Geneva Airport – the most confusing place in the world?

When it comes to travelling via an airport (and leaving queueing aside which can be a bit boring and frustrating) I don’t generally find it to be a particularly stressful experience – it’s usually quite clear where you are and where you need to be.  Not so at Geneva airport; French side, Swiss side, arrivals, departures – none of these things have signs or directions!

After Sam’s show with Les Arts Florissants in Versailles, we hired a car in Paris for a trip to the Alps, and arranged to drop the car back off a week later at Geneva airport (French side).  We used SatNav and directions from several péage workers and nevertheless ended up at the car return depot on the Swiss side of the airport.  This was rather inconvenient as I was cutting it rather close on my flight time and we weren’t insured to drive out of France – oops.  Still, there were no signs that we’d actually crossed a border so how were we to know?

With some incorrect directions from the Alamo staff (Swiss side) we eventually made it to Alamo on the French side, hurrah!  We were then directed into the arrivals hall of the airport where we were swiftly told to leave the airport again and enter through departures, not arrivals. Easier said than done when there are no signs anywhere to tell you where to go.  So, now running through the airport ‘backwards’ (from arrivals on the French side to departures on the Swiss side), I said a hasty goodbye to Sam (who went to catch his train to St Gallen for his next patch of work – Purcell’s Fairy Queen) and queue-jumped my way through two bag-drops and security to run to the gate, in time to board my flight back to London.

Signage in France (and apparently Switzerland) is generally lacking clarity according to my recent travels through the region.  Even the signs to different runs on the Alpe d’Huez pistes were pretty poor, and the lack of markers ensured Sam and I took on some rather tricky off-piste boarding completely by accident (along with some very confused and terrified-looking French skiers).

We did have an amazing week’s snowboarding in Alpe d’Huez: 250km of piste, including the longest black run in the world, sunny days and a fabulous chalet (Chalet Lingayoni) where the other guests were great fun and the staff were fantastic.  Nick is a trained chef and whipped us up a new culinary masterpiece every night, and Ellie took care of us so well we didn’t have to think about a single thing while we were away. We will definitely be returning for more fun on the slopes here!

All in all Sam and I enjoyed an amazing 10 day trip from Paris and Versailles to Alpe d’Huez and back to Geneva (French & Swiss sides) with the exception of the Geneva airport drama and an episode with snow chains that, while tricky at the time, was well worth the effort when just over a meter of snow fell the night before we had to drive out of the Alps!  We were gutted that we didn’t get to enjoy all that powder (there had been no fresh snow fall while we were there) but we did partake in an epic snowball fight with the other guests at our chalet and the staff, so we didn’t miss out on all the fun.  And my new board/bindings combo is AWESOME!!

A lesson in customer service

I had an interesting experience at TSA (The Snowboard Asylum – Ellis Brigham) a couple of weeks ago.  After spending several hours researching snowboards on the net, I made my choice and opted for the Bataleon Distortia 11/12, 149cm.  Having called the store to check the size and make sure my new Burton Stiletto bindings were compatible, I placed the board on reserve on a Sunday morning to be collected on the following Tuesday afternoon.

When I got to the store it turned out that there is a 24 hour limit on reserves (which I hadn’t been told) and my board had been sent to another store for another customer. I was gutted.  The store said they could order in another board for me but it would take up to a week and I was leaving for France the next day.  They suggested other (more expensive) Bataleon boards that they did have in stock. They even offered to loan me one of last season’s Bataleon boards free of charge for my trip and order my board for me for when I got back.  However, having made my decision on that board, I wasn’t about to change my mind.

I’ve always found the staff at TSA to be very knowledgable on everything from kit to resorts, and on that day they were also very helpful – after I’d been informed there was a board in the Milton Keynes store I asked them to have that one couriered to my home; the manager said he’d make some enquiries and see what he could come up with.  His solution to the problem was to put the board in Milton Keynes on hold for me, send one of his team up there on the train and have them bring it back then deliver it to me at school the following morning.

In terms of customer service, that’s pretty good!  Admittedly, it was the store’s error that my board was not kept for me, but I really admire a business that goes all out to honour it’s contract with you when they’ve had a mis-hap at their end.  TSA have made an even-more-loyal customer of me thanks to their problem-solving and getting my board to me as promised!

Lone travels in Dubai

This January was the first time I can remember being, for all intents and purposes, alone abroad and entertaining myself.  I used to think that it would be very easy to pass time on holiday by yourself; after all, sunbathing and swimming are hardly restricted to being group activities. However, having spent a short amount of time alone in Dubai, I quickly realised that this is not necessarily the case.  Sure, it’s easy to while away a few hours on the beach or by the pool reading a book (or, in my case, working on my accounts in order to submit my tax return in time), but what happens after that?  I found myself wandering around, enjoying the sights but wishing I had someone to share them with, and knowing all too well that there were some loved-ones who would definitely have jumped at a chance to be there with me!

