Geneva Solar Panels (almost) Verboten!

Joy Kundig

Well, several thousands of francs in – deposit with the solar panel installer, paying to have the house re-appraised (surprisingly it’s the same size as when it was built), appealing the first (administrative) negative decision, appealing the second (tribunal) negative decision, we are now waiting for the decision of the final appeals court of the Canton of Geneva.

You see, Geneva does not readily agree with solar panels. You have to fight hard and pay. You must be morally deserving.

Every single village in the Canton of Geneva is protected as a historical site—from the entrance sign (often riddled with bullet holes) to the exit sign (often knocked out of kilter by speeding traffic). These Historical Site Villages can include rusty metal machinery hangars, pig pens, modern apartment buildings, waste lots filled with derelict buildings and vehicles. They are all strenuously protected by the Geneva Department of Monuments.

These civil servants take their jobs very seriously, and are adamant that solar panels are aesthetically evil. A pig pen with a rusty tin roof is considered much more pleasing to the eye than a pig pen with solar panels fitted to it. This is historically correct, as the Romans, when they made Geneva a civitas brought with them smelly fish paste, vines, and the know-how to make clay roof tiles. They introduced browny-coloured roofs, and, unfortunately, hadn’t thought of solar panels.

I exaggerate, of course. IF the solar panels cannot be seen by ANYONE, then they are allowed. The people who can be offended by solar-panel roofs include the frontaliers whizzing past from their French residences, living pedestrians and cyclists, and any neighbours—either real or future/potential.

If, for example, we had wanted to put solar panels on the north-east roof of the garage where there is about 5 minutes of weak sunshine on a good day, then that would have been just fine. Cows’ aesthetic rights are not taken into consideration at the moment.

Two different Geneva courts have made the trip from their well-heated cantonal offices in the Old Town of Geneva to our countryside village to judge our solar panel suitability. It’s a bit like adopting a child.

The first time there was a convoy of three cars on bitter cold day in January. Everyone quickly developed red dripping noses and bad attitudes. I got snapped at and asked why-the-heck I would actually WANT solar panels. The insinuation was of subjecting everyone to a greeny attention-grabbing caprice.

The second time was just last week. There were leaves on the walnut tree, and from the middle of the sidewalk-less road, with cars rushing to and fro, there was not a sliver of the roof in sight.

The appeals court – a different crowd – was more jovial in the summer sunshine as they moved from comfortable shade to sweaty sun. Perhaps they finally got it. Anyway, we have high hopes for our roof and the power of the sun.

Remember this Word, You Might Need it: Systembolaget!

Joy Kundig

I hate the first day of summer. It means that Christmas is just around the corner as the days rudely begin to tick themselves shorter and shorter and time goes faster and faster.

In the academic working world you don’t much notice the 21st of June as you’re so busy with end-of-school exams, the behaviour of highly questionable colleagues and students, and general nervous break-downs. Hectic summer holiday plans are also raising concerns as you have no trace of a 2-week car rental that you’re sure you booked back in February.

The most traumatic summer solstice was in Sweden: Göteborg, to be exact.  The hotel was situated on a scenic canal across from a power station to the left and a casino to the right. In the middle was a Mongolian meat restaurant. The view from the slanting roof windows was of the sky with a smokestack in the corner.

The June day started badly as everything was shut. This turned out to be not, exactly, a holiday, but just a normal Swedish working day.  Shops seem to open late in the morning and close at early in the afternoon. Obviously, during these brief business hours, shopping is hectic and robust.

Trying to find a bottle of wine to celebrate the summer solstice was a double challenge. You wander out into the searing heat of a Swedish summer looking for something that mentions alcohol. (The Swedish word for alcohol is alkohol. The Swedish word for wine is vin. Really, you would think they could do something with those two that would make sense to an interested, thirsty, tourist over 20 years of age, with money in her pocket.)

But no. The government liquor-monopoly stores are called systembolagets (the System Company). But if you happen to find one and get there in the summer-popsicle-thin window of opening hours (11 am – 1 pm on Saturdays, for example), the choice is vast.

