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From London to the Swiss Alps: A Family-First Migration Story · Whereabouts Tales | Stories of Belonging and Immigrant Experiences

0:00
Welcome to this episode of Whereabouts Tales.
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Today we share the story of Joe Rideout, who made the ball move
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from the busy streets of London to a tiny village deep in the
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Swiss Alps. Joe's journey is about embracing
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A radically different way of life, navigating challenges like
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Brexit, a global pandemic and cultural integration, and all
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for the sake of family and new beginnings.
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Join us as Joe opens up about what it really means to leave
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one home behind and find another one in a small, close knit
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community surrounded by nature. I'm Paul and this is whereabouts
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this Joe. Hi, good evening and thank you
0:48
for doing this. Hi, Paul.
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Today's episode is going on a path that we haven't haven't
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explored until today. So Joe, how I will let you say
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it because I don't want to devolve it.
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So maybe you can tell us briefly first your name and then where
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are you living at the moment? Hey so I'm Joe and I live in AI,
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moved from the UK. I'm originally from north of
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England, but moved from London to actually a really small
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village in rural Switzerland in heart of a National Park.
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It's a village of 900 people called Ukin.
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Oh my God. You know, from London to Ukin
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was a bit of a, you know, baptism of fire.
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So that's kind of my migration story, I guess so.
1:36
That's what I'm saying. It's a bet that we haven't
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explored until today. So UK to Switzerland we haven't
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had until until now. So we had UK to Australia, which
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was a huge step. Then we had, we had Mexico to to
1:48
Switzerland but not UK to Switzerland.
1:51
You said London, Drew. Was it there, the brace that you
1:54
grew up or you are originally from a different city?
1:57
No, I'm sorry, I'm originally from Newcastle, which is, you
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know, complete opposite end of England.
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It's far north of England. So you know, like already to me,
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like London fell like an in an internal migration of sorts,
2:08
right, you know, from moving from one end of the country to
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another, particularly like a, you know, big ish country like
2:14
the UK. So, you know, I kind of kind of
2:19
felt like I've been on the few move, so to speak.
2:23
Yeah, my wife is originally from China.
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So we're kind of got like their third culture.
2:28
You know, we've got kids. So it's you kind of got third
2:30
culture kid situation. Well, that's, that's extremely
2:35
interesting. That's extremely interesting.
2:36
Did did you met in in China, In China?
2:39
In UK? Yeah, I met in the UK.
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I met in London. So she's in London and I, I have
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my first job there. We met.
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We met there like 7 or 8 years ago.
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You said you grew up in Newcastle.
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It's Newcastle upon Tyre, So the one with the yeah, yeah,
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exactly. Yeah, there's two.
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There's one one in Staffordshire as well in the Midlands.
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But where's the where's the football club from?
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Is it from the up? On tyre, that's from my one,
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yeah. OK, OK, that's different.
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OK. Because everyone knows Alan
3:10
Shearer for sure. Yeah, certainly now that, you
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know, he was kind of playing up front when I was a kid, you
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know, like the 1990s, OK, when I was growing up.
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So that was a big kind of cultural thing.
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It's kind of a region obsessed by football, but I was always a
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rugby kid so I've kind of been a bit different.
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Kind of guy, I like rugby as well and it's it's so weird
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because it's not something that you get a lot of people to talk
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about because everyone is a bit able to talk about football, but
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rugby is just like. I know.
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It's so interesting. What are you?
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Were you a big city kid or were you like countryside kid?
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What, what? How did you grow up or what?
3:55
Do you Yeah. So I I grew up kind of in the
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middle of the city, kind of like a real kind of urban
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environment, but I've. And then I lived in London and
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then I just got to a stage where I just.
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I was. I have enjoyed like the
4:11
restaurants, the busy life. But like the minute I had kids,
4:15
like the switch flipped, right? I just thought, Nah, I've had
4:20
enough of this, you know, had enough of trying to get the tube
4:24
with small kids. And I was like, I've got to find
4:26
something else like, and also, you know that you've reached
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that stage where like working in London and I was looking, can I
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afford a house in London? No.
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And you go into like practical mode.
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And I was thinking, you know, what could what could I do?
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What would be best for my kids to grow up?
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You know, what will be best for them?
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Where can I build like a life? And then I thought, well, and so
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I had someone doing the same profession as me.
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I'm a lawyer, patent lawyer who moved in with Switzerland.
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And then kind of I saw a job pop up and I was like, let's go for
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it, kind of almost a spur of the moment type thing.
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And I'd never been to Switzerland, not once before I
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applied for this job. If I kind of heard like a lot of
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people saying it's like safe. It's, you know, nothing ever
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happens. I thought, you know, if you're
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going to lose your social life once by having children, why not
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lose it twice? Because you can't.
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You can't lose it twice. Isn't it so nice?
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So, you know, I, I just applied for a job and then came here and
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then, you know, and then got a job in Basel and then my wife,
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my wife was in finance. So I thought, where should I
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live? I want some a bit quieter than
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Basil. So we're basically live in a
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village halfway between Basil and Zurich, which has been
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cheaper than both. And also she can get to Zurich,
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whereas if we lived in Basil be a long old commute to Zurich.
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So we're kind of in the middle, which suits us really well.
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We're really happy with where we live and not, not, you know, not
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too far from the cities, but you know enough that everything is
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like a really slow pace of life. And she goes to the village
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school and you know, nothing ever happens and she's really
6:07
happy. But did you?
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You said you were living in London, you said you enjoyed the
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life and everything was. Did you ever had during your
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upbringing, thoughts of moving abroad or was just only because
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of the kids? It's because the kids and
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because of life cost living and finally somewhere where you
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know, in London is somewhere where everything costs an
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extraordinary amount of money and you know, the salaries are
6:36
not so great in the UK. So it was just like a kind of
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opportunity to have a better life for me, the kids for
6:44
everything really. I mean just an old fashioned
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economic migration, hence the day.
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Was it? Was it before the Brexit?
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It was just before I moved, so I had my interview in like the end
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of 2019 and like when I when I moved to Switzerland, it's the
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end of February 2020. Oh my God, what the perfect.
7:09
Moment just so Brexit happened like I think it was like the
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last day of January or like 1st of February.
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Then I moved like two or three weeks later or something like
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that. And then COVID happened like,
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you know, like 2 weeks after that.
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And you know, my, my wife was, was in the UK because she, she'd
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like applied for British citizenship and she was like
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having to wait to get her passport.
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And we had a newborn baby and she, I was going to come find a
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flag, get all the moving stuff, sort of all physical lifting,
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putting all the furniture in place.
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And then she'd come like 3 weeks later, something like that.
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And then, you know, we got stuck across where she was stuck in
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the UK and I was in London and I was in Switzerland when COVID
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broke and what's more like, and then a landlord died.
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And then this was the time when like this was happening, you
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know? You said in the beginning it was
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a boring story. How could that be a boring
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story, man? Yeah, you know, and my wife had
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like pretty much a newborn baby, like two or three months old or
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something like that. And then like, you know, she's
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by herself. And then, you know, we told her
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to go to the flat in a month. And then like there was a
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rumours of national lockdown and we read she's homeless in a
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pandemic with the kids and the husbands stuck in different
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country. And so my, my dad had to drive
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down all the way from like, you know, far north of England near
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Scottish border all the way to London, which is like, I don't
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know, 5-6 hour drive with no furniture, you know, apart from
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like 1 bed. That was just, we just left
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there. I'm just going to, you know,
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leave in the house and he had to go down there, sleep on the
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floor so the furniture was gone and then drive back the next day
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because they're with because this was like middle March and
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all the other countries have locked down.
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But the UK and the Boris Johnson was like, oh, no, we're fine.
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We're just going to, like, ride through.
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This, yeah. You know, so and then he had to
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drive all the way up the next day and another 6 hour drive on
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the way back. And then my wife, bless her, had
9:13
to live with my parents for three months.
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COVID. So that was kind of unexpected
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and they didn't have, we didn't have another plan.
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And as it happened, she didn't get to Switzerland until.
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So I left in like mid February and I started work in the 1st of
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March and she didn't get to sums until the middle of June.
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So it's four months. It's meant to be like 3 or 4
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weeks, something like that. And yes, four months.
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Oh, man, oh man. That's, that's a, that's a,
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that's a big story. But when you arrive, you arrive,
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you said you arrive mid February.
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Yeah. How was the did you get to do
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the landing process or the registering process in this in
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Switzerland as an EU citizen? Effectively, yes, it was in the
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transition period. OK, that means it was not that
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complicated. No, no, no.
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And now it's a strange situation where like, you know, when I
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got, I applied for my permanent, I got my permanent residence
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recently after having my five years, you know, so I came in
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February. So you know, five years was up
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earlier this year and early 2025.
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And like, you know, you still get like the perks of like the
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easier route being British now. In fact, even you would even
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have came after Brexit. So like a weird, we're kind of a
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weird. And now I've got like the, the,
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the, the hangover, right? You know, like a grandfather did
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the. Hangover.
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Yeah, OK. OK.
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So that means take me a bit to the registration.
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Did you do it by yourself or did you have the company the the
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company that hired you doing it for you?
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I. I, you know, it's pretty easy.
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I didn't like, I did have a relocation company, but there's
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nothing much to do. You just turn up and then they
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just give you. And Switzerland is bizarre.
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They, they, they literally took like a photo and then like it
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was like something for the 1980s and they like cut it out and put
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in like a paper booklet and like stuck it on with like glue.
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So the least, least official looking document ever.
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It looked like you made it a home.
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Oh, you got your kids to make it a home.
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They've been, they've been replaced.
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Now they're all with like proper cards, but used to be like kind
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of a bit shambolic. That's interesting that I you
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you wouldn't expect this from a country like Switzerland, right?
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No, I mean it was all quite organised, but like the document
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itself looked a bit, yeah. And you did the registration for
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yourself and when when your wife joined you had to register the
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kids, did you had one or you had already you had another kid or
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you had only? 11 kid at that time, now I've
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got 2. OK, so you had to register it
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for the kid and everything went smooth as well?
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Yeah, pretty much, yeah. OK, that's nice.
11:58
How was the apartment hand hunting process or.
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So when when I got to Switzerland, I was in like a
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company, like my employer, like provided like a flat that was
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initially like a month. But then because like we got
12:13
stuck over COVID, it would end up being like 3 months.
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But you know, because no one else from you was coming in,
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there was no real pressure for me to get out, which was not
12:22
like. So I ended up not having to pay
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for any, for any accommodation for three months.
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It's meant to be a lot shorter. Yeah, it was nice.
12:30
There's kind of a bit lonely. It's kind of a bit of a shock
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being by myself after, you know, being with the new ball and
12:36
everything. But yeah, it was all kind of
12:40
simple. And then, you know, move to the
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new flat in June, I think. But yeah, it's all kind of quite
12:51
smooth. Like it sounds a well organized
12:53
country like nothing, nothing is complicated or goes wrong.
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You hear all these horror stories about like 300 people
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queuing from an apartment in Zurich because they'll build
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these price controls, right? Which makes it, you know, look,
13:04
it's good on one hand and that in case, you know, people
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payless. But then the quid quo Pro is
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that if the prices are good, then, you know, everyone wants
13:13
it in this in these areas. And so it's impossible to get,
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but where I live in like kind of a rural area, it's really not so
13:19
bad. So we only missed out on one
13:21
apartment and found the second one we're looking for and then
13:25
hand over. Pretty simple.
13:28
I can imagine that that searching like you said.
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So it's I think touring Basel all all big big cities are a
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horror to get to get their apartment in foreshore.
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But I think as long as you move on the countryside.
