Be Prepared!

Last Friday, I volunteered to help two kindergarten teachers and over 40 children trek through the forest (again!). This time it wasn’t just the normal four hours, it was a marathon 6 hours with lunch included!

Start of the journey, 40+ children sitting on a wall...

We walked for about one hour and found a place for everyone to sit and eat their “znuni” (the snack eaten at around 9.00am in German speaking areas of Switzerland!). After singing the znuni song and eating the znuni it was on the move again, to find what became our living area for the next 5 hours.

In all areas of Switzerland, there are designated grill areas situated in and around many forests and parks, they are available for everyone to use. The one that we came across even had old tree trunks surrounding it which meant that there was plenty of space for everyone to sit down.

On the menu for lunch was “Alphabet Soup and Grilled Sausage”. All children came prepared with a sausage to grill on the open fire and the teachers came prepared with all ingredients and utensils to make the soup over the open fire! As this was not the first time that the teacher and kids have been together in the forest, the children knew exactly what the protocol was i.e., collect the wood for the fire and then play time! They worked hard collecting and carrying the wood and then they played for hours, climbing trees, rocks, looking for mice and singing FC Basel football songs at the top of their voices!

Hunting for a mouse!

As well as mice, they found the most disgusting long thick black slugs, which a lot of children carried around with them for the duration in the forest! Yuuuukkkkkkkkk!

We carried with us to the forest, two black saucepans that looked like witches cauldrons and a large collection of sharpened sticks which had been collected during many trips to the forest. The cauldrons were used to cook the soup and the sharpened sticks were used to plunge through the middle of the sausage and then held over the open fire. It didn’t matter if raw meat touched cooked meat, or if any kind of meat fell on the ground, once cooked it was all eaten!

Two pots of Alphabet soup...

How many children, sticks and sausages can you fit around a fire?

The washing line for those that got their socks wet in the stream.

Fields of wild garlic....

On the way home, I took my turn and carried one of the black cauldrons and a bunch of the sharpened sticks to be used at the next forest outing. My hiking boots were covered in muck, as were my old jeans and rain jacket, my hair was a big fuzzy mess due to being the open air for so long. I hoped I wouldn’t meet anyone I knew, as luck would have it - yes of course I did! My friend Graziela drove past in her black sporty Audi, dark glasses on, looking as glamorous as ever, she tooted her horn and asked me if I’d joined the boy scouts!