misplacedheidi

I lived in Switzerland for 4 years.
I joined the englishforum.ch when it was relatively small. I have put a link on this website to it. It is an incredibly well mapped website which encompasses most things to with Switzerland in separate sub forums. I don't think this could be nor should be repeated here. Switzerland is very unique and there are all sorts of issues to do with contracts/housign/insurance etc and it does warrant an entire forum.
I don't contribute to it anymore as I don't live there, but I sometimes keep an eye out. If anyone ever needs any advice there are loads of people ready to help on that forum.

HTH

jdr

Read post 5, and answer them on here, then there maybe a forum start.

misplacedheidi

jdr,
I appreciate the sentiment but as I said in my original post there is no point in repeating the forum content when another forum is totally dedicated to that country.

"I don't think this could be nor should be repeated here."

I also appreciate that one forum is hardly likely to direct to another forum, but if you really want to know about Der Schweiz, englishforum is the place to go (and no I am not a moderator on it or anything - just a person!)

Have a look around that forum and you'll have an idea of that country. It really is quite odd!

jdr

Tell me how they started then ?

People asking and others answering, not people sending them off to other sites though.

I am sure Switzerland cannot be worse than Spain for example, where you need every piece of paper you have ever owned in your life and three copies of each, then they will still find a piece you haven`t got.

GDE

I have lived in Switzerland twice. Most recently, I left Switzerland in March 2008 and had lived in Zurich for nearly 3 years. The time before was in Basel. So, I can say that I know it quite well.

English is spoken in the workplace only in large international corporations. So, if you work in the international head offices of a pharmaceutical company, bank, consultancy, etc. You will have few problems with English. Otherwise, you will probably be expected to speak the language of the region you are living in. As you probably know, there are 4 national languages in Switzerland, German, French, Italian and Romantsch. In the German area, the language is Swiss German. Actually there are many dialects of Swiss German. This can make communication a bit challenging.

Quality of life is very high in Switzerland. It is a very nice life. Little or no corruption, good health care, amazing public transport, accessible public administration, safe, calm, etc. Almost everything you could want from a country. However, it is a expensive and some people find it boring. What this means is that on Sundays most things other than restaurants are closed. Evenings can be very dull depending on where you lived. Swiss can be quite reserved and take some time to get to know. But they are often very kind and helpful. For example, if you forget your wallet somewhere, a Swiss person may come running after you to bring it to you, fully intact.

There lots of expats and they are easy to find depending on where you live. I am now living in Lithuania and by contrast, I am finding very few expats here. It is quite a change but I love it.

Let me know if you have any specific Switzerland oriented questions that I might be able to help with.