Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas to all – and to myself too! I was dreading spending Christmas alone – so far none of the good people of Zuoz or St. Moritz has thought of inviting me, though they all know that I am on my own. Turns out I will have company: I found out that my friend Paul booked his flight back to Canada for December 26 because his family celebrates according to the Russian calendar. So he too would spend the 25^th moping around alone – and I invited him to come up to Zuoz – and he accepted the invitation despite the very limited time we will have together since I’ll be working until 7pm on the 24^th and he has to leave in the afternoon of the 25^th to catch his flight on the next morning. It doesn’t matter. The perspective of having a guest motivated me to decorate, and not having seen anybody except locals since the end of October, I am very much looking forward to seeing a friend.

I am in high spirits tonight, as I just had two days off in a row. Yesterday, while listening to the whole Messiah I spent 2 hours decorating my living room with ornaments found in the apartment and the greenery collected in the woods before the snow covered it all. The apartment looks quite festive now. I had planned to go cross-country skiing in the afternoon, but while I was eating lunch I heard a fire truck come up the road towards the village, followed by an ambulance a couple minutes later. Then another fire truck... I was starting to feel some anxiety - since spending September 11, 2001 in New York I have a very low tolerance level for multiple emergency vehicles. Eventually 9 fire trucks drove up the road and I knew that something major was happening. So, instead of going skiing, I walked up to the village. The barn of the house next to the one we used to stay in was on fire. The narrow roads made for difficult access and the fire trucks were positioned in the streets all around the barn - each trying to reach all the way to the fire. I couldn't see any flames - just smoke coming through the roof. A few firemen were on the precariously slanted roof, shoveling snow, and then cutting a hole into it. I watched (and photographed) the action until I was really cold and went home, looking forward to warm up with a hot cup of tea.

I got home ok but never got the tea, for as soon as I got home the power went out - and stayed out for a good 3 hours, or until past 6pm. Since it was -25 C last night, the apartment started to cool down quite quickly, and at 5pm it also started to be really dark. In Portland I am well equipped for our frequent power failures. Here they never happen, and I was unprepared - except for the many candles I had displayed all over the house with my Christmas decorations! Dinner was a salad with a glass of milk - it was an early dinner because I anticipated a long, cold and boring evening and therefore an opportunity to catch up on my sleep. Thank God the power returned just as I was getting really desperate for a cup of coffee. The cause of the failure: a private jet crashed on a transformer station near the airport, resulting in a black-out in the whole valley. Not even the train was circulating and I felt really lucky to be safely at home rather than in transit in the cold.

Thankfully today was eventless. It was less cold than last week, with a perfectly blue sky and the low sun giving all the warmth it could, and I went downhill skiing, right here in Zuoz. I found out that the chairlift was closed only when I got there, so I spent my time on the bunny slope, having a blast in the fresh air and the sun.

I went out one more time in the late afternoon, to an Advent Window: during all of December, every night a family hosts a gathering open to all, to mingle and celebrate. Unfortunately these open houses take place between 5-7pm and therefore I cannot attend when I work. Today's was hosted by the public library. I had never gone up to the center of the village with all the holiday lights and the tree lit up. The open house itself was a flop - I was the only one there and the librarian was busy being a librarian, so I didn't stay. Still it was worth the trip, since I then walked home with the almost full moon painting the snowy landscape in silver.

St. Moritz holiday lights and Palace Hotel tree.

My decorations. On the right, the figurines of my father's nativity. The structure that's supposed to house the figurines, a barn built my Dad himself when he was young, is in Portland!

Fire in Zuoz.

Zuoz Christmas lights.