25Dec 2010

I was nervous about spending Christmas at M’s mom’s as it was bound to be emotionally laden. Upon my arrival at the airport, Eti was excited to see me and ran to me. M declared he had not washed Eti’s hair since they arrived, which would have been about 9 days. Being back in Zurich felt good and familiar. We went into the Migros at the Flughafen and also bought some kipfellis and headed to Herrliberg. It was real nice to be spending time with family, even though this would be my extended family. We got around to preparing for dinner….M’s mom had prepared veal and vegetables in a terra cotta pot, apparently of Germanic tradition.

Dinner was delicious, other than M’s failed potato dish which had not enough time in the oven. We had the delicate winter nussli salad with boiled egg. Wine was from the late M’s papa’s cellar. He was indeed missed…After dinner, we had our present opening, with Eti getting an overwhelming number of presents that he completely lost interest of opening his #1 superstar present – a box of Lego for an airliner! Lucky Y got a raclette from her mommy. I got a pair of earrings from Y, and little knick-knacks from M’s mom. Fatigue set up shortly and I passed out for the next 10 hours.

26Dec 2010. It was a clear beautiful day. Loads of snow had fallen the day before or so, and it made a picturesque Christmas scene. N suggested we head up to the nearby hills for sleigh-riding. Seemed like everybody else in Herrliberg had the same idea, and seemed like all the kids appeared from the woodwork because I never see any at the playground nearby. We warmed up with apple cider, skipping the bratwurst cooking on the grill by the outdoor stand next to the slopes. Evening, we headed back and had leftover for dinner – still very good.

27Dec 2010 – The event of the day was that R & L were joining us for dinner. It was going to be raclette. We headed to Migros at Erlenbach in the morning (seemed like grocery shopping was a favourite thing to do for N.) She bought more sausages (as I had used them for Eti’s breakfast), and M insisted she get real cheese.  A minor scene occurred. I filled the shopping cart with Migros potato chips for some late night snacking. After all, I was on vacation! R&L turned up early and the kids got their Christmas presents. L squealed with delight at the present that I had gotten her – a plastic monkey from PetShop. I lucked out with that. Eti was so excited about his police dress-up set, which included a whistle, handcuffs, cellphone, flashlight and a white hat. He would wear it very frequently for the rest of his stay. Raclette was fun. We poured the melted cheese over our potatoes and bread. The sausages were so-so (full of nitrates and MSG) but the entire atmosphere was merry-making.

28Dec 2010 – Nothing during the day. M is to leave for Florence in the evening so the schedule evolves around that. Eti and I hang out briefly at the deserted playground but soon it gets boring. In the evening, we take a train to Stadelhofen and walk to Tibits by Hilti for my favourite vegetarian buffet. Food is by weight, so the trick is not to fill your plate with heavy things! Eti wasn’t hot about anything and ate lots of french fries. We then got him a margherita pizza at the Belleville which he chomped down with great satisfaction. In the meantime, M slipped away to the train station.

On the day they arrived, Eti and I picked them up from the airport. In their usual non-excited way, they just said hi, as if they live round the corner and see us on a weekly basis. No hugs, no squeals of excitement, nothing…..that was my first cultural shock. After all, I really have been in North America for over a decade. I picked up Mother India roti dinner for all of us on our way back to Fennings Street. They unloaded their gifts – Eti was thrilled with Pop’s “truck with eyes” present. Mom had brought along curry paste, chicken chilli, two packs of instant laksa, amongst other goodies. Of course M & I hadn’t informed them yet of my pregnancy. I was mostly nauseated.

We headed to Whittamore’s Farm over the first weekend and had a small picnic of fried rice & sausages. It was a beautiful spring day. That was the start of Mom’s bad cold which would slowly get passed to M, Eti & I. Next few days, I noticed that she was slowly sounding very hoarse, but out of politeness I didn’t ask her if she was sick, and neither did she say anything. Work was busy at the office due to the three school projects, but I managed to take some time off to bring them for Dim Sum in Chinatown one afternoon, then sushi bento box another afternoon, and then a walk at High Park another afternoon (during which Mom tripped over some uneven pavers at the zoo).

On the Friday, we headed off up to Cozy Cottage which was close to Algonquin NP. It was a pleasant drive, not too long. There was a zillion blackflies and mosquitoes. Ah, the pleasure of cottaging. We stayed mostly indoors unless we absolutely had to do something. Pop, M & Eti took the canoe out across the lake. That evening, we had a BBQ. Mom’s cold was getting bad to worse. The bathroom was adjacent to our bedroom and in the mornings, she had non-stop coughing and clearing of her throat in there. Then she was persistently coughing…Second day at the cottage and Eti started having a heavy yellow eye discharge in both eyes. We got worried and quickly brought him to the emergency department of the town hospital. It wasn’t busy and he was looked at immediately. Turned out to be bacteria conjunctivities, mostly from the tap water which came from the water well, which I suspected was probably not UV filtered or something. Anyway, guess who else got it – Mom! I was seriously starting to realize Mom’s immune resistance was just as rudimentary as Eti’s. No-one else came down with it.

We broke the news over dinner of my pregnancy, and guess what, again no reaction, just “Oh, when are you due?” from Mom. It was really awkward. Pop said nothing, and the conversation fell silent immediately after that. M & I looked at each other and shrugged. What do you do with Asian parents? Mom did indeed started ramping up chicken soup for me almost every night, though she added one big tablespoon of soya sauce, which I wasn’t too hot about. After all, soya sauce has a non proven risk of cancer.

