Day 27 - Festival de la Terre (Festival of the Earth)

Continuing on from yesterday, we left the party at the top of the mountain at 6am. We started walking downwards and we could see the city of Geneva and the lake from below... and we were far away! I'd had no idea how high up we were.

This was how high up we were... we needed to get by the lake...

We were so exhausted, we were both falling asleep as we were walking, it was ridiculous. In the end, we found a spot in the sun on a grassy banking on the side of the road and took a nap.

Taking a nap!

We're not sure how long we were asleep, but we woke up around the same time and set off again. We reached the point that we were dropped off at the night before, but we still had a LONG way to go. We stuck our thumbs out to try and get a lift and it didn't take long for a really nice bloke on his way to work to pick us up! It's a damn good job as well. It took 20 minutes to drive, but the road was windy, it would've taken us HOURS to have walked. We got back to Lausanne at half 10, so the journey back had taken us 4 hours!
I got the train to Villette and fell asleep until half 4!
When I was conscious again, I met up with Rosa and some of her friends in Lausanne. We sat by the lake and although a barbecue had been planned, I got there too late. Isabel was there and we caught up. She asked me how I was doing with the family and we mainly spent the time gossiping about the parents. How we much prefer Valerie when David isn't around. Turns out that I'm not the only one who can sense David's hostility towards others. For example, David doesn't allow guests in the house. Not even friends of Valerie's. Yesterday, Valerie had a colleague around for lunch. Afterwards, she came up to my room and asked me if I wanted a cup of tea (she's never done this before) then asked if I would mind not mentioning to David that she's had a friend around. She later tried to justify with "We're always working away, so weekends are special for the family," but we both knew that she wasn't convinced by this herself.
After sitting in the park for a while, Rosa, Christelle(?) and I headed back to Lausanne centre to "Festival de la Terre." We met up with Iñaki and Marta and watched some bands play, they were pretty good. Sim's were a hip-hop/pop-rock band, then there was Hugh Coltman which was acoustic blues. It was a bit too slow for us though.

Sim's

Christelle, Marta and Iñaki went home and Rosa and I went to the train station to pick up. We spent the rest of the evening getting blazed at the festival and drinking beer. We got approached by two guys which was a bit intense (more so because we were stoned) who were trying to chat us up. One was getting a bit too touchy feely with Rosa. It was quite entertaining for me because the guy that was attempting to chat me up couldn't speak English, so we had this weird conversation which was us both using what little we knew of each others language. He also kept calling me "Bat" - No one outside of Britain can pronounce the "th" sound! Eventually they left us alone. We'd started to look for a club, but thought that just sitting down and smoking in the big park that the festival was being held was best. Favourite quote of the night from Rosa: She tried to say she had an apple in her bag "I am an apple." I cried with laughter!

I caught the train home, fell asleep again, GAH! But luckily woke up in time to walk home from Cully.

Day 26 - Saleve party!

I got a text off Rosa in the wee hours of the morning, asking if I wanted to go to a drum & bass party on a mountain, just over the border into France, so my morning was spent trying to work out how to get there... Not that I worked anything out... 

Zoe was really grumpy when she came home for lunch. Valerie was working from home today so at least I didn't have to bear the full brunt of it. She insisted she wasn't tired, but me and her mum made her go and rest. She's going to sleep over at Juliette's tonight, so she needed to get some shut-eye! She's getting quite worried about the bed-wetting situation that could occur. She's planned to wear pull ups, but she's frightened that the other kids might see them, poor thing!
After she went back to school, I was free! I took a trip to Lausanne to get some beer for tonight and some food shopping, then took a nap when I got home. Didn't want a repeat performance of the public transport debacle last week! As I was heading out of the door, I dropped my phone and the screen cracked. I didn't check it until I was on the train, but it's completely unusable, so I had no way of getting hold of Rosa when I got to her flat. I stood outside, not really knowing what to do. In the end, I stopped some people in the street and a guy let me borrow his phone to contact Rosa by Facebook. What a hero!
Rosa and I sat in her flat for a while, trying to figure out how to get to the mountain top. Public transport didn't get up there, so we had to get as close as possible. We just went on a whim. At 9.30pm, we left the house, then we got the train to Geneva. We didn't pay, so when the conductor came up the train, we pretended to be asleep. Fool proof! Once we were there, we asked loads of people how to get as close as possible. The taxi would've cost 100FR so that wasn't an option.

