WORKING IN SWITZERLAND

Local Holidays

Transport

Switzerland has one of the most extensive and efficient public transport systems in Europe. It is also extremely good value for money. A month's travel card for central Zürich (equivalent to a zone 1-4 ticket in London) for buses, trams and trains costs 70 CHF a month. Over 95% of public transport departs and arrives exactly on time, so you can normally be very sure of connections.

Travelling by train is a great way to see Switzerland and her neighbours, as you can get to Austria, France, Germany and Italy within a few hours. To make this cost effective you can buy a "Halbtaxkarte" which costs approx 150 Chf for one year, but entitles you to half price train travel.

If you are intending to fly in from the UK, the best value for money flights are offered by either Easyjet (Luton to Zürich or Geneva and Liverpool to Geneva) or Go from Stanstead. However SwissAir and CrossAir do offer very good value if you stay a Saturday night, which reduces the price.

Culture

The Swiss are known throughout Europe as being punctual, very sensible but a bit introverted. Look behind the reputation and you will find a very colourful assortment of people. The Swiss are slowly opening up to the rest of the world, yet still remain quite traditional and reserved. It takes perhaps longer to get to know a Swiss person, but once broken through the ice, you will find them reliable, trust-worthy and sometimes even feisty in their independent natures.

Switzerland is divided into 26 cantons with 4 official languages, so the man in the street is multilingual and multicultural. "Sibling rivalry" between different regions is very apparent, for example there is an imaginary border between French and German speaking parts called the "Röstigrabe" (Rösti being a traditional potato dish eaten in the German part and "Grabe" meaning ditch!!). Other cantonal stereotypes are as follows: The Zürcher think they are superior, the Bernese are methodical, rather slow and very prudent, the Walliser are the party-animals, and the Vaudoise are very friendly and hospitable (probably due to the amount of wine produced here).