After enjoying the solstice festive atmosphere among the young, bronzed, tall, skinny, beautiful, white-teethed people, you inevitably start to fade and retire back to your hotel in no-man’s land. You drink a final glass and hit the sack. The sun is still shining. The roof-windows are luminous. There is no blind. There are no curtains.

You start with the bathroom towel tucked in around the edges with the window-trap shut. The light shines through. You add the duvet to try to bung up the roof hole. There is no air in the room. You long for duct tape.

You work on it all night: eye masks, pillows, toilet paper, and I think that the shower curtain was even involved. But there were no nights. We visited the systembolaget more and more (it was always crowded) and after six days we finally got home deeply disturbed and disoriented.

Be careful what you wish for, but I am longing already for the 21 of December when the days start getting longer again and I can lean forward to the beginning of summer.

Baking Pies while Vienna Fiddles

Joy Kundig

Well, the true luxury of having a season ticket to a classical concert series at Victoria Hall, is that if you are not in the mood you do not have to go. Those two hard little chairs with the fat lady’s knees wiggling into your back simply remain noble, empty and silent.

And we have learned that if you have the slightest of coughs or colds you really should not go. We were present some years back when Sir John Eliot Gardiner stopped his musicians, turned around, spotted the white-haired old dear who was hopelessly hacking into her handkerchief, and told her that, for the good of everyone involved, she should leave at once. The tapping of her solitary little shoes in a dead-silent concert hall still rings in my ears.

Of course, you have to deal with your own guilt and lack of moral purpose, but that is a deeper issue that possibly needs professional help.

However, yesterday evening, we were primed for the very last concert—an A+ production by the Vienna Philharmonic. Very last concerts are also extremely satisfactory, as you can wish everyone a nice summer and breathe a sigh of relief that you don’t have to deal with those clowns or Dvorak for the next few months.

The program looked not too exhausting (only 75 minutes) and Strauss was featured. Don Quixote was the first set and having seen the Stratford production of The Man of La Mancha recently, I was wondering if I could hum along with Richard’s Opus 35 variations. The second bit was A Hero’s Life which also sounded somewhat familiar after a weekend baby-sitting stint with a hale and healthy 2-year-old.

At 5pm I put a raspberry pie in the oven. It was a huge success when it came out at 5:40. Then there was the soaking of mushrooms and chopping of onions for a post-concert supper. Then there was the bath to remove mountain grass stains and dried blood (don’t ask). Then there was the donning of the fresh linen dress and the ploughman’s preconcert supper (you just add a pickle to bread and cheese) with a chilled glass of white wine. Then there was the blow drying of hair and lipstick was applied. Shortly after 7, we drove into town and witnessed the miracle of a convenient parking place.

As we were a little early, we sat on a park bench in front of a bronze reclining lady fountain at Planpalais. We noted the groups of people coming and going as the pigeons swooped over our heads. We commented on the diversity of the Geneva population and the lovely breeze swooping down on us from the Salève.

We got to Victoria Hall at 7:50, and there was no crowd bubbling in the foyer. The concert had, exceptionally, begun at 6 pm and was just finishing. The nice young man was very sorry.

Fighting windmills, we drove back home.

 

 

Sing, Goddamnit, Sing!

Joy Kundig

Any visit to Stratford (the REAL one in Ontario, Canada) and you are constantly star-struck.

It already begins on the Toronto flight with the hockey players. They used to be the nice young men sitting in the slum-class seats with their knees up around their shiny ears. They were giant, keyed-up and chattily practising their Swedish-English before hopefully hitting the lucky interview and a place in the NHL.

Now they are the former hockey players and coaches—still keyed-up and searching for North American talent to bring back to Europe. The last one I met was the general manager for the Ingolstadt Hockey Club. He seemed to be interested when I told him that Ingolstadt was where Victor Frankenstein, of Geneva, fashioned his now-famous creature. He said he would check it out, but gave me the tip that big bruiser players were no longer fashionable and miniature mosquito-type midgets were currently in vogue.

After landing, there is the exciting drive in the Parcel Bus that delivers you to your door. Actually, it delivers you to many, many doors before the one you want. The drivers are usually spry octogenarians and with their lack of hearing and canny survival instincts they are the true masters of the jam-packed 40l highway.

