Zurich - Theaterspektakel

Theaterspektakel - Taking Cover at the Back!

As I was scratching my head, wondering what to write about next, I realised that I hadn’t yet said anything about Theaterspektakel. This is a theatre festival of sorts – it’s located by the lake and a stage is set up for paid performances. In addition to this, the area is laid out with various stalls selling food and drink.

You can wander round and watch various performances for free – usually magicians or other types of street performers.

I’ve been there many times with Lena but we have a bit of a history of managing to wait for each other at different entrances and thus spending quite a lot of time hanging about beforehand. It’s not helped by the fact that I’m not a mobile phone type of person and often forget to bring it with me / charge it in advance / have it switched on / bring a note of my SIM password. There’s such a lot to remember, I really don’t know how people cope.

Anyway, this time we settled for an unambiguous meeting point at Buerkliplatz, so that we could arrive in style by the boat that’s laid on by the event (you have to pay a nominal fee unless you are Lena and have a special card).

It’s one of the many summer events in Zurich that rely on good weather. I envied the swimmers a bit as we arrived, but the evening was a good temperature and we strolled about looking at the various acts and deciding where to eat. I usually have a Mistkraetzeli (a small chicken described in wonderful Swiss terminology as “shit scratcher” as Lena likes to point out), but this time I was in the mood for a lamb curry. It’s the usual process of paying a deposit on your glass which you get back when you return your drinking vessel.

It seemed to me that there were slightly more acts than usual this year – one guy doing balloon animals, another performer slicing a sheet of newspaper with a whip into ever tinier sections while a petrified volunteer held it steady, another magician cutting a girl into two.

We sat down for a drink, but the only place was beside two smokers. It’s so ironic that the Swiss, who are such keen skiers, swimmers, cyclists, and mountaineers, are also avid smokers. I guess they have to have at least one vice to show that they are, after all, human.

The wind started to pick up out of nowhere. People started to move themselves to places where there was cover. Lena and I sat there, believing it would just blow over. A few big drops splatted onto our table, but we clung to our belief that it would be only a shower. Eventually, as we got wetter and wetter, it became clear that it wasn’t going to be just a short flurry and so we, too, took cover, only there wasn’t much space left at this point.

We ended up in the actors’ entrance just behind one of the free acts on the main stage. The act was a slapstick acrobatic magic show type thing and really it was as interesting to see the childrens’ faces as anything else (I’m not entirely sure the performers realised that so many children were going to be present as some of the humour was a little adult). I don’t think I’d seen so many children in previous years, but Lena said it was earlier this year and so the children were still on holiday. We were probably a bit of a nuisance to the actors who kept on pushing past us to get to their lockers, but they were very polite all the same.

By the time we went home, though, the rain had stopped, so it wasn’t such a big deal!

Zurich - Zurich Eats!

Stall at the Street Food Festival

Swimming and food seem to be the sole two topics of my blogs! No prizes for guessing the topic of this particular entry.

I had Geraldine over to visit for a weekend in September, so I investigated what would be on while she was across. It turned out to be the month of Zurich Eats, so we pretty much joined in.

There was a Street Food Festival along the lake. For some reason, I’d kind of forgotten to factor in that it would be very busy if we went at 6pm, but I guess at least we saw it at its peak.

There were loads of stalls selling hot snacks from all over the world – I can’t quite remember what they all were now, but I think there was Nepalese, Tibetan, Korean; if not those, then it felt as if almost everywhere was represented including many countries that you don’t usually see (however, the UK was not represented!).

The choice was a bit baffling and we ended up sitting by the lake with a glass of wine while we tried (and failed) to make up our minds as to what we would eat. The boat just in front of us was the one I’d hired for my 50th birthday! In the end, we just started walking round again and stopped at the first one that took our fancy (it all looked good, but nothing was a “must have”).

There were loads of people, so it was a slow process walking along to see what there was and then also a bit complicated to locate where a queue began and ended and which people were just onlookers. But I’m not complaining! People were not pushy and for such a large attendance, it was pretty civilised. It was fascinating to see all the different types of food.

The prices were not expensive (by Zurich standards), which indicated to us that the idea was probably to buy things from one or two stalls rather than get a full meal from one. However, we ended up just buying something from one of the stalls and it ended up being more filling than it looked. I think it might have been Taiwanese dumplings. The rain was probably also a factor in us cutting down our food intake.

Another part of Zurich Eats was a tomato festival (yes, a tomato festival!). We went to that on the following day after stuffing ourselves at the Hiltl where we had had brunch.

Several people had told me that the Hiltl brunch was very good and indeed it was. For a fixed price of 57 CHF, we got a prosecco, two hot drinks, plus the full buffet including breads, cereals, fresh juices, fried and scrambled eggs, as well as the usual lunch / dinner buffet that they always have, which has an overwhelming choice. I can’t even begin – there are things like onion rings and pakoras, then there’s an Indian curries section, a Thai curries section, then just general salads, then other vegetarian dishes (Roesti, mushroom sauce, spaghetti, other pasta dishes), and then a whole section of desserts.

