goats at one point
SWITZERLAND

We astounded ourselves in our ability to not only find the bottom but also our bus and came home happy but also quite sore.

BUT NOT TO SORE FOR NIGHT SLEDDING (sledging in swiss/german)
This sounded pretty tame and non-life endangering but it was NOT. We went up a tiny gondola used to carry cows sometimes, or patrons to one of the many seemingly inaccessible restaurants located halfway up mountains in switzerland and looked out over the little villages and their lights in the basin of the mountains. So beautiful. Then we were handed a blinking light to put around our necks and a little plastic sled. There are no lights or barriers to keep you from falling off a cliff really. You keep your feet out straight and steer by putting one foot our the other down into the snow. Basically an invitation to break at least a leg. But it was so incredibly beautiful and fun. You can see anything except a little of the path and the total distance was 2.4 miles. It took about an hour and we stopped to look at a frozen waterfall and to regroup. Me, Liz, and Shannon had so much fun and I was really glad I decided to go. The dark makes everything seem even more magical. We couldn't really take pictures but it was like winding through the snowy woods of a mountain and sometimes coming around a curve and looking into a valley of lights. Then afterwards we went into a little wooden swiss restaurant and had swiss dinner and fondue, bread dipped in melted swiss cheese.

It looked a little like this but darker
and the lights were all in the valley.

After sledding, on top of skiing and flinging myself off the ledge, I was sore in all kinds of ways. Liz and I couldn't walk and even had to ask Schlep the dog for a ride upstairs to our room. Luckily he's the size of a horse so he obliged.
The next day we were leaving in the afternoon, so we just went around town.

So Northern, great

Maybe not...

Mountains, lakes, turrets!

The water is suspiciously blue
Like Carribean blue. So unexpected.

Countries really are as into their stuff as you'd expect
Heidi in Switzerland, Pinnochio in Italy
It's really a big deal.

Chocolate Swiss Army knife
OF COURSE

I really loved Switzerland, the hills were alive with the sound of me screaming for my life but I didn't break anything and it was awesome and I definitely would recommend Interlaken and the Funny Farm (!?) to anyone who likes anything.

Lent's not and say we did

So with obese fat tuesday coming to a close, carnivale is finally over. I'm very sad because I loved all the masks and celebrations and I hate even pretending to fast or worse pretending to give up second dessert!

Carnivale made every day feel like an episode of Gossip Girl
Not that I watch that show... or even know what it is....

But that's okay because tomorrow I am departing for the Alps! To see Switzerland! I don't actually know what language they speak and have heard that they're not on the euro (but why) but oh well, I have one pair of gloves, a winter coat (liner), faux leather boots from target, and a hat with moose on it so I'm ready to go! We're staying at a "backpackers hotel" called "the funny farm" which frankly sounds terrifying but I'm sure it'll be really special! To Switzerland!

CARNIVALE

The word Carnivale means a Farewell to Meat. Ew that sounds like something I'd hate, I LOVE CHEESEBURGERS AND MEATSAUSE!! But no it's okay, Carnivale, to Liz and I, actually means massive dance parades! If you smashed together a scene from Moulin Rouge with a pop concert, with a renaissance festival (like actually during the ACTUAL renaissance, not one of those things for weird people), with a block party, and placed it in beautiful lagoon lands that is Carnivale...hope I described it okay. 

First we went to Venice! We decided that since we wanted to do more than chug wine in the main piazza, we would explore the islands of Burano and Murano (yeah they rhyme, just in case you were still under the misconception that Venice is a real place)

Liz, knowing how to blend in with the natives
pants-wise.

Every building is a different color and there's no streets.
This place is pretty much fictional

For the morning commute

In Burano, you're only allowed to wear clothes
in the same color palate as your house, boat

But actually...

Beautiful little ducks on the beautiful little island

At around sunset we headed back to the main island, and walked down the BUSY streets to Piazza San Marco. It was such an amazing sight. Everyone is dressed up, dancing, singing in the streets and it's busy but not in a claustrophobic way. It's like NYE in manhattan except somehow not horrible. It's like magic. On a magical island of bridges and people dressed in gowns. Yeah, I'm not sure I'll be able to remember that Venice isn't always how it is at Carnivale because it was my first time going there...that's okay, it's nice to think that magical places exist in the world.

Piazza San Marco
I don't even know what that is!!

After grabbing exploring the piazza for a little, which is honestly beyond explanation, we grabbed a pizza. Just being in the Carnivale atmosphere is incredible. They were playing 20's songs on stage that somehow blended perfectly with the top 40 dance music blasting out of the speakers in the back. Some people are dressed as Elizabethean royalty and others as superman. Wine is coming out of fountains in the Piazza. AND SOMEHOW IT ALL WORKS!!

Seized by the spirit, Liz and I followed a giant moving pair of speakers (attached to a mac, on wheels, dragged by a lady dressed as a tiger) through the beautiful streets (bridges) of Venice that we'd never even seen before. It was a giant moving dance mob, but mob is the wrong word because it's never stressful or too crowded or scary it's just GREAT. Everyone's just dressed up like Halloween but more colorful and beautiful and dancing in their own little worlds. There were tons of people on the sides cheering too and you could spend your entire life just looking at what everyone's wearing. We danced up and downstairs, over bridges, showing amazing  canal views of a city I'd never even seen before, to ridiculous music both Italian and American. It was kind of like being in another world, the world of DANCE PARADE. We had hoped the parade would loop back around into the square.

It didn't. So we were in the middle of a water palace city where I had never been before and we had to get back to the waterbus in the next 30 minutes. Whoops. Luckily we didn't fall into a lagoon or anything and followed some weird signs back to the piazza!




Day 2 Viareggio
In case I didn't already have sensory overload, we went to Viareggio. In my mind I was like floats and stuff! NO. Works of really weird art and amazing dancing people.

People dress up and do dance routines on the floats
even older people and little kids!
It's so cool, like Halloween could be if everyone was into it and it wasn't just for kids.

Giant, papier mache, great
don't know who that guy steering the bird is is...lots of political jokes I didn't get 

SOME WERE REALLY SCARY!!
He roars so loud!!

But some were pretty
I love the dancing flowers!

Making fun of the french for...being french?

Why not?

Liz joins the parade with her new friend, colorful fruit man

Families aren't this great without being really lame in america

A skunk couple watches a dinosaur.

Why was the fireman axing the dinosaurs tail?? I DON'T KNOW!!

All the music had the same beat
BUM bum BUM bum

Giant popes, can you find our president?!

Our feet were getting cold, so LUCKILY we were able to find another dance parade behind the popes where people weren't wearing costumes or doing planned dance routines so we were able to dance our way down the whole street. And once again run back to the bus as fast as we could (with a gelato stop).

Can't wait to come back and swim in the adriatic!

Even the colors on this page are hurting my eyes. I need to like shut them or look at a white wall for awhile. Such sensory overload but I never want to leave this weekend. MAGIC.