Do you live in Switzerland? I have questions…

[Fallulah]

Came back recently from a holiday to the chocolate box/tourist/hiking parts of Switzerland. We were wondering about a few things as you do when you go to a different place. None of these questions are intended to offend!

The big wooden houses - are they more or less expensive to build than a ‘normal’ house? Does the wood have to be renewed after a certain amount of time, like thatch does?

The same wooden houses just sometimes seem to be in the middle of grassy landscapes - how do you know which land is yours as there don’t seem to be any boundaries? What if you have a dog? There are no fences?

Did Switzerland not have covid particularly badly? They pack people on to the cable cars and trains like sardines and there is nothing suggesting people might want to wear a mask even if it’s not mandatory - we were frequently the only people in them on the transport, which was packed with people from all over the world.

When you live in Switzerland, do you realise how expensive it is or are wages a lot higher to compensate for the fact, e.g. a small bottle of coke is 6CHF?

Are languages pushed a lot more in school than they are in the UK? Pretty much everyone in the tourist areas seems to speak Swiss, German, French and English!

Do you just feel really smug all the time that you live in such a beautiful, clean, well organised country?!

Well said.

The person whose Swiss friend had an arab ex wife and prefers to bring his kids up elsewhere (I guess 'here' being the UK) I would love to understand what part of Switzerland he thinks is worse than the UK for prejudice against Arabs

No. Not the UK.

I heard a level of casual racism I do not hear in the UK.

Yeah - I’ve been quite shocked at casual racism - eg taxi drivers complain g tbe drivers from Uber etc are “straight from the jungle”

I have to admit, I am totally intrigued by this, what part of Switzerland does he come from and what country did he move to ?

I do find it hard to believe that a Swiss person believes their country is racist, mainly because it's not !.

In your opinion it’s not.

In his opinion it is.

And that’s all there is to it really.

Not just my opinion, it is my experience of living here in a mixed race family.

And his experiences are his as a Swiss person with a mixed race family.

@Helvetic, apologies but just to add that I won’t reply to anything else you post to me on this subject as I find your rather unfortunate way of asking questions rather aggressive and they don’t make me inclined to want to chat with you.

And please feel free to make of that what you want.

Is now a good time to mention the varied cuisine? Such as the consumption of cat meat and dog meat?

Where exactly can you find that?

I've lived in/near Lausanne for 22 years. Have never come across that.

This is the first time I have ever heard that, however google did bring up an old article from 2012.

"There are no statistics on the number of dogs and cats killed every year in Switzerland and social disapproval of dog-eating means the practice is shrouded in secrecy. No commercial abattoirs slaughter dogs or cats, but farmers in the Appenzell and St Gallen cantons in German-speaking Switzerland often slaughter the animals themselves."

"In 1993 6,000 people signed a petition calling for dogs and cats to be protected, but Swiss lawmakers decided that the question should remain a matter for personal conscience."

😯😯

Wow, well I'd never heard this either but if you google in the local languages then yes it seems to be a marginal thing, practiced by 3% of the population.