Times like these in Zurich

During the weekly Tord Boyaux session, Stephanie, Rachel and I decided Tuesday night, March 21, to drive to Zurich the next day to see a Jack Johnson concert. We didn't have tickets and none of us had ever been to Zurich before, but those were minor barriers. Wednesday morning, we took a 9:30am train to Geneva to pick up Stephanie's car. We went to a ticket outlet and bought tickets for what we presumed was the concert, though most of the writing was in German (Zurich's located in the German-speaking region of Switzerland) so we weren't entirely sure about what we'd purchased. As we were walking away, Stephanie began deciphering it and discovered that we'd merely bought BUS tickets, for transportation from Lucerne to Zurich! We rushed back to the store and the sheepish clerk gave us back our money and, after making a call to the venue, revealed that the gig was sold-out. Undeterred, we agreed to head to Zurich anyway and try to scalp tickets. We stopped by Stephanie's grandmother's apartment to say hello, then headed to her chalet to pick up the car.

Rachel and I sat by quietly while Stephanie argued vociferously with her mother about the not-so apparent wisdom of our adventure. Asked our opinion on the matter, we both tried to gently nudge the excursion forward by diplomatically advocating a "let's just try it!" approach. We won out, but the matriarch wasn't happy. I was a little disconcerted when I saw the vehicle, an automobile whose age likely exceeds mine. I gritted my teeth and clutched the Oh-Sweet-Jesus-Handle when Stephanie revealed she'd only had limited highway driving experience. Nevertheless, we made it out of her driveway safely and I relaxed a little once we were cruising. Note the sad irony in this vehicle's name.


We had to hop off the highway for a bit and drove through some quaint Swiss towns, including this one where traffic lights haven't apparently yet arrived.


Because we drove at a leisurely pace (and because I had no desire to press Stephanie to drive faster), we got stuck in rush hour traffic outside Zurich and slowly inched into the city. Along the way, the girls gave a friendly wave to an amiable-looking semi-truck driver who then rolled down his window, handed us three pens emblazoned with his company's logo - HUMBAUR - and gave a cheerful toot on the horn. It was a nice welcome to Zurich and not the last act of friendliness we'd experience.

We had a 3"x3" map of Zurich but were able to discern half of the venue name - the "Hallen" portion of Hallenstadion - and guessed correctly that it was our destination. We arrived at 7pm (the concert was scheduled to start at 7:30), found a nearby parking lot (and decided to push our luck further by not paying) and then searched out scalpers. The situation was complicated because there were two types of tickets - seated and standing-only - and though we could find plenty of seated tickets, nobody had three consecutive seats and we couldn't find anyone selling standing tickets. We decided to pick up three separate tickets and just try to get into the standing area. We bounced from scalper to scalper trying to find a decent price and were becoming desperate as the clock neared 7:30. Finally, as we were nearing the entrance, two guys offered us three seated tickets for 150 Swiss francs, 45 francs less than face value! We jumped on the deal and rushed inside. Denied entrance to the standing area, we turned to Rachel and asked her to work her magic. Five minutes later, we were inside, making our way towards the stage. She had asked a random guy if he'd be willing to go inside and come back with three of his friends' tickets and give them to us so we could show them to the ticket checkers. He agreed and once inside, we thanked him and returned the tickets. Random kindness act #2.

Matt Costa opened for Jack - apparently ALO also toured with them, but they must've been taking the night off. Costa wasn't bad, but it was a little too countryish and the crowd definitely didn't fall in love with the music. I think the band sensed it because they only played a rather short set before bowing out.


Wild applause accompanied Jack's arrival onstage and I'm sure the very cool set contributed a bit to some of the excitement.


Near the height of my furriness.


Our spirits buoyed by the excellent concert, we exited Hallenstadion around 11pm only slightly concerned about our lack of sleeping arrangements. We'd decided earlier to sleep in the car if necessary and were steeling ourselves for that possibility when a girl in the parking lot walked over to us and jabbered something in German. We looked at her blankly and asked, "English?" She then explained that her car wouldn't start and asked if we had jumper cables. We checked the trunk and, of course, there weren't any, but I volunteered to walk with her to a nearby gas station to buy some. She bought them, I proceeded to gingerly hook them up (I swear, it's the most nerve-wracking experience ever) between our two cars and directed her to try to start the car - to no avail. As she packed up the cables, the girls offered her a ride to her house and she accepted. Along the way, Rachel tucked in a mention that we were looking for somewhere to sleep, and did she perhaps know of any hostels nearby? Anita, as we had by then exchanged names, asked if we'd like to sleep at her house and, exchanging eager glances and biting our tongues to avoid shouting YES too suddenly, we said that would be lovely, as long as it didn't inconvenience her. We arrived at a four-story building and she explained that her parents occupied two of the floors and her room was on the top floor, would that be OK? Anita discerned that we were hungry and led us to the kitchen. Her mom was awakened by our arrival and gave us all the ingredients for a pleasant midnight snack: bread and butter, ham, some amazing cheeses and iced tea.

Fully satisfied we made our upstairs but rather than make us sleep in our day-old clothes, Anita gave the girls some of her pajamas and found some of her dad's for me. They were an, uh, interesting design and I asked where they came from - Zimbabwe! Her father had been born and grew up there, but left after the government began nationalizing white farms. So that night I wore Zimbabwean pajamas while sleeping at a Swiss girl's house who we'd known for about an hour. Wow. We left around 10am after thanking her profusely and exchanging e-mails. We decided to explore the city for a few hours and began by playing with some of the very cool contemporary street art, absolutely rife in the city.


With me, of course, was my trusty Rough Guide and a brief consultation revealed that Zurich was home to Europe's largest clock face - it wasn't too difficult to find.


We continued to wander around; the girls wanted to shop but were shocked by the prices. A lunch-time plate of Chinese food from an average looking establishment was $15 USD; Stephanie said that most of the prices were double what they were in Geneva, but a search in a nearby Migros grocery store did turn up one discount discovery.


Back in Geneva, we dropped off the car at Stephanie's, then returned by train to Grenoble. We thought we were going to have a construction helmet to add to our collection of interesting artifacts, but the owner thwarted our plans just before boarding the train.