The Swiss paradox

Posted on August 23, 2011 by gydle

Switzerland often strikes me as a country of paradoxes.

At first glance, people seem so strait-laced and conventional. Nobody wants to stick out. The other day, a friend was describing an encounter with a slightly mentally unstable guy who lives near her. Her kids had seen him on the metro, “wearing a woman’s fur coat and a pair of red converse high tops.” He drew plenty of attention. She sighed. “In New York or London, nobody would bat an eye.” Actually, I said, in New York or San Francisco he’d probably be pretty mainstream.

Just yesterday, I was in town with Brendan, renewing his annual public transport pass and showing him all the amazing functionalities of his new ATM card.

— Rotten parent confession digression —

Yes, at the ripe old age of 18 Brendan has just opened his first personal bank account. Yes, I know I’m a rotten parent.

What can I say? I’m horrifically lazy. We never did allowances because I’d always forget. When the inevitable time to open the account came (he’s an adult, for heaven’s sake), I followed some innate Swiss-tuned instinct and called my personal bank advisor. Americans are a special bunch, it seems. We made an appointment.

On the dot of the appointed hour, we entered the hallowed halls of UBS Lausanne. There are no tellers in this building, just a vast shining hall of marble with a man standing serenely behind a tall counter at the far end of the vastness. This is a place for Important Transactions. Millions and trillions change hands here. I was surprised the man wasn’t wearing white gloves. I imagined I was a rich heiress, come to transfer a few thousands into the kids’ trust fund accounts. I had put on my freshly ironed white crop pants for the occasion, although regrettably I hadn’t gone so far as to add a necklace. We were ushered suavely into a private room.

When the advisor came, I quickly disabused him of the idea of credit cards for the boys and said we’d just like regular accounts with an ATM card. He took our various pieces of identity and vanished, returning twenty minutes later with a multitude of forms for the boys to sign. The Bank of Mom is now officially closed. Ah, liberation. Maybe I’ll even get some extra spending money myself, from the one-franc fines I’ve just established for towels left lying on bathroom floors.

— end of rotten parent confession digression —

Anyway, as we walked around downtown, we noticed that all the teenaged girls were dressed alike – short shorts or short skirts, tight top, ballet flats or greek-style sandals (the ones that buckle up around the ankles, not over the instep).

“I’m so glad you’re not a girl,” I said. “I don’t think I could handle it.”

I’ve been wanting to try the Vibram Five Fingers shoes. Or run barefoot. But I’m leery of doing it here. It’d be like standing up on an airport ticket counter and mooning everyone. I don’t mind being labeled an American – I am one, after all – but in our seven plus years in this country I have gradually internalized the Swiss penchant for blending into the background. I feel uncomfortable attracting too much (welcome or unwelcome) attention.

Somehow, though, in the midst of this comfy conformity, the Swiss also excel at being truly and certifiably nuts. They love it. There is something about this culture that encourages over-the-top craziness. In just the past two days, three news items caught my eye.

First, the International Alpine Beard Competition that was held last weekend in Chur. Here you have 60 old, gnarly alpine types (think Heidi’s Grandpa) wearing dorky hats and sporting a lifetime’s growth of disgusting facial hair. Check out the Daily Mail article to see some pictures. This is considered quaint.

Then yesterday’s paper had an article about a Swiss guy who tightrope-walked 1,000 meters up a cable car wire, untethered, in Germany (see photo below). (I wonder why he had to go to Germany? there are tons of cable cars here at home…) It made Gizmodo in the US, as I found out from Dave this morning. I had glanced at it in disapproval yesterday, thinking it would give kids bad ideas. “But I saw that guy in the paper, mom…”

Freddy Nock scaling the cable car wire…

This brings to mind the famous Swiss Jetman, Yves Rossy, who straps a jetpack and wings to his back and does insane things like fly over the English Channel and the Grand Canyon. He’s living everyone’s childhood fantasy. He’s so popular here, the national telephone network, Swisscom, uses him as an advertising icon. (Actually, I heard they tried to use pictures of him without his approval, and had to backtrack and sign him on officially.)