By the time we were about to leave for Lousiana, M had this super bad cough/cold that he had caught from Mom. He was rasping away non-stop during our drive to Buffalo. Eti was also by that time sick and coughing. I must have been protected by the chicken soup. Pop must have already caught it previously because he didn’t appear to be falling sick despite sharing the same bed with Mom at night, and she was hacking away all night. I had to get her to visit the walk-in clinic at Queen and Spadina, and they had given her this slow-releasing antibiotics which made her sick. This wasn’t obviously making her cold go away, and I tried to get her to take some form of cough suppressant because her cough was absolutely driving all of Crazy!

We had a brief shopping trip in Target in Buffalo before heading to the Buffalo International Airport, almost missing our flight because of bad traffic. Chocolate milk cost $5 on the plane….nothing else really offered on board other than complimentary pretzels. Once at Louis Armstrong Airport in New Orleans, we were ready for our adventure. It was super hot and humid, and Pop & Mom felt like they were home. We picked up our rental car and drove to our Holiday Inn in the French Quarter, and crashed for the night. Eti and I shared one queen bed, and Mom and Dad shared another, saving me the cost of getting another room.

First morning in New Orleans and we were roaring to go. We had the most expensive breakfast buffet right at the mexican restaurant next to the Holiday Inn. Then after a brief walk, Mom confided in me that she had an accident in her pants! Geez! We left Pop behind to explore the city while we headed back to the hotel. Mom blamed the yoghurt and the lozenges….what could I say? I felt like I was totally an adult child taking care of an elderly parent, with role reversal, except that I also had a young child that I was taking care of. Fortunately this was going to be the only “accident” of the entire trip.

Mom’s cold improved significantly in Lousiana. We booked ourselves on a Greyhound tour of N.O. and the effects of Katrina. It was such an eye-opener to be on the retrospect. I recalled the big military ship that we all went for our lunches, by then I had returned my FEMA badge because I wasn’t a US citizen. The bus took us to Ward 9 where a portion was redeveloped by Brad Pitt, where renowned architects had taken on the rebuilding house by house. Urbanwise, the area was still an isolated pocket of brownfield site, but these houses with environmental features like solar heating attempted to make better what was there before.

We mostly ate 2 meals a day in N.O., following recommendations from the chowhound website. Once was at this off-the-beaten-track seafood restaurant, Bozo’s,  where we had a huge plate of crawfish for $5. Not that I was crazy about crawfish at all. We tried gumbo, jambalaya, fried catfish and chips. Another time we took the recommendations of the Greyhound bus driver and went to a Gumbo House. It was a charming restaurant and very crowded. Food was excellent. We headed off to Lafayette, New Iberia (Avery Island Tabasco Factory), Konriko Rice Mills, Swamp Tour at Cypress Lake Preserve, Laura & Oak Alley Plantations, the magical Rip Van Winkle Gardens for the remaining trip. We had 2 dinner buffet at Chinese restaurants. Not pricey at all, and well worth the fun! Pop ate like he missed Chinese food like crazy. I even took them to my all-time favourite Victor’s Cafe in New Iberia where our team used to lunch on a daily basis while posted out there. Food was just as good as ever, including the ever famous cornbread.

Finally back in TO, M was in a super bad mood because he had been sick for the last week and we had not given him a call for Father’s Day. Petty all over. I was already starting to feel sick by then. Serious sore throat, to last for the next week, plus serious coughing. Thank you very much MOM!

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When his nanny E went away for a 1 month long vacation back to the Philippines, we signed him up for extra days at the LVK school with a stand-in nanny V to pick him up after 3:30pm. One evening, he was dropped off, cleaned up from a nosebleed as a result of being hit in the face by a ball. He then apparently went straight to sleep on the couch at 5:30pm. I was dead worried. The house took on an air of death (same feeling when the dog was sick and dying.) Eti slept and slept till 8pm. Could it have been head concussion? Then when he woke up, he became his usual silly self, and I heaved a sigh of relief.

Big Milestone date: November 19, Saturday, M took the training wheels off his red bike, and after 3 rounds around the school by Osler Park, he takes off like a bird with wings. It was after much discussion as to exactly when he was going to have his training wheels removed. He had decided it would be his 5th birthday. I drop by the park to see how they are doing, and he is beaming away. He asks me a few times, “Mom, are you proud of me?” I certainly am very!

Eti is particularly sensitive. He asks me all the time, “Mom, do you love Oskar better or me better?” When I reply, “The same,” he is not satisfied and asks me the same question again until I modify my reply to the following, “I love Eti better because Eti is my real boy. Oskar is my pretend boy and he has a real mommy.”

He asks me one evening when I am giving him a bath 2 weeks ago, “Mom, when I am dead, will you still love me?” How do I answer that? The thought of Yvonne weighs heavily in my mind when I answered him. “Eti, you won’t be dead until you become a grown-up, and then become an old man, and then you will die.”

Which he replies, “Mom, will you love me when I am an old man and I am dead?”

Then he asks me “Mom, will you love Papa when he is dead?”

“Yes of course Eti.”
“Mom, who will be dead first, you or Papa?”

I didn’t reply directly. I said, “Eti, mommy’s papa and mom are not dead yet. They are Singapore grandpa and grandma. Remember them?”

He is apparently not satisfied with the answer. When I put him to bed that night, he asks me again, “Mom, when I am dead, will you still love me?”

More on this topic. Once M & I played a game of holding our breaths. Eti got hysterical because he was certain we would die if we held our breaths too long. “No!!!!! Mom you are going to die!!!!” He screamed in tears, which led us to torture him more by doing it again…Aren’t we sadistic parents?

