Salut Switzerland!

Okay. I'm here in Switzerland and it's lovely... the trip to get here, however, was not so lovely. Let me set the scene. The night before I left I got my bag packed and everything ready to go so I wouldn't stress too much in the morning. Went to bed. Woke up and was extremely ill. I could not believe my bad luck. I haven't been sick my entire time of being here and illness chooses to strike me now? Why? WHY? I ran to the bathroom and was violently ill. Managed to get back to my room where I got inside the door before collapsing onto the floor clinging onto my bin hoping I wouldn't puke again. What a lovely blog this is turning out to be! I had a raging fever and was sweating my life away as I lay on the floor thinking "No! No! I have to fly to Switzerland today!". It gets worse. I was going to have breakfast with Miranda's parents that morning and I had to call and cancel - I felt SO BAD. I just wouldn't have made it up and down the stairs without blacking out. Dreadfully ill. So I lay down and tried to sleep for half an hour. Woke up and had another hurl. Felt better. I gave myself a pep talk throughout the getting-dressed-and-ready-to-go process which consisted of "You're doing great, Phoebe. Just put this in the bag and you're all done. You can do it." Which helped. Managed to get to the bus stop and waited there for an hour because two buses decided not to show. Throughout the bus ride I kept a plastic bag in my handbag in case I needed to be sick again - that's commitment to this trip. On the bus there was a full-on argument between passengers as the bus driver didn't stop at one of the stops and the woman wanting to get on ran up to the bus and started tapping on the door. But he drove off. All the other old dears on the bus began arguing with one another in loud voices:
"What a rude man! Mean man!"

"He was doing the right thing! He can't let someone on at a round-a-bout!"

"She wasn't at the round-a-bout. He didn't stop!"

"She didn't signal him!"

"Yes she did! The bus driver should be more concerned about his passengers given that we pay his salary!"

And this went on and on and each woman who got off would give the bus driver a piece of her mind. It was all very amusing.

I arrived at Terminal 5 and took some deep breaths in order to get off without gagging. Checked in my bag and then got the full treatment from Heathrow security. They must have had the x-ray scanners up super high because I set it off! First time ever. One of the security people took me aside and I was frisked up and down by this woman... Oh my... quite an experience.

Everything was fine and my flight was on time and I made to Switzerland after managing to keep a whole muesli bar down! Things were looking up. Flying into Geneva was AMAZING. It's so green and beautiful with mountains covered in snow falling as the backdrop to this green wonderland. It's like England but SO much prettier. And warmer. Hooray!

Jun met me at the airport and we decided to bop around Geneva and get dinner before heading to his hometown of Lausanne which is a 40 minute train ride away. We walked down to the lake and it was stunning. I was so glad it was sunny and blue sky because it had been pouring with rain that morning and the forecast for the weekend was bleak. I saw the main monument of Geneva which is the giant fountain, Le Jet d'Eau, which is one big fountain. I can't say it's a very flattering photo of me given that I'm still a faint shade of green but you can see the lovely jet of water. Makes me think of the fountain in our lakes at UQ back home! Just being here is breath taking. Using one of Jun's terms - being in the beauty of this place just makes you want to die because when you go away from this place you'll miss the beautiful landscape too much. I'll be dying a lot this weekend.

We tottered around the town for a bit and settled on... sigh... McDonalds for dinner. Don't be thinking that after all my illness I went and did a stupid thing like eating a burger and fries because I didn't. I had a really delicious salad. Who would have thought? The only catch - being in Switzerland - was that the salad cost 7.90 Francs which is about 10 Australian dollars. Whoa. In McDonalds? My main thought for this short journey was - "Eep!". Kind of concerned about my funds at this point...

We caught the train to Lausanne (25 Francs) and went to Jun's student flat which is very nice and met his very nice housemates. Once we got to Jun's I was pretty tired so I took a shower and we watched a film. Glad I arrived alive is all I can say!