Monday, August 04, 2008
Sunday, August 03, 2008
Heidi cartoon and Japanese tourists in Switzerland
While we were at the train station Lauterbrunnen, on our way going up to Jungfraujoch, there was a reserved train with about 50 Japanese tourists, and around half of the tourists around us were speaking in Japanese. One of them was lifting up a yellow umbrella all the way from the departure station at Wilderswil to Lauterbrunnen, I supposed he is the tour guide. When our train was moving up, we noticed that the Japanese tourists were all over the mountains! At that point of time, we did not know why Jungfrau is so popular for them.
As we expected, the Jungfraujoch mountain is full of Japanese tourists, and sign boards in Japanese. Then the biggest surprise came along: all of them were eating the same type of instant noodles. I was thinking that it was probbaly the tour guide who brought the cup noodles and arranged with the restaurant at the top of Jungfraujoch to prepare the hot water. The answer is: No. THis restaurant offers cup noodles of hot and spicy flavour at 7 swiss francs (about 5 € or 22 RM)! We also got ourselves a cup noodle each to join the fun and we drew attention from them throughout the meal.
When we reached the village Wilderswil after the day trip to Jungfraujoch, Francois told me that Jungfrau and Interlaken look very similar to the sceneries in a cartoon called "Heidi". We soon looked through the internet to find some video clips about Heidi, and true enough, a flag very similar to the flag of interlaken appeared in the Introduction part of this cartoon.
As Francois said, Heidi was living in her granddad's house in a swiss mountain, with goats, cows and nature around her. Lucky little girl! They have a St Bernard dog named "Joseph"(Japanese version; its name is "Hercule" in the French one) .
You might be surprised, the productor of this cartoon was a Japanese! Even though this cartoon was originated from a novel "Heidi's Years of Wandering and Learning", usually abbreviated "Heidi", written by a swiss author, Johanna Spyri in 1880, the cooperation between the Japanese and German producer had made it a success all over the world. Besides the Japanese, there were quite a number of Middle East tourists as well, and could it be also the popularity of Heidi in Arabic version?
Switzerland is apparently a dream-like destination for the Japanese tourists: Swiss Alps, fresh air, stunning lakes etc..... It has been reported that Heidi has drawn them to Switzerland to see her village called Maienfeld, as well as other destinations with similar sceneries.
I have just watched 2 episodes of Heidi cartoon, it seems to be an extremely "touching" cartoon describing a life of an Orphanline girl in the Alpes. I might get myself the book to discover more about this famous little girl.
Saturday, August 02, 2008
Friday, August 01, 2008
Happy National Day Switzerland!
Today, 1st August, is the National Day of Switzerland, since I am now in Switzerland, I share their joy to celebrate it together!
How did this event come about? In fact, it was a result of an agreement called "Federal Charter of 1291" signed by 3 patriots from 3 cantons: Uri , Schwytz, Nidwald, in August 1291 in a place called Rütli, situated in Brunnen, and the exact date is not clear. So this year it is the 717th anniversary!
Despite that this date was first celebrated in 1891 in Berne in commemeration with the 600th anniversary, it had not been an official holiday until 1994, following a public vote (In Switzerland, in order to implement a new rule, the swiss people have first to vote directly) on the 26 September 1993.
So what do the swiss do on their National Day? according to some sources on the internet, they will have bonfire, fireworks, lantern cortege etc after the nightfall. For example, here in Lausanne, there will be a official festival at Ouchy, a place near the lake side. We will check it out if it is not raining!
Soon 2 years in Europe!!
I started my European discovery in August 2006, and soon it s gonna be the anniversary.
I want to summarise my 2 years' life here..... but, where to start?
Given up my MD job, came here to start new life. My adjustment has been quite smooth, for this, I have to thank thousand times my other half, and also my buddy who stays here for nearly 20 years. It was their explanations and advices that I got to enter the French world. Nevertheless, I have to admit that I am still far from being integrated. To me, I don't have to live like a French, but I should at least make an effort to really know the French.
Too much to say and it's getting late... I will do my best to continue my stories and updates from time to time.
Bonne nuit!!
