wengen

in my final semester of lawsch, i took a "take home" final exam to danang, vietnam to complete at a friend's birthday party. definitely one of my (few) proud moments, although the prof for that module was unimpressed by my lack of self-control. note to self: don't post gloaty holiday photos when you're in the middle of a 72h take home, at least not without restricting the audience first. but if i hadn't gone to danang, i'd never have met S who has become a dear friend over the years. visited her at her home near luzern a couple of christmases ago, she's come for tea at mine in london while looking at universities for her daughter and more recently, has been very generously extending an open invitation to her home in the mountains. 

jumped at the chance to escape the big smoke yet again and didn't need to have my rubber arm twisted. her cabin is in wengen, car-free and accessible only by cogwheel train (!!!). bonus - i love trains and even more so when i'm not on godawful virgineastcoast up and down the country. as luck would have it, found a weekend other friends (puerto rican lawyers based in NYC and their college-aged sons) from the same danang party (all connected through E&P our danang bday hosts) were going to be visiting and made a pre-party of it. was resigned to massive FOMO because they were pre-gaming prior to E's 60th birthday extravaganza in berlin which i very sadly couldn't attend because, well, work. but hey, a bonus weekend in the alps? sign me up.

the alpine cabin was what it said on the tin and when i told another friend of my weekend plans, he got very excited and thought it would be all bond baddie alpine lair stylez a la blofeld's lair from on her majesty's secret service with hot chickies in lycra. uh, think again. gimme S' swiss hospitality anytime :)

spent two glorious days walking in the mountains. S and her husband knew the paths like the back of their hands, walking in summer, skiing in winter and it was like living in a technicolour ricola advertisement, if you get what i mean. was feeling incredibly smug about my pseudo-mountaineering ability at 18 weeks gestation until i suspected they'd probably picked the easiest walks for us to do.

M would wake early and procure us fresh yoghurt, bread and cheese from the lone grocer. breakfast was a simple yet hearty affair and i could eat it forever and ever. the milk! the glorious fat in it! the butter! all the dairy products my lactose-intolerant constitution could stomach!

S even had the brainwave of doing a hot chocolate blind tasting! so we'd plenty of energy to use against gravity on the mountains.

alas i might've underestimated the summer sunshine and ended up lobster red. silly :( also missed my flight from zurich to london because of sunday traffic. but hey who's really complaining about an extra night in switzerland? had redeemed BA miles for the flight anyhow so took the first flight out monday morning and made it to the ward in time to prep for ward round. never mind it was walk of shame-ish cos i had to be gross and wear the same clothes i'd left the ward in on friday cos i'd gone straight to heathrow after work.  #winning