Friday, February 24, 2017

Winter

SNOWBOARDING
It's Thursday morning and I'm currently on the train on my way to the mountains for a snowboarding lesson. Skiing gave me horrible pain in my knees, so much so that I got really nervous about injuring them. I took a lesson to try to fix my bad form but that only slightly helped the pain. So now I'm a snowboarder. Snowboarding is not very common in Europe, maybe only 5% of people do it. I still like skiing better but I have no more knee pain so I'm sticking with snowboarding. It's just much harder to learn with harder falls. I wear butt pads, knee pads, wrist guards and a helmet. I'm too old for an injury. And in the last 2 weeks, with the kinds of falls I've taken, I'm certain I've prevented 1 concussion and a few petallar and tailbone fractures
Its funny, when I was little and would go rollerblading my mom wanted me to wear all the padding but I refused, totally uncool to be seen with all that when you're 10. But now I want all the padding available!

 I don't know how it is in the States, if you're a skier then tell me. But here, and France too, people cut you in line like crazy to get on the ski lifts. Very obvious, blatant line cutting. Whole families, encouraging their kids to push ahead. It drives me crazy. Last week I finally turned around and said something to a little girl who kept kicking at my board with her skis, saying she wanted the snowboard out of her way. Her dad was right there and didn't stop her. I told her I wasn't gonna go anywhere if she kept kicking me like that, she stopped. And why do parents never apologize when their stupid kid skis into me, while I'm struggling on my board just to stay up, causing me to fall and their kid keeps on skiing past. As if it's my fault because I'm the adult. Friends: don't be that parent, be aware if your kid is a jerk

THE SWISS RED CROSS
    the bane of my existence here in Switzerland. Ugh! I started the process of getting my nursing license recognized here in January 2016. The paperwork I had to compile, it was just so ridiculous. Finally in October I sent off my file for the final step and had to wait 3 months for what I thought would be my Swiss nursing license. Adam and I were making plans as if I'd have a real job in February. Well 3 months came and went and in late January I got a letter from the Swiss Red Cross telling me that I did NOT meet the requirements to get my diploma recognized. I am short 1200 university credit hours in hospital clinicals (Thank you Xavier!) And also, 1 year of working in med/surg is not enough. Never mind that I worked 6 years in high risk labor and delivery units, L&D nurses don't exist here so they don't care about all that. 
     So they are requiring me to do a 6 month internship in med/surg, which is most likely unpaid, before they will allow me to have a Swiss nursing license. 
     I almost had a temper tantrum when I read that letter. For the next 2 weeks I called all sorts of hospitals and agencies asking about this internship and got "no we don't do that" or "we don't have any internship positions available" from everyone I contacted. Both healthcare agencies I contacted told me they don't assist with internships, the Red Cross said they don't help either, it's my responsibility. 
     But luckily I have a few connections here and through the grapevine I was able to get an interview for an internship on a pulmonary floor. That's for Monday the 27th. The thought of working med/surg again makes me cringe. And pulmonary too, I hate phlegm, and I better not have to take care of anyone on a vent or I'll walk right out that door. 
     But it might be a blessing in disguise that I get to be hand held for 6 months before venturing out on my own. But I'm dreading it so much I've considered finding a job as an Au Pair, and you know how much I dislike kids. But I'd rather take care of kids all day than med/surg patients, and that's saying something. So we'll see what even happens at this interview. It's probably best to continue with nursing after all the effort I've put in, anyways. So that's to be continued....

THE DAY TO DAY
So mostly I'm bored a lot but I do keep busy. I go grocery shopping across the lake in France, that takes up half a day. I meet up with Adam when his business trips are close to home. I met in the middle to see my friend who lives in Germany. I take classes at the gym almost every day. I also have almost daily french lessons. Adam's company is offering each of us 50 hours of private lessons. I'm working on expressions and idioms to make me sound more fluent. French has a ton of them, more than English. It's hard to remember them. I also got a book called French for Nurses and I learn names of all the hospital supplies, how to describe a bedsore, and all the various ways of asking the patient about their bodily functions.