It’s like if you’re going to be crazy, it’s better just to go all out. Don’t bother with garden-variety craziness. Mind you, I don’t know if this is Swiss or European in nature. The French seem pretty nuts to me, too. Runners in the Mt Blanc race do in a single day what it took our family 11 days to do hiking. But they also seem a little more relaxed in their day-to-day lives, kind of “live and let live.” But then I don’t live in France, so who am I to say? It’s just hearsay. (Plus they have their own paradox already, involving lots of red wine and rich food and an astonishing ability to not gain weight despite these nutritional no-nos.)

The third article covered last weekend’s paragliding championship at the far end of the lake, in which the world’s best paragliders jumped off cliffs, flew over the busy autoroute in various complicated formations, and then touched the lake gracefully with one tip of their parachutes before landing. The article revealed that Switzerland has 20,000 registered paragliders. That’s enormous, given that the population of the whole country is only 7 million or so. The article also reassured everyone that “since the creation of the Swiss Acro League, there hasn’t been a single incident, nobody’s even broken a nail.” Heaven forbid! I certainly hope not.

Switzerland isn’t the world’s most conventional country, not by far. People are very tolerant on the whole. So I don’t buy the argument that these extreme types are balancing out an overabundance of conformity, and people welcome them for that reason. I think there is just something about the landscape, the culture, perhaps even the freedom the Swiss have to determine their own political system, that encourages dreamers and wild types to just go for it. Personally, I strive for the middle ground, a comfy level of ordinary crazy. I’m not about to take up paragliding (I know people who have broken their pelvises this way), ultramarathoning or tightrope-walking. I’m also not going to put makeup and heels on to go to the grocery store, wash my car every weekend, or place bucketsful of geraniums on every available exterior surface in the summertime.

I’ll still swim in the lake once summer vacation is officially over, I’ll run barefoot on the sand all year round, I’ll let my hair go grey and I’ll eat something other than bread or yogurt for breakfast. I probably see the other extremes so much because it’s not my native country, and I feel a need to figure out how I can find my place in it. But I love living in a country where such different approaches to life can coexist in mutual respect.I mentioned to my other brother (the crazy one) that I was writing about crazy Swiss people, and he said, “Oh, have you seen the video of that guy who set the world speed record climbing up the Eiger?” All I can say is Watch This Video. Ueli Steck is totally amazing. You think you’ve seen it all, and then…

I’m off to buy some flippers to swim in the lake. That ought to turn some heads on the beach.

Hiker heaven

Posted on August 15, 2011 by gydle

We’re back! What a hike. We did the “Tour de Mt. Ruan” — a four-day hike that straddles the mountainous border between Switzerland and France. I didn’t intend to do journaling on this blog, but I didn’t intend not to do it either, so here’s a recap of the highlights for anyone who’s interested.

Continue reading →

Take a hike

Posted on July 31, 2011 by gydle

Tomorrow is August 1st, Switzerland’s Fourth of July. In every village of the country, celebrations commemorate the pact that was signed in 1291 by the the three founding cantons of Uri, Schwytz and Nidwald. Bonfires are built to evoke the smoke-signal communications technology that was used in the middle ages. Several days beforehand, huge piles of wood are stacked together in preparation. When they’re lit, the villages’ volunteer firefighters stand, hoses trained steadily on the fire, as it burns higher and higher into the night, sparks shooting up into the air. This must be what my 40 franc annual firefighter tax is for. Continue reading →

Shopping

Posted on July 25, 2011 by gydle

My trips home to the US usually involve a certain amount of shopping. I’ve lived in Switzerland for 7 years now, but I still haven’t figured out how to buy clothes here. And there are some important items that cannot be found, at least at a reasonable price, on this side of the pond… Jelly Bellies, of course, top that list. Continue reading →

Fire!

