Its 8am. We are currently on a train headed to Lake Como, Italy. Which is 5 1/2 hrs away, just on the other side of the border of switzerland. We'll be spending our 4 day easter weekend there. Switzerland has public holidays the Friday and Monday of Easter. Therefore all of Switzerland is heading out for a vacation and at every stop the train fills up more and more.
Right now I'm very tired and not in a good mood because Adam's daily alarm went off at 6:30, 45 minutes before we needed to wake up to catch the train. I'm normally not a very nice person to be around when my sleep gets interrupted but after these last 2 weeks I need as much sleep as I can get.
For 2 weeks I've been working every day 7am-4pm. Re-learning all the medical/surgical nursing I've forgotten over the years. Learning about heart surgeries and heart problems that I've never taken care of before. Learning various medications that have completely different names than in the US. Learning the organisation and rythym of the unit. Learning how to chart. Oh and did I mention that I'm doing all of this in another language!
My brain is fried. I'm mentally drained. To make matters worse, for my first week, right after working 9 hours and speaking french 9 hours, I had one last full week of french lessons. Then I'd go take a class at the gym (can't take a break now, wedding is less than a month away, need muscles) On Friday of my first week they let me go home 2 hours early because it was so obvious how utterly exhausted I was, I couldn't even think straight. I was like a zombie. I went home and promptly took a 90 min nap. And napped Saturday as well.
The hardest thing is by far the language. Nurses, remember in nursing school we had to learn medical shorthand and abbreviations. Abbreviations for diseases, shorthand and symbols for the little words you get too lazy to write in your charting or in prescriptions. Now try doing it in another language. I bring a little notebook with me everyday to write in that has pages full of just that. To all my nurse friends who are not native English speakers, I don't know how you did it! Everyone reading this right now needs to go hug a foreign doctor or nurse, there's tons in the US so you have plenty of opportunities. I feel so ignorant for never thinking about how hard it must have been for them. Americans can be like that
My first 2 weeks I mainly observed and learned how to do basic things that I'd forgotten like dressing changes and EKGs, helping patients with their bath (luckily most are pretty independant). Next week I think I'm going to start getting assigned simple patients to take care of.
It's mainly a post-op floor for mostly cardiac surgery patients after they have stabilized in the ICU. There are other surgeries as well, like thyroidectomies, back surgeries and GYN stuff.
Charting is all on paper. Nothing is on the computer. And french/swiss people have weird handwriting that I have a hard time deciphering. They have totally different ways of writing certain letters and numbers. The number 1 is like an A without the line through the middle (because in Arabic, where our numbers came from, it was based on angles, and that shape has 1 angle, and they still write it like that). A 4 sometimes looks like a sloppy 6 to me. A capital M looks like a large lowercase n because they don't make that little downward angle in the middle. And a few other letters aren't like Americans typically write them. And it's a half-cursive, half-normal print mix. I'm always having to ask what is written on the chart. I'm getting used to it though. But reading doctors handwriting... impossible.
As far as nursing duties goes, it's not that different. Some materials are different but most are the same or similar. They use plastic bottles for IV drips instead of plastic bags. And unless it's a dangerous drug like a blood thinner, they don't use IV pumps. There is no medication machine like a pyxis guarding all the drugs. It's just a wall of drawers, alphabetized, unlocked. Except for opoids and such, obviously locked up.
The patients are much more patient than Americans. Which is a huge plus. If you tell them "no" they accept it and don't ask questions.
There's less documentation than in the US. Also huge plus. They worry of being sued for everything you do just doesn't exist here. It's a very American thing. Over charting, over treating, over intervening. Over-CYA (cover your ass). One thing I've realized being out of America is everything there is just over done. It's a culture of excess. I like being away from that.
Some of the values for labs are different because they use different units of measurement. For example a normal blood sugar value here is between 3.3-6. In the US it's 60-100.
The only thing I don't quite like is that the locker room for students and interns is unisex. It's a tiny room without anywhere to hide. So I wear my undershirt to work so I don't have to take off my shirt. And I change my pants as soon as I walk in as fast as I can if there's no guys in there yet, or wait till they leave. It's only 1 or 2 guys, and in europe it's not a huge deal, but as an American it's kind of awkward. Even though, technically, my underwear covers just as much as my bikini does. So I guess it's not a big deal so I'll get used to it.
Oh yeah the other huge adjustment that I still don't like... taking care of men. For a week and a half I successfully avoided having to go near man's private parts but I knew that would eventually have to end. Pre-op cardiac patients have to be 100% shaved on the front side of their body before surgery. I just have to keep in mind that Europeans are more open than Americans about that sort of thing and it's more awkward for me than for them. Which was the other way around when I worked in Labor and Delivery. The patients were all shy about having their hoo-ha's looked at by everyone that walked in the room, while us nurses never thought twice about it.
The staff is incredibly nice and welcoming and supportive and understanding of the learning curve I'm suffering. They help me with all the words and abbreviations and medication names I don't understand. And if they're all joking around and laughing and I'm just sitting there blank faced they say "you didn't get that did you?" and they will then explain the joke to me. Which includes teaching me interesting slang expressions and cuss words. Which there are so many more of in french than english.
They're always making fun of American accents but they mean no harm, it's like how Americans like to randomly break out in a British accent. I like to make them try to pronounce my name in english, and they just don't get it. (I've had to frenchify the pronunciation of my name these last 2 years, here my name is "laurenne" with emphasis on the "renne" and the impossible, back-of-the-throat french R sound)
Almost all of them are from France. The conditions and salary for nurses in france are just terrible so a lot of them come to switzerland where they get paid double. Plus the Swiss just have a hard time recruiting their people to be nurses. Years ago they recruited tons of nurses from Quebec, then from Portugal. Now the Swiss have their panties in a bunch and only want to hire swiss nurses. There was recently a report on the radio about how to make the medical field more appealing to young Swiss people, because there's just so few.
On my first day, as we were sitting down to chart our morning rounds, the nurse I was following stopped mid sentence and said "oh, before we start, I have to show you something very important" she turned around to the wall of drawers of medications and opened the largest one, which is unmarked, inside it was full of chocolate! I said "yeah this is obviously a Swiss hospital"
Friday, April 14, 2017
Tuesday, March 28, 2017
I got a job!!!!
Starting Monday, April 3rd, I am no longer unemployed! It will be almost exactly 1 year to the day that I had my last day at Stanford and worked as a nurse. It took much longer than we expected but hey, that's life abroad.
Quick sidenote, I will be working but not getting paid. (so much for the 2nd income we were looking forward to) Its technically an internship. Those aren't paid. But its OK because I won't be sitting on my butt all day with nothing to do. The process of getting this internship was quite difficult and that's what I'm going to explain in this blog today.
So I got that letter from the Red Cross at the very end of January telling me I did not meet all the requirements to have my diploma recognized and that I needed to do a 6 month internship in med/surg to make up for it. For 2 straight weeks I called countless hospitals with no luck. Finally, mid February, a hospital said they'd hire me and brought me in for an interview. This was a public hospital. They explained that by law, any internship over 3 weeks long had to be paid. But they couldn't afford to pay me for 6 months so they said I needed to apply for unemployment so that I could be paid in some way, shape or form. I took all the steps with the unemployment office only to get to my interview and they tell me I don't qualify for unemployment because you need to have worked for 12 months in Switzerland to qualify. I knew this but I said this wasn't because I was technically unemployed, its because this hospital required me to have unemployment benefits so that somebody could pay me for my internship. Even with this special case, I still didn't qualify, so the hospital said they could not give me an internship.
Back to the drawing board. I reached out to 2 private hospitals (I'll refer to them as #1 and #2). These are the 2 hospitals I had interviews with last summer. Private institutions are not regulated by the government so they can get away with not paying me. I've mentioned before that the private hospitals are for people who pay big bucks for the highest tier insurance and its like a luxury hotel hospital and you treat the patients like royalty. Not my cup of tea but whatever.
Hospital #1 replied immediately with an offer for an internship, its a hospital 1 hour away by train. Hospital #2 is a 10 minute walk from my apartment, my american nurse friend works there and they have a maternity unit for me to make potential connections with. Obviously the better choice. But #2 took forever to get back to me, and even when they did, took forever to get the ball rolling on an offer. So I accepted #1 and was set to start 2 weeks later. Right before I was supposed to start, hospital #2 finally got their act together and gave me an offer (after I emailed them saying I had to accept at another hospital because they were taking too long). I struggled with what to do. I was told it might not be the best idea to cancel an offer I've already accepted. I didn't really want to burn any bridges but #2 is just obviously better for me, so I accepted it. I felt really shitty about having to cancel the internship with hospital #1, my french teacher helped me write a very professional email to them.
So, nurse friends, get ready for all my future posts about what its like to be a med/surg nurse in Switzerland.
Also, this is why I love Europe and where America needs to take notes and learn. Seriously. At my meeting with the nurse manager of hospital #2 she asked me if I needed any days off. I said I needed a week in May for my wedding. The response I got: "oh, you're wedding! pff! take off 2 weeks if you need it!" Then I said there were 2 weekends in September I probably would need off. Her response: "well you should think about taking a week or 2 during the summer. May to September is a long time without a vacation" Boy, do I love that European mentality. That would never happen in the US.
In other news, I have 2 funny stories.
- Adam and I seem to have not the smartest French teachers, or, it seems like they don't get out much. After going to Finland, Adam was telling his teacher about the northern lights. She had no idea what he was talking about. He explained what they were, still she didn't know what he was talking about. Thinking he was just speaking really terrible french, he showed her a picture of the northern lights, her response: "oh! you mean fog!" .... no! what fog is green?! Turns out, she has never ever heard of the phenomenon of the northern lights... seriously? I don't get it.
The only person I will pardon for not knowing this was a friend in Madagascar, she is Malagasy, it made perfect sense to me when she commented on my photo asking what that was.
-When I told my teacher about Finland, she had no idea what a snow mobile was. I had to explain that to her. She lives in a country full of mountains, even has a chalet in said mountains, and has no idea what a snowmobile is...smh
-Then, I was explaining to my teacher how Adam and I find all of our cheap flights to the US. I said that if you fly in the summer time though, it will always be expensive no matter what. She said, "well unless its winter in the US" I gave her a confused look. She said "like in June or July when its winter in part of the US" I stared back at her with the most confused look ever and she said "isn't the United States divided into both hemispheres?" I said "um... no... not at all. Its all quite far north of the equator. The equator is in South America" She didn't know this. Basic geography people!
Further in our conversation about air travel I also had to explain to her that you are actually allowed to bring food on a plane. And if you buy any food or drink after security then its allowed on. And that these days it usually costs to check a bag (that one she just did not believe) I think its been a loooong time since she's been outside of Switzerland. She is even shocked when I tell her how much cheaper things are in France.
-2nd funny story, its a little vulgar, I'll try to tone it down. But I have to tell it. One day I was listening to the Swiss morning radio on my computer. I clicked on a story they had done called "Fist F**king." I clicked on it because I figured it had to be a metaphor for something and I wondered what it was. Nope! Not a metaphor! Not at all! They actually had a sex therapist on discussing this particular sexual act. She said the idea came to her to talk about it on the radio when she saw her teenage son watching porn and they were doing this and he didn't think it was physically possible. She discusses why people like it, who likes it, how its done, the risks, the pleasures, the social connotation. All discussed in very professional, matter of fact way, as if they were talking about the weather report. I couldn't believe my ears. But I forget, this is Europe. Sex is not a taboo subject. Americans are prudes.
Quick sidenote, I will be working but not getting paid. (so much for the 2nd income we were looking forward to) Its technically an internship. Those aren't paid. But its OK because I won't be sitting on my butt all day with nothing to do. The process of getting this internship was quite difficult and that's what I'm going to explain in this blog today.
So I got that letter from the Red Cross at the very end of January telling me I did not meet all the requirements to have my diploma recognized and that I needed to do a 6 month internship in med/surg to make up for it. For 2 straight weeks I called countless hospitals with no luck. Finally, mid February, a hospital said they'd hire me and brought me in for an interview. This was a public hospital. They explained that by law, any internship over 3 weeks long had to be paid. But they couldn't afford to pay me for 6 months so they said I needed to apply for unemployment so that I could be paid in some way, shape or form. I took all the steps with the unemployment office only to get to my interview and they tell me I don't qualify for unemployment because you need to have worked for 12 months in Switzerland to qualify. I knew this but I said this wasn't because I was technically unemployed, its because this hospital required me to have unemployment benefits so that somebody could pay me for my internship. Even with this special case, I still didn't qualify, so the hospital said they could not give me an internship.
