A New Kind of Adventure

And so begins the history of this part of my life. I make no promieses of grandeur or profound musings, simply a record for my own future curiosity and reminiscence.

Since I am already a week behind in my journaling, I will backtrack and begin from, well, the beginning.

Sarah and I begin our journey in Portland, with friends and family to see us off. Our trip being uneventful for the most part, we arrive in Geneva Switzerland missing only a lot of sleep and a treasured pillow somehow misplaced. We were quite dissapointed the plane we were in lacked the personal screens, which we both had come to enjoy on long, international flights.

Upon arrival in Geneva, we were greeted with a representative from the school, (actually a theology student, we later learned) who refused to speak to us in English, if he knew any at all. We drove the short 15 minutes to the school and met the head of the dorm, also who truly spoke no English whatsoever. She showed us to our room in the dorm (La Clairiere), hauling our overweight luggage up 3 flights- with some help from some nice boys, and quickly became excited about the view. Out one window, we can see the town of Geneva, a bit of Lake Geneva, and some foothills. Out another we can see the campus, and the third we can see Mount Saleve. Our lovely corner room contained 3 windows, 2 beds, a long desk, 2 lamps, a sink, and several closets, one bookcase (above Sarah's bed) and one side of the room (mine) had a bulletin board instead of wall, which was nice for posting pictures. It lacked- hooks for hanging towels and such, a rug in front of the sink (making for a cold floor in the morning), screens on the windows (story to follow...), more than 3 electrical plugs, and space to spare. No matter, we were excited. We began to settle in, met our hall director, and decided to head into town for the first time.

The town is called Collonge, officially Collonge Sous Saleve, or Collonge below Saleve (the giant moutain behind the campus). It is a most pleasant walk, about 10 minutes (all downhill), through windy streets and tree-lined lanes. Cute houses with well-groomed yards, green fields, and a little stream all mark the way to the tiny town of 2,000. From what we can tell, it really consists of little more than a bank, a couple of pastry shops, a small general store, a few other miscalaneous shops, and little else, all of which close for an extending period during the lunch hour and don't reopen until 2:00 or 2:30 ish. (Think Mexican siesta...)Well, since this is my first posting and I don't want to bore any potential readers, or myself, I think I will close with this, though I haven't even finished describing the first day, though I doubt the postings will always be this long. Descriptions of first impressions are always lengthy.