A driver in Zurich hit an eight year old child in Mai 2002, injuring the child seriously.
The child had jumped directly into his path from behind a hedge.

He was charged with speeding (he was travelling at 53 kmh in a 50 kmh zone) and bodily injury caused by negligence.
He was acquitted of the injury charges and fined CHF 100 for 'minimal' speeding.

The court ruling resulted in indignation and outrage:
'The driver couldn't expect a child to jump directly in front of his vehicle - the child had caused the accident.'

The case was back in court last December and the outcome, confirmed by the appeal courts this week, was even more of a surprise:
The driver was sentenced to two months imprisonment (conditional) for grievous bodily injury caused by negligence and is to bear all costs incurred by the accident.
The reason:
The driver was familiar with the road and had to reckon with a child jumping from behind a hedge. He should, therefore, have matched his speed to the situation - in this case 30 kmh. He was, therefore, driving recklessly in the given situation.
The child was in no way to blame.

To my mind this is quite absurd.
While I do not condone the running down of children, neither do I condone the use of two measures.
The driver, being familiar with the road, was driving recklessly at 50 kmh.
A driver who is unfamiliar with the road is allowed to rely on it being safe to follow the signs.

Have you ever driven behind a vehicle that, for no visible reason, is travelling at 'half' the speed allowed?
I know that I have and - being late for an appointment - I nearly went nuts behind my steering wheel!

What on earth are road signs and speed limits for, if I am not allowed to rely on them?
The person responsible for the accident, was the one that had the signs put there in the first place!

This post is more specifically for Mrs. Mac who was taken to Appenzell for Mothers Day this year.

Three pictures; three angles of the same hill ...


... the view from a place called Nord (North) just outside Appenzell ...


... the view from the main road leading into Appenzell ...


... and then a 360° panorama from just below Nord.

As you can see - Appenzellerland, Little Switzerland, is totally overpopulated!
I hope you like the pics, Mrs Mac.

Have you ever noticed that those deodorant-sticks always last for years on end and don't really seem to make any difference?

Well I just made a discovery - if you remove the transparent plastic cap, it makes the world of a difference!

I was out the other day, taking pictures again.

There was a strange light that made the grass greener than usual. Quite kitschy.
It rained the next day, so then I knew the reason.
30 Liters of rain per cm in under an hour.
The worst (rain)storm in the last 100 years, or so they say!
When my radio-alarm-clock woke me that day, it informed me that a house had been washed away in Engadin, Grisons.
Then there was news about trees blocking roads and motorways.

I drove to work without noticing anything. So I didn't give it another thought.
At about 10:00 the storm reached eastern Switzerland.
It started to bucket down with rain - it looked like one of those scenes from a cheap catastrophe film, where you get the impression that the camera is being sprayed with a hose.
It turned out that four windows at the place I work are badly sealed!
Of course, one of them is in my office.
By the time I noticed the fact, a pile of papers I'd had on the window-sill and the carpet below the sill were sodden.
The loo, two doors down was literally flooded!
I read in the news that the storm caused somewhere around CHF 10.000.000 damages - I'm not sure our loo was taken into consideration.

So what about the pictures?

I was out locally. The first picture is of the mountain range called the Alpstein (Alp-stone). It stretches from the Hohe Kasten (Tall Cupboard) - the one with the mast on the left - to the Säntis - the one with its peak in the clouds.



The second picture was taken with a tele photo lens so it's quite long.
Looking in the opposite direction to the first, you can see the village of Stein on the left, St.Gallen, in the valley just left of center and Teufen on the slopes to the right.



I shan't bother you with the fact that it took five hours to put the second one together!

The Swiss opened a new railway tunnel this week. The third longest in the world.

The Lötschberg-Tunnel is 34.6 Km long, which leaves it 15.87 Km shorter than the Channel-Tunnel and 19.27 Km shorter than the Sei-kan-Tunnel in Japan.
Strangely the Swiss also have the third longest road tunnel too - the St.Gotthard-Tunnel which is 16.92 Km long. The longest being the Laerdal-Tunnel in Norway with 24.5 Km.

Today, Saturday 16.06.2007, the public can ride backwards and forwards through the Lötschberg-Tunnel by train. It will be opened for general service in December 2007.
The tunnel was tested intensively as of December 2006 at speeds of up to 280 Kmh. Passenger trains will be scheduled to use the tunnel beginning in August so I presume 'open for general service' means the inclusion of goods-trains ...

The opening of the tunnel means good news for anyone who needs to travel from Germany to Milan or vice-versa - it will reduce their journey by a whole hour!
It is considered to be the safest railway tunnel in the world.

