Author Archives: lauren

La Poste

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Post by Lauren

The post office is called La Poste. It’s French for post office. Ladies and gentlemen, this is not your ordinary operation.

Here is what you can do:
-Send mail & buy stamps, of course.
-Pay your bills and fines – just bring the originals in with your payment and they handle the bill paying for you (there are no checks in Switzerland). Don’t ask us how we know so much about the proper way to pay fines.
-Get permits for driving on highways, for your bicycle, etc. It’s 40 CHF to drive on the highway here. Anyone who drives on a Swiss road has to pay this. Think twice about a little joyride in the Alps other EU peeps….it costs a pretty penny here. It’s only 6 CHF for the right to drive your bike on the road here. What a steal! Since I have taken mine out twice, I’m at 3 CHF a pop.
-Pick up a package that is bigger than a standard 8 x 10 envelope or sometimes just a 4 x 6 cardboard envelope that looks important (they won’t leave at your door, you have to walk 3 blocks to pick it up). Oh and watch out. You’ll likely have to pay 30 CHF VAT for the right to pick up your package. Enjoy!

Here’s what you cannot do:
-Do not try to pay by credit card.
-Do not attempt to pick up a package for your hubby without your marriage license. Especially if your last name is different. Not happening.

When you enter La Poste, you take a number slip from a machine. You don’t have to stand in line, you just wait until your number appears . That frees you up for…..SHOPPING! You can buy a ton of stuff at the post office:

Office supplies! Makes sense.

A rather large assortment of wallets.
At least 4 types with Swiss flags.

Lots of tools. Even a 100 pc set!

Need a new cell phone? No worries, there is quite a variety here!

How about Spongebob??

They also have tons of recipe books, gift cards (iTunes, department stores) and small appliances.

It’s really more like a gas station convenience store than what we know as a post office.

Like most things, sending mail is not cheap here. Its $1 for a stamp inter-Switzerland. $3 for one to the US. I had a normal sized envelope yesterday and they said it was abnormally large for Switzerland and charged me $5. This is why a lot of you get photos from us instead of real cards. Sorry.

Sugar Bowl : How the times have changed

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Post by Lauren

My Hokies played in the Sugar Bowl against Michigan last night. The last time we played in the Sugar Bowl, in 2005, I made it down to New Orleans for the game with a group of friends. That city is definitely the best bowl game destination possible. We had so much fun I think I actually got walking pneumonia from the trip.

This year, a trip wasn’t possible. Also, to make matters worse, the 8:30pm kick-off meant it would be 2:30am for us in Geneva. I decided the best approach was to go to bed early so that I could get up at 4:30am to see the end of the game. Or so I thought I was going to see the end. Our Slingbox that was working perfectly last night was on the fritz this a.m. It was too late to call our Slingbox hosts for a re-boot so I tried to watch on ESPN.com watch live. Unfortunately, that didn’t work either so Drive Chart had to do for getting the play-by-play.

I was glued to the posts and Tweets to see how the game changed back and forth to go into overtime. It was actually surprising how suspenseful watching a game on a laptop screen can be!

In the end, Michigan scored a FG in OT and we did not. Since I couldn’t see the game, I couldn’t sum up how it went overall. According to Facebook*, about half of my Hokie friends say it was a bad call and half say it was bad coaching.

From Bourbon street to the laptop. Funny how times can change in seven years.

*Thank you Facebook for all your minute by minute sidelines chatter….it helped me understand what was happening! However, my favorite part of Facebook on Game Day is seeing all of my friend’s kids dressed up for the game. 

Virtually watching the Sugar bowl


Bangkok, Thailand

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Post by Lauren

This post would have been more interesting had I not picked up a little friend* in Cambodia who dwelled in my tummy during our last stop, Bangkok. I finally made it out of our hotel at 5pm one day and 2pm the next, so a few of our plans in this great city didn’t come to fruition.

Luckily, we’d had a little unexpected time earlier in the week when our connection to Cambodia ran into a snafu. We showed up at the airport at 6am for our 8am flight. We were told by Bangkok Airways, “Oh, the plane is already full. You catch next flight…2pm” After much back and forth, explaining how we had a full day in Cambodia already planned a tour paid for and showed receipt of confirmed seats, we still didn’t have any luck**.

They gave us a free hotel room, but we decided to use the time instead to get an early view of Bangkok. We hopped in a taxi to the Royal Palace. While we still did miss part of our itinerary in Cambodia, this time to see a bit of Bangkok was a blessing in disguise because of how awful I felt later when we returned. Not sure it could have happened then.

Here are a few of the sites at the Royal Palace:

 

 

As mentioned above, our return trip to Bangkok was limited in sightseeing. However, we did manage to catch a drink at SkyBar, Gabe experienced some Bangkok nightlife after I turned in, and we hit the huge Saturday market, Jatujak. And, we got to see how the Thai ring in the New Year with lots of color and liveliness. A bonus was seeing the fireworks from all sides of the plane as we took off at 12 midnight on New Years Eve.

 

We’ll just have to come back to Bangkok to get to see all the things we missed!

This leads us to….

Travel tips for Bangkok/Cambodia:

*We suspect my food illness was actually from our 5-star hotel, not actually local food in Cambodia so don’t let this turn you off.

**Bangkok Air entitles itself the “Asia’s Boutique Airline”. Don’t believe it. This is the worst run airline operation we have ever seen. After having one of our legs “full” at check-in and the other return flight 4 hours late (no weather issues), we were not fans of this “boutique”. On the other hand, Thai Air was A-M-A-Z-I-N-G.

Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom

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Post by Lauren

As we mentioned in the previous post, we were shocked how many ruins there were in the Angkor region….about a thousand! That was such a surprise for us as we were thinking it would just be the one…Angkor Wat.

However, Angkor Thom ( Angkor = “city” and Thom = “big” ) had so many amazing sites within its four walls. Not to mention, its four walls were adorned with detail, 2 miles each. Crazy! There were also a lot of sites just outside the deep moat surrounding the walled city.

To top it off, the most magnificent, Angkor Wat, was constructed during the height of the Khmer empire and is said to be the world’s largest single religious monument.

One of the other takeaways we had was how the temples “changed hands” throughout history. They changed back and forth from Hindu to Buddhist depending on the king at that time.

Here is a chronological recap of our three day journey:

Preah Khan, just outside Angkor Thom

 

Neak Pean - where all the healing took place

Ta Phrohm - where Lara Croft Tomb Raider was filmed

 

Banteay Srei - incredible detail work by the artisans

 

Pre Rup

 

Angkor Wat