Final

This will be my final post. I am returning home to again be near loved ones.

Here I was able to find close friends, widely different rules and perspectives from my own, and new ways to communicate that I had not previously understood. I will take back with me these relationships and memories, and look for ways to inspire from them. And if the opportunity again arises to return to work here, I will know specifically what conditions to create for myself, and how to navigate correctly from the beginning. If only these experiences could be taught without having to experience them first, perhaps all of us could make better choices.

Ciao for now.

Mad Men

I've just started watching the first season of Mad Men, a show set in a 1950's Madison Avenue advertising firm. I had been hearing about how popular this show was without paying any attention to it, until now. It is not uncommon for me to not know the theme of a popular show. I didn't see any episodes of 24, Lost, or Weeds. I tend more toward the talent shows via youtube and how their creative editors weave in the tearful drama. And, given that I don't watch any TV here because the kids monopolize it with their British shows, I spend most of my free time reading.

But this show, the first episode of Mad Men, struck a particular nerve for me. It pokes fun at American culture 50-plus years ago when gender discrimination and smoking in the work place was the norm, two topics I've been hardwired to be overly sensitive. I suppose the reason I am so sensitive to it even now is because I see a lot of this here, in Switzerland, in 2010... still... far more than I should.

A joke will be made, followed by an awareness that an American is nearby, and, oh, Americans are litigious, so perhaps we shouldn't joke like this right now. Is it that we're litigious? Or are we just far more aware of how we were held accountable for our discriminating behaviors in the only way that was legally available in the past? To change an unwelcome behavior, one (or a group) must change their tolerance for it.

There is still smoking in the buildings in Switzerland. They have spent a little more money to seclude people in a designated space of the building into a phone booth equipped with a vacuum and a filter. I think Americans might have done this, too, at one time. Perhaps they feel the escaping particulates are at an acceptable level, like our FDA allows certain levels of mercury in our farm fish, or acceptable levels of antibiotics and gene manipulations in our farm beef.

Signs of tolerance are still around. Here's a photo of actual chairs, in a commons area, in a business setting. They're cute, no? They're not gender-specific, per se, but the conversations about these chairs, at least those in my presence, always seem to turn gender-specific. Perhaps even this is just to test me and my own tolerance, to see how much more gender humor I can take without walking away. I once wrote in this blog about certain topics still seemingly being stuck in the 1970s here. Maybe my accuracy on the decade was a bit off.

Twelve

Raising a twelve-year-old is difficult enough. But transfer her to a country who has for the past two years ranked at the top of Global Competitiveness, and some very strange perspectives emerge.

She attends an International school. In this school are the children of people from all over the world. Naturally, some have more means than others. And so the competition begins. We do not have much, and we do not need much. Conversely, my daughter likes to spend her hard-earned babysitting money on certain items with designer-style labels. I like to roll my eyes. I'm pretty sure this is not something I taught her. I'm a man. I'm ignorant to such things.

Today, she went to a birthday party, where more twelve-year-olds were also going to be gathering. She smelled of Abercrombie-ness. She was wearing designer tennis shoes that her aunt gave her for Christmas. She was carrying a designer bag, inside a designer wallet. And her shirt had some other label on it. As we were leaving, a six-year-old girl for whom she babysits was playing outside.

her: Hi.
daughter: Hi.
her: Where are you going?
daughter: A birthday party.
her: Another one?
daughter: Yeah. There are a lot this month.
her: And you're taking your Juice bag?
me: Ha. Juice bag.
daughter: Juicy.
her: Does it have juice in it?

We do live in the land of understatement. Wearing labels and bobbles that show your numbers is scoffed at by the Swiss as very poor taste. And apparently the same by 6-year-olds from England.

Cuss

I love the process of learning a new language. I learn it like a baby learns to communicate. Lots of grunts and gestures until finally a pattern emerges. But I also like there are cuss words that, for whatever reason, are very easy to remember in a new language. There must be a linguistics paper somewhere that describes why we find a way to store and recall these words far more readily than useful things like "I'm sorry".

But when these words cross over into common colloquialisms, it's even more fun. I learned early when I started coming here that the word "whore" used to be used as an emphasis adjective a decade or two ago: "whore far", "whore big", "whore fast", "whore pretty". It made me laugh to here this. Not something to be used in a business or family setting... just reserved for trusted friends. But then I heard other word substitutions to help tame down the emphasis. In English, we might substitute the word "shoot" for a certain expletive. But because the word "scheibe" is close enough to the same expletive in German, one will say "window" instead.