Arriving at my sister’s house—famous for its old and wicked beauty—you still cannot escape the clutches of fame. For example, she has fed Justin Bieber cookies which he has eaten with his own true teeth and swallowed down his very own Justin Bieber gullet.

Yes. This is a true fact. Stratford is Justin’s home town, and whenever his mother comes to visit, she jams with my nephew.  My niece’s daughter is lobbying hard for Justin to animate her next birthday party when she will turn 7.  Obviously, we are practically related to Justin Bieber.

Then there are the actors, the writers, the singers. The Stratford Festival theatre season runs for about 6 months, and after seeing the magnificent world-class plays, you can often catch a glimpse of Hamlet buying cornflakes at the supermarket, or My Fair Lady playing with her kid in the sandpit at the playground.

Summertime also includes outdoor cultural activities with art, music, and animation on the Avon Lake which, Mariposa Belle-style, is only a few inches deep. Picnicking on the edge one summer a rather rambunctious member of our party screamed at a packed raft floating past “Sing! Goddamnit sing!” Turns out they were members of an old folks home (or, perhaps, Parcel Bus drivers) being taken on an airing.

Even the local church is quite notorious. Last summer there was quite a scandal when thieves stole plants from their mixed border.  And at their jumble sale just a few weeks ago, I purchased a set of famous grapefruit spoons from the estate of a deceased famous person.  Upon enquiry, it seems the person is still alive.

Identity—mistaken and otherwise—is the very soul of Stratford’s star-struck life.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Little Switzerlands: Don’t Bother

Joy Kundig

Any country that can possibly get away with it (and several that can’t) have created their own little versions of Switzerland. Essential ingredients include trees (any sort except palm), fields (ploughed, fenced and tended), altitude (the higher the better) and a fresh-water lake (preferably turquoise in colour.)

If you happen to know the real, big Switzerland, avoid these places at all cost.

I have been to little Switzerlands more times than I like to admit: India, Korea, Japan, Sri Lanka, Burma, and China all have their “Swiss” landscape dreams. They are often strange forlorn places of heat and odd architecture.

Switchback roads are the essential opening ingredient to get you to an authentic little Switzerland. If you’re really lucky, you will spot a rusty wreck stuck in the bushes below a particularly sharp bend. You conclude that puzzling aerial wires going nowhere must be for ski lifts in case the earth’s weather patterns change. Sometimes there is even a dodgy mechanical device that takes the cheering pedestrians from one viewing platform to another.

Having sworn off little Switzerlands, I was surprised to myself in yet another one. This one was sneakily hiding in Calabria, the toe of Italy.

It really wasn’t my fault. In that region, the only three-star attraction (apart from the Riace Bronzes in Reggio Calabria which are believed to be two (buck-naked) brothers about to kill each other in front of their mother….but here I digress) is the Sila mountain plateau. At almost 2,000m altitude, sure enough, it is officially designated Calabria’s “Little Switzerland.”

It is also a national park and has ploughed fields, painted wooden houses perched in alpine mixed forests, flowery meadows, one herd of cows, and endless unmarked roads. There are no people, restaurants or gas stations. It is quiet and serene, and as you drive, lost on the SP31 (that is not to be found on any map and goes from nowhere to nowhere) you become exquisitely bored.

As the gas tank empties and the bladder fills, you long to be in good old Italy and back to the trip you had planned. You wish for the thrill of the autostradas, the delights of bergamot ice cream, a double espresso, an Aperol-spritz.  You worry where your next meal is coming from, and miss the peculiar characters in the kiosks that sell you popsicles and scratch-off parking permits.

You feel the need for a good dusty duomo and a museo filled with gangs of school kids crashing from exhibit to exhibit photographing each thing with their shiny-new smart phones and retaining their complete, noisy ignorance.

The SP31 finally meets the SS179 and you are out…free to drive into the future and come back to Italy and the crowded friendly chaos of the rose festival of Santa Rita. All thoughts of Switzerland—both big and little—have dropped far below the waves of the wine-dark sea.