M attended Eti’s first Parent-Teacher meeting last Thursday. Report is that Eti has gotten high marks for socialization. (He tatters on his classmates, that much I know.)

Halloween was such a big thing for Eti. This was the first time he was so actively excited about the entire event. He helped me put up the scary house decorations. Then we had to make a rule that only during Halloween one could eat as much candy as one wanted. Which he did. He counted down to Halloween, which was a Monday. After dinner, we left for trick-or-treating. He had quickly lost interest on giving out candy at the front door. However, his enthusiasm for collecting candy was unlimited. By the end of Fennings Street, it was quite obvious he needed to pee. He was upset that he had to go home but I convinced him it would be better than last year when he had to pee into a bush and ended up peeing into his bear suit. Anyway, this is Bear Suit version #3, Eti has worn it since he was 2 years old, now a little too short at the arms and legs. After 1-1/2 intense hours of trick-or-treating, he decided he had enough candy, but kept repeatedly asking me if he could eat as much candy as he wanted on Halloween. Once back home, boy, did he stuff his face. First smarties, then bag after bag of potato chips, then the sour gummies, until I was afraid he was going to get sick. The only downer for the event was that someone stole all the candy that we had left outside in the late evening while we were watching a horror movie, and the next morning, someone else had stolen our pumpkin that I had so lovingly carved.

Finally, almost every day as I get closer to the birth of #2, he gives us suggestions of names for his new brother. Almost always they are his classmates. Then he talks about what his brother can or cannot do, i.e. his brother will need training wheels on his bicycle, cannot play with LEGO, etc. We go to the midwife appointments often, and he gets to turn on the ultrasound scope to hear the heart beat. Mostly during these times, he becomes intensely quiet and shy.

He still hates his greens. He only devours broccoli, eats spinach when bargained with. Loves his meats like a carnivore, doesn’t mind fish if cooked properly. Loves “crunchy noodles” which he devours with his fingers and wow even the Vietnamese owners at Golden Turtle when he almost cleans out his plate. Loves bento box with the yam tempura. Loves his sausages and ham and eggy to death. Loves his “yakult” or yoghurt drinks. Eats apple slices without skin no matter what I try to convince him to do. Eats grapes. Sometimes eats oranges. Loves his chicken rice and pasta the best. Always asks me, “Mom, what’s my lunch tomorrow?” If it is anything but pasta, he sulks. Loves pasta with mushroom cream sauce in particular. Loves his “cranberry cooks (cookies)”. Helps me to unpack the grocery cart onto the cashier belt without asking. Sometimes makes me buy the things he likes at the grocery store (chocolate milk or flavoured soya milk boxes for school).  Doesn’t mind too much the soups I make. Likes roti prata which he dips liberally in the curry sauce, but then drinks gallons of water and sucks his breath. Loves fried carrot cake, adores siu mai at T&T and the chive cakes, loves the pan fried noodles at Rasa Malaysia. And then, he makes the biggest poops every night. No wonder! Sometimes I gaze in wonder at the shit sitting in the potty, how such a small body can contain so much in his intestines!

Then there was the secret Y tried to hide: for the last few months she had a woman come in once a week to clean her apartment and do grocery shopping, paid for by the state. This woman had reported on her job while M was at the apartment cleaning up, so M could ask her questions.

It is difficult to close the questions to the cause of Y’s death until the toxicology results are out in about 2 months’ time.  M said she had collapsed in the TV room, and there was a bruise on her right side of her face. A cup of apple juice was spilled by her side.

With loss, comes grief, and then some form of reprimand…why didn’t Y get her life together responsibly to prevent such a predictable outcome that has brought severe pain to her mother and brother?

In the end, all I could do was send her mom this poem that I found, in memory of Y, which N cut out and put behind Y’s picture:

Don’t Cry for me

Don’t cry for me now I have died, for I’m still here I’m by your side,
My body’s gone but my soul’s is here, please don’t shed another tear,
I am still here I’m all around, only my body lies in the ground.
I am the snowflake that kisses your nose,
I am the frost, that nips your toes.
I am the sun, bringing you light,
I am the star, shining so bright.
I am the rain, refreshing the earth,
I am the laughter, I am the mirth.
I am the bird, up in the sky,
I am the cloud, that’s drifting by.
I am the thoughts, inside your head,
While I’m still there, I can’t be dead.

Author unknown.

Can’t believe this is happening. Can’t believe this is happening. Can’t believe this is happening. These thoughts just kept repeating themselves in my head all day. We were barely a month back from Zurich, had celebrated N’s 80th birthday together at Cafe Rossli, had spent a nice afternoon walking along the lake. Back at Herrliberg, she had taken a shower and washed out her pants and was walking around the apartment without her pants while it dried. M had reprimanded her for acting like a child. She was doing her thing, having a cigarette. Eti was hanging out with her in the balcony while I packed. She had come into the room and asked what she should do with the DVDs that she had bought for Eti’s birthday. M had told her she had gotten too many and that she should keep them for next time. I had offered to take them from her, and said I would keep them and “time-release” the DVD of Bob with the birthday cake on Eti’s birthday. When it was time for her to take her train, we had given each other a hug.

The weekend after N’s 80th birthday,  I had a food poisoning episode on a Saturday, Eti had reported the entire event to N on skype, and so I was called to the computer where I chatted with N. She was in very good spirits because Yvonne had taken her to the zoo where they fed penguins. Yvonne came to the skype after N, and we chatted a little about my job, and its expected end, and how I should get on employment insurance. She told me that in Switzerland, welfare was 70% of the last income. She described what would be for dinner that evening, they were preparing a vegetable pastry dish, with “zuchetti” (zucchini), carrots and other vegetables. Mmmmm….I wished her a very enjoyable dinner, and we said goodbye.

