these weeks in the odyssey
7.19.99 -- 8.2.99
zurich, new york, zurich, zug, lucerne, wiedlisbach, liechtenstein?

Who Can Put A Price On Art?

Life with an Art Historian can be a lot more difficult than you might think. The snap value judgments ("Listen, Sid, sometimes the Renaissance is just crap"), the esoteric art puns ("I'm overflowing with Klee!"), the tendency to wax rhapsodic on matters of visual composition ("There's something just so, well, sugestivo about the trompe l'oeil essence of that fresco...") -- it can all get to be a bit much for your average Bill Bootstrap, Larry Lunchbucket, or Sid Sixpack.

And don't kid yourself -- it can be expensive, too! Though the standard issue Art Historian wardrobe of "casual black, off-black, and dress black" definitely saves on the clothing budget, the ceaseless visits to art museums can have you chunking out some serious coin if you're not careful. That's why you have to remain ever-vigilant against unnecessary cash outlays. You need to check the price of admission at the door. You need to affect a doddering accent and try to get the Senior Citizen discount. You need to sneak into the Louvre via the fire escape, paraglide onto the top of the Prado, and tunnel your way into the Uffizi. And, if all else fails, sometimes, you just have to run screaming from the art museum. That's what I do anyway. Well, at least until next Sunday when admission is free.

I don't know if you, the Office Odyssey reader, have noticed, but we haven't been moving around much lately. Oh, sure, there was that little U.S. jaunt of a three weeks ago where we went from Boston to New York to Washington to San Francisco to Washington to Toronto to Paris to Zurich, but aside from that, not much has been happening. Understandably, we were starting to feel a little bit restless. If we're not on at least one transatlantic flight per week, our traveling jones starts to kick in. We need to chew up baggage claim stubs and spit them out at flight attendants. We need to play bumper cars with the luggage carts, go the wrong way on the people movers, test the limits of the duty free import restrictions. Airports give us life, let us feel confident about our existence. Rene Descartes had it all wrong with that "I think, therefore I am" crap. If he was kicking around today he'd be (1) really freaking poor since philosophers pretty much make chump change, unless (2) he updated his shtick to write bestselling self-help guides with titles like "Today, I Cried," "Today, I Felt Slightly Bloated," or (my personal favorite) "Today, My Inner Child Ran Off With The Mailman Because I'm Such A Hopeless Loser." What was the point of that? Oh yeah -- if Rene Descartes were alive, he would have also (3) updated that "cogito ergo sum" chestnut to read something like "I'm in the airport, therefore I am. Also, I'd like a Wet-Nappy to clean up a little bit, please."

Now, I'm no Rene Descartes (though I can do a killer impression of Jean Jacques Rousseau's noble savage), but I feel pretty much the same way he would. Yes, I'd like a Wet-Nappy. Also, I wanted to get myself back into the New York groove. Fortunately, Chip provided me with just the excuse I needed by agreeing to get married there. What a guy! Though I'm not sure he did it entirely for me, I soon found myself on yet another airplane, winging my way back into the muggy arms of New York City. Unfortunately, my Extreme Partner In Crime, Kristanne, was not making the trip (saying something like, "You can't make me go back to that godforsaken hellhole ever again, you heartless jackal"), so I found myself flying solo.

Well, almost solo. There were also my fellow passengers, each of whom seemed intent on claiming the prize for Most Annoying Air Traveler Ever. It started slowly. I had the aisle seat in a two-seat row (the very last row in the entire aircraft), but my neighbor seemed normal enough. Slightly more than middle-aged fellow, bit gray at the temples, reading the Bhagavad Gita. I figure the worst that can happen is that he'll make audible humming sounds while he meditates. No big deal, right? So, I was somewhat taken aback when an hour into the flight it came time for him to go to the bathroom and instead of politely asking me to get up so he can leave, he instead proceeds to stand on his seat, painfully wrestle his leg over the headrest (knocking me a sharp blow to the noggin in the process), and then tumble over the seatback onto the ground below. "You know," I say, "I would have gotten up for you." Responding with a sheepish grin and a half-bow, he limped his way into the bathroom, not to be seen for another hour. Cool.

