Homecoming

I woke up at 05.20 with nearly seven hours reasonable sleep behind me, and was relieved to find I could move reasonably well, as long I moved carefully. After breakfast and a final inspection of the house, I locked the house and walked to Montreux gare for the 07.24 train with twenty minutes to spare. As this train stops only at Lausanne and Genece Cornavin before the airport, it's one of the fastest of the day, an hour and ten minutes. It's crowded with commuters, students, teachers and business workers, as well as heavily laden travellers destined for the airport. I had to walk through a couple of carriages to find an empty luggage rack, let alone a seat. 

Having found both, I went to sit down, and was greeted by a smiling friendly face - Bethany-Ann, who'd been in church with her five year old daughter yesterday for the midweek Communion service, such a delightful surprise. She teaches English in both Lausanne and Geneva's Webster Universities, travelling this route by train to work several times a week. So instead of gazing at the sunrise over the lake and dozing, I enjoyed an hour's good conversation all the way to Geneva. 

Bethany-Ann's father is a retired American Lutheran pastor in Philadelphia. She teaches students from around the world, many from Arab countries. She said how filled with hope her Saudi students are at the rise of a young Crown Prince able to give them a voice through his progressive thinking and actions. Her younger sister is an academic who began as a French graduate to learn Arabic and now researches and writes on Islamic culture. Bethany-Ann is married to a Kosovan Muslim who was a refugee at the time of the Yugoslavian war and made his home in Switzerland. Such is the everyday diversity of a significant proportion of the inhabitants of Switzerland. It made for a happy conclusion to my stay.

The airport was busy. Twenty minutes to drop off my suitcase, but only ten minutes to go through security. The flight landed at Bristol ten minutes early, and I was soon on a bus for Temple Meads station. My twenty minute wait for a train turned into a half an hour wait, as the train was delayed due to 'cows on the line', which makes a change from 'leaves on the line' I suppose. Clare met me with the car at Cardiff Central, to save me lugging my case to the nearest bus stop. Home by two.

As ever, there were Windows PCs to be updated and made fit for purpose, before attempting any work on them. Sister in Law Ann arrived for the weekend at four, and Owain at six, then we walked together to 'La Cuina', the Catalan restaurant at the bottom of King's Road, for the first of Clare's birthday meals, a superb gourmet affair with an excellent bottle of Catalan wine from Vallibona de les Monjes, due north of Tarragona. Unfortunately, it rained on us as we walked home, not that it dampened our spirits after a splendid night out.