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Original poster

International Incident at the Chalet School

999 replies

RueDeWakening · 23/11/2014 22:05

Hear ye, hear ye! Gather ye hence, all angels (be-costumed with slightly tacky silver halos and suchlike) with your lark-like notes and prepare to dazzle us all with your charm.

No, not you Joan. Shop bought cake and cheap looks for you, my dear. See Matron for some milk on your way out.

OP posts:
Original poster
RueDeWakening · 04/01/2015 19:20

Umbrellas not permitted on trips, I think. In fact the standard issue for expeditions was a bag with most of your packed lunch and a first aid kit (mistresses), your handy Swiss army knife and Guide cord, possibly also art supplies for sketching opportunities. Drinks should be left in the hall at the Chalet at all times, leading to high jinks of collecting water to drink from mountain streams or relying on the juice from the apricots before a kind herder's wife takes pity and offers you buckets of smoke-flavoured milk that she has sitting around etc etc.

OP posts:
EatingMyWords · 04/01/2015 19:41

Congratulations Toni! Flowers

I threatened to take the SLOC to a psychiatrist for his pathological hatred of umbrellas after a festival we went to in the summer. It poured down and he no only refused to use the umbrella but also stayed outside a perfectly good tent Confused

Flappingandflying · 04/01/2015 20:30

Father has bought us across to France and we are overnighting in Paris before getting on the train to Basle. I'm having trouble with Trebuchet already as she keeps fluttering her eyes at the waiters and won't say her night time prayers. She seemed very put out about bedtime being 8.30. Giverny is really keen on skiing but keeps talking about a new thing called snowboarding. She uses the word 'awesome' a lot and does talk about Radio 1 a lot. Not sure that the evening dances are going to cut it with her. She's smuggled something called an ipod which plays music and I'm not talking about The Red Sarafan either.

UniS · 04/01/2015 20:33

Did alpen stocks belong to the school? or individuals, ditto skis? These gels must have had trunks like elephants to fit it all in.

And how did they get back up the hillside they skied on, I recall no mention of a lift or tow of any kind. just lots of skimming like birds or shuffling slowly with regular tip crossing tumbles. Must go and read " two sams @" again more carefully, which others have heaps of sking scenes in?

hels71 · 04/01/2015 20:51

I often wonder about the ski thing too......that would he a lot of luggage!! Do they still have umbrellas in Switzerland or US it more of a UK.thing?

Ericaequites · 04/01/2015 22:05

My father's name is Earl, but he always goes by Joe, which was his uncle's confirmation name. I was eight before I knew he was really Earl, as I was told off at school for addressing an invitation to Mr & Mrs Joe Equites!
When I was at a girls private school in the 80s, most girls wore handmedowns from older sisters. If you lost something, you didn't have to pay to get it out of Lost & Found if it had a sister's name tag. I wore navy sweaters that belonged to my dad and brother that had felted and shrunk in the wash. Mother stuffed Father into one of these sweaters measuring 37"still in the walk in cedar closet this fall. He wears a 42" short, so resembled Alice after she had grown. We are old Swamp Yankees, so discard very little.

SockQueen · 04/01/2015 22:52

I can remember skiing in Oberland, Mary-Lou and Triplets, but I'm sure there are more than that.

I can't help wondering if either a) EBD didn't actually know much about skiing or b)skiing was different at that time, before big resorts with lots of lifts. The way they learn, taking steps and trying not to cross your toes with hilarious results, and then racing back to the chalet on skis when a blizzard comes up, seems more like cross-country than downhill, but at other points she definitely mentions going down slopes and even carving, so I'm not really sure. I've never done CC so don't know if it sounds more like that, but it's certainly not like the downhill skiing I've learned - though the kit has come on in leaps and bounds since the 50s so it may have been totally different!

UniS · 04/01/2015 23:04

The steps and being able to move up hill effectively does sound they are using free heel binding s ( like current cross country or ski touring ) and I believe back in teh day all bindings WERE free heel style.

But going up hill is still not easy or quick. I have skied Cross country ( I learnt that style first, then down hill after a couple of years) . Its very good work outgoing up hill or on the flat.

DeWee · 05/01/2015 08:28

I suspect the school had their own skis etc, but you could bring your own. That certainly was true of the sledges because there's a bit where they talk about using the school ones or getting their own.
They may have been able to leave them at school too I suppose. So onyl sent once.