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But how was the How receptive is the countryside of Switzerland
13:45
to foreigners? I would say the general kind of
13:48
vibe is like no one wants to talk to you, but no one gives
13:54
you any trouble. It's, you know, you just
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basically it's, you know, yeah, you're there.
14:00
No, we'll leave you alone. You leave us alone.
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I think it's a probably a very hard country to properly
14:08
integrate in because, you know, I think you know, most of the
14:12
countries in Europe when you learn language, you learn like,
14:16
you know, the writing and the speaking match.
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I know you're in. You're in Germany, right?
14:20
Yeah. Presumably you've learned German
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to some degree, but how you know you've encountered Swiss German
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at some stage That's. Not German.
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That's not German. Yeah, exactly right.
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It's not German. So like you have to like learn
14:32
German and then learn Swiss German when he for kind of not
14:35
when you've learned German already to a decent standard.
14:38
Yeah. And it's really, I think it's
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quite a challenging, but you know, language, especially in
14:43
more rural areas. So like, you know, I can
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understand what's written quite well, but spoken varies.
14:53
I think especially if people don't realize I'm a foreigner
14:56
and they come up to me and then they speak in total dialect,
14:59
then it's quite challenging. My German's pretty bad, to be
15:02
honest. But you know, I've, I've learned
15:04
enough that I could go in and I'll have like a, what I've
15:07
called Post Office German, you know, where I can think about in
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advance. It's a very scripted, staged,
15:13
staged situation. Is there a a previous episode?
15:18
It's so funny. I had an episode that I think
15:20
one of the previous one with Paul, he's he's living in
15:23
Germany from UK as well and he called it exactly Post Office
15:28
German. Is it a pattern in UK like
15:30
that's? Why perhaps it is.
15:33
I thought I, you know, came up with this, but maybe maybe it's
15:35
a phrase that others use as well.
15:38
OK. Yeah, I guess you could call it
15:40
like supermarket German or something, something like that,
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you know, where it's just, you know, you've got a very simple
15:46
sentence to say and you can think about it in advance and
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you know what the response is going to be.
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And it's in a particular such, you know.
15:51
Confines the thing that I discussed with him is that it's
15:54
so bad when they move out of your prepared speech and they
16:00
have I don't know they have a question that you didn't plan in
16:02
your speech and then it gets you off the track and then you're
16:06
but no, that wasn't VBT that that was not meant to be there
16:12
and then you're still because I know exactly what you mean by
16:14
this prepared speech like every time when I called an office,
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when I called the authorities, I always prepared my speech at the
16:19
beginning and tried to get exactly what every possible
16:23
question that could have come. I have prepared an answer for
16:26
it, but sometimes there is an unscripted question.
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This coming up is messing up the complete speech that you have
16:33
prepared. That's also complicated.
16:35
Yeah. And to be honest with you, I
16:36
think, I think my German learning has been hindered by a
16:39
couple of things. One of them is the fact that
16:41
it's a very, very strong dialect of German, you know, probably
16:46
stronger than anywhere in Germany, I'd imagine.
16:49
And even by Swiss standards is not super easy.
16:54
And second one is like working in English.
16:58
It's kind of a weird situation. I mean, I guess there's not many
17:00
other times like it, you know, where you move to a country that
17:04
doesn't have your native language and work in your own
17:06
native language. So that, yeah, that makes it
17:11
hard because I'm just in English all day and then I go home.
17:14
You have a long commute at home and I'm, you know, in English at
17:16
home. You know, my wife survived
17:18
Chinese, but you know, she lived in London, speaks fluent
17:20
English, you know, so like, I've learned enough for permanent
17:25
residence, but like, I, I don't haven't excelled, if I'm honest.
17:32
How was the How is it for the kids?
17:35
Oh, yeah, my, my kid. You know, she like, everyone
17:39
knows that she's got British passport.
17:41
She kind of looks like half Chinese, half European, half
17:44
British. But then she speaks like a Swiss
17:47
farmer because, you know, she's got no, no dialect from us.
17:53
And then she grows up in like a farming village.
17:55
So she speaks like a farmer. So the thing which comes out of
18:00
the German, which comes out of her mouth, is not what you'd
18:02
expect. The mismatch of those things I
18:05
think must be extremely funny. Extremely funny.
18:09
It's Yeah, this is what it is. Certainly to me, anyway.
18:13
I mean, I don't know if this would see it the same, but
18:16
certainly like to to me it sounds very Swissified German.
18:20
That's what you expect, right? That's that's her her main
18:25
experience of German. Sure, she watches like regular
18:27
German on the TV sometimes, but you know, most of the time she's
18:30
seen it at school and everyone's speaking the dialect.
18:33
Absolutely. And I think it's good that you
18:35
don't try to speak with her because we have the same thing
18:39
with our son. We don't speak with him German
18:41
and he's learning, he's actually learning German from, we live in
18:45
in the Suebian area of, of Germany.
18:48
So he's he's speaking German. Like, OK, so you're not too far
18:53
from us, just a bit. No, no, no, no, no.
18:55
I'm I'm, I would say 2 hours away from Zurich.
18:59
Yeah. So you've got kind of a bit of
19:00
our manic lilt up there. Yeah.
19:04
Yeah, I'm not far away from the from the bodency.
19:07
Oh, OK. Yeah, yeah.
19:08
Not too far, not too far at all. Yeah, yeah.
19:11
So that's why I'm my son is speaking German, like, like a
19:15
Swabian from the countryside because he's talking with his
19:19
colleague in school and that's, that's what's happening.
19:21
Yeah, we're really keen, especially with the.
19:25
I think English is one of those ones where I'm not too worried
19:27
about because I've just think, yeah, with a bit of English at
19:32
home and the fact that such a ubiquitous presence that I'm
19:35
not, I'm not too worried with my kids English, although that's
19:37
pretty much the only language I speak to a good degree.
19:40
So obviously I talked to her in English, but we've really worked
19:42
hard on making sure her Chinese is really good.
19:46
My wife, my wife speaks to her like, unless I'm like really
19:49
involved in the conversation pretty much like exclusive in
19:51
Chinese. And we met and she has like
19:53
online lessons with tutors in China and reading Chinese as
19:57
well. So really try hard to keep, keep
20:01
all her kind of cultural influences going, you know, so
20:05
she's kind of growing up in all three cultures at once.
20:09
That's, that's so nice. My son kind of doesn't really
20:13
speak Romanian anymore. So he's understanding, but he's
20:17
not speaking that good anymore. And we are struggling with that,
20:19
to be honest. And that's something which has,
20:22
it's kind of a pain for me. And I, I know exact completely.
20:24
I think that's, that's the same for, for your wife.
20:27
So I think it's, it's a pain to talk to the family and it's a
20:29
pain to talk to whomever is only speaking the, the, the, the
20:34
mother's language to say it like this.
20:38
What was the the first impression Drew not during
20:42
COVID, because during COVID, I think the first impression is
20:45
that like you said, loneliness, nobody there you had, I think
20:48
you are alone. You work from home.
20:49
I do suppose there was not much office discussion with the
20:54
colleagues. But what was your first
20:55
impression when you actually get to leave the Swiss life in a in
21:00
a village? I kind of thought it was kind of
21:02
too good to be true, you know? I just like everything coming
21:08
from the UK where everything is like either broken or dirty.
21:12
Like sure there's good points but like but in Switzerland like
21:19
it just seemed that everything like you know, I commuted by
21:22
train when COVID died down a bit and like the train was never and
21:26
I mean never late. It took me like 3 years until
21:29
the train was late and then it was because like there was
21:31
literally a fire at the next station.
21:35
Fair enough. That's a good excuse.
21:38
You know, like a building, a building was on fire next to the
21:41
track. Like everything just seems to
21:43
run really, really well. And you know, it's got a bit of
21:47
a reputation being a hyper organized, hyper vigilant.
21:51
I kind of feel like what's the catch, you know, what's what's
21:56
the catch, I guess. Surprise.
22:01
I guess, you know, but I guess it felt just really, really
22:07
great to begin with. And I think there's a long, the
22:09
longer I'm here, the more I think you get used to the
22:12
positives And I kind of real kind of realized there is, there
22:15
is a bit of a catch like it, there is a, a strange feeling
22:21
where I've been, I've been here for quite a while, like 5, five
22:23
and a half years. And the kind of feeling that
22:26
like it's home on one level, like, you know, this is where
22:29
like my kid grows up. This I bought a house here now I
22:33
and I, I don't see myself going home unless I'm forced to.
22:37
But the same time like, you know, it's never going to be
22:39
like, you know, it's never going to be like your home.
22:41
It's never going to be like where you're from.
22:43
It's never going to be like where you've got less kind of
22:45
cultural understanding and where, you know, all these
22:47
little, little cultural quirks, you know.
22:52
So it's always a, you know, when we go home, I always feel, you
22:55
know, especially to like my best of England, like the Northeast.
22:58
I always feel like kind of nostalgic, miss it at the same
23:02
time. Wouldn't really want to, you
23:04
know, it's nice to be there for two weeks, but when I wouldn't,
23:06
wouldn't want to deal with the difficult, the practical
23:09
difficulties living, living up there.
23:14
So it kind of feels like, I mean, yeah, it's a really nice
23:20
situation to be in living in Switzerland.
23:21
But like I always feels a bit like I don't have a cultural,
23:24
especially when you don't speak the language super well and
23:26
there's like, you know, really close knit community and like
23:28
rural local people speaking dialect.
23:31
You kind of miss out a bit on the like interpersonal
23:33
interactions and kind of live a bit like a ghost in like a rural
23:38
village. You know, we just go home and go
23:40
to sleep and go see office the next day.
23:42
So that's the catch. I think the catch is that, you
23:45
know, maybe like without really good language skills and that's
23:48
hard, you know, with language, strong dialect, you're kind of
23:52
missing out a bit on kind of a personal connection.
24:00
I, you said something which I said as well, quite often I'm
24:05
not going home unless I'm forced to.
24:08
That's my statement as well. And I think, I think I quoted
24:11
almost in every episode. Priyanka, I had Priyanka who
24:14
moved from from India to UK and she said something which I think
24:20
it fits for all the experts. Is that you belong everywhere
24:26
and nowhere like you don't really think have that belonging
24:30
when you moved to, but you don't have that belonging in your
24:34
former home anymore. Like it's a it's a mix.
24:37
It's a strange feeling that only an expert can understand.
24:43
And I fully agree with you, Joe, with the missing on social
24:46
interactions. That's something which is, I
24:48
have to say that that's something which was on my plate
24:51
at the beginning as well for quite long.
24:54
It took us a while to, to learn the language as well.
24:57
And we were kind of in the same situation where I didn't spoke
25:00
with my mother's language at, at, at work, but I was speaking
25:03
English, which I was, I was OK in.
25:05
So I didn't, I didn't have to struggle.
25:08
And also in the same time, like when you want to do something
25:12
social, you need to speak German, because otherwise there
25:14
is there is no way in which you can connect the to the locals.
25:19
But most probably that's the catch.
25:20
But that's, that's not the catch of Switzerland.
25:23
That's the catch of every expert move.
25:27
Trade, trade. That's that's just what everyone
25:31
has to know when they are trying to do this or when they are
25:33
planning to do. This yeah, I guess, I guess
25:35
Switzerland specifically like it's not the most lively place,
25:40
right. It's type of place where like
25:42
neighbors will call the police if the, if you like, if there's
25:45
any noise like 10 O 1:00 PM. You know, they're like, they're
25:49
kind of sticklers for the rules. And like everything I like is
25:53
catered for the Swiss taste, you know, like we're talking, I
25:58
think before the recording started about Mexican food and
26:01
like, you know, it's everything like the Indian food.