Anyway, after brunch, we walked up to the Tomato Festival by Buerkliplatz near the lake. Unfortunately, we were both too stuffed to be able to eat anything else, although tomatoes aren’t my favourite food, so I wasn’t really so tempted anyway.

We wandered into a prize giving ceremony, but we weren’t sure what it was for and only later discovered that it was for the photography competition. The photographs were all printed on the outside of the tent and ranged from professionally-taken arty photographs, to colourful displays of tomatoes, to photographs of tomatoes in funny shapes, and just generally comedic photos with tomatoes. I wasn’t sure what the judges were looking for based on this large range of topics or if there were different categories for people to enter. It was a fun display, though.

There were also many stalls set up from people selling different breeds (?) of tomatoes and it was, as far as I could tell, a celebration of rare tomatoes. Each stall had tiny bits of tomatoes set out for you to try, so you could wander round and taste each of them in turn. The colours ranged from almost white to almost black and some were multi-coloured. One was called a pineapple tomato and I was a bit curious about that but never got to taste it.

In addition to tomatoes, there were also other stalls of handcrafted items and home-baked or home-grown food, as well as various types of grappa. Grappa / schnapps seems much more common in Switzerland and Germany than in the UK.

Anyway, it made for an interesting afternoon. Next weekend, the food festival continues in my work building on Saturday, so I think it’s following me around and not me it. I will obviously starve once October comes.

Zurich - Eating Out

Desserts at the Kameha Sunday Brunch

I’ve been trying to decide if there are differences between eating out in Egypt and eating out in Zurich (apart from the obvious – prices and location!).

I’ve revisited some old, familiar places since I’ve been back (Seerose, LakeSide, Bauschaenzli, Tao’s) and tried out some new places (Kameha, Razzia).

I started off thinking that really you can eat out just as well in Egypt as you can in Zurich, but I’m now wondering if that’s true and, actually, whether it’s even fair to compare. The two countries are complete opposites – Switzerland is almost sickeningly wealthy and Egypt is so poor that even the electricity isn’t stable. Switzerland can afford better things and in addition the quality items are closer and cheaper to import. It has a larger, wealthier population to serve; in Egypt, particularly now, the “wealthy” residents and tourists (whether Egyptian/Arabic/Western) are relatively scarce, and there’s no incentive to invest in fancy restaurants. Interestingly, Egyptians and Arabs holidaying in Egypt now spend more money than the Europeans, so the recession in Europe has its consequences for Egypt as well.

Although I enjoy eating out, it’s not a “must do” on my agenda in life. However, when I was in Egypt, I used to go out maybe once a week with Nicole, trying out various establishments. The quality was higher than I was expecting, although, of course, the better the food, generally the higher the price. B’s at the marina, for instance, has high quality offerings and a great location, but you are paying near European prices (whatever that means; but lower than Swiss prices!). Thai Garden in Mamsha is also nicely designed with good food. Again, it’s not so cheap, but that’s speaking as someone who is thinking of Egyptian prices and having no income rather than as someone earning and thinking in Swiss francs!

My budget is limited in Egypt as well, so I rarely go to the very top-end establishments, whereas in Switzerland I’m earning and can afford to spend the money. This also skews the comparison. For instance, the Indian restaurant at the Oberoi in Sahl Hasheesh is supposed to be stunning, but I’ve also heard its cost is near prohibitive (for those living in Egypt), so I’ve yet to try it out.

But the selection and quality of good restaurants in Zurich is superb. I’ve already had some wonderful meals sitting by the lake (Seerose, LakeSide), some restaurants have interesting features (Razzia is an old cinema and is beautiful). You pay a price, of course, but there’s such a huge selection of places to go, many of which I have yet to visit, that it’s overwhelming. In Hurghada, we sometimes struggled to find somewhere we hadn’t tried that looked decent (by European standards). Often, the best places are in hotels, which makes eating out feel a bit clinical, too.

In Egypt, places are often not consistently good – so you can go one time and think you’ve found a hidden gem, you return, and you feel rather disappointed. In Switzerland, there’s more consistency. Usually, if a place is good, it will be good all other times that you go as well. You may feel you are paying a fortune, but in return you will often be sitting somewhere that’s amazingly well (or interestingly) designed. In the Kronenhalle, you can even go for a drink surrounded by original works from Giacometti, Picasso, and Chagall. Angkor has little channels with fish swimming round you as you eat. This summer, the Hiltl, the world’s oldest vegetarian restaurant, has decorated its exterior with fake grass. And, of course, you get a great selections of wines in many restaurants, which is lacking in Egypt.

A very German/Swiss tradition is the Sunday Brunch. It took me many years to warm to this idea – I couldn’t really see the point at first (why eat all that at this time of day? Breakfast isn’t so expensive and I like my morning cereal). However, I’m now a convert. It’s a wonderful way to spend a Sunday. Brunches generally run from around 11am until 2pm and most times it is an all-inclusive buffet with breakfast items, main course lunch items, and desserts. I went to the brunch at the Kameha the other week.

