Thursday, March 16, 2006

Am I Becoming...A Swissy?

Maybe!
First, I spoke to the Swiss Guard in Swiss German at the Vatican City. Then, yesterday, I found myself surrounded by old Swiss men staring (as the Baslers like to do) trance-like at tram repairs in downtown Basel. Today? I found myself in line at U.B.S. at 8:58 a.m. with about half a dozen other Swiss people waiting for the automatic doors to open at precisely 9:00 a.m. This was after earlier this morning when Mrs. TBF called me a Swissy when I draped our duvet outside over a balcony chair for a little frisch luft (as the Swiss are also inclined to do!). Mein Gott! What is happening to me?
I realized that I needed to take immediate action to, if not stop, at least slow down my metamorphosis. So, after walking out of U.B.S. at 9:02 a.m., I noticed a Starbucks kitty-corner across the street from the bank. "Aahhhh...a little shot of Americana - exactly what I need", I thought. I walked in, ordered my grosses tages kaffee mit platz für milch (help!), and then walked directly to a chocolate shop to buy a box of Swiss chocolates (ok...I might as well begin filling out the Swiss citizenship papers!).
Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it...), the large Starbucks coffee went right through me and the imminent "green apple quick-step" put an end to yet another morning of aimless Swiss wandering.
Fortunately, I knew that the next tram to take me home would arrive in exactly one minute (Swissy!!!!).

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Yuck! Nice slang dictionary. Find it in Swiss German yet? ;-)

CanadianSwiss said...

You're gettin' really good at the Swissy thing. We'll talk more about it on Saturday ;-)