Not a bad performance, right? A little bit annoying, but definitely not Most Annoying. Really, more surreal than annoying when you think about it. So, now it's time to up the ante. There's a family of seven about twenty rows ahead of me. They see their opportunity for glory and seize it, instructing their children to play tag whilst running circles around the aircraft. I visualize myself sticking my foot into the aisle and tripping them one after the other as they come whizzing past, signaling their arrival with piercing squeals of joy. This image gives me great pleasure and I am soon in a bit of a reverie, leaning back in my seat with a vision of five children heaped on top of one another at my feet in the aisle, completely immobile.

Soon, however, my peaceful reverie is broken by a startlingly loud British voice in my ear. What is it saying? Is it saying "Get away, now, you tag-playing children, back to your seats with you?" Is this the long-awaited intervention of the stern British Airways stewardesses? No. It is not. Rather, it is a sixty or seventy year old gent singing "The White Cliffs of Dover" quite loudly while he stands next to my seat. Now, don't get me wrong -- I like singing as much as the next guy, and this fellow actually does have a rather nice set of pipes on him. So, I just look back with a slightly disapproving expression, hoping he'll get the clue that singing on an airplane is perhaps not the most genteel thing that has ever been done. Unfortunately, however, this fellow mistakes my disapproval for encouragement, immediately cranking up the volume as he heads into the chorus, framing it with some curiously ad-libbed scat phrasing for our listening enjoyment. I add him to my mental picture of the five immobile tag-playing children, only now they're playing tag again as they jump around on his prostrate body chanting "kill the pig...kill the pig." It's not helping though, so after considering and rejecting my idea of accompanying him with some human beatbox breakbeats, I turn around just as he's winding it up for the big finish and politely (ok, maybe not so politely) ask him to stop singing. He looks at me with a rather amazed expression ("who could possibly mind me singing loudly on an airplane?") and mutters something incomprehensible about "craven philistines" before wobbling back to his seat. Just then, my missing neighbor loudly tumbles back over the top of his seat, landing with his head on the armrest and his feet kicking the head of the lady in front of us. "Man," I say, "give it up. You're not ever gonna beat that singing dude."

Eventually, though, we arrived. I was pretty excited to see the two policemen meeting our plane, thinking they were going to put the tag-playing kids and singing British dudes in the pokey for their various transgressions. Apparently, though, they were just there to arrest the three different people who insisted on lighting up cigarettes in the bathroom during the flight despite the warnings of the captain that this offense would occasion a two night stay in jail and a $5000 fine. But, hey, when you need a smoke, I guess even some time in the joint doesn't look too bad.

Onward! Back into the gaping maw of New York, to be consumed anew in a maelstrom of the usual revelry and stupid human tricks. Barring that, there's always a rousing game of Scrabble going on at Jacek and Loydie's apartment. Sometimes, Ania (Jacek's sister) even shows up (that's when the maelstrom really begins)! Should you go on a visit of your own, I would caution you to agree on the Scrabble rules beforehand -- Jacek is a notorious Scrabble cheat. He will take advantage of you.

Unfortunately living down to my rapidly-growing reputation of being somewhat absent-minded (ok, "completely airheaded"), I naturally forgot to bring the digital camera to Chip's wedding and the ensuing hijinks. However, I can confidently say that I learned at least two lessons during the sundry festivities. First, New York is just a heckuva lot of fun, even more so when you're hanging out with great people. Second (and this is the important one), should you happen to go the Coyote Ugly Saloon, do not under any circumstances -- I repeat, do not -- accept the bartender's offer of upside down tequila shots administered whilst standing on top of the bar. It's just a bad idea. For some reason, I just seem to keep relearning that last lesson over and over. For those of you keeping score at home, our total now reads New York - 2, Sid - 0.