Rosa & Martin (The good luck charm!)

By this point, we were pretty drunk, so we didn't have a clue what was going on! While we were waiting for the tram, we went to use the toilet in a bar across the road from the station. The bouncer caught us just as we were about to walk into the bathroom and threw us out. Nightmare! We got the tram/bus (Can't really remember) and ended up in a place called St. Julians which is just over the border into France. From here, we stuck our thumb out and eventually a guy picked us up. Rosa communicated with him and I had a nap in the back of the car. He managed to get us pretty close... But not as close as we thought. We stopped a car on their way down who said that it was a half an hour walk up the hill... It was double that at least! We were just following the sounds of the music! Eventually, we made our way up a dirt track and found it! By this time it was 3am... It had taken 5 and a half hours... but we were there. There were probably about 25 people left and a couple of tents scattered around, but we danced! There was a small table set up for the DJ's and some decent speakers and lights!

We got chatting to a few people and danced with everyone, the atmosphere was really friendly! We were both absolutely shattered, but the music was great. We just danced until the sun came up, it was awesome. The mountain top was a really nice place to have it. By the time the sun had fully risen, we were both absolutely exhausted and everyone was starting to clear up. We did a runner! It was 6am when we left.... To be continued!...

DJ Rosa, when the sun had come up!

Day 25 - The Abyssinians!!

I woke up excited, I was going to see The Abyssinians today! I went to Vevey in the morning to get some nail varnish to paint my nails Rasta colours!

Rasta nails!

It was really hot again today so I didn't want to exert too much energy. Zoe and I had lunch (I nearly made her sick when I gave her rocket leaves...) and after she'd gone back to school, I spent the afternoon in the pool. Not bad this job....
After school, I made Zoe do some homework that Eta had set her yesterday and we did some work in her science workbook too. It was a fairly productive afternoon! We did some swimming too.
This morning, Valerie had said that she was going for an aperitif after work...I'd already make plans, but she said that I could take Zoe to the train platform in Villette, meet her off the train, then get on it myself. I got a text off Valerie asking if everything was ok to meet there, then when we got 3/4 of the way to the train station, I realised I had another text off Valerie saying that she'd missed her connecting train and could I take Zoe to Lausanne and meet them there. I had no credit on my phone, so I couldn't get in touch with her at all, she kept texting, asking if the plan was ok. She couldn't even ring me. I nearly turned and went home, thinking that I couldn't just take Zoe to Lausanne when Valerie didn't know what was going on! But then I realised I could top up my phone with my debit card... Don't know why I didn't think of it sooner... I finally got hold of Valerie and as I was on the phone, Zoe shouted "THE TRAIN" we very nearly missed the connecting train in Cully because the original train was late. Zoe ran as fast as she could bless her, my purse flew out of my bag at the same time. Luckily, Zoe was stood by the door of the train, holding on to the 'doors open' button. The hero!
We met Valerie in Lausanne and I made my way to the D! Club where the gig was. Steve (a couchsurfer that I met up with a couple of weeks ago) arrived at the same time as me and we went for a drink at Le Petit Central.We went back to the D! Club. When we got in there, I found Iñaki (Rosa's housemate) and some people that they both knew. They all knew each other through Couchsurfing! I never managed to catch their names though! We got inside, got a beer and not long after, The Abyssinians came on. And they were incredible. The vibe was just amazing. Reggae is just such calming, happy music to listen and sway to! There were people smoking sneaky joints all around me. I've never wanted a spliff so much in all of my life. Overpriced beer had to be my substance of choice unfortunately. The music was just brilliant, they played all of my favourite songs, I wasn't disappointed. We managed to squeeze ourselves quite close to the front too!
After the gig, the club stayed open with a DJ. We stayed for another beer and a dance. I even met one of The Abyssinians!

Steve, David Morrison(!!!) & me

I caught the replacement bus home - I had to force myself to stay awake.I didn't want a repeat performance of last Friday!

