Geneva

Our travels today took us all around Geneva, via bus and trolley. We walked through a large garden and around town and got a glimpse of Mont Blanc. The unexpected highlight was a tour through the crypt at the cathedral. The area was under excavation when Mike was here in 1990. The crypt is now available for tours and was fascinating. It was interactive and showed the four churches that had occupied that site starting in 100AD with the burial of a chieftain whose bones are still there and partially visible. I’m not a big fan of touring churches and crypts even less so, but this was definitely worth it.


We finished the day with a tour of the original United Nations headquarters. It’s set on a hill overlooking the Lake. Peacocks wander the grounds as a living memorial to the man who donated the land to the City. He kept peacocks in his original garden. The tour was more interesting than I expected, particularly after the inefficiencies of the entry and ticket purchase process. I kept thinking – typical government processes and building. There were boxes and partitions stacked around giving the building a cluttered, lived in, don’t-know-what-to-do-with-all-this-stuff appearance. Once we got on the tour, however, it was stimulating and educational. (Why am I always reminded how limited my knowledge of world history is? Didn’t we learn this stuff in school in Texas?) The building, built in the 1930s, was home to the original League of Nations as envisioned by Woodrow Wilson. Ironically, the US was never a member because the US Senate wouldn’t ratify the treaty. Some things never change. We saw the original General Assembly room that is now in NYC. We also saw a beautifully painted room – donated by Spain in the 30s – with each wall depicting progress in some area such as human rights, medicine, work, etc. Interestingly, all of the figures were men – all of them (except for a few women crying for their husbands). Seems like we need a new wall on the progress of women. When I asked, the tour guide’s explanation was that the painting was done in the 30s. He went on to say that the building contains numerous references to Christianity which would obviously not be acceptable today, either.

Some random thoughts -

- Why do all these cities have super efficient bus service with real-time arrival information and the US doesn’t (and it’s provided free to hotel guests)
- How there can be a market for THIS many expensive watches (there are watch shops every few feet)
- Why there is every possible kind of food (Peruvian, Japanese, Thai, Chinese, Vietnamese, Ethiopian) EXCEPT Mexican (Honestly, we finally saw one Mexican restaurant in Geneva. It was fun to see enchiladas and tacos explained in French! )
- And mostly, I don’t understand fancy, high-heeled shoes on cobble stone streets.