My first afternoon in Zurich

Yesterday I worked, watched the littles, cleaned, walked J to futbol, went to the market, and made supper. However, when I checked the mail I saw something in my name for the first time!!! It was a slip for die Post saying I had a PACKAGE!!! Woo hoo! J and I walked to die Post and there it was . . . a beautiful package sent from my dear grandmama! Lol, thank you so much grandma! It contained DVD's of our last outing to Florida in April and other care package items. ;-P

Today has been a wonderful day! Today was my day off, so I woke up early, made myself up, had a leisurely breakfast and walked to the Bahnhof. Unfortunetely, as I was walking up the ramp the doors closed, I ran and started punching the grun (green) button (this was the last train in order for me to be on time to class), but t'was too late and I was obliged to wait for the next train to Wetzikon, much to the amusement of a certain elderly gentleman observer. So I took the opportunity to look over some German words our teacher had us translate. When I made it to Wetzikon and walked through the Migros into the Klubschule, the class had been moved to another zimmer (room) due to a Cambridge final thing and when I went to the zimmer where the paper said it was, haha, it had been moved again. After a bit of serching I finally found the classroom and walked in 15 mins. late, while the class giggled (I did too) and the guy from Agyptin (Egypt) helped me catch up.

Class went really well, and I was able to ask the teacher, "Was ist das?" It was all I could do to keep from doing a jig around the room. GLORIA! We went over the family again and in one bild (picture) was a man saying, "Das ist meine frau" literal translation, "this is my woman." I could not stop laughing!

After class while waiting for the bus one of the girls (she's from Turkei) came up and started talking to me. Lol, she doesn't speak English, at all, and I don't speak Turkish, haha, so we communicated with hand signals, lots of laughter, and the few German words we know. She showed me pictures of her family and told me briefly about them and it was highly amusing especially to those listening to us as I am sure they were. :-P Before we got on the bus a car drove by with a little boy with his face pressed to the window making faces. LOL, he stuck his tongue out at me and when I did the same he started laughing. It was rather cute.

Once back in Uster I made some lunch, dropped off my books and walked back to the bahnhof this time to go to Zurich. I grabbed Agatha Christie and enjoyed the train ride. However, when I stepped off the train in Zurich I had to prevent myself from standing there, gaping. I had to walk up at least two escalators to get to the street level and then it was even more amazing. It was so HUGE and so many people and so much going on for a second I definitely felt like a minnow in a gigantic ocean. I gathered my wits and then proceeded to desparetely appear European, lol. Mrs. had said that when I find a huge screen then that is the exit to take because then I'll be near the Bahnhofstrasse. Once I found that, I made myself small in the crowd and was so thankful for the light rain that had been falling all day, because now I could hide my fascination under my lavender umbrella. Incidently I found myself strolling behind an English tour group! Once I found the Starbucks the aupair group meets in I went in, ordered a hot chocolate, walked downstaires, and dived into my book. It has always been a foolish notion of mine to read in a European coffeeshop and while Starbucks is a bit ordinary, my imagination made up for the rest. Besides, who could be more delightful to read about then that amazing little Frenchman, Hercule Poirot!?!

About an hour or so later I left, strolled down to the waterfront, which looked absolutely gloomy with all the fog (I loved it!) and then walked back down the strasse taking note off all the amazing shops, Dior, Armani, and so many others. I happened upon an English bookshop and finally bought my Deutsch/English dictionary and then went to Sprungli (an amazing chocolate shop!) and bought two truffles for later (Bacardi and Bailey's). :-D By then the museum had closed and so I walked back to the Bahnhof and actually found the glies my train was leaving from! Yay! There were so many levels and instead of maybe 3 glieses in Uster, there were up tp 50 in Zurich. O_O

Then a bit of shopping in the Migros for strawberries for supper and then back home to freshen up. I am so glad I spent my afternoon there so now on Wednesday I can hopefully look like I know what I am doing. I did feel better when I realized there were people from everywhere and when I passed some Americans talking. And it did tickle me pink when I was waiting for the tram to pass and a women asked me directions in Deutsch. :-)

Now off to make some supper, have a bit of compy time and fulfill the family tradition of Friday movie night, now if only I had some of momma's homemade pizza . . . ;-)