26:04
It's all like for very, it's all Kate.
26:07
They all cater for the local Swiss taste, which is very
26:10
plain, you know, very vanilla, you know, and like not, you
26:17
know, we need different like cities like London, something
26:19
like I always used to say, something always happens like
26:21
you got your door and like this summer event, which takes place
26:25
almost every week and there's something you can talk about and
26:27
something you know, I can talk finally about like X happened.
26:30
Isn't that crazy as I feel like in Switzerland, like nothing
26:34
crazy is the five years since I came.
26:37
So I think, I think, you know, if, why would say to people who
26:42
are thinking about Switzerland is like it's really stable and
26:46
like on the, on the kind of the hard metrics, you know, it
26:50
scores really, really well. Like the salaries are very good
26:52
by European standards, taxes very low.
26:55
And Despite that, all the thing, all things work really well.
26:59
But like the negatives are that it's not very exciting.
27:05
I mean, you have to really like outside space, right?
27:07
It's a very, very objective. It's a very beautiful country,
27:10
like lakes, mountains, etcetera, etcetera.
27:11
I'm sure everyone knows it really well catered to an out
27:16
kind of, you know, outdoorsy people.
27:18
And I think another thing just I didn't quite appreciate coming
27:23
here with kids is like there's a bit of like, you know, it's a
27:29
bit like living in the 1950s when it comes to child care.
27:32
Like I know people, you know, I work right next to German border
27:34
and all people who live in Germany, sure they like to pay
27:37
loads more tax, like twice as much tax as we do.
27:40
But like, you know, all the child care is like pretty much
27:42
100% or close to 100% funded. You know, I don't average it
27:45
costs, but not much. I've put in the kids in, in
27:49
childcare. Whereas like, you know, I've got
27:51
two kids and it is like, well, speaking EUR, it's like €3000
27:56
per child per month for putting a kid in in daycare.
28:02
Yeah. And I guess in Germany it's
28:03
probably about 300, right. It's. 300 if you so daycare it's
28:08
I think the the government subsidized one at 450 or
28:12
something. OK, yeah, but still.
28:15
Yeah, it's not 3000. Yeah, OK, crazy.
28:19
So it doesn't really make sense for your wife to to go.
28:22
But my wife doesn't. She does work, you know, and my
28:25
kids are kind of quite staggered an age.
28:28
So we're doing only kind of paying twice for a little bit of
28:31
time. But you know, it's a country
28:35
where like the whole whole system is like very set up.
28:39
I mean, I'm going to be quite honest here for like women to
28:42
stay at home, it's a very bad through, you know, we, we're
28:45
looking at compared to UK and especially like London, like,
28:47
you know, that that probably died off, I don't know, 30-40
28:52
years ago. And Switzerland, it's still, you
28:57
know, I heard a friend came around of the day and she was
29:02
told, she was asked, she was told, you know, like, why do you
29:05
work when your husband, your husband has a job, you know, and
29:07
this is kind of like in that. Yeah.
29:10
And, and it's more than like the attitude.
29:13
I think you could live with this kind of attitude.
29:15
And this is just what people say and like, but the practical
29:19
amount of occasions are that, you know, Katie's are very
29:22
expensive and also the school like the my daughter finishes
29:26
school every day at 11:40. That's that's that's still.
29:32
How many? We're just expected to be there
29:33
to pick her up, you know, and, you know, you just have to deal
29:38
with it. And in a small village like
29:41
where I live, it's, you know, they can have lunch like a place
29:44
next to the school, but that's it.
29:47
You know, like from like 1:00, I think at 1:30 that, you know,
29:50
then you'd have to pick your kid up every day.
29:53
So we've got like a, you know, working from home arrangement,
29:55
you know, swap working from home.
29:57
Then my wife works home. Some days I will come another.
30:00
But like, you know, like in the UK it would be a kid probably in
30:03
school for like, you know, 3330, which is a lot more manageable
30:06
than 11 11:30. So it's, it's not like a, in
30:13
some ways it's very friendly for people with parents because you
30:16
can actually afford a house, at least if you live in a rural
30:19
area, much more than living near London.
30:21
But it comes at a cost. Like, you know, it's just
30:24
really, really set up like a traditional like dad goes to
30:28
work and mum stays at home. That's just like the it's still
30:32
on that kind of I had mindset. This is an.
30:37
This is an interesting discussion too, because I, we
30:41
often have this discussion in general, not, not not only about
30:44
our case, but because you don't I, we have the possibility to
30:49
leave out son in, in, in school. We had it in the kindergarten.
30:52
We have to possibly to leave him in school until 6:00 PM.
30:55
So it's actually 7:30 AM to 6:00 PM.
30:58
We never used that. So we never used that.
31:01
So my we tried to always pick him up when the school is
31:05
finished and every only in Special Situations to leave him
31:09
to play there. I realized more and more every
31:13
time when I go to a parents meeting, you know, do you have
31:15
this? I don't know how they are called
31:16
in English, the official name, but in German there are this
31:19
Elton Alban where you go there and and you have these meetings
31:22
where the principal of the school is always saying the same
31:25
thing. Please try to pick up your kids
31:28
in time. Your kids need you more than
31:31
they need us. They and it could be that even
31:35
though it's hard for you now, it could be that for your kids,
31:37
it's absolutely the right thing. We never know.
31:40
We never know for sure. We we don't know that we it's
31:44
not for a grinding mentality, for sure.
31:47
It's not for this. Let's push it.
31:49
Let's make another promotion. Let's get this and that because
31:52
it's it's a different mentality for sure, but you don't know
31:55
what's right at the end. You, we don't know we are, I
31:59
will just say the same as I said last time, we're just winging
32:02
it. We have always tried to find the
32:04
whole way of this life. There is no user user manual
32:08
when you start it. And I think it's good for your
32:11
kids that they get to see one of you everyday.
32:14
I think that that's amazing and they see a lot of you, let's say
32:17
like this, like and even though they go come home, they get to
32:21
play and you you still have to work, but you are there like
32:24
you, you, you take them home, you have a nice walk with them,
32:27
the home. And I think that's a benefit.
32:28
I see it as a benefit. I have to be.
32:30
Honest, I can't imagine what it was like in the days before home
32:33
working. How people manage this I really
32:38
it's not easy. Absolutely, absolutely.
32:41
And The thing is that if like you said, you are living in a on
32:43
a rural area, I think a possibility to find a nanny,
32:46
like someone to take your kids home.
32:48
It's almost not there like you have it in big cities.
32:53
I had, I had a really good quote a few a few days ago, I don't
32:59
remember from whom, and I'm sorry for that.
33:01
But he said something like, it's interesting how as as soon as
33:06
the society is evolving, we are buying the community back.
33:11
So back then you had the, you're living in a small city or in a
33:14
small village and you had the neighbors looking over your kid.
33:18
But now you have to buy that service from someone.
33:22
You go to work, you make more money, but you have to buy the
33:24
person that take care of, take, take care of your kid and so on.
33:28
And I think that's, that's interesting.
33:30
And I think the, the benefit of the fact that you get to spend
33:33
with your kid every day. We don't, as I said, I, it's
33:36
only my opinion. I stand behind it.
33:38
I think your kids are extremely happy and lucky to have this, to
33:44
have one of you every day. Did you have the feeling that
33:52
you said about food? And I want to come back, about
33:55
come back to food because I had the same problem at the
33:58
beginning and not to the beginning, but I still have it
34:00
with the German restaurants. Because The thing is that this,
34:05
this adaptation, this local adaptation, like you said, you
34:08
have Chinese food, but it's Germanised.
34:11
Yeah, Vietnamese food, but it's Germanised.
34:15
I, we have Indian food and every time when I I love Indian food
34:18
and when, every time when I go to an Indian food in in Germany,
34:21
I have to tell him, don't make it German spicy, just make it
34:24
really spicy. Yeah, if I'm honest, most of my
34:27
restaurant experiences are, you know, even I live in
34:30
Switzerland, actually in Germany because I live maybe like 5
34:33
kilometres from the border and you know, it's half the price in
34:36
Germany. So when I'm talking about my my
34:39
restaurant Express, most most of it is in Germany rather
34:42
Switzerland. OK, so you know what I mean by
34:45
the Indian? I know exactly what you mean.
34:46
Yeah, yeah, but then but then, you know, I I got a bit too
34:50
cocky and you know, they when they said how many do you want
34:52
it on a one to five Spicer. I said 5 and then it came and it
34:57
was like I wateringly hot. I had to go down to, I had to go
35:02
down to a four for next time. That's true.
35:06
But after you miss it for a while, after you miss it for all
35:09
you need it like that, that pure spiceness, which is really
35:12
amazing. But I think the, I don't know if
35:16
you had the experience because you said you had the, the German
35:18
restaurant experience. What what my experience is
35:22
saying is that the Italian restaurants in Germany are
35:25
really the Italian authentical experience.
35:30
Yeah, I. Don't know if you.
35:32
Yeah, Italian. I guess somebody might think,
35:35
OK, no, not really my thing. I tend to be more of an Asian
35:38
food guy, whether that's like Chinese or Southeast Asian or
35:42
Indian or maybe Mexican. But like things with a bit of
35:44
like a bit of cake, like Italian food always felt a bit vanilla
35:49
to me. Although actually having said
35:52
that, we did, we did. We went to a local pizza place
35:55
in the village recently with other British kind of expat and
36:01
you know, for Switzerland actually, if it was really good
36:03
and not too expensive. But then sort of bizarrely, it
36:06
kind of turned, even though it's like a proper restaurant, it
36:09
almost turned into like a quasi nightclub where the weather
36:12
where the lights went low and the and the kind of the, you
36:16
know, the had like a DJI guess because like they don't have any
36:20
pub culture, like like a evening hours, maybe a bit more, I don't
36:24
know. I've seen that.
36:27
I've seen that in Mannheim as well in Germany.
36:30
That's so interesting. Also in the Italian restaurant.
36:33
Yeah, that's so interesting. I've I thought it's only a
36:37
German thing. Most probably if you live, don't
36:40
far away from the board. Yeah, you could literally walk.
36:44
You could literally walk. How do you enjoy the The Walking
36:47
experience in in, in Switzerland?
36:50
Joe and I know London is also walkable and you take a lot of
36:54
the public transport and so on, but I mean the nature walks.
36:56
Yeah, that's interesting you mentioned that.
36:58
So I live in the middle of the, I guess the Jurassic Park,
37:02
right, the Jura National Park. I found all the dinosaurs and
37:06
yeah, it's, it's incredibly picturesque.
37:08
Like people talk about like, you know, the Swiss mountain range
37:11
being the Alps, right? But actually, like, for me, I
37:14
don't know the Alps. It's not actually very walkable.
37:17
You know, we'd go down to the Alps because it's all you know,
37:19
It's super steep and proper. Proper hikeable, yeah.
37:21
Hikeable. It's that right.
37:23
Climbable. Yeah, exactly.
37:25
Yeah. What's the juror like?
37:26
You know, it's a bit like, I guess a bit like the Scottish
37:30
Highlands, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's all like, you know,
37:32
rolling hills, really beautiful, you know, like walkable, no
37:37
sharp peaks, but like really picturesque, you know, with like
37:41
tree lined, you know, like limestone, like few kind of
37:44
caves, lots of it. And it's, it's really empty.
37:49
It's it's really empty. And it can get really beautiful
37:52
kind of walking experiences. Lots of Swiss people actually go
37:55
to the Jira and don't get to help so much because it's
37:58
actually somebody who can enjoy the walk, you know, covered.
38:00
You're not surrounded by tourists.
38:04
I'm trying to, you know, sell you like an overpriced hat.
