Swiss Precision: A Weekend in Zürich

On the surface Zürich is exactly what you’d expect it to be. Modern infrastructure set against a backdrop of stunning mountains, a picturesque lake, residential areas that look like Hansel and Gretel grew up and became property developers, all randomly interspersed with paddocks and dairy cows.

It has everything you want in a European city – quaint alleyways, cheese, wine bars, cheese, artisan bread, cheese, preserved meat, fancy beer, cheese, chocolate truffles, and cheese with bacon bits!

Public transport runs like it should – on time – and if the tram/train is even one minute late, emphatic and genuine apologies are issued.

It is also incredibly clean, so much so that when I arrived into Zürich airport I was struck by a familiar yet unexpected smell that took me a moment to place. You know that aroma you get when you open a box of new trainers? Yeah, the airport smells like that.  

The people are fit, polite, bilingual, eat like gods, smoke like the devil and are everything I am not (read, dull). Children are well behaved, the crime rate is low, and as for the one and only homeless guy I saw, I actually suspect this is his lifestyle choice, a loner bucking the trend, no doubt with his trusty Swiss Army knife in tow.

Whilst it may sound idyllic, could I actually live in Zürich? Hells to the no! As I said, this is Zürich on the surface. And it’s the perception you would have if you were an ordinary tourist dropping in for a citybreak with little opportunity to dig much deeper, because while the Swiss are lovely, clever, innovating people, they are somewhat backward in coming forward on the human interaction front. Lucky for me, my host for the weekend was a good friend and fellow Aussie who now happens to live here.  

Early into our 12 year friendship we discussed his dream of marrying a Swiss lady (or Swedish, or German...basically a blonde with an accent).  Three years ago a friend of a friend emailed asking if she could stay with him while holidaying in Melbourne. She was Swiss, and the rest, as they say, is history.

My first question to him when we meet is, ‘what makes everyone so civilised?’ ‘Well…’ he begins…

Just the week before he had attended a dinner party at the home of his Swiss wife’s cousin in Bern. A relatively civilised affair – six guests chatting around a dinner table over some wine and, no doubt, cheese – they were interrupted at 10:30 on a Saturday night by a squad of riot police, ‘there’s been a noise complaint, reports of a loud party’. Standard procedure, apparently. What do you expect of an over funded police force in a city that has next to no crime?   

I also learn that the washing machine in the communal laundry has a curfew.  Put your whites on after 7pm and expect a stern note under your door in the morning from neighbours complaining about the disruption. And you think you have mortgage stress? In Switzerland, when you pay off your mortgage you have to pay tax on the earning potential of the property as though you were renting it out, even though you’re still living in it. Perhaps this is why that guy I mentioned earlier decided to be homeless.

It probably comes as no surprise that Zürich is also very expensive; $20 for a vodka, lime and soda anyone? Perhaps that shop assistant wasn’t racist rather simply explaining that no one can afford to shop along Bahnhofstrasse, not even Oprah. Despite my apparent chocolate addiction (someone send me some Haigh's, please) I just couldn't justify 20 francs on a bar, not a block mind you, of praline from the specialty store. That said, European supermarkets have become my own personal amusement park, so on a visit to one I didn't hold back in the chocolate isle and what can only be described as a wall of cheese! I'm still disgruntled that Airport security wouldn’t let me out with my toothpaste-like-tube of mayonnaise.   

Zürich is pleasant, it's pretty, and lives up to the expected Swiss precision. Seriously, even the swans glide majestically across the busy lake in a single file military procession. Whilst I felt safe, there is a sense of unease about the city. It's synonymous with the vibe you get when visiting an OCD relative – you don't trust yourself to sit on their white couch and never know what to say for fear of crossing some imaginary, yet probably still socially appropriate, line. 

 

A few days in Zürich had me looking forward to returning to grit of London. Apparently I find comfort in disorganisation and loud mouthed scousers – it adds character and colour after all. Cultural differences aside, the raclette (kind of like fondue) and a few too many chocolate samples, had caught up with me and I needed to split before my jeans did.

 

-Eliza Rose Harper