Less than 2 weeks later, she was gone. How fragile the state of normalcy can be. Was my breaking of the dishes on New Year’s Day an omen? I hated to think so, but it appeared to be so. This whole day passed as if, as M put it, as if one was in a bad dream. She got me a nice pair of earrings that I really liked for my birthday. I had gotten her what she asked for – reading glasses and body lotion from the dollar store. M had gotten her from Amazon an electric toothbrush. She had invited us over to Winterthur for pasta dinner, and had asked me if I would like cream porcini. It was real nice that she had remembered I liked mushrooms. We had arrived via train and bus, and she greeted us, and N had bought some cheese sticks which we ate while chatting and playing with her cat. She had opened a bottle of champagne, and we sat down to some nussli salad with garlic crotons. She had specially gotten Eti some grapes for starters, which was so typically thoughtful of her. Yvonne had made a big pot of porcini cream sauce, and dinner had been delicious. I even had some cream sauce packed to go. Her kitchen had been messy and I had offered to help clean up, but she said it was ok, would give her something to do. I had said I liked her apartment because it felt like a hippie’s place, full of memorabilia and books. She had been quite happy to hear that. We had brought along the raclette that N had given her for Christmas which we had used when Regina was over at Herrliberg for dinner. Because Eti was so enamoured with the soft toy cat, she had generously given it to Eti, and said it is his. So very her. I asked, are you sure? You know Eti always wants everything. You don’t have to. She said, of course, take it. So Eti now has it in school for his nap. His “Jem”.

I feel numb. And so exhausted and tired. Edi’s passing was different because, well, he was old, and had lived a very full life and lived to a ripe old age. Yvonne’s is different because she was just 44, a few months shy of her 45th birthday. She had been struggling with her meds for many years, and last time she mentioned it was right before M & Eti’s trip to Zurich in mid-December, that she was voluntarily checking herself into the rehab clinic and that she would be out on Christmas Eve, and she had said she really wanted to get better and help herself. I had said, “good for you, Yvonne,” encouraged that she had taken the initiative to kick the meds out of her life. Ironically, shortly after Edi’s death, on one phone conversation, she had asked me how M was taking their father’s death. I had said that M appears ok, but M is also very private, he doesn’t talk about it with me, but that doesn’t mean he is ok.

In Zurich, she had mentioned she liked a Boris guy, that he had gone over to her place a few times for dinner, and she asked me for “some advice”. How could I ever be in the position to give her advice knowing what she had gone through in her life? She had been struggling with drug addiction in her twenties since she returned from Equador with her best friend Regina. M thinks because Regina fell in love with a guy there and because Yvonne didn’t, her self-worth fell and she went into drugs. M recounted to me how once he had to get her out of a bar of poor reputation. Ten years ago, her last boyfriend had died of a drug overdose. Both of them had met in a rehab clinic, he was from Sicily and a pastry chef, and had given N a plant. They were serious and apparently she had thought he had kicked the drug habit. Not really, it turned out. He did some drugs secretly with a friend and overdosed. She found him in his house, called the police. She had told me because he was such a big guy, it was strange seeing him in a small coffin. Her thing with her neighbour Dieter didn’t work out. He was a chef at an old age home and lived downstairs. It was more a relationship of convenience. Now, she was interested in her former psychiatrist, Boris. She had asked me if I thought he was interested in him. M had mentioned this before to me, how he thought it was so sweet that his sister had found love, and he was hopeful this was a sign of optimism and recovery. I was treading on dangerous grounds, and I knew that, the way N was listening quietly and carefully as she put away the dishes after our dinner. I didn’t dole out any advice because I had none, but instead asked lots of questions.

Then the night before we were all going to leave for Venice, she had the incident with the heart palpitations which we all felt was psychosomatic and related to her not ending up going out together that afternoon because he had called to say he was busy packing. N had been in pieces and crying, and M immediately left for Winterthur to get Yvonne to the emergency room.

Back in Toronto, I had sent Yvonne and N a link to the photos and she had called, thanking me for sending her the photos. (So very typical of her – warm and big-hearted).  We had been so hopeful and optimistic of her recovery. We had all thought that her father’s passing was a kick-start to a new chapter of her life. We had been so human to be hopeful, but in the end, she had become too human and succumbed. I remember sitting with M on the sofa watching some of the very old home videos of their family vacations that he had converted into DVD per the request of his mom, and every scene had appeared so idyllic, so happy, so carefree. M splashing his papa in the sea, almost with a manly vengeance. Little Yvonne crawling and tottering around. The story over Christmas dinner about some Egyptians wanted to buy the blond little Yvonne in exchange for some camels. She was a pretty girl who, according to N, was a fussy eater which made N fret alot, and would crack an egg everyday into her chocolate milk for some added nutrients. She had said, little did she know Yvonne would be so big.

I feel so badly for everything that is happening to the B- family. The decades of pain, tears, suffering, inflicted one to another, and then another back to one; from the outside, one only see an affluence, the good fortune to be able to have traveled to so many countries in their lives. I had a passing thought which I said to M, that the only one good thing about the timing of Yvonne’s death is that it happened after her dad’s death. Who knows what sort of blow that would have driven into his “Lucky”? The one very bad thing about the timing is that Yvonne’s mom is around to live through the pain of it, which should have been reserved only for M. M had mentioned more than once before, that he would someday have to bury his sister.

