The Lugano Life

Happy first day of Le Tour de France!! I can't believe I'm on the same continent while it's happening. How amazing would it be to go and watch?
On Friday, Melanie, Nonna (Carlo's mom who also lives in Bellinzona and Melanie's grandma who is super excited Melanie is here because she hasn't seen her for nine years) and I went to the nearby town of Lugano, the one with the giant lake that I took pictures of when I went on my helicopter ride. There are lots of little shops and it's a lot more touristy than Bellinzona but still very cool and charming. In Lugano, we took a lunch boat on a trip around the lake, so we got to enjoy some beautiful views while eating spaghetti with seafood. It was really delicious with muscles and clams and kalamari and the like, but I could not bring myself to eat the baby octopus. Somehow, I couldn't get past the little tentacles.

Salami, anyone?

The main square in Lugano, surrounded by tons of little restaurants and shops

I thought this was kind of cool- instead of the tunnels being tagged with graffiti, the walls were blackboards and people could write on it in chalk

A neat little bookshop. Too bad everything was in Italian. For those of you who are wondering, my Italian is still pretty limited. I am better at getting the gist of what people are saying, but a lot of them speak so fast it's hard to tell. I do know how to say "Thank you for the gelato" and "I would like [insert flavor here] of gelato." Do you sense a theme here? :)

Came across a Fisker Karma- isn't it pretty??

What's interesting about the lake at Lugano is how the mountains are right up against the lake- it goes straight from water to a vertical climb

Melanie and Nonna

Part of the land on the lake is Switlerland, and part of it is Italy and the only way to tell the difference is to see which flag the people are flying, because it looks much the same

After the lunch boat, we got a gelato and then took another boat, this time to the other end of the lake (I should note that this is a rather humungous lake- you should google a map of it) which took us to the Italian town of Porlezza. We only had 50 minutes before the boat left again, so we did a quick tour, had another gelato, (help!) and then we were back to Lugano. 

The amazing little church in Porlezza. I wish we'd had more time there because there were lots of cool little pasta shops and clothing shops (which I didn't think were near as exciting as the pasta ones)

After we dropped Nonna back and home and had some regroup time, Carlo and Marie-Helen took us out to a local pizzeria. I had a mushroom and ham pizza which was pretty good, especially because it was cooked in a brick oven. My favorite, however, was Marie-Helens; it was arugula with this amaaaaaazing fresh cheese on it

When we were done with dinner, their oldest son Rossano arrived for the weekend from Zurich, where he is studying mechanical engineering. Cora left on Wednesday to go back to Bern because she has exams soon.

On a more random note, this is their other cat, Tildy. (Nirvana left with Cora) She always sneaks into my bedroom and curls up on my bed, whether I'm in it or not. Somehow I don't mind. :)

Fresh Mountain Air aka My Farming Education Continues aka Erreday I'm Makin' Hay

On Monday night, the Kellers' niece Melanie from New Zealand came to stay. She's really fun and it's good to have someone else around who speaks English as their first language. Luckily for her, she speaks German so she can communicate with most people as a majority of them speak German.
On Tuesday evening, we went to Lena's house. Lena is a good friend of the Kellers and she lives about an hour away from Bellinzona in this remote village in the mountains with a population of 80 people. She is so sweet and kind and left us chocolates in our rooms. :) She speaks a little bit of English and her and Melanie were able to communicate well in German.
We had a nice relaxed morning Wednesday then we walked a little ways to their acreage to turn the hay, which had been cut a couple days earlier and left to dry. While we waited for the turned hay to dry, Lena took Melanie and I up to their cabins even further up in the mountains. We had to take this Indiana Jones rode to get there, bumping along a dirt and gravel, crossing through a river (no bridge included) and even driving around gigantic boulders from the landslides that frequently occur. When we came back down, we had to rake the hay to the flat part (because it was all on these really steep hills) which felt like a never-ending task because when you raked the hay into a pile there were always leftover pieces you had to go back and get. Eventually we finished and felt very accomplished with our work. For dinner, Lena made us fondue and let me tell you it was the most amazing thing ever, fresh swiss-made cheese and big hunks of super soft fresh bread ohh man. It was my first time ever having fondue, unless you count the time when Mom made it and I was like 5 and thought it was the weirdest thing ever and had not yet been cultured in cheese. (Get it? Haha cultured...cheese...cheese cultures?) Anyways, it was amazing, and I am now obsessed with fondue.

This was the view out my bedroom window.

Lena's cute little garden. She also has chickens and rabbits and sheep.

Me and my good friend the wooden rake

Our little hay-making party. On the left is Davide, Lena's husband, then Lena, Melanie, and their son, Ronnie.

This was the view from their cabin 

The little houses they can come and stay in. Apparently there are some nice hikes around and even a lake that is very cold but good for swimming.

For the second party of our hay-day (bahaha) Ronnie and his wife and their two adorable kids Nancy and Jonathan came and helped. The kids loved it cause they would take running jumps into the hay.

This little cutie is Jonathan. He would bring me these funny little bugs as presents.

You know when dogs get that wild look in their eye and go tearing around with frantic happiness? That's what their sweet little dog would do. Frequently. Here though, Jonathan was playing fetch with an old coke bottle.

This is the machine Davide used to collect all the hay

The kids got to ride on the hay-collector with Grandpa.

This is the adorable Nancy

Melanie and I 

Lena and I

On Thursday we took this cable car up a very steep hill and went hiking around a resoviour with some spectacular views then we had some lunch at Lena and Davide's house and came back to the Kellers. One of the nice things about Melanie being here is that we can go together to places that we probably wouldn't have gone by ourselves, and that really provides lots of cool opportunities. 

After our hike, we stopped at the little restaurant for a drink. Some of the best hot chocolate ever

Davide and Lena. Aren't they the sweetest?

It feels weird not to have gone to the clinic for a couple days, I actually kind of miss it and all the people there. It seems hard to believe I've been here for 2 weeks. My second week definately went faster that I thought it would be possible to go, probably because I settled into a nice routine of working in the clinic/going out on rounds, having a nice long lunch break (2 hours!!) and working again till 5. It's nice to feel like I'm finally fitting in.