Posted on June 29, 2011 by gydle

Looks like I spoke too soon with all my good news. That same day, right after I finished the post, I got two slamdunks. One, a massive forest fire is threatening my hometown of Los Alamos, New Mexico, and two, my brother (the one that’s not a geek, or rather, not quite as much of a geek. We’re all geeks because we were raised in Los Alamos) was in a car accident in Montana. Thankfully, he’s fine. But the fire is not. It has burned over 60,000 acres so far and as of last night, was zero percent contained. The town’s best kept secret, its awesome ski hill, is starting to burn. It’s horrible and dangerous and devastating. Continue reading →

Good news

Posted on June 27, 2011 by gydle

Good news: I don’t have a brain tumor after all!

I just got back from a visit to the GP and all my blood work is stultifyingly normal. His conclusion: my high blood pressure is a gift from my parents. We have wrestled it back into the normal range with the help of a white pill called Lisinopril.

I guess I can swallow this, given all the other great stuff mom and dad bequeathed, not the least of which is my stature. Those extra inches are most welcome when scanning crowds, reaching for things on top shelves, and overindulging in food and/or drink. I know it’s not fair. Perhaps the blood pressure is the price I must pay for possessing what is otherwise an excellent jelly belly and margarita processing apparatus.

Of course the doctor is speaking French, saying “ah, tension” which is French for “ah, blood pressure,” and I keep thinking he’s saying “attention” which means “watch out.” We were discussing the dosage, and I was explaining the lightheadedness I experienced on yesterday’s hike.

I’d tagged along on an outing with friends from Montreux, figuring the hike would be reasonable because Christine doesn’t like to suffer too much. Her husband Greg planned the hike, and it’s in Greg’s best interests (read: domestic harmony) to keep these hikes reasonable. I had not reconnoitered the route on a map beforehand. Not that I didn’t try, but the spot just happened to be just outside the edges of the two maps I have. Never mind, I told myself. Greg knows what he’s doing. Follow along for once.

It was a hot, beautiful day. We went 1,300 m (4,000 feet) pretty much straight up, to the top of a grassy bump just outside Gstaad called the Lauenehore. The sweat poured out of me, running down my back, forming rivulets down the insides of my arms, making my glasses slip off my nose, pooling in my belly button. By some amazing twist of luck, the cows hadn’t been released upon the grassy meadows we were traversing yet, so we didn’t have to dodge piles of fly-infested steaming cow shit as we climbed. Nonetheless Christine suffered. I suffered. Greg suffered. (He’s probably still suffering!) It was so terribly, terribly beautiful! All those Alps! All those amazing wildflowers! Suffering was never this good.

And as I huffed and chugged my way up at my normal breakneck pace, I felt my head starting to detach from the rest of me. I’m usually very secure while negotiating knife-edges and hopping blithely from rock to rock at high altitude, but there I was, grabbing onto tussocks of grass and rocks to steady myself. So this is what Marc means by vertigo. He must have low blood pressure!

The doctor nodded knowingly. The dehydration, combined with the medication… No surprise at all that I almost lost my head and my footing. On second thought, maybe he was saying attention. He said the next time I plan to climb 4,000 feet on a really hot day I can skip the lisinopril.

So anyway, I finally got to the summit, fueled by the thought of a nice chocolate-enhanced snooze. I may have mentioned in this blog that Switzerland is practically insect-free. I was wrong. Every insect in the country is on top of the Lauenehore. The roar of little wings up there was deafening. I waited bravely for Greg and Christine and then we got the hell out of there. I had my very own entourage for a while, until a breeze picked up. Now I know what movie stars feel like.

Finally we evaded them and stopped on a rock slide, drank deeply and ate our chocolate. Greg redeemed himself by naming most of the peaks in the panorama of mountains spread out before us. It was worth every drop of sweat and every bug bite. Switzerland can be stunning like that. I’ll post a photo when Christine puts them up on Facebook. I didn’t have my camera.

