Even More Visa Issues

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December 31st, 2009

[After a nice, long vacation in Thailand, I am back in the USA. I've been putting off writing this blog post both because I was upset when it first happened and because I just wanted to relax on the beach for awhile before dealing with it again. But now the time has come to revisit this issue and catch up on lots of blog posts.]

Unfortunately, the great Swiss visa saga of 2009 continues.  When I was leaving Switzerland on December 5th to go to Thailand, I was stopped at passport control.  I was prepared for this inevitable event with a detailed spreadsheet of all of my travels for the year to show that I have stayed within the legal limits of my tourist visa by only staying in Switzerland for 90 days out of 180.  Unfortunately, although I had been careful to follow the rules, I had been given bad advice by a Swiss lawyer so my accounting was inaccurate.  The actual rule is that I can stay 90 days out of 180 in ALL SCHENGEN AGREEMENT COUNTRIES, not just in Switzerland.  So even though I was in CH for less than 90 days, I had been in Schengen countries for 101 days, meaning I had overstayed my tourist visa by 11 days.  Doh!

So back to the passport control at the airport.  They noticed that I had overstayed my visa and sent me into a back office with another police officer.  They locked me in a large room with one older woman who was bawling and apologizing profusely for overstaying her visa by over 90 days.  I had to explain my situation to the (very nice) officer and fill out a form.  Then I had to pay a fine of about 250 CHF, but luckily since I was about to miss my flight, the officer accepted the 60 CHF that I had in my wallet as full payment.  Then I had to sign another form that basically said I acknowledge that Switzerland/Schengen area may deny me entry in the future because of this incident.  However, the officer said that since I had only a minor violation that this would probably not be an issue for me.  So let’s all keep our fingers crossed that I am not permanently banned from Europe…

Thanksgiving in Zürich

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December 7th, 2009

Emily and I had a bunch of our friends over on the Sunday after Thanksgiving for a traditional American feast.  The menu:  turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, cranberry sauce, green beans, and pumpkin muffins – plus Rich and Julia made a homemade lemon meringue pie for dessert.

It was a bit difficult to find all of the necessary ingredients in the Swiss grocery stores, but we managed to find just about everything.  We bought the only turkey they had at the Coop near our apartment.  It weighed a little over 8 kg, or about 18 pounds.  And turkeys are quite expensive in Switzerland too;  the price was CHF 120 but luckily happened to be 50% off.  The other big challenge was that the ovens are very small in Switzerland.  The turkey fit but it filled up the entire oven (it was on the lowest rack and the foil covering it touched the top).  So we had to cook the muffins the day before, the stuffing after we took out the turkey, and everything else on the stove.

All of the food came out perfectly, if I may say so myself.  Literally everything.  The turkey was nice and juicy, Emily’s famous stuffing was delicious, the buttermilk mashed potatoes were a big hit, and even the gravy was great (even though Emily had never made it before).

The group ended up being 10 people including us.  Everyone seemed to enjoy the food, but I think the biggest hit of the night was the turkey baster.  Apparently turkey basters are exotic and fascinating in Europe, who knew?  After dinner, everyone hung around our apartment and played Taboo.  We all had a great time, and it was fun for Emily and I to be able to share this American holiday with some of our European friends.