As M put it, “I can hardly talk”. I say the same, because I can’t as well.

Slightly before midnight, M & I drove out to our favorite parking lot along the lake and watched the cacophony of fireworks across the various towns around the lake. A fog was slowly rolling in from the city of Zurich so the main fireworks were not apparent. Boom….boom….boom… When we returned, N had burned out the candles from Christmas, and told us it was a yearly tradition she had with Edi, which she felt was very important to do this year as well in his absence.

Jan 1, 2011. A mini crisis occurred in the afternoon when M decided to invite Markus over last minute to join us for a New Year dinner. We had already planned for a whole locally caught Swiss perch between Eti, M & I, and two small pieces of beef sirloin for N & Y. What sort of food would we do for a big grown man? Crisis management required us to cook the chicken drumsticks that I had originally bought for Eti, which I marinated in sweet mustard, salt, pepper, herbs and honey and baked in the oven. I spent the entire afternoon in the kitchen with N, chopping the assortment of vegetables for the oven (squash, zucchini, tomatoes, eggplant and onions).  Then I got the garlic ready for the fish…before Markus arrived at 3pm. We took a short walk through the very scenic farmland behind N’s house. It was a little like from the Sound of Music with the pre-Alps framing the lake of Zurich as we headed back to Ackerstrasse.

Dinner turned out fine for everybody. I first pan seared the perch in the pan with slivers of garlic and olive oil before finishing it in the oven. N had watered down the leftover potato soup for M & Markus (which had also been the product of a mini-crisis prepared for the Christmas dinner because M had insisted the potatoes were too soft for the gruyere cheese and potato gratin he wanted to make). After they left, I was washing up and putting dishes away from the dishwasher when…horrors of horrors, a dish slid out of the upper cabinet and crashed into the sink and countertop that were stacked with dishes. A baking dish, a crystal dish, a crystal glass and N’s 54 year old fine bone china salad dish broke into smithereens. Did I mention a mug broke too! My curse has continued since New Year’s Day! The crystal bits had scattered across the kitchen floor and we spent quite some time cleaning up. A daughter-in-law from hell!!!

I spent New Year’s Eve evening watching a live broadcast from Monaco of circus performances with N, and then binging on the bags of Migros potato chips.

Jan 2, 2011. Getting ready for our trip to Venice…we decided to head out to a Thai restaurant close to Bertastrasse for dinner to celebrate the start of our vacation on a vacation. Eti was so excited to have siu mai and dumplings for dinner….he screamed with excitement when the bamboo steamer arrived at our table. He chowed down all four pieces, and then continued to chow down the shared pad thai with N. I think he missed Asian food! M & I had ordered the three-chilli Pad Phat curry ( a decision that we both arrived at separately ). It turned out absolutely delicious – a taramind based red curry broth with an assortment of long beans, cauliflower, broccoli, tofu, bamboo, carrots, and other vegetables. 5-star approval!

Back at Ackerstrasse, Y reported from her Winterthur apartment that she was experiencing heart palpitations and chest pains. I was extremely annoyed at this news. N was in pieces again and was extremely upset. M told N that he would take care of it and drove off. We concluded it was mostly psychosomatic as she had not ended up going out on her date with her new crush…M arrived back from Winterthur at past 2a.m. saying Y was in Emergency and the series of tests showed nothing was serious other than the inflammation she was encountering due to her back.

Jan 3, 2011. The alarm woke us up at 5:15 a.m., very early but the adrenaline flowed and so we jumped out of bed (including Eti asking if it was morning yet), getting ready and rushing to the road to catch the first bus to Herrliberg Train Station.

At the Zurich HB at 7 a.m., M bought us some kipfelli and cheese pie for me and we boarded the train heading to Milan. The train ride past Zug was classic Swiss picturesque, pointy snow shrouded mountains framing a clear lake with little houses at the edge of the lake…then I fell asleep as it continued through the Gottard.

It was a very long ride to Venice. We had mistakenly taken the local Italian train instead of the express so we sat in a sweltering cabin alongside with winter packed Italian tourists making stop after stop at each town and city along the train line. Finally the train got onto the Ponte della Liberta, the city’s only connection to the mainland…the magical feeling seeped in. What a sight! We stepped out of the Stazione di Santa Lucia (Ferrovia) station onto the Fondamenta di Santa Lucia square and was greeted by the Grand Canal in front, vaporettis parked along the canalside and a entire spectacle of tourists soaking in the unlikely winter Venetian sun. I was thrilled….M bought for us the three-day vaporetti pass and we took the No. 41 vaporetti to the island of Lido where our 4-star Grande Albergo Ausonia & Ungaria was located.

Our hotel rooms were modest but fabulously packed with goodies like a bidet, spa level shampoos and creams, and two double beds with exquisite sheets. It was early evening by the time we decided to check out the Lido for a dinner restaurant. Then the unspeakable happened….N tripped over an uneven edge of the sidewalk and fell right onto her face. It happened so quickly as a loud smack came from the cobblestone path next to me. She tried to get up and I tried to help her up. I shouted for M who was way ahead with Eti on his shoulders. Fortunately a passer-by dashed over and lifted N up with both arms under her armpits. She looked fine but very shaken. We sat her down by the bench and made sure she hadn’t broken anything. M ran into the apothecary and bought an Italian “Trauma Gel”. After, we brought her to the hotel to rest. Her glasses was bent, after which got broken when M tried to adjust it. M, Eti and I decided on the Trattoria Africa, a modest local restaurant off the pedestrian Via Lepanto decked from floor to ceiling with pictures of fishing boats and other para phernalia. We had a short aperitif at a bar/café of spritz (an orange coloured fizzy drink with most likely orange liquer)  before adjoining for dinner with N. I ordered pasta with tomato sauce as primi piatti which Eti wolfed down and then a small 250g grilled whole sole in olive oil and parsley as secondi piatti. We had house red wine, a carafe for €5. It was hearty working-man fare. We settled comfortably back into our hotel after dinner.