The location isn’t so great (although Lena tells me that it says otherwise on the Kameha website!), but for 69 CHF the brunch was excellent value and the food of good quality. There were all the traditional breakfast items, plus honey from a honeycomb, antipasti, a dim sum table, eggs cooked to order, a choice of mains cooked fresh to order and brought to your table (the day we went, it was veal or a vegetarian pasta dish), tea, coffee and water to your heart’s content (and a prosecco before you began). The desserts were home made as was the delicious ice cream. There was no mistaking the flavours in the desserts – the coffee mousse was stronger than my cappuccino!

If you want to experience the high life, the Dolder brunch is also good, but more expensive (and, scandalously, doesn’t include water). However, you can buy a champagne add-on option, and drink as much champagne as you like. That’s what I call getting your priorities right!

So, all in all, I’ve got to admit that it is nice to be back and to have this huge range of places to go to and enjoy. This is, however, largely helped by the fact that I’m earning a salary (for which I am also grateful!).

Zurich - Open Air Cinema (Salt Cinema)

Salt Cinema with Live Orchestra - photo (c) Hye-Youn Lee

Let me clarify something when I say that I love the open-air cinema. You have to bear in mind that it’s Switzerland and, although the weather here is, surprisingly, much better than it is in the UK, it’s still Switzerland and not Egypt. Consequently, there is always a risk of rain.

In previous years I have sat watching a film in the pouring rain thinking I will just sit it out, then the water trickles down the back of my neck (because I haven’t put my waterproof – that they supply – on properly) and gradually more and more people leave as everyone sits there getting wetter and wetter. This isn’t the scenario I’m talking about when I say it’s one of my very most favourite things! Although I guess the sense of anticipation of whether the weather will stay good does add something of a frisson to going to the event (I'm a risk taker at heart).

As I said in my FilmFluss blog, Salt Cinema is a grander occasion than FilmFluss. First of all, you usually need to book in advance to have a hope of getting a ticket (hence why you can end up sitting in the rain – for FilmFluss you can just turn up on the night if the forecast is good and usually be pretty sure of getting in). Unless you’ve managed to get a limited, special ticket, you have to turn up early, as soon as the doors open, and, after queuing, run to reserve yourself a good seat. The seats are on a purpose-built stepped wooden tribune overlooking the lake and they are on a first-come, first-served basis.

There’s a choice of places to eat where you get good food and you sit down at tables (even if the tables are usually packed!). Of course, there’s a bar as well, and you have to pay a deposit on your plates and glasses and return them to the collection stations. It’s all very well organised. They have signs for you to use to reserve your chairs once you’ve found a free one, and they provide the waterproof ponchos if it rains. There’s no undercover section, so the weather has to be good.

For me, the high point of the evening is when the screen goes up. If you’ve never been before, you don’t necessarily realise that the white thing hanging horizontally across the lake is the screen. I originally thought it was just a piece of the necessary equipment. The music starts, and then the solid white thing rises up – out of the water it seems – and becomes vertical on metal legs, and you realise that it’s transformed into a screen that’s framed by the backdrop of the lake. I find it magical. In the background you can see the boats chugging up and down the lake, the moon shining on the water, hear the water lapping...

This year, I think for the first time, the final film was accompanied by a live orchestra to play the film track. The film was Perfume – I’d read the book but not seen the film (indeed, it had completely passed me by that it had been made into a film; I read the book many years ago).

I had been wondering how they would organise this, since if it rained, it would presumably have to be called off (yet they’d sold all those tickets!). However, it turned out that they had constructed a special covered section for the orchestra, so the musicians were always going to be dry (and, more importantly, so were their instruments). The orchestra was seated just under the screen, so for this performance, I missed out on the magic of the screen rising up as it was obviously not technically feasible to do this once the orchestra was located where it was. Consequently, we arrived to the screen already in place.

As is typical, Perfume showed on one of the very few nights where rain was forecast; however, although a few drops of rain landed on our heads, it didn’t last long at all, and the evening turned out to be cool but not wet. Most of the audience wore their waterproof ponchos throughout just in case, but fortunately the waterproofs served only as an extra layer of warmth.

In addition to the orchestra, there was also a choir located to the left, also under cover (I almost wrote undercover! They weren’t undercover; indeed, they stood up each time they sang).

Since I hadn’t seen the film before, I didn’t have a comparison of with and without live orchestra, but although at times I forgot the orchestra because I was so engrossed in the film, at some points I was very aware of the music (actually, I may go and get the soundtrack, I thought the music was beautiful). They had cut the original soundtrack from the film, so the live orchestra provided the whole rendition.

Because the open-air cinemas always end late due to having to start fairly late as they need to wait for it to get dark, people usually rush off as soon as the credits come up. However, this time, because the orchestra was there and playing right until the end (indeed, it was probably their longest piece!), most people stayed. And, of course, there was hearty applause at the end, and very well-deserved too! I felt privileged to have been able to experience this and we were so lucky that the weather held, making it a brilliant experience.