Back to the drawing board. I reached out to 2 private hospitals (I'll refer to them as #1 and #2). These are the 2 hospitals I had interviews with last summer. Private institutions are not regulated by the government so they can get away with not paying me. I've mentioned before that the private hospitals are for people who pay big bucks for the highest tier insurance and its like a luxury hotel hospital and you treat the patients like royalty. Not my cup of tea but whatever.
Hospital #1 replied immediately with an offer for an internship, its a hospital 1 hour away by train. Hospital #2 is a 10 minute walk from my apartment, my american nurse friend works there and they have a maternity unit for me to make potential connections with. Obviously the better choice. But #2 took forever to get back to me, and even when they did, took forever to get the ball rolling on an offer. So I accepted #1 and was set to start 2 weeks later. Right before I was supposed to start, hospital #2 finally got their act together and gave me an offer (after I emailed them saying I had to accept at another hospital because they were taking too long). I struggled with what to do. I was told it might not be the best idea to cancel an offer I've already accepted. I didn't really want to burn any bridges but #2 is just obviously better for me, so I accepted it. I felt really shitty about having to cancel the internship with hospital #1, my french teacher helped me write a very professional email to them.
So, nurse friends, get ready for all my future posts about what its like to be a med/surg nurse in Switzerland.
Also, this is why I love Europe and where America needs to take notes and learn. Seriously. At my meeting with the nurse manager of hospital #2 she asked me if I needed any days off. I said I needed a week in May for my wedding. The response I got: "oh, you're wedding! pff! take off 2 weeks if you need it!" Then I said there were 2 weekends in September I probably would need off. Her response: "well you should think about taking a week or 2 during the summer. May to September is a long time without a vacation" Boy, do I love that European mentality. That would never happen in the US.
In other news, I have 2 funny stories.
- Adam and I seem to have not the smartest French teachers, or, it seems like they don't get out much. After going to Finland, Adam was telling his teacher about the northern lights. She had no idea what he was talking about. He explained what they were, still she didn't know what he was talking about. Thinking he was just speaking really terrible french, he showed her a picture of the northern lights, her response: "oh! you mean fog!" .... no! what fog is green?! Turns out, she has never ever heard of the phenomenon of the northern lights... seriously? I don't get it.
The only person I will pardon for not knowing this was a friend in Madagascar, she is Malagasy, it made perfect sense to me when she commented on my photo asking what that was.
-When I told my teacher about Finland, she had no idea what a snow mobile was. I had to explain that to her. She lives in a country full of mountains, even has a chalet in said mountains, and has no idea what a snowmobile is...smh
-Then, I was explaining to my teacher how Adam and I find all of our cheap flights to the US. I said that if you fly in the summer time though, it will always be expensive no matter what. She said, "well unless its winter in the US" I gave her a confused look. She said "like in June or July when its winter in part of the US" I stared back at her with the most confused look ever and she said "isn't the United States divided into both hemispheres?" I said "um... no... not at all. Its all quite far north of the equator. The equator is in South America" She didn't know this. Basic geography people!
Further in our conversation about air travel I also had to explain to her that you are actually allowed to bring food on a plane. And if you buy any food or drink after security then its allowed on. And that these days it usually costs to check a bag (that one she just did not believe) I think its been a loooong time since she's been outside of Switzerland. She is even shocked when I tell her how much cheaper things are in France.
-2nd funny story, its a little vulgar, I'll try to tone it down. But I have to tell it. One day I was listening to the Swiss morning radio on my computer. I clicked on a story they had done called "Fist F**king." I clicked on it because I figured it had to be a metaphor for something and I wondered what it was. Nope! Not a metaphor! Not at all! They actually had a sex therapist on discussing this particular sexual act. She said the idea came to her to talk about it on the radio when she saw her teenage son watching porn and they were doing this and he didn't think it was physically possible. She discusses why people like it, who likes it, how its done, the risks, the pleasures, the social connotation. All discussed in very professional, matter of fact way, as if they were talking about the weather report. I couldn't believe my ears. But I forget, this is Europe. Sex is not a taboo subject. Americans are prudes.
Friday, February 24, 2017
Winter
SNOWBOARDING
It's Thursday morning and I'm currently on the train on my way to the mountains for a snowboarding lesson. Skiing gave me horrible pain in my knees, so much so that I got really nervous about injuring them. I took a lesson to try to fix my bad form but that only slightly helped the pain. So now I'm a snowboarder. Snowboarding is not very common in Europe, maybe only 5% of people do it. I still like skiing better but I have no more knee pain so I'm sticking with snowboarding. It's just much harder to learn with harder falls. I wear butt pads, knee pads, wrist guards and a helmet. I'm too old for an injury. And in the last 2 weeks, with the kinds of falls I've taken, I'm certain I've prevented 1 concussion and a few petallar and tailbone fractures
Its funny, when I was little and would go rollerblading my mom wanted me to wear all the padding but I refused, totally uncool to be seen with all that when you're 10. But now I want all the padding available!
I don't know how it is in the States, if you're a skier then tell me. But here, and France too, people cut you in line like crazy to get on the ski lifts. Very obvious, blatant line cutting. Whole families, encouraging their kids to push ahead. It drives me crazy. Last week I finally turned around and said something to a little girl who kept kicking at my board with her skis, saying she wanted the snowboard out of her way. Her dad was right there and didn't stop her. I told her I wasn't gonna go anywhere if she kept kicking me like that, she stopped. And why do parents never apologize when their stupid kid skis into me, while I'm struggling on my board just to stay up, causing me to fall and their kid keeps on skiing past. As if it's my fault because I'm the adult. Friends: don't be that parent, be aware if your kid is a jerk
THE SWISS RED CROSS
the bane of my existence here in Switzerland. Ugh! I started the process of getting my nursing license recognized here in January 2016. The paperwork I had to compile, it was just so ridiculous. Finally in October I sent off my file for the final step and had to wait 3 months for what I thought would be my Swiss nursing license. Adam and I were making plans as if I'd have a real job in February. Well 3 months came and went and in late January I got a letter from the Swiss Red Cross telling me that I did NOT meet the requirements to get my diploma recognized. I am short 1200 university credit hours in hospital clinicals (Thank you Xavier!) And also, 1 year of working in med/surg is not enough. Never mind that I worked 6 years in high risk labor and delivery units, L&D nurses don't exist here so they don't care about all that.
So they are requiring me to do a 6 month internship in med/surg, which is most likely unpaid, before they will allow me to have a Swiss nursing license.
I almost had a temper tantrum when I read that letter. For the next 2 weeks I called all sorts of hospitals and agencies asking about this internship and got "no we don't do that" or "we don't have any internship positions available" from everyone I contacted. Both healthcare agencies I contacted told me they don't assist with internships, the Red Cross said they don't help either, it's my responsibility.
But luckily I have a few connections here and through the grapevine I was able to get an interview for an internship on a pulmonary floor. That's for Monday the 27th. The thought of working med/surg again makes me cringe. And pulmonary too, I hate phlegm, and I better not have to take care of anyone on a vent or I'll walk right out that door.
But it might be a blessing in disguise that I get to be hand held for 6 months before venturing out on my own. But I'm dreading it so much I've considered finding a job as an Au Pair, and you know how much I dislike kids. But I'd rather take care of kids all day than med/surg patients, and that's saying something. So we'll see what even happens at this interview. It's probably best to continue with nursing after all the effort I've put in, anyways. So that's to be continued....
THE DAY TO DAY
So mostly I'm bored a lot but I do keep busy. I go grocery shopping across the lake in France, that takes up half a day. I meet up with Adam when his business trips are close to home. I met in the middle to see my friend who lives in Germany. I take classes at the gym almost every day. I also have almost daily french lessons. Adam's company is offering each of us 50 hours of private lessons. I'm working on expressions and idioms to make me sound more fluent. French has a ton of them, more than English. It's hard to remember them. I also got a book called French for Nurses and I learn names of all the hospital supplies, how to describe a bedsore, and all the various ways of asking the patient about their bodily functions.
I remember in the Cross-Cultural Training class we took the lady told us the 6 month mark is the hardest. Well she was spot on with that! At the 6 month mark we went to the US, to Florida, did a lot of wedding stuff, stayed with my parents, Adam's parents came to see us. It was only 6 days and very busy. Not long enough to fully enjoy. For the first time in 2 years I really didn't want to come back to Europe, I did not want to get on that plane. And when I got home, I did not want to be here. It lasted a week. I was really down in the dumps. Adam left immediately on a 4 day business trip. I was super bored. No job. No interest in speaking French. Then that Red Cross letter came right as I was pulling out of my funk and it pulled me right back down.
That article I posted the other day about trailing spouses being miserable... well I'm not miserable and I'm not depressed, but jeez its hard. I LOVE my job in the US but I've never missed it. Well now I miss it. When my friend here went into labor in January and was texting me about it, I wanted so bad to go to the hospital and play nurse for her. I LOVE my friends in the US but I never felt sad about missing them because I'm used to living far from them, but now I really miss them. At least in Grenoble we had activities and friends and a social life but we're having a hard time finding that here. I have 2 American girlfriends here and they're great, so that really helps because they understand my expat blues. I'm lucky to have them. And of course Adam, my very best friend, our relationship grows stronger every day.
I think the problem for me, specifically, is that since 2012 when I started travel nursing I've been chronically unsettled. This didn't bother me at first, I was having a blast with travel nursing. Then I arrived in San Francsico in 2014 and, just like when you meet "the one," I knew I wanted to stay there forever. But of course "the one" became my boyfriend that same year and then I went to France and that was just gonna be temporary. Then Switzerland happened rather unexpectedly and that's also supposed to be temporary, but we don't know how temporary or when we'll leave. I'm so sick of living life in 3 month intervals. Now its less, its like week by week.
But probably in 10 years when I'm bogged down with kids and work I'll look back on these unsettled, childless days when I sleep 9 hours every night and miss them. So I don't think about it, I just keep swimming and keep a positive attitude and look forward to our next cool vacation. Which is Arctic Finland.
I found out something totally awesome that will come in handy when I'm having a bad day. We have a wellness/natural therapy thing we added to our health insurance. So, for example, I got $200 towards my gym membership. But the best is massages! It covers massages! I can get a 1 hour massage and only have to pay $20! I can get about 10 massages per year with this, I've used one and can't wait to get more!
RESTAURANT JOB
when working at the restaurant in December I got really stressed and behind on a very busy friday lunch rush. I forgot to give a table their salads. Heaven forbid. They didn't tell me I forgot, as any normal person would do when their waitress forgets something. Instead they told the head server as they walked out the door to leave. I got in trouble. I asked her why the hell didn't they just tell me during their meal that I'd forgotten and I'd have gone and gotten them their salad (which in Switzerland is a measly plate of just lettuce for $5). It was so busy. I had 10 tables. Easy mistake that's easily fixed. She said the Swiss will never say something like that, either they will tell you at the end, or say nothing and give the restaurant a bad review on TripAdvisor, which is all restaurant owners here care about.
Since there's no tipping standard here, you can't just take your anger out on a forgetful server by not tipping them, your anger gets directed at the whole restaurant. So TripAdvisor reviews are everything. (I, personally, was the reason for their most recent 5 star review)
Then I explained that 2 servers for 20 tables and 50 customers is just insane and how could I be expected to not get behind in those conditions. In the US that restaurant would have at least 3 servers, maybe 4. She said here, there is server school, which she took to be a career waitress, and you are expected to take care of 40 customers by yourself, and that's just how it is. Restaurants are typically small, personally owned, wait staff is expensive (I got paid $20/hr) so it's got to be like that.
SPAIN AND NEW YEARS EVE
So we took an awesome 11 day road trip around Southern Spain: Andalusia. Starting in Barcelona and visiting Montserrat, an old monastery in a very cool looking mountain. Then on to Valencia for 3 days, where we stayed in a hostel and spent Christmas eve and made some friends and went on a pub crawl that I very much regretted the next morning. Christmas day we drove 6 hours to Sevilla, and from there took day trips to Cordoba, Granada, and Ronda. We had a great time. Spain is so different from the rest of Europe and I love it. The history is so interesting, 700 years of Islamic rule, Spanish Inquisition, and now a fun, social, laid back culture with great food.
Because Spain should technically, geographically be in a time zone behind the rest of Europe, but it's not, everything there happens later. You can't even eat dinner until 8pm because that's when restaurants open. Our tour guide in Sevilla referred to 12 noon as the morning, and 7pm as the afternoon.
