Happy Easter

Here, in Sri Lanka, the majority of the people are Buddhists and Hindus. There are also Muslims and Christians. And Easter will be celebrated. It is also a national holiday. And people are very serious about it; almost everything will be at a standstill and shops and places closed.


In my close past, Easter went unnoticed by me. I was living in countries where no celebrations were made.

When I went to school we had Easter camps. The school organized a 4 day trip to somewhere. During 7 years, my parents offered me these trips. But I cannot tell about these travels. Because. Every time when we got up, there were clouds and it started to rain. We all gathered at the railway station, ready to go. And then the teachers decided to cancel the journey.

Happy Easter to all of you.

Women: the Frontline Against Hunger

Women: the Frontline Against Hunger

Today, one year ago

Today is the Annual Convention of the Humanitarian Aid of the Swiss Government. Where the Swiss Humanitarian Aid Unit will be celebrated. The event is important and it has about 900 participants. One year it takes place in the German part of the country, the following year in the French part. This year it is in Montreux.


The Montreux Convention Center is the place of the venue. So, today, there will be different "sounds". Because the center is also the place where the jazz festival takes place in July every year.

I will attend the meeting, before flying back to Sri Lanka tomorrow.

A year ago, today, I attended the meeting too. It was during the coffee break that I was approached and asked if I would accept to go to Sri Lanka. Well, I don't think that I will be approached this time.

Weather Frogs (a trip that was a flop)

I admit: Weather forecasts, today, are reliable. In particular when it comes to short term. On a Friday, you can plan your activities for the weekend, according to the weather, and can be (almost) sure that it will work out fine. But it was not like this a few decennies ago.


What you see above is the weather observatory of the Jungfraujoch. It is located in the Bernese Alps. In that particular area, three mountains "stick" together: Eiger (with its famous, and for climbers dangerous North Face), Mönch and Jungfrau.


In the display above, you see these three mountains. The arrow points to the region where the weather observatory is. And where the highest railway station of Europe is. At an altitude of 3'454 meters. This place is popular among tourists.


In particular Japanese tourists. Who go up there by hundreds. And Americans on their "Europe in 7 days" trip. The place is like Zermatt in the Valais Alps or St. Moritz in the Grison Alps. If you have not seen it, you have not seen Switzerland.

So I thought that it was about time for me to go "up there" too. Sometimes in 1979 (I don't remember exactly when, but it was after I came back from Chad), I decided to make the journey to the Jungfraujoch. On a Sunday.


In Saturday's evening news the "weather frogs" gave a great forecast for Sunday. Beautiful weather for the next 3 days.

I set off very early in the morning, the travel takes quite some time. The weather was indeed beautiful. I travelled first class (excusez du peu). First, one hour to Berne, then another to Interlaken from where it took a further hour to Lauterbrunnen (where supposedly Sherlock Holmes died after his fight with Moriarty). And then the "climb" started with the Wenger Alp Bahn (again almost an hour).


And finally I was sitting in the "Jungfraubahn" (you see behind the train the Jungfrau) for the final leg up to the station. This is quite an amazing trip, but I will make another post on this soon. What you have to know is that the train is going up inside the mountain. It was, I think another hour before we reached the Jungfraujoch-Station.


I got off the train, walked away from the station towards daylight. All excited. I would see this. The Jungfrau Glacier in beautiful sunshine. With the mountains sticking right to my face.


Well, I saw NOTHING. Because the sky was like in the weather chart above. Thick clouds and fog. The time I was in the train going up (in the mountain) the weather had completely changed. Visibility was less than 5 meters.

What a disappointment!

I had to pay around 100 dollars to get up there; I ate terrible food in a self-service restaurant and I had a terrible "altitude" headache. I spent an hour up there and then started my return trip. Completely frustrated and cursing the weather forecasters.

I think that I have some courage. But I, surely, will not attempt again to go to the Jungfraujoch. Unless I have a written guarantee by the "weather frogs" for bright sunshine up there.

Greed (but a few cents can amount to a lot)

Things happen and sometimes one cannot believe them. But what I am going to tell you is absolutely true.


We all (well, many of us) enjoy nice things in life. Like a good bottle of wine. When I am at home, I have a glass of red wine with my lunch and another with my dinner. Over the years, trying wines from different countries, I found my favorite: Antu Ninquen from Chile. An absolute high class wine, at a decent price and good to keep for years.

But many years ago, when I had less means and started to enjoy wine, I bought wines from various countries in one liter bottles. Those wines were simple but good. From Italy, Spain, France or Switzerland.

These bottles were not closed with a nice "liege" cork but simply with a crown cork like a Coca Cola bottle. And you had to take a plastic case of 12 bottles. For the case there was a deposit of 5 dollars and for each bottle one of 50 cents. Which I paid once as I always exchanged the empties for the "fulls".

Then I moved to Mauritania. And we could get wine. In liter bottles. It came from the Canary Islands. Either by plane or by ship. And there was no deposit. You bought one, two or more bottles and when they were empty, you just threw them away.

And the local people collected them and had many uses for those bottles. Like putting oil for their petrol lamps (Mauritania is a desert country and the people were living away from town) or fuel for the cars.

But there was a guy who was very interested to get empty bottles.


