Gurten - Aara - Bern

Niederhorn

Thun, Beatenbucht, Beatenberg

The Dutchies are in town!

It's always nice having visitors, especially when they travel from another country to see you. Well today my Dutch friends came to visit, all the way from Nieuwegein, as small town near Utrecht.

oh la la Paris

I awoke to my alarm ringing telling me it's time to get out of bed and get down to the station and catch the train to Paris, yes another business trip. A long trip on the train, around 6 hours, but a very good meeting.....enough said! The more I look at this picture the more I think of the Beatles album cover 'Abbey Road', although nothing really like it at all, maybe it's the cross-roads? This picture was taken from outside the front of Gare de Lyon train station.

Birthday Boy Benji

I'm 6 today!

from Bern to Berlin

A weekend in Berlin, great fun!

So much trouble!

Although I wanted to refrain from talking about 3 things; love, religion and politics, I have to relinquish myself as I’m incensed with all the trouble in the world. What the hell is going on and why is ‘mankind’ trying so hard to ‘fuck up’ the very essence of life and existence we all strive so hard for? What has gone wrong?? I don’t have the answers and I don’t understand the depth and complexities that have manifested to get us into this turmoil in the 21st Century. But I’m fed up with only hearing bad news on the TV and in the papers. It seems ironic that well known TV companies can make a drama out of a crisis, with on the ground reports video images and propaganda. Where is this going to end, or will it never end? Which is more worrying! Will we ever be a world of peace, harmony and consideration for our fellow human beings? I think not! Why? Because it’s in man's nature to destroy, just look back through history and from the beginning of mankind has caused wars, terror, torture and turmoil. Always the innocent people suffer at the hands of their leaders and dictators, which is a great pity as these people have no individual strength, power or money to change this. And if you happen to live in a country under such rule or regime then life can be intolerable. These are the poor pawns in the grand master plan of their leaders, who treat them as surplus to requirements, that can be dispensable and also used as a propaganda tool to aid their belief and perpetual desire to permeate and destroy. If the United Nations and the G8 Countries actually got off their proverbial asses, they might be able to stop some of the innocent victims from death, destruction and disaster. For every day wasted more and more people will die and be lost to a wasted course that will never ever end. I’m not just referring to the Middle East crisis, but to all troubles around the world, whether man made or natural catastrophes.

Hypothetically speaking, what would happen if our beautiful world was being subjected to hostilities from another world? Would we unite or would we die because of our arrogance? It’s not strange I ask this question. It's as if you use the comparison of your favourite football team you will be a loyal supporter, wear the team colours, go religiously to the games, sing their anthem and hate all opposing supporters, BUT when you are on holiday, say in Spain, and you spot a fellow football supporter from your home country, wearing his teams shirt, you disregard his choice of team in favour of his friendship in this foreign country and become best of buddies. Also when your country is participating in the FIFA World Cup football, then you are once again all buddies down the pub, united in song. But back home at the football ground you think nothing about kicking the shit out of the same guy and chanting obscenities to the very people you were (or could've been) buddies with on holiday. Well, my point is, we believe in safety in numbers; we like to be part of a following, organisation, group or team and we will defend what we believe in unequivocally. But what we really need is to have an open mind, consideration, compassion, respect, support and willingness to work together for each other, then we might start the basic fundamental principles to preserve humanitarian values.

Bob Marley was right, listen to his song................

Hitchhicker guide to Bern!

Whilst driving back home to Bern from Ribeauville I arrived at the boarder crossing at Basel and spotted 3 girls on the side of the road looking to go to Bern. So I decided to pull over and offer them a lift, although this is contray to what I would normally do, I was going that way, I had a hire car and it was around 10pm, and thought I would not like to be on the side of the road at this time. I realise this was their choice, but nevertheless I felt impulsed to offer them a lift. So all loaded up we set off and had an interesting conversation on the way, well if you can say that as they only spoke French and Spainish, and as my French is pretty poor to say the least and my Spanish is worse, so you can inmage the conversation. One of the girls acculally spoke English as bad as my French, so we were able to communicate and I understood they were off to the ‘Gurten Music Festival’ in Bern, which I was well aware of. Anyway to cut a long story short, I dropped them off, made a call to their friend who was to meet them, as their phones were not activated for internaltional roaming (which they did not realise), exchaged some money for them as they also did not realise they could not use Euros and ensured they got into a camp site. I then dropped the car off at Avis car hire and went home to bed! I know I did not have to do any of this and maybe on another occation I wouldn't as you never know who you can pick up on the road, but for some reason unknown to myself I just felt implused to do this and help them on there way. I think I'm going to invest in a 'Babelfish' as all these different languages are making communication difficult!

my road to Oz

In our lives we seek certain desires, goals, ambitions, whatever you call them we strive to achieve, but its not always easy for many reasons. We stumble along the way with roadblocks and obstacles which we don't always see and this can deflect us and we may never seem to get back on track. My road is best described as the 'Yellow Brick Road' a road to the wizard who has all the answers, the oracle, the person who can give us the guidence we need to live a more fulfilling life. I have no idea where I'm destine for but this blog is a medium for tracking some of my journey and thoughts I would like to share alone the way. My blog is not really structured and therefore I can digress from one topic to another, so bear with me and enjoy the journey. Living in Switzerland has opened up a new chapter in my life and it's a great place to explore and find personal solitude. And this is also a great country to enbale easy access to other countries such as France, Germany and Italy. I have just returned home from a brief but rewarding trip to France, a small medieval village called Ribeauville, which is situated beween Colmar and Strassbourg.