Back when I was little school uniform was less "disposable" than it is now. I know my dsis didn't have a change of anything other than shirt because I pulled her into the bath and she had to go to school the next day in civvies. (her fault she was trying to scare me!) And I can remember being terribly pleased to have 2 summer frocks because someone passed one on to me and I had my dsis one year.
I think all my dsis stuff was second hand, except any dm made for us, and mine came down to me from dsis too. And that was fairly standard, I remember handing my uniform onto someone in my brother's form after I'd finished with it.

Whereas my dc would have 3-4 cardi/jumpers, 2-3 skirts/trousers, and usually 4-5 summer frocks. And I think I was unusual in that mostly it was second hand-dd2 did get a new cardi in year 2 (top form) because she is very tall and needed a couple of sizes above cardi to fit her prosthesis in. Though why the school uniform shop had ordered cardis for an infant school in size 13-14 is beyond me, not surprisingly they had a lot left.
And I made their gingham frocks at infant level.

hels71 · 05/01/2015 09:33

I always assumed when miss Keith made her comment about not needing the scarlet inform until you needed to buy new sizes she thought of your average girl so maybe a year or so.......not thinking of Marlows with enough to stock a shop!!!

EmilyAlice · 05/01/2015 17:08

A joyful welcome to baby Kate. November is a very Chaletian birth month and red hair as well!

DeWee · 07/01/2015 16:03

Everyone packed and ready to go?

NellWilsonsWhiteHair · 07/01/2015 18:25

Disaster! Got on the wrong train! Never mind, there's a helpful girl here and her father's going to sort it all out for us. Jolly good.

UniS · 07/01/2015 20:12

Maybe he knows the head? Don't worry, I'm sure helpful girls family will have room for you and your little sister and the other third formers you gathered up along the way.

hels71 · 07/01/2015 20:16

Although it does seem an extreme way of ensuring you are head girl.....

Original poster
RueDeWakening · 07/01/2015 20:48

I think I left my brolly on the train...is Matey going to skin me alive?

:o

OP posts:
hels71 · 07/01/2015 20:52

I expect so and then the prees will tell you what they think of your carelessness......

EElisavetaofJingleBellsornia · 07/01/2015 22:45

Cave Rue, NellWilson will hear you! She's most awfully on the spot (except when on a train to Exeter by mistake).

UniS · 07/01/2015 22:45

But your brolly will turn up in the lost property cupboard at half term , thanks to the pet monkey belonging to the next door neighbours. It stole your brolly on the train and is hiding it along with all the other items it has stolen in an air brick leading to the lost property cupboard.

Ericaequites · 08/01/2015 00:58

Isn't tge pet monkey from Judy the Guide?

UniS · 08/01/2015 10:09

Well spotted.

morningtoncrescent62 · 08/01/2015 10:32

Oh my lambs, such adventures I've had. I flung dropped my Swiss army knife out of the train window in Northern France and detrained immediately to find it, as planned. Sadly I turned my ankle in the fall. I was pluckily trying to walk on it (yep, all the way to Switzerland) when a nice man with a dog approached. Turns out he's a doctor and he took me to the chateau round the corner to strap my ankle up. I got put to bed with a glass of special milk, natch. When I woke up a lovely lady was standing over me. I'd been waving my hands about and talking in my milk-induced haze sleep, and she recognised me as a long-lost cousin-by-marriage twice removed. Her husband will be motoring me to school later on, so I'll be there in time for Kaffee und Kuchen. Oh, and I'm to go and stay with them for the holidays.

Don't worry, Rue. I spotted your umbrella as I leapt from the train and I knew you'd forget it, so I took it with me. It'll be back with you soon.

DeWee · 08/01/2015 11:48

Oh mornington what a simply ripping adventure. Mind you, nothing unexpected at the Chalet School eh?

Which unattached pretty teacher shall we send to collect you? and eye up the doctor

RobinHumphries · 08/01/2015 20:53

Is the doctor the husband or the (hopefully single) brother/ brother-in-law of your cousin-by-marriage twice removed? These details are important!

EatingMyWords · 08/01/2015 21:17

There's a thread in chat about a boy who showed off his swiss army knife on the school bus- the school weren't very appreciative of it!

And this one would make EBD get her notebook out for 'compliments' and unnecessary weight comments if she was still alive www.mumsnet.com/Talk/_chat/2276728-Strange-compliments?pg=1

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