They don't do much celebrating on dec 24th or 25th in Spain. The gift giving day is January 6th. So the week between xmas and new years is huge sales and people flocking to the stores to buy stuff. They also don't have Santa in Spain. Gifts come from family, not a fat guy with a beard and reindeer.
New Years Eve we were supposed to fly back to Geneva, with a layover in Lisbon, Portugal. We would have probably been on the train home from the Geneva airport when the clock struck midnight. We don't really care about NYE, its too overrated, so we didn't care.
But our first flight to Lisbon was delayed and we realized it would cause us to miss our connection to Geneva. We spoke to the airlines and they said they realized this and it would be taken care of when we got to Lisbon. We landed in Lisbon and staff were waiting to take those people missing connections to a bus. The bus took us to a 4 star Marriott where we were served a free buffet meal. We took a sardine-packed subway downtown to where I read there'd be stuff going on. Got there at 11:45 and ended up having a great view for some awesome fireworks. We paid not one single dollar from the time we landed till we left the next morning. Great way to start 2017!
BELGIUM
I met up with one of my best friends in Belgium one weekend and spend a saturday with her and her bf in Bruges. Adorable town, by the way. Sunday we met up with one of Adam's friends who lives in Antwerp, Belgium and he took us to the Red Star Line Museum. This is the opposite of Ellis Island, it was one of the main ports where everyone immigrating to the US at the turn of the 1900s left from. Soooo cool! So interesting. Especially since my entire family came to the US during this time. I stood there reading every little thing in every exhibit and eventually was so behind I couldn't find Adam. At the end was a room all about anti-immigrant sentiments in the US at the time, against the thousands of Germans, Poles, Russians, Italians etc, that were coming over. There were political cartoons that you could literally put into a newspaper today and not know they were 100 years old. It was exactly the same issues. It was very interesting and insightful to see. History repeats itself, we should learn from it. In the words of Forrest Gump, and that's all I have to say about that....
Adam's friend also told us a funny story about Belgian/Dutch last names. When Napoleon ruled there, people didn't have last names, didn't need them. so Napoleon made a law forcing everyone to have a last name. Most people gave themselves last names that were practical, if they lived on a hill, their last name was Hill (in dutch of course). If they were nice people, their last name was "good neighbor". His friend's wife's last name is "dogs" maybe her family were dog lovers. Some people with a sense of humor didn't take this law seriously and thought it was just a temporary thing, and for generations their family's last name has been "amazing orgasm." Luckily, Belgian government allows people with ridiculous names like this the ability to change them.
I also learned at a bar in Bruges that you shouldn't serve a beer unless it has a matching glass for it. If not, the bartender will apologize. I've noticed in France in Switzerland too, when I order a beer, its always in the same name glass.
McDONALD'S
I've only eaten at McDonald's (or as the french say: MacDoh) twice in my 2 years out here but I've noticed some interesting differences when walking by. Only a McDonald's in Switzerland would serve cheese fries with venison meat. (all swiss restaurants serve deer... and wild boar) And only a McDonald's in France would serve a raclette burger. Once they featured a "Chicago BBQ burger".. Adam and I found this a little strange because I'm quite certain BBQ does not come from Chicago. But the French would never know this, all they see are 2 American words and instantly think its cool. It's funny how they change their menu for the culture they are in. In India, McDonald's only had chicken and veggie burgers, of course with curry and all sorts of flavors. McDonald's here are also very nice, clean, and have a separate cafe with coffee and pastries. McDonald's in Switzerland is crazy expensive. Dollar menu? yeah right! A big mac is $11. A happy meal is $7.
SWISS MILITARY
so my french teacher also teaches me a lot about swiss culture and other things about how to live in Switzerland. She told me that the mountains are full of bunkers for emergency situations if the entire population needed to hide out in some crazy nuclear war situation or something. Her husband went to one during his military service. They have ones with food, supplies, makeshift hospitals, everything you could need. It reminds me of District 13 in the Hunger Games
I've also heard the borders are lined with explosives to shut the country off from said crazy situation, but I'm not so sure that's true, nobody has been able to confirm that one.
Switzerland may be neutral but they have a very strong, very wealthy military. A military that, I've heard, you don't want to mess with. And every Swiss man has to do a certain amount of required military service.
Switzerland is a very rich country today but this wasn't always so. Switzerland was a little country of mountains, cows, and farmers. Then came WWI and WWII. They were neutral. While the rest of Europe was spending money on their military and then afterwards spending money on rebuilding their country that had been bombed to smithereens (like France and Germany) Switzerland never spent a dime doing those things. The Swiss are known as good watch makers, thus good at making precise tools that the military could use. They sold military devices and machinery to both sides during WW2 and made a fortune. And voila! Now you have a country where a big mac costs $11
But I do like it here....
It's Thursday morning and I'm currently on the train on my way to the mountains for a snowboarding lesson. Skiing gave me horrible pain in my knees, so much so that I got really nervous about injuring them. I took a lesson to try to fix my bad form but that only slightly helped the pain. So now I'm a snowboarder. Snowboarding is not very common in Europe, maybe only 5% of people do it. I still like skiing better but I have no more knee pain so I'm sticking with snowboarding. It's just much harder to learn with harder falls. I wear butt pads, knee pads, wrist guards and a helmet. I'm too old for an injury. And in the last 2 weeks, with the kinds of falls I've taken, I'm certain I've prevented 1 concussion and a few petallar and tailbone fractures
Its funny, when I was little and would go rollerblading my mom wanted me to wear all the padding but I refused, totally uncool to be seen with all that when you're 10. But now I want all the padding available!
I don't know how it is in the States, if you're a skier then tell me. But here, and France too, people cut you in line like crazy to get on the ski lifts. Very obvious, blatant line cutting. Whole families, encouraging their kids to push ahead. It drives me crazy. Last week I finally turned around and said something to a little girl who kept kicking at my board with her skis, saying she wanted the snowboard out of her way. Her dad was right there and didn't stop her. I told her I wasn't gonna go anywhere if she kept kicking me like that, she stopped. And why do parents never apologize when their stupid kid skis into me, while I'm struggling on my board just to stay up, causing me to fall and their kid keeps on skiing past. As if it's my fault because I'm the adult. Friends: don't be that parent, be aware if your kid is a jerk
THE SWISS RED CROSS
the bane of my existence here in Switzerland. Ugh! I started the process of getting my nursing license recognized here in January 2016. The paperwork I had to compile, it was just so ridiculous. Finally in October I sent off my file for the final step and had to wait 3 months for what I thought would be my Swiss nursing license. Adam and I were making plans as if I'd have a real job in February. Well 3 months came and went and in late January I got a letter from the Swiss Red Cross telling me that I did NOT meet the requirements to get my diploma recognized. I am short 1200 university credit hours in hospital clinicals (Thank you Xavier!) And also, 1 year of working in med/surg is not enough. Never mind that I worked 6 years in high risk labor and delivery units, L&D nurses don't exist here so they don't care about all that.
So they are requiring me to do a 6 month internship in med/surg, which is most likely unpaid, before they will allow me to have a Swiss nursing license.
I almost had a temper tantrum when I read that letter. For the next 2 weeks I called all sorts of hospitals and agencies asking about this internship and got "no we don't do that" or "we don't have any internship positions available" from everyone I contacted. Both healthcare agencies I contacted told me they don't assist with internships, the Red Cross said they don't help either, it's my responsibility.
But luckily I have a few connections here and through the grapevine I was able to get an interview for an internship on a pulmonary floor. That's for Monday the 27th. The thought of working med/surg again makes me cringe. And pulmonary too, I hate phlegm, and I better not have to take care of anyone on a vent or I'll walk right out that door.
But it might be a blessing in disguise that I get to be hand held for 6 months before venturing out on my own. But I'm dreading it so much I've considered finding a job as an Au Pair, and you know how much I dislike kids. But I'd rather take care of kids all day than med/surg patients, and that's saying something. So we'll see what even happens at this interview. It's probably best to continue with nursing after all the effort I've put in, anyways. So that's to be continued....
THE DAY TO DAY
So mostly I'm bored a lot but I do keep busy. I go grocery shopping across the lake in France, that takes up half a day. I meet up with Adam when his business trips are close to home. I met in the middle to see my friend who lives in Germany. I take classes at the gym almost every day. I also have almost daily french lessons. Adam's company is offering each of us 50 hours of private lessons. I'm working on expressions and idioms to make me sound more fluent. French has a ton of them, more than English. It's hard to remember them. I also got a book called French for Nurses and I learn names of all the hospital supplies, how to describe a bedsore, and all the various ways of asking the patient about their bodily functions.
I remember in the Cross-Cultural Training class we took the lady told us the 6 month mark is the hardest. Well she was spot on with that! At the 6 month mark we went to the US, to Florida, did a lot of wedding stuff, stayed with my parents, Adam's parents came to see us. It was only 6 days and very busy. Not long enough to fully enjoy. For the first time in 2 years I really didn't want to come back to Europe, I did not want to get on that plane. And when I got home, I did not want to be here. It lasted a week. I was really down in the dumps. Adam left immediately on a 4 day business trip. I was super bored. No job. No interest in speaking French. Then that Red Cross letter came right as I was pulling out of my funk and it pulled me right back down.
That article I posted the other day about trailing spouses being miserable... well I'm not miserable and I'm not depressed, but jeez its hard. I LOVE my job in the US but I've never missed it. Well now I miss it. When my friend here went into labor in January and was texting me about it, I wanted so bad to go to the hospital and play nurse for her. I LOVE my friends in the US but I never felt sad about missing them because I'm used to living far from them, but now I really miss them. At least in Grenoble we had activities and friends and a social life but we're having a hard time finding that here. I have 2 American girlfriends here and they're great, so that really helps because they understand my expat blues. I'm lucky to have them. And of course Adam, my very best friend, our relationship grows stronger every day.
I think the problem for me, specifically, is that since 2012 when I started travel nursing I've been chronically unsettled. This didn't bother me at first, I was having a blast with travel nursing. Then I arrived in San Francsico in 2014 and, just like when you meet "the one," I knew I wanted to stay there forever. But of course "the one" became my boyfriend that same year and then I went to France and that was just gonna be temporary. Then Switzerland happened rather unexpectedly and that's also supposed to be temporary, but we don't know how temporary or when we'll leave. I'm so sick of living life in 3 month intervals. Now its less, its like week by week.
But probably in 10 years when I'm bogged down with kids and work I'll look back on these unsettled, childless days when I sleep 9 hours every night and miss them. So I don't think about it, I just keep swimming and keep a positive attitude and look forward to our next cool vacation. Which is Arctic Finland.
I found out something totally awesome that will come in handy when I'm having a bad day. We have a wellness/natural therapy thing we added to our health insurance. So, for example, I got $200 towards my gym membership. But the best is massages! It covers massages! I can get a 1 hour massage and only have to pay $20! I can get about 10 massages per year with this, I've used one and can't wait to get more!
RESTAURANT JOB
when working at the restaurant in December I got really stressed and behind on a very busy friday lunch rush. I forgot to give a table their salads. Heaven forbid. They didn't tell me I forgot, as any normal person would do when their waitress forgets something. Instead they told the head server as they walked out the door to leave. I got in trouble. I asked her why the hell didn't they just tell me during their meal that I'd forgotten and I'd have gone and gotten them their salad (which in Switzerland is a measly plate of just lettuce for $5). It was so busy. I had 10 tables. Easy mistake that's easily fixed. She said the Swiss will never say something like that, either they will tell you at the end, or say nothing and give the restaurant a bad review on TripAdvisor, which is all restaurant owners here care about.
Since there's no tipping standard here, you can't just take your anger out on a forgetful server by not tipping them, your anger gets directed at the whole restaurant. So TripAdvisor reviews are everything. (I, personally, was the reason for their most recent 5 star review)
Then I explained that 2 servers for 20 tables and 50 customers is just insane and how could I be expected to not get behind in those conditions. In the US that restaurant would have at least 3 servers, maybe 4. She said here, there is server school, which she took to be a career waitress, and you are expected to take care of 40 customers by yourself, and that's just how it is. Restaurants are typically small, personally owned, wait staff is expensive (I got paid $20/hr) so it's got to be like that.