One thing I found most disconcerting was being somewhere in the world where I have no understanding of the native language, and only occasional wifi access to help me out with my general queries.  I had been staying in a friend’s apartment while he was away, so there was no hotel concierge to offer advice.  And while taxis in Dubai are incredibly cheap they were also useless as no taxi driver seemed to know where anything was; consequently they spent a long time driving around before calling somebody to ask where they were going – so, I learned to be as specific as I could, which is quite hard in a place that you don’t know at all.  It was all very foreign – the Metro stations were like airports, nothing at all like the Tube in London, there was often no pavement by the side of the road – just sand, the restaurant staff were hit and miss with their English…  It’s a very unusual and somewhat fake place, the city in the desert, but in some ways one of the more fascinating places I’ve been to – such a mix of peoples and cultures and more highrise towers than you could care to imagine.  But as I sat alone, finishing my meal for one in a Lebanese restaurant by the marina and then trying to navigate back to the Metro station with my box of leftovers, I was still extremely grateful to be enjoying some time in a place far sunnier and warmer than dreary London in January.  I was wearing flip flops and a t-shirt and feeling rather smug about it!

New Year, New Start

Since I last wrote a blog entry I have quite literally taken my life apart and put it back together again.  Still, it’s a new year, “time for a new start” and all of those other impossibly optimistic New Year cliches.Anyway, the start of this year was not looking so good for me on the diary front.  The run up to Christmas and New Year was pretty busy, as it always is, but what with the credit crunch in full effect, this January has seen a decline in the function band work I have relied on in the past to get me through the lean months – no more corporate award ceremonies for “salesperson of the year” or Christmas parties in January (even though the venues are cheaper).

January was going to be a really tight month until I got a call offering me a gig – The Lifeline Gig – with a week’s notice.  It’s great when that happens.  One minute you’re looking at your budget for the rest of the month and wondering how you’re going to live on £1.52 for food and petrol (because it has snowed too much, so your teaching keeps getting canceled and therefore you don’t get paid), to breathing that huge sigh of relief when you get off the phone knowing that you are actually going to make it through to see February without having to beg (although I did have to buy cheap baked beans, and they were horrible).

In a way, the quieter months at the start of the year can be quite relaxing after the manic pre-Christmas workload, and it gives you time to sort out your accounts and file your tax return and generally get your life in order.  It’s also a great time to do some decent practice, rather than only having time to play during gigs.  And I’ve taken on the role of ‘Chief Ironer’ for my mum and sister as I have the time to do it and they have the cash to pay me for it.

And so tomorrow will see my playing for Guildford Philharmonic in a Magical Kingdom children’s concert.  The dress code is “smart casual and loads of bling and a mad hat if you’ve got one” but I’m not complaining, just happy to be out working!

A Painful Couple of Months

August and September were pretty painful from a trumpet player’s perspective, and October is proving to be no different.  Since the start of August I’ve been suffering with a cough that just won’t go away.  After the first month of non-stop coughing, and having pulled my intercostals muscles (an old coughing injury which is now re-occurring) I decided I’d better see a doctor.  The main problem for me here is not the irritating cough, it’s the fact that it simply hurts to breathe in and out under any normal circumstance.  So, imagine if you will, how painful it is to take in enough air to play a brass instrument and then be able to muster enough diaphragm support to blow that air back out again.  So, I went to see the doctor; otherwise I was soon going to have to start turning down work on the basis that it was just too painful to play.The doctor’s first assumption was a chest infection, and so put me on a course of antibiotics, which did nothing to help.  The second assumption was asthma, which they’ve struggled to test me for effectively as my ribs have been so sore that I can’t blow hard enough on the testing equipment for them to register proper results – an odd situation for a trumpet player to be in, I’m sure you’ll agree!  Still baffled by the on-going chest trouble, I was referred for a chest x-ray which came back normal.

Along side the asthma testing I was referred for physiotherapy on the NHS, which has been amazingly helpful.  The stretches and exercises given to me by my physiotherapist, Lorna, have been really very helpful, although without my doctor curing the cough she can only do so much to help me.  And the latest exercise of putting my fingers underneath my ribcage and pulling it outwards is pretty grim.  The intercostal inflammation (which was pulling my ribcage outwards) has gone down but now my diaphragm is under tension (which is pulling my ribcage inwards – hence the new exercise).

After a rehearsal with the Big Beer Band last week I have had two ‘remedies’ suggested to me.  The first was a homeopathic treatment called Bryonia, which is apparently excellent for clearing up coughs (cleared up somebody’s 10-month cough in 2 days apparently).  The second was to try changing my toothpaste…Apparently, toothpaste can contain irritants which can affect the chest and cause relentless coughing; a change in toothpaste brand may solve all my problems.  To be frank, I’m at the stage where I’m willing to try anything.  The toothpaste suggestion was a very interesting one.  I have been staying with a friend recently and using their toothpaste and my cough was much better until I went back home again.  However, a week on with different toothpaste and I’m still coughing, so I guess that’s not it.  I haven’t managed to find any Bryonia but am now trying an alternative homeopathic remedy for coughs and chest trouble.  In the meantime I shall just have to keep loading up on the “2x Ibuprofen + 2x paracetamol to be taken 1 hour before playing” method, which does work, but I’d prefer not to have to take so many drugs and just get the cough sorted once and for all.