Thai Food Festival - Bern

Every year there is a Thai food festival at the Thai embassy in Bern, and since I live here then I thought I should go along and experience the food, the culture, and of course check out the girls! As you see from these pictures there is a lot of variety of food from different regions of Thailand, North, South, etc. So I ensured I sampled some and tried the Thai beer, which was wonderful. I was actually surprised to see so many mixed couples, mainly older Swiss guys with Thai wifes. This is mainly because of cheap affordable holidays to Thailand and girls that clearly would like to live in Switzerland, but then who am I to judge!

Happy Birthday Fifi (not Fifa)

Today is my elder sister's birthday and as you should never ask a girl her age I will spare you the detials. Fifi is her knick name as she has been called since she was a kid, so I have carried this on.

She lives with her husband Greg in Brooklyn, New York and has a 22 year old son Michael.

She is very good with languages, has a great sense of humor, a wicked laugh and is also my buddy.

Controversy at the FIFA World Cup 2006

After 1 month of televised football, 32 teams we have a winner, Italiy, but not after a lot of controversy and Sepp Blatter the President of FIFA has not really given us a clean and friendly tournament to remember, especially if you are Australian, Swiss, Dutch and English as these countries have a little more to be concerned about. Numerous Red and Yellow cards and very bad decision making by the official referees on the pitch has left a sour taste in the mouths of these player and supporters. And with the idea of introducing a 3rd Yellow card, where is this sport going as Blatter has suggested that suspensions should kick in after three yellow cards instead of two. Why oh why does Blatter and FIFA not address the biggest concern; the ‘divers’ the guys that think rolling around on the ground pretending they were fouled is enough to get a free kick or even a penalty. 'Diving', 'simulation', 'acting', 'conning' or just plain cheating to give it its real name, has become the scourge of football. These players should be in the movies, as they are better suited as ‘Stunt Men’ and not professional footballer. This World Cup, has been dominated by foul play, cards, bad referees and a lack of new technologies (even with 28 camera's) that can capture whether the ball has actually crossed the line or not, have not come into the decission making, which could be far quicker than the referee running over the the blind assistant. I don't mean to be derogatory, but the assistant referee would have to see through players, the goalkeeper and the post to deduce whether it was a goal or not. Therefore a game can easily be lost because neither the referee nor his assistant has seen the ball scooped out from behind the goal line, which happened at least twice during the tournament. The King of Diving and deliberate tormenting of opposing players goes to Cristiano Ronaldo of Portugal, although others include; Lukas Podolski's blatant dive in the penalty area against Argentina, to Michael Ballack's feigning against Italy, to Thierry Henry clutching his face against Spain when the slightest contact from Carlos Puyol had clearly been to his chest. You do not need to speak Portuguese to deduce that Luiz Felipe Scolari's instructions as his substitutes take to the pitch go something on the lines of 'Go and get us a penalty'. At least that is how it seemed as Helder Postiga threw himself to the floor with twist and pike as well as monotonous regularity in the semi-final against France. Why on earth does a talented young player of Cristiano Ronaldo ability have to lower himself to becoming such a bad diplomat of the ‘Beautiful Game?’ So much so that after aiding the departure of Wayne Rooney and subsequently the England team, has now become the most hated player of the tournament and is not welcome back in England. How the hell can we get to a situation like this, as Rooney and Ronaldo are both class players and teammates at Man U? I recall Blatter suggesting the referee that dished out 4 red cards in the game Holland against Portugal should have given himself a yellow card is a little harsh, as Blatter maybe should reflect on the event and award himself a Yellow card as he is ultimately responsible for the officials and the flow of the game. As the figure head, the president and the guy that can change the rules, he himself is the guilty one in my opinion. Anyway as Jimmy Greaves always said: ‘It’s a funny old game!’

School's out for the summer!

No more school for the Summer, what a bummer!! Actually this gives me time to catch up on all the lessons I have missed, do some study and go back to school knowing a little more than when I left....well that's the idea, or maybe I will be lazy and sleep through the summer dreaming..... So if you are as old as I am you will probably remember the song by Alice Cooper, 'School's Out!' well check out the link and sing along.

Lucerne

After another eventful day we woke up to yet another beautiful sunny morning and decided to go to Lucerne. My Mum has been there before, well when she was 19 years old, but I don’t suppose too much has changed since. As I have been to Lucerne many times I was the tour guide for the day. We did the usual tourist things, took the same touristy pictures, ate on the lake and did a lot of walking.

Back in Bern

Thun - Interlaken