SPAIN AND NEW YEARS EVE
So we took an awesome 11 day road trip around Southern Spain: Andalusia. Starting in Barcelona and visiting Montserrat, an old monastery in a very cool looking mountain. Then on to Valencia for 3 days, where we stayed in a hostel and spent Christmas eve and made some friends and went on a pub crawl that I very much regretted the next morning. Christmas day we drove 6 hours to Sevilla, and from there took day trips to Cordoba, Granada, and Ronda. We had a great time. Spain is so different from the rest of Europe and I love it. The history is so interesting, 700 years of Islamic rule, Spanish Inquisition, and now a fun, social, laid back culture with great food.
Because Spain should technically, geographically be in a time zone behind the rest of Europe, but it's not, everything there happens later. You can't even eat dinner until 8pm because that's when restaurants open. Our tour guide in Sevilla referred to 12 noon as the morning, and 7pm as the afternoon.
They don't do much celebrating on dec 24th or 25th in Spain. The gift giving day is January 6th. So the week between xmas and new years is huge sales and people flocking to the stores to buy stuff. They also don't have Santa in Spain. Gifts come from family, not a fat guy with a beard and reindeer.
New Years Eve we were supposed to fly back to Geneva, with a layover in Lisbon, Portugal. We would have probably been on the train home from the Geneva airport when the clock struck midnight. We don't really care about NYE, its too overrated, so we didn't care.
But our first flight to Lisbon was delayed and we realized it would cause us to miss our connection to Geneva. We spoke to the airlines and they said they realized this and it would be taken care of when we got to Lisbon. We landed in Lisbon and staff were waiting to take those people missing connections to a bus. The bus took us to a 4 star Marriott where we were served a free buffet meal. We took a sardine-packed subway downtown to where I read there'd be stuff going on. Got there at 11:45 and ended up having a great view for some awesome fireworks. We paid not one single dollar from the time we landed till we left the next morning. Great way to start 2017!
BELGIUM
I met up with one of my best friends in Belgium one weekend and spend a saturday with her and her bf in Bruges. Adorable town, by the way. Sunday we met up with one of Adam's friends who lives in Antwerp, Belgium and he took us to the Red Star Line Museum. This is the opposite of Ellis Island, it was one of the main ports where everyone immigrating to the US at the turn of the 1900s left from. Soooo cool! So interesting. Especially since my entire family came to the US during this time. I stood there reading every little thing in every exhibit and eventually was so behind I couldn't find Adam. At the end was a room all about anti-immigrant sentiments in the US at the time, against the thousands of Germans, Poles, Russians, Italians etc, that were coming over. There were political cartoons that you could literally put into a newspaper today and not know they were 100 years old. It was exactly the same issues. It was very interesting and insightful to see. History repeats itself, we should learn from it. In the words of Forrest Gump, and that's all I have to say about that....
Adam's friend also told us a funny story about Belgian/Dutch last names. When Napoleon ruled there, people didn't have last names, didn't need them. so Napoleon made a law forcing everyone to have a last name. Most people gave themselves last names that were practical, if they lived on a hill, their last name was Hill (in dutch of course). If they were nice people, their last name was "good neighbor". His friend's wife's last name is "dogs" maybe her family were dog lovers. Some people with a sense of humor didn't take this law seriously and thought it was just a temporary thing, and for generations their family's last name has been "amazing orgasm." Luckily, Belgian government allows people with ridiculous names like this the ability to change them.
I also learned at a bar in Bruges that you shouldn't serve a beer unless it has a matching glass for it. If not, the bartender will apologize. I've noticed in France in Switzerland too, when I order a beer, its always in the same name glass.
McDONALD'S
I've only eaten at McDonald's (or as the french say: MacDoh) twice in my 2 years out here but I've noticed some interesting differences when walking by. Only a McDonald's in Switzerland would serve cheese fries with venison meat. (all swiss restaurants serve deer... and wild boar) And only a McDonald's in France would serve a raclette burger. Once they featured a "Chicago BBQ burger".. Adam and I found this a little strange because I'm quite certain BBQ does not come from Chicago. But the French would never know this, all they see are 2 American words and instantly think its cool. It's funny how they change their menu for the culture they are in. In India, McDonald's only had chicken and veggie burgers, of course with curry and all sorts of flavors. McDonald's here are also very nice, clean, and have a separate cafe with coffee and pastries. McDonald's in Switzerland is crazy expensive. Dollar menu? yeah right! A big mac is $11. A happy meal is $7.
SWISS MILITARY
so my french teacher also teaches me a lot about swiss culture and other things about how to live in Switzerland. She told me that the mountains are full of bunkers for emergency situations if the entire population needed to hide out in some crazy nuclear war situation or something. Her husband went to one during his military service. They have ones with food, supplies, makeshift hospitals, everything you could need. It reminds me of District 13 in the Hunger Games
I've also heard the borders are lined with explosives to shut the country off from said crazy situation, but I'm not so sure that's true, nobody has been able to confirm that one.
Switzerland may be neutral but they have a very strong, very wealthy military. A military that, I've heard, you don't want to mess with. And every Swiss man has to do a certain amount of required military service.
Switzerland is a very rich country today but this wasn't always so. Switzerland was a little country of mountains, cows, and farmers. Then came WWI and WWII. They were neutral. While the rest of Europe was spending money on their military and then afterwards spending money on rebuilding their country that had been bombed to smithereens (like France and Germany) Switzerland never spent a dime doing those things. The Swiss are known as good watch makers, thus good at making precise tools that the military could use. They sold military devices and machinery to both sides during WW2 and made a fortune. And voila! Now you have a country where a big mac costs $11
But I do like it here....
Saturday, December 10, 2016
Fall
In the 2 months since my last post I've made a lot of little observations and we've done a lot. So this will be long
New Job:
~ I have a new temporary job as of the beginning of November. This is a swiss/italian/pizza restaurant owned by a guy from Kosovo. I almost didn't have the job after the 2nd day when I asked what to do about needing a week of vacation in January. Restaurants here are very different from in the US. There are no chains, they are all small and personally owned and therefore the owners are usually tight for money so only employ the bare minimum of servers. He only has 2. So when you only have 2 servers, you are in quite a bind when one of them wants vacation days. Since I needed a week off in January he wasn't going to hire me because he wanted someone who wouldn't go on vacation. When I heard this I didn't want to work there anymore anyways. Then he called me back and said he could figure out that week in January, as long as I didn't have any other vacation. I told him I need a week off in May for my wedding (I didn't think this mattered because it was 6 months away) he said no never mind, he'll gonna find someone else. Seriously? But apparently he didn't find anyone else because he called me back to work for him.. So I told him I could only work until December 16th because I'm going on another vacation. Plus I don't want to work there any longer than necessary.
I don't love it, I don't really like the other server I work with, she's so picky and specific about how everything is done and just always tells me what I'm doing wrong, but whatever, it gives me something to do and keeps me speaking French every day. Hopefully by January my nursing paperwork will be done and I can get a job at a hospital.
Some food culture stories:
~ I worked in restaurants for years, in the US when, when you're finished eating someone will come by and take your plate while the rest of the table finishes. Here you cannot do that! I thought I was being nice and explained I was giving them some more room at the table. The owner said I can't do this in Switzerland. You have to wait until every last person is finished to clear anything off the table. Even if everyone else finishes 20 minutes before the last person, you don't go near the table. Or they think you are rushing them. And Swiss/French don't like to be rushed through their meal. They take forreeverrrr.
~ Pizza is not sliced here, unless it is for take-out. But if you're eating the pizza in the restaurant it is eaten with a fork and knife. Not your hands. People here also eat burgers with a fork and knife, which is even stranger to me. Except at McDonald's.
~ I love bagels, bagels don't exist in Europe and when you find them, they're terrible. We found a highly rated bagel/pastry/tea place in Bern and decided to try it. I asked for mine with just butter and asked if they would toast it. The guy looked at me as if this was a strange request and says, well yes but then the butter will melt. I was like, "uhh... yeah, I know" Then I remembered that I've had cold sandwiches here with butter on them, they prefer cold, hard butter. At least the bagel was good, hit the spot.
Future Travels:
~ So our month of traveling, its a whirlwind. December 16-20th we're going to start in Strasbourg, France to see their christmas markets, then drive to Stuttgart, Germany, then Adam has a meeting in Mannheim, Germany and while he's there I'll drive down and explore Heidelberg by myself. All those places are close to eachother. Then we get back home for just a couple hours and go to the airport to fly to Barcelona. From there we rent a car and over the next 11 days roadtrip all over southern Spain. We'll spend Christmas eve at the hostel in Valencia and Christmas day we drive 6 hours to Seville. We fly back new years eve. We'll ring in the new year on the train from Geneva to Lausanne. I'll buy a bottle of champagne at Duty Free.
Then the first weekend of Jan we're visiting my good friend in Belgium while she's vacationing in Europe. Then we're going to Florida Jan 10-15th to do a bunch of wedding related stuff and see both of our parents.
Past Travels:
~ In October we went to Sudtirol, a region in the Italian Alps (the Dolomites) that borders with Austria. I surprised Adam for his 30th birthday. Took him on the train and rented a car and he had no idea where I was taking him. This region was part of Austria until recent history so you don't feel like you're in Italy at all, in fact, they speak mostly German and the food is mostly Austrian. It was really nice, we loved it.
~ My mom came for a short 4 day trip at the end of October. We had a great time. I took her to Interlaken and we hiked. We also went to Gruyeres to the cheese factory and ate Swiss fondue (i like french fondue better) and then to a thermal bath, they have lots of those here.
~ The end of November we flew up to Manchester, England. Adam had a meeting. They have huge christmas markets. His co-worker got us 2 tickets to the Manchester United soccer game. That was fun! We sat right next to the "away" section. Which was bordered on all sides, every single row, by security guards. Apparently these fans can get violent when it comes to their beloved football team. When each team scored, they would look at the other fans and yell, get into shouting matches, and throw not so nice British hand gestures.
You're not allowed to drink in the stands, you have to finish your beer out by the food stalls, there's a big sign saying you'll be arrested if you have alcohol at your seat. Apparently the fans would throw the glass bottles at the field or at other fans. But it keeps the stadium really clean and the fans less drunk. It was definitely a different experience than a typical American sports game. And we got really into it.
~ We also took 2 weekends and took the train out to Lucerne and Bern to explore and take free walking tours and learn more about Switzerland and use the very expensive unlimited Swiss train passes we bought
Random stories and observations:
~ I joined a gym back in September to tone up and put some muscle on my bones because I have zero. Its just a little different here. For one, they don't keep the gym freezing cold with fans and a/c. Which is not good because I'm already sweating in the locker room before I even start my workout. I mostly take the group classes. The room for the classes has mild a/c but no fans, well there is a box fan but its never turned on. So its always SOO hot in there. When my class is right after something intense, when you walk into the room its so hot and sweaty and smelly. I don't understand why there is no ventilation in a room like this. Well, there's a little ventilation, coming from outside, which is full off people smoking on the sidewalk. So when I'm winded I take a nice deep breath full of cigarette smoke. And there's no water fountain, if I forget my water bottle then i'm screwed.
Also they're very clean, you're not allowed to wear outside shoes in. You have to put shoe covers on when entering and change into shoes that you only wear indoors or at the gym. I change into other shoes but I wear them outside running too. I'm not about to buy a pair of shoes just for the gym.
And, culturally, you should change into your workout clothes once you get to the gym. People in Europe never wear workout clothes/yoga pants outside the gym unless they are actually in the process of jogging or something. This is disappointing because I love to wear yoga pants all the time, especially when I worked night shift and was always exhausted. Here I have to actually look presentable to go to the store.
A funny story about this. We talked to a French person who visited the US and said to their American friend "wow, Americans are so healthy and fit" and the friend said "what makes you say that" and this French person said "well they are all working out and going to the gym, they are all in their workout clothes all the time." The American had to explain that Americans just wear those clothes normally and it doesn't usually mean they are working out.
~ Switzerland has 3 main official languages. French in the west, Italian in a tiny region in the south, and German everywhere else. (well, technically 4, there's an ancient language called Romansch that a teeny tiny percentage of people in the east still speak. Its the closest living language to Latin)
The German they speak is Swiss German, a completely different dialect than "high" German (Germans cannot understand them), and every region in Switzerland has a different Swiss German dialect. I've heard its very hard for a non-Swiss German to learn. But all signs and labels and newspapers are written in high German because they all know that too.
The typical Swiss person is fluent in at least 2-3 languages, including English. English is so widely spoken here that they voted to make it the 5th official language but it was voted down. But its basically the unofficial 5th language.
