This past week has been absolutely insane. I left for Switzerland right after my last class ended on Thursday, got back Sunday night and went directly to church and didn't get back to the house until around 10 pm. This wouldn't have been a big deal if I hadn't had midterms the next day...but oh well. Monday was very stressful, as was yesterday, but today they are over and I have my life back - which is why I'm writing in the blog now.
So, Switzerland:
My first challenge was actually getting to Switzerland. It was my first time leaving the UK, and I was traveling by myself. Somehow I made it there without losing any luggage or missing my flight, and the Lovely Laura met me at the airport and took me the rest of the way to Lausanne. A lot of my friends are studying in Lausanne with the Pepperdine program there, so I was so excited to get to see them again - some of them for the first time since April of last year! One of my friends, Alex, was supposed to go to Paris the weekend I was there, so I didn't think I was going to get to see him. But as Laura and I were walking toward the Lausanne house at 1 am, I saw some sketch guy sitting by himself at an outdoor table. It was Alex!!!! He decided to wait and leave for Paris on Friday night, and I was so happy I got to see him! The next day I got to see Elle and Alyssa for the first time, and got to spend the whole day with them and the rest of the group on the field trip. I felt so welcomed in Lausanne - the group there is amazing and so fun to be with. The field trip was to a watch-making factory, which was...cool. The neatest part of the day was actually lunch. We ate at this random restaurant overlooking a canyon, and it was the weirdest place I have ever eaten at. There was a real bowling alley inside the restaurant, a working witch's cauldron, lifesize Smurfs outside (p.s. life-size smurfs are only slightly larger than life-size elfs), and 240 items on their dessert menu, the signature dessert being a swan made out of marangue. It was certainly an experience. On Friday night, Laura, Elle, Alyssa, and I went to an Italian restaurant in Lausanne. We were there for over two hours - a truly European experience! Oh, and I learned that I absolutely not cannot speak French - and the phrase that my mom taught me when I was little: "Ale, toot suite, veet, veet" does not actually mean "hurry up. go faster." :) (I apologize to those of you who actually know how to spell in French - I probably butchered that.)
Laura and I woke up at 5 am to catch a 6:20 train that would take us to Interlaken. We got there smoothly, but that's about the only thing that went as planned that day. There was fog covering all the moutains, and that dang fog nearly ruined our entire day. We were supposed to meet the skydiving company at 9:00 at the train station. They still weren't there at 9:30, so I wandered around trying to find a payphone. Apparently, pay phones in Switzerland only take credit cards and only give directions in German. So we finally got in touch with the skydiving company, which informed us that it was bad weather (obviously) and that we would try again later that day and see if the weather was better. So that meant that we had to call the canyoning company and change our canyoning time to later in the day as well. They didn't have a later time, so we ended up canceling our reservation and paying an outrageous cancelation fee. :( Laura and I hung out in Interlaken for a few hours, admiring the Asian influenced architecture (weird, right?) and buying genuine Swiss army knives from Switerland. How legit is that?! So we arrived back at the train station at 12:30 to meet the skydiving company. They picked us up and took us to the store, but the weather was still terrible. So we waited until 2:00, and the weather was still bad. Alex, from the skydiving company, told us that she would take us back to Interlaken and would call us at 4:00 to tell us if we would get to jump. The odds didn't look and we didn't think that we were going to get to do anything exciting that day. So Alexis told us that we could probably go bungee-jumping if the weather didn't get better. We obviously didn't want to come back from Interlaken, the extreme sport capital of the world, with the highlight of our day being getting "yeah, we got some sweet Swiss Army knives," so we decided to go bungee jumping. (side note: Alexis, who is a professional skydiver, told us that bungee jumping scared the life out of her and would probably never go again...as our reservations were being made. Awesome. hahaha). So at 4:00 Alexis called us and told us that the weather was still bad and we wouldn't be able to jump, and so we confirmed our bungee jumping reservation. I was so bummed and was trying to figure out when I would ever be able to go. I had already planned the rest of my weekends, so there was no chance of being able to come back. And yes, you can skydive anywhere, but there's absolutely no comparison to skydiving over the Swiss Alps. Well, about 2 seconds later our friend from Pepperdine who was with us made a phone call to some other people who were going skydiving at Interlaken that day to tell them that they probably wouldn't be able to go, and they replied with "Actually, we're on our way to the jumpsite right now." So in a time span of about 2 minutes, we cancelled bungee jumping without having to pay a cancelation fee (thanks, Alexis!!) and ran to the train station to meet the other skydiving company. (By the way, let me just say that Alexis, who runs the first skydiving company, is amazing. She drove us around all day and tried to organize other things for us to do. She knew that I wouldn't be able to come back, and totally encouraged me to go with the other company if they were jumping that day, even though it meant that she was losing business.) On the way up to the jumpsite, Laura was so torn between whether to go or not. She had not originally planned on skydiving that day, since she was planning on going in December with her brother in Arizona for much less money. She ended up deciding to go, which I was so happy about, and she is too!
As for skydiving itself, I can't even put into words how amazing it was. My tandem partner was Hans (The Hansinator), and a guy named Mick jumped with us and filmed me. The guys were absolutely hilarious and tried to calm my nerves...not really. I asked Hans how many times he had jumped, and he said "five." I was about to cry, and then he said "No, between 5 and 6 thousand." Holy cow!!! I can't imagine skydiving 6,000 times!!!! Anyway, the flight up to 13,000 feet was incredible. As I was about to jump out of the plane I saw the snow-peaked Swiss Alps at eye-level (amaaaazing!) all around me. I was the first one to jump, and was absolutely terrified. There's nothing like standing on the ledge of an airplane and someone pushing you out. We were free-falling for about 30 seconds (I'm not sure exactly how long it was - I was a little out of my element at that point). We were spinning around and doing flips (at least that's what Hans told me afterwards). Then he pulled the chute and we were soaring over Switzerland. If you've ever been on the ride "Soaring Over California" at Disneyworld, you have a taste of what that feels like. It was the most exhilarating thing I've ever done, and can't wait to do it again! (sorry, mom!)
On Sunday morning back at Lausanne we went to a little church of Christ that some people from the group go to. We sang some classic CoC songs in French, which was really cool. And as I was looking around, I spotted a picture of my friend Bryn hanging on the wall. Random! Then I remembered that she had done "Let's Start Talking" in Switzerland a few years ago, and that was the church that she worked at. Isn't it funny what a small world we live in !? After church we had a Swiss potluck, which is the best kind. There was a crepe maker in the middle of the table, and toppings and fillings all around, and everyone made their own crepes. We seriously need to reform our potlucks and adopt this method. It was incredibly yummy!
When I got back on Sunday I went straight from the airport to church, backpack and all! I started studying for my midterms really late, and basically pulled an all-nighter. I won't bore you with the details of my midterms, but imagine this: I had gotten less than 5 hours of sleep every night in the past week, and had to take four essay tests on subjects such as "Describe everything you know about the Fall of Rome." It was fantastic.
But midterms are now over, and I am ecstatic about having my life back!
Tonight I am going to see "Phantom of the Opera" with the group, and I can't wait! I'll be sure to tell you how it is.
So until next time, "Au Revoir! And go to Switzerland!"