Jan 4, 2011. Breakfast was part of the package and we headed excitedly down to the breakfast room. What a marvelous spread of sweet and salty savories! We had scrambled eggs with bacon, a sweet croissant with jam and butter, accompanied with milk, grapefruit juice, and then a small helping of cocoa cereal, and finally some cookies. A treat for the king!

We walked along the Gran Viale Santa Maria Elisabetta to the vaporetti station and headed straight to the #1 tourist attraction of Venice – the San Marco square, described by Napoleon as the ‘finest drawing room in Europe’. It was slightly marred by the extent of restoration and renovation occurring to the façade of the St. Mark’s Basilica; the Campanile was entirely fenced up for reinforcing of the brick, and the Procuratie was partially concealed behind construction hoarding. Eti spent some moments chasing the much photographed famed pigeons. There was a record level flood just a week before over Christmas Eve and raised walkways (passerelli) were still set up in front of the Basilica over about one inch of water. The front entrance of the interior of the church had wet patches on the floor. It was a glittering sight within with beautiful mosaics of birds and flower patterns on the floor.

After the Basilica, we wondered the narrow streets behind, winding past shops (Venice appears to be one big shopping centre – showing off its wares of carnevale masks, murano glassware, lacework. We stopped at a pizzeria stand and had the most amazing Margherita slice fresh from the oven. In fact we had two slices shared between the four of us. What fun!

In the afternoon, we headed to the Ponte di Rialto, a famous bridge (and the largest in Venice) and paused a moment amongst the throng of tourists to contemplate the scene over the Grand Canal. It was partly cloudy and hovering around zero. The damp cold was creeping into the bones. We had been walking a lot that day. Our final destination was the Palazzo Ducale, home of the Doge. Eti was impressed with the Prigioni Nuove (New Prisons) .  Dark windowless cold dungeons carved from stone with a small opening for entry and a smaller hole for passing of food and other necessities.

By then, it was time to call it a day. We made a brief survey of what would be a reasonable restaurant for dinner and headed into one of the many. Food arrived fast from the kitchen. N and Eti were sharing a veal cutlet with side of fries and an extra order of grilled vegetables, M was having the usual Margherita pizza (€6), and I got lasagna with grilled eggplant. Portions were small and after we wolfed down our dinner, I was almost ready for more. The Lonely Planet had explicitly described the worse areas to eat as in Cannaregio – along the route from the train station towards San Marco, which was precisely where we had looked…We went to the Billa Supermarket and checked out the Italian groceries with N. I bought some curiosities like fig jam and coloured pasta, and the usual staple of milk, and returned to our 4-star abode.

Jan 5, 2011. Breakfast at the bright greenhouse-like breakfast room. This morning, scrambled eggs were missing so Eti and I made do with hard-boiled eggs with salt and pepper together with bacon. The Filipino server explained that the eggs could not make it on the boat this morning. Imagine that!

M wanted to visit the Ca’D Oro this morning so that was where we headed straight from the Lido. Eti was already fast asleep by then and the museum front desk prohibited a backpack into the museum. The palace itself was not open to the public, only the museum was. We decided not to go after all, and M and Eti then headed to the Gallerie dell’Accademia, while N & I took a vaporetti to the island of Murano famed for its glass work. Our boat passed a small high walled island, the Isola di San Michele, entirely a cemetery for the city’s inhabitants before arriving at Murano. Even the Venetian dead  made the final journey via water! At Murano, we were lured into a glass workshop where we had to pay €3 each to watch an artisan blow glass and shape it into a vase, and then a galloping horse frozen in time.

We walked in and out shops along the Fondamenta dei Vetrai, and were glassed out by the glassware that served decorative (jewellery, beads, rings, vases, glass candies, Christmas baubles) and functional purposes (ash trays, clocks, pendant lamps). Finally at 5:30pm at dusk, we took the second last vaporetti back to the Ferrovia where we had arranged to meet M & Eti. Our dinner choice was again a poor one. We picked one that was fairly busy, and it turned out that it was because the table charge was €1 per person and the menu was cheaper compared to other restaurants. It was run and owned by Chinese who spoke Italian! We felt like we needed a second dinner and headed to a nearby pizzeria stand and I got funghi and sausage pizza. I bought a bag of sundried tomatoes for €4 from a vegetable/fruit stand even. Then we headed back to the Lido.

Jan 6, 2011. We headed to the much anticipated breakfast room in the morning anticipating scrambled eggs. M wanted to ramp up the things we would do today so we headed first to Palladio’s Chiesa di San Giorgio Maggiore built between 1565 and 1580.  We admired Tintoretto’s Last Supper and Shower of Manna on opposing walls at the high altar, and then took a lift up the bell tower for a bird’s eye view of Venice. What a small island it was, yet felt so immense in its twisting alleys and canals.  There was a temporary exhibition on Piranesi at the museum next to the church and M & I spent some time walking the gallery while N & Eti warmed up in the museum store. We then headed across to Venice proper and had a light noon snack before bidding N goodbye as she headed to the Lido for her arranged appointment with the in-house Thai masseur. It had started to rain lightly and we were poorly dressed for the rain and the cold. We zoomed to a Renaissance church, and then to two Gothic churches, and by the evening, felt exhausted and bone-weary. The rain had now become a light persistent wall and we quickly headed back to the Lido where we decided to return to Trattoria Africa for a hearty and familiar Italian dinner to celebrate the end of our holiday in Venice.