Everything everywhere is written in those 3 languages, but since the majority of Swiss people speak German, sometimes things are only written in German. Going grocery shopping is a language lesson. I have to do a lot of guesswork if I don't find a french label. But I'm learning little bits of German. I do want to start learning basic German, since its everywhere, it would be helpful when we leave the french speaking area.
~ German can be a hilarious language when you have an immature mind like me and Adam. Our favorite words we've come across are: 'ausfahrt' which means exit, 'extrafahrt' which means extra trip, 'Badgasse' which was a street name in Bern meaning Avenue of the Baths, 'Dammgasse' which was a street name in Germany, and 'Buttholz' which is in the name of a construction company.
~ The Swiss learn English at a young age and all English teachers here are actually native English speakers. So at a young age they are taught a correct British or American accent and they have very slight accents when they speak English. I think its because of this that when I speak English with English speaking customers they don't automatically know I'm American. I've been asked 4 times now "wow, your English is so good, how did you learn to speak such good English?"
~ In France, there is an entire aisle dedicated to cheese. Tons of cheese. Its fantastic. Here in Switzerland the cheese section is pretty small and that's disappointing. But what they have instead is an entire aisle dedicated to chocolate.
Swiss chocolate is said to be the best in the world. Switzerland consumes more chocolate than any other country. And it has to be made in Switzerland. Apparently its the milk. There's a region here that is said to have the best conditions in the world for the best grass full of all sorts of herbs for cows to eat and produce the best tasting milk/cheese. That region is Gruyeres, hence, the famous Gruyere cheese. This is also the milk they use for their milk chocolate. I wasn't a big chocolate lover before but now I eat a lot. It really is better.
You can buy Lindt and Toblerone in the US but its crappy quality because its made with US ingredients. Hershey's chocolate has such a small percentage of real cocoa in it that they are not legally allowed to call it chocolate and they have to label it "made with real chocolate." Typical American food industry. Crap.
Like how a very good quality and good tasting French cheese (Reblochon) that is required for a staple in French alpine cuisine (Tartiflette) is illegal in the US. Because it isn't aged long enough. Its short by just a few days. But then they allow Velveeta to be sold. And Cheez Whiz. You should see a french person's reaction when I tell them what Cheez Whiz is. And we wonder why there's so much diabetes... ok I'll stop now.
~ I mentioned the strict recycling and trash rules in my last post. How you have to buy special taxed trash bags for non-recyclable stuff to encourage recycling, and they're expensive. A lot of people go shopping in France since its cheaper and we didn't understand why they wouldn't just buy trash bags there too. We did. Well I found out that if you are caught with a non-swiss taxed trash bag you are fined big time. So how do you get caught? Apartment buildings have cameras set up on their trash cans. People will open a non-swiss trash bag and find something with your name on it and then fine you that way. And there are also "civil police," your neighbors are watching you. Usually little grumpy old people will watch you and tattle on you. So we bought the swiss trash bags, $10 for 10 small ones, before we could get caught.
~ I got a Swiss drivers license. If you're living in a European country for more than a year you have 1 year to transfer your foreign drivers license for a Swiss one, or you get in big trouble if your pulled over after that year is up. Adam never did this in the 3 years he lived in France, he tried to but the French administration system is so unbelievably obnoxious he gave up. But here it was easy, I was in and out with my new license in about 20 minutes. I just had call the Georgia DMV a few weeks ago to get a document with the date of my very first license and drivers test on it. I still have my Florida license but there's a sticker on it that says "not valid in Switzerland." Its not like we will ever drive in Switzerland, renting a car here is double or even triple the cost of the rest of Europe. When we've rented cars we take the train just across the border to rent in France or Germany. The other day we booked a car rental and when we clicked that we lived in Switzerland the price almost tripled, but when we clicked that we lived in the US the price went back down.
~ Switzerland is expensive, everyone knows this. It was recently voted one of the richest countries in the world. To give you an idea of how filthy rich some people here are, I saw a magazine called "How to spend it: Boating edition"... makes me want to throw up. If I had that much money I'd donate to so many charities.
~ On the ground floor of our building is a small grocery store, out front sits a homeless lady, every day from 8am-7pm. Since I pass her a few times a day I decided I'd give her something. Since it was about to be winter I went through my closet and found a hat, scarf and gloves. I gave this to her and she looked at it like "wtf is this?" and then looked at me and in broken french asked for coffee. That night after she left I found my gloves on the ground in her spot, I took them back. A couple days later I brought her that coffee. Again, she didn't say thank you, but asked for bread, tomatoes, salami. This annoyed me, but I went into the store anyways and bought her some food but I forgot the salami. She still didn't say thank you but asked for the salami. I said no, this is good, and walked away, angry. I'll never get her anything again. I give things to homeless people all the time and they're always so grateful. A couple weeks later I saw her wearing the hat I gave her. Now I cross the street to avoid her.
~ Our apartment building is full of families. We noticed that our neighbors leave their kids' bikes and razor scooters in the hallway. Without locks. One person even has a whole coat rack in the hallway outside their door. This was a surprise to us coming from France where anything left unattended anywhere is stolen within minutes. In Grenoble, Adam brought his bike, when it had a broken chain, into the hallway and left it there to fix it later, the next day it was gone.
~ This last story I'm borrowing from a friend but relates to the post I wrote about the cultural class we took and how the Swiss aren't the most inviting when it comes to making friends. My friend's husband (who is not Swiss) worked with a guy for a year (who is Swiss) and they really got along, after a year he asked to get together with their wives for a drink sometime. The Swiss guy said "no, we already have enough friends from high school and stuff" ... can you believe that?!
(I do want to say that the Swiss are super nice, I've never met a rude one, its just getting into their inner circle that I'm told is difficult)
New Job:
~ I have a new temporary job as of the beginning of November. This is a swiss/italian/pizza restaurant owned by a guy from Kosovo. I almost didn't have the job after the 2nd day when I asked what to do about needing a week of vacation in January. Restaurants here are very different from in the US. There are no chains, they are all small and personally owned and therefore the owners are usually tight for money so only employ the bare minimum of servers. He only has 2. So when you only have 2 servers, you are in quite a bind when one of them wants vacation days. Since I needed a week off in January he wasn't going to hire me because he wanted someone who wouldn't go on vacation. When I heard this I didn't want to work there anymore anyways. Then he called me back and said he could figure out that week in January, as long as I didn't have any other vacation. I told him I need a week off in May for my wedding (I didn't think this mattered because it was 6 months away) he said no never mind, he'll gonna find someone else. Seriously? But apparently he didn't find anyone else because he called me back to work for him.. So I told him I could only work until December 16th because I'm going on another vacation. Plus I don't want to work there any longer than necessary.
I don't love it, I don't really like the other server I work with, she's so picky and specific about how everything is done and just always tells me what I'm doing wrong, but whatever, it gives me something to do and keeps me speaking French every day. Hopefully by January my nursing paperwork will be done and I can get a job at a hospital.
Some food culture stories:
~ I worked in restaurants for years, in the US when, when you're finished eating someone will come by and take your plate while the rest of the table finishes. Here you cannot do that! I thought I was being nice and explained I was giving them some more room at the table. The owner said I can't do this in Switzerland. You have to wait until every last person is finished to clear anything off the table. Even if everyone else finishes 20 minutes before the last person, you don't go near the table. Or they think you are rushing them. And Swiss/French don't like to be rushed through their meal. They take forreeverrrr.
~ Pizza is not sliced here, unless it is for take-out. But if you're eating the pizza in the restaurant it is eaten with a fork and knife. Not your hands. People here also eat burgers with a fork and knife, which is even stranger to me. Except at McDonald's.
~ I love bagels, bagels don't exist in Europe and when you find them, they're terrible. We found a highly rated bagel/pastry/tea place in Bern and decided to try it. I asked for mine with just butter and asked if they would toast it. The guy looked at me as if this was a strange request and says, well yes but then the butter will melt. I was like, "uhh... yeah, I know" Then I remembered that I've had cold sandwiches here with butter on them, they prefer cold, hard butter. At least the bagel was good, hit the spot.
Future Travels:
~ So our month of traveling, its a whirlwind. December 16-20th we're going to start in Strasbourg, France to see their christmas markets, then drive to Stuttgart, Germany, then Adam has a meeting in Mannheim, Germany and while he's there I'll drive down and explore Heidelberg by myself. All those places are close to eachother. Then we get back home for just a couple hours and go to the airport to fly to Barcelona. From there we rent a car and over the next 11 days roadtrip all over southern Spain. We'll spend Christmas eve at the hostel in Valencia and Christmas day we drive 6 hours to Seville. We fly back new years eve. We'll ring in the new year on the train from Geneva to Lausanne. I'll buy a bottle of champagne at Duty Free.
Then the first weekend of Jan we're visiting my good friend in Belgium while she's vacationing in Europe. Then we're going to Florida Jan 10-15th to do a bunch of wedding related stuff and see both of our parents.
Past Travels:
~ In October we went to Sudtirol, a region in the Italian Alps (the Dolomites) that borders with Austria. I surprised Adam for his 30th birthday. Took him on the train and rented a car and he had no idea where I was taking him. This region was part of Austria until recent history so you don't feel like you're in Italy at all, in fact, they speak mostly German and the food is mostly Austrian. It was really nice, we loved it.
~ My mom came for a short 4 day trip at the end of October. We had a great time. I took her to Interlaken and we hiked. We also went to Gruyeres to the cheese factory and ate Swiss fondue (i like french fondue better) and then to a thermal bath, they have lots of those here.
~ The end of November we flew up to Manchester, England. Adam had a meeting. They have huge christmas markets. His co-worker got us 2 tickets to the Manchester United soccer game. That was fun! We sat right next to the "away" section. Which was bordered on all sides, every single row, by security guards. Apparently these fans can get violent when it comes to their beloved football team. When each team scored, they would look at the other fans and yell, get into shouting matches, and throw not so nice British hand gestures.
You're not allowed to drink in the stands, you have to finish your beer out by the food stalls, there's a big sign saying you'll be arrested if you have alcohol at your seat. Apparently the fans would throw the glass bottles at the field or at other fans. But it keeps the stadium really clean and the fans less drunk. It was definitely a different experience than a typical American sports game. And we got really into it.
~ We also took 2 weekends and took the train out to Lucerne and Bern to explore and take free walking tours and learn more about Switzerland and use the very expensive unlimited Swiss train passes we bought
Random stories and observations:
~ I joined a gym back in September to tone up and put some muscle on my bones because I have zero. Its just a little different here. For one, they don't keep the gym freezing cold with fans and a/c. Which is not good because I'm already sweating in the locker room before I even start my workout. I mostly take the group classes. The room for the classes has mild a/c but no fans, well there is a box fan but its never turned on. So its always SOO hot in there. When my class is right after something intense, when you walk into the room its so hot and sweaty and smelly. I don't understand why there is no ventilation in a room like this. Well, there's a little ventilation, coming from outside, which is full off people smoking on the sidewalk. So when I'm winded I take a nice deep breath full of cigarette smoke. And there's no water fountain, if I forget my water bottle then i'm screwed.
Also they're very clean, you're not allowed to wear outside shoes in. You have to put shoe covers on when entering and change into shoes that you only wear indoors or at the gym. I change into other shoes but I wear them outside running too. I'm not about to buy a pair of shoes just for the gym.
And, culturally, you should change into your workout clothes once you get to the gym. People in Europe never wear workout clothes/yoga pants outside the gym unless they are actually in the process of jogging or something. This is disappointing because I love to wear yoga pants all the time, especially when I worked night shift and was always exhausted. Here I have to actually look presentable to go to the store.
A funny story about this. We talked to a French person who visited the US and said to their American friend "wow, Americans are so healthy and fit" and the friend said "what makes you say that" and this French person said "well they are all working out and going to the gym, they are all in their workout clothes all the time." The American had to explain that Americans just wear those clothes normally and it doesn't usually mean they are working out.
~ Switzerland has 3 main official languages. French in the west, Italian in a tiny region in the south, and German everywhere else. (well, technically 4, there's an ancient language called Romansch that a teeny tiny percentage of people in the east still speak. Its the closest living language to Latin)
The German they speak is Swiss German, a completely different dialect than "high" German (Germans cannot understand them), and every region in Switzerland has a different Swiss German dialect. I've heard its very hard for a non-Swiss German to learn. But all signs and labels and newspapers are written in high German because they all know that too.
The typical Swiss person is fluent in at least 2-3 languages, including English. English is so widely spoken here that they voted to make it the 5th official language but it was voted down. But its basically the unofficial 5th language.