Road weariness seems to go away, though, the closer you get to Zurich. It's like the urban equivalent of an Advil, removing any possibility of pain. We're not sure, but we think it has something to do with that little guy you see there at the right, wand at the ready, working his magic on the head-bowed supplicant. Moments after this picture was taken, Kristanne felt so good that she competed in the Zurich Ironman Competition, placing third in her division. Unfortunately, however, a post-race drug test revealed an unusual concentration of muesli in her system and she was disqualified. We had no idea that muesli was on the controlled-substance blacklist. Forewarned is forearmed, my fellow triathletes!

It was great to be back in Zurich with Kristanne. Four days is a long time to go without your Extreme Compadre. Kristanne especially seemed to feel the distance, seeing as how she'd basically been without much human contact since I'd been gone. Still, I think her combination flying-tackle power-hug was a little bit over the top. After reassuring the airport policeman that I in fact knew this crazy woman who had me pinioned to the tarmac, we headed back to the apartment to plot our next move.

Hmmm...what could we do? What would feel best to a travel-weary jet-lagged pilgrim fresh off the airplane from a four day blitz of New York? How 'bout renting a car and doing a heckuva lot of driving?

Sounds great to me. We've both missed a bit of the pell-mell flavor of the original North American Odyssey -- the five hundred mile drives with no stops for bathroom breaks, the rolling driver-side switches, the intimate familiarity with truck stop food -- so we decided to once again get our motor running. Through the web, we found an amazingly cheap car-rental alternative (three days rental was cheaper than two round-trip rail tickets to Lucerne from Zurich), so we headed down to the appointed parking lot at midnight where our Sales Representative met us with pry-bar and hot-wire kit in hand. After taking the car stereo for himself, we were soon on the road out of Zurich, headed to Zug and Lucerne and whatever else might come our way.

Getting on the road again felt great. It's actually one of the few things we miss about our lives back home in the U.S. Being American means being mobile. It means driving big gas-sucking things wherever you go. It means driving the single block to the 7-11 for nachos instead of walking, just because you can. Driving in Switzerland, however, is slightly different than driving back in the U.S. Sure, they drive on the same side of the road as we do, and the steering wheel was still on the left side of the car, but the similarities start to disappear about there. My first clue that something was afoot came as we hit the highway. I had our little VW Polo pegged at about 10 Km/h over the posted speed limit of 100, figuring that they probably observe the same 10-over-speed-limit rule that we do back home in the states. Imagine my surprise, then, when car after car came blazing past me at speeds nearly doubling my own. Not only were they going fast, they were driving well, too. Lane shifts caused by road construction (where your lane abruptly shifts 45 degrees to the left or right) normally cause several mile-long slowdowns in the States. Here, people actually seemed to speed up for these little blips, trying to test their cars and their own skill. After some initial trepidations, I started to really get into it...so much so, in fact, that Kristanne had to suggest in her calmest of voices that I might possibly want to "slow it the hell down, there, Mario Andretti-breath."

The drive to Lucerne from Zurich was surprisingly short, only taking about 40 minutes of white-knuckled highway fun to roll into downtown. We immediately pit-stopped the car with the nearest crew for a tire-change, oil-change, and injection of high-octane nitrous-enriched rocket fuel before ditching it in a parking garage to explore Lucerne.

Lucerne is a gorgeous city, situated on a picturesque lake nestled between Mt. Pilatus and Mt. Rigi. The old town straddles the River Reuss as it exits the lake, flowing down into the valley below. Spanning this river are two strikingly beautiful covered bridges, seen in just about every postcard from Lucerne you will ever see. Never ones to shirk from a cheesy photo-op, Kristanne and I soon had the pictures you see above and to the left snapped and into the digital camera for posterity (if you look closely, you can pick out Kristanne in the top photo).

As beautiful as Lucerne is, it's also a baaaad town to be a dachsund in. Everywhere we went, we saw the little signs you see pictured at right, clearly stating that although the locals might look kindly on geeky tourists in bermuda shorts, there was definitely no room in this town for smallish, floor-bound canines. The trail of refugee dachsunds heading out of town to the forced encampments in the Alps was one of the saddest sights I've ever seen. No word yet on whether NATO or the SPCA has been alerted.

