I went skiing in the Alps! We went to Engelberg and skied Titlis. It was absolutely amazing. It was a 3 ½ hour train ride both ways, but it was more than worth it. The views were phenomenal and it was definitely one of the most amazing experiences of my life. We bought train tickets, lift tickets, and rented equipment for under $200. I skied in jeans and used sunglasses as goggles. It was quite the sight. We were the people that I always laugh at on the mountain.. We only skied a couple hours, but there were no lines so we got in more runs than I can count. The mountain was enormous. A run from the very top to the bottom took close to 40 minutes. My legs were dead by the end of the day and still  hurt when I walk down stairs. It was by far the best skiing I’ve ever done. I’ll put up pictures ASAP.

Yesterday we went to the pharmaceutical company called Rouche. The presentations were really interesting, but was different from any other presentation that we have had. A communications director presented to us so he was really good at avoiding the hard questions that we were asking him. Not only did we get all sorts of free souvenirs, but they also gave us an excessive amount of food, chocolate, and wine in the couple hours that we were there. At the end of the visit they gave us all business cards and told us to keep them in mind when we’re looking for jobs after college. It was definitely neat to visit, but at the same time I couldn’t help but thinking that they were wooing us with gifts as a way to keep us from asking questions.

India on Saturday morning! Our flight is at 7 am on Saturday from Zurich. That means we have to leave the hostel at 3 am…ugh.  I have so much laundry to do before then. The only problem is that it costs 10 franks to do 2 pairs of jeans and a few t-shirts at the hostel. They wash, dry and fold your laundry, but it’s just as expensive to do it at a nearby laundry mat. I think I’m just going to wash my clothes by hand and have them wash the clothes that I want to shrink back up.

I’ve gotten so sick of buying lunch every day because it’s so expensive here that I’ve started stocking up on food from the grocery store. I’ve been eating a lot of nutella and banana sandwiches and clementines. I’ve also been eating waaaaay too much chocolate. Their chocolate here is amazing (of course). Mar and Jen…it’s even better than Germany’s and you know that’s saying a lot.

Hi!

I'm now in Basel, Switzerland. We were in Geneva for 3 nights. It was great! It was such a short time to be in such a great city. We tried to pack in as much as possible. We went to a bunch of UN agencies. I actually ended up meeting the Director-General of the WHO Margaret Chang! She is one of the most important people when it comes to health in the world. We also had lunch with the minister of health of India. We met so many more amazing people and learned so much about a lot of important UN agencies and NGOs in Geneva. We had some free time to explore the city as well. I met up with my friend from St. Mike's, Justin, who is studying in Geneva for the semester. It was so nice to get a little taste of home while I'm away. We have very limited access to internet. I'm at a starbucks right now. We have to pay money to get WiFi so I've been trying to use it whenever I can.

We started classes. They seem really interesting. It's neat because everyone in my group comes from such diverse backgrounds. We have a lot of pre-med students, so bio/chem majors, some public health majors, some international developments majors, some soc/anthro majors, and even a politcal science major. It makes the classes really interesting because everyone has a different perspective on the issues that we're talking about. In Basel we have been taking classes with my professors at a University here. We are here until next Saturday the 29th and then head to India. It's been a little hard to find a balance between classes, going out and hanging out with friends, and sleeping. Today was our first day off so I got to sleep in which felt sooooo nice.Last night was muesum night. All of the museums in the city were open until 2 am. It was really neat because all of the public transportation was open until 3 and the city was packed. Because we're such a big group it's really easy to just follow the crowd and not really pay attention to where you're going. I did that in Boston because a few of the girls on my program go to school in Boston. I hated the feeling of not knowing where I was going in Geneva though. I started paying attention and ended up falling into the role of directing everyone around the city. Last night I had to get us all around Basel, switching trams and everything. I don't know how the heck that happened because living in Readfield, Maine doesn't give me much experience in that, but it's kinda funny. Now wherever we go to group is asking me directions. Hopefully I won't get everyone lost...

Overall, the food has been good. We get two meals for free and have to pay for one meal during the day, usually lunch. Europe is so expensive though. I'm so glad that I'm not here the whole semester, I would be broke (sorry Jen, Jenny and Meg). They have a lot of meat to eat here which isn't really my style, but I've been sucking it up.

Yesterday we went to a non-traditional hopsital. They practice anthroposophic medicine. It's more of a holistic approach to medicine. The hospital only had 63 beds and felt more like a hotel than a hopsital. The philosophy behind this type of medicine is to take care of the whole person rather than just the one part of the body that isn't working. The doctors really stressed the importance of looking at each patient as an individual. Mar, there was even a place for Musictherapy! There was this big, open, gorgeous room that had all sorts of instruments. You would have loved it. The rooms all had windows with beautiful views. It was very relaxed. They had a room were they put people after they died for 3 days so that the could transition from the physical to spiritual world.  I agreed with parts of the way the hospital ran, but other parts were too much. It is the same cost as a regular hospital and covered by insurance. I can't imagine anything like this being in the U.S. They still practice traditonal medicine, but with more of an individualistic approach. Overall, Swiss helath care is really interesting. I think we can learn a lot from them.

They spoke French in Geneva, but here they speak Swiss-German (so much more difficult than regular German!) so I've been trying to remember some stuff from high school. It's been interesting to try and communicate with people, but a lot of people still speak English.

My time's running out, but I'll write again soon! Miss you all. Auntie - there's a 44 year old woman on my trip who is just like you. I think you two would be amazing friends. Happy birthday Mad! Wish that I was there to celebrate with you.

Made it to Switzerland! Geneva is absolutely gorgeous. It reminds me a lot of Munich. I forgot how much I loved Europe. Running on only a few hours of sleep so I'm going to head to dinner and then sleep. Up at 7 tomorrow to go to the WHO.

Orientation

So I’m off! My trip to Boston was interesting to say the least. The snowstorm on Wednesday complicated things, but we made it. We ended up taking the train from Portland so we (as in Bud) didn’t have to drive through the snow. I met my group at a hostel in Boston. There were only 13 out of 35 of us that made it there on time. People have been trickling in slowly and all but 2 have made it. Everyone’s just crossing their fingers that they’ll be here before Saturday morning when we fly to Switzerland. I’ll be traveling with a really great group of people. The majority of them are science majors, many considering med school. There are a few Soc/Anthro majors, but not as many as I expected. There are only 5 boys which makes for an interesting group dynamic. I have 2 traveling professors and 1 staff member named Mattie that is just a few years older than me. She’ll be with us the whole time and is kind of like an RA on the trip. We’ve haven’t done too too much so far. We’ve done a lot of icebreaker games and today the coordinators went over the policies of the program. Tonight we went to the president of IHP’s house for dinner. There were a few alumni there so we got to hear some advice from them. Tomorrow we have a long day that starts at 9, but we have from 5 on to do whatever we want to in Boston. My e-mail address is ashley.whittemore@yahoo.com if you want to e-mail me while I’m away. I’d love to hear from everyone.

Talk to you soon <3