     I remember in the Cross-Cultural Training class we took the lady told us the 6 month mark is the hardest. Well she was spot on with that! At the 6 month mark we went to the US, to Florida, did a lot of wedding stuff, stayed with my parents, Adam's parents came to see us. It was only 6 days and very busy. Not long enough to fully enjoy. For the first time in 2 years I really didn't want to come back to Europe, I did not want to get on that plane. And when I got home, I did not want to be here. It lasted a week. I was really down in the dumps. Adam left immediately on a 4 day business trip. I was super bored. No job. No interest in speaking French. Then that Red Cross letter came right as I was pulling out of my funk and it pulled me right back down.
    That article I posted the other day about trailing spouses being miserable... well I'm not miserable and I'm not depressed, but jeez its hard. I LOVE my job in the US but I've never missed it. Well now I miss it. When my friend here went into labor in January and was texting me about it, I wanted so bad to go to the hospital and play nurse for her. I LOVE my friends in the US but I never felt sad about missing them because I'm used to living far from them, but now I really miss them. At least in Grenoble we had activities and friends and a social life but we're having a hard time finding that here. I have 2 American girlfriends here and they're great, so that really helps because they understand my expat blues. I'm lucky to have them. And of course Adam, my very best friend, our relationship grows stronger every day. 

I think the problem for me, specifically, is that since 2012 when I started travel nursing I've been chronically unsettled. This didn't bother me at first, I was having a blast with travel nursing. Then I arrived in San Francsico in 2014 and, just like when you meet "the one," I knew I wanted to stay there forever. But of course "the one" became my boyfriend that same year and then I went to France and that was just gonna be temporary. Then Switzerland happened rather unexpectedly and that's also supposed to be temporary, but we don't know how temporary or when we'll leave. I'm so sick of living life in 3 month intervals. Now its less, its like week by week. 

But probably in 10 years when I'm bogged down with kids and work I'll look back on these unsettled, childless days when I sleep 9 hours every night and miss them. So I don't think about it, I just keep swimming and keep a positive attitude and look forward to our next cool vacation. Which is Arctic Finland. 

I found out something totally awesome that will come in handy when I'm having a bad day. We have a wellness/natural therapy thing we added to our health insurance. So, for example, I got $200 towards my gym membership. But the best is massages! It covers massages! I can get a 1 hour massage and only have to pay $20! I can get about 10 massages per year with this, I've used one and can't wait to get more!

RESTAURANT JOB
    when working at the restaurant in December I got really stressed and behind on a very busy friday lunch rush. I forgot to give a table their salads. Heaven forbid. They didn't tell me I forgot, as any normal person would do when their waitress forgets something. Instead they told the head server as they walked out the door to leave. I got in trouble. I asked her why the hell didn't they just tell me during their meal that I'd forgotten and I'd have gone and gotten them their salad (which in Switzerland is a measly plate of just lettuce for $5). It was so busy. I had 10 tables. Easy mistake that's easily fixed. She said the Swiss will never say something like that, either they will tell you at the end, or say nothing and give the restaurant a bad review on TripAdvisor, which is all restaurant owners here care about. 
     Since there's no tipping standard here, you can't just take your anger out on a forgetful server by not tipping them, your anger gets directed at the whole restaurant. So TripAdvisor reviews are everything. (I, personally, was the reason for their most recent 5 star review)
     Then I explained that 2 servers for 20 tables and 50 customers is just insane and how could I be expected to not get behind in those conditions. In the US that restaurant would have at least 3 servers, maybe 4. She said here, there is server school, which she took to be a career waitress, and you are expected to take care of 40 customers by yourself, and that's just how it is. Restaurants are typically small, personally owned, wait staff is expensive (I got paid $20/hr) so it's got to be like that.


SPAIN AND NEW YEARS EVE
     So we took an awesome 11 day road trip around Southern Spain: Andalusia. Starting in Barcelona and visiting Montserrat, an old monastery in a very cool looking mountain. Then on to Valencia for 3 days, where we stayed in a hostel and spent Christmas eve and made some friends and went on a pub crawl that I very much regretted the next morning. Christmas day we drove 6 hours to Sevilla, and from there took day trips to Cordoba, Granada, and Ronda. We had a great time. Spain is so different from the rest of Europe and I love it. The history is so interesting, 700 years of Islamic rule, Spanish Inquisition, and now a fun, social, laid back culture with great food. 
     Because Spain should technically, geographically be in a time zone behind the rest of Europe, but it's not, everything there happens later. You can't even eat dinner until 8pm because that's when restaurants open. Our tour guide in Sevilla referred to 12 noon as the morning, and 7pm as the afternoon. 
     They don't do much celebrating on dec 24th or 25th in Spain. The gift giving day is January 6th. So the week between xmas and new years is huge sales and people flocking to the stores to buy stuff. They also don't have Santa in Spain. Gifts come from family, not a fat guy with a beard and reindeer. 
     New Years Eve we were supposed to fly back to Geneva, with a layover in Lisbon, Portugal. We would have probably been on the train home from the Geneva airport when the clock struck midnight. We don't really care about NYE, its too overrated, so we didn't care.
     But our first flight to Lisbon was delayed and we realized it would cause us to miss our connection to Geneva. We spoke to the airlines and they said they realized this and it would be taken care of when we got to Lisbon. We landed in Lisbon and staff were waiting to take those people missing connections to a bus. The bus took us to a 4 star Marriott where we were served a free buffet meal. We took a sardine-packed subway downtown to where I read there'd be stuff going on. Got there at 11:45 and ended up having a great view for some awesome fireworks. We paid not one single dollar from the time we landed till we left the next morning. Great way to start 2017!

