Apr. 29 – Of electrical fences and perverted old men

Nadim took out Jordan, Cora, and I today. We went to Rorschach and Heiden, from where you could see rolling hillsides and mountains on one side, and almost all of Lake Constance on the other side. At one point, we were walking along the hilltop, on a one-lane road, when a large tractor needed to get by. There wasn’t much room between the road and a fence, so I leaned on the fence, which turned out to be electric! At first, it didn’t feel like it had been very strong, but my leg was stinging for a while after that. Jordan got shocked too! There was a Swiss family walking towards us who successfully managed to avoid the electric fence, because they knew that it was electric!!! There were no signs or anything. The Swiss family (mother and 3 young girls) were laughing at us stupid tourists, and I’d probably laugh at me too.

We eventually went for dinner at a Thai restaurant. I was so incredulously happy to have ethnic food that it was ok to pay 40 CHF for it. Don’t ask. I think it’s hard to understand unless you’re in Switzerland. There was an old man walking around the restaurant and talking to the patrons – we assumed he was the owner. We asked him to take a picture for us, which he managed to do after turning the camera the right side around. Then, with camera still in hand, he stepped over to me, pointed it towards my face and then to MY BOOBS, and then laughed and handed back the camera to Nadim!!! He did this all slowly and deliberately. I somehow kept my cool – I think it was because I wasn’t in North America and because I was speechless. Inside, all I could think was “What the fuck?!” I wanted to slap him, yell at him, and throw a drink in his face, in that order. Ugh!!! Perverted old man!!!

Anyways, after that, we went back to the hilltop at Heiden. The stars were out, we could see all the city/town lights around Lake Constance, and it was the perfect setting for a series of philosophical conversations, which is exactly what we did to end the night.