Day 24

Went to Lausanne to do some window shopping and have a bit of a wander this morning. By the time I got back, it was absolutely boiling! So I sat in the garden until lunchtime, topping up my tan!
After lunch, Eta (the maths tutor) came and I spent the rest of the afternoon in the pool. Zoe joined me when she was done. The weather was awesome. There wasn't a cloud in the sky and not a breath of wind! I managed to burn my arms and the front of my legs though. Too much swimming, not enough sun cream.
I took Zoe to judo and sat by the lake in Cully writing until she was finished. Afterwards, Valerie, Zoe and I sat on the balcony for ages. We had dinner, then followed that with chatting, drinking red wine and eating cheese and bread, it was lovely! We were trying to teach Zoe how to eat cherries without making a huge mess, it was hilarious. I never considered that it was one of those things you have to learn - pitting a cherry with your tongue... I really like Valerie, I prefer it when David's not here. Although I feel bad for thinking that because he's not a horrid person. I just feel more comfortable when he's not around... 

Valerie went for a walk and I watched the sunset on the jetty. Not a massively exciting day, but beautiful nonetheless.

Day 23 - A mi-chemin... (Halfway...)

I'm halfway through my Swiss experience. It feels like I've been here forever as in everything is habitual, but it also feels like no time at all. I have so much more to explore!
I couldn't sleep last night so I spent the morning horizontal on the sofa. By the afternoon, the sun was shining, so I moved to the garden. 
When Zoe came back for lunch, she was acting strange. I'd asked her how her morning had been and she replied with "I don't know..." In response I said "Well you must know, you've only just come back from school"
"Well I don't know."
I couldn't hear her because of the traffic, so I told her this and said we'd talk in the house.
"That's not very nice, saying I can't talk and I have to wait until I get to the house."
"That's not what I said, it's just I'm finding it difficult to hear you."
She was just being really stroppy. When we got to the house, she sat on the floor with her toys and didn't say much. I begged her to tell me what was wrong and asked her to come to the kitchen while I was cooking just to chat to me as I couldn't hear her.
"It sounds like you're speaking really quietly."
Then she went a bit mad. "I'm not talking quietly, there's nothing wrong with my voice and everyone says there is." This shocked me a bit, as I hadn't said anything which would have provoked such a reaction. She started to run upstairs, but I called her. She stopped halfway up and started crying. There was obviously something up.
"The thing is Juliette [her 'best friend'] keeps saying that I think I'm the most beautiful, but I don't." - 7 year old problems!
So it turns out this Juliette girl hasn't been very nice to Zoe, snatching things from her, forcing Zoe to play things that she doesn't want to play and general playground meanness. I reassured her that we'd get something done about it and Zoe is more than happy for her mum to talk to Juliette's mum, so hopefully the nastiness will stop.
Zoe went back to school, glad that things will be sorted out soon enough. While she was in school, I set about making a pie. And my god was it good!

Delicious pie!!

We did some swimming, it's so warm here now! About time after all of the drizzly weather. So my day has consisted of sunbathing, making/eating pie and chilling really. All in a days work.

Day 22

Mondays are kind of my free day as I don't have to pick up Zoe for lunch. I spent the morning doing the ironing and watching Lie to Me. I've finally finished the series and now feel a bit empty inside!

:(

Afterwards, I went to Lausanne for a look around for some things to make clothes with. I wanted to take a look at places I'd never been to before, but I took the Metro to the end of the line (Croisettes) and it didn't look very appealing. If the weather hadn't have been so drizzly, I would have been more inclined to explore, but I ended up getting the Metro back to Riponne and leaving as soon as I'd found what I wanted. Boring I know.
Zoe's got an awful cough at the moment and is feeling a bit run down, so when she came home from school, we watched Kung Fu Panda 2 and I wrote some postcards.
David has gone away on another business trip, I feel quite relieved when he's not here. Not that I dislike him as such, but when he's working from home, I feel like he's breathing down my neck a bit.
At dinner, Zoe confided in me about something that's worrying her. Her friend Juliette is having a sleepover on Friday and Zoe is really looking forward to it, but of course she keeps having little "accidents" in her sleep. She's so worried,  so we were trying to think of different ways she could go about tackling the issue.
Zoe: "I know, I'll wake up in the middle of the night when everyone else is asleep and put my 'pull ups' [like nappies for older children] on"
Me: "Well if you do that, why don't you wake up and go to the toilet?"
"Oh yeh... " she said, and pulled a sad face. The poor thing!