We had red house wine and sparkling water. I ordered pasta with tomato sauce again, (M did the same, foregoing his favourite Margherita pizza), and then I had the Venetian speccia (grilled salami) with polenta and rocket. Three enormous slabs of salami sat on my plate….it was very salty and greasy, not really my cup of tea, but worth the experimentation for €8. M and N had separate orders of grilled sole, N ordered verdure frittes (or fried vegetables). A little like tempura but the dough is quite different. We ate like kings and listened to N’s account of the war, food rationing and her original home in Kusnacht before the war which she said was still there. Her roots do go deep in Zurich.

Jan 7, 2011. Morning we woke up, regretting that it was our last day in Venice. After breakfast, we packed a storm and headed to the Ferrovia to drop off our bags (€5 per bag for 4 hours). Then we took a local train to Padua where M insisted he wanted to visit the Cappella degli Scrovegni  to view Giotto’s famous and historial fresco cycle. Because bookings had to be made in advance, we obviously didn’t have a spot. M went into his usual tantrum in front of the museum staff until they relented. We became #25, 26 & 27 as part of an Italian elementary school group with their teacher (25 was the stipulated allowable limit).  It was a very long train ride back to Venice and then the SBB to Zurich. We missed our connecting train from Art Goddau because the train was not meeting its schedule based on technical limitations along the Goddard line, and was running 45 minutes behind. We had to continue on to Lucerne before taking the S-bahn back to Zurich. It was almost 2a.m. when we stepped into Herrliberg. We were exhausted…

Jan 8, 2011. It was a spectacularly crisp sunny winter morning. We got ready quickly for N’s early 80^th birthday lunch at the Hotel Rossli. The restaurant had been renovated extensively since our wedding dinner in 1993. It now had a distinct understated touch of class with its white linen and hint of green in the vases and fresh cut flowers. We sat at the corner of the restaurant with clear views of the lake and the mountains. It was classically Swiss and very beautiful. We started with an amuse-bouche of pumpernickel bread topped with brussel sprouts. Then M & I shared an appetizer of pasta noodles with truffle sauce. N got her main order of grilled salmon, Y had beef brisket with pasta noodles, Eti had fish fingers with fries, I had Zurich veal with rosti, M had fried perch with young potatoes. The portions were American sized. I struggled to finish my lunch. Eti ate all 5 sticks of fish fingers. The bill came up to $298…quite reasonable considering our epic portions. It was a leisurely lunch and we shared a dessert of toblerone  mousse. At about 3:15pm, we concluded our lunch and walked around the scenic town of Raperswill. Because it was such a beautiful afternoon, there were many people out walking along the elevated wood boardwalk that criss-crossed the lake of Zurich. Eti spent a few minutes at the playground.

Back at Herrliberg, I began packing and concluded my 2-week winter vacation in Zurich with fondness.

Next day, I offered to rent a car and drive M to Buffalo for him to pick up his car outside Dan’s place and then I turned around and returned to Canada. At the border I was stopped again, and directed to the immigration office. The same immigration officer who the female officer consulted with was there. He looked at me and asked me what I was doing there. I told him I had to drive my husband to work because I had to leave the car behind in the US. “Whose car are you driving today?” He asked disapprovingly. I told him I rented a car. “GO. And make sure you fulfill your Canadian residency requirements.” He then slammed my passport and PR card on the table. What a public embarrassment.

Week before Christmas, I took M & Eti out to the airport for their trip to Zurich. I had been distraught earlier because it was Elaine’s last day as she had mentioned she would not continue babysitting Eti once he started nursery school because it meant compromised hours (and $). Somehow in the mad shuffle of things, alongside with M’s angry rants at being rushed, I left my Stefi Talman handbag SOMEWHERE…..

I realized this once we arrived at the airport, but it was nowhere in sight when I returned to Fennings Street. Damn Fennings Street with all its half-minded street people, trash diggers and druggies. Someone in need of money must have taken my newly fattened Stefi Talman wallet (ready for my trip, and food money from M), and then dumped my nice expensive exclusive Swiss red leather handbag into the bin. Desperately I walked the streets and alleyways for hours. It was dark and snowing. Soon, everything was covered with a sheet of white. I slept little that night, thinking I must have been cursed. The biggest problem of all was that, as the police whom I made the report to told me, I was one of those women who carried their lives in their purse. I had my US Green Card, and recently renewed NYS Driver’s license in it, plus my Canadian PR Card, and everything else…..I had a sinking feeling I couldn’t travel to Zurich after all this Christmas.

M was naturally furious – that would have been an understatement. I finally figured the best thing to do was to head to Buffalo (without my Green Card but with the Travel Document I had applied for to officially be out of the US for 2 years)…everything turned out fine. I was questioned at the US border at 7am on Thursday morning (last day the Canadian Consulate was open before Christmas), and then spent 2 hours at the Consulate in Buffalo waiting in line, then spending a few minutes showing my employment papers to prove my residency, and then finally getting that visa sticker in my passport. And getting called into the Canadian border office again at 11am to explain why I didn’t have my PR card…

I was so relieved with the turn of events that I shopped my heart out that evening. Bought 3 pairs of jeans (one Billabong for $10, two Buffalo Bitton for $25 and $65 each)..