Our misgivings about the second-class citizen status afforded dachsunds aside, Lucerne was still a great town. Kristanne and I had both been there before, though, so we quickly fell back into the standard Office Odyssey mode of, "Yup, seen that, seen that, seen that....let's get out of here and do some more driving." So, after a few hours, back into the car we went for an incredibly scenic drive around Lake Lucerne, enjoying the picturesque vacation towns and unbelievably grand lakeside hotels. This was the real advantage of having the car -- being able to see some of the sights that you miss when you're bound to trains and buses. Well, that and being able to burn some rubber around those nasty hairpins up around Weggis. Smokin'.

Unfortunately, it was also in Lucerne where we met Miss Money Money's bizarro-world evil twin -- The Anti Flirt (official motto -- "Don't Even Think About It, Pal"). The Anti Flirt is sort of the Swiss yin to Miss Money Money's Italian yang. Where Miss Money Money would give you that look that says, "Let's spend some money and have some fun," The Anti Flirt gives you a look that says, "I know painful combat techniques with which to damage you." Where Miss Money Money drank frizzante wine and munched on crostini with caviar, The Anti Flirt subsists on a diet of unleavened bread and rainwater collected from the downspouts on her survivalist encampment high in the Alps (right down the road from the Dachsund Refugee Camps, in case you're wondering). I don't know about you, but I'm thinking that maybe we should be leaving Switzerland pretty soon, maybe try to put a little distance between us and The Anti Flirt. She kinda scares me.

Since Switzerland is approximately the size of my belly after a typical Swiss meal of fondue and, well, fondue, we decided to just drive back to Zurich that night and stay in our own apartment rather than pony up the bucks for an overpriced and underfeatured hotel room (who wants to spend $100 to pee in somebody else's toilet?). Unfortunately, our apartment does not have the wake-up call service associated with most hotels, so we ended up getting a somewhat late start on our Second Day With Car. The original plan had been to power off to Bern, check it out in our usual one-hour whirlwind tour and then Never Leave The Car until we arrived in Interlaken for a little alpine exploration. Given our somewhat tardy start, however, this was not looking too likely, especially since we planned to make on minor stop in the tiny hamlet of Wiedlisbach en route to Bern.

Wiedlisbach? Wiedlisbach? What the heck is in Wiedlisbach? Well, my inquisitive friends, let me be the first to tell you that Wiedlisbach is the very site from which the Swiss Family Bohner (umm, that is, Kristanne's family) emigrated to America lo those many years ago. During a trip to Switzerland some fifteen years ago, Kristanne and her family had visited some distant relatives there, arranging to meet them during an exploration of their extended genealogy. So, we decided to stop by and see if it was at all like Kristanne remembered it, paying homage to her roots in the process.

Wiedlisbach is very small -- only about 2,000 inhabitants, all told. So, as we walked around the old town, we took to examining the names on the mailboxes, trying to see if there weren't any "Bohners" listed. After about 20 minutes, this actually started to get a little boring. Still, Kristanne and I have a surprisingly high tolerance for tedium, so we persevered, no doubt drawing some curious glances as we went from house to house, mailbox to mailbox, stooped over and reading names. Just as we were about to give up, we hit paydirt. There it was! "Bohner!"

Hmmm...should we knock on the door? We had no idea who lived there, whether they might possibly remember Kristanne's family's visit, or whether they might even possibly harbor evil intentions toward our persons. "But, heck," we figured, "it's only Switzerland. What's the worst they're gonna do? Stab us with the toothpick attachment on their Swiss Army Knives?" Actually, since we're not complete cultural boors (well, at least Kristanne isn't), we just decided to risk ringing the doorbell, reasoning that they were probably pretty nice people, as most folks in Switzerland seem to be.

