a weekend in zermatt

so its almost been a full year in switzeraland (with all extenuating circumstances aside) and i finally saw the matterhorn. we spent the weekend in zermatt celebrating a friend's birthday with 30+ people. this shot of the most famous mountain in europe looking pretty fierce was taken from gornergrat.

we stayed in at the theodul apartments on a side street in the middle of town. the rooms were clean and the balconies were big. the skiing was decent for december (so i'm told). and the group was full of energy and good cheer.








on friday, we hung out this awesome bar - cinema - gallery called vernissage. it had some pretty amazing modern paintings of the matterhorn in different lights. and the cinema had this incredible old school movie projector. the place was rad and i recommend it to anyone passing through town.

saturday night was even better. we hiked 40 minutes up to a friend's bergrestaurant for an outdoor apero of gluweine and processco, and then continued on to the bergrestaurant blatten. there we ate a traditional swiss meal of salad, rosti, desert buffet and lots of wine. it was cosy and good. by the time we left, there were huge chunky snow flakes falling from the sky and all the snow machines were doing their thing. we walked back to zermatt in the dark.

subprime crisis...

brian is going to kill me, but i just can't help it. one of many ubs spoof ads making the rounds in various inboxes today.

how the markets really work

for anyone who's looking for clarification:

story of my life

zeughauskeller has grenades

so it would be advised not to smoke there (sorry - its a bit hard to read). my favorite part is that they've chosen to communicate this potential devastating danger on a laminated sheet of paper taped to the wall. (photo: zeughauskeller, paradeplatz - zuerich)

but the BEST part is that when they say "stored here," they actually mean "we like to keep grenades directly under this sign." (you can find this on your left when you come in from the left-side entrance.) nothing says bon appetit better than instilling the fear of live ammunition mistakenly firing after that sign is swept away by an updraft caused by the door on any given windy day...but i guess that's the price you have to pay for turning the old armoury into a restaurant.

anyway, i'm sure they aren't real. just like that cheap replica of a 17th+ century canon they have inside - that thing's totally plastic ;)

cadbury and its spoof

for those who haven't see the cabury gorilla commerical, check it out here:



and now the spoof:

weinachts markt

of course zuerich dresses their xmas tree top-to-bottom in swarovski crystals. what else would they do? shiny...(photo: zuerich, hauptbahnhof)

burger king

on the hunt for the "best burger of all time," we ventured out to rappersville on friday night. after getting the ultimate burger tour of nyc, our swiss friend maintains that dirty joe's burgers are unequivocally #1.

i give their farm burger a 6. i am certainly a picky burger eater and i can't say the swiss do it better than some of my preferred haunts in the us. as for a spot outside of zurich, dirty joe is a hip, thrifty dive. the music is loud and the decorations are kitsch - they even have some half-dressed mannequins with fro-wigs popping out of corners. if you are ever trying to get a taste for zuerich's surrounding villages, its definitely a cool place to kick it.

here's a list of my all time burger favorites, in no particular order:

corner bistro, nyc
ruloff's, ithaca, ny
dinosaur bbq, syracuse, ny
matt's bar, minneapolis
rick's cafe, chagrin falls, oh
in-and-out burger, san fran
electric house, london
white trash fast food, berlin

ohh that tinguely feeling

last week, we went to basel for the cornell alumni club thanksgiving feast. on saturday, before our annual meeting and dinner, we had a guided tour through the tinguely museum. it was awesome.

jean tinguely lived in basel and was a leading participant in the parisian avant-garde movement of the 1950s-60s. he is most famous for his installation, kinetic works like the one pictured below. the museum was particularly interesting for its design. it was meant to resemble a factory space, similar to the workshop where tinguely built his pieces.


he spent much of his time scouring flea markets and junk yards for inspiration and material. one of the most striking series was one created from the wreckage of a fire-consumed barn. morbid at times, it incorporated animal skulls and charred farm equipment. just goes to show you, one man's junk...might be a world renown artist's treasure and admired in a famous museum one day.

he has some mechanical fountains that can be seen in and around basel. and he is also responsible for the lake-side statue "eureka" in zurich, near the china garten (vintage pic below).



jean tinguely is considered a swiss hero and graces the front of the 10 franc note. and now here's a real knee-slapper: the swiss claim that they portrayed tinguely with his glasses on his forehead so the austrians wouldn't mistake 10 for 1000...!

more to come on swiss money. probably some of the coolest currency i have seen. just another reason not to join the european union and adopt the euro.

little things make me happy...

so naturally, i'm digging the little people project.