Penquin Parade

We've got a yearly membership to the Zurich Zoo so we visit at least a few times a month. Lukas never tires of the monkeys or the shoebill (don't ask me why - it never even moves. Know what a shoebill is? - I've gone ahead and googled it for you: http://www.google.ch/search?hl=en&q=shoebill&meta ;-) But a special treat is the Penquin Parade. Basically, any day that the temperature is below 10 degrees celsius (yes - it is still that cold here) they let the penquins out of their exhibit to walk through the zoo. We first get some "heisse marroni" (roasted chestnuts) and munch on those while we watch the penquins waddle by. Equally fun for Lukas is pointing out the penquin poop that is left in their path....

Skiing

It's embarrasing to admit that we've been living in Switzerland - the ski capital of the world - for 2 years now and have yet to go skiing! Our excuses are varied: what will we do with Lukas, too expensive, to much hassle with all of the equipment to rent, etc. This past wkd Rob's coworker (Heinrich) invited us to go skiing with his family. He had extra skis for all of us and offered to give Lukas ski lessons so that Rob & I could ski off on our own. Obviously, this offer was too good to pass up!

We had a perfect day of skiing with blue skies and good snow. As soon as we got there, Heinrich had Lukas on his skis and away they went up the towrope and down the bunny slope! Heinrich is an EXPERT skier and has taught all of his kids to ski. Their youngest is 3 1/2 and was cruising down the intermediate slopes and was clocked at 64 kilometers/hour!

I can't say that Lukas is there (yet!). But this mornng he said that it was "super fun" so that's all that matters. (On the actual day of skiing he wasn't quite as enthusiatic and just wanted to play in the snow after a few trips down the bunny hill.)

Unfortunately, Heinrich & his family actually live just over the border in Austria which is where we skiied.......so we still can't claim to have skiied in Switzerland.

Grumpy Neighbor and Stinky Man

Last week we ran into our neighbor in the hall. Lukas pointed at him and shouted "Grumpy Neighbor!" Luckily, I'm pretty sure that our neighbor doesn't understand english or at least a little 3 year old's english. Of course, we have no one but ourselves to blame. We regularly refer to our neighbor as the "grumpy neighbor" since he pounds on the wall when we are too loud - he even used to pound when Lukas cried as a baby. As if we liked to listen to that ourselves..... Anyways, we rarely see our hermit-like, unfriendly neighbor so in Lukas' eyes he has grown into this mythical creature. Sometimes when he is playing, the little people or animals that he is playing with get attacked by the abominable snowman OR the grumpy neighbor.....

A couple of weeks ago, we were riding on the tram when a guy got on & sat in front of us. This man was clearly an addict and/or in need of psychiatric help, but the bottom line is he really smelled. Lukas started sniffing & stated "something stinks!" Then he sniffed the back of his jacket and stated: "he stinks!". Now, unfortunately, "stink" in English translates into "stink" in German. Fortunately, I think the guy was too out of it to hear Lukas anyways.

Everytime Lukas says something inappropriate I realize how much we are able to get away with here because of the language difference. We need to start monitoring our choice of words around Lukas more. Soon we'll be back in the States where every word that Lukas utters can be understood by all...... yikes.......

Oman

We're back from our trip to Oman - it was great! The arrival was a bit rough, though. After the 6+ hour flight it took us a good hour to get through immigration and then another 45 minutes to get our rental car. Finally, at about 1 am we were on the road to our hotel - another 45 minute drive - if we hadn't gotten lost. Here we learned our first lessons about Oman and the Omani people. 1) It is impossible to find an accurate map of Oman/Muscat. 2) Omani people must not be used to using maps anyways & don't know how to read them 3) Omani people are so friendly, though that they don't want to admit they can't read the map & will try to help you anyways. Thus, after driving for an hour & asking numerous people we finally had a very nice man actually escort us in his car until we found our way......checked in at about 3am!



Resort was beautiful - great swimming pools & right on the beach. The resort has 3 hotels and there is a "lazy river" that you can float down on innertubes to get from one hotel to the other. One of our favorite activities!

Admittedly, we didn't venture off the resort as much as we normally would. It was hard to convince Lukas (and ourselves!) that we should just walk by the sparkling cool swimming pool and instead get in a hot rental car to see the sights but also invariably 1) get lost 2) have Lukas live up to his "Pukey Lukey" nickname and 3) have to worry about searching for tasty authentic - yet stomach friendly - food. Plus, everything closes from noon - 4p.m. so you have to plan your sightseeing accordingly.

Why give up this?.......

For this.....(post-puke clean-up)

That being said, we had some awesome experiences! We spent a full (12 hour) day driving to some nearby towns to explore some old forts, castles and markets.

Of course, just being "off resort" was an experience in itself seeing all of the Omani in their daily dress: dishdashes (basically white robes) and an embroidered cap for men and long black dresses/robes and black shawls for women. Most women just covered their heads & neck with the shawls, but we did see a fair amount of women that only had their eyes showing or not even that (very sheer shawl over entire face.) Looked so hot to wear! It was interesting - on Thursday & Friday - the weekend in Oman - we had more Omani people at the resort. We saw a few of the women wearing the robe & shawls poolside. Even floating down the lazy river & swimming in them! In case you're wondering: Inga could wear her normal clothes "off resort", but it was appropriate to wear long sleeves and long pants/skirts. On the resort, shorts/tanktops, etc. were OK.

We explored Muscat, the capital of Oman. There was a great "souk" or market with silver, pashmina scarves, frankincense, and spices. Oman isn't touristy yet so the markets feel authentic without any t-shirts, souvenirs, etc. Also visited the Sultan's palace (can't go in though) and the Grand Mosque. The mosque is the 3rd largest in the world and has the world's largest persian carpet in the men's prayer room - very ornate & beautiful. We basically headed into Muscat every evening for dinner since dinner on the resort was the typical $80 while off-resort it was closer to $10. Unfortunately, the food wasn't anything spectacular (either on or off-resort) - lots of shwarma and Indian food .

Sultan's Palace

Grand Mosque

Finally, we hired a private tour guide to take us into the desert with a 4x4. It was amazing - nothing to see for miles but dunes, dunes, dunes, camels wandering and the occasional Bedouin (nomadic Arab tribe) camp with tents & goat pen. We did some dune driving (limited - based on Lukas' puke history) and some camel riding. Wow - are camels tall! And you REALLY have to hold on when they get up or get down from a standing position - otherwise you get catapulted over their head! But look who decided he wanted to ride afterall.......

The men negotiating the price for a camel ride

Drinking tea with the Bedouin in their tent

On our way home from the desert we stopped in a "wadi" (an oasis in the dry mountains) for a swim to cool off. It was about 99 degrees in the desert.
After a wonderful 8 days we flew back to Zurich. We were greeted with snow on the ground and 30 degree temps........