So, ring that doorbell we did! Much to our surprise, a friendly-looking head popped itself out the window asking us just what the heck we wanted. After Kristanne explained that she was, in fact, a Bohner, too, that self-same friendly-looking head bopped down the stairs (attached to its equally friendly-looking body, natch) and opened up the door to invite us in!

Five minutes later, we were all seated in the little garden behind his house, sipping on beers and happily talking away. Luckily for me, Stefan spoke perfect English (although Kristanne speaks German, I get by with the usual grunting and pointing people have come to expect from me). After a few minutes, he called his parents up to tell them that a "Bohner from America" was in town and soon they came over to join us.

This was amazing...far more than we had ever expected. In our fondest hopes, we only thought we might be able to say hi to someone, exchange pleasantries and then be on our way. Soon, however, Bohners were piling out of the woodwork. Stefan's parents (Hugo and Olga) spoke very little English, so Kristanne started to get a workout on her German. For my part, I was doing my best to follow along with what few German words I knew and the apparent context. It was great! After an hour or so of conversation, Kristanne and I piled into Stefan's car for a quick tour of the nearby town of Solothurn (a well-preserved and quite picturesque place) and then on up the mountain above Wiedlisbach to take in the view. Though the skies were too cloudy to see to the Alps (usually Jungfrau and the Eiger are both visible), we could see quite clearly down to the green valley below and the town of Wiedlisbach nestled on the banks of the Aare River. That's me and Stefan there at the left looking down at the town of Wiedlisbach in the distance. Stefan's girlfriend called him about then on his cellular phone and said she could even make us out on the mountaintop from their kitchen window. She also said that we were late for dinner and that we better "get our butts back down here this instant if we knew what was good for us."

Gulp. So, back into the car for a quick dash back down the hill to Hugo and Olga's place where we found Hugo hard at work on the barbecue (that's Hugo at right). Our mouths began to water as we realized that we were meant to join them in this feast. This was incredible! We've never met nicer, more hospitable people. It was great fun just to sit around talking with them, enjoying the afternoon sunshine and the great company.

After a delicious dinner (most of it from Hugo and Olga's garden), even more Bohners came to join us. It turned out that the two houses adjacent to Hugo and Olga's were occupied by other Bohners just as nice as Hugo and Olga. That's the whole gang there at the left, complete with new additions Willie and Antoinette and Stefan's girlfriend, Ruth (who, in reality, did not say "get your butts back down here this instant" two paragraphs ago. Sorry, but she's really nice, too!). Dessert was served, coffee was sipped and conversations were enjoyed. Eventually, Hugo got a little mischievous glint in his eye and went back inside to retrieve "a little special something." It turned out that Hugo and Olga were not just proficient gardeners -- they were also distillers of the local Swiss specialty liqueur, kirsch. Kirsch is like grappa made from cherries, and it is incredibly strong (and delicious!).

As time slipped by, we began to realize that it was getting late. So, after marvelling at family resemblances (some of the Bohners in Wiedlisbach look remarkably similar to Kristanne's family back in California), we exchanged addresses and assurances of seeing one another again and reluctantly headed back to Zurich. Hugo even sent us away with a little bottle of his homemade kirsch (with an admonition not to drink it while driving back home)!

It all ended too soon -- such nice people, such a good time. But, we needed to get back home and get our rest so we could get up early for the Third And Final Day With Car. Naturally, though, we didn't, instead tumbling out of bed sometime around 11:00 in the morning. No matter -- into the car we go. This time we headed southeast from Zurich, bound for the Graubunden canton so we could take a leisurely drive through the Alps around there. After seeing the Alps in Graubunden and realizing that yes, they certainly are gorgeous, we began to get a little bit bored. So, we decided heck, why not go to Liechtenstein?