Everything everywhere is written in those 3 languages, but since the majority of Swiss people speak German, sometimes things are only written in German. Going grocery shopping is a language lesson. I have to do a lot of guesswork if I don't find a french label. But I'm learning little bits of German. I do want to start learning basic German, since its everywhere, it would be helpful when we leave the french speaking area.
~ German can be a hilarious language when you have an immature mind like me and Adam. Our favorite words we've come across are: 'ausfahrt' which means exit, 'extrafahrt' which means extra trip, 'Badgasse' which was a street name in Bern meaning Avenue of the Baths, 'Dammgasse' which was a street name in Germany, and 'Buttholz' which is in the name of a construction company.
~ The Swiss learn English at a young age and all English teachers here are actually native English speakers. So at a young age they are taught a correct British or American accent and they have very slight accents when they speak English. I think its because of this that when I speak English with English speaking customers they don't automatically know I'm American. I've been asked 4 times now "wow, your English is so good, how did you learn to speak such good English?"
~ In France, there is an entire aisle dedicated to cheese. Tons of cheese. Its fantastic. Here in Switzerland the cheese section is pretty small and that's disappointing. But what they have instead is an entire aisle dedicated to chocolate.
Swiss chocolate is said to be the best in the world. Switzerland consumes more chocolate than any other country. And it has to be made in Switzerland. Apparently its the milk. There's a region here that is said to have the best conditions in the world for the best grass full of all sorts of herbs for cows to eat and produce the best tasting milk/cheese. That region is Gruyeres, hence, the famous Gruyere cheese. This is also the milk they use for their milk chocolate. I wasn't a big chocolate lover before but now I eat a lot. It really is better.
You can buy Lindt and Toblerone in the US but its crappy quality because its made with US ingredients. Hershey's chocolate has such a small percentage of real cocoa in it that they are not legally allowed to call it chocolate and they have to label it "made with real chocolate." Typical American food industry. Crap.
Like how a very good quality and good tasting French cheese (Reblochon) that is required for a staple in French alpine cuisine (Tartiflette) is illegal in the US. Because it isn't aged long enough. Its short by just a few days. But then they allow Velveeta to be sold. And Cheez Whiz. You should see a french person's reaction when I tell them what Cheez Whiz is. And we wonder why there's so much diabetes... ok I'll stop now.
~ I mentioned the strict recycling and trash rules in my last post. How you have to buy special taxed trash bags for non-recyclable stuff to encourage recycling, and they're expensive. A lot of people go shopping in France since its cheaper and we didn't understand why they wouldn't just buy trash bags there too. We did. Well I found out that if you are caught with a non-swiss taxed trash bag you are fined big time. So how do you get caught? Apartment buildings have cameras set up on their trash cans. People will open a non-swiss trash bag and find something with your name on it and then fine you that way. And there are also "civil police," your neighbors are watching you. Usually little grumpy old people will watch you and tattle on you. So we bought the swiss trash bags, $10 for 10 small ones, before we could get caught.
~ I got a Swiss drivers license. If you're living in a European country for more than a year you have 1 year to transfer your foreign drivers license for a Swiss one, or you get in big trouble if your pulled over after that year is up. Adam never did this in the 3 years he lived in France, he tried to but the French administration system is so unbelievably obnoxious he gave up. But here it was easy, I was in and out with my new license in about 20 minutes. I just had call the Georgia DMV a few weeks ago to get a document with the date of my very first license and drivers test on it. I still have my Florida license but there's a sticker on it that says "not valid in Switzerland." Its not like we will ever drive in Switzerland, renting a car here is double or even triple the cost of the rest of Europe. When we've rented cars we take the train just across the border to rent in France or Germany. The other day we booked a car rental and when we clicked that we lived in Switzerland the price almost tripled, but when we clicked that we lived in the US the price went back down.
~ Switzerland is expensive, everyone knows this. It was recently voted one of the richest countries in the world. To give you an idea of how filthy rich some people here are, I saw a magazine called "How to spend it: Boating edition"... makes me want to throw up. If I had that much money I'd donate to so many charities.
~ On the ground floor of our building is a small grocery store, out front sits a homeless lady, every day from 8am-7pm. Since I pass her a few times a day I decided I'd give her something. Since it was about to be winter I went through my closet and found a hat, scarf and gloves. I gave this to her and she looked at it like "wtf is this?" and then looked at me and in broken french asked for coffee. That night after she left I found my gloves on the ground in her spot, I took them back. A couple days later I brought her that coffee. Again, she didn't say thank you, but asked for bread, tomatoes, salami. This annoyed me, but I went into the store anyways and bought her some food but I forgot the salami. She still didn't say thank you but asked for the salami. I said no, this is good, and walked away, angry. I'll never get her anything again. I give things to homeless people all the time and they're always so grateful. A couple weeks later I saw her wearing the hat I gave her. Now I cross the street to avoid her.
~ Our apartment building is full of families. We noticed that our neighbors leave their kids' bikes and razor scooters in the hallway. Without locks. One person even has a whole coat rack in the hallway outside their door. This was a surprise to us coming from France where anything left unattended anywhere is stolen within minutes. In Grenoble, Adam brought his bike, when it had a broken chain, into the hallway and left it there to fix it later, the next day it was gone.
~ This last story I'm borrowing from a friend but relates to the post I wrote about the cultural class we took and how the Swiss aren't the most inviting when it comes to making friends. My friend's husband (who is not Swiss) worked with a guy for a year (who is Swiss) and they really got along, after a year he asked to get together with their wives for a drink sometime. The Swiss guy said "no, we already have enough friends from high school and stuff" ... can you believe that?!
(I do want to say that the Swiss are super nice, I've never met a rude one, its just getting into their inner circle that I'm told is difficult)
Thursday, September 29, 2016
Moving Day, Job, and other observations
So we finally moved into our new apartment. I thought I was going to hate it. After the brief look at it we got when we saw it in June, filled with the old tenant's stuff, made me have a bad feeling about it. But once we got our own stuff in and unpacked, I actually love it. Its a 320 sq ft studio with a little balcony. Its the perfect size. We try to live modestly and minimally, its harder for me than for Adam. We've got extra stuff in the storage locker in the basement or else I don't know what we would have done. We made 3 trips to IKEA, each time carrying a big box back on the train with shelving units and dressers to build, among other things. Before this, the only furniture we owned was a bed, a kitchen table, and a small twin sized futon. Our French apt was furnished.
The move-in process was a slight disaster though. We met at the apartment on a Thursday, the 15th, to get the keys and do an "etat de lieu" (walkthrough) with the previous tenant and the apartment building agency. Upon entering the room I immediately sensed tension in the air and could tell the previous tenant and the apt agency guy were having some sort of disagreement. Apparently she paid the whole month of September on accident and wants half the month back, since shes moving out the 15th. Understandable. Well the apartment guy says something about not being notified, they cant get her money back for some reason, she didn't notify them, she says she called for the past 3 weeks, its all in rapid french spoken by people with accents and i'm having a hard time understanding. This lady starts getting really angry and raising her voice. She's yelling that she won't give up the keys, because she hasn't gotten her money back, so shes not going anywhere until the end of September and we might as well leave because we're not moving in because shes not giving up the keys. He says that they will just change the locks if she wont give up the keys. They're going back and forth and I tell Adam we should go downstairs because I dont want to be a part of this. A few minutes later the agency guy comes down to review the walkthrough papers to sign, noting the crack in the tile and the holes in the wall, none of which I have seen to be able to verify because I was caught up in this arguement. Then the lady comes downstairs with a bloody hand, apparently she has hit the door trying to slam it or something. They have called the cops on her now. She starts yelling at us "Don't sign anything! this is a dishonest company! they were nice to me too at the beginning and now look, they will do the same to you! You'll see! Don't sign anything! you will benefit and I will lose!"
So we decided not to sign. One, because we didn't get to really walk through the apt ourselves. Two, I wasn't about to sign anything in front of her. We didn't know who to believe at that point. We were told a locksmith was on his way to change the locks right then. Luckily we had a few nights booked at a hotel and stayed there until the locks were changed, and the bathtub re-enamled, which they did 2 days late, so we had to wait to move in. So the process started on a Thursday, I spent my first night in the apt on Sunday.
Oh and she ended up giving the keys up and getting her money back that same night of the fiasco. But we still had the locks changed. Just in case
Oh and she ended up giving the keys up and getting her money back that same night of the fiasco. But we still had the locks changed. Just in case
They have a very strict recycling system here. EVERYTHING must be sorted. paper, aluminum, plastic, and then the rest. You have to pay a special extra tax on the trash bags for everything else. Which makes you want to recycle because that's not an extra cost. I like it. I've always been big on recycling. Ask my parents how many times I yell at them for throwing away milk gallons and boxes, even wrapping paper at xmas.
They also have laundry schedules, we learned this when we looked at the other 17 apartments. Luckily, our building doesn't have one. I'm so relieved. In most buildings you get a specific time for laundry, for example, only on tuesdays. Or, even worse, every other tuesday, or only on tuesdays between 7am and 3pm. It would be annoying but I guess its nice to know there's a time where the washing machine is 100% yours, and you don't have to wait for other people.
Another interesting nurse fact I learned from my friend: They don't have to be CPR certified! WTF?! everyone gets it when they get a drivers licence, but you never have to re-do it, its optional. that doesn't make me feel very safe. Especially since every time I've taken it in the past 10 years, they change something. I can't keep it straight.
Oh my new job. My waitress job. I really like it. Its a small restaurant right on the lake at a marina. People pull up in their sailboat on the weekend, get lunch and head back out on the lake. The food is really good and I get free lunch every day. Its a small town and there's lots of regulars. Lots of nice people. The owner is the nicest guy ever. He's obsessed with classic American cars and shows me pictures of the 15 mustangs and Shelbys he's owned. I'm helping him plan his trip to California this winter.
Its good for my french practice. I speak it all day. Except when the occasional American or British customer comes. Which is more often than not in this region. Every Swiss person always asks me what my accent is. Where am I from? Sometimes I make them guess. Usually they guess right. Sometimes they think its British English (the american and british accents in french are pretty different) A few people have said German, one said Czech. Then the next question is almost always about the election. And I roll my eyes.
I've made a few language mistakes, ordered the wrong thing. Even though I repeat every single thing they order, some words are so similar and my accent makes them think I've said the right thing. Like once someone asked me for an ashtray, in french its cendrier (pronounced sahn-dree-ay). Well I thought she wanted a sangria, I repeated sahn-gree-ah? Oui, she said. I put down the sangria and she says "I didn't order this" and then picks up the ashtray and says "cendrier" and we all laughed and I probably turned a little red.
The best part is not having to worry about tips. I've read things before that are anti-tipping culture, and that the US needs to change and I never understood why it was bad. But now I do! It is soooo nice to be paid a real salary and not have to worry at every single table what my tip will be, aka my only income. Tipping isn't common in Europe, but this is a small town with generous customers and I get a tip about 70% of the time. but its minimal. its usually between 5-10% but I don't care. I appreciate the tip more now because I know they didn't have to do it and it means that they truly appreciated my service. And when I don't get a tip I don't care, because I'm making $21/hr. (keep in mind the cost of living here is outrageous so $21/hr is not the same as it is in the US)
Food culture is different here, obviously, but i'm learning the differences more now. nobody likes ice cubes here, and when they do want some they just want 2 or 3. The owner had to tell me to stop filling the whole glass with ice.
When you reserve a table it is yours all night. France too. and when all the tables are reserved we turn people away, because most people will sit at their reserved table all night. because a meal in Europe is never quick. A meal is a time to spend with friends and family and relax. People even come at 3pm, alone or with friends, order just a drink, as simple as a bottle of water, and just sit, for 1 or 2 hours, reading the paper or talking with friends. Its nice, slow, laid back. Not so hurried and rushed like in the US.
Speaking of water they usually only drink carbonated water here. You have to specifiy if you want still water.
They loooove their espresso. Everyone gets an espresso or coffee after a meal. Its just what you do. And usually dessert too. I had a table of 3 Americans and they didn't order any dessert or coffee and when the owner saw me give them the check he was like "what? they dont want coffee? no dessert?" I said "no they're american we don't really do that very often" People must think Adam and I are crazy when we go out to eat, we don't drink wine (another big thing here), we don't get coffee, we don't get dessert. Such weirdos.
