Swiss Sundays- The Ultimate Day of Rest

In South Africa our Sundays often started with a cycle, which was then followed by a bit of grocery (or clothes) shopping and/or a visit to family. Often in the afternoons Steve would dabble in a bit of DIY by building, fitting, painting or sanding something in our house or garden, while I used Sundays as my chance to catch up on everything I didn't have time for during the week, usually laundry.

When we arrived in Switzerland we realized that our Sunday routine was about to change dramatically! Because in Switzerland Sunday is the ULTIMATE day of rest!

Here's a list of 10 things that are ILLEGAL to do on a Sunday in Switzerland. If you're caught doing any of the below mention acts, you will be fined by the police.

1. Doing laundry and/or hanging it up 
2. Mowing your lawn
3. Washing your Car
4. Going shopping (all the shops are closed)
5. Doing any kind of DIY (that your neighbors can hear or see)
6. Taking your recycling to the recycling drop off area
7. Vacuuming your house 
8. Cleaning the windows of your house 
9. Moving house
10. Children are not allowed to 'make too much noise' (not sure what is classified as 'too much')

Steve and I spent our first few Sundays in Switzerland wondering what people do on a snowy, minus 5 degree Sunday here...and then one Sunday we walked past a Mc Donald's. Ye, apparently that is what people do on a Sunday in Switzerland. Unfortunately eating Mc Donald's is not illegal on a Sunday like everything else. Other than Mc Donald's apparently people also visit friends and family, attending church, go skiing, hiking, ice skating and for walks.

Let's just say we are still adjusting to these forced days of rest every Sunday and ALL public holidays...which have the same rules as Sundays. 

Saint Anton, Oh How I Adore You!!!

I spent last week in Saint Anton, Austria on a `working holiday`. St Anton is a 3 hour train trip away from where we are staying in Zug, and it's a very popular winter holiday destination, as it is perfectly designed for skiing, snowboarding, snow shoeing, Nordic walking and pretty much any other sport involving snow or ice. It is a beautiful, tiny, old fashioned town located in the middle of the Tirol mountain range with incredible views of snow covered mountains in every direction.

Although I didn't get a chance to ski or snowboard during my time in St Anton, I did do a lot of relaxed hiking through the beautiful valleys and over the snowy mountains. This, along with the perfect weather and delicious Austrian food, that I was served 3 times a day, made me fall more in love with this divine country.

Below are a few pictures that I took on my phone during my hikes.  

 

The 6 Week Attitude Adjustment

So in a nutshell, I spent my first 6 weeks in Switzerland being completely and utterly miserable. I can basically count on one hand the number of times I left the apartment. I felt like I just didn't fit in here...because I couldn't speak a word of Swiss German, I had no clue how the recycling worked, I was car-less, my feet were always sopping wet from trudging through snow in shoes that weren't waterproof, I experienced minus 10 degrees Celsius for the first time, the people here seemed really unfriendly and to top it off I couldn't find Bovril in any of the stores, after being told that it is sold here.  

I got to a point where I had to decide, either I return to South Africa and continue normal life there, or I have a major attitude adjustment and make it work in Switzerland. I decided to go with the attitude adjustment and started looking for the good in Switzerland and the people around me. I then did what all my friends and family members had recommended from the start and joined every group, club or team I could find. 

Some of the delightful and unusual groups that I recently joined are:

• The Zug Expat Meet Up Group- This group consists of a bunch of expats from all around the world who meet at a different restaurant in Zug for drinks every Tuesday after work. We've only been twice but really love this group and the 40 odd people who come to it every week. They are (or were) all just like us initially, completely overwhelmed, confused and out of place, and they go out of their way to make us feel welcome. 

• The Let's Practice German (AKA Russian housewife) Meet Up Group- Basically me and a bunch of young, lovely Russian housewives get together every second Thursday for lunch and to talk less than fluent German to each other, in an attempt to improve our German skills. It's a great way to practice High German in a country that mainly speaks Swiss German, but I'm not convinced any of us ever really understands whats going on in the conversation.  

• The Grumpy Expats Social Media Group- This group is literally a bunch of grumpy expat woman who live mostly in Switzerland. They complain about everything from the cost of flights, to the manners of local children, to car companies that have ripped them off, to child safety in Switzerland, to speeding tickets, to people pushing in front of them in queues. If not for my recent attitude adjustment I would have been the lead contributor to this group, but for now it just serves as a reminder that I am not the grumpiest person living in this country.

• The Bokkies Breakfast Club- I was recently invited to join the Bokkies Breakfast Club, and I attended my first meeting with them today. This is a group of about 30 South African ladies living in Zug, who meet up once a month to catch up, network and give each other the old school support that you can really only get from a South African. These woman are so divine, today was the first time I've felt like I really fit in here. They all got together to discuss finding me a job and where I could buy Bovril (this is really a big thing for me), and they've promised coffee dates and to be available anytime to answer questions or give support. There is really something so special about South Africans. Ye of course I'm biased.    

• The Luzern and Central Switzerland Facebook group- This group is constantly updating us on interesting and relevant topics, such as events that are happening nearby, apartments that are going up for rent, possible jobs, rad places to go visit and how to do your taxes in Switzerland. It's so great as it's geared to people like me that have no idea whats going on here.

  

I would absolutely recommend Meet Up Groups to everyone, whether you're in a new town or even if you're in your old town but are looking to become more adventurous or meet new people. Over here you can find a group for pretty much any interest including a knitting group, board game group, Salsa dancing group and an entrepreneur group. They're awesome, go and join one, and if you can't find one you like start your own one! 

All of these groups have been instrumental in helping me to change my attitude and we've met some really awesome friends and connections through them. It has been so refreshing to be reminded that I'm not the only person in Switzerland feeling like I don't fit in. So from here on out it's Onwards and Upwards :-) 

Lost in Translation- Sorry Steve

He he he he he he.

I had to share this story, as I've been walking around chuckling to myself since it happened yesterday afternoon. 

I went into Zug town to meet Steve for lunch and to do some shopping yesterday. I hopped on the bus to come home and was standing casually with my shopping bags. At one of the stops a random youngish guy got on the bus and came and stood near me. I smiled politely at him and continued to look out the window. He assumed my smile meant, "let's have a lovely long German conversation", so he sparked up a lovely, long, German conversation. He asked about where I am staying, and then when he heard my less than fluent German he wanted to know (in German) where I come from and what I am doing here and do I like it here. I explained, in my best German, that I'm living here with my husband who is working in Zug and we are from South Africa. Up to this point I was quite proud of my basic German conversational skills. 

The conversation then took an unexpected turn when he decided to ask me, in German, if my husband and I were happy together. My brain, perhaps in an effort to protect me from this awkward question, decided at this point to confuse the German words for 'happy' and 'colleagues'. I'm really not sure why as they don't sound anything alike, but I blame it on his poor pronunciation. So what I thought he had asked was "are you and your husband colleagues?"

To which I replied Nein nein...meaning no no. 

He then got this big grin on his face, as one does when they find out the girl on the bus isn't happy in her marriage, and asked me if maybe I'd like to meet him for drinks sometime. It was only then that I realized that I had just accidentally told this guy that I was not happily married, and not, that Steve and I weren't colleagues. He saw the opportunity and took it. 

I then had to awkwardly try to explain in my broken German that actually I had changed my mind and my husband and I were very happy together and therefore I was not going to be able to meet him for drinks. I told him how lovely it was to meet him and proceeded to leap off the bus at the next stop and walk the remainder of the trip home. 

Nothing Says Adventure like...being Culturally Confused

Juanito's Restaurant, Zug- Photo By Steven Coates

Wednesday is Laundry Day

Welcome to the wonderful world of communal laundry...just another way to complicate your life as an already bewildered Swiss house wife.

 

"Whaaaaat? Noooo!" was my response when I arrived in Switzerland and Steve explained that we don't have our own washing machine or washing line in our apartment. Instead, we have a communal washing machine and line in our communal laundry, a mere 4 flights of stairs below our apartment, which we share with the 9 other apartments in our block. 

 

During Steve's explanation of how to approach the communal laundry situation, he stressed that it's important to remember that one does not simply wander in to the laundry room in their free time and throw a load of washing on, any time, on any day. Instead at the beginning of the year one has to choose either one afternoon or morning a week that they will dedicate, for the rest of their life, to do laundry. 

 

After much strategizing Steve and I decided that Wednesday afternoons for the remainder of our stay in Switzerland will be LAUNDRY DAY...and we will fight to the death anyone who attempts to come between us and our Wednesday laundry commitments.

This sudden commitment left me with increased anxiety and many unanswered questions such as what if we come home from holiday on a Thursday and have loads of washing to do, do I have to wait a whole week to do it and what if I get a job that doesn't understand the importance of my Wednesday afternoon washing endeavours ;-) The answers to these questions still remain a mystery.

   

If perhaps you're wondering why there's a cross through Sunday on the washing schedule below (I did too)...remember Sunday is the day of rest...which means no washing!!!

 

 

The dreaded Washing Schedule

 

 

After our washing is finished stewing for an hour in the communal washing machine, which has also stewed 20 other peoples washing in the past week, we then hang it up on the communal washing line. Yes, the washing line in the communal laundry that every person in our whole apartment building has access to 24 hours a day. We just hang it up there...and go about our daily duties and when we come back an hour or even a day later, it's still there...in the exact spot that we left it. 

 

I must admit my Proudly South African heritage made me quite sceptical of this system when I first arrived here, and I would only hang our really old clothes in the laundry in case someone saw something they liked and pinched it. Fortunately over the past 6 weeks I have grown more trusting and now even hang Steve's brand name clothing down there over night. Oh no, not mine...I'm not ready to leave mine down there just yet.

 

Admittedly I do count how many items I leave on the line and then ensure that I collect the same amount of items the following day. But I account that more to being organized rather than paranoid. Unfortunately I really have a bad memory, 6 weeks of unemployment will do that to you, and I usually forget how many items I have left down there and get into a panic when I go to collect my dry laundry and I cant remember if there was 16 or 19 things left down there.  

Our Laundry Room- Instilling trust in me, one day at a time.

 

 

Finally I must admit, being the prude I am, I have not yet mustered up the courage to drape my underwear in all its glory across the communal laundry line. But fortunately or unfortunately, I am one of the few in my apartment block who are so reserved, so often my Wednesday afternoons are spent bobbing and weaving between my fellow residents granny panties and tighty whiteys to find the perfect spot on the line for Steve's name brand clothes. 

Nothing Says Adventure Like...a Chinese Walking Tour

 

Limmat River, Zurich- Photo by Michelle Coates

3 Christmas Markets...3 Countries...24 hours

On the 14 of December our Swiss friends collected us from Zurich train station and took us on a 24 hour long Christmas market extravaganza. We traveled to Bregenz in Austria where we booked into a hotel and immediately went to our first Christmas market, in the town center. Later that afternoon we moved onto a busy, but incredible night Christmas market in Konstanz, Germany. Once we had seen, done and eaten everything in sight in Konstanz we went back to Bregenz for dinner and a quick nap and then set off to the Christmas market in Winterthur, Switzerland first thing on Sunday morning.

It was such a wonderful and different weekend away, as we got to experience Christmas in 3 different countries and it really got us into the Christmas spirit. We found that although the markets in the 3 countries had many similarities, there were some specific things that differentiated them from each other, including the food, drink and music.

Austria- Bregenz

Bregenz is a really cute little town on the banks of Lake Constance in Austria, and it lies in between Germany and Switzerland.

The Christmas market in Bregenz was very small, but so lovely and traditional. It was filled with stalls selling Glühwein, Christmas decorations, Cherry Pip bean bags (to keep you warm), onion pizza bread and pony rides. A stroll through this town and Christmas market will leave you feeling like you're living in the 19th century.

The entrance to the square where the
Christmas Market was held

Bregenz Christmas Market

Germany- Konstanz

Konstanz is about an hours drive from where we were staying in Bregenz. This town is well known to the Swiss as it boarders Switzerland and many of the Swiss people travel here on a regular basis to do their shopping, as it is considerably cheaper to shop here than in Switzerland. 

The Germans really know how to do bright, big, bold and delicious Christmas markets. This market is on the banks of Lake Constance, and part of the market is on a huge yacht which floats on the edge of the lake. The Konstanz Christmas market was so busy, we were constantly dodging people, however, this gave it a very lively and festive atmosphere. There were hundreds of different stalls selling everything including jewelry, rugs, sweets, wooden goods, knitted clothes and hot chocolate. There was also a fun fair and a carousel with real ponies. I did however feel very bad for these probably very dizzy ponies ambling around in circles.

The majority of the stalls were decorated so beautifully (see picture below), with life size 3D Christmas themes and every tree in the nearby vicinity of the market was covered in thousands of tiny lights. Christmas music rang out over the speakers and you could not escape the smells of delicious food.  This was by far the best Christmas market that I have visited thus far.

Some of the market stalls
have the most incredible Christmas displays on the roof 

Steve admiring his favourite Swiss made product-
The Victorinox Swiss Army Knife

Trees covered in lights

Steve`s first taste of the delicious German Lebkuchen

Switzerland- Winterthur

On our way back home on Sunday morning we went to the Winterthur Christmas Market, This was about a 30 minute drive from Zurich and it was wonderbaar (wonderful).

Again the stall roofs  were decorated with the most incredibly creative 3D scenes and they sold everything from hand made guardian angel decorations, raclette and healing jewelry to Swiss lebkuchen (with almond cream inside it), Heisse Marroni (roasted chestnuts) and handcrafted wooden puzzles. 

One of the stunning roof top displays 

Chestnuts roasting on an open fire... 

After singing this song for years...I finally got to taste chestnuts that have been roasted on an open fire. They were warm, really soft and completely unlike what I expected. 

Am I glad I tried them?...YES

Will I eat them again? Probably not. They weren't my favorite.    

Chestnut anyone?

My first chestnut experience