2006: Dead frogs, cows on parade, a kidnapped snowman, and Japan

2006 stands out to me for a lot of reasons: my first full year of unemployment, our first whole year living in Switzerland, my first calendar year without stepping foot inside my home country (in 7 years of expat life, I’ve almost always gone home once or twice a year before this), my first year of blogging…

Now that I have a blog, it’s nice and easy to look back and see what has actually gone on during the year. Here were some of the highlights:

January started out strong with a trip to that Mecca of stuffed frog museums, Estavayer-le-Lac. We also began our Swiss ski adventures, with a couple unblogged ski trips (I wasn’t so sure about this whole blog nonsense back then).

In February we got more snow, did more skiing, visited friends in Bavaria, and watched mariachis get banned from the trams in Zurich.

In March we got even more snow, participated in insanely fun Alpine village winter sports, and learned to love Zurich’s bureaucracy. Also, I made a half-assed attempt to learn Swiss German, and the mariachis’ tram rights were reinstated.

In April I learned that Mexican restaurants in Zurich suck and that the Swiss have a very different definition of political correctness than Americans do. We were relieved to learn that at least some Swiss have a sense of humor. I traveled to Berlin, Halle, and Dresden, in my first trip back to eastern Germany since I moved away six years ago. I also started painting again, for the first time in 10 years. And of course, we skied.

In May we discovered the Matterhorn, the joys of monsters singing heavy metal, the charms of Bern, and politically incorrect candy.

In June we hiked in the Alps, hung out in the snow with some monks, discovered pizza in Zurich sucks, and got sucked in by the World Cup.

In July I barely managed to survive the heat wave (hottest July in Zurich ever!), using strategies such as swimming in the lake and ascending more snowy mountains.

In August we rejoiced in the cool weather, learned how to post videos, watched the Alps crumble, saw Zurich rave, and got our first glimpse of real live Alphorns.

In September we had fun in southern France, swam across the lake, and discovered Öpfelchüechli.

October brought us a Swiss cow festival and all kinds of crazy fun in Japan.

I barely remember November except for the novel-writing part. Oh, and our first trip back to Italy since moving away over a year ago.

So far in December we’ve… drunk a lot of Glühwein, in Switzerland, France, and Germany.

All in all, not a bad year!

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This post was inspired by the current ProBlogger group writing project.