Some interesting facts:
The tunnel is 34.577 Km long, the whole system is 88.1 Km but only 57 Km of tracks have been laid?
If you take a stroll along the tunnel, you should be able to count 133 video cameras, 3200 fire alarms, 2500 emergency lights, 437 telephones but only 6 ventilators.
By the time the tunnel is completed it will have cost somewhere around 4.3 billion Swiss Francs, which is just 1.1 billion more than the original calculation.
They ran into unexpected geological formations along the way ...
... Oh, look! A mountain!!

Fed up of coming in third - on June 1, 2007, 103.672 Km or 67.6% of the total of 153.5 Km of tunnels, galleries and passages of the Gotthard Base Tunnel, had been excavated. When completed, the Gotthard Base Tunnel will be the longest in the world with 57.072 Km!

A bear 'strolled' across the border from northern Italy this week and into Switzerland.

The Swiss authorities, efficient as ever, decided that - seeing as how they had neglected to check the bears papers at the border - they would issue guidelines for the conduct of bears!

The problem is, you see, just recently a bear wandered into the Bavarian Alps and just happened to pass in front of someone's rifle. Of course, the rifle went off and the bear never got a chance to read the rules of conduct for German bears.
The Swiss would like to prevent the same fate befalling 'our' bear.
First, bears have been classified in three categories:
unobtrusive; problematic and high-risk.
I'm not sure you'll find these categories in any zoological encyclopedia, that is just how Swiss minds work.
High-risk-bears may be shot - no questions asked.

Our bear was sighted carrying a white flag, so he's been classified as unobtrusive.

Dear Mr/Mrs Bear,
If you are reading this, please take a look at the guidelines for the conduct of bears in Switzerland. Don't wave at the photographers as this may be misinterpreted as a threatening gesture. And when you climb on your unicycle, please remember that we drive on the right here in Switzerland - we wouldn't want you to have an accident!

Take care.

All this talk about Swiss punctuality is codswallop!
They have leeway!

Take public transport for instance.
A train that enters a station two minutes late is still considered punctual!
However, a train that enters the station on time will leave on time - on the dot.
So if you yourself are a little late, don't bother running - it's not worth it.
Go and drink a coffee instead.

When visiting you are still considered to be punctual if you arrive up to a minute early or up to two minutes late!
So don't rush - you still have plenty of time.

Talking about visiting ...
... you may consider yourself very lucky if you get invited to someone's home in Switzerland. It probably means you haven't practised your sarcastic British humour on them (irony is totally lost on the Swiss) and you haven't asked them what they earn. You've known them for more than two years and during that time you haven't said anything provocative to begin a discussion!

So you arrive on time to discover you have been invited to a party with fifteen other guests ...
How long does it take to say 'Cheers' to seventeen people?
In England 'Cheers everybody', two seconds and then you get to drink?
In Germany it is similar: 'Zum Wohl allerseits' just a second longer.

In Switzerland names are very important.
"Zum Wohl," pause while you wait for eye contact and savour the name you are about to pronounce ...
"Ruedi" (Pronounce the letter 'e' separately)

"Zum Wohl," ...
"Hans-Ueli" (Don't forget the 'e')

"Zum Wohl," ...
"Päddy" (I thought Patrick was an Irish name!)

"Zum Wohl," ...
"Sabine" (Never, never pronounce the 'e'!!)

"Zum Wohl," ...
"Hampi" (Who would ever have guessed that that is Hans-Peter?)

"Zum Wohl," ...
"Chüde" (Kurt-Dieter!! Practice coughing up a hairball 'ch' and don't forget to pronounce the 'e'!)

After half an hour of eighteen individuals saying 'Zum Wohl' to seventeen individuals and if your drink hasn't evaporated in the meantime, you may now sip your drink.
It is best to concentrate hard when being introduced to people - they will always remember your name long after you have forgotten theirs.
If you are like me and forget names immediately, then you have to concentrate on the names the person next to you is saying and toast the same individual immediately afterwards ...

By the way - when visiting in Switzerland, it is usual to bring a present along with you.
I wouldn't recommend the 750g. bar of Toblerone.
Toblerone is now owned by Kraft, an American company and is, somehow, not quite as Swiss as it used to be!

And while we're at it ...

I've moaned about mentioned Swiss hospitality before.
I don't mean meeting the Swiss in their homes (chance would be a fine thing - they are very, very reserved) I mean Restaurants and Hotels.

I had some training to do at a company in St.Gallen one November before I moved here and, because it was a three-day-course I had to stay at a local Hotel.
The hotel is well known as one of St.Gallens high class hotels.

On the last day of the course we finished early and I decided to drink a coffee in the hotel restaurant before going for something to eat.
The restaurant was empty and I sat at a table in the window.
A waitress came along and asked if I was expecting company. I said no and she asked me to sit in the middle of the restaurant at a table for two - I was at a table for six.