 

In Search of / The Curse of / The Solution to — Ten Thousand Steps a Day

Joy Kundig

An unseemly epidemic of healthiness seems to have broken out around me, and I am handling it badly.

Everyone seems to be in bike races, walking to Santiago de Compostela, climbing mountains, taking Aqua-Fit lessons, puffing on their exercise bikes, jogging miles with their dogs, and, much closer to home, trying to achieve 10,000 steps a day.

Interestingly, I have found that the best place to do this in a natural fashion is at airports. Frankfurt, for example, is very good; and by the time you’ve gone through the endless tunnels to the lounge and back to your gate, you have thousands of steps as you sit down on the plane and sip your restorative glass of champagne.

Taking a two-year-old grandson to the mall can also achieve the same, if not greater, level of physicality. Unfortunately, at the end, the clean, smiling, polite person offering you a glass of bubbly is usually missing.

Being a tourist in a strange city is also productive of many steps if the weather cooperates. You happily stride through the streets, climb clock towers, and stroll through endless churches and museums.

However, without these artificial settings, ten thousand steps can be dead boring: you get to know exactly how much time it takes (to the garage and back twice) and wonder if you can do it faster or if you can make your steps shorter. You try to get up early and get it over with. You try to fool your step-counter by waving your hand around while relaxing on the Chi Swing Machine….it doesn’t work and you fall asleep.

In other words, getting those daily steps under your belt can be a grind.

Art-in-the-woods walk, Vers, France

To alleviate this darkening mental cloud and to introduce a note of gaiety to the ten thousand steps, a new tactic has been introduced: The Geneva countryside is filled with villages; in the villages there are cafés: in the cafés there are affordable plat du jour lunchtime meals; clean and polite people ask what you would like to drink.

There is the Plain Walk. You park the car somewhere that is about 5,000 steps from the target restaurant. You walk there and back.

There is the Cultural Walk. You book a restaurant. You park the car somewhere and head to the ruin, or extraordinary site that you have located on the map, and do a discovery tour.  Exhausted but intellectually elated you saunter into the restaurant.

There is the Nature Walk. You reserve a table. You look at the dotted lines on the map, plan your route, battle through the untended paths, along rivers and over fences until you’ve completed your circle. Rather the worse for wear, you swagger into your café.

Preparation, execution, recuperation: ten thousand steps can fill your day. And with intense admiration of your own iron discipline you settle down on the couch with a pizza in the evening, already dreaming of what all the cooks are planning for your lunch tomorrow.

The Sound of (Simplon) Silence

Joy Kundig

There is something disarmingly wrong when there are earplugs instead of chocolates on your hotel pillows. This was not the case in the cosy little family hotel at the top of the Simplon Pass last week. The regulation miniature Toblerones were perkily propped on their feathery mounds.

We were on our way to Italy, fleeing the cold flat grey winter of the Geneva countryside. We had images of 15th-century frescos, baroque churches, duomos, termas and the Mediterranean dancing in our heads, and to have properly deserved their Latinate luxury, the leaving of Switzerland over the grim Simplon seemed dramatically appropriate.

The Simplon Pass (2006m) is open all year round, but in the winter you can see almost nothing from the road due to the huge mounds of ploughed snow and ice piled high at the edges. You have to be very clever and brave and turn off into unmarked cleared areas to see Kaspar Stockalper’s monumental buildings that he used to stock his merchandise—mostly salt—being transported over the pass. He was a sort of 17th-century Donald Trump—an extraordinarily rich bully with a castle in Brig and big plans to make money from the rest of the world. He got so annoying, that he was even kicked out for a time.

What is visible, thought, at the top of the Simplon is the gloomy giant granite eagle, built by the Swiss troops during their stay there during WWII to (successfully) scare both the Germans and the Italians away.  History is in the air.

The evening started well, and local generosity included wines from the Upper Valais and a chicken cordon bleu about the size, thickness and colour of a bible.

Then there was night.

In a proper Swiss hotel room, the duvet is the most crucially meaningful feature. At a mountain hotel, the duvet is king. It is very thick, very light, and could possibly protect you from the rigours of the South Pole or outer space. You must position your limbs so that they are half-in, half-out and hope that your body and brain figure it out.

