a Geneva business trip

I've been able to do more work with Landor (my former employer) from the UK and was asked to go to Geneva for a project kick-off. It's really nice to be able to do something professional again, but with the stress that my old team had getting the presentation ready, I'm also glad I'm not there. Since Geneva was a business trip I didn't get out much, but I did bring my camera and have a few shots to share in case you don't get over there.

My first impression of Geneva was a good one. The cab driver that took me to the hotel was quite unusual. She was only the second female driver I've ever had and she was the epitome of European sophistication–wearing a nice dress, well-done hair, trendy sunglasses, boots, the whole nine. She drove a fancy SUV that was perfumed inside and had fashion magazines in the backseat pocket. Ok, so that was a little deceptive. None of the other drivers looked like that and despite my first impression of the clean sophistication of the airport and my driver, the city itself has plenty of graffiti, trash, and seedy areas to bring it back down to earth.

Overall, Geneva is a very attractive place surrounded by Lake Geneva and mountains. I didn't get a great view of the mountains most days since the buildings block them and we had very cloudy, drizzly weather that resulted in the mountains being enveloped as they received a dusting of snow. We even got some flurries in the city on the day I left. Even so, when you did get a peak it was impressive.


The lake is in the bottom left corner and mountains in the upper right.

Our hotel was right next to Lake Geneva so I was able to take some sunrise shots as I trekked to Starbucks in search of breakfast one morning...


Geneva is very French considering it's surrounded by France. It even looks like France might have partial ownership of the lake. The architecture in the city is very formal and what I would consider French, but definitely European. The smaller, residential homes I saw sporatically as I was driven through the city had hints of Swiss chalet.



As you would expect, nearly every large prominent building that I saw was owned by a bank. What did surprise me, however, was how hard it was to find an ATM.

The food was pretty good, although quite expensive. We went to a "traditional" Swiss place one night and had the "festival of ravioli," which is a Landor tradition. It's an assortment of mostly cheese ravioli, tortellini, and penne covered with more cheese and baked. Fondue also seemed quite popular there. The next night we went to the Old Town section of Geneva for dinner and I had a tasty beef filet and frittes (maybe real "French" fries) that were very good.

I didn't get to see much of the Old Town, but this a square.


Besides cheese and chocolate, Geneva is famous for the Jet d’Eau. It started out as a practical pressure release for some water turbines on the Rhone river and, having proved a popular tourist attraction, it became decorative and was moved to a more prominent location in the lake.

Today, the height of the jet is an incredible 140m, with 500 litres of water forced out of the nozzle every second at about 200kph. Each drop takes sixteen seconds to complete the round-trip from nozzle to lake and, on windy days, the plume can rapidly drench the surroundings...

It's also pretty when illuminated at night.


And finally, there was one funny sign. I just couldn't resist. Apparently the Swiss stick men are in an especially big hurry to escape the impending doom of fire or of their own fumes :)

Happy Birthday SHAWN!!

This is the Millenium Bridge crossing the River Ouse south of York. It's the most attractive piece of modern architecture in the city so, of course, we thought of you.

We hope that you are having a fantastic birthday!

speaking of funny...

Greg dug up this list of the "Most ridiculous British laws." Pat and I laughed pretty hard, so we though we'd make it "front page" news in case you're not reading the comments...

1. It is illegal to die in the Houses of Parliament.

2. It is an act of treason to place a postage stamp bearing the British monarch upside-down.

3. In Liverpool, it is illegal for a woman to be topless except as a clerk in a tropical fish store.

4. Mince pies cannot be eaten on Christmas Day.

5. In Scotland, if someone knocks on your door and requires the use of your toilet, you must let them enter.

6. A pregnant woman can legally relieve herself anywhere she wants, including in a policeman's helmet.

7. The head of any dead whale found on the British coast automatically becomes the property of the king, and the tail of the queen.

8. It is illegal to avoid telling the tax man anything you do not want him to know, but legal not to tell him information you do not mind him knowing.

9. It is illegal to enter the Houses of Parliament in a suit of armour.

10. In the city of York it is legal to murder a Scotsman within the ancient city walls, but only if he is carrying a bow and arrow.

We have heard versions of #10 (we are in York, of course). We heard that the Scotsman doesn't necessarily have to be armed, but just identified within the city walls. There are two versions of the rules for killing him 1) you must use a bow and arrow, but can be anywhere within the walls when you do it or 2) you must be standing ON the wall with your bow and arrow. Other people add a qualifier that it can't be done on Sunday. Our "house rule"--we say you have to shoot from the walls to make it more of a challenge. We don't care what day.

On doing some "weird news" web research, I found some more information on this strange subject. Believe what you want...

As a matter of fact, England is lucky anybody visits its towns, since York might not be alone in allowing profiling-based, archery-enhanced homicide. According to Mundayweb.com, Welshmen can still be shot with a longbow if found in Hereford, (but not on Sunday). And "in Chester you can only shoot a Welsh person with a bow and arrow inside the city walls and after midnight."

funny signs, part 2

It's that time again. I'm getting a backlog of "funny" photos. Today's topic is road signs. I apologize in advance for the poor quality of some of these pictures as I am not accustomed to taking pictures of small objects from a moving object going 70mph and keeping it in focus--much to Pat's frustration :) I'm sure there will be more road signs, but to get started...


My absolute favorite. It speaks on so many levels, yet as a road sign it is relatively ambiguous.


Pat and I had a debate about this one. I say "yield to windsocks," he says "caution wind." I concede that he's right, but it's funnier my way!


This one speaks for itself--I like the addition of the stick man.


This one doesn't make much sense to me (small airplane on left side). If Pat doesn't take heed when an airplane lands on the motorway, I'll let you know.