BELGIUM
I met up with one of my best friends in Belgium one weekend and spend a saturday with her and her bf in Bruges. Adorable town, by the way. Sunday we met up with one of Adam's friends who lives in Antwerp, Belgium and he took us to the Red Star Line Museum. This is the opposite of Ellis Island, it was one of the main ports where everyone immigrating to the US at the turn of the 1900s left from. Soooo cool! So interesting. Especially since my entire family came to the US during this time. I stood there reading every little thing in every exhibit and eventually was so behind I couldn't find Adam. At the end was a room all about anti-immigrant sentiments in the US at the time, against the thousands of Germans, Poles, Russians, Italians etc, that were coming over. There were political cartoons that you could literally put into a newspaper today and not know they were 100 years old. It was exactly the same issues. It was very interesting and insightful to see. History repeats itself, we should learn from it. In the words of Forrest Gump, and that's all I have to say about that....

Adam's friend also told us a funny story about Belgian/Dutch last names. When Napoleon ruled there, people didn't have last names, didn't need them. so Napoleon made a law forcing everyone to have a last name. Most people gave themselves last names that were practical, if they lived on a hill, their last name was Hill (in dutch of course). If they were nice people, their last name was "good neighbor". His friend's wife's last name is "dogs" maybe her family were dog lovers. Some people with a sense of humor didn't take this law seriously and thought it was just a temporary thing, and for generations their family's last name has been "amazing orgasm." Luckily, Belgian government allows people with ridiculous names like this the ability to change them. 


I also learned at a bar in Bruges that you shouldn't serve a beer unless it has a matching glass for it. If not, the bartender will apologize. I've noticed in France in Switzerland too, when I order a beer, its always in the same name glass. 


McDONALD'S
I've only eaten at McDonald's (or as the french say: MacDoh) twice in my 2 years out here but I've noticed some interesting differences when walking by. Only a McDonald's in Switzerland would serve cheese fries with venison meat. (all swiss restaurants serve deer... and wild boar) And only a McDonald's in France would serve a raclette burger. Once they featured a "Chicago BBQ burger".. Adam and I found this a little strange because I'm quite certain BBQ does not come from Chicago. But the French would never know this, all they see are 2 American words and instantly think its cool. It's funny how they change their menu for the culture they are in. In India, McDonald's only had chicken and veggie burgers, of course with curry and all sorts of flavors. McDonald's here are also very nice, clean, and have a separate cafe with coffee and pastries. McDonald's in Switzerland is crazy expensive. Dollar menu? yeah right! A big mac is $11. A happy meal is $7. 

SWISS MILITARY
so my french teacher also teaches me a lot about swiss culture and other things about how to live in Switzerland. She told me that the mountains are full of bunkers for emergency situations if the entire population needed to hide out in some crazy nuclear war situation or something. Her husband went to one during his military service. They have ones with food, supplies, makeshift hospitals, everything you could need. It reminds me of District 13 in the Hunger Games
I've also heard the borders are lined with explosives to shut the country off from said crazy situation, but I'm not so sure that's true, nobody has been able to confirm that one.

Switzerland may be neutral but they have a very strong, very wealthy military. A military that, I've heard, you don't want to mess with. And every Swiss man has to do a certain amount of required military service. 


Switzerland is a very rich country today but this wasn't always so. Switzerland was a little country of mountains, cows, and farmers. Then came WWI and WWII. They were neutral. While the rest of Europe was spending money on their military and then afterwards spending money on rebuilding their country that had been bombed to smithereens (like France and Germany) Switzerland never spent a dime doing those things. The Swiss are known as good watch makers, thus good at making precise tools that the military could use. They sold military devices and machinery to both sides during WW2 and made a fortune. And voila! Now you have a country where a big mac costs $11


But I do like it here....





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