1st August 2008:
To live in a foreign country, I find that the hardest is to make friends with the locals.
Sometimes, I try to strike a conversation with people: lining up to pay at the counter is the best occasion. Somehow it never works out well for me, the conversation comes very soon to an end. Perhaps I still do not express myself well enough in French and thus they feel tiring to continue a conversation after a while as I speak slower and probably not clear enough:p C'est loin d'etre gangé (still a long way to go)!
So, I have not made any new French friends here. My french friends remain those I had met in Malaysia, or friends of my boyfriend. I don't know if I should see this as a "failure", but I don't think that friendship should come along after a hard try..... That's not friendship anyway.
So, I make friends with foreigners in France. It works out extremely well! I hang out quite often with friends from Germany, Canada, USA, Malaysia, Vietnam, China etc... From a relational point of view, I am a fairly opened and easy going person, and try to make the person to whom I speak to at ease. Just a little hard to go about with the locals. It's a shame, I admit it. I would really treasure if I could have a couple of good local friends to exchange our viewpoints nad chill out from time to time.. but well, see what luck will bring me then!
What about colleagues? Oh French colleagues will remain "colleagues". A drink after work, well.... not in their tradition.... unless we change the working company. A different culture certainly.
Work wise.
The European work attitudes are generally: stand on your own feet. Whenever a task is being delivered to me, they would expect me to figure it out on my own. They welcome intelligent questions, that's clear. Well, I think that I was not used to search for answers myself as most of the time, those more experienced colleagues in Malaysia would come to my rescue when I get doubts. Here, I see no one to back me up. Moreover, due to my foreign worker status, I have to proof really hard that I am capable to deliver twice the work quality. Such a drastic change put me at times a great deal stress.
I guess I should talk about other experiences in separate posts, eg: travels, foods.....
Till then, happy reading!
I want to summarise my 2 years' life here..... but, where to start?
Given up my MD job, came here to start new life. My adjustment has been quite smooth, for this, I have to thank thousand times my other half, and also my buddy who stays here for nearly 20 years. It was their explanations and advices that I got to enter the French world. Nevertheless, I have to admit that I am still far from being integrated. To me, I don't have to live like a French, but I should at least make an effort to really know the French.
Too much to say and it's getting late... I will do my best to continue my stories and updates from time to time.
Bonne nuit!!
1st August 2008:
To live in a foreign country, I find that the hardest is to make friends with the locals.
Sometimes, I try to strike a conversation with people: lining up to pay at the counter is the best occasion. Somehow it never works out well for me, the conversation comes very soon to an end. Perhaps I still do not express myself well enough in French and thus they feel tiring to continue a conversation after a while as I speak slower and probably not clear enough:p C'est loin d'etre gangé (still a long way to go)!
So, I have not made any new French friends here. My french friends remain those I had met in Malaysia, or friends of my boyfriend. I don't know if I should see this as a "failure", but I don't think that friendship should come along after a hard try..... That's not friendship anyway.
So, I make friends with foreigners in France. It works out extremely well! I hang out quite often with friends from Germany, Canada, USA, Malaysia, Vietnam, China etc... From a relational point of view, I am a fairly opened and easy going person, and try to make the person to whom I speak to at ease. Just a little hard to go about with the locals. It's a shame, I admit it. I would really treasure if I could have a couple of good local friends to exchange our viewpoints nad chill out from time to time.. but well, see what luck will bring me then!
What about colleagues? Oh French colleagues will remain "colleagues". A drink after work, well.... not in their tradition.... unless we change the working company. A different culture certainly.
Work wise.
The European work attitudes are generally: stand on your own feet. Whenever a task is being delivered to me, they would expect me to figure it out on my own. They welcome intelligent questions, that's clear. Well, I think that I was not used to search for answers myself as most of the time, those more experienced colleagues in Malaysia would come to my rescue when I get doubts. Here, I see no one to back me up. Moreover, due to my foreign worker status, I have to proof really hard that I am capable to deliver twice the work quality. Such a drastic change put me at times a great deal stress.
I guess I should talk about other experiences in separate posts, eg: travels, foods.....
Till then, happy reading!
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