Today, what a busy day! Up a little later than yesterday (leaving the house at a leisurely 7:30) and into the Trollstrasse for another day of cleaning and chores. Morning was mostly spent washing the kitchen windows. Being extra-practical these Germanic windows featured unscrewable frames, allowing polishing betwixt the two panes of glass. Mine still came out smudgy looking. Oh well. It was an eventful morning in the kitchen for two other reasons, however: 1) Half way through cleaning I spilled the plastic basin of soap water onto the floor in front of 3 or 4 construction workers; 2) The construction workers were informing our kitchen crew leader that the sink spigot was of an inferior quality and would not last a year--emblematic of the state of affairs in general. Monday lunch will be consumed with plastic forks and knives as the real have not yet arrived. Wir gehen durch. (we just gotta go through) as the Principal has said.
Did some errands around Winterthur today as well, which consumed a lot of the afternoon. Picked up office supplies, plants, ball pumps at Migros among other places (basically the Swiss Walmart--although there are 3 different sizes of Migros in comparison to the Walmart and Walmart Supercenter; they almost manage to blunt the impression of horizontal market domination by having separate store spinoffs for every category imaginable (Migros Sport; Migros Office, Migros Bank...). Also shopped at a place called Brocken. Sounds a lot like gebrocken (broken) doesn't it? Funny since it's a second hand store. Basically the Swiss equivalent of Goodwill (lest you think the Swiss don't try to spare a little cash now and then); that said, we bought a 70CHF ($88.88) metal bell to sound the advent of Lunch (a bell, which in an alternate live might quite possibly have hung around the neck of a cow).
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| Almost an exact replica of the bell we purchased. |
In the evening we had a SalZH Team Meeting, which heavily evokes the feeling of office work, paper, blah--and mind you this meeting started at 7:30pm. In truth, it was lovely. Essentially, it was a worship service. We sang praise songs in German, Swiss German, and English with just about all of the teachers from the various schools. Afterward one of the teachers shared about her sabbatical experiences visiting the Bodensee (Lake Constance) and messianic jewish schools in Israel. Then blessing of coming and going teaching personnel, and concluding with the Lord's supper in small circles by grade level. It was really special. It was a real bonding time, and it makes me all the more glad to have to come her. The people are wonderful.
And there's a shared mission.
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| John Mahler (Right). |
Well, after a whole long day of running around like a chicken with it's head cut off, I was ready for bed. Instead I was invited to a music festival in the old city by some of the younger teachers. I went.
This too was super. Most of our time was not spent listening to music but rather to one another. I met my host Father's son, who has the same wild curly hair of his father just in blond and who was engaged just a week ago to a teacher at SalZH. Also there was Raphael Bruehlmann, one of the full-time teachers, a hip Italian-looking guy; and Naieemee (phonetic translation from raw aural mental recording in a live concert setting). It turns out David's son, Timon was one of the previous occupants of my current room and also weekly visitor of the Schneider abode. We got along well.
Unfortunately further visual details of my room of occupancy will have to way for a later post. Time to go to sleep. Enjoy your evening all you folks in the U.S.!!!!! Jonathan
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