In Switzerland

Words and Photograph by: Mikael Matossian (Grade 11)

I had never traveled alone. But last summer, I got the opportunity to travel to Switzerland for two weeks with about thirty other students from around the world. I didn’t know what to expect; I had never been to Western Europe, except for one night in a hotel in London. But when I came back to the United States, I knew that I enjoyed the trip and would later pay another visit to “La Suisse.”

When we landed in Geneva International Airport, we were met by a rainstorm. We quickly huddled onto a bus and headed to the hotel. Most of the students were sleeping, but I found myself glued to the window, watching everything going on outside. This was a whole new country, thousands of miles away from home, and I didn’t want to miss any of it. I noticed that wherever the bus went, I found myself being followed by the Swiss Alps, the omnipresent mountain range in western Switzerland. These were nothing like the tiny hills in the San Fernando Valley. Some of the Alps were so high that I needed to bend my neck to see their peaks, which were covered by the clouds.

Over the next few days, the group and I went into downtown Geneva quite frequently, and I found it to be different from the cities in the United States. Everything was more organized and orderly. The buildings were compact, and it seemed like everyone was organized and knew where they were going. The city has been referred to by many as “the world's most compact metropolis.” The public trolley ran in the middle of the street and people jumped on while it was moving. I heard a combination of everything in that city: the smoke spewing out of the trolley, children playing in the alleys, the ragtag street bands found on sidewalk corners, and the Smart Cars speeding away on streets. However, the nightlife was much like that in the United States, with teenagers and young adults on the sidewalks walking to clubs, festivals, and parties. Lake Geneva, (the largest lake in continental Europe and strangely named “Little Lake”) was literally in the middle of the city, and is home to the famous Fetes de Genève, a large multicultural summer festival that lasts from May to August every year.

Everywhere I went, I found stores flush with Swiss products, especially chocolate and watches. You could find anything you wanted: chocolate bars, chocolate squares, chocolate cookies, chocolate Swiss army knives, big watches, small watches, expensive watches, counterfeit watches, and even some chocolate watches.

I also found old castles and fortresses standing next to modern towns and restaurants to be an interesting combination: a union of the old and the new. There was a bevy of ancient castles left from the twelfth century Swiss Confederacy, like the Chateau de-Chillon, an old fortress built by the powerful Saxon noble family. As I walked through the underground prisons and the furnished bedrooms, it seemed like the castle hadn’t been touched since the twelfth century. I learned that the nation of Switzerland was actually a group of cantons, or provinces of people of Swiss descent. The people shared a common historical background dating back to the twelfth century. Yet I found myself bombarded by droves of Swiss flags hung outside patriotic citizens’ houses.

Before going there, I thought most of the people in Switzerland would be primarily either of Swiss or French ethnicity. I did see a lot of Swiss, French, and German people, but what struck me was the number of other races I saw. I truly felt like it was a multicultural city. I heard a number of languages, like French, German, Arabic, Russian, Italian, Hindi, and Romansch (the Swiss variant of the German tongue). Walking through the city I saw throngs of Muslim women with pitch-black burkas that almost covered their entire bodies except for their eyes. Along Lake Geneva, I noticed that there were more Indian, Lebanese, and Pakistani kebab restaurants than Swiss and French ones. The sultan of Oman had even bought a large property right on the lakefront, with his Lamborghinis parked on the street. Farther downtown, I found an avenue of numerous museums and institutions, among them the second-largest United Nations office in the world and the International Red Cross headquarters.

In the middle of Lake Geneva was the Jet d’Eau, a famous water jet that continuously spewed out water 150 meters up into the sky. To see the top of that gigantic behemoth, I was forced to get on my knees and bend my neck, and I could feel its water droplets falling on my shirt while standing dozens of feet away from it.

The city was interesting to see, but so was the countryside. Outside of the city, our tour bus sped past along endless farms and grape vineyards on the mountains. Probably the most distinctive feature of the country was the number of lakes. Next to every town or small urban area there seemed to be a lake. However, I could actually see my reflection clearly in the pristine water, unlike the water of the Pacific Ocean. The water of the lakes was completely clear, without any pollution or trash. The small towns next to the lakes were inundated with restaurants and pubs, with people lounging outside laughing and talking without a care in the world. There were no busy streets or sidewalks inundated with people rushing to get where they needed to be. To me, everything seemed more calm and peaceful.

Overall, I thought it was an amazing trip and I was sad to not only leave the friends I had made but also the calm, quiet, truly multicultural and international country of Switzerland.