This didn’t happen, and so after the heating was experimentally turned off, it was agreed that the window should be opened. The cold mountain air slipped in.

However, so did other things. In the village there is a humble stone bell-tower. In the day time, I swear, it sits silent. At night, it chimes every quarter hour, and then changes to a bell-tone down an octave to sound the hour. I must admit, I missed both the 1 and 2 o’clock bells, but enjoyed them all after that until the 6 a.m. frenzy of frantic bell-ringing in the alpine darkness. This, it turns out, is not a village fire alarm, but a signal for you to get up to pray.

I had never before quite understood Napoleon’s rather negative attitude towards churches. Simplon might have been my epiphany.

 

Political Dynasty Disorder

Joy Kundig

It has been brought to my attention from the highest of confidential sources that the whole of Canada is cringing with embarrassment.

Justin Trudeau, it seems, has been publically making a complete ass of himself.

No. It’s not his silly socks or his political correctness for all of peoplekind, but, rather, turning his week-long holiday to India into his own personal Bollywood movie. Supporting cast features his wife and three kids. The villain of the piece is a Sikh extremist/criminal who should have come to an official dinner but had to be uninvited. And the wardrobe department has outdone itself with trunks full of fancy wedding kurtas, sherwani and pointy-toed embroidered slippers.

For the first three days, Justin visited the tourist sites and spun cloth Ghandi-style while dressed as a traditional Indian bridegroom. It started funny, and got quickly annoying.

It would be as if he had arrived in Switzerland dressed in Swiss folk costume, with the kids as little Heidi and Peters and Sophie in a bust-popping Germanic dirndl. A goat might have been part of the entourage.

Several reasons have been offered for his misplaced display of cultural appropriation. Those with a soft-spot for him have suggested his first trip to India with his dad, Pierre Eliott Trudeau (who was Canadian Prime Minister from the 1960s into the 1980s) had something to do with it. The cynics say he was trying to play to the huge Indian population in Canada—especially the Sikh contingent. The jokers say he was purposefully attracting attention away from (and thereby annoying) Donald Trump.

I say that he is suffering from a serious case of dynasty disorder. Kids, wives and siblings should not try to follow the old man down the chutes of political power. There are bound to be mishaps. Looks at the Kennedys, the Nehru-Ghandis, the Bhuttos, the Clintons, the Castros, the Kims, the lePens. Nothing good ever comes of it.

(Timely Warning! Be very careful what you wish for, Caroline Mulroney (daughter of Brian).)

There is an up-side to all of these shenanigans, however, as our Little Potato’s political antics are bringing us all together again. It has been a long hard winter in Canada this year and the resulting cabin fever has produced serious outbreaks of family testiness and winter squabbles. All of this is blowing nicely away, as we follow Justin’s totally mortifying holiday from hell.

We wrap ourselves in our blankets of Canadian common sense and decency and know what it is to be a good tourist: You dress quietly and discreetly; you stay calm and clean; you indulge in self-depreciation and good humour; you stand patiently in line; you try to pay more and get less; and you tip as much as possible whenever you can.

Everybody knows that you never ever “go native” or bring your own chef with you to cook the local food.

And we thank goodness that Justin is back in Ottawa again and that spring is just around the corner.

 

Europe’s Most Dangerous Airport

Joy Kundig

Nobody ever actually tells you that you’re going to be flying into one of the world’s most dangerous airports. However, if your local low-cost carrier sells you a ticket for a seven-hour round trip out of Geneva for 43.50 francs, be prepared for anything.

It started, as all good things do, with an idea—that old post-Christmas, chase-away-the-blues, ocean ozone week away. And, of course, it was not our fault that the flight to Funchal, Madeira—a rugged Atlantic island featuring fado, sword fish, water mills, poncha, irrigation canals, landslides, and viewpoints—was so surprisingly cheap.  So many kilometres for so little money. What a deal!

On our departure day we ended up (after six hours in the air) back on the Portuguese mainland in Porto. We even got a 7-euro supper coupon, and our flight was re-scheduled for the following morning.

