cheese and amazing hospitality

this is going to be a long one



george and mary antoinette!!!!!!!!!!!!!



i have a friend that is going to school at the goetheanum about an hour or so away near basel switzerland. i left thursday to go visit him. before i went there pierette brought me to an old underground water mill. it is centuries old. it was used for many many years but then electricty came around and it just became a trash dump for the city and for a bucherie that was near by. later on, one man in his spare time started cleaning it out. he soon got help from his friends and after 7 years it was all cleared out. now they have tours there. it was all in french so i didnt know what they were saying ,but i think i know what was going on.
pierette didnt go with me on the tour. she went to see a friend. so i hitch-hiked to basel. i had 2 signs with me. one the said delemon( which was supposed to say delemont but it was spelled wrong) and on the back in said basel which is french. and i had another sign which said bale, which is german for basel because basel is in northern switzerland where they speak german, and i was told the german speaking people might not like that i had a french sign.
after 15 minutes i got picked up by a guy name sylvin. he brought me 15 minutes down the road to a rotary. it was a good spot to catch another ride. i gave him a bar off choclate for his kindness. i was using the sign that said delemon because delemont was on the way to basel. i was standing in a nice shady spot and got picked up by johnjack!!!!! and his nice car with his nice fancy salesperson clothes. he sold lights for the phillips company. he was coming from a business trip in lyon, france. i rode with him for 45 minutes to delemont. the ride was beutifull. steep mountains foiligiatinggldy all over the place. we came to this one point on the rode and he stopped and let me get out and enjoy the view. then we continued and soon got to delemont. he went a bit out of his way to bring me to a good spot to catch another ride. within 5 minutes i got my last ride. i didnt ask theire names. the guy seemed kind of tough and serious. he didnt talk to me much. he was with a girl who was maybe 27 or 30 who he seemed really pissed off at. i gave them a bar of choclate. he didnt say anything, the girl seemed happy. 30 minnutes later they dropped me off in the center of basel. i ran into the post office and mailed a post card to my friend dave that i've had since amsterdam.
i took the tram to dornach which is the name of the town tim is in. then i walked up the hill, got lost, asked a few people where his street was and then i finnally made it. we started talking about the cheese olympics that was happening that weekend. we were both excited about it. the next day we were on the computer at the youth center looking up the info for the cheese olympics. the last train was leaving in 30 minutes. so we ran back to his apartment, packed up and ran to the station. we didnt buy tickets because we were feeling rushed and what not. the train came but it was on the wrong side of the track and it stopped way down at the other end. so we ran over the tracks hopped over a construiction barrier thing got yelled at by a bunch of construction workers and ran to the train. i thought they were chasing me. it was a rush. we got on the train right before it left. we were on the way to the cheese olympics !!!
unfortunetly the ticket people were in that car and asked for our tikckets. then the police came out of no where and asked for our passports and all that. we had to pay 80 francs. which really stinks. (my parents are now freaking out i bet) . we rode the train for an hour to the village of the cheese olympics. when we got there, there were 80 different vendors. many free samples. it was the first day of the festival. the commisioner or whatever was there giving a speech and there were many farmers protesting. i didnt see but they were throwing boots at her. it was in the paper.
that night was the giant vat of fondu. fondu for 1200 people!!! there were hundreds of tables set up in the big room and each table had a 2 or 3 gas burner thing for the pans. we had to pay 18 francs to eat the fondu but it was very much worth it. before the fondu was ready we were talking with a nice french guy named george. he asked where we were staying, and we told him we were probolly going to camp out in the woods. then he and his wife told us to stay at there place. george is 60 something now and he is well travelled. he said he did alot of hitchiking when he was younger. the european hospitality is incredible. incredible!!! during the 2 hours of stuffing myself with fondu they bought us wine liquor, and then bought us coffee.
all the sudden this band came out of nowhere and started playing poka music. i never thought i would get into poka, but i did. the people we were sitting with grabbed our arms and started swaying back and forth real upbeat like. i was laughing hard. there were people on stilts putting pepper on people plates. georges brother kept on sayin ca va ca va.
george and marie antoinette brought us to theire beautiful big house a few towns over and showed tim and i to our room. we got to sleep on a nice big bed. before we went to bed we all sat in the kitchen and drank tea and talked. george is an administrator for a watch company. that next morning he brought us to his work and gave us a really nice tour of the factory and took time to explain everything. there is alot that goes into making watches. lots of time. i still dont much care about them though.
for the last 20 years george has gone to bangcok 2 weeks of every month for business. he drove us to a house he is having built for his daughter who is an artist. its a beautifull place in the country side. lots of big windows and light colored walls. then he drove us around the windy backroads and then into france. he liked to drive fast and i started feeling quieeezy with all that cheese still in me. then he dropped tim and i off at the cheese olympics and told us to give him a call if we wanted to stay another night. tim and i were so cheesed out. there was a cheese buffet for pretty cheap but i didnt want any cheese. so we walked some trails and hung out with some cows for a while then went back to the fest. there was this really rocking bluesish polka band playing with funky bass and tight drums. they had a girl rocking out on the apline horn. it was great.
there was a hotel down the road that we went to in hopes of getting into a sauna. when we got there we found the sauna but needed a key to get in. there was a hockey rink attached in the complex and we went inside and sat down for a bit and ended up watching a really good hockey game. it reminded me off the old days when i used to play. we called goerge and he came and picked us up. tim and i planned on making him dinner but somehow it eneded up with george taking us out to this fancy upscale restaurant. the food was delicous and the wine too. we tried to pay but george said to forget about it and threw down some money. what an amazing inspiring guy. i was tired by the time we got back and went right to bed. in the morning they again had breakfast for us. bread and homemade jam. yogurt and tea. coffee.
after breakfast we went on a walk with george through the woods. he brought us to the top of this mountain. on the top of the mountain there was a small cabin where anyone can go and spend the night. its always open. the view was blurred from all the fog but it felt really good being there. we walked back to the house and then said our goodbyes to george. we walked an hour and half back to the olympics, ate some samples for a couple hours then tim hitched a ride back up to basel.
i went and watched a crappy hockey game and then met up with pierette at the cheese parade. she was going to bring me home but that didnt work out because her niece unfortunetly got in a car accident and pierette had to leave quick and i wasnt around at the time. so i was on my own to get back. i started walking and saw a sign that said 5 hours to st.imier, which is the next village over from where im staying. i was walking down the path and met this couple that told me of a good spot to get a ride. so i went to that street and started walking. i got picked up by a family of 3. a mom and a dad that spoke little french and there 13 year old daughter. they were very kind and brought me 10 minutes down the road. i got my next ride in about 20 minutes but didnt get to far with that one. then i started walking up the steepish road towards st.imier. i never had to wait so loing for a ride since that time in austria. i didnt mind it though. i felt really good then. i was signing to myself and clapping my hands.i had fun. i was walking for over an hour putting my thumb out to every car. except when i saw a dog. he was timid at first but then he was so so friendly and loved when i patted him. he stank like cow. when i was petting him a bunch of cars had gone by.eventually i got a ride and it brought me all the way to the house. so i got to town withing 2 hours instead of walking for 5.
this is the longest entry yet. and ive tried to keep it short. so many experiences this weekend. this could be more detailed but i think im done writing for now.