Drizzly day

Not a lot has happened since. The weather is really putting me off exploring further afield, but hopefully it'll clear up soon and I can do something a bit more adventurous!

Day 21

I woke up with the intention of doing very little. My throat was a little better, but the weather was rubbish. I'd got a message off a Couchsurfer earlier in the week asking if I'd wanted to meet up today, so I thought I may as well do something with my day. Plus he looked cute from his photos, ha!
Now I never pay for the trains here, it's too easy not to. But on my way to Lausanne, I saw some conductors doing their rounds. I ended up jumping off at the next stop and luckily I didn't get caught. It's 100FR fine if you do though. I'll have to be more careful!
I met up with Sylvain in Ouchy. He's French and has come to Lausanne at the end of his travels to work and maybe settle down for a year or two. There was small Thai festival taking place on the lakeside which I found out later it was the Khon Thai festival. There were loads of Thai themed stalls, selling jewellery, general bits and bobs, Thai massage and food, which looked and smelt absolutely incredible. It took so much restraint not to spend all of my money. We got a Singha beer, sat down and talked for a bit. It started tipping it down with rain so we (and what felt like the rest of Lausanne) all crammed into a tent for a while and watched a band (who were average at best!)We took a walk along the lake, but the weather was lame. We ended up getting a bus to St. Francois and sat in Starbucks chatting for ages about life plans, travelling, etc. We're into similar music and the reason he got in contact in the first place was regarding a gig I'm looking to go to on Thursday (The Abyssinians) so hopefully we'll meet up again!
I was still pretty run down and ill , so I was home by 8pm. Early mornings again tomorrow!

Day 20 - Je m'apitoie (Feeling sorry for myself)

So I left off getting on the train in the early hours of Sunday morning. Next thing I know, I wake up and I haven't got a clue where I am. As I'm pretty drunk, I decide the best thing to do is get off at the next stop. So I walk off the platform and, for some reason, assume that I hadn't even been past Villette. So I started to walk in the direction I think is right, along the lake: I can't get lost that way right...?
Wrong.
I must've gone way past it, but I was drunk. I kept walking and started sobering up a bit. But I still had no idea where I was, or whether I was even going in the right direction. Eventually I saw a bus that was heading to 'Vevey' - I recognised the name of the town and had been there in the week so thought I might be able to find somewhere familiar... I fell asleep on the bus... I think I must've been on the bus a while, because I was awoken by the bus driver shouting at me in French and pointing vigorously. I just got off the bus which was luckily in Vevey. Right by the bus stop was a train station, so I got on the little train that had stopped there. What I didn't realise was the train wasn't a train at all, but a shuttle bus/cable car thing up to Mont Pèlerin. I didn't have a fucking clue where I was going!

I should've guessed that this 'train' wouldn't get me anywhere near
where I wanted to go...but I was drunk...

When I got to the top, I got off, thinking maybe I could get a train back to Lausanne from there... Or maybe I could just walk to Vevey... That was until I saw a sign pointing down the hill saying "Vevey-1hr" - no thanks. By this point it was about 9.30am....
I got back on the shuttle bus to go down the hill...And fell asleep again. I ended up going up and down another 2 or 3 times until an old lady woke me up. I got off again in Vevey and finally had the sense to look for the actual train station... which was about 100 metres in front of me...
I finally got to Lausanne and onto Villette and got home at 11.30... So it took me 5 and a half hours to get home, when it could've only taken me an hour and a half to walk in the first place. Maybe going out on Friday nights without a nap isn't such a good idea...
I fell asleep when I got home and woke up at about 3pm. The clouds had settled by then and I had a throat that felt like someone was scraping at it with razor blades, so I settled on the sofa watching TV all night and feeling sorry for myself.

Day 19 - Soleil, BBQ & bières (Sun, BBQ & beers!)

