By the time my birthday rolled around, Brad and I were feeling up to a mini get away. We were still living without light fixtures, but, we now had our furniture and we were finally feeling human again. After ruling out Paris (not a good idea with a four-month old), we settled on a day-trip to Annecy in France. Annecy is about an hour drive from our home outside of Geneva and we’d heard rumors of its beauty. Nestled in the Alps and on a beautiful lake, it can’t but be beautiful, right? Ok, so it’s no Paris, but hey, it’s still the French Alps. I mean, come on!
We decided that Tycho would not be accompanying us on this trip, so we set out to find him a nice “doggie-camp” to attend. A friend of mine recommended a place in the next town over called Gland (yes, the “d” is silent, but I prefer to pronounce it the English way and say the “d” on the end. “Hi, I’m from Gland and this is my sister, she’s from Cyst.” Okay, I digress.) Brad asked a colleague to arrange a rendezvous, as the owner of the kennel does not speak a lick of English. She is the other Swiss person that isn’t bilingual.
On the day in question, I took Tycho to camp. I rang the bell and the owner, a pretty and gruff woman, wearing the most enormous shit-kicking boots I’d ever seen, came to the gate. I gave my standard greeting but couldn’t keep my eyes off her boots. On closer inspection, I determined that they were moon boots (moon boots!!), wow! Struggling to maintain eye contact, I ceremoniously fanned out Tycho’s health records, including his brand new Swiss passport. Oh yes, our dog is the only member of the family with a Swiss passport. In Switzerland, you need a passport for your dog—with his microchip number and vaccination record—in order to cross the border.
I was hoping that displaying Tycho’s documentation would spare me an awkward and painful conversation about the well-being of my dog. No such luck. I got through the name and address part without a hitch and then it came to the gender questions. She asked if Tycho was male or female. I responded “male” and she drew a big male symbol on the sheet. I remembered that they paired up the dogs according to gender, so I wanted to make sure that she knew Tycho was neutered. I didn’t want him hanging out with any aggressive Alpha dogs for the day, picking up bad habits.
I had conveniently learned the word for neutered on a chance encounter with a dog with an Elizabethan collar (you know, the cone thing) around its neck. That owner tried to explain that her dog had been neutered and used the word châtré, which sounds like castrated. I produced my random vocab word for the kennel owner (hoping I wouldn’t have to resort to sign language), and she must have understood my horrid pronunciation, because she crossed out the male sign. Poor Tycho.
With Tycho safely tucked away, we started out for Annecy. Upon approaching the Swiss-French border, we realized that we were passport-less. Back we went, grumbling all the way. An hour later, we set out again on our day trip (unfortunately, the approach was already taking most of the day). We arrived in Annecy, circled around to find a place to park and then began to explore. Did I mention that rain poured upon us for the entire journey and indeed day? Yup, happy birthday to me.
The tour books would describe Annecy as a city that has maintained an “old-world feel,” and I’m not inclined to argue with them. The canals and colonnaded shopping coupled with the Alps and lake make it a charming place to spend a day. Brad and I chose one of the plentiful sidewalk cafes and had a delightful birthday lunch, waiting for the rain to go away. My salmon was scrumptious and Addi seemed to agree as she nursed happily in our picturesque, but wet, setting. Unfortunately, Mother Nature continued to vent, so we stuck to the sheltered shopping, peeking out at the canals and the old-world charm, unaffected by the rain. I’m sure the Alps were beautiful, but the fog was so thick that we couldn’t see a thing. Besides, my sights were firmly fixed on a selection of soon-to-be-mine decadent French chocolates and my very cool birthday gift—a stackable silver ring.
Despite the relentless rain, we considered the day a success. Tycho spent the night at camp and was thrilled to see me the next morning. He gave me a muddy greeting as I paid the proprietor, who was still in her moon boots. Unfortunately, in true Tycho form, he did not want to get in the back of our station wagon. Yes, we have a station wagon people. But at least it’s a VW, and there’s plenty of space for Tycho to sit in the back—when he feels like getting in, that is.
So, picture this: my 110-pound dog is resisting the trunk and fighting me as I try to force him in. He’s pulling on his leash and “giving me the paw” (he puts his big, meaty paw over the leash when he doesn’t want to go). So, “the paw” is in full effect and the owner sees me struggling. She comes over to help me tug. No good. Tycho throws himself in the mud. Now I’m getting really annoyed because I can’t get this dog to do what I say and this lady can’t understand what I am saying. Suddenly, she jumps in the trunk on all fours like a dog, and starts saying, “Tee-co allez! Tee-co allez!” which means “come on!” My thoughts exactly.
Tycho actually bought it and hopped in the back. Despite the language barrier, we were both cracking up. Belly laughs, moon boots, and castration: bringing the people of the world together. Some things just don’t need translation.
Other columns in the series:
Stories From the Land of Cheese: How Do You Say “Vomit” in French?
Stories from the Land of Cheese: You Can Get Lost in These Holes
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