Monday 25 March 2013

World Radio Switzerland

I just found out that my blogs ("erniemcpeck - Adventures in Switzerland" and "Swiss Red") were mentioned as part of a broadcast by World Radio Switzerland last Thursday.

As part of their regular feature called "The Connectors", presenter (and blogger) Catherine Nelson-Pollard discussed the My Big Geneva website with Michael Shevlin (another blogger and local teacher), and as a side note also mentioned my own blogs. What an honour!

The My Big Geneva website is a fantastic source of information, and quite rightly the focus of a programme discussing expat experiences here, as it has a ton of articles on what to do in Geneva. Before talking directly to Emilie and Carla of My Big Geneva, Catherine mentioned my blogs as an example of a British expat who blogs about life in Switzerland.

You can listen to the programme through the WRS website, or download it directly through this link.

I always find it incredibly flattering whenever anyone mentions my blogs, as with my recent interview on the Expat Dads Who Blog series on the Geneva Family Diaries website. It humbles me just to know that people read what I write, and I sincerely hope that what I blog about can help other people in some small way.

I would like to express my thanks to Catherine and WRS in general for mentioning my blogs, which are also linked from their website. In return, I would like to encourage others to tune in to WRS, either through 101.7 FM in the Geneva region or by streaming through their website. Listening to shows such as The Connectors can help you find information from other expat sources that could be interesting or even helpful to you.


Below is a list of websites and blogs run by other expats here in Switzerland:

Geneva Family Diaries
- I've mentioned my appreciation for this website in past articles, after they first came to my attention when they asked me to do an interview for their series on Expat Dads Who Blog. Michela runs a very tidy and information-packed website that is mainly focused on Geneva but also stretches to the surrounding areas, and is a great source to check if you want to find out what's going on in the coming days or weeks.

Know It All Passport
- The Know It All Passport is a guide book for English-speakers in the Geneva and Vaud regions of Switzerland, and this website supports the book with expanded information and articles. As you would expect with a guide book and an accompanying website, it is absolutely jam-packed with information on what to do and where to go in these areas of Switzerland. Having read some sample pages, I think this just might be next on my list of books to read!

Lausanne Mom
- A brilliant website written my Meta, an expat mother of two who lives in Lausanne and blogs about very wide-ranging subjects related to daily life in Lausanne as well as things to see and do in other parts of Switzerland. She also has loads of great ideas for things to do with kids, with many articles on craft ideas that will come in very handy during the winter months when the kids can't go outside!

Linda - Lost in Switzerland
- This was a cracking blog by Linda who moved to Switzerland from her native Sweden. She blogged about her views on things in life, which were often unrelated to Switzerland, but amongst the articles about fashion or movies she liked there were some real gems, such as "Sweden vs Switzerland", where she compared the pros and cons of the two countries (Sweden won). Sadly she no longer blogs here as she moved back to Sweden earlier this year, but historically it's still a good read.

Living in Nyon
- This blog is written by The Connectors presenter Catherine Nelson-Pollard herself, providing a view of life in Nyon from a British expat. Lots of information about life in Switzerland can be found here, as well as articles for tourists visiting the area and upcoming events. It's another website that I wish I had found out about sooner, and this is now firmly in my list of sites to follow. Catherine also runs a blog about life in Switzerland called "The Perpetual Expatriate", giving her view on life here.

Mamizeit
- This is a web magazine written with expat mothers in mind, that aims to share information amongst international women living here in Switzerland, with topics ranging from daily life to fashion tips. It's an interesting read, even from a male perspective!

Mr Shev
- A blog written by Michael Shevlin, who was part of the WRS The Connectors broadcast that mentioned my blogs, on his views on life, which are written with a kind of humour that strikes a chord with me (quote from his Snow Driving Tips article in January: "...the motherland has had a couple of inches of snow so the whole country has come to a complete standstill and people have started eating their pets..." - funny stuff!). A good read that will make you chuckle.

One Big Yodel
- Written by an American living in Switzerland, this is a useful and often humorous look at life in here, albeit in the German part of the country. A good read and full of useful info, it's a good place to go for English-speaking expats.

Your Swiss Life Line
- A website dedicated to helping people who are moving to Switzerland, with helpful info on orientation and how to settle in and adjust to life here - why have I only just found out about this site?? It has loads of useful blog articles that would probably have come in handy to me had I read them over three and half years ago! If you are in the same situation as I was - i.e. about to move to Switzerland - I sincerely recommend this blog!


A useful list of blogs from expats here in Switzerland is also available through the Expat Blog website, here.
If you've come to my blog from the WRS website then thank you very much for your interest in me, and feel free to browse my blog entries! :)

Sunday 24 March 2013

Pigtail Princess

Lydia's hair has never been particularly long. She wasn't one of those babies born with a luxurious full head of hair; with dark hair round the sides and a fairly sparse covering on top, she actually looked like she had styled her hair on the typical image of a monk.