Also, to them, normal apple juice is carbonated. I had no idea our apple juice at the restaurant was carbonated so when a mom asked if we had non-carbonated apple juice I said yes, because why would you have carbonated apple juice? I gave it to her kids and they drank it and made a funny face. She said "I thought it wasn't carbonated" I said I had no idea that it was. The next day someone asked the same thing, when I said it was carbonated she said "so its just normal apple juice." Apparently that's their normal. Strange to me.
Anyways. While I'm off facebook, just a break, just a couple months, I might still post in here so if you're interested check back every few weeks to see if I've found any more random observations or crazy stories to write about. That's what traveling is though, random cultural observations (my favorite) and the occasional minor crisis and annoyance. But I love it.
Thursday, September 1, 2016
Cross Cultural Training
Yesterday Adam and I went had a meeting, organized by his company, with a lady from a company that does what is called Cross Cultural Training. It lasted 8 hours and it was just the 2 of us. Its designed to educate employees who have moved from abroad about their new culture, common dos and don'ts, guidelines for interaction with various people, etc. The lady giving the course has lived in the US and France and is very culturally conscious. I didn't know what to expect but ended up really enjoying it and learning a lot of useful tips. Some of it I like, some of it will take some getting used to. I think you will find all this pretty interesting too, and this is only a little bit of what we learned:
First she asked us what we wanted to learn about Swiss culture. We said one thing we wanted to know basic rules on how to interact with our future neighbors, is there a specific do and don't in these and other interactions? Because in the US, neighbors commonly greet the newbees with cookies or invite them over for coffee to introduce themselves, things like that. I said I wanted to know about relationships between doctors and nurses, and nurses and patients. Because what I'm used to, at least at Stanford, is while nurses, doctors, techs, and secretaries all have different roles, we all work together as a team on the same level, we all get along great and are even great friends outside of work too.
The first response I got was, in a serious tone, "The Swiss are never friends with their co-workers. We do not understand this about Americans." She said the basic philosophy and cultural value behind this is a motto that says "If its not business, its my business" The Swiss are very private people and the line between business and personal life is very defined, whats considered "intimate" is anything that is not work related. She said, in a business setting, you could work in the cubicle next to someone for years and not know if they have children, because that's personal life and not to be discussed at work. I smiled at this point, thinking to myself about all the extremely personal and inappropriate conversations that happen between 4 and 5 am at the nurses desk. I said that, in my years as a travel nurse and moving to cities where I knew no one, I relied on my job to provide me with friends and that it is very important to me to really get along with my co-workers since we spend so much time together. As a result, some of my very best friends today were my coworkers from travel nursing assignments. She said that, of course, in Switzerland you can like your coworkers and get along great, but you would not have any contact with them outside of work. This happens, from time to time, that a coworker develops into a great friend, on occasion she's been to a birthday/christmas party of a co-worker, but its not very common. She said I will have to find other means of making friends.
Back to Swiss valuing their privacy and things they would consider "intimate." The Swiss home is considered intimate. Much different than American culture and might be hard for us to understand. You would never be invited into a Swiss person's home unless you are a very dear friend. And even if you were, the living room and dining room are the only areas of the house that are open to you. The kitchens in Swiss homes are separate, not open to the living room like many American homes, and it is considered an intimate area, not to be entered unless you are family. When living in the US, she was shocked and thought it absurd that when going to someones home for the first time, they would immediately take her for a tour of the whole house, even showing her the bedroom and bathroom, which in her mind should be very private.
The refrigerator is extremely personal. Opening the refrigerator of a Swiss is one of the rudest things you can do. She would only do this at her parents or siblings house.
When invited to a Swiss home for a meal, it is more polite to NOT help the host clean the dishes, because doing so would require you going into their kitchen. It is more polite to sit and let to host clean themselves.
When saying hello to a neighbor, wait until they have closed the door to their apartment. It is rude to say hello while their door is still open, because by saying hello with their open door, you are looking into their apartment and looking into their private life.
She said if we ever invited a Swiss person into our home they would come out of politeness but would feel quite uncomfortable while there. They would be very touched at this gesture and would want to reciprocate but would never feel comfortable letting you into their home, so since they know of no way to equally reciprocate such a kind gesture, they will most likely just never talk to you again and avoid you.
She compared Swiss people to coconuts. Hard and not so pretty on the outside. really difficult to penetrate. But once you have it gets softer, and once you are all the way in its completely open. And you have complete trust and permission into the Swiss's personal life.
They are extremely punctual and schedule/time oriented. If a business meeting is to start at 9 am, it will start at 9 am, sharp. If you want to have the usual chitchat about the weather and your weekend beforehand, you must come 5-10 minutes early to do this. If it is supposed to end at 10 am it will end at 10 am. If it threatens to go past the scheduled end time, it must be mutually agreed on by everyone that its okay if the meeting will last 30 extra minutes, if not, they will schedule a time when it is convenient for everyone to finish the meeting. Being schedule oriented, they know that when a meeting goes over by 30 minutes, people might be inconvenienced because they will have other things on their schedule to do. Also, getting to a meeting or interview too early is also bad form. 5-10 minutes is okay, but any more and you will be seen as not knowing how to manage your time correctly, and if you can't manage your time correctly than how can you manage anything else? It could have huge implications on whether you get the job or not, even if the interview goes well otherwise. (I got to my interview 15 minutes early a few weeks ago... oops)
the Swiss also consider slowness as a virtue. Politics are slow, administration is slow, they believe if something is done slowly then it is sure to be done correctly. Quick means hasty and a possibility of mistakes. This comes into play with friendships, which is why, when meeting a new neighbor for instance, start with Bonjour and no more. they don't know you so will be very slow to want to get to know you.
After this information I now understand what was meant by the various French people who, after learning I was moving to Switzerland, would say "hmmm, the Swiss, well, they're not the French"
In France it is very different. When it comes to friendships and privacy, it is much more like American culture. One of Adam's best friends is his French co-worker, who has invited us into his home many times, lets us cook in his kitchen, I've slept in his son's bed. The french are very warm and welcoming and we felt comfortable with all of them.
The other thing she discussed with us was the roller coaster of emotional stages related to moving to a different country. Adam has been through them all before, having already spent 3 years in France, and I felt them too in France, maybe more mildly though. She said at some point you will reach a stage of culture shock that can be very bad for some people, in a few cases it can lead to depression. This usually hits around the 3-6 month point. A realization that some of your very important cultural values do not align with the values of your new country and you must figure out how to cope with that. That we may wonder what we're doing here, what's the point, we just want to go home. She also said that throughout this entire roller coaster of emotions we will have little support from those at home, because nobody will get it. And we will really need each other. This is true, there have been a few times I've complained about things to someone and the response I get is "how can you complain, your living in France/Switzerland!"
She mentioned that psychologists have identified the top 3 most stressful things a person can go through, and I remember this from nursing school too: 1. death of a loved one. 2. Separation/divorce. 3. moving. but they only studied people moving from one city to another within the same country. So moving from one country to another has got to come before 3!
People think living abroad is all sunshine and rainbows, and while there are a lot of cool things about it, (and the opportunity is such a cool and rare one that we are voluntarily going through the rough stuff) it is very, very difficult. When you have few or no friends, when the language is different, when the culture is not what you're used to, when the process of finding a job and just getting settled with anything is 10x harder because you're foreign and more documentation is required for everything, documentation that's not always easy to obtain, it wears you down. Its hard to stay motivated and positive. Forget the view of Lake Geneva and the Alps down the street, you want some normalcy every so often, normalcy that's not easy to find. My normalcy is with Adam (and an occasional trip to Starbucks). You want to see your friends and family but nobody can afford to fly to Europe or take time off work and you can't afford to keep going back to the US. People say they will visit you and you start looking forward to it, get really excited about it, and then life gets in the way and they can't come anymore. Scheduling phone dates with friends every few weeks instead of calling them whenever you feel like it.
Apart from that, I actually love living in Europe, for the most part, I actually prefer the culture and lifestyle here much more than US culture and lifestyle. And, honestly, we're glad to be away from the US these days. According to the "cultural profile" I filled out yesterday the lady told me I am not American at all, I align much more with an Italian's profile actually, and that I might have a very difficult time re-assimilating back into American culture. I'm not sure if I believe this, but we'll see, I could see it being true to a degree, though. But we will come back some day, sooner than later. I don't want to be so far from my family, especially when little half-asian babies come along. I would feel guilty if I never came back. Plus, if I can't have the same job role and work life that I'm used to in the US, then I don't want to stay, because I LOVE my job. But the plan is to give it 2 years, for better or for worse, no matter what happens, to get the full experience and see how everything pans out. It may be difficult and there are days when I want to pull my hair out and scream when I find out about another obscure document I have to track down, but I can't give up just yet, I've barely started.
I'll end this with one thing this cultural training lady said to us, who has been doing this training for 15 years. She said that when the international move happens to a couple, all the stressful things that happen to the people individually and to them as a couple will really test their relationship, and if that couple comes out of it still strong, well that couple is meant to be for life. And I have no doubt that Adam and I will crush this Swiss experience together because there's nobody more meant for each other than we are.
First she asked us what we wanted to learn about Swiss culture. We said one thing we wanted to know basic rules on how to interact with our future neighbors, is there a specific do and don't in these and other interactions? Because in the US, neighbors commonly greet the newbees with cookies or invite them over for coffee to introduce themselves, things like that. I said I wanted to know about relationships between doctors and nurses, and nurses and patients. Because what I'm used to, at least at Stanford, is while nurses, doctors, techs, and secretaries all have different roles, we all work together as a team on the same level, we all get along great and are even great friends outside of work too.
The first response I got was, in a serious tone, "The Swiss are never friends with their co-workers. We do not understand this about Americans." She said the basic philosophy and cultural value behind this is a motto that says "If its not business, its my business" The Swiss are very private people and the line between business and personal life is very defined, whats considered "intimate" is anything that is not work related. She said, in a business setting, you could work in the cubicle next to someone for years and not know if they have children, because that's personal life and not to be discussed at work. I smiled at this point, thinking to myself about all the extremely personal and inappropriate conversations that happen between 4 and 5 am at the nurses desk. I said that, in my years as a travel nurse and moving to cities where I knew no one, I relied on my job to provide me with friends and that it is very important to me to really get along with my co-workers since we spend so much time together. As a result, some of my very best friends today were my coworkers from travel nursing assignments. She said that, of course, in Switzerland you can like your coworkers and get along great, but you would not have any contact with them outside of work. This happens, from time to time, that a coworker develops into a great friend, on occasion she's been to a birthday/christmas party of a co-worker, but its not very common. She said I will have to find other means of making friends.
Back to Swiss valuing their privacy and things they would consider "intimate." The Swiss home is considered intimate. Much different than American culture and might be hard for us to understand. You would never be invited into a Swiss person's home unless you are a very dear friend. And even if you were, the living room and dining room are the only areas of the house that are open to you. The kitchens in Swiss homes are separate, not open to the living room like many American homes, and it is considered an intimate area, not to be entered unless you are family. When living in the US, she was shocked and thought it absurd that when going to someones home for the first time, they would immediately take her for a tour of the whole house, even showing her the bedroom and bathroom, which in her mind should be very private.
The refrigerator is extremely personal. Opening the refrigerator of a Swiss is one of the rudest things you can do. She would only do this at her parents or siblings house.
When invited to a Swiss home for a meal, it is more polite to NOT help the host clean the dishes, because doing so would require you going into their kitchen. It is more polite to sit and let to host clean themselves.
When saying hello to a neighbor, wait until they have closed the door to their apartment. It is rude to say hello while their door is still open, because by saying hello with their open door, you are looking into their apartment and looking into their private life.
She said if we ever invited a Swiss person into our home they would come out of politeness but would feel quite uncomfortable while there. They would be very touched at this gesture and would want to reciprocate but would never feel comfortable letting you into their home, so since they know of no way to equally reciprocate such a kind gesture, they will most likely just never talk to you again and avoid you.
She compared Swiss people to coconuts. Hard and not so pretty on the outside. really difficult to penetrate. But once you have it gets softer, and once you are all the way in its completely open. And you have complete trust and permission into the Swiss's personal life.