38:07
And you know, it's actually a very, very, I don't know for me,
38:11
I just love walking in the dura. And this is something I try to
38:14
try to do like every weekend. And like I say, it's in
38:17
Switzerland. You really have to like the
38:18
outdoors. If you don't like the outdoors,
38:20
it's limited amount of things to do and it's and there's paths
38:25
everywhere. You know, I always lived in
38:27
cities before. So I've never really had this
38:29
like countryside living, but I think even in the UK like it
38:31
wouldn't be. So it wouldn't be so like well
38:34
connected, like you can walk from any town to any other town.
38:38
There's a lot of paths and up in the hills.
38:40
So yeah, it's very it's a it's a beautiful place to walk.
38:43
And this is kind of a very famous like Cherry Tree walk and
38:46
the fractal, you know, it's known for its cherries and you
38:50
walk past all of the cherry trees and blossom.
38:52
It kind of may time. OK, so Southern Korea style.
38:56
Yeah, exactly. It's interesting that you said,
39:00
I think the, the Alps are incredible.
39:02
And for me, Switzerland is an amazing country even to drive
39:06
through. We drive often to Italy, going
39:11
from from Germany to Italy and we take, we take Switzerland and
39:14
we, we pay the highway protection tax, which is
39:18
amazing. Like for everyone watching this,
39:20
I don't know if everybody's aware of it.
39:22
The highway tax in Switzerland, it's so easy.
39:25
You're just getting paid for one year.
39:27
Yeah. Exactly.
39:30
Well, you're doing well if that's all you pay are no fines
39:33
for doing something You know, like they seem to find people
39:36
constantly for doing like the most minor breaking of the
39:40
rules. Look, I got my fair share of
39:44
files in Germany after I moved from Romania because you move
39:46
from a country where driving is not.
39:48
So the driving rules are optional mostly.
39:51
Yeah. So you don't respect them all.
39:53
And then you you go to Germany and you had to speak.
39:56
I had spit tickets in the first two months, more than I can
39:58
afford. I was just crazy.
40:00
No, I just bring the vignette. But I love driving through it as
40:03
well. And a lot of amazing places in
40:06
Dalton so that you can walk. I don't know if you know the
40:08
gorges. So there are these places where
40:10
you can walk. Like just on the side of a river
40:14
and on the corner of the of the mountains that those are
40:17
amazing. There are three spots which are
40:18
really. Amazing.
40:20
The proper hiking in the Alps, you know, because I've always
40:24
had small kids is something I've always kind of like.
40:26
It's always been like next year, maybe it'll be a few more years,
40:31
depending if this is my last spent free stop at two kids.
40:33
Whether you know, we'll see. But yeah, certainly this is
40:36
something I've really got to a lot more of.
40:38
Like it's hard to take advantages of everything
40:41
contrast to offer when you've got small children.
40:43
Absolutely, absolutely. When was the moment when when
40:48
you feel like you truly live in Switzerland, not not visiting
40:52
anymore? Oh goodness, that's that's a
40:56
hard question to answer. You know, oftentimes I hear like
41:04
people say when you move to a country, you've got to get
41:06
through like a period of being upset, like being homesick.
41:10
Like for me, that didn't happen at all.
41:14
I moved and like it was just fine from day one.
41:17
I was like, well, this is OK. And actually I was really
41:21
enjoying myself like a lot like I said earlier, there's when I
41:23
came here, I was like, what's a catch?
41:24
You know, I had no issues whatsoever even when there was
41:28
COVID, Like it was like when we had that, you know, lockdown in
41:36
the UK, it was like you can't move, be more than like a mile
41:39
from your house. You can't be within like 2
41:42
meters of someone in Switzerland.
41:44
It was like, yeah, don't go to the shop.
41:46
But then everyone was out. You see, you know, you saw loads
41:50
of people like biking outside, walking through like the parks
41:55
and you know, actually like, yeah, life wasn't normal.
41:58
But the same time, like it wasn't restricted in a way.
42:00
Like I had a really lovely time during locked up half of missing
42:04
my kid and that was that was horrible.
42:05
But you know, in terms of like, you know, being in the outdoors,
42:07
new country that was really beautiful.
42:10
And you know, considering I moved to a new country just for
42:12
locked eye, I felt kind of home of us immediately.
42:18
Switzerland had a reputation as a reputation of being boring,
42:20
safe, solid. And that's exactly what it was.
42:24
Even though I'd like no experience of being in
42:25
Switzerland before I came, I'd literally just come for the
42:28
interview. But you know, it was exactly
42:33
what it was promised or would have sold out.
42:36
So, you know, I didn't, I kind of felt at home immediately.
42:40
So like I kind of, I get, I guess, you know, maybe a bit
42:44
when COVID calmed down and my wife and kid can a few months
42:47
later. And by that time, like, it was,
42:49
I've been there for three months and just like home, you know, it
42:53
was, it was pretty much immediate.
42:56
I certainly. Yeah.
42:58
I, I think that the problem is less like, did I?
43:00
Do I feel like I live there and more like, do I feel like, you
43:04
know, I'm really part of the community?
43:07
Like my, my wife is really good at talking to people and not,
43:11
you know, she's got a kind of decentish German, I guess a bit
43:14
better than mine. But mine's like a mixture of
43:16
being like a little bit afraid to approach people, you know,
43:19
with a bit of like hesitancy about language barrier.
43:21
She took us straight in. So I think, you know, I feel
43:26
like, you know, to properly be there, I, I, I don't, I don't
43:30
think I'll ever make that. But at the same time, this, you
43:34
need to learn to be, if that's never going to happen for you,
43:36
you need to learn to be happy with where you're at, right?
43:40
There's always a cost, you know, whether that's working really
43:43
hard on your language skills or whether it's, you know, like
43:46
living with maybe a slightly reduced social life.
43:48
There's always some kind of drawback.
43:51
You always have to choose your heart.
43:52
Yeah, exactly. You've got to choose, choose,
43:55
choose your poison. And you know, being a bit away
43:58
from my friends, from home, being away from my family, you
44:04
know, this is this is the cost. But you've never always feeling
44:09
like you're never fully at home anywhere like you said earlier.
44:13
Is it is it friends and family that you miss the most from UK
44:17
or food? I would say the food's just kind
44:23
of, yeah. And, you know, more kind of
44:25
disappointing. I don't think that's a big deal
44:27
to me. Just little cultural aspects.
44:31
Like I miss a proper British pub.
44:33
I miss, I miss, with all due respect, like German and Swiss
44:37
beers. I, you know, I miss a proper
44:41
beer, like a cask beer, you know, like, and British Beer
44:44
doesn't travel, right. You know, you can get a German
44:46
beer and a bottle and that's great.
44:48
And a German beer is good in a bottle because it's keg beer.
44:51
It's comes out with a carbonation.
44:53
Whereas proper British Beer, you know, it has to be like hand
44:55
drawn, no added carbon dioxide. And so it doesn't travel.
44:59
And I miss a proper British problem, miss the atmosphere.
45:02
I miss a British Beer even though, even though I enjoy a
45:05
German beer, a Swiss beer too. Well, no, not so much as Swiss
45:08
beer, maybe a German beer. Like, you know, I miss, I miss a
45:11
British pub, miss the atmosphere.
45:12
Like, it doesn't like Switzerland doesn't have a pop
45:15
culture, just little, little, little cultural things, you
45:20
know, they're always kind of different move from one country
45:22
to another. I missed that a little bit.
45:24
The it's interesting, as I said, I had Paul in the previous
45:28
episode and he said completely the opposite.
45:30
I enjoy enjoy German beer more than English.
45:32
And I said come on man, you cannot say that.
45:34
I mean everyone from UK will kill.
45:37
Oh. It's not.
45:37
I totally like to respect a German beer, but that doesn't
45:41
mean I can't miss a British 1. And I think, I think it depends
45:44
whether you're like a real ale fan like I am, which you know.
45:49
You cannot. Well, he's like a.
45:50
Caspir you know one, not the one fizzy ones was hold on top, the
45:54
one where they got to go. I really pull it like this.
45:55
You know that you can't that doesn't travel.
45:58
So I every time I'm in England I make a point to go to an English
46:05
pub now for relay. Correct.
46:07
I mean, the pub experience is something that you only can get
46:10
in England, Ireland. I'm in the United Kingdom.
46:13
I would just sum it up. And Ireland, yeah, because
46:17
that's that's what you get. How was the how was the
46:20
evolution of your career? You said you are working only in
46:22
English. I you said you are a lawyer too.
46:25
Is it? Is it international law?
46:27
So I'm a patent attorney specifically and that's like a
46:30
Europe, that's like a Europe wide qualification.
46:35
So like, yeah, you can practice like in front of the European
46:38
Patent Office in English, French or German.
46:40
And for me, I mean, that's almost like 95% is in English
46:44
generally, especially my field, right.
46:45
Someone pharmaceuticals, you know, maybe maybe kind of small,
46:49
like manufacturing companies, you might go more local language
46:52
like French or German. But in my field it's, I see
46:55
very, very rarely something it's not English, you know, you know,
46:59
like Novartis, I work for Novartis, a big pharma company
47:03
in, in Basel. And you know, it's very, very,
47:06
very international and everything's in English.
47:09
And you've got loads of commuters coming over from
47:11
France, you know, live in France and the French, you know, And so
47:15
like, if a lot of people you know, maybe some of them know
47:17
German, but a lot of them won't and have no interest, you know,
47:21
no need, you know, have the audio to learn English.
47:26
So, you know, live it's, it's basically 100% English
47:30
atmosphere. Yeah, I'll never, it's one of
47:33
those things we've got to be extremely fluent to practice law
47:36
and language. Like every little word matters.
47:41
So like the nuances matter. So it's not something where you
47:43
can get like AB2 and like be fine in it.
47:45
It's you've really got to be like AC2C2.
47:48
Yeah, absolutely. And that's just not, and that's
47:50
not going to happen for me. If I get AB2 I'll be amazed.
47:55
That's why I ask you about the international law, because I
47:57
think law is something first of all, it's local and like you
48:02
said, but the pattern, it's international.
48:03
So I think that's quite easy. And like you said, Mother Mother
48:06
language is important because every nuance is critical in.
48:09
Yeah, you know, I've got absolutely 0, like I 100% know I
48:14
will never ever be able to practice in German and I've got
48:17
I've completely accept that and that's fine.
48:18
You know, it's in my field. I'm quite lucky.
48:22
We're lucky. You know, I'm looking in this
48:24
fact that almost all the jobs like our in English, but the
48:28
same time that does make it hard.
48:30
It makes a heartland native language.
48:33
Absolutely. The sometimes I have to I have
48:36
for work to to read the the general laws.
48:40
That's man. It's I have to say, it's not a
48:43
it's not a walk in the park. No, it's a yeah.
48:48
You don't get to understand. How was the this?
48:51
I have to ask because you, you mentioned earlier that you, you
48:54
you purchased the house. How was the contract signing
48:59
process? Did you had any English support?
49:03
Basically, well, this is quite a while ago when we signed the
49:06
contract. It's like 2 years ago.
49:08
I think now my wife might be able to handle it.
49:11
I and I could you know, I basically couldn't, but she she
49:14
would pull me through the time my wife was maybe a little bit
49:17
lower standard. I mean basically got a Swiss
49:21
friend to sign up for us. OK.
49:25
Yeah, OK. Understood.
49:26
But you know, we, we managed like a translation into English,
49:31
you know, a Google Translate works very well these days.
49:34
So just translated it all. And actually, you know, my
49:37
employer provides a service where someone will look at the
49:40
contracts and give you some advice, you know, which is
49:42
really good. It's interesting.
