Zurich: the Good, the Bad and the Ugly

22 Sep 2010

Okay, so far I've been waxing eloquent about my new city and how lucky I am to be here.  It's time to reveal the nitty gritty: the good, the bad and the ugly.

First, here are (some of) the good things:

• our apartment
• the cleanliness and friendliness













•  the view from our apartment

•  the food



These are all olive oils and they had about fifty samples.



There are Zurich markets every day but Sunday and Monday.

We've been feasting on mushrooms



A good day at the market!



 This is what Greg had to say about the food:

There are lots of great things here. A fabulous bakery is 2 blocks away. Did I

tell you Zurich is in a glacial valley? The two blocks has an elevation change of

about 100 meters (300 feet). On the bright side, there is a restaurant that makes

its own outstanding beer across the street from the bakery (that part is level).

We went to the Oerlikon Market yesterday. The produce is awesome. We got

3 different wild mushrooms, tomatoes that actually taste like tomatoes, red and

yellow carrots (did you know that carrots have flavor?), fish (didn’t smell like fish -

I think that it was fresh) and wild boar. We also found a discount store where we

bought good (not great) wine for 8CF (8 dollars) a bottle. So with a little work, I

think we will be able to feed ourselves for less than 100CF per day.

• the flowers. Flowers are sold everywhere and are fresher and cheaper than we usually get in the States or Canada.

All right, enough of this Pollyanna crap!  Let's get down to the nitty gritty:  Zurich the Bad.

• top of the list is the shower.  Here is how Greg describes it: How do we take a shower when the shower is smaller than an economy seat on a regional Jet?

• 
  
  a close second is the dryer. When we received the description of this place, I was pleased to see that it had a washer and dryer - even if the laundry room was a shared space in the basement. Well, here they are:

Here in Europe they have washers and dryers that are all in one. I was hoping that this machine might be one of those. No such luck. You take your clothes out of the washer and hang them on the clothesline. If you look closely at the picture of the hanging clothes, you can see a machine on the wall in the background. This is a fan that spits air out at the clothes in a mysterious cycle that eventually (kind of) dries your stuff. Laundry here is an all day commitment. And to think that I used to make fun of my friend Doris because she had a dedicated laundry day. (Doris do you still haul your clothes up from the basement to dry on lines in the attic? You'd feel right at home here!)

• 
  
  the size of the kitchen. Poor Greg! Here is pre and post.

Greg's comment?  Electric? I only do gas!
Of course, it's a typically efficient European kitchen so it's not too bad.

• the garbage situation.  I'll let Greg tell you about it:
  
  Why are there six different kinds of garbage and how do we sort it? 
  Are there enough adaptors in the world to support our electronics?
  (Fortunately, manufactures have put transformers on most things so
  they work here.) I brought a surge protector so we can plug in all of our
  American electronics. When I tried to use it, I blew a circuit and toasted
  the protector. We weren’t sure of how to dispose of it here in this twenty
  kinds of garbage country and so we made Heath and Katie cart it home
  when they left.

the pets we left behind.  Greg wrote:

Four days after Margo arrived, I hopped a train to a Gordon conference in the Swiss Alps. My arrival home was sad as it’s the first time in 12 years my dog Abbey wasn’t there to greet my return. Margo tried to compensate by barking and jumping but it just wasn’t the same. 

Katie and Heath report that the cat hasn't seemed to realize we're gone but poor Abbey is stressed and driving them crazy. She demands constant attention when they're home and chews up doors when they're gone. This is the e-mail we received from them yesterday:

Abbey is now the proud owner of (don't laugh):

A dog pheromone room infuser to calm dogs

Dog relaxation vitamins

2 new toys

A radio to keep her company

And a new gate that is hopefully indestructible.

Let’s hope one of these things works.

P.S. We also bought a shock mat to lay in front of the gate that Heath shocked himself on about 10 times while setting it up... and Abbey stood on it unfazed. I'm beginning to think maybe your dog is immune to shocks.

• 
  
  the friends we left behind.  (I hope nobody notices that I talked about the pets first.)

Finally, on to Zurich the UGLY. Here it is, the one you've been waiting for! (Scroll down)

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Here I am with my old lady cart. 

My family made me buy it.

It was only 30 francs. 

I wanted one of the sleek black ones that were 200 francs.

Heath said he'd only let me buy one of the cool ones if it went out on its own to do the shopping.

So here I am living in a cosmopolitan city with a bad haircut and an ugly cart.

Sigh.