Fine dining with friends

Last week, our friends Joe and Leslie visited us from New York. Though I had school, babysitting and ballet to keep me too busy to accompany my parents and our guests on most of their excursions, I did get to spend Saturday evening with them eating what was probably the best meal of my life. We went to dinner at a restaurant called Auberge de l'Onde that was in a small town near Vevey and had a Michelin star.

First off, I met everyone at the restaurant a little late because I was in Geneva watching my ballet school perform the little mermaid (I was supposed to be in the show too, but unfortunately I fell down the stairs a couple weeks before and sprained my ankle pretty badly. Don't worry, it's just about better now!). Anyways, I took the train to the tiny town the restaurant was in. As you go past Lausanne along Lake Geneva, the mountains get steeper and run right into the lake. So, the towns along the lake there are built practically vertically, reminiscent of the Amalfi Coast (we vacationed there in summer 2007, and it seemed like there were more stairs than sidewalks). The train station at St-Saphorin is practically built on the lake. When I got off the train, it was just past sunset; even though it was hazy, I was still pretty amazing. I'm continually awed by the beauty of this place, despite having lived here for ten months.





The restaurant was elegant and old and amazing. The meal was the best I've ever tasted in my life. Not kidding. And after having tasted food from a restaurant with only one Michelin star, I'm itching to experience a three Michelin star meal.

Gruyeres

A couple weekends ago, we took a day trip to Gruyeres... it's the place where they make cheese. Yeah, gruyere cheese. It's in a really beautiful valley about an hour drive from where we live. Down below is a factory that you can tour, with SO MUCH CHEESE.



I have never seen that much cheese in my life.

Then, up on a hill is the medieval town of Gruyeres. It's definitely a tourist town, but that doesn't stop it from being impressive.




It's a very well preserved and very cute medieval town centered around a castle that used to be the home of the counts of Gruyeres (that is, until they went broke in the 1500s).

While the weather was not the best (May weather in Switzerland is cold, wet, and gray), it was still a really interesting look into Swiss history and cheese making.
By the way, the French claim that they are the producers of gruyere cheese. Don't believe them; they don't have a town called Gruyeres.



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death by exams

It's that time of year.

No matter what country I live in, I can't escape the imminent doom of the AP exams. And while last year I had it easy with just one exam, I'm not quite so lucky this year.

I may have brought it upon myself when I signed up for four AP classes, but pure bad luck has all four of my exams scheduled in a row. Tuesday = Spanish, Wednesday = Calculus, Thursday = Literature, Friday = European History. The nice thing is that I'll be finished with my exams by Friday afternoon. It also doesn't give me very much time to panic. But the not so nice thing is that I have much less time to hunker down and study. Though looking at my current amount of excessive procrastination (ahem... I probably shouldn't be blogging right now... it has nothing to do with Spanish verb conjugations), more time to study might not actually result in more studying.

So, I'm getting ready to dive right in and do my best. After this week, I'll only have to go into school for Philosophy and French 1, so life will be a breeze. Many hours spent at the beach and pool is anticipated, as well as more time in the ballet studio. I just have to get through the next four days...

Good luck to everyone suffering through exams right now... I'll see you on the other side!