49:46
We did the same a few years ago. We did purchase the house and
49:51
fortunately enough they gave us the contract, I think one month
49:54
before the signing so that we get the time to read it at home.
49:58
Oh yeah, that was so good. Because the the guide then
50:02
notary. Is it notary in English?
50:04
Yes, Yeah. Yeah, same.
50:05
It's German. Thank you.
50:07
So the notary read it in front of us because he had to read it
50:11
in front of us and the other couple that was selling the
50:13
house. But man, I got nothing, so I
50:16
was. I mean, it's often very
50:19
technical words, right? It's not.
50:21
Easy. Absolutely, Absolutely.
50:22
We call, we call it in Romanian wooden language.
50:25
Yeah. I don't know if that's the term
50:28
that you use in English as well, but in Romania we call it this
50:30
wooden language. Like the language?
50:33
And I guess to be honest, there's probably loads of people
50:35
out there who don't understand words like that and their own
50:37
and their native language. Absolutely.
50:39
A 100 percent, 100%, The guys that we bought the house from,
50:42
this is the same man. We don't, but that's all.
50:45
That's OK. That's why we have the notaries.
50:51
What's something about about Switzerland, Joe, that you think
50:56
people don't expect until they move?
51:01
Goodness, that's, that's a hard question because in my
51:06
experience it was very much as advertised.
51:11
I would say that it's one thing that did surprise me a little
51:16
bit is it does feel, does feel very strongly divided.
51:22
There's a really strong internal division within Switzerland,
51:27
like the, you know, like the culture between the French and
51:30
the German, but they, they seems like, you know, everyone in the
51:32
German but of Switzerland, like where I live, like seems like
51:35
they will rarely go to French speaking in Switzerland, and to
51:37
maybe a slightly lesser extent vice versa.
51:41
And like every referendum you can like literally look on the
51:43
map. It's like the, the, the kind of
51:45
voting follows exactly the linguistic boundary and there is
51:48
quite a internal divide. I think in Switzerland they kind
51:55
of feel very unified as a country.
51:57
But to me as an outsider, it does look like it's, there's
52:01
some kind of tension between the two halves in some respects.
52:04
I don't know if they would Swiss will describe it in those terms,
52:07
but it does seem like a this almost might be, it might be
52:11
insulting. So it kind of feels quite
52:13
artificial. You know, the two countries that
52:15
are very two halves of the very different language and a very
52:17
different culture. Perhaps they would see
52:20
themselves as more unified than that.
52:22
But it feels very, very different to me.
52:23
Like whenever, whenever I cross into Roman day there, the French
52:26
speaking half, it feels totally different.
52:29
And the Italian bit feels even more different, you know,
52:32
passing the Alps to get there. Yeah, like I guess.
52:37
But the Italian bit feels like it's, I don't know, like a
52:41
random bit of Italy that's just delighted to be in Switzerland
52:44
and could be in this rich country.
52:48
Absolutely. I have to say I feel I felt the
52:50
same when I was there and there was.
52:52
There is no I'm talking about the Italian part now I I never
52:59
realized there isn't any kind of accent when they they were
53:03
speaking Italian. So I really had the feeling that
53:04
they are speaking the Italian that I knew from Italy due to my
53:07
Romanian heritage. I can understand Italian most of
53:10
it I think 8090% of it. But like you said, I, I never
53:15
had the feeling that I'm a Switzerland.
53:17
I always had the feeling that I'm in, that I'm in, in Italy.
53:20
Yeah, I think with Italian speaking bit of Switzerland is I
53:24
can never quite decide whether it's like Italian zest with a
53:28
Swiss organization or whether it's the Swiss zest with Italian
53:34
organization. I kind of I kind of almost feel
53:40
like it's I kind of flipped between speaking to one or the
53:43
other. It is, it does sometimes feel
53:47
like it's a little bit loses some of that Italian, you know,
53:52
randomness. Like, you know, when in Italy,
53:53
like there's some like crazy driver, you know, you're driving
53:56
200 miles an hour. Something something is always
53:58
going to be like disorganized but kind of fun.
54:02
I don't really get that so much in the in the Italian.
54:06
No, no, it kind of feels like a very watered down Italy.
54:15
Maybe somewhere to go for Swiss Germans to go on holiday if
54:18
they're not brave enough to get to the real Italy.
54:22
Absolutely, you see. But it's interesting they all
54:24
speak the three languages, right?
54:26
Or is it? No.
54:28
No, no, no, like certainly I think, well, I am, you would be
54:33
very hard pressed to find someone unless they're from
54:36
Italian heritage, presumably just from local, local descent,
54:40
like local Swiss, Germans. And I think very few would be
54:43
able to hold down the conversation with Italian.
54:47
Yeah, very, very rare. Yeah.
54:50
And French, I think the older generation were raised, you
54:56
know, with French was the first like foreign.
54:58
I know it's like a little Swiss language, but to them it's
55:00
foreign, first foreign language. And I think, you know, you might
55:03
have a decent chance with an oldest person.
55:05
I think with a younger person it's actually got worse because
55:09
English has become like the, the, the first foreign language.
55:14
Yeah, it does depend a bit where in the German speaking bits, if
55:17
you're from close to the linguistic boundary, you might
55:21
get people a bit better. Like if you're from Bern, you
55:23
know, in the West of the German speaking area you might have, he
55:26
might find a lot of good French where I'm from a bit further.
55:30
EI think you're more likely to pine either, you know, in my
55:35
village people, most people I think would either be
55:37
monolingual German speakers or having English to some degree
55:43
and then French. Rarer and predominantly older
55:47
people I think would be happier in French.
55:51
I always imagine that at least at least in the border areas,
55:56
and I mean by border, not the official borders, but the
55:58
unofficial. Borders between.
56:03
The exactly, I always thought that in those border regions
56:06
they are speaking the at least the two languages of the border.
56:10
Yeah, across the border, yes. But, you know, I think that, you
56:13
know, that only really seems to apply for a few kilometers or
56:17
maybe if you're in the bilingual Canton, it's pushed a bit harder
56:20
like like I I certainly think if you're in like the, you know,
56:26
the up and in Valles and up in the Alps, you know, I think if
56:29
in the German bear, most of them will be able to hold on a
56:30
conversation in French, as I understand.
56:32
Yeah, I'm still, but out here less, significantly less.
56:38
I'm quite most probably don't. I don't know if you know it, but
56:41
you know Europa Park, so the. Oh yeah, of course.
56:44
We go to Europe all the time. I'm actually actually.
56:48
We go to Rolandica as well. I don't know if you.
56:51
Yeah. No, no.
56:52
No, we go. We were currently trying to
56:55
break last. Last time we went we braved the
56:58
German trains and that was a mistake.
57:03
You've been twice now and both times we will more than hour
57:07
later than we should be. So it's been a choice between
57:10
this expensive Swiss trains, like a direct train from Basel
57:14
that goes all the way to the Europa Park, like without a
57:18
single stop. But it's really, you know, it's
57:20
Swiss prices. So we tried that and then we
57:23
went for the German trains, which were just, it seems like
57:25
German trains have a lot of issues and they're just
57:28
constantly late. But now we've found that there's
57:32
in, in the village village next to where I live, there's a,
57:36
there's a bus that goes there. So I think we're going to take
57:38
that next time. But we go, we go all the time.
57:40
My kids absolutely love it and it's not too far.
57:44
It's an amazing place. And I, I was just saying,
57:48
mentioning Europa Park and Rolandica as well, because they,
57:52
those are that there is just for, for everyone who doesn't
57:56
know, it's right in the corner between Germany, Switzerland and
58:00
France. So it's I of course not exactly
58:03
the corner, but the, the, let's say the, the corner area.
58:06
And they are, they look to speak, they, they seems to me
58:09
to, to speak French as good as German.
58:12
Yeah, on both sides. So I I never met anyone who only
58:16
was able to speak only German. No, most of them.
58:19
Most of them speaking. You know as soon as I say a
58:22
sentence in German that you're fine English.
58:24
Now it is. Exactly, exactly.
58:27
And if you like, I have to give you a tip if you like
58:29
entertainment parks and it's also not so far away from you as
58:32
far as I know, maybe a yeah, of course far away than than Europa
58:38
Park is, but there is an amazing one in Italy which is called
58:40
Gardala. Oh yeah, no, no, no, I'm, we're
58:42
actually playing there as well. I went, I went there a very long
58:46
time ago. We're talking over North.
58:50
Yeah, 2021 years ago, you know, and I was kind of in my.
58:53
Late teens. Nice.
58:56
So it's been a long, long time, but I might get back there.
59:00
Nice, that means you actually know how it looked like before.
59:03
Yeah, that's a long time ago. My memory's a bit fuzzy.
59:07
But I have to say it's it's really enjoyable and gardaland
59:11
it's it hasn't that I know now round about the age of your
59:15
kids. And I have to say that the the
59:18
it's enjoyable for kids, for tall toddlers and a bit bigger
59:22
than than toddler ages because they there is a happiness in
59:26
there. Like you don't feel that in
59:28
garden. There's always happy music
59:30
playing and you don't have it in Europa Park event.
59:33
But in garden we have the I think it's from my point of view
59:35
is, is, is is I think that the the, the, the group that they
59:40
focus on is this like, I don't know, 3 to 8 or 9 years old, OK.
59:45
Yeah, because my, my daughter's been desperate to go to Euofer
59:50
Park and she, she always asks if she's like tall enough to go on
59:53
the six year old rides. Yeah, she's always a little bit
59:57
too short. Maybe, maybe by the end of the
59:59
summer she'll squeak over that 120cm boundary.
1:00:03
I have to say the the in gardening, I think there are two
1:00:06
big roller coasters that they are not able to ride, but
1:00:08
they're out and that everything they are, they are able to.
1:00:11
Ride Yeah, I imagine the you know, maybe I'm making a bit of
1:00:14
a stereotype here, but imagine they tell into less less strict
1:00:16
on enforcing the the rules than the.
1:00:18
Germans. No, no, no, no.
1:00:20
They actually are. Yeah.
1:00:21
They actually it's, yeah, it's quite critical because they talk
1:00:25
with you, talk about kids and if something is happening then it's
1:00:29
not something they can play with.
1:00:30
Yeah, no, I mean, actually to be fair, the my kid is right on the
1:00:34
border like and and they seem to be OK in in Europa Park, but it
1:00:38
was like touch and go. It's like, was it 119 or 120?
1:00:42
No. OK, OK.
1:00:45
That, that's something you can get through with for sure.
1:00:48
Yeah. What's your favorite hidden gem
1:00:55
in Switzerland row? Is it, is it Euro like you said
1:00:58
or it's do you have some something more as well?
1:01:03
Well, yeah, in, in terms of like the outdoorsiness, yeah, for
1:01:08
100%. If you're kind of a tourist
1:01:12
looking to go to Switzerland, I would totally go to the juror.
1:01:16
One would not do so much of it's all these like all the mountains
1:01:20
seem to be the same. Like you have a cable car and
1:01:23
then there's like some overpriced restaurant or like
1:01:26
place we can buy a 50A-15 bottle of cola and a 20 bar you.
1:01:31
Have my chocolate bar. You are my kind of guy Yeah
1:01:35
absolutely. And then instagramable place
1:01:37
that you can take a picture an. Instagram yeah, like take it,
1:01:40
push, push, press a button here, you know, you know, get your
1:01:43
Instagram. I think yeah, you can do one of
1:01:46
those. You can do one boat, you know,
1:01:47
one boat trip. But like I kind of felt like
1:01:50
when you're one of those done the more whereas the jurors a
1:01:52
bit more organic, you know, like if you see like real Switzerland
1:01:57
with like real, real Swiss people and if you're going to go
1:02:03
to the mountains, I would say go to somewhere like Uri or Blaira,
1:02:08
some of that's a bit less set up for the tourism.
