My oldest host brother Aaron and I one night during dinner started talking about art. He also went to Gymnasium (High School, but only certain people can go to it. They have other schools where were you could instead and do an apprenticeship) and his main subject was art. He still does a lot of art. He does a lot of woodwork. and he sketches and paints. Anyways, we were talking about art periods and artists when he started mentioning this Swiss artist named H.R Giger. H.R Giger was the artist for the creature in the Alien movies. Eveything that had to do with the aliens in these movies, he did it. Aaron is a big fan of his and was telling me all about Giger's paintings and he got really excited and said we should go to the museum together some time with Jael. I of course said yes, even though after seeing some pictures, I wasn't a huge fan of his subjects. I likes his style and the way he painted them, but what he was painting, not a huge fan. But the town was fantastic!
Since I want to make it clear about my host family, here are the names and their ages. Hopefully this clear things up a bit:
Host Dad: Andre Host Mom: Lilianne
Aaron (25)
Michael (22-23 maybe)
Noah (20)
Jael (18)
On February 23 was the day we went. In the morning we went to church and then afterwards Jael, Aaron and I left but their other sister Michael asked if we could give her a ride to Fribourg because she had a hockey game she had to go to (she's a physiotherapist and was helping the players that day). So it was maybe around 11:00 when the service was over and we tried to go to a Dönner (a turkish wrap that I absolutely love) before we went but all the stores were closed for another half hour. Instead we went to the Coop (groccery store) by the train station and I got a huge coffee!
The Coop (small one) Burgdorf Train Station
So, we instead went back to Michael's house and hung out there for a bit and then we left. It was about an hour to Fribourg so it wasn't that bad. The scenery was rather beautiful and we actually passed by a Cartier building.
Then we went from Friboug to Gruyere and that was about another hour, maybe 50 minutes.
So when we arrived in Gruyeres, we pulled into the museum parking lot (which was just a field) I was very confused about why there were so many children here because in the car Aaron told me that he heard there was a designated room that only adults can go it (I wasn't worried about that at all *she said sarcastically). When we all got out we walked up this hill, which again I was very confused about beccause why would there be a hill to a museum? That's not very accessible to other people now is it? It turns out, that was just to get into the town Gruyeres. I'm guessing this is one of the towns where you can't drive around in. Anyways, I didn't take a lot of photos sadly during my time there so I got these from the internet:
The day we went the weather was also so nice and there were so many people just walking around. I think this place is one of the most Swissy places I've been to. Most of the buildings when you keep going up a hill are actually restaurants all serving the same thing! Fondue, Racallete, and there were so many things to do with Creme and cheese. I tried to look for one without any diary and I couldn't! There was nothing that didn't have any diary in it! Jael and Aaron started looking at the menus planning to get something to eat and the whole time I was hoping they wouldn't make the suggestion that we eat something. They didn't, thankfully, and we ended up walking up a hill and immediately say a statue by H.R Giger and we knew we were in the right place.
So we went in and here they speak French and at this point I can hardly speak a word in french. I try and say a sentence and I say about two words before I end up speaking German. Je suis.... suchen für ein.... ugh!
You weren't allowed to take any photos in the museum and I can't find any online of the actual museum inside but here are some of his paintings: WARNING! HIS PAINTINGS MAY BE A BIT TO VISUAL AND CREEPY! (I've tried to find the ones that are a bit more.... less.... less... Giger. I can't even think of a word to describe his work.)
This is a picture of him working on the alien from Alien
The museum was interesting and the whole building had to feeling that you were in... well his world. Everything was very dark and the floor was matted with diagrams of his Alien creature. H.R Giger did all of his work by airbrush and sometimes charcoal. He never drew anything with pencil first, he just went to his studio and just began working on something. He said it was like he wasn't imagining them, more like he saw something and was just copying it down on the canvas. Other people also said that about how he worked. My favorite part of the museum were his sketches that he did for the movie. He wrote notes on the side explaining his drawing and they were written in English, since he was working with Hollywood. But sometimes he would be trying to say something in English but would write the word in German or sometimes if it was the same word but just written differently in German, he would write the German word. I found that pretty cool. So red would be rot, and then concept would be konzept.
I found a lot of his pictures where very.. adult. We could say. It was intresting and cool to look at them. There was this room and they had huge 7 foot paintings of his covering every inch of the wall, but these ones where a little bit different and I caught a glance of one. The next thing I knew I turned my head and was like "Oh look! I'm wearing shoes! And they're black! WHAT?!!?! How cool are my black shoes!?" as I coolly walked into the next room.
I have nothing against his work but sometimes it was just a bit to much for me. There was a second floor and there were a lot more sculptures and more to do with the movies. They had a sculpture of a table that he made for one of the Alien movies and they had one of the actual models he made too. This was the floor with the "For Adults Only" room and I was thinking, "so all of this, all the paintings that are not inside the room, children can look at?" Aaron and Jael went into this tiny room that had a red light and was only covered by a curtain. I took two steps into the room and then a "Nope" came out, and I walked out again. I saw enough in that 1 second I was in the room. The thing is his style as you can see is a bit creepy. Anyways, there was also a third floor that we went to and there they had a documentry about H.R Giger with some of his friends and actually some interviews with him and his family. They showed old videos of him working. It was in English and French and the movie was actually really interesting. I would've liked to known the name of it because it was very well done and they talked about some interesting stuff. On the third floor they had some pieces of art from H.R Giger's private collection (none of his work but works that he bought from other artists). For someone who really only paints in grays and blacks, his collection was full of colour and brightness. I rather liked it. So that was the museum, and we spent some more time there just looking around.
At maybe around 4, we left and found a cute resturant to eat at. Everything on that menu had to do with cheese and diary. Aaron got a Vermicelles, which according to google: Vermicelles is a southern Swiss speciality dessert. It normally comes in big chunks of dough or paste that then must be pressed through a perforated sheet to create about 15 cm long "worms" of Vermicelles. This is where the dish most likely got its name from, since in Latin "vermiculi" means "worms. It's made from Macrroni (not idea what it is is enlglish but some sort of chesnut) and then is placed over some whipped cream-custard like stuff and sometimes a small egg white crunchy, cookie/cake thing. Wow; I'm fantastic at explaining what it is.
It's not sweet, in fact, it's rather bitter. But it's very popular around here at Christmas time. You can also eat the nuts this dessert is made from in Christmas. It's like how we have roasted chestnuts, they have roasted Macroon stands.
Anyways, Jael and I ended up getting the shredded veggies and it came of course with a creme sauce. It was actually very good. Oh! Aaron had a side of cream with his and he said it was the best cream he every had. And it looked more like a liquid custard, it was so thick!
After we ate, we went back home. And that was it.
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