UPDATE: Here’s the photo!! Thanks, Greg.

We hustled down the other side just in time to catch a hot, packed tourist train back to Montreux. I felt bad taking the seat next to the nice old lady because I knew I must smell like a person who has been sweating profusely for seven hours. But my head was once again threatening to detach and I figured I’d be better able to manage it sitting down.

A shower, a beer, a bowl of pistachios later and my head was right back where it belonged, I was fining the boys for the towels they’d left lying on the bathroom floor (a new policy) and cleaning up the disaster area that had been our kitchen just twelve hours earlier.

More good news: the house-sized asteroid that was noticed just four days ago from two remotely-controlled telescopes in New Mexico will slip past us today by a margin of just 7,500 miles. The MIT brains say that even if it had hit us, it would have just broken to bits in the atmosphere. I also learned that we survived an even closer call last February when asteroid QC1 missed the Earth by a mere 3,400 miles.

Even more good news: I read in the Johns Hopkins Alumni Mag that the 100-pound rocks that mysteriously travel 100 meters or more along the floor of Death Valley and that have stumped scientists for more than 100 years (that’s a lot of 100s) aren’t being moved by pranksters or aliens but by a bizarre physical combination of ice and gale force winds. They set up spy cams and tested a model in a freezer. I’m sure you are as reassured as I am. I still think aliens are involved.

Rock at Racetrack Playa, Death Valley National Park, CA Credit: wikimedia commons, Pirate Scott

That’s enough good news for one day.

The bad news is that New Mexico is burning. Again.

Snap!

Posted on June 24, 2011 by gydle

When the first snapping turtle surfaced, village authorities were surprised. It got its picture in the paper, and an expert from the Lausanne Vivarium came and hauled it off, saying the turtle had probably been living there for ages, unnoticed. Great trepidation in the hamlet of Renens. These things can bite off your arm! Continue reading →

Nailed

Posted on June 18, 2011 by gydle

Art is what you can get away with. — Andy Warhol

Sometimes, instead of imitating life, art imitates art. This is more commonly known as forgery. If you can get away with it, I suppose you’re an artist of sorts.

Here’s a real-life story of some forgers that didn’t. Continue reading →

Mindset Mapping

Posted on June 12, 2011 by gydle

I keep returning to the idea of stereotypes. Or perhaps the idea keeps finding me.
As the poet John Donne so aptly put it:

No man is an island; every man
is a piece of the continent, a part of the main;

That’s the human dilemma, isn’t it? We’re alone, yet not alone. We each have our own unique perspective, the way things look from the island of moi. And yet we want so badly to belong, to make sense of all those other islands whose views are so unlike our own.

On that geographical note, I thought I’d share a series of maps designed by Bulgarian-born London-based “graphic designer slash illustrator” Yanko Tsvetkov. He has taken the idea of stereotyping up a notch, with maps that stereotype how different people stereotype each other. The whole idea is wildly politically incorrect, yet … You’ll see what I mean. Continue reading →

Space Invaders

Posted on June 10, 2011 by gydle

Those who visit this space frequently know I have a thing about weeds (see my Weed Manifestos I and II). I like control and order, so these uninvited invaders offend my sense of decorum. I’m also lazy, which means I don’t want to do the actual physical labor involved in removing them. In short, I’m torn. Recently I lightened up a bit and decided to let them have their place in my garden. At least until Oscar comes and digs them all up.

Today, a whole bunch of things came together that made me think again about weeds – and more generally about what constitutes an “undesirable.” In a press release from the University of Arizona, I read this:

The recent field of invasion biology faces a new challenge as 19 eminent ecologists issue a call to “end the bias against non-native species” in the journal Nature.