I pointed out that the restaurant was empty and I would like to enjoy the remainder of the sunlight ...
She repeated her request for me to move and offered to turn the lights on for me.
I moved - I drove into town and drank my coffee there.

I ate, went to the cinema and returned to the hotel at around 22:00.
At the hotel bar I ordered a beer.
I drank the 0.33 Litre within five minutes and asked for another.
The look the barmaid gave me was withering - she asked if I wouldn't prefer to use the mini-bar in my room - she wanted to finish for the evening!

In my experience that is typical of Swiss hospitality.

I visited Gin and Teutonic yesterday and was surprised to hear, that Germany is now classed as 'The Service Desert' while Switzerland is 'Service Heaven'.

When I say I was surprised, I mean I was very surprised.
Perhaps I can't waggle with my hips so well or perhaps my voice doesn't sound quite as sexy as Rachel Welch on the phone but then, I'm a man. My experience with Customer Service, however is quite the opposite.

Just last week I discovered that the seal on the fridge door was broken and the fridge froze up even when set to 'Low'.
When the frozen milk began to get on my nerves, I took a look at the identification plate inside the fridge, wrote down the model name and serial number and entered them into the Customer-Service-Request-Form on the web site of the well known international refrigerator manufacturer with the information that the fridge door wasn't sealing properly.

That was Sunday. On Tuesday morning I received a phone call.
A very unfriendly female voice inquired about the oven that wasn't working - she informed me that there is no such model as the one I had noted - the EZ13 refers to the power consumption (the power consumption is noted on the id-plate at 125W). The serial number is non-existent and would I please now read the information directly from the id-plate to her.
I said that the oven was still a fridge and that I would be glad to read the information to her, but she would have to phone back in the evening - I was at work.
"Oh," she said "you work!"
I informed her that, like herself, I had to work for a living.
She would phone me tomorrow at 10:00 - I shall please be at the fridge to read the id-plate to her!

I suggested she give me a mail address, I would photograph the id-plate and send the photograph to her - I didn't want to take the day off just so that I could read her the numbers I'd already given her anyway ...
I started to feel very annoyed when she tried to inform me that it would be easier, if I just read the information to her. But I bit my tongue and insisted she give me a mail address.

I photographed the id-plate, which still contained the exact same information I had imparted, and sent the image to the refrigerator manufacturer via mail.
The very next day the same unfriendly voice informed me that she had found a seal for the EZ13 door and the technician would arrive 'some time next week' to fit it.
"No problem," I said "just have him phone me when he is there - it doesn't take me longer than 40 minutes to drive home ...
... or perhaps it would be more practical to inform me beforehand when he might arrive?"
"He might be able to make it on Wednesday."

After some haggling we were actually able to arrange a time between 08:00 and 10:00.
Not once did she apologise for virtually calling me an idiot the day before, or mention the fact that there had been a mistake in identifying my fridge and if I had let her, she'd have had me take the week off work to wait for a techi who may or may not arrive!

And that is 'Customer-Service-Heaven'?!
I prefer German customer service myself.

Don't mention the skiing.
That is what Heather's blog is called.

I discovered it some time ago, but wasn't into blogging then - neither reading nor writing.
Then I read something about a British expatriate winning the Swiss blog-award.
That was how I discovered the magic behind Heather's writing.
Heidi would have been proud of her.

We never met personally. We exchanged a few comments now and then.
I would find something in her blog that I commented on and vice versa.

Her last entry was on 20th February 2007. On the 21st she moved from somewhere in Canton Zürich in Switzerland to somewhere in Germany.
Sadly she hasn't been heard of since.
Perhaps she really does have a new blog entitled 'Don't mention the Leberwurst' or 'Hans would have been disgusted' or something similar.
If she does, I don't know of it yet.

Heather hasn't visited my blog since February and I can't see any of her comments on other blogs she used to frequent.
I do hope that nothing happened on the way to Germany ...

Heather,
if you still have an internet connection, put up a few words to let us know how you are and how Germany greeted you.
You have a faithful audience out there and I know that many of us are waiting to read about your adventures in Germany.

Go on - nudge, nudge ...

Sorry to have kept you so long ...

I have visitors from Germany here at the moment and, whenever the weather has allowed, we've been out sightseeing.
Some of the results have now been put together and you may see them by clicking on the images below.

The Lake of Constance, the Bodensee is known in southern Germany as the Swabian Sea and is the third largest lake in central Europe after Lake Balaton in Hungary and Lake Geneva in Switzerland.

Two of the pictures below are 360° images and were taken in the harbour in Arbon, the third is 180° from above Rorschach.
The opposite coastline, visible in all three pictures, is that of Germany.