We have had to wait what has felt like a very long time for her hair to grow - she's nearly 2 years old - and now that it's finally long enough to play with my wife is taking every opportunity to do just that. Ponytails and pigtails are the fashion of the day in our house now!

Unfortunately, and probably fairly understandably, Lydia doesn't like the process of tying her hair up, as yanking on her hair is rather uncomfortable. She therefore objects whenever we try, and it's not really fair of us to force this on her. The problem is that she looks so damn cute with pigtails, it's hard to resist!

This is her with pigtails:


...to me, she looks really cheeky and yet unbelievably cute at the same time, although this is coming from my biased, proud-father viewpoint.

She is just starting to like the concept of a princess, so hopefully this will be the beginning of a long phase of wanting to wear pretty dresses, tiaras (plastic ones, of course), etc...

Friday 1 March 2013

Allez Lausanne!

Back in May 2010, during my first twelve months in Switzerland, I travelled to Basel to watch FC Lausanne-Sport play against FC Basel in the final of the Coupe Suisse (see "Following FC Lausanne-Sport to the Final"), in what promised to be a great day out.

As it turns out, FCLS were on the wrong end of a serious spanking, losing 6-0 in what was truly a dire performance. Having spent 120.- CHF for a round trip train ticket, plus the cost of the match ticket, then sat for the duration of the game with a headache in torrential rain, I can honestly say I was not particularly impressed with Swiss football.

I wrote in my blog entry afterwards that I doubted I would attend another FCLS match unless they made it to another cup final. On 27th February, FCLS were scheduled to host FC Sion in the quarter final of the Swiss Cup, and an invitation from my brother-in-law Pascal tempted me to go back on my words.

La Pontaise starts to fill up with hopeful supporters...
It was a bitterly cold evening, coming a few days after most of the Canton of Vaud was covered by a few centimetres of snow, and the match was only scheduled to start at 8:30pm. I met up with Pascal and a few of his friends, and we quickly bought our tickets and went inside to warm up.

I'll admit I was a little surprised by the price of the ticket, forking out a whopping 50.- CHF for my seat in block J of the Stade Olympique de la Pontaise, the home of FCLS. Granted, my seat was well placed in row 22 slightly to the right of the stand with a side view of the pitch, a viewpoint that would let me see all the action regardless of where it happened on the pitch, but I honestly found the ticket price to be rather high considering it was FCLS.

The other side of the stadium has cheaper tickets, at around 30.- CHF, but it is more open to the elements and on such a cold night a little wind protection was a welcome bonus. Still, I wasn't impressed at the dent this made in my cash flow, and hoped that the match would be an open, entertaining affair to at least make it worth my money.

Sadly, this hope was totally misplaced.

Insipid, dire, dreadful, dull. Plenty of words come to mind that would describe the match, but none of them are positive. Both sides played some truly awful, uninspired football of a standard that would be unacceptable at even a fourth division team in England.

FC Sion scored a goal in the 28th minute of the first half, and that was practically the only effort on goal. In an attempt to keep some level of interest in what was a terrible display of half-arsed football, we spent the first half counting the successive passes by each team to see if either side managed to string more than 5 passes together before losing possession. FCLS managed this just once in the opening period, and FC Sion not at all.

On such a cold night, the shivering supporters searched desperately for a reason to applaud their side, if only to generate a bit of much-needed heat through banging their hands together. These occassions were few and far between, aside from the solitary goal.

When the referee's whistle signaled the end of the first half, there was a sense of huge, collective disappointment amongst the FCLS fans. We headed to the bar and grabbed a beer; at least that gave us something to be happy about.

The second half, unfortunately, was full of the same tripe as the first, with very little to cheer for either set of supporters. To their credit, the FC Sion fans entertained themselves with songs and the occasional flare, and they actually looked to be enjoying themselves despite the shockingly bad game they were witnessing.

The only real move for the FCLS fans to cheer was when a shot from distance crashed back off the crossbar. At that moment, the supporters might have sensed a small hope that their team might be about to wake up and suddenly start playing some actual football. The hope died shortly afterwards as the match reverted back to being the equivalent of watching paint dry.

Right at the death, FC Sion won a penalty that they duly converted with the very last kick of the game. The ref whistled the end of the match, with FCLS on the wrong side of a 2-0 defeat, exiting the Coupe Suisse with little more than a whimper.

I headed home after the match (where a hot shower helped to warm my semi-frozen body) thoroughly disappointed and a little angry to have spent so much money on such a terrible, terrible game.

This brings me back to the same sentiment as the last time I watched them play in 2010, as I really don't think they are worth my money.

It's a shame as I enjoy the experience of watching a football match, with songs ringing around the stadium and flags being waved from passionate supporters. If the ticket price was cheaper I might be tempted to go more often, but at 50.- CHF for sub-standard football, I think my wallet will be staying firmly shut.