Oh yes. We should have been in Madeira, but having flown out to the island, and examined the seething cauldron of rain and cloud and tempestuous winds below, the pilot chirpily informed us that we were not allowed to land.

Day Two meant getting up at 4 a.m. (again) but this time, we managed to successfully touch down at the little Funchal Airport. This was accompanied with much cheering and clapping–pilot and crew included.

The airport runway extends out over top of the motorway at the edge of the sea. It actually tilts up a bit at the end which I guess is a serious clue to the pilot as to which way he should be heading. It is more or less like landing on an air-craft carrier, except that there is no elastic bungee to catch your wheels and stop you going over the edge and into the drink.

There is no flatness in Madeira (except in the middle where the wind turbines are all continuously blasting at full-speed and no one in their right mind would ever want to land there). Plus, Madeira is a volcano and seriously close to the earth’s core (information gathered from the Lava Tunnels Volcanic Visitor’s Centre) so dramatic danger can be just around the corner at any place or time.

Our big fight with the lying and cheating car rental company is now fading into oblivion. Our walks in the laurel forests with the view of the wine-dark sea far below are anchored firmly in our memories. The poncha and passion fruit drink at the warm and sunny harbour is recalled with longing. The flour from the old mill has been baked into bread.

We even got our full week’s holiday, as our departure was delayed for 30 hours due to the windy rainy airport being closed yet again.

A winter trip to an Atlantic island can, eventually, be crowned with success. Money is not so important: just take lots of time with you.

 

 

 

Drinking Smoothies with Leonardo

Joy Kundig

We do not really have smoothies here in the Geneva countryside. We have yogurt and we have compost bins. We have juice extractors, lemon presses, and blenders. We also have neat and efficient Nespresso coffee machines and George Clooney’s face on airport walls. What else could we possibly need?

Suddenly, though, the smoothie bullet machine has become ubiquitous. In the January post-foie-gras struggle to regain levity and youth, the stores are heaped high with these never-before-seen, health-war, bomb-shaped machines. The clear plastic globe carries the charge and is shown stuffed with a mixture of fresh fruit and vegetables—plump, perfect, and pristine—all ready to be whizzed into your daily dose of wellbeing.

You add exotics such as barberries, Goji berries, chia seeds, wheat germ, hemp, linen, almonds, dates and cranberries. To smooth it out, you add an avocado and/or a banana. Apparently, removing the peel is optional.

The cutting/slicing/dangerous blades tear up the outer structures of the seeds and nuts and release their essential nutrients that would otherwise just slide right through you. You are warned not to include avocado or apricot stones to your mixture. You are rejuvenated as you suck down the pap.

You no longer need teeth.

As our cuisine dissolves, so do our minds. In my village in the Geneva countryside, there is no cable TV.  Until recently, we relied on an antenna on the roof and a receiver dish, wobbling in the wind, strapped to the chimney, pointing toward a possible satellite. However, a recent automatic upgrade on our telephone system means that Netflix has raised its head of seductive nothingness.

Inside this smooth advertisement-free world, you suck down mindless made-for-TV-series of brilliant non-qualified lawyers, zombies, fictionalized royal history, movie-star sex-criminals who suddenly disappear, and future princesses. We sit under quilts and approach death at an alarming rate.

You no longer need thought.

To counter this mushy decadence and inspired by a recent Venice visit to a cold church filled with Leonardo’s incomprehensible machines, I have blown off the dust and taken up volume one (out of three) of The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci. This attempt to claw myself back into the world of gravitas has definitely not worked as the 500-year old observations are startlingly relevant and depressing as he worries about overpopulation, pandemics, climate disasters, political wandering wits, and the importance of truth.

Seriously stuck in the slough of despond, I have not moved past page 102 and the tome is now being used as a pillow for the Chi energy machine which is gathering dust under the couch.

I like to think that if Leonardo were around today, he would be busy building a rocket to Mars to save mankind. But, perhaps, he would have given up like the rest of us, and wearing a pair of pink pyjamas, be cuddled up to his boyfriend, mindlessly sucking on a millet and strawberry smoothie while watching Da Vinci’s Demons.