And then there is…”The Waiting Place…for people just waiting.
Waiting for a train to go or a bus to come, or a plane to go or the mail to come, or the rain to go or the phone to ring, or the snow to snow or waiting around for a Yes or No or waiting for their hair to grow. Everyone is just waiting.

Waiting for the fish to bite or waiting for wind to fly a kite or waiting around for Friday night or waiting, perhaps, for their Uncle Jake or a pot to boil, or a Better Break or a string of pearls, or a pair of pants or a wig with curls, or Another Chance. Everyone is just waiting….No! That’s not for you!…. ” (Oh, The Places You’ll Go, Dr Seuss.)

M’s dad finally passed away peacefully and uneventfully on the morning of October 28, about a week after M anounced that he had bought tickets to Zurich for Christmas. He lived life to the fullest and heartiest, packing loads of whiskey, cakes and sweets everyday into his diabetic ridden body to the nagging frown of everybody else around him, but guess what? He lived to a ripe old age of 80. Better than my grandfathers, one of which in my fondest of memories spent Saturdays cleaning and fixing my watch and letting me pull out his beard stubs with a pair of tweezers. (He died at 69 when I turned 10.)

M left 2 days later for his father’s funeral and Eti was extremely upset that he couldn’t go along. We deliberately omitted the fact the M was going to Switzerland. He screamed and cried during our drive back from the airport, and then made me act out with his toys the action of “papa going away and leaving Eti behind”, him being papa.

***

Then we played a funny game of a police officer making underage drivers go straight to Lego prison:

Police Officer: You are speeding. How old are you, racecar driver?
Racecar Driver: I am three.

Police Officer: You are too young to drive a car. Only grown-up can drive. Go straight to prison!

Next round:
Police Officer: You are speeding. How old are you racecar driver?

Racecar Driver: I am a grown-up.

Police Officer: But how old are you?

Racecar Driver: Grown-ups don’t have numbers…..How old are you mommy?

(30)

Racecar Driver: OK, I am 30.

***

Another funny incident while Eti was in bed with M.

M: I like it when Eti is in bed with me to protect me from the scary monsters.

Eti: I am not a hardhat!

***

It was almost 5pm when we turned into the dirt roads of Rock Hill Road, guided by our GPS. The lodge was at the end of a RV campground, overlooking the woods. I was disappointed at the lack of view. The Trout Lodge was rather nice though. The trout theme perpetuated itself everywhere: on ceramic fish hanging on the walls, 2 real-size trout stuffing, trout printed plates…M freaked out about having to get supplies since it was so “ulu”, so we returned back to civilization, a.k.a. Walmart Supercenter, where we bought milk, 6-egg carton, sweet potato frozen fries, maple syrup honey, salt-n-pepper, olive oil, juice, water and bread. We planned to have our breakfasts at the lodge. M & Eti shared a queen bed downstairs since he strongly forebade Eti from climbing upstairs to the loft where a second bed and foldable futon sofa were. We had a real treat with the starry starry night. Even saw a shooting star.

Day 2 – after a hearty breakfast, we decided to check out the parker dam state park which was close by, and walk part of the Quehanna Trail which went through the Moshanon Forests. It took us the better part of 5+ hours. At first, we strolled along, enchanted by the wild blueberries ripening on the bushes. I picked a whole bunch, emptied Eti’s goldfish into my pocket and filled about a small quarter of the foil bag with deliciously sweet cool-to-the-touch berries. We walked through some amazing stretches of tall trees with fern. Didn’t meet another soul for the rest of the hike until we arrived back at Parker Dam, where eti headed straight to the playground and M to the lake for a swim. We stopped at a bar and grill place for dinner and waited over an hour for our food to come. Eti wolfed down his meatball, little parts of his tomato sauce pasta, and my baked garlic/lemon cod. I ate like I had not eaten all day. I was ravenous!

Evening, after putting Eti to sleep, we watched a movie on M’s laptop. We were the only ones at the lodge grounds again. It was blissfully quiet, such that we could even hear the roar of planes passing through high up – barely 1cm from where we stood. Again, the nightsky was magnificent.

Day 3, we decided to extend our stay, and this time spurred on by our hike the day before, we took to the road towards Cook’s Forest after the same egg breakfast. We stopped at a cafe for an afternoon snack. The patio was built around two mature trees, and lent a picturesque quality to the cafe. We shared a small pizza. I regretted it shortly. It just filled me up and created a pukeness when we started our hike at Cook’s Forest. It wasn’t nice – the trail was barely along the highway that snaked through the forest. The constant din of traffic was quite unpleasant. The only nice feature was the blooming white and pink flowers of the mountain laurels – the state flower of Pennsylvania.  On our drive back to the Trout Lodge, we stopped at a family-run buffet restaurant and stuffed our faces. M had portions of breaded tilapia with mountains of mash potato, Eti ate nothing because he had stuffed his face with peanut butter cereal bar earlier. I had baked cod (I am into fish lately). Back at the Lodge, shortly after Eti fell asleep at midnight, he had a puke attack, and we frantically cleaned up after him.

Day 4 – after cleaning up the lodge, we headed through the Allegheny National Forest to the Kinzua Dam. It was spectacular, as all big feats of engineering works are. We spent the afternoon at the Marina Grille overlooking the Allegheny Reservoir and ate grilled crab-cake burger, grilled portabello burger, and Eti voraciously chowed down the chicken fingers and fries. When we finally got into Buffalo, at Paul’s place, we wound down to the lazy backyard BBQ that they were having. The kids played, we talked, squished mosquitoes. We left after 9+pm, with fireworks sprouting in the darkened sky. It was yet another fun road trip!