Friday, April 20, 2007

Burn Frosty Burn!

Sechselauten. It's a Zurich holiday we celebrated on Monday, April 16th. This is one of those holiday traditions that is disturbing to outsiders but normal if you've grown up with it. I can't help but wonder if this is how foreigners see Halloween... Anyway, this is how Zurichers celebrate the end of Winter. They have a mock snowman filled with fireworks on top of a haystack. They light the haystack and cheer as the snowman burns. If his head blows off in less than 15 minutes, it means it's going to be a hot summer. Here's the website http://www.z-z-z.ch/Index.php in case you want to check it out. We're in for a hot summer this year which is unfortunate considering I'll be in my third trimester.

An unsuspecting snowman relishes in the spotlight. Thousands of people have gathered just to see him!

Frosty recognizes maybe the center of attention isn't the place for him.

AHHH!

Those pieces of burning snowman are his head blowing off.


There was also a parade that came down the city streets which caused problems when trying to meet up with my hubby & friends. There were thousands of people packed along one or two streets city streets. To my single girlfriends, here are plenty of Swiss men for you to date...




After a few hours, Tally and I finally found eachother later that night back at our place. This is our view of the city from our balcony at our corporate housing apartment.


On Tuesday, Janelle & I got to go to the Bern Temple. It was so beautiful and it was nice to see that the church is the same everywhere ... except the language.





Then on Thursday, the American girls got together and went to the Lenzburg Castle. I didn't get any good pics of the whole thing, but I got a lot of pictures of some cute kids (not posted)!



Alyssa & the kids in the dungeon!

Here is a pic from the pamphlet to show you what it looked like.

Playing around with my new camera.



More of Zurich from this week of us just hanging around.
I love this style of this building.

Tal & I overlooking part of Zurich.

We just learned the outcome of when this happens...

Sometimes if you stand back a bit you get the best shots.

2 comments:

Maker said...

I can't believe they killed Frosty the Snowman!
What sort of crazy crazy messed up world do we live in?!
I don't know what else to say....I miss you Frosty...I miss you so very much.

On a more cheerful note, your blog is blogtastic! The pics are great!
Hi Tal!
Chambon!
Haribo!!

CJ said...

I'm so happy to hear you are having a girl! Litte girls are the best. Now that you know her gender, you can start shopping like crazy.

Love all the great pictures! Everything is so gorgeous where you are. I can't remember why you are there though... Tally's job?