The group is questioning the automatic (and politically correct) assumption that native species are inherently more valuable and “good” than non-native ones. It turns out that plants and critters brought in by accident in luggage or on purpose to eradicate a pest sometimes thrive so well in their new habitats that they crowd out the oldies. This causes consternation and a call to wipe out the newcomers, to put back the clock, to return nature to its “pristine” state. But as endless examples have shown, once these space invaders have gotten established, there is no going back. Just look at the cane toads in Australia, the zebra mussels in the Great Lakes and the Kudzu vine or Tamarisk in the Eastern US. Like it or not, they’re here to stay.

Reading that paragraph over, it struck me that this isn’t just a problem with plants and animals. Here in Switzerland many people exhibit exactly this same bias against other, “invading” human populations. They don’t look right, smell right, eat the right things. They’re crowding us out of our jobs! They don’t share our ideas about what’s important! I think it’s actually a very human tendency – resistance to change. We often assume that how things were is automatically superior to how things are, particularly when newcomers are involved.

But it’s certainly a selective resistance. As the press release mentioned, native species often do just as much, if not more damage than invaders. Nobody would mind at all if the bark beetles died out, gobbled up by, say, ladybugs from Outer Mongolia. I doubt anyone would fuss if the Anopheles Mosquito kicked up its heels and disappeared off the face of the Earth. Our outrage seems to be proportionally related to the cuteness of the local species and the ickiness of the invading one. Even our word choice screams bias — we employ the adjectives “invasive” and “non-native” much more frequently than “opportunistic” or “exotic” (this last is often used to refer to non-native plants sold in nurseries, however, which can be classified as attractive and thus are okay).

Photo: katanski

In a remarkable coincidence, I came across an article in the New York Times about a cute little hamster living in the Alsace region of France that’s having a hard time surviving because the farmers have stopped planting alfalfa and are putting in corn or selling off their land for housing developments. These guys wake up after a winter of hibernation and there’s nothing to eat! There are only about 800 of them left in Alsace, although they’re apparently thriving in Eastern Europe and in no danger of extinction. The EU is planning to slap the French with up to $25 million in fines if they don’t take measures to get the numbers up.

Meanwhile, in Switzerland, the two wolves that are permitted to live in the Alps are under close scrutiny. They’d better behave themselves, because if they so much as show a whisker near a herd of sheep the hue and cry goes up and the guns come out. Livelihoods are at stake! This native species was eradicated ages ago long before anyone had written a thesis on “invasive species,” and nobody really wants them back, because the newcomers (people, sheep and cattle) aren’t interested in living in a balanced predator-prey ecosystem. The only predator here is the cheesemaker, the butcher and, eventually, the bank. (That’s Switzerland for you!) I guess their cuteness factor just doesn’t make the cut.

All this underscores a problem I’ve had with conservation biology (and now the new field, “Invasion Biology”) for a long time — that we’ve made the mistake of taking ourselves out of the equation. This is both mathematically and philosophically irresponsible. We don’t exist in parallel to nature, where one kind of reasoning applies to us, and another to the rest of the natural world. Our species is just another species, deeply interwoven with all the others, altering things irreversibly all the time, just like they are.

I read today that every human parent passes 30 mutations on to his/her children. Like the rest of the natural world, we are in a state of constant adaptation. Nothing stays the same! We’re not going to stop traveling, so invaders will continue to invade. It doesn’t look like we’re going to stop heating up the planet, either, so habitats are going to change, making room for even more invaders. We’re invading each other, they’re invading us, we’re invading them — it’s a war zone out there! So once again, I say, carpe diem, take a good look at what’s around you and savor it right now. It might be covered with Kudzu next week.

Come to think of it, isn’t there an argument that life on Earth originated from stuff that hitched a ride on a meteorite? Maybe the whole shebang we call “life” is one big massive accidental invasion. God is up there saying “now look what happened, I had a perfectly decent planet and now it’s crawling with vermin…”

Gydle

Category Archives: Switzerland