School wasn't compulsory this morning because the school play is going on, so Zoe slept in a little (I didn't get the chance to though!) We fed the ducks some prawn crackers off the jetty and wrote a story about some of the ducks we'd seen (It was 3 drakes all trying to mate with one duck...) Because she'd missed school, I wanted to make sure Zoe did something productive, so we did some pages in her science workbook, she got really into it too which was great! She said "I wish I could finish the books." So I'm going to try and see how far we can get with them. This also impressed David, so a step in the direction of  being the best au-pair ever!
We attempted a picnic in the garden, but Zoe started complaining of sore eyes. She blamed the sun, but I have suspicions that she has hayfever (sneezing a lot, itchy eyes), which has fallen on deaf ears when I tried to tell David... I said to Zoe we should go inside and all she said was "But I don't want to ruin a lovely picnic in the garden" - bless her. I managed to persuade her that cake inside is more fun when you don't have itchy eyes!

Attempted picnic in the garden!

When Zoe went to school in the afternoon, I took the train to Lausanne to try and get the key cut again. Success this time! I did some food shopping and rushed back in time to get Zoe from the bus stop. (Managed to fall onto a woman on the train in the process, I was so embarrassed.)
I read Zoe a story and let her have a little rest before her show tonight, then sat in the garden. For dinner, she had chicken, beans and chips - on David's recommendation as he wants me to use up food in the cupboard before they move house. I wasn't happy with Zoe's exclaims of "This is DELICIOUS!" - I told her not to get used to unhealthy food!
I got a text off Rosa at about half 6, asking me to go along to a BBQ tonight, so I met up with her in Lausanne later in the evening. I met her housemate Iñaki and his friend Marta. We got the bus and went to find Iñaki's friends who were by the lake.  It was so busy and the atmosphere was really nice, there's a festival going on near where we were this weekend (but it's pretty expensive and we'd gotten there late.) I met all of the people at the bbq (for the life of me, I can't remember everyone's names) There was a Belgian girl, a French guy, 3 Italian brothers, a Catalonian guy and then Iñaki and Rosa who are Spanish and Marta who is also Catalonian... So there was a whole bunch of languages being spoken, it was really cool. I was a bit drunk and a bit high, so I just stood there in awe of everyone switching languages. And there was me again, the ignorant Welsh girl!

Iñaki, Marta & Rosa, drinking in the street!

We had some food and beers, then got the metro to Lausanne. We sat in the street for ages, drinking our own beers, it's so expensive to drink out here. Eventually, we went into the Bleu Lezard, where Rosa and I had gone last week. We did some dancing there, then moved onto the next place (I think it's called Jaggers) I remember shots and some dancing!
I was really tired though, having been up since 7am. At 6am I got the train home... 

Me, Rosa, Marta Iñaki & some randomer that started dancing with us...

Day 18

Zoe was well enough to go to school this morning. After I'd dropped her off at the bus stop, I went to the "beach" while I waited for my train to take me to Lausanne. I had to get the key that I'd lost recut. I'd looked up 2 different places that I could get it done and the directions on Google had seemed simple. I still managed to get lost and go in every other direction to the one that I was supposed to. Eventually, I finally found the first shop where he told me, in French, to come back at 4. I think he said the guy who cut keys had gone for a swim(?) I have no idea... I found the other place too, but he didn't have the right type of machine for the type of key. After the wasted trip, I went and sat in the garden until lunchtime.
After Zoe had gone back to school, it got too hot for me to sit outside. As it was the first night of her school play, I decided to make her a chocolate & orange cake - I'd bought a little plastic rabbit today for it. She's a rabbit in the play and her favourite animals are rabbits!

The promise of a surprise was enough to ensure Zoe ate all of her dinner. She LOVED the cake, she was so grateful! She's so cute when she enjoys something! Plus David liked the cake too, so hoping to get on his good side, even though we still don't really converse unless necessary...
I watched the sunset on the jetty with a cup of tea, lovely!

*Racial slur from Zoe this morning. When we crossed at the zebra crossing this morning, we waved to thank the drivers.
Zoe: "I think someone who was black, and smoked and wore a hat wouldn't say thank you."
Have to find out what those skewed views are and call her up on it...