Now I'm told the Swiss kids use the word "mega" to emphasize: "mega far", "mega big", "mega pretty", or just "mega" on its own to cut down on the number words.

Mega culture.

Limbo

I walked to the bus stop on yet another rainy dreary day this week, and for two minutes, I was again an American realizing I'm walking around in Europe. I call these moments "waking up only to roll over". It doesn't happen as frequently these days as it did. I've internally adapted to my surroundings, seeing 400 year old buildings that have been restored and maintained, seeing men in their 40s and 50s wearing vests, shorts, and funny little hats scootering around at top speeds in a crowded train station, hearing church bells and cow bells and languages I can't understand, seeing a wide array of varying breads and cheeses and meats and wines without gasping "wow". It's now easy to understand why colonies of immigrants in America would import their favorite parts of their cultures. When I first started writing this blog, a Swiss colleague would occasionally comment about it in private interactions. He found my observations humorous, mentioned he hadn't noticed these things in this way.

Him: "Now I hear church bells all the time where I didn't before."

I've grown a bit more accustomed, maybe even numbed depending on one's perspective toward positive or negative. Yet, I still have that "grass is greener" sense I am not as accepted here as I would be back in my own home town. I'm not implying I would be so welcomed back there, just that there would be less aspects to synchronize in the first three minutes of every interaction. I can't read people here like I thought I could there. All of the signals and anticipated responses are different. I also miss being there during these "rolling over" moments. I am told this is similar to how a person from a remote Swiss German village working in Zürich feels. If they do, I would be surprised at that level of self awareness or interpersonal differentiation. That's a whole new level of which I will never be able to relate. I am still an American working in Switzerland, not truly accepted, but also not fully rejected... just tolerated somewhere in the middle, limbo for now.

Fluffy

My daughter is a bit frustrated with recent interactions.

her: That's the third time!
Mm: What?
her: Grandmas are supposed to be fluffy and smell like cookies. That mean one just barked at me for reflecting the sun around with my compact mirror. I mean seriously?
me: You did it three times?
her: No. The other day another mean grandma yelled at me for Bear pooping. And a completely different one for walking across her backyard. What's up with the Mean Grandma Gang here??

Fluffy and cookies?

Fashion

Zurich does at least a couple of things well: Pretty and Money. But who introduced this idea? Man-pris? Come on. When I was growing up, and we grew out of our pants, they called these "high waters" and kindly asked "Are you waiting for a flood?" Now they're a style?

And who thought shorts and suspenders with a funny little hat and a purple vest would be useful? Perhaps the concept of money is also lost on me.

Ah, Swiss people...

F*ing Mosquitos

Pardon my French.

Food prices in Switzerland (re-revisited)

Frustrated again with food prices. Let's assume the US dollar and the CH franc are even enough to compare.

- Whole rotisserie chicken in US: Avg 8.00
- Whole rotisserie chicken in Switzerland: Avg 22.00 ... for real.

- Starbuck's grande cappuccino in US: Avg 4.50
- Starbuck's grande cappuccino in Switzerland: Avg 7.00

- Milk in US: Avg 3.50 gallon
- Milk in Switzerland: Avg 1.50 liter

- Gum... omg, gum! I give up.

her: You're complaining about food again? It's better quality, alright?
me: ...

Food prices in Switzerland (revisited)

For the sake of comparison, let's assume that in the US you can drop in a quarter, turn the knob, and receive 5-7 pieces of gum. These machines exist in even the most disgusting of places, where any 5-year-old is delighted to receive gum for a quarter. Speaking as a 5-year-old, we are aware that the quality will suck, and the gum is quite likely to be stale. It's just a quarter.

But here, one can spend 1.60 on a stimulating pack of gum, similar tasting product, similar life cycle, similar conditions of the gum once purchased.

Even the imported M&M's cost less than a crappy pack of gum. For that kind of money on a pack of gum, I shall expect to be stimulated.

Zurich Street Parade

There is something very different which happens here once a year. For several hours on a designated day, the downtown area loses its freakin mind. I tried researching the significance of such an event. 600,000 people this 19th year again celebrated techno music. It is said to have evolved more toward love and tolerance since these are easier to understand than techno. I think tolerance has become the primary term as I know of four basic qualities that can characterize this state.

- Alcohol
- A high density of scantily clad humans wandering in theme-less-ness
- Trash
- Loitering

I attempted to capture these with photos the best way I could, but it's safe to assume the quality of alcohol just spans across all of them.

Parallel

Big cars are hard to park. It's hard enough to parallel park in between two small cars where the space is only supposed to be big enough for another small car. In our apartment, we have a garage with reserved parking. We've been on the "reserved" list since February. No one moves. So, parking on the street is our only option. Usually we park near the bakery. That's a bit of a walk.

Blue parking zones here are free for one hour or whatever the sign says, unless you pay for a permit which then you can park in the designated letter zone as long as you wish. There aren't any of these close by. Yellow zones are restricted, reserved for someone who has paid for it specifically. The yellow ones close by belong to another apartment, reserved for their tenants. So, we get the free white ones, like everyone else. When we're lucky, really lucky, we can find an open one just outside our apartment. But most people just leave their cars parked there forever and take the trains.

Having a car is a nuisance.

McDonald's

I grew up having a very different emotional response to McDonald's than I have today. I was curious what kind of emotional response a Swiss would have to this. After all, I am attempting to fit in. What is the view of an American corporation attempting to fit in? I asked two Swiss colleagues.

me: Have you seen the McDonald's ads?
1: Ha. Yes.
me: And? What do you think?
1: (sigh) A typical American's thinking... They come here, act like they're Swiss, expect to change us and everything around us.
me: (pause) Oh.
1: (pause) Oh, I mean no disrespect to you. I had actually forgotten to whom I was speaking.

Maybe another opinion might help normalize this first impression.

me: Have you seen the McDonald's ads?
2: Ha. Yes.
me: And? Does it give you any particular emotion?
2: Emotional? Not me, not particularly. I mean I eat there once in a while when I want something fast. But they aren't the first to say they are using local ingredients or local products. Starbucks even says they use Swiss coffee machines in Switzerland.
me: I see. I asked another Swiss person this same question, and it almost sounded anti-American.
2: Well, when the Iraqi war started, lots of people stopped going to McDonald's, Burger King, and Starbucks. Then they came up with these ads to say they aren't just American but they're also Swiss. Pretty clever.

I'm Swiss.

Metrics

Since starting this blog, here are some metrics about it that are interesting to no one other than me.

Years in Switzerland: Just celebrated 1 year, on August 1st, Swiss National Day
Total posts: 100 (counting this one)
Total number of moderated spam comments: 42 (I love the random auto-spammer comments, usually written in Chinese because they don't even show up on my reports)
Number of visits: 3,516
Number of visitor countries: 49
Number of visitor cities: 416
Avg time spent reading this drivel: 2 minutes, 31 seconds

Top 10 visitor cities:
1. Zurich - 721
2. Rueschlikon - 385
3. Lenexa - 257
4. New York - 136
5. Kansas City - 124
6. Adliswil - 108
7. Lenexa - 92
8. Armonk - 90
9. Kilchberg - 83
10. White Plains - 61

Of the 3,121 google searches which brought visitors to this blog, the top 10 search terms are:
1. omgswitzerland - 71
2. omg switzerland - 36
3. nullachtfünfzehn - 34
4. omg switzerland blog - 18
5. food prices in switzerland - 13
6. omg france - 10
7. mbibler omg - 7
8. food price in switzerland - 6
9. null acht funfzehn - 6
10. food prices switzerland - 5
... and many more variations of similar terms.

Top 3 pages most frequently landed upon which are not the main page:
1. Food Prices - 63
2. Size Matters - 54
3. Nullachtfünfzehn - 48

Metrics, beans... Who's counting?

Driving

A colleague pointed something out to me today I hadn't noticed...

her: Have you noticed there aren't many stop signs here?
me: Whaaat?
her: It's true. Can you think of any?
me: (long pause) ... No, I actually can't.
her: You can practically count the stop signals on two hands. They're all round-abouts and yield signs.
me: (grunt)
her: And, did you know you're supposed to yield at every intersection to the driver on your right?
me: (sigh) Nope.

Then I got home, and remembered this cute thing in my neighborhood. I suppose it qualifies. Maybe. Otherwise, it's good to have a few reminders, e.g. mirror check and lunch advice.

Moo

Cows. They play a very prominent role here. Their bells can be heard most days. More cowbell. You can buy these bells in airport souvenir stores. As small as you want, or as big as your head. Cheese, milk, steak, ice cream, cappuccinos... and chicken. Cows are into a whole lot of things here.

That's my son's voice in the background of the video.

Him: The one to the left's milkbag is also big.
Sister: SHHHHH!
Him: It is.

Milkbag.

Gina

Retrieved my family from the airport this morning. I drove. I'm a bit fearful of driving here. I need a useful GPS. We brought one of those with us from the US and had to install the local maps onto it. Her voice is rude, and she butchers the road names. I call her Gina for no particular reason other than it sounds funny to the kids (sorry if your name is Gina, no offense). Gina the GPS wanted to drive me through downtown Zurich to get to the airport. I decided to ignore Gina, and follow the freeway signs with the airplane on them. In doing so, I learned for the first time there is this huge new tunnel which opened within recent history. Gina has driven me around the backstreets a lot. If I don't pay attention and challenge Gina, double-check her accuracy with my own intuition, she'll direct me into a lake, an open field, a closed road... Either she's not that bright, or she's jealous I'm married.

Anyway, major hugs from the kids made my early-morning adventure worthwhile.

Mosquitoes

By day, temperatures are blistering hot. By night, temperatures remain sultry, but the windows have to remain open to get a breeze working. OMG, it's flaming hot, and these people don't use air conditioners. "Oh just go jump in a glacier water lake. It'll cool you right off." "You're wearing the wrong clothes, of course you're hot." Last week I was bitching about American frozen air being blown on everything. A few days ago, I was bitching to a friend about the mosquitoes again because 'tis the season once again.

me: I've decided I'm going to re-engineer mosquitoes.
friend: Huh?
me: Yeah. Take all the blood you want, but quit leaving that itchy crap behind. What's that all about?
friend: Did you say re-engineer a mosquito? Are you feeling ok?

Then, this article showed up today from Discover about re-engineering mosquitoes to take away malaria. I hate mosquitoes. I hate little else. I hate mosquitoes.

What???

I have no idea what has happened to me. I don't like the food in the US any more. Everything has the taste of really low quality corn in it. I have somehow become a picky grumpy old man. And what is happening with most buildings and air conditioning?? Did I realize this when I lived here? Why does the US have to blow frozen air on everyone at all times? I need one of those "inside" sweaters. Or a scarf. Yeah, an "inside" scarf.

Leaving Kansas City this Friday to head back to Switzerland until winter. I love Kansas City, my home.

OMG American Airlines

A few years ago I started flying a lot to and from Switzerland. I accumulated a LOT of frequent flyer points. I was able to use these over the past weekend to upgrade my seat, my wife's seat, and my two children's seats to business class on American Airlines. We paid for economy. This is actually an amazing thing when considering how many people also wanted to upgrade. I guess suffering so much through the past afforded me a one-time luxury, which I really needed to take advantage. I'll come back to why.

During boarding, the announcer called us "business ass classengers". Twice. I picked up on it the first time, Kris refused to believe me when I tried to tell her. Then , both Kris and I heard it the second time. It's funny enough that she said this. It's more funny to know how true it is what she's saying, even if she's slipping by accident.

During the reshuffle process, Kris and I were seated together. Not bad at all. The kids were spread across the plane. Also, not bad if you're a business ass classenger since you don't have to hear two pre-teens fight about touching each other's arms on the arm rests, or putting their shoes under the other's seat.

The first business ass classenger to see one of my children looked at my son, my 9 year old, and promptly looked around as if he were on Candid Camera. Kris darted up to him from a few rows back.

her: Sir? Would you be willing to trade seats with my daughter, just over there?
bac: Ha. When I saw him, I knew I would be moving.
son: Yeah, I'm not so comfortable around strangers.
bac: You'd be surprised I'm not all that strange.

Family settled, the plane was delayed by two hours for replacing a valve sensor in the right engine. I'm happy to wait as long as it takes for a cross-Atlantic 9 hour journey, just to be safe.

Back to why I needed the advantage this time... I somehow chose this 9 hour flight to mature a flu to the point of severely high fever, serious dehydration, and a dramatic disoriented wheelchair ride off the plane in NY. Had I been sitting in coach, I can't imagine going through all of those hallucinations for so many hours with so many people crammed around me. I think they lucked out, too. Kris not so much, but everyone else...

Back to rehydrating.