1:02:11
Like, I think by all means, go to like one of the big touristy
1:02:15
places, like get the go up the young Frau, you know, the €300
1:02:19
train, sure, and get a photo, but go to somewhere a little bit
1:02:23
less, less commonly visitors. But having said that, I, I
1:02:31
actually really enjoyed it's like a panoramic train.
1:02:33
You can go in good out London in the southeast of Switzerland.
1:02:37
And that that was absolutely for something that's very touristy
1:02:41
and not normal. Normally is it the Glacier
1:02:44
Express? Yeah, I think there's two.
1:02:47
There's the Glacier Express and then there's another one.
1:02:49
I can't watch how round it is, but it's the one that basically
1:02:52
like it goes in and it's hard to describe as it gets like into
1:02:55
the middle of the mountain. It's like kind of huge, like
1:02:57
Viaduct or Aqua Doctor it's called.
1:03:00
And then like travels right into the mountain.
1:03:03
Like the engineering to go up there is incredible.
1:03:06
It goes like kind of the like it's a proper trend.
1:03:08
It's like a cable car and it goes like 2000 plus meters.
1:03:12
But then most probably the Glacier Express is not the one
1:03:14
starting from Italy, right? Because there are two, like you
1:03:17
said, it's one that is only in in Swiss and there is one
1:03:20
starting. From I think it's the Bernina
1:03:22
Express, but I think the glacier 1.
1:03:24
You might have a very similar kind of experience on yeah, but
1:03:28
that I enjoyed that, you know, I, I went through that in the
1:03:32
middle of winter and seeing like the like the snow being like
1:03:36
like on, on roofs, like up a 2 cave, like, you know, being like
1:03:39
the, the snow, the 2 meters deep, if not more.
1:03:43
You know, again, coming from a country that's, you know, you
1:03:45
never get that even in the even in the north, you would never
1:03:48
ever see that. And it's kind of it's kind of
1:03:50
you know, I'm, I'm one of people who like, despite moving to
1:03:54
Switzerland, like skiing is my idea of hell.
1:03:57
Like, you know, I, I, you know, I, I don't really understand how
1:04:01
skiing is a Swiss sport because it's a country that's like
1:04:04
solid, safe, dependable. And skiing for me, it's like,
1:04:08
you know, it's a bit too adrenaline fills, you know, like
1:04:10
I like it solid and safe and dependable.
1:04:12
And I don't like feeling being out of control with gravity at
1:04:16
least. The thing is that The thing is
1:04:18
that if you start skiing as a kid, it's like riding on a
1:04:22
bicycle. Yeah, this is what I I got told
1:04:24
I'm not able to ski as well. I'm like you.
1:04:26
I love my feet as they are in one piece.
1:04:28
I usually I don't love my feet when they are in two or three
1:04:32
pieces so I will never start. Yeah.
1:04:36
Because it's too late. Yeah, and I like roller coasters
1:04:38
where, you know, toy Europe apart, you know, we feel like in
1:04:40
control like skiing and I mean, I'm sure it's great, but I've
1:04:44
never been skiing. And so I kind of refresh one of
1:04:46
the mountains like it's it is special.
1:04:50
It is. Special, but at the same time it
1:04:51
can't. I kind of feel like it's a bit,
1:04:53
maybe I've lived here too long now that kind of feels like a
1:04:55
bit repetitive. So I like them all kind of like
1:04:58
organic places. Like I went up, I was in the
1:05:02
Italian speaking bed and went up like this mountain near Lucano
1:05:06
and just walked up and seeing those like little villages like
1:05:11
the Rusticos, which is kind of a really only like, I don't know
1:05:14
if that in Italy, but it's something at least within
1:05:16
Switzerland, there's only the Italian part.
1:05:17
We see this like, I don't know, it's like these tiny little
1:05:22
villages of halfway up the the mountain with like seem like no
1:05:26
utilities. I think they're more like
1:05:29
holiday cottages than like proper homes.
1:05:32
Absolutely, Absolutely. And that seemed that kind of
1:05:36
real, like real side of Switzerland is nice to me.
1:05:40
And I think if I ever left, if I came back, I would do stuff like
1:05:44
that. Not the life of touristy, not.
1:05:46
Not going to deserve math. Not going.
1:05:49
Yeah. Not going to these kind of
1:05:51
places. The places where everyone is
1:05:54
going and there are all the Instagram pictures from.
1:05:56
No, absolutely not. No Matterhorn.
1:05:58
No Matterhorn. Joe, you mentioned a few times
1:06:01
the the Swiss prices and as as someone who knows a lot of
1:06:07
person doing then how Swiss experience like you mentioned
1:06:10
before working in Switzerland and living behind the German
1:06:15
border on the German side. I don't really know how
1:06:21
expensive actually living in the the the living in inside the
1:06:27
countries. And did I want to ask you, has
1:06:31
it changed how you handle money since you live in Switzerland?
1:06:38
Well, I think when when you say it's expensive, I think you're
1:06:42
there's Quidco pros, right. It's like, yeah, house probably
1:06:45
costs. I don't know twice what does in
1:06:47
Germany, but then like the interest rates are like 1%, not
1:06:51
4%. You've paid all this tax, you
1:06:55
know, So there's always positives and negatives.
1:06:57
Like, you know, in some respects you get and something
1:07:01
Switzerland's very good, but other times you have to pay a
1:07:03
lot yourself as you would get it to the state and other countries
1:07:06
like childcare. Do I handle money differently?
1:07:12
I don't know. I, I feel like, you know, in
1:07:15
London you're always, I think this is true for most people who
1:07:18
came from like England and maybe other European countries as
1:07:21
well. You felt you're fighting for
1:07:23
every penny, you know, it feels like a doggy dog world.
1:07:26
Whereas in Switzerland you, I kind of feel like a little bit
1:07:29
more relaxed, you know, because there's the salaries are a bit
1:07:31
better. So I do feel a little bit less
1:07:34
stressed in that regard. But the costs are maybe having a
1:07:39
bit more to do with the childcare than I would
1:07:41
elsewhere. Yeah, it has made life like on
1:07:45
those kind of hard metrics. It's certainly like, I would say
1:07:48
certainly a significant step up, you know, from other other
1:07:52
European countries as far as I'm aware.
1:07:56
So the, it certainly would be actually cheaper living in
1:07:58
Switzerland than Germany, if you look alike, if you.
1:08:01
I think I've got a lot of colleagues and some of them say,
1:08:03
Oh yeah, it's cheaper living in Germany, cheaper living over the
1:08:05
border. And I think it's easy to like go
1:08:09
to the supermarkets and I think, oh, you know, I'm paying, you
1:08:12
know, €3 for this price piece of, you know, this loaf of bread
1:08:17
and sort of 150 or something. But actually, you know, for most
1:08:20
people, I think the tax actually makes a lot more difference.
1:08:22
And it's people don't think about it.
1:08:24
So I think actually, you know, when you like sit down and do
1:08:27
the sums and rather than think emotively, Switzerland's, yeah,
1:08:31
it's, it's cheaper in that way. I have to ask you in talking in
1:08:36
percentage, because I can tell you from my general perspective,
1:08:39
I pay roughly 45%. So if you talk about tax, health
1:08:44
care and so on, how, how, how small is it in in Swiss?
1:08:48
Well, it varies Canton by Canton, right?
1:08:50
So like for sure Switzerland has this is 24 cantons.
1:08:53
I'll never get citizenship if that's wrong.
1:08:57
I think it's 24 and like it varies quite a lot, right?
1:09:01
If you're in like Basil or Geneva, like basically all of
1:09:07
the French bits in Basil simplified and burn as well and
1:09:11
solar tone, then it's going to be quite, you know, reasonably
1:09:14
high. I think it goes up to like 40%.
1:09:16
But like you've done a lot of money to like, you know, whether
1:09:19
you're talking like in like Germany or the UK, like, you
1:09:21
know, hitting that 40% and like maybe 50,000 a year, something
1:09:25
like that. Whereas in Switzerland it would
1:09:27
take you like to like hundreds of thousands to hit that.
1:09:29
And while I live in Max is out at 35, but you would need to
1:09:33
learn a really, really high amount of money to earn that
1:09:36
much. And we pay in the 20s somewhere
1:09:40
in the in the low 20s, I think. But it's both working 100%, you
1:09:44
know, in in busy jobs. So you know.
1:09:48
But that's a big difference, yeah.
1:09:50
For sure, for sure. I mean, it's a massive.
1:09:51
Difference. It's a massive difference from
1:09:53
Germany, yeah. Yeah, for me it's, it's kind of
1:09:56
starting from 45%. So it's the 45 that I pay on the
1:10:00
salary directly. And then you have this, the
1:10:03
famous story clearing that you have to fill in in Germany.
1:10:07
And then depending on the amount of money that you make as a
1:10:10
family, it could be that you have to pay more.
1:10:11
Yeah. And then you've probably.
1:10:12
Got the tricky. One capital gains tax and stuff
1:10:15
like that, I guess. No, you have, there is a, there
1:10:21
was a, there is already, I think it's again a social tax that you
1:10:25
have to pay soon and there wasn't a solidarity.
1:10:29
Oh, it's East Germany thing, yeah.
1:10:31
Exactly that. They paid until I think two
1:10:34
years ago or something like this and then they stopped it.
1:10:36
So now they are come somehow putting the bed back in.
1:10:40
So it's kind of strange. Yeah, I know.
1:10:41
I appreciate you must have people from all over and a lot
1:10:44
of them might make might have this really like romantic,
1:10:47
romantic, you know, like I've always wanted to live in, you
1:10:50
know, like, I don't know, like Brazil or you know, like
1:10:53
Thailand or somewhere. And people have this amazing
1:10:55
like Instagram photos having this, you know, wildlife.
1:11:00
I'm afraid Switzerland is not is not like that.
1:11:04
And you know, I'm afraid it's, you know, most people that come
1:11:08
there. I think it says boring, humdrum
1:11:09
things, but these things matter, right?
1:11:11
And they especially matter when you've got family.
1:11:13
Absolutely not. Maybe not super.
1:11:15
You need to be boring. You need to be boring.
1:11:18
I think you know on the on the sensible boring metrics does
1:11:20
very well. Absolutely.
1:11:25
Is there one thing that you wish you'd knew before moving?
1:11:32
I think there's one thing I did. Now there's there's one thing
1:11:36
for buying a house. I think the moving thing was
1:11:39
exactly as I expected, like it was exactly as a result.
1:11:42
But I think for buying a house is I have to pay tax on the rent
1:11:48
I pay myself. So if I own my own house, I have
1:11:50
to pay. I have to pay tax on the rent
1:11:53
that I pay to myself as as the property owner.
1:11:59
I have to pay like an income tax if I live there myself in my own
1:12:02
house, which is almost a catch. Which is OK and that OK, that's
1:12:09
interesting. That's really interesting.
1:12:11
OK. So there was, there was a, there
1:12:13
was a bit of a catch on that. OK, more widely.
1:12:18
More widely, yeah. I don't, I don't know.
1:12:23
I I, I think it's, it's just not an unpredictable country.
1:12:29
It just isn't. You absolutely, but like you
1:12:32
said with kids, you need boarding and I think it's
1:12:34
important, it's, it's really important to mention if you if
1:12:37
you need safety, it's the country to be if you need
1:12:40
safety, if you. Need.
1:12:40
Oh yeah, that that. Is quite.
