Breakfast in 3 languages

The cornflakes boxes here have german, french, and italian. So do the instruction books on the appliances. (At least we already know what to do with the cornflakes.)

Snow in Zurich

Last night, it began to snow. It was great! I packed several snowballs. The ground was covered in snow. The sad thing is the snow thawed in the afternoon, so it problably won't snow tomorrow. :-(

Zoo Zurich

Last week we went to Zoo Zurich. It had tons of animals from Alpackas to Zebras. It also had a place called Zoolino for kids. There was a huge playground that was really fun. Another part of Zoolino had prairie dogs that you could see from inside a mound! They also had an interesting display on bats. Another place was a walk-in habitat called the Masoula Rainforest. Some of the plants looked like ones we had seen in Singapore.There were lots of bats. We also saw red-ruffed lemurs and once, an iguana. We had a fun time there!

Zurich

We have finally arrived in Zurich. The trams here are very interesting. They are numbered 2-11 and 13-15. The picture on the upper right shows the 9 which runs by us. Another line that runs by us is the 10. There are other forms of trains, especially for going up steep hills. The Sielbahn Rigiblick, near our house, is a funicular railway -- two cars on a long cable. The Dolderbahn (lower right) is a cog-wheel railway -- a rack of gear teeth goes all the way up the hill.

Kampong Pluhk

Another place we went to in Cambodia was a kampong(village). We took a riverboat on Tonle Sap Lake to get there. At the village, went to the school, were they were learning "If Your Happy and You Know it Clap Your Hands" We sang that with the schoolchildren. I got asked a bunch of questions because the students rarely get a chance to practise English. We also saw big mats with THOUSANDS of shrimp on them! After exploring the village, we ate a lunch of fish from the river, vegtables, and rice. On the way back home, we passed the famous floating village. It was a wonderful day!

Temples in Cambodia

The rest of the time was mostly visiting temples. We got a three-day passes to Angkor except me because I was free. We went to the Bayon. The Bayon is a temple with many towers with four faces of Avalokitesvara, one facing each direction. We went through a gate (right) to get there that had four faces of the Avalokitesvara too. My favorite part was the bas-reliefs depicting battles and daily life.

Then, we went to another temple called Ta Prohm. It was overgrown with very tall trees. They grew while the temple was abandoned for nearly 800 years. The workers at the temple haven't removed the trees because if remove the trees, wham! It's a pile of rubble. After Ta Prohm, We went up a temple called Takeo. It had really steep steps, and looked a little like an Aztec pyramid.

That evening, we went to a restaurant that had apsara dancers (right). One dressed up as a golden fish at one point. A person dressed up as Hanuman, the Hindu monkey god, tried to catch the fish and kill it with a knife. I thought that was interesting.

The next day, we got a guide and went to Banteay Srei. It was 35 kilometers away from the other Angkor temples. Banteay Srei is small but it is richly decorated. Inside the temple, there was a group of landmine victims playing music. Dad bought one of their CDs for 10 US dollars.


Finally, we went to the most famous temple in Angkor, Angkor Wat.

Silk farm in Cambodia

Today, we got back from Cambodia. On the first day, we went to a silk farm. The farm had guided tours that were free. They grow silk worms then, when they're in cocoons they kill some and boil them. The rest live to make more silk worms and the process repeats. We saw some mulberry plants for the silk worms to eat. I thought it was interesting that silkworms only eat mulberry leaves. They have 16 different types of mulberry plant. They have so many types because some grow faster,some grow easier, and some taste better. We saw how they boiled the cocoons.The silk farm also dies and makes cloth. The guide showed us the traditional materials for dyeing. He also told us that they use mostly chemicals now.