Just some of the traditional costumes.

JULY 2, 2010 FRIDAY

This morning was preparation day for the baptism tomorrow. There’ll probably be a lot of people there for it and after Mary is baptized, there’ll be a buffet of food that members will bring. No matter how much is brought, there’s always a need for more. Members, investigators, missionaries and friends seem to linger for a long time after these occasions and eventually everything gets eaten. So this morning we made banana bread, almond cookies and carmel popcorn. Every time we visit Paul he gives us several bags of popcorn until it was coming out our ears. We hit upon the idea of carmelizing it and taking it to the baptism. As far as we know the Swiss haven’t had it before so it’ll be something new for them and, at the same time, get it out of our house. To make the banana bread we needed bananas so my morning walk was to Migos and back, but while there, I also bought some tomatoes and nectarines (half price at $1.50 a pound).

Just as we were finishing the popcorn Charlotte called and said she was just arriving at the Schaffhausen Bahnhof and wondered where we were. We told her we were still home and to come meet us here. We invited her to come today to take part in the yodeling/alphorn playing and flag twirling festival that started today at 3:00. She was a little early, but when she got here, we visited while we finished candying the popcorn.

About 2:00 we went in to town and found the Munster Church where Daniela Martin was going to perform tonight. There were a lot of booths set up selling all kinds of traditional Swiss costumes, souvenirs and food. Some dress costumes cost over $2000; men’s vests were over $400 and shirts $80 on up. I saw a wool hat for $48 and I wished ZI would have bought it. Maybe tomorrow, if it’s still there.

When we got to the Munster we realized we probably needed tickets to get in, but we decided we’d wait until Daniela got here later in the evening. She was going to perform at 7:30. While waiting for her, we took the bus and went up to the Munot where the people were going to play the Alphorns. We got there a little early, but we found a good spot and waited for the event to start. It was exciting to hear the alphorns and the music was hauntingly beautiful. There were solo performers as well as duets, trios, quartets and so on. There was a young school group that was very good, but women and men played also. I took a lot of film clips, but they are probably too long to load onto our blog, but we’ll try.

About 6:00 we walked down the steep steps from the Munot to the city floor and then made our way back to the Munster. We found Daniela and then we went to the stand to buy our ticket to the event. The people manning the booth told us the only thing available was to purchase a badge that would have allowed us in to all the events for the three days. It cost $30 each. We decided that was a little expensive for one yodeling event even though Daniela was scheduled to sing in it. We went back to Daniela and she and Charlotte went back to the ticket booth and haggled with them for awhile and gave them the sob story that we were from America and we’d only be here the one night. They finally relented and sold us the ticket for half price. We paid the price, thanked them and then went in to await the performers. It was well worth the money and Daniela performed her song without accompaniment and did a great job.

They had a break at 8:30 and since Charlotte had to leave to go home anyway, we made our way out and back to the bahnhof. We saw her train didn’t leave for another forty minutes so we walked back to main street, saw a stand selling bratwursts, and bought one apiece. They were tasty and hot. We saw a group of three men set up to play the alphorns on the street with a female flag twirler. With so many people around and these performers doing there thing in the town square, it was a picture perfect Swiss celebration. A ot of people not connected to the performers were wearing their traditional costumes just to show off. Each county has their own particular style and so it was just an amazing scene.

Charlotte’s train came and so she left and we came home. Madeleine had left a message on our answer machine to call her, but it was too late tonight so we’ll see her tomorrow. We hoped Jasmin would have called, but we didn’t. We’ll check up on her tomorrow. So that ends our day and we’ll have a long one tomorrow.