Yes, Liechtenstein! The postage-stamp sized country wedged between Switzerland and Austria. The one that exists primarily as a place for travellers to get a new stamp in their passport (sold for two Swiss Francs apiece in this age of open European borders). That Liechtenstein! We rolled into Vaduz (the capitol city), expecting at least some sort of imposing architecture, cultural finery...something apropos of a capitol city's status. Though there wasn't really any of that, there was a really nice McDonald's and a couple of tourist shops. So, why not go in and get ourselves a couple Genuine Liechtenstein Souvenirs? Sure. Let's do that.

After selecting our tchotchkes (I got the melon baller with the Liechtenstein logo; Kristanne got a little doll that says "Where the hell is Liechtenstein?" when you squeeze its tummy), we brought them up the counter for purchase. Never having been to Liechtenstein before, I inquired with the clerk as to whether Swiss Francs would be acceptable for our purchase. "Oh yes," the clerk cheerily informed us, "the Swiss Franc is actually the official currency of Liechtenstein!" Grinning widely like some Kathie Lee Gifford wannabe, he went on to perkily inform us that "you'd need to count the cows for us to have our own currency!" This seemed to be the height of hilarity for this fellow. His friendly smile was so wide at this point that it threatened to fall right off the edges of his insufferably popping-fresh face. To be sure, his grin narrowed just a tad when The Anti Flirt made a momentary appearance to ask him, "Geez, why do you guys call your country 'Liechtenstein?' Why don't you just call it 'Crappenstein?'"

Hmmm...why not indeed? We left our suddenly crestfallen clerk to ponder this very question -- why not "Crappenstein?" -- and took our leave to head back to Zurich.

This turned out to be a move of questionable intelligence. Today, you see, was National Switzerland Day, the day they celebrate, well, being Swiss, I guess. We figured that this would be a true-to-Swiss-character type of experience -- maybe one or two raised voices, a flag here and there, possibly even a free classical music performance enjoyed quietly down by the lake. What we didn't figure was that the Swiss would celebrate themselves by doing their damnedest to blow each other up. By the time we rolled into Zurich, the bridges and sidewalks were already lined six deep with people drinking and firing off fireworks. I'm not talking sparklers and pop-its, either -- roadside vendors were selling rockets big enough to tempt an Iraqi arms dealer. Rockets with twelve inch bodies attached to four foot sticks. Kristanne even thought she spied one fellow trying to cram a disassembled Scud missile system into the trunk of his Trabant. In addition to the rockets, it appeared that you could also buy what sounded like half-sticks of dynamite. The resulting chaos playing out across the skies of Zurich made me half expect to see Wolf Blitzer show up in a trenchcoat, earpiece pressed to his ear to block out the din.

"Bernie, this is Wolf Blitzer reporting live from Zurich. We're seeing some heavy fire taking place across the Zuri See. There are boats burning even as we speak, and I'm not sure how much longer I'm going to be able to keep this connection..."

"Wolf, for god's sake, man, get yourself to safety! This story is not worth your life!

People lining the shore appeared to be firing their rockets at the boats out on the lake. We watched several boats take direct hits, their passengers laughing the whole time, thinking it to be a great joke. People would light off big Roman Candles in the middle of the crowd, possibly forgetting that those neat balls of fire shooting up in the sky still obey the laws of gravity, coming right back down where they started from. Huge crowds of people were scrambling in waves of humanity to avoid spontaneous ignition from the descending fireballs, laughing all the way. We decided to cut our losses, try to avoid death, and head back to our apartment to wait for the all clear to sound on the air-raid sirens.

Last Week's Front Page Picture

As for that picture over there, that's me and Kristanne reveling in the clean, Swiss mountain air, enjoying the view down to the ancient center of the Swiss Family Bohner, Wiedlisbach. Yup, we climbed a genuine Swiss mountain! Well, actually, we kinda just drove to the parking lot and then walked the 25 yards to the top, but we were definitely feeling the burn, lemme tell you! In case you're wondering, we did the whole climb without bottled oxygen or Sherpa support (though I did have to push Kristanne up the last few feet). I guess the snack bar at the top probably means that this doesn't qualify for a "first ascent," huh? Guess I better cancel that telephone call to "Outside" magazine.