1:12:42
Like it's worth something. I was, I was shocked about one
1:12:45
thing. And that's actually when you
1:12:46
mentioned the kids, like it's normal for children who are like
1:12:50
four or five to walk to school by themselves.
1:12:53
And so it's I don't think it's the same in Germany, is it?
1:12:56
Right. Yeah.
1:12:56
I mean like I think in the UK that would be looked at really
1:13:00
strangely. Like you, you might have a kid
1:13:02
walking like 8 or 9, but I've seen four and five year olds
1:13:05
walk to school by themselves as a bit.
1:13:06
There's a culture shock. I think like in the US you're
1:13:08
probably arrested if if your kid.
1:13:11
I'm not even joking. Yeah.
1:13:12
I mean, I mean, in US it's hard to walk generally.
1:13:16
Yeah, anywhere you want to try to go walk.
1:13:18
To school, I think that would just be a total no no.
1:13:20
Yeah, so going going walking to school.
1:13:23
I live also in a small village so I think my village is
1:13:26
somewhere around the thousands. Mate.
1:13:28
Thousands inhabitants and it's the same like the the the school
1:13:32
is in walking distance. So the primary school is walking
1:13:34
distance. So all the kids are walking.
1:13:36
Of course, I have some, I have some not German neighbors who
1:13:41
are walking their kids to school always like you see the pattern
1:13:44
in, in the in the parents, like it's so interesting, but it's
1:13:50
it's a normal health thing to walk to, to walk.
1:13:52
The kids are walking around. I actually still walk my as.
1:13:58
I still walk my kid in. Guilty as judge, Guilty as judge
1:14:01
at the same I mean, the IT took me.
1:14:06
So I have to say, I don't know if I ever told this story
1:14:09
talking about safety, because Germany is also not that far
1:14:11
away from from Switzerland, I think is more safe than Germany
1:14:15
is. But also Germany has its share
1:14:17
of of safety that you have it especially in the in the small
1:14:21
communities. Oh yeah.
1:14:21
I mean, you know. This generator.
1:14:23
Across the the border there they feel very similar.
1:14:26
This was 1. Exactly, exactly.
1:14:28
And I I keep telling this so I have AI have a back door to my
1:14:31
house and that leads to my garden and I forgot it like wide
1:14:36
open for about two weeks. Yeah, but because we were busy
1:14:40
with work and stuff and we didn't actually go in the back
1:14:44
of the of the house because it's a bit about two weeks like wide
1:14:49
open and. No, it's, it's, it's a really
1:14:51
good place in that kind of respect.
1:14:53
No, exactly. My kid seems a bit reluctant to
1:14:56
walk to school by herself. I think she just wants a bit
1:14:58
like a lot of older children, you know, first children.
1:15:02
I think she's a little bit kinky to her parents.
1:15:04
So maybe, maybe, maybe we're just a little bit older.
1:15:07
Maybe I could compromise between the English position and the and
1:15:11
the Swiss position. Trust me, you'll walk besides
1:15:14
her like 200 meters behind her to make sure that she's walking
1:15:18
at the right at the right place. Joe, before we wrap this up, I,
1:15:26
I have some some rapid fire questions.
1:15:29
I want to thank you. First of all, even though we we
1:15:31
didn't finish, thank you for sharing it.
1:15:34
It was much fun. The discussion.
1:15:36
I have to say I have some rapid fires questions.
1:15:42
First thing first UK tea or Swiss chocolate.
1:15:47
Oh, UK tea. I actually think Switzerland is
1:15:51
very good at marketing itself. I'm not really sure it's Swiss
1:15:54
chocolate is all that special. What about cheese?
1:15:59
I don't eat cheese, so I'm not very good at the Swiss, the
1:16:05
Swiss foodstuffs, I'm afraid. OK makes sense now I understand.
1:16:10
Also your your complaints about food.
1:16:12
If you don't eat cheese you miss 80% of the experience for sure.
1:16:16
Yeah, yeah. No, I would say tea, even though
1:16:22
like I'm more of a coffee drinker, but I'd still say much
1:16:24
tea. OK, London Tubor Swiss.
1:16:28
Trains. Oh God, Swiss trains, you know,
1:16:32
I think, I think you know with London train, London Chew a,
1:16:36
it'll be broken down. Half the time it's someone will
1:16:38
be on strike. You can overtake it.
1:16:40
Walking Swiss trains, they will be on time 99.99% of the time.
1:16:47
It's super reliable. That's an easy one.
1:16:52
Isn't that interesting that they are they are doing even though
1:16:54
they are nationwide and London is only for for London.
1:16:57
But I think the craziness of London, we have to be honest,
1:16:59
the craziness of London is something that you can match
1:17:01
because like the amount of people that are living in there,
1:17:04
that's not natural. No.
1:17:06
And something always happens. There's always some crazy person
1:17:09
on the tube. You know something's happening.
1:17:12
It's interesting that week. It's it's absolutely incredible.
1:17:17
Absolutely. What's your favorite Swiss SWAT?
1:17:20
Boonsley, which is basically, it's actually a real Swiss
1:17:25
surname and basically it means like a narrow close minded
1:17:29
person who is a stickler for the rules.
1:17:33
Basically it's like it's the Swiss word for someone who is
1:17:36
extremely Swiss. You know, there's someone
1:17:39
someone who reports their neighbors if they don't follow
1:17:42
the rules, if they don't, you know, if they cut their grass on
1:17:44
a Sunday, you know, if there's any noise coming from the house,
1:17:50
you know, 10 O one, but a real Swiss buns.
1:17:52
They wouldn't complain in 950. They would wait until a 10/10
1:17:55
and then call the police, you know?
1:17:58
1010 O one, Yeah, absolutely. I get, I know that from Germany,
1:18:01
but I forgot to ask you, I think the most important question.
1:18:04
You just mentioned out the cutting the grass on a Sunday.
1:18:06
How did you get used to the stores being closed on Sunday?
1:18:09
Oh God, I hate it. I absolutely hate it.
1:18:14
I really, Oh, no, no, I really don't have too much time for
1:18:17
this. You know, like you talk to Swiss
1:18:19
people about it and they're always like, oh, it's like a
1:18:21
labor protection thing. Like, come on, guys, no, it's
1:18:26
not like your restaurants are open.
1:18:28
What difference does it make? Why are restaurants open?
1:18:31
Why does that make sense? Like something that's like, you
1:18:34
know, a luxury is open like a shop.
1:18:37
It's just a hangover from Christianity.
1:18:39
And not that Christianity is a bad thing, but you know, it's
1:18:41
like an enforcement of it, right?
1:18:43
And it's actually, it has an interesting story.
1:18:45
I don't know if you know the story of it because they were
1:18:48
open until the 60s and there was a huge, I don't know, do you
1:18:52
know the story of them? No, I don't.
1:18:54
Because it's nothing to nothing to do with Christianity.
1:18:57
It's so interesting. I, I really actually researched
1:19:00
it because I was curious how did they manage to, to do it like
1:19:03
this or why? And there was, I think in the
1:19:06
60s there was a huge protest made by kids in Germany and
1:19:10
Switzerland, I think in Switzerland as well, but in
1:19:12
Germany for sure. And it was some the protest was,
1:19:16
were called and you can Google them afterwards.
1:19:18
It's called Sontag Gig hurt Papi.
1:19:21
It was a, it was a, it was a, it was a protest like the parents.
1:19:27
The parents should have Sundays off to spend with the family.
1:19:33
I mean, yeah, why Sundays? I mean, I, I get the, I get the,
1:19:37
you know, parents, you know, maybe like there's got to be
1:19:40
some labour protection, stop people working seven days a week
1:19:42
in an inhumane hours. But I don't know, man.
1:19:46
But then why? Why?
1:19:47
Why? It's just supermarkets, you
1:19:49
know? Yeah.
1:19:51
It's. Arbitrary.
1:19:51
And then you like, you go to the railway station and which is
1:19:54
like the only place the shops are open and it's like a
1:19:57
supermarket you've never seen. It's like instead of like. 10
1:20:01
people, that's 1000 and the queue is like half an hour long.
1:20:04
But I was and. You paid the most money that you
1:20:07
paid for a bread in your life. Yeah, I don't know.
1:20:10
I struggle with that. I really, I really like
1:20:12
emotionally, spiritually struggle, struggle with.
1:20:16
I do not like that one bit, you know, that's just, it just feels
1:20:20
so oh, like, you know, kind of weirdly controlling and weirdly
1:20:28
like rules based, you know, I like, you know, I'm not someone
1:20:33
who likes like a narcotic situation, but that to me, I
1:20:35
don't know, I'm not a big fan of that.
1:20:38
So yeah, I'm a regular, you know, I try to do my best to
1:20:41
undermine the system by by going to the tiny petrol station shops
1:20:45
which are open on a Sunday. Although or the, or the, or the
1:20:48
railway supermarket. I feel like enough people get
1:20:51
involved and go to the railway and it just comes too busy.
1:20:53
Then they'll have to have to relent.
1:20:58
You want to do the protest the other.
1:20:59
Day I'm just not organized. I don't think you know, I'm not
1:21:01
one this. I will never be organized to do
1:21:03
everything on a Saturday. And also like, you know, the
1:21:06
types of you're doing something else on a Saturday.
1:21:08
You can do something with your kids on a Saturday.
1:21:11
So the few of these things will never be Swiss.
1:21:13
You know, like all Swiss do their recycling and they, you
1:21:16
know, in England, you put when you've got carpet recycling, you
1:21:18
put it in a box and then something takes away.
1:21:20
Now in Switzerland, if they get a piece of string and ties up
1:21:24
immaculately and they can do it. And it's like, it looks
1:21:27
beautiful. It looks like someone's like
1:21:29
this work of art. You know, when I do it, it looks
1:21:32
like, you know, all the cardboard is falling out of the
1:21:34
side. You know, I just can't do it.
1:21:37
I just not. I don't have that Swiss Jean
1:21:39
everything. We're so neat and perfect, you
1:21:42
know? You have to, you have to think
1:21:43
about the fact that they have recycling hoof.
1:21:45
I don't know, do you have recycling hoof?
1:21:48
Well, kind of right. So there's like a, there is a,
1:21:50
there's like a recycling Center for like glass and yeah, we have
1:21:58
glass and plastics. But then you take like your no,
1:22:00
no, not plastics, glass and metal.
1:22:03
And then you take plastic somewhere else.
1:22:04
But then, like cardboard, the only way to do it is by tying it
1:22:08
up, leaving us at the front door.
1:22:11
And that I, I just. Yeah.
1:22:13
You know, it's just you need a lot of time to do that, right?
1:22:16
It's the whole system is predicated on someone being like
1:22:20
a home and being like, a perfect, like a perfect
1:22:23
housewife. Yeah.
1:22:24
You know, I like to say the same.
1:22:26
Keep them busy, keep them busy. Don't let them think, keep them
1:22:29
busy. So there's some respect, even
1:22:31
though like I'm kind of like in many ways aligned with the SU
1:22:34
square system. I, I do have a problem with
1:22:36
people who moved countries and then wanted to be like their
1:22:38
home country. I don't want to be that person,
1:22:41
but at the same time I, I feel like you know you, you're going
1:22:44
to be 100% of the way. This.
1:22:46
I'm like, I try to, I, I like to think I'd like 80% in the Swiss
1:22:49
mindset. But like this occasional thing
1:22:51
like that Sunday opening. Well, I like to stay in the UK
1:22:54
way because I feel like you moved to Switzerland because you
1:22:58
do think Switzerland is a better country in the UK.
1:23:00
But like there's, it doesn't mean it's 100% that way.
1:23:02
I don't know if you feel the same with Germany and Romania.
1:23:04
Yeah. So the, the, the thing which is
1:23:07
which is I got used to it. So shopping, I got used to it.