We took great care getting this one in focus since we smile every time we see it--sorry Grandma. This one raises so many questions. These are always in pairs and seem to be marking the beginning and end of some type of imaginary crossing zone, but why? Where are the elderly coming from? Why would they want to cross in a designated zone? Why would they want to cross a motorway, which are usually much busier than this one appears, when they clearly can't run? (Note the thin little cane) I've looked, but I don't see any obvious nursing homes or even really very many residential buildings near these signs. It's not like they have to cross the street to get their mail. If I ever see an elderly person crossing the motorway and causing a traffic snarl, I'll let you know.


Warning--attack sheep! No seriously, these little free-ranging guys have access to the road in this area and you really do have to keep your eyes open to keep the wool off your bumper. There are similar signs for cows. Cows even get their own stoplights in some areas so that they can be safely herded across motorways. You certainly don't want to hit one of those suckers.


Then there's those pesky people. They can be quite dangerous too.


Just put your mind in the gutter...


The original one and only?? I doubt it, this is just a side street, but interesting all the same.

For a look at the last batch of funny signs, click on this link for the archived post

Happy Guy Fawkes Day!

Remember, Remember the Fifth of November!

This is the night to have fireworks and bonfires "to commemorate the failure, in the year 1605, of an attempt to assassinate the king and Parliament." Some of these celebrations even have burning effigies of the most famous perpetrator, Guy Fawkes. According to our British cultural lady in the US, celebrating a failed terrorism plot is the only excuse the British have come up with for a good firework show.

And you know how people love fireworks! Fireworks are legal here and they even sell them at the grocery store this time of year. While buying our weekly foodstuff, we heard an announcement that you can only buy fireworks AFTER you buy your groceries. Good thing... you know how people get the itch to set them off as soon as they get them in their sweaty hands :)

From what I understand, Guy Fawkes Day is celebrated a little differently in York. We had sporadic fireworks shooting out of people's backyards Saturday and Sunday night, but you won't see any large scale celebrations or burning effigies. You see, Guy Fawkes was born and raised here so they're not too keen on burning him at the stake every year.


There's a plaque on this church whose last line proclaims that, among other things, "Guy Fawkes was baptized here on 16th April 1570."



So instead of watching a doll burn, we'll celebrate the day by watching V for Vendetta and consider the possibility that he was a hero, not a villain. As Hollywood so eloquently states...

Voilà! In view, a humble vaudevillian veteran, cast vicariously as both victim and villain by the vicissitudes of Fate. This visage, no mere veneer of vanity, is a vestige of the vox populi, now vacant, vanished. However, this valorous visitation of a bygone vexation stands vivified, and has vowed to vanquish these venal and virulent vermin vanguarding vice and vouchsafing the violently vicious and voracious violation of volition. The only verdict is vengeance; a vendetta held as a votive, not in vain, for the value and veracity of such shall one day vindicate the vigilant and the virtuous. Verily, this vichyssoise of verbiage veers most verbose, so let me simply add that it's my very good honor to meet you and you may call me V.

the ever-setting sun

It became very obvious when we got back from the states how far north we are. The sun is very low on the horizon already, making it feel like the sun's setting all day long. It does make for some interesting light effects and really long shadows...


This was taken in the morning. Not that unusual for sunrise I suppose, although it's probably 10am or so.


This was taken at noon. Not too much change--still long shadows.


This was taken in the afternoon, probably around 3:00ish.


And done. I think this was about 4:30 or so.

We just had daylight savings so now the sun starts to set around 4ish and is pitch black by 5. Winter should be really interesting. According to a planner Pat has, the sun is suppose to rise in London at 7:44am on Dec. 1 and set at 3:55pm. Keep in mind we're still farther north and Dec. 1 is before the shortest day of the year. According to one of our travel books, there's an average of 1.5 hrs. of sunlight each day in January (clouds + dark = no sun). Stay tuned. It should be a long, dark winter. Glad I brought my tripod :)

Pat documented the reverse when he arrived in July. For a reminder, click on this link back to that archived post.

the accommodations

Now that our place is as furnished as it will get, and it's nice and clean, I finally got around to taking some pictures. (For a reminder of what it looked like before, click on this link back to that archived post)

The back entry from the private parking lot (aka car park). Nicely done.


The common entry way. Yes, very impressive.


Our place. Second floor (aka first floor in England).


Our storage room/junk room/laundry-drying room (aka third bedroom). Unfortunately the first thing you see when you come in. Less impressive :)


Our living room/dining room. Nice open floor plan.


Our dining room/kitchen. Love the workspace in the kitchen, but storage is tough. I think there's actually more usable storage at our house. Especially since the tall vertical cabinets on the left are the refrigerator/freezer, the low cabinet under the toaster is the dishwasher, and the one next to that is the washer/dryer. Luckily we didn't bring all of our stuff!


Our bedroom. You can't see the wall of Ikea cabinets for all of our clothes--nice :) We have more clothes storage here than at home.


Our bathroom. Note the coveted large, fully-enclosed, non-leaking shower--truly an endangered species over here! We're willing to share when you come to visit :)


Our guest bedroom. After sleeping in here for the first month or so, I can tell you it gets bright in the morning since it's facing east. The double bed is very comfortable initially, but is so soft it tends to make you a bit sore. (It's a lot better if you don't sleep on your side all night) There's also an air mattress available.


Our guest bathroom. Nice amount of space and a great tub.


It's a nice place, no complaints. Ultimately our landlord wants to sell the flat vs. renting it. It can all be yours for around $800,000--jump on that bargain price! (It's not THAT nice) Needless to say, we can't afford to live here :)