Sexism at the airport

On mashable today I stumbled across this article. It outlines a new idea put forward by Heathrow Airport that passengers in the terminals will be 'trackable' as "passengers who are running late for flights can cause delays." 

The idea is as follows: "To address this problem, Heathrow Airport has pioneered a new technology through its boarding card system that is designed to track the locations of passengers in the airport as well as direct the passengers where to go or what to do to catch their flight on time. With the new system, which the airport is calling "positive boarding," passengers simply present their boarding cards at an automated gate where the boarding card barcodes are scanned. The gate's computer cross-references information from the barcode with flight details and, once verified, the passengers may enter the departure area. Information about their flights also pop up on a screen, so passengers will know if they are in the right terminal or if they have to go somewhere else."

I didn't really have any strong feelings on the matter, positive or negative. When I carried on reading however, what did jump out at me was the following:

"If a passenger arrives at the gate less than 30 minutes before the plane is set to depart, she will not receive access to the terminal and will need to visit the check-in counter for more information."

Sorry what? she will not receive access to the terminal? Is the suggestion here that the women cause the delays due to their excessive duty free shopping? I'm hoping that a simple / was missed out here (which would make it a far more acceptable s/he).

Stone Hipsters

Apologies. I have been a busy bee, buzzing between the hive, the flower and the honey... (Or home, work and the occasional post-work-drinks..) Therefore my writing has shamefully been neglected. Nonetheless, I still find the occasional moment to marvel at the wonders of the world via the genius of the dangerous depths of the internet. In all of those nooks and crannies there are some real treasures. For instance this:

Basically, photographer Léo Caillard and art director Alexis Persani had a moment of creative hilarity. A genius idea that was pretty simple to translate: Leo photographed the classic sculptures at the Louvre in Paris and then his friends posed in a similar way. Alexis then took over to do the retouching and place the clothes on the sculptures. Ta-dah, the Street Stone series were created!

"The creative duo once again prove that nothing is truly set in stone!"

Information here and here. 

Tschüssli!

Switzerland, it’s been a pleasure. I’ve survived. 7 months I’ve lived here now and considered myself very much an objective observer of the culture of cheese, cheese fondue and chocolate.

Things I won’t miss about Switzerland…

Fashion: what fashion?

The Prices (especially food): A single zucchini costs 4CHF. Enough said. Or 12.- CHF (about £9) for the equivalent of a tesco value chicken. I’d rather pay less for Findus lasagne and know I was getting horsemeat…

Shop opening times: Sundays are dead to the world. The Swiss officially go into hibernation. You have no food? Not even biscuits? Tough. Sunday is a day of rest. The same goes for aaaaall Bank Holidays / New Years Eve/ New Years Day / random ‘national feast days’ – you get the idea. For instance Zurich; one of the significant business cities on the globe. But Wednesday 1^st August 2012 (National Swiss Day) it is Dead. To. The. World.

Smileys: I’m somewhat of a grammatical snob. I very much associate smileys in texts with my 14-year-old self texting.. (‘wot u up 2?’ Cringe.) BUT I was emailing the Head of HR at a very prestigious publishing house in Zurich, negotiating a formal job interview… Imagine my absolute perplexity when an email contained “no problem :)” Smilies are absolutely 100% acceptable in Switzerland.

Things that I think are rather nice:

Actual ‘lunches’ at lunchtime: You’d be in the definite minority if you stay at your desk devouring your delights during lunch rather than head out to a restaurant. Lunchtime for the Swiss is a big deal. I must say I rather like the idea of actually sitting down for a meal with the colleagues rather than dropping bits of sandwich on my laptop.

Language aspect: Ah yes the Brits abroad… There still seems to be the assumption that everyone else should speak English. But in Switzerland I feel a fool being only able to speak 2 languages!

Noteworthy but bizarre Swiss Observations

Crossing the road: A big deal for me as I am a self professed ‘car hurler’ – over the years, when crossing the road, I have amassed the great skill of assessing the distance between a passing car and myself so that I can begin crossing when it hasn’t entirely passed. Swiss drivers simply do not comprehend this. They will perform a full emergency stop and let you cross. But wag their fingers at you… Thank you kindly but it’s fine! I’ve judged the space and speed between you and the car heading in the opposite direction and I’m more than happy to cross after you’ve passed me!

Shopping: There I am at the till, ready to collect my plastic bags that I will obviously then recycle as bin liners. But everyone else is whacking out their own ‘eco friendly’ tote bags! Of course this is also an option in the UK, but here I’m not offered a single plastic bag! So what happens if I need to do my food-shopping straight from work? Do I have to take my shopping bags to work?