1:23:10
And we have, I have to say, I got discipline to go not even
1:23:13
Saturday, because Saturday is a, you can kill yourself inside the
1:23:16
store because it's awful. It's awful.
1:23:19
And I, we got somehow disciplined to go on either on
1:23:22
Thursday evening because some of the stores, they have an extra
1:23:27
open time on Thursdays, like they open 10:00 PM, then 10:00
1:23:31
PM and then we go real late on Thursdays because on Saturday is
1:23:36
crazy. But the recycling experience is
1:23:38
killing me, man. I have half of my, my, my
1:23:42
official washing room, let's call it like this.
1:23:47
It's full of separation bins for different kind of plastic.
1:23:51
Because in Barden Wittenberg, when I leave, I have to, I have
1:23:54
to recycle. I have.
1:23:55
I think we have 7 kind of plastic.
1:23:58
Types, yeah. Yeah.
1:24:00
And this is, this is like this is, yeah, I do it.
1:24:04
I have to because otherwise the the normal garbage is more
1:24:08
expensive. Than Germanic ability to
1:24:10
organise is very strong. I don't think I'll ever be quite
1:24:14
quite 100% that. Keep, keep on busy.
1:24:17
I told you everything is organized.
1:24:19
Everything is organized. I try.
1:24:21
You know, I try. What's your UK comfort food that
1:24:30
you crave the most? I would say like an old
1:24:34
fashioned Indian Curry. And when I say old fashioned, I
1:24:38
don't mean any of this like street food.
1:24:40
I mean like an old fashioned, you know, like nineteen 1980s
1:24:44
style Curry house, you know, whether it's like a dependable
1:24:47
menu of the the old favorites. Like.
1:24:54
The way, the way it always was, you know, like like a totally
1:24:57
inauthentic in like British Indian, you know, like adapted
1:25:00
for British taste Indian food. I'd say that's something that's
1:25:06
I would always have when I go home.
1:25:12
What's your What's 1 Swiss rule or law you you secretly love
1:25:17
besides the one that you don't like?
1:25:20
What I do love, let me think, let me think, I, I would say
1:25:33
like it's less the fact less than individual laws that I
1:25:37
love. The more that and people take
1:25:40
them seriously. I think like if you had all
1:25:43
these rules in the UK, like, for example, like, you know, like
1:25:49
after I've now got my permanent residence, I can file a tax
1:25:53
return like every, every like year.
1:25:56
I don't pay taxes. And if you have this impression,
1:25:58
like everyone be like misreporting things.
1:26:00
I think there's like an honesty and like a trust in society
1:26:04
where people do the right thing and look out for their neighbors
1:26:07
and you have a sense of community and like, you know,
1:26:09
everything is organized like the village level or the most the
1:26:13
Canton, and there's a sense of salt, like kind of maybe
1:26:17
solidarity is the wrong word, But since it'd be like, you
1:26:19
know, like community and being there, the I think the that's
1:26:25
kind of breaking down in the account.
1:26:26
I think it's true of a lot of the western world.
1:26:28
I think sorts as much maintain that so it's less like an.
1:26:32
Individual. Than the sense of the rule of
1:26:35
law is like the rule of law is very good.
1:26:38
Makes sense that I think it's the trust in each other, yeah.
1:26:41
Exactly which is. Surprising me, which is
1:26:43
surprising me a lot as well in Germany, because in Germany it's
1:26:47
happening as well. So I, I have AI have a car
1:26:50
service which is like 300 meters away from my house and usually
1:26:54
my wife's car always goes, goes there.
1:26:56
We took, we take, we take it there and I took, I went one day
1:27:00
to take the car and he said just go out.
1:27:02
I'm don't have the time to to make your invoice today, just
1:27:05
come tomorrow again. And I went tomorrow and tomorrow
1:27:07
said yeah, not, not not even today, no, no, no, just come
1:27:10
next week. And it took me two months to get
1:27:13
my bloody invoice. And yeah, I mean it's.
1:27:14
Crazy, right? You know, it's in Switzerland.
1:27:17
I can do online shopping without paying for it.
1:27:20
And it comes to your house like an invoice, Like if you did that
1:27:22
in the UK, like nobody ever pay, it would be totally it just
1:27:28
wouldn't work. And that's what I mean about the
1:27:30
Santa Trust. Do you have the flowers to to to
1:27:34
that you can cut yourself, cut that you can cut for yourself
1:27:38
and then pay for them in a? Box Yeah, yeah, that's that's
1:27:42
brilliant would. That work.
1:27:43
Would that work if you key? No, I mean, to be fair, I think
1:27:48
there's a lot of times like, you know, you might have like AI
1:27:50
don't know a farmer selling eggs or something with an honesty
1:27:53
box. And that might work, OK, because
1:27:54
I think that would be seen as like a right theft.
1:27:59
Yeah, I think, I think whenever we go beyond the level of like
1:28:01
this is some small person who's, you know, would suffer.
1:28:04
I I don't think it would go much further than that in the UK with
1:28:09
problems. The last question Joe, how did
1:28:17
your relationship changed with your with your home country
1:28:21
since you're gone? Right.
1:28:23
Well, I think, I think when I left, I was kind of just fed up.
1:28:28
I kind of have my fell like I really like respect London for
1:28:33
London for what it has to offer, but I certainly wouldn't want to
1:28:36
live there. Nice to visit, not nice to live.
1:28:41
Now I've been away for a bit. I kind of I kind of get
1:28:44
nostalgic some of the things that the UK has that Switzerland
1:28:49
doesn't have some of that. And I'm sure the community
1:28:53
warmth that like back in my back in my hometown, you know,
1:28:57
everyone knows everyone, as opposed to me being some like,
1:29:00
you know, like foreigner who, you know, like comes home and
1:29:04
they're never so slow to, you know, that that that kind of
1:29:07
sense of neighborliness. But I'm never going to be part
1:29:10
of that their world that that's not a really mess.
1:29:18
And certainly like I think I would either.
1:29:21
I think if I went weirdly, I think if I went home home to my
1:29:24
home country, I'd want to go home to my home region.
1:29:26
I'd either stay completely away or go right back home.
1:29:31
OK, Yeah. I mean, the thing which I fully
1:29:37
understand what you're saying, I have to say that somehow I have
1:29:40
the feeling that we can kind of go through the same roller
1:29:43
coaster of feelings because it's exactly 100% know what you mean,
1:29:47
Because it's the feeling of knowing everyone, like saying
1:29:50
hello to everyone on the street and not saying hello out of
1:29:53
curiosity out just saying hello because you know exactly who
1:29:57
that guy is, who's his brother, who's his, who are his parents
1:29:59
and so on. And that's that's something that
1:30:01
you miss a lot when you're when you're outside.
1:30:03
Yeah, I guess when you grow up, you never like, you know, when
1:30:06
you grow up, especially when you're like, you know, your
1:30:07
parents are native to that country and you come from like
1:30:09
a, you know, a homogeneous background.
1:30:11
I guess you never think of yourself as someone who when you
1:30:14
grow up is going to leave. And if you're living a different
1:30:17
life to the one you was expected to have, like I didn't have
1:30:21
long. I didn't have this plan and 18 I
1:30:23
was going to come here when I was 30 something, you know, So
1:30:27
like this kind of you kind of almost, even though you're the
1:30:31
one who chose it and chosen for good reasons, I think you still
1:30:33
kind of warned the life you didn't have even though you
1:30:36
chose it. I don't know if you feel like
1:30:39
that it's you always think about what the other side of the
1:30:43
that's why coin. Yeah, you always, you always
1:30:48
like to experience the things that you haven't experienced
1:30:51
because you don't know how they feel.
1:30:54
And I think I think that's the reason why I was saying that
1:30:57
happiness is a choice. Like you said, you have to learn
1:31:00
to enjoy the things that you have and not not cry for the for
1:31:04
the things that you don't have. Exactly.
1:31:06
Because at the end, at the end, you, you, you will always have
1:31:10
things that you don't have. Like if you wouldn't have moved
1:31:14
outside of UK, you would have thought OK would have been
1:31:16
better. I don't know.
1:31:17
I've, I would, I would have loved to do that.
1:31:21
Looked at Virgin Switzerland, looks amazing.
1:31:24
I always say, you know, I, I talked to a few people thinking
1:31:28
about moving and I always say like, make sure, like you, the
1:31:33
most important thing is to know yourself, know the kind of
1:31:37
person you are and think about the country you're going to move
1:31:41
to and think, could I live with that?
1:31:43
And I think the worst thing people do is have like AI don't
1:31:48
know. I can almost like instinct, like
1:31:51
they see something they don't like and then I'm going to go
1:31:53
now and then they kind of go to someone and say, Oh, no,
1:31:55
actually, I don't like this place in a way that could have
1:31:57
been predictable. I think it's important.
1:31:59
Like when I went to Switzerland, I had, you know, even I've never
1:32:03
been there before, really had the idea of what it'd be like,
1:32:05
you know, I knew myself. I knew I could live with the
1:32:07
with the downsides, everywhere has downsides.
1:32:10
So like, you know, know that, know yourself and embrace that
1:32:14
decision. I guess it's OK to move back
1:32:18
home, but I would rather not be, especially with kids like making
1:32:21
it going somewhere, going back, you know, So I like, I know I'm
1:32:26
happy to, you know, there are some side I'm happy to live with
1:32:28
them and. I think besides the fact that
1:32:32
you have to know yourself is you have to know your reasons.
1:32:35
I think the reasons are more important than knowing yourself
1:32:37
and the like you mentioned at the beginning, you, you did for
1:32:41
the kids, like for the safety of the kids.
1:32:43
That's the best reason that you can have because then something
1:32:47
that can cover all the downsides that you might meet on the way,
1:32:53
but that's the goal and the goal.
1:32:54
Your goal is rich and that's why you you you're, you're accepting
1:32:57
everything that's going towards. Yeah, I just.
1:32:59
Think the fact that you. Yeah, there's not.
1:33:00
When you have kids, there's nothing.
1:33:02
There's nothing that is as important.
1:33:04
It's like giving your kids like the best opportunity you can as
1:33:08
a parent. I think growing up, growing up
1:33:11
in a kind of an objectively kind of safe rich country that if I
1:33:15
can keep hold of that, I will, you know?
1:33:19
And I have to be honest, I moved outside of Romania before I had
1:33:21
kids. And the only thing that was in
1:33:23
my head is exactly this. I want to give them A to make
1:33:27
for, to make it for them easier than it was for me.
1:33:29
Yeah, that's it. That's the only.
1:33:33
They don't have to move. Yeah, Joe, thanks a lot.
1:33:39
Yeah, thank you very much. Thank you for your time.
1:33:42
Was a really fun conversation. Yeah.
1:33:44
Thanks very much. Seems like we've gone through
1:33:45
some of the same thoughts. Absolutely, absolutely.
1:33:49
That's the reason why I started it, Joe, to be honest, because
1:33:51
I, I realized I'm not the only one doing this and I want to
1:33:54
have this, this experience is because when you are alone and
1:33:57
you think about all these experiences alone, you think
1:33:59
that you're crazy and you're the only one going through this.
1:34:02
But when you, when you realize, no, it's normal, like this is
1:34:05
what everyone is experiencing. You have to choose your fight
1:34:08
and you have to choose your heart.
1:34:09
That's why it makes it makes it easier.
1:34:12
OK. Thank you so much.
1:34:16
I thank you for your time. I enjoyed the hell out of the
1:34:20
conversation and maybe we get to do it again so.
1:34:22
OK, great. See you.
1:34:24
Thanks, Paul. See you soon.
1:34:25
Bye.