"Public Transportation is Not for Everyone."

I do believe my life will be in euro shambles for a long time to come.  I will be the first to admit that starting my internship two days after arriving here was yet another bad decision in a string of many concerning my Geneva experience thus far.  My jet lag conveniently hit me on my bus ride home from work Tuesday evening when I still had to get home and start and finish Write-On before nightfall.  Fortunately, I woke up before Bus 8 transported me across country lines, and I hopped off at the first stop in sight.  Still unfamiliar with the Genevois transit system and rather cracked out from my nap, I decided to cut my losses and try to walk home, lest I get on the wrong bus in the wrong direction (I figured my lack of a sense of direction would be much less dangerous on foot).  Not yet having had the chance for any sightseeing, I broke out the digi to keep me company and caught a few shots of the mountains.  Miracle of all miracles, 8 kilometers later I was safely back at the hostel/convent in time for choir practice.      

My aversion to public transportation grew deeper later in the week when I realized the unfortunate caliber of my French skills on a bus ride home in which an adorable 4-year old Italian girl tried to strike up a conversation with me in what was undoubtedly her second or even third language.  I thought I had gotten pretty good with just smiling and nodding when I didn't understand something, but this child was having none of it.  I'm pretty sure girlfriend was even talking smack about me in Italiano to her madre.  Commutes to and from work now find me with my iPod blaring my bad 90s music, trying not to make eye contact with anyone like a good American.  

"If You Give a Leb Free Breakfast..."

  I do believe I will like this Geneva place.  My first couple of days here I stayed at a hostel called Le Cenacle in a charming part of town called Malagnou.  I was filled with nothing but excitement and sheer terror when the taxi dropped me off at the front steps with my 67-lb. hastily packed suitcase (thanks for the going away drinks, girls) and uncertainty as to whether my reservation a la the internet had gone through.  

Later that evening, when I awoke from my 6-hour nap to the sound of the choir's evening exercises (did I mention this place was a renovated convent?), I was starving and decided to wander "into town" to hunt down at least a baguette or something.  What I found was a whole lot of nothing.  Geneva virtually shuts down post-7 p.m., and worse yet, this was a Saturday, and NOTHING would be open the next day.  As many of you already know, I experience extreme anxiety when I don't know where my next meal is coming from.  However, the aura of Geneva has this glorious calming effect on me, and I went to bed that night satisfied.  (I also discovered the hostel offers complimentary Swiss chocolates, and nabbed a whole basket of them for a midnight snack...they are as good as they say).   

Of course the reason I even booked at this hostel was for the free breakfast.  If there's anything I learned from Souad Kawerk, it's that buffets necessitate full horizontal as well as vertical use of your plate's area.  So naturally, I took three maxed-out plate's worth of advantage of the free breakfast layout of fresh bread, cheese, butter, jam, yogurt, hard-boiled eggs, cereal, milk, juice, hot chocolate, tea, and coffee (except I didn't have any coffee because I don't like it).  Most notably, I did end up eating an incredibly dangerous amount of hard-boiled eggs in the three days I was there.  We'll see how that pans out.