The Golden Oldies

There are about 3 days left until the end of January 2013 and I have only just realised, that I haven’t actually made any New Years resolutions. Now I don’t normally make any serious resolutions such as learn fluent French / read a novel a week / go to the gym 5x a week. It’s usually more along the lines of ‘try and be a nice person’… However this year I don’t even seem to have got round to thinking about that! So I instead I decided that I’ll think of something I’d genuinely quite like to do at some point. Perhaps not this year, perhaps not even next year, but something that I want to do and hopefully will do!

I have no idea whatsoever why this is the idea that sprung to mind… Why not plan a holiday with my paternal grandparents?

Before you quote me as mad, hear me out. My grandparents (i.e. my dear daddy’s parents) are divorced. Both are remarried. As the word ‘grandparent’ insinuates, both are retired. Therefore they have a lot of time on their hands. Both are for me an embodiment of cultural citizens; something to aspire to. She attends book clubs, sings in a choir, regularly plays in concerts on grand pianos, is a regular at art galleries and even took up the violin. He is an avid reader, foodie and lecturer. Not of the university variety, but of the kinsfolk kind – the slightest reference to politics and we’re off… Nonetheless it is without a shadow of a doubt that I feel that both of them see travelling as their ultimate hobby.  

Of course they’ve both done the obligatory retirement cruise round the Med, but what impresses me a whole lot more are their respective destinations within the last 5 years: Europe, North America, South America, Thailand, Japan, the Antarctic, Australia…  However both have a distinctly different travelling appetite.

Granny dear is a wild one. She’ll go and befriend the outback Koalas and chase some penguins around the South Pole. I reckon she can show me some riveting places and spaces. The Grandfather on the other hand travels differently. The hotels are exquisite and the service benign. Russian heiresses descend to brunch in their Louboutins and the food is divine!

Granny and Gramps don’t go to the ‘in’ places, but simply where they absolutely want to and more importantly how they want to, each loyal to their style. Both of which I want to experience… and who better to show me the world than my cultured grandparents?!

(Obviously I’m also hoping they’ll cover my costs, but whatevs…)

Congrats Ma'am

On a whim, last weekend I ended up in London for the Queen's Diamond Jubilee celebrations. In true British style, the weather was a shocker, but it was super fun and it was so great to see so many turn out to see the Pageant even in the horrific weather. The atmosphere on London was incredible with bunting and street parties everywhere and alcohol and picnics aplenty!

But most impressive of all was that the Queen and Prince Phillip stood and waved on their barge for about 5 hours. FIVE hours!! Now that is dedication. I was whinging and moaning for a Starbucks about 10 minutes after reaching our spot on the bridge..
I think that the weekend really showed the importance of the British Royals as they're a wonderful figurehead to have and truly sum up the British spirit. The fact that so many, young and old alike, turned out to see them despite the grim weather only reinforced this.
So thanks Ma'am for a wonderful four day weekend well spent and congratulations on your 60 years!

To Kindle or not to Kindle, that is the question...

The Kindle was rumoured to have been Amazon’s Christmas 2012 bestseller, which is not surprising, considering that this year in the U.S. more ebooks were sold than ‘actual’ books. With the risk of sounding like an archaic, nostalgic and pretentious literature student, I’m going to put it out there that I like physical books where I turn the pages. After discovering the ‘Bücherbrockenstube’ (second-hand bookshop to all you non Swiss-German speakers) in Berne this summer, selling thumbed through paperbacks for 1 CHF, this love only grew. I think it’s SO artsy and edgy to buy someone’s cast off version of that book from the top of my reading list. Maybe they’ve dog-eared the best pages, hell maybe there’s even a “à mon amour” postcard inside, which yes, is still my bookmark. On top of that, there’s the fact that I’m reading a humanities university subject, so naturally, reading and books are both business and pleasure to me.

On another note, as a self-labelled jet setter due to my various international homes (!!), I would like to say I’ve cracked the art of efficient packing. I no longer pay £98.87 to British Airways for excess baggage (yes, I’m bitter and the sum is forever more etched onto my brain) and still manage to bring back ALL the academic books I’ll need over the holiday PLUS that blasé novel in the hand luggage for plane entertainment. I’ll casually brush over the fact that in the clothes department,  I have in fact only packed knickers. Maybe my favourite jumper is bunched up in my washbag… The point is I travel with a LOT of physical books, academic or not.

Funnily enough, it’s on these trips that I most encounter people reading, be it the Financial Times, Grazia, an academic textbook or their favourite novel, and they all seem to be doing it on a Kindle or an iPad. And hey…they have absolutely teeny suitcases with so much baggage allowance weight wasted I could cry.

So I’m going to be functional and embrace a Kindle for the sake of practicality and academia. But I’m not going to lie and say that the prospect of buying a pretty, leather book-style case for it doesn’t excite me…! Obviously I’ll also keep visiting the Bücherbrockenstube, but those books will be read in one country only.