They are extremely punctual and schedule/time oriented. If a business meeting is to start at 9 am, it will start at 9 am, sharp. If you want to have the usual chitchat about the weather and your weekend beforehand, you must come 5-10 minutes early to do this. If it is supposed to end at 10 am it will end at 10 am. If it threatens to go past the scheduled end time, it must be mutually agreed on by everyone that its okay if the meeting will last 30 extra minutes, if not, they will schedule a time when it is convenient for everyone to finish the meeting. Being schedule oriented, they know that when a meeting goes over by 30 minutes, people might be inconvenienced because they will have other things on their schedule to do. Also, getting to a meeting or interview too early is also bad form. 5-10 minutes is okay, but any more and you will be seen as not knowing how to manage your time correctly, and if you can't manage your time correctly than how can you manage anything else? It could have huge implications on whether you get the job or not, even if the interview goes well otherwise. (I got to my interview 15 minutes early a few weeks ago... oops)
the Swiss also consider slowness as a virtue. Politics are slow, administration is slow, they believe if something is done slowly then it is sure to be done correctly. Quick means hasty and a possibility of mistakes. This comes into play with friendships, which is why, when meeting a new neighbor for instance, start with Bonjour and no more. they don't know you so will be very slow to want to get to know you.
After this information I now understand what was meant by the various French people who, after learning I was moving to Switzerland, would say "hmmm, the Swiss, well, they're not the French"
In France it is very different. When it comes to friendships and privacy, it is much more like American culture. One of Adam's best friends is his French co-worker, who has invited us into his home many times, lets us cook in his kitchen, I've slept in his son's bed. The french are very warm and welcoming and we felt comfortable with all of them.
The other thing she discussed with us was the roller coaster of emotional stages related to moving to a different country. Adam has been through them all before, having already spent 3 years in France, and I felt them too in France, maybe more mildly though. She said at some point you will reach a stage of culture shock that can be very bad for some people, in a few cases it can lead to depression. This usually hits around the 3-6 month point. A realization that some of your very important cultural values do not align with the values of your new country and you must figure out how to cope with that. That we may wonder what we're doing here, what's the point, we just want to go home. She also said that throughout this entire roller coaster of emotions we will have little support from those at home, because nobody will get it. And we will really need each other. This is true, there have been a few times I've complained about things to someone and the response I get is "how can you complain, your living in France/Switzerland!"
She mentioned that psychologists have identified the top 3 most stressful things a person can go through, and I remember this from nursing school too: 1. death of a loved one. 2. Separation/divorce. 3. moving. but they only studied people moving from one city to another within the same country. So moving from one country to another has got to come before 3!
People think living abroad is all sunshine and rainbows, and while there are a lot of cool things about it, (and the opportunity is such a cool and rare one that we are voluntarily going through the rough stuff) it is very, very difficult. When you have few or no friends, when the language is different, when the culture is not what you're used to, when the process of finding a job and just getting settled with anything is 10x harder because you're foreign and more documentation is required for everything, documentation that's not always easy to obtain, it wears you down. Its hard to stay motivated and positive. Forget the view of Lake Geneva and the Alps down the street, you want some normalcy every so often, normalcy that's not easy to find. My normalcy is with Adam (and an occasional trip to Starbucks). You want to see your friends and family but nobody can afford to fly to Europe or take time off work and you can't afford to keep going back to the US. People say they will visit you and you start looking forward to it, get really excited about it, and then life gets in the way and they can't come anymore. Scheduling phone dates with friends every few weeks instead of calling them whenever you feel like it.
Apart from that, I actually love living in Europe, for the most part, I actually prefer the culture and lifestyle here much more than US culture and lifestyle. And, honestly, we're glad to be away from the US these days. According to the "cultural profile" I filled out yesterday the lady told me I am not American at all, I align much more with an Italian's profile actually, and that I might have a very difficult time re-assimilating back into American culture. I'm not sure if I believe this, but we'll see, I could see it being true to a degree, though. But we will come back some day, sooner than later. I don't want to be so far from my family, especially when little half-asian babies come along. I would feel guilty if I never came back. Plus, if I can't have the same job role and work life that I'm used to in the US, then I don't want to stay, because I LOVE my job. But the plan is to give it 2 years, for better or for worse, no matter what happens, to get the full experience and see how everything pans out. It may be difficult and there are days when I want to pull my hair out and scream when I find out about another obscure document I have to track down, but I can't give up just yet, I've barely started.
I'll end this with one thing this cultural training lady said to us, who has been doing this training for 15 years. She said that when the international move happens to a couple, all the stressful things that happen to the people individually and to them as a couple will really test their relationship, and if that couple comes out of it still strong, well that couple is meant to be for life. And I have no doubt that Adam and I will crush this Swiss experience together because there's nobody more meant for each other than we are.
Monday, August 15, 2016
1 month in Switzerland
today marks 1 month in Switerland. and I spent almost half of it not in Switzerland. We started out with bad luck on the apartment search and my job search but some good progress has (finally) been made.
Apartments:
We were avidly searching for apartments the first 2 weeks we arrived. We expected to be in this temporary housing 2-4 weeks, maybe 6 but we thought that was in an extreme case. Well we are the extreme case. We saw a grand total of 18 apartments and submitted our application for 10 of them and we were rejected for all of them.
2 places rejected us because they thought the apartment was too small for 2 people. What's it their business how we want to live? That made us mad. Another rejected us because they wanted only Swiss tenants. Another rejected us because we didn't have our Swiss residence cards yet, and we're assuming this is why the rest of them rejected us too.
Now these residence cards can only be applied for the day you move into the country (which is what we did) and they take up to a month to be processed and sent in the mail. In that mean time, you get a paper that is supposedly just as good as the card, stamped and signed, to use until the card comes in the mail. Apparently this paper was not enough but we were told it was the same thing. Which made us even more mad because how is any expat supposed to find a place to live for that 1st month? We started losing hope.
Last week, when we were nearing on our 1 month mark, Adam contacted his company to ask for an extension to the 1 month they allotted us for this apart-hotel. At first they said no. Adam explained our situation, we've been actively searching, we're not taking advantage of the free housing, they said they'd figure something out. They came back and said we get 1 more month but we have to pay a percentage now.
At the same time, while I was in the US, Adam got his residence card in the mail (they wouldn't give him mine because I had to personally sign for it) and asked the housing agency to re-apply to all of the apartments we'd been rejected from. They were all gone except for one. We didn't love this one but it was reapplied for and we didn't hear anything. For all of the apartments, we were told if we didn't hear back in 2-3 days, it means we were rejected. This is how most of them went before.
So last wednesday we were looking at our 18th apartment when Adam got a call telling us we'd finally be selected for an apartment! One day after I got my residence card and we had a "complete" file. I got really excited and then not so excited as I listened to Adam's end of the call and realized it was that one that was leftover that wasn't our favorite. We had only applied for it because its next door to the train station (Adam's top priority). We decided to wait 24 hours to accept and see if the 2 other apartments we'd recently seen (and liked better) would come through. They didn't, so we accepted our seemingly only option.
So here is what we have: a 320 sq ft studio on the 6th floor of an old building that has a grocery store on the ground floor. It has a balcony that faces the back of the property which has a view just of other buildings and a small open lot. If you crane your neck to the left you can see a little bit of Lake Geneva. The apartment hasn't been redone is a good 30-40 years. The kitchen is very small and old but it does have an oven with 4 burners! (in France we had no oven and only 2 burners, which is the same thing we're working with at this temporary place). The bathroom is very old and the bathtub is horribly stained so we are requesting it be re-enameled. There is 1 small closet and designated storage space in the basement. There is also a washing machine in the building but Swiss buildings have laundry schedules for tenants so we'll have to find out what that is. There is also one of Lausanne's few homeless people, the same lady, who sits in front of that grocery store every day.
I'm very glad it faces away from the street and is so high up. Less chance of cigarette smoke entering through the windows. Which was a big problem in France on the ground floor facing the street, and now in our 2nd floor temporary apartment facing the street and a cafe. The French and Swiss smoke like nothing I've seen before, its everywhere, and I HATE cigarette smoke more than anything. (My college friends know this is not an exaggeration). It sucks because there is no A/C so you need to keep the windows open but I can't because there is an almost constant flow of smoke into the windows. I have to be realistic that at least 1 of our new neighbors will smoke. And I will probably get occasional wafts of smoke in my apartment. There's just nothing you can do about it here.
Oh and we can't move in until September 15th. So we're stuck in this temporary place 1 more month. Adam's clothes had accidentally been packed and he'd been living off the same 4 shirts and 2 pants for a month so we had them delivered and they arrived today, for $250. Otherwise we have no access to our belongings in storage.
Jobs:
Adam's company is giving me job support so I met with an agency that is supposed to help me look. I'm not putting much faith in it because its usually for business jobs and the nursing world is just so different. After our first meeting she put an estimate of 6-12 months on the job hunt. Saying that because I'm American, employers have to fill out extra paperwork and put in extra effort to hire me so I'd really have to network and sell myself. Even for a little cafe or grocery store job that I was hoping to get until I found a nursing job. That didn't make me feel very good.
Don't know if I mentioned in the last post that Adam happened to meet a wonderful nurse, Valerie, on the train. She's actually French but has worked here for 25 years. We met up and she's been networking for me and calling HR departments and telling important hospital people about me and giving me tons of information on nursing and living in Switzerland in general. She's been a life saver! And way more help than this corporate job assistance person. She advised me to try working in the clinics. Here the concept of a clinic is the opposite of a clinic in the US. A clinic in Europe, where they have socialized healthcare, is where the people go who pay the big bucks for private insurance (the highest and most expensive tier). Its very fancy and very hoity-toity. Its better for me to work here because a lot of expats will come here because they work for big, rich companies like Philip Morris and Nestle so my English speaking will be really useful. Also because I can work as a Labor and Delivery nurse. In the public hospitals, midwives and only midwives take care of women in labor, and they deliver the baby too. Doctors are rarely used, only for c-sections and high risk deliveries. Nurses can only do ante-partum and post-partum care. I thought I'd have to get stuck with that for the next 2 years, or worse, med/surg. But at the clinics, the midwives act only as a Labor and Delivery nurse, and like in the US, the private doctor comes around occasionally and is called for orders, for problems, and for the delivery.
Valerie helped me translate my resume into french and let me use her as a reference to vouch for my french speaking abilities, and I sent it off for a Midwife position at one of Lausanne's fancy private cliniques. She told me it usually takes 2+ weeks for them to respond. I got a response in just a few days, rejecting my application (probably they saw the word American and that was it). We thought this was strange because Valerie had talked with someone in HR there. Just a few days later I received another email telling me to call them back because actually, now they wanted to interview me.
I had an interview, 100% in french, with HR and then with the midwife in charge. I explained very clearly to them that my job role is exactly the same as theirs even though I'm not trained as a midwife. She took me on a tour of the unit and explained some things to me. There is no straight nights or day shift. You have to rotate, and there is no pattern to it. Just a mix of nights and days. Terrible. Its not hourly its salaried. So extra hours are not paid. It seems like an LDRP. I'd also have to take care of GYN surgeries They only do 600 deliveries a year. I should have told her I was used to working at hospitals that did 4,000- 7,000. I had lots of questions on the differences between here and the US.
To my fellow L&D nurses you won't believe this! She gave me a recently delivered patient's chart to look through. First of all, its all paper charting. No computers. and whats worse, no central monitoring! For such a beautiful facility I feel like that's archaic. You can only see the tracing on paper and in the room only! And OMG get this: I asked how often we have to chart on the strip and she looked at me like I was an alien and said "why would you do that? you have the tracing right here in the chart you can look at it and see for yourself" That floored me! There's a lot of writing directly onto the strip, which older nurses have told me is the way it used to be. But the amount of free time US nurses would have if we weren't charting on that darn strip every 15 minutes, can you imagine? Its a very American thing, Americans love documentation because they love to sue people.
Anyways the interview was Friday, Valerie seems the be very optimistic about it, is sure I will get the job. This morning I got the same exact automatic stock email that I got last week telling me my application was rejected. I wasn't sure whether to take it seriously, Valerie says not to because its just an automatic reply type of email. So I'll keep waiting. She said it can be very slow. And then all the sudden they'll call me and want me to start the very next day (they did this to her). So we'll see.
I also met an American nurse who works med/surg at this clinic. I talked with her and she calmed my fears a bit. She got a job in 2 weeks when she moved here. She said to forget the official nursing license recognition, private clinics don't care, they're private and they can do what they want. Just to take my time in getting it and not to stress like I was. She also said, of course, the language barrier is tough at first, new vocabulary, medications all have different names (generic and brand names), and sometimes doctors might get mad when you keep asking them to repeat themselves, but that when they learn you're American they will instantly respect you. She said doctors have a great appreciation for American work ethic and know that orders will get done when they tell her. Now knowing 2 nurses, I'm feeling much better about everything.
That's all for the updates now. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for this job!
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