A new place? Keepin' our fingers crossed.

I think, hopefully, that we just found and won a new apartment to rent today. I mean 'won', because finding a decent apartment in Lucerne is like winning the lottery. There is much more demand than supply, and in a country where discriminating against anyone who isn't Swiss is perfectly legal, acceptable, and even expected, we are apparently very lucky indeed. We just checked out the apartment today, and I don't have any pictures of it yet, but I do have pictures of the view from its small balcony and will include those at some point in this Post. It is a two bedroom, one bath, not much bigger than our current apartment, but it does have a dishwasher (hurray!!) and a balcony, as already mentioned. The bathroom is actually smaller than the one we have now, but beggars,--- or outlanders,---can't be choosers. It is in a very nice location, not far down the road from the Casino we work at, although farther than we currently live, and a five minute walk from the lake shore and beach areas. Once the weather improves, we will be able to commute to work easily with bikes. Also, the rent will be cheaper than we pay now by about $350 a month, very cool, and we will still be close enough to town and the lake to enjoy what it has to offer without having to deal with the accompanying noise from traffic and the Church of Hells Bells. Yea for us!

I also wanted to mention that we took a four day trip to Hungary a week or so ago to hang out and visit Timi's parents. We had a good time, I played tennis with Timi's dad and he kicked my ass, and then we played billiards and I kicked his. All those years of having a pool table in our living room paid off! We also ate a lot of grubbin', and cheap, food, and I shopped for, and found, two awesome coats for half what they would have cost here. I like Budapest, it is so 'Old School Europe', the people just seem to be more 'real', and the city is filled with thousands of old, grand, Baroque-style buildings, some renewed, but most in various states of decay, a tattered hearkening back to an age of elegance, refinement, formality, tasteful opulence and grace. Sure, Budapest is grittier, dirtier, more ragged, with more crime and poverty than Switzerland, but Switzerland has never endured 40 plus years of a corrupt, fatally flawed political and economic system, and previously brutalized and/or invaded by one bully country after another. The Hungarian people, even with all their disadvantages, seem to be more creative, and enjoy life more than 'super serious Switzerland' does. Switzerland is without a doubt more prosperous, cleaner, shinier, and safer, with incredible natural resources, and that is nice and admirable; we like it here in many ways. But, at the same time, it's culture seems to lack a certain something in the personality category, maybe as a result of a lack of any real adversity for the last 500 years? I will get to my thoughts on this in a later post. That's all for now, I'm going to eat some store bought pizza(made in Austria), that Timi is sprucing up for us, then get ready for work! See ya. Check out the pics below of scenes around town. You can click on them to expand.

Is it a Gym, or a Library?

Thanks, Anthony, for your comments, and to everyone else, please post any comments, thoughts, or questions you might have, no matter how bad. I really appreciate them, and they encourage me to write more. And doesn't everyone want to read more of my rants on Switzerland?! I do.

Just got back from a gym workout, Timi's at the hairstylist, so I thought I would write a little more. I've mentioned it before, but I'll mention it again, gyms in Switzerland are not like gyms in America. I walked into the cardio area today for my warm up, and what was on the TV's, you might ask? The Welsh Open Snooker tournament. And what music was playing over the loudspeakers(or maybe I should say quietspeakers)? 'Ebony and Ivory' by Paul McCartney. Now I know what you're thinking, 'Oh my God, Marty, don't you know that the combination of Snooker playing Welshmen and the song 'Ebony and Ivory' can be deadly!? That it can elevate your pulse rate and adrenal levels so quickly that your head could explode!? Well, don't worry, I quickly put my Ipod earphones on, and averted my eyes from the rousing game of Welsh Snooker on the television. Anyway, you really had to focus your ears to hear the music. If it's much above conscious sound-awareness levels, the Swiss will quickly raise issue. Gym atmosphere here is required to be more suitable to a library than a place of physical fitness, or it is deemed inappropriate.

So maybe someone could enlighten me as to what is up with black socks here? Timi has tried in the past, but I still don't understand. I do understand that one should wear black socks in combination with black, or probably any other dark color, of pants, but here they wear black socks with everything! Light-colored pants? Black socks. All types of jeans? Black socks. Dress or casual shorts? Black socks. Athletic pants or shorts? Black socks. White shoes? Black socks! And they are usually calf-high socks pulled up as far as they can be. Are Europeans aware that there are other colors of socks? They must be, so what is up with this? I should mention here that the concept of 'Nerd' does not exist in Europe. This is because almost everyone here would be classified as one if the term did exist. Unfortunately, here Nerds rarely grow up to be highly creative and innovative CEO's of their own technology companies. I would also like to mention here that the stereotypical arrogant, conceited, full of themselves American Lawyer/Businessman/Doctor/StockBroker/Succesfull Professional of any kind does not really have it's Swiss counterpart. It's hard to be full of yourself when you 're driving around in a car the size of a bathtub and when it accelerates sounds like a bee on speed, or have to shlep downstairs to do your laundry in the basement bomb shelter. The supreme confidence and sometimes arrogance exhibited by many American men doesn't really exist here. I'm not sure if this is a good thing or a bad one. Maybe a little of both. Enough for now, signing off, Bye!

"The Land of Smoking's Past", and Food

I don't know where to start. I have so many things that I want to write about, but I'm not sure how I should start! Should I just focus on one or two topics each post, or should I just go more free flow and stop when I'm ready to? I guess this is a form of writers block, too much stuff to say and not knowing where to begin.

I think I'm just going to go free flow. I've been discovering other blogs of expats living and traveling in Switzerland lately, and through reading some of these I've been discovering that many of the things that I have been experiencing are many of the same things that other people experience, who would have thunk? I also have discovered that other people are better writers than I am. This is maybe another reason I haven't been blogging much lately, I feel inadequate. But here I am anyway, and I'm going to keep blogging, not because I want to be a good writer, but for my own future reference, to solidify and analyze my own thoughts and experiences, and for the enjoyment of my family and friends. So there.

Let's talk about smoking, shall we? The Swiss smoke like no culture I have ever witnessed before. Sometimes I imagine that America, perhaps in places like Alabama or Idaho, must have been like this in the Fifties. They smoke here with an intensity and frequency that is normally exhibited only by religious zealots. They inhale the smoke with every fiber of their beings, sucking in their cheeks and squinting their eyes, pursing their lips to create a perfect vacuum around the cigarette in their mouths so as not to allow any smoke to escape it's intended destination. Then they most often light their next coffin nail with the smoldering embers of the previous fag. And those are just the kids! Ha Ha, seriously though, here there is none of the 'Smokers Etiquette' that exists in other places. The Swiss will smoke everywhere that it is legal to do so, at all times, and are so oblivious to the status of those around them that they do not give one thought that the billowing clouds of smoke that are being exhaled into your face just might be offensive and sickening to you. These cigarettes are not the namby pamby 'Ultra Ultra lights' that exist elsewhere in the world, but hardcore, no nonsense French ciggies, made from old truck tires and leftover industrial sludge. There is virtually nowhere that one can go in public to get away from the smell of cigarette smoke. It is everywhere, on the street, in shopping malls, grocery stores, even the gym. Yes, I frequently pass by people at the gym that reek of smoke so badly that I almost lose my lunch, and I have often seen people leaving the gym building with an unlit cigarette and lighter in their hands, eagerly anticipating the step onto the sidewalk where they can immediately light up their next smoke. They are smoking terrorists. Switzerland is the "Land of Smoking's Past", where none of the knowledge and statistics on smoking's negative health effects seems to have been noticed or discovered by anyone, perhaps because they have their heads buried so deep in the dirt that they don't notice anything outside the borders of their little 'country that time forgot'. You might be thinking that smoking here is mostly practiced by the older generations, but no, teenagers and younger adults are the worse perpetrators. It honestly seems that smoking frequency is on the rise here in Switzerland, even though 'official' statistics say otherwise. Yes, these are harsh statements, but harsh observations sometimes call for them.

Did I say in my last Post that I would continue to write about more good stuff here? I think so, so now I will. The quality of the food to be found in the grocery stores here, any grocery store, far surpasses what can be found in most stores in America, especially the meat products. There exists here no corn-fed, genetically modified, crap beef and poultry force fed to an oblivious population by ruthless, amoral, unethical, greedy, employee-abusing corporations whose sole focus is on the bottom line and who couldn't care less about the unhealthy shite that they are foisting off onto an ignorant public. I wouldn't say that you can't find healthy, organic food in America, but you have to really look for it, and then pay quite a premium for it, basically about what you have to pay for it here in Switzerland, but here it is everywhere. Most of the meat to be found at stores here is free range, grain fed organic. Most of the fruits and vegetables are naturally fertilized, pesticide free, and organic. Just about everything one can eat, or make into something to eat, from a grocery store tastes better here. Which naturally leads me to wonder why Swiss restaurants make such mediocre food!? How can they take such great ingredients and turn them into such bland, uninspiring dishes? It should be a crime. What is Switzerland's signature food dish? Fondue. Bits of bread dipped into bowls of melted cheese. This is what 500 years of uninterrupted prosperity has produced?! A country with more time on its hands than most couldn't do any better than this?! I do like fondue, but come oooooooooooon! Even restaurants that cook food from other countries cook it bland here. We went to a Thai place a couple of weeks ago, paid twice what we would have in America, and liked what we ate half as much. There is no reason whatsoever to go to a restaurant in Switzerland unless you're on the road and are forced to.

I do want to clarify a few things here. The Swiss do know how to make pretty good pastries and cakes and such, and almost everytime my wife and I are out walking around town, we can't resist buying some different goody to munch on. And sausages. Bratwurst, or roasted sausage, is usually awesome here. There are little stands and stores around most Swiss towns where you can buy different kinds of Bratwurst, and it is usually very good. And chocolate. The Swiss, and Germans, can make some damn good chocolate. If some makes it into our apartment, it doesn't last long, especially white chocolate, which I guess technically isn't chocolate at all, but I love it. That's all for now, gotta go.
The pictures above are of me enjoying myself in a Swiss Conditerai(Bakery Cafe), of Timi hanging out on the shore of Lake Lucerne, and of Timi at the World Snow Festival at Grindelwald.