In those years, most of the African countries had "technical cooperation" programs. Infrastructure was built, health services were put up and a lot of educational assistance was also given.

France was very good at it and sent a lot of teachers. They worked all year and when the summer holidays came, they all went back to France for two month. They had their tickets paid and an allowance to take cargo home.

It just so happened that I was at the airport when the teachers left for home. One teacher came with 5 metal trunks. The customs officials asked him to open them. He did. The trunks were full of empty one liter wine bottles. I was surprised to see that. In the evening when I met my buddies at the bar of the "Oasis Hotel", I told them what I had seen.

They laughed and said (the ones that had been here for some years) that the guy is known for this. He collects the bottles during the year, takes them home to France and turns them in at the bottle exchange to collect the 50 cents deposit per bottle.

Had I thought of this, I might be a rich man today?

I was lucky and that is why I am still alive

As you know, I did not like school. Except for one subject: Geography. And that is why, probably, I am running around in this lovely world.

But the man below might have been instrumental for this:


René Gardi, a famous Swiss explorer. He wrote books and made films of his travels. And he also came to schools to show one of his movies and then to discuss it. He came to my school and showed us a movie on Chad, the country in the middle of Africa. I was impressed and my mind started to wonder.....!


A few years later (I still went to school) I saw the movie "Roots of Heaven" with Errol Flynn and Juliette Greco. It played in Chad. And from that moment, Chad became my "dream" country. This was in the late 50ties. And never would I have thought that one day I will be in Chad.


I arrived in N'Djamena, the capital city, on February 5, 1979. I was excited to be in Fort Lamy (the old name of the city). I got a room in a small hotel with a big name: Grand Hotel.


But at that time, the country was in turmoil. There was the President, Felix Malloum, and on the other side were two rebel leaders, Hissen Habré and Goukouni Weddey. The situation was very tense. I did not have much chance to stroll on Avenue Charles de Gaulle. One week after my arrival, the civil war broke out.

We were about 5 customers in the hotel. There was no staff anymore because they could not come to work. The fighting in town was heavy. We were stuck. There was no way that we could have gone somewhere. What to do? We went to the kitchen and broke the cold chamber open to find some food. We drank water from the tab, when there was water coming out. And we did hide in our rooms. Without any exageration, we all thought that this was our end. It was really bad.

After about 5 days, the door to my room was opened violently. A huge black guy in combat fatiques entered and I thought that now I am done. But then he turned around and I saw on his arm the French armoiries. He was a soldier from the Foreign Legion. He told me to get ready with a small luggage and that he will come and get me in 30 minutes. And he went. To come back a few moments later saying that there is no time for the luggage and that we are going immediately.

They took me out (and the 4 others) in an armoured car and took us to a safe place at the camp of the Foreign Legion. They pampered us with food (and good one too). We stayed there for a few days and were able to "cool" down. And then the French Army flew us to Cameroon with their Transall aircrafts.

A few weeks later, I was back in Switzerland.


On July 14, 1982 I was in Paris and saw France's National Day celebration. With an army defilée on the Champs Elysées. All the troup categories passed. But when a company of the Foreign Legion passed, they were covered with a roaring applause.

Me, I looked at them with tears in my eyes.

I will never forget that these brave men saved my life.

Changes (useless ones?)

I played around with my blog and took some things of. And added others. Like my "Day to Day Small Talk". Where I just put a daily short on what hits my mind, in the morning, very early morning. Its an extract from my "Livejournal". And most of the time it does not make much sense.

Then you will find "Sunday's Wisdom". There I put small things I found and find on "A Lady's Life". They make a lot of sense and if not, they make you smile or even laugh. But a lot of sense you will find in "The Toilet Paper". Sense that makes sense.


And finally, on top right you will find headlines about things that are related to Switzerland. The small writing under each headline is simply a comment from me, related to the story. And of course, these comments are very seldom serious. Sometimes nasty. Or silly.

As you can see, a bunch of useless things. But perhaps they can give, on a few
occasions, a tiny wee bit of sense.

But is there any sense wanting to run after sense, all the time?

The only sense right now is that since 3 days I am having a break. At home!!

Jazz on the 5th, Nr. 22

You know that I am a Big Band fan. This video is great. I don't know who they are. But they play great. The tune must be their signature tune. The video says "The Opener". It does not really matter. It is just good Big Band sound.

I could have, I was, I could not have, I wanted

In the middle age, poor Swiss men often went to France to serve in the various King's army. Like in the one of "Le Roi Soleil". Had I lived in that time, I could have done this too.


When a Head of State visits Switzerland on a State Visit, the Swiss Army makes guard of honor in front of the Federal Palace. I was a soldier in the Swiss Army. And I stood a guard of honor. But never for a Head of State.


The smallest country in the world, the Vatican, is ruled by the Pope. And he as an army. The Swiss Guard, I could not have been a member of it. Because you have to be a bachelor and a catholic. And I wasn't both.


When I left the army, I wanted to join the French Foreign Legion. That would have put me in troubles with Switzerland. But this could not have bothered me. Because, after having finished my tour of service, I could have received French citizenship. I did not join them. But in 1979, in Chad, the Foreign Legion saved my life. And that is why I am still here to post.