I moved into a student dorm in Lausanne, Switzerland a little under two months ago. I absolutely love it.
It might be worth for comparison's sake to mention Switzerland relative to London or England. London is often touted as a multicultural city. Indeed, that is it's very problem. I do not like London. I realise I am ripe to be flogged by hipsters the world over, but London is not a place I would like to be in for extended periods of time. Mostly because I cannot afford it. But also because the aforementioned multiculturalism is precisely what is at the core of my problem with London. In December, it took 45 minutes on the Tube from Heathrow to hear my first word of English being spoken. Broken English. In London, the different cultures keep to themselves. They speak their native languages. They receive their own cultural education. London is the modern cultural ghetto culture.
Switzerland is everything you would not expect and all of it is fascinating and engaging. 20% of the population in Switzerland is foreign. But they are all (save the Albanians, who are universally despised for being primitive and violent) engaged in society. They all speak the same language. They mingle. They do not try to import their customs. It feels a lot more open and free when you party in the same language with a muslim syriac, a moroccan atheist, a french rastafarian and a hard line swiss conservative.
Switzerland has plenty of archaic laws governing it, and compared to the rest of Europe, Switzerland is politically very traditional. Women didn't get the vote until 1971. If you're born on Swiss soil that doesn't necessarily make you Swiss. Every adult male must undergo military training and renew it every year.
But these intricacies of the Swiss legal system are so ingrained in the culture that they are simply non-issues. Foreigners who really want to become Swiss are perfectly capable of doing so, provided they show the commitment required to be a Swiss national.
Gun related killings are so scarce they do not constitute a statistic on their own merit in official books. Yet every adult male who has undergone military training is required by law to keep a clean and functional assault rifle in their homes.
Crime is rare yet 7% of the population regularly consume cannabis - a drug on the brink of legality, yet still technically illegal. No War on Drugs is necessary.
The people are handsomely taxed and in exchange they receive a magnificent education, a health system the envy of Western Europe and car insurance, all on behalf of the State.
Politics are truly representative - the President changes every year from a group of 7 elected people. Every federal law must be subject to referendum.
It is said that a language is a dialect with an Army and a Navy. Switzerland has no language of its own (other than a truly minor Romance language called Romansch), and speaks German, French and Italian - a striking difference of culture in a country where people from across the valley communicate easier with English people than with each other, yet Switzerland is united with true patriotic passion.
Switzerland, on the whole, is modern, vibrant, elegant, traditional, cosmopolitan - and significantly cheaper than you might expect. I like it.
All photos and text are my own and subject to CC-BY-NC-ND.
