December 9, 2010

Between Stadelhofen and the lake you find the opera. The lakeside was very beautiful today with the snow lying on the Uetliberg. I walked along the lake and then along the Limmat and I was surprised to see that someone seems to have been playing paintgun around the old buildings along the river as you can see on the last picture.

Julien Assange is really the man of the month, in charge of Wikileaks he is the man that the US authorities want to charge for high treason and the Swedish authorities want for rape charges. The latest publishing from Wikileaks was a large number classified documents on the communication between the US and their embassies. I don't really know what I think about leaking classified information but there is at least one very positive aspect of it. For a long time now we have been going in a direction of a surveillance society where big brother is constantly watching us. The authorities can demand information about our whereabouts on the web and telephone communications. Privacy seems to be a notion of the past but at least the Wikileaks shows that this is not only a one way thing, the authorities are watching us but we, the public, are also keeping an eye on them. They can't expect to get away with any kind of behavior which will probably in the long run force them to well consider their actions and keep them within moral and legal frames.

December 1, 2010

Winter has come! There is plenty of snow on the Hönggerberg and on the Bahnhofstrasse the Christmas shopping has kicked off. The have change the lightening this year as the old one was so profoundly hated by everybody.

The Swiss once again got through a xenophobic vote although I am not quite sure it was really out of xenophobia that they voted the way they did. The vote was whether or not to deport all criminal foreigners. Listening only to the slogan I can understand that people voted for the suggestion, after all, who wants to have criminals of any nationality? It is only once you looked closer in to what the proposition really was about that you almost had to be against it. The proposition was that you will get automatically deported without having any kind of individual hearing about your personal circumstances meaning that you can be born in Switzerland, lived your whole life here and then be deported to a country where you have never set your foot. True to the Swiss mentality tax fraud is of course not one of the crimes that would lead to deportation.

I think that this vote is mostly about that we are all longing back to a society where the crime rates are so low that we could leave our door open and were never afraid to walk home alone at night. In nostalgia we are blaming what is the biggest difference between now and then, namely the amount of foreigners. It was quite clear in the aftermaths that the cantons most favorable to the proposition were cantons with the lowest amount of foreigners and probably the lowest crime rates as well. I am therefore convinced that this is not about disliking foreigners, it is about being afraid of them, or rather afraid of the unknown.

Another less philosophical reason could simply be that people are victims of catchy slogans and to lazy to read what the vote is really about.

November 17, 2010

A walk in Niederdorf, one of the old parts of Zurich.

Just came back from two weeks in Sweden where the traditionally biggest party, the Social Democrats, is facing a major crisis. They had a disastrous result in the latest election and now the leader, Mona Sahlin, has resigned. This is not the first time she is resigning. She did it once many years ago from a position as a minister in the government because she had bought Toblerone (swiss chocolate) and diapers with the credit card of the ministry. An affair that might seem ridiculous for the more southern Europeans that are used to more political extravaganza but that really pissed of the Swedish working class.

Anyway, what is so funny about the situation in Sweden at the moment is that there is this huge pool of people that are terribly loyal to Social Democrats that don't know what to think any more. They actually mean what they are saying: "we don't know what to think" because the party hasn't decided on their politics and therefore haven't informed the "grassroots"about what opinions they should have. One would expect that you belong to a political party because you share their ideals and visions but in Sweden people are so loyal that they stick around until the leaders of the party have decided on a new policy. I find that rather hilarious.

October 27, 2010

A fantastic autumn day at Hönggerberg. In and around the Friedhof Hönggerberg there are really some extraordinary views. It is very peