Lausanne 2011-2012

Normandy EFT

2011-10-14T14:38:00.000-07:00

Sorry it's been so long since my last post. I hope this one makes up for it!

We spent this week at our Educational Field Trip in Normandy, France. We flew out of Geneva to Paris (I saw the Eiffel Tower on the skyline!) and took a bus into Caen, where we stayed for the first 3 nights. Our hotel was great, we each had apartments with full kitchens, nice bathrooms, great breakfast... except the beds were hard as rock. Oh well, I managed to sleep anyway. It's a beautiful city, almost all new buildings (since it was completely destroyed in WWII) with a big river flowing through it all. We got dinner at a local restaurant (my first actual 3 course meal) and wandered around town afterwards. There's a small castle close to where we stayed, and we could get on the ramparts, so we spent some time up there looking over the city. I didn't get any good pictures, sorry!

We spent Tuesday at Mt. St. Michel, an enormous castle jutting from a rock/island (depending on the tide) in the endless plains of Normandy. I can't recall the exact history, but the fortress grew as it evolved from a monastery to a castle to a prison during the Reign of Terror following the French Revolution. Unfortunately we didn't get to see it at high tide, when it becomes an island. Nonetheless, it was a magnificent monument to see. Now it's got some bustling little shops on its single, windy, steep and narrow road. Though it's turned into a tourist attraction, they still have monks living there.

(What everything around Mt St Michel looks like)

Wednesday was the day we visited Omaha Beach, the American Cemetery, and the D-Day Museum. The first stop was Omaha Beach. I'm sorry to say that it was horribly disappointing. They only gave us 15 minutes once we got off the bus to look around. Never would I have recognized the beach--since it was high tide, it was only about 20 feet (the Allies landed 1 hour after low tide on 6.6.1944) which obscured the scene. The concrete bunkers were replaced with tourist shops, and any sign of a battle is long grown-over by greenery. Honestly, I wasn't even sure if that was the beach that the invasion took place at at the time, since they gave us so little time/information and it was so unrecognizable.

Omaha Beach

   Then we went to the American Cemetery. An American Vietnam Vet gave us a little history of the cemetery and some stories about D-Day. When you walk in, the first thing you see is a large arched wall with the names of each person buried on it. There's a large statue past that, in a different courtyard area, with some diagrams of how the Normandy invasion was carried out. They played the National Anthem, followed by Taps, and they gave each of us a rose. We were encouraged to find the grave of someone from our state and place the rose on it. The graves seemed to stretch for miles; they seemed to curve off in the distance straight into the sea. I wandered off by myself among the graves of these men-boys, really-who were probably not much older than me, perhaps even younger. Eventually I stopped at the grave of George T. Castro, a draftee from California. He died on July 6th, 1944. It's a strange feeling, thinking about the life he had, cut so short, and the life he could have had, how he probably wasn't much different than myself, how he was probably going through basic training at the same age that I was getting ready to move to Malibu for college. He didn't ask to be there, but he went anyway and gave his life to fight for a cause greater than himself. It adds an entire perspective to how incomprehensibly blessed I am. I put my rose in front of George's headstone. I don't plan on forgetting him any time soon.

   After leaving the cemetery, we ate an awful lunch (some terrible horseradish/noodle concoction, followed by fish and rice, and tiramisu for dessert, which was great until I discovered the liquor-soaked cake at the bottom). As we took the bus from the lunch place to the museum, our tour guide pointed out some old concrete remaining from the bunkers on the cliffs. It was still very hard to see. Anyway, the museum was great. They had a number of WWII weapons on display (including a few folding-stock M1 Carbines, which I took a picture of for Dad) as well as uniforms, equipment, etc. The section of the beach that the museum was on was used for the artificial harbor the Allies constructed after the beaches were cleared, and so they focused on that during the tour. There are still some containers sitting in the ocean. I had never learned anything about the harbor, which was an unbelievably massive engineering feat. They also showed us a brief movie, narrated by an officer days after D-Day. It was all very interesting and I highly recommend that my family visits this museum if they make it to Normandy!
   Our last stop on the way back was at these German artillery bunkers. They were incredibly impressive (and spooky) to see. But I'll let the pictures speak for themselves.

"To these we owe the high resolve that the cause for which they died shall live"

Thursday was our last morning in Caen. We left and stopped in a few cities on the way to Rouen, where our hotel was that night. We spent an hour in Honfleur, where I wandered by myself. It's a very cool, small port city. They've got a large church there made entirely out of wood, like the Nords would make. We stopped for lunch in Deauville, a resort city, but didn't get to explore. We showed up in Rouen and got a short tour. One of the cathedrals there has (I think) the second highest spire in Europe. It was enormous, no picture I could take could really do it justice. We saw the church where Joan of Arc was killed ("And she deserved it," as a few British men told us at the pub that night). The city is pretty big (the biggest in Normandy I think) and the downtown area had a lot of activity. I spent some time looking around and getting food, but I ended up at our hotel lobby with some friends watching fencing on TV (apparently some big championship tournament was going on). We ended up going to an Irish Pub a little bit later. It was quiet when we showed up, but within a half hour or so the place exploded. We spent some time people watching, which wasn't a disappointing venture. On our way out, we ended up in conversation with a few local students (the outside of the place was also packed). One, probably a little extra enthusiastic because of what he had to drink that night, told us how much the French love Americans. We didn't get to talk too much, but I was glad I had an opportunity to practice my French.

Honfleur

Rouen

Rouen

We left this morning (Friday) after visiting Claude Monet's house. His Japanese garden is incredible. He has some flowers I've never even seen before, and I'm sure he drew some inspiration from them. His house was filled with Japanese art, which I learned influenced him heavily. It was all interesting to see, but it was a fairly short visit, and we headed back to Paris for our flight shortly after.

And here I am now, safe and sound in Lausanne again. This past week was outstanding, but now I've got to catch up on all my homework (we've got a research paper due this week and midterms coming up after), so forgive me if I don't post for a while. Next weekend I'm trying to go to Germany and visit Pepperdine's program there, and the week after I'll be seeing Sonny Rollins play in Tourcoing, France. Wish me luck with everything! Hope things are well in the states, and I look forward to hearing from you all!

Interlaken (and this past week)

2011-09-18T17:29:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since my last post, so I figured I'd catch you up on what's happened. Mostly I've just been getting to know the city and the rest of the people in the program. The more time I spend here, the more I find how much I love both.

1. Finally bought some shoes. This is a big deal. I've been wearing flip flops for the past few weeks. I looked at probably 4-8 different shoe stores without finding anything comfortable/Euro-fashionable/affordable (<100 CHF/$120 USD). Then I accidentally stumbled upon this place selling shoes for 30 CHF (unheard of really) so I ended up picking up 2 pairs for 70 (one super warm/soft pair for the snow).

2. Picked up my ticket for Sonny Rollins at FNAC. I knew I needed to bring the card I bought it on. Turns out I used a different card than I thought... a card which I had cut into pieces literally that same morning since we had some fraudulent charges on it. Luckily I found all the pieces and scotch taped it together. The girl at the desk was very nice about it and I didn't have a problem.

3. Jazz-I decided to check out the jazz school's jam session last Monday night (they have them every week, except this week since it's a national holiday here) with my friend Frances. It took about 20 minutes to find the place, but it's only about 5 minutes from the house. It was really cool, it was Afro-Cuban night. They didn't have a lot of different musicians playing (basically the same rhythm the whole time, one singer/violinist, a flute player, and one piano teacher who switched in a few times) but they were all outstanding musicians. We talked to a few of the musicians after, including the flute player (Ewan) who was very friendly. I asked him about the big band I found on their website, and although he didn't know much about it he told me to check with the office sometime. I ended up doing that a few days later.
When I stopped by the school again, I asked around about the jazz band. There were a few students outside and I saw a saxophone by them, so I asked them. They couldn't really tell me much but one girl talked to me about it for a minute (after laughing at my French a bit... not the first time that's happened). I ended up stopping by the office and getting some good news--the big band was cheaper than I originally thought, plus the cost was for the whole year and not just a semester, and even though I wasn't already a student there I could sign up. I got the number of the director and called him. He doesn't speak English but I got it established that I'm sitting in with the band this Wednesday night. I'm really excited about the opportunity, so I'm just hoping the band is around my skill level!

4. Classes started this past week. Not much to say except I like all of my teachers and all of my subjects. I'm looking forward to classes really as much as is possible.

Anyway, I went to Interlaken with a group of friends this weekend. It was so beautiful! We took a train Friday night and stayed at a hostel two nights. Turns out this hostel was one of the top 10 party hostels in the world and it's got its own club underground. The techno beats pulsing through the ground don't exactly help you sleep. Anyway, most of our group went either paragliding or bungee jumping, and of course they all had an amazing time. I ended up exploring the town, finding this nice little local cafe where everything was in German, going for a hike up towards the mountains, and going to a "chocolate show" at a local chocolatier. That was amazing, they fed us SO much delicious chocolate and gave us a voucher at the end. Plus we got to see how they make and decorate it (by hand). Sort of touristy but I'm ok with that. (Oh, by the way, if you were unaware, they like to make truffles with alcohol. Like whiskey. Seriously. I inadvertently took one during our sampling... absolutely the worst thing I've ever eaten in my life.)
Remember, you can click the pictures a few times to make them larger.

Anyway, the next day (Sunday) we went to Luaderbrunnen, this small town a 20 minute train ride away. We hiked a few miles to get to this river that carves its way through a mountain--it was amazing! It rained all day, but I enjoyed it all the same. The hike on the way was through the exact scene you picture when you think of Switzerland: lots of old gingerbread-house-looking homes, each with about a dozen cows and pastureland. It was absolutely gorgeous. We hiked up behind a waterfall after our first hike (I hope the picture does it justice). I got back to the house about 11 tonight, and since it's now 2 AM, I'm exhausted. Please enjoy the pictures, and I'll let you all know how the band goes on Wednesday!

Vevey-9/10

2011-09-11T12:20:00.000-07:00

We spent Saturday the 10th at the vineyards of Vevey. Vevey is a nice, quiet town down the lake from Lausanne. We took a couple of trains to get there and took a steamboat back. The view from the train (and the vineyards) was unbelievable--just look!

After walking through the beautiful vineyards, we wound up at a little swimming spot where some locals were barbequing and enjoy the water. A few guys went swimming. Walking through the streets around there felt like we were in Italy--just some old, small European streets.

We had some free time in the town, so we walked around, bought some chocolate, and visited some of the little shops. A girl came up and started playing cello (or viola? Forgive me if I'm wrong). I took a video of a little part of the town. The area by the water was breathtaking. They happened to have a classic car festival going on, who would've guessed? Anyway, we took a steamboat back with an even more spectacular view. (Sorry, the pictures are kind of scattered all over the place, this site makes it hard to move them)

Last night, I went out with a friend around the city. We walked through this Electronic Music festival going on. It was really interesting to see, though it was underwhelming really, not the crazy rave-type setting I expected. Anyway, eventually we ended up at this club called Le Darling, where a bunch of other Pepperdine students said they would go. However, none of them were there when we showed up. Funny enough, we ended up at a table of a bunch of Swiss people! I got to know a few of the guys (in fact, a few of them just added me on Facebook). Two work for the city, one was still going to school. They were all very friendly, and we talked about everything, from the city and the culture to politics and government. One of them (David) and I started talking about the US, capitalism and the poor with what we could in French and English. I talked with them mostly in French-- I have no idea how I did that! It was an absolutely incredible experience, and hopefully the first of many!

Oh, and I just found out that the jazz school in town has jam sessions every Monday night! Tomorrow, they're playing Afro-Cuban. I'm definitely stopping by, with or without my horn. We'll see how it goes. Souhaitez-moi bonne chance!

More Orientation

2011-09-09T15:49:00.000-07:00

We've mostly gotten over the jet lag by now, and we've started exploring the city. Our second day (Thursday) we toured a medieval cathedral. It was absolutely magnificent, and not too far of a walk from the house. I'm still getting used to having a camera and I keep forgetting it when I go out, so unfortunately I only have one picture of it from far away, but when I visit again I will be sure to take pictures. It's a lot easier than trying to describe it. (By the way, click on pictures to make them bigger)

I'm still getting used to the food and drinks here. We went to Le Barbare and all got their "hot chocolate." It's something between our hot chocolate and chocolate pudding. It's topped with ice cream-which is extremely rich-and whipped cream that I think is unsweetened (tastes more like butter). All the milk here is incredibly creamy. Apple Juice is closer to Martinelli's, and Fanta Orange is more like sweetened and carbonated orange juice. All so very different.

Turns out I showed up with less than 10 shirts, all of which I had already worn at Pepperdine, so I went shopping for some European-esque clothes at H&M. Surprisingly I found 4 good shirts for 45.- CHF (~$55). The weather has been great here, just like back home, but once the cold hits I'll need to buy some warmer clothes too... and probably shoes too. I didn't really bring shoes.

Then today (Friday) we met the French teachers and those of us in lower division French courses took a walk down to the lake. It was beautiful! Not a cloud in the sky. The water was actually warmer than the ocean usually is in Malibu. There's a skate park down by the water... not exactly something I expected to see. There are some nice parks to walk/run through, volleyball courts, paddle boats... so many things to do down there! I hope to go kayaking sometime soon.

I also passed a music store downtown with some saxes in the window (one bari was a little more than 10,000.- CHF, about $4,000 more than in the US), so I hope to visit there when they're open. Also, I want to stop by the jazz school here in town next week. I found out one of the professors here is a jazz singer, so hopefully I'll get the chance to talk to him too!

We're going to the Vineyards tomorrow, and we have a free day Sunday. Wish me luck exploring! Au revoir!

First day!

2011-09-08T13:54:00.000-07:00

Just arrived, outside the house!

We arrived safely in the house early Wednesday morning on the 7^th! The trip was quite a long one. I stayed up all night before leaving for the airport at 3:30 AM. We met our massive group at LAX and proceeded through all the checkpoints without any major incidents. We had about 2 hours to wait before our plane boarded, and I got to know some of the other students a bit more while waiting. Our whole group seemed to get along well and we boarded the plane at 8:35 AM. I got my sax on no problem! That was something I was very worried about. The first part of the flight was really exciting, even though we were only headed to Newark, but soon the tiredness took over. I tried to stay up the whole first flight but the all-nighter got the best of me with 2 1/2 hours left. The entirety of both of our flights consisted of trying to sleep and pass time, with no remarkable incidents. I had some nice conversation with a friend on the way to Geneva. We were in the middle section, so sadly we didn't get to look out the windows, but it was during the night anyway so it wasn't too much of a loss.

Finally we descended into Geneva. We saw the sunrise over the clouds from the air! I can’t describe the shock when I saw the beautiful Alps out of the left hand window! I stressed a little with figuring out roommates, and one girl almost lost her passport, but it worked out without any problems. I met Pete Lessing and Mary Mayenfisch, our Director and Assistant Director, both of whom are very nice. Kevin Kelly, whom I had just met a few days before when we stayed in the same room before leaving the country, and I decided to be roommates. We're still getting acquainted, but I think it's going to be a good pairing. We have an unbelievable view of Lac Leman and the Alps from our balcony! I can’t believe the beauty of this place!

Later that day, we got a house tour, met the staff, and walked down to the Olympic Museum. I've never been that tired in my life. I feel so bad for our tour guide, she was so nice and outgoing, but everyone in our group was absolutely dead tired! I felt like I was going to fall asleep walking, and I almost fell asleep a few times during dinner. However, it definitely helped and I don't feel jet lagged at all! (I'm writing this Thursday night). Anyway, I'll put a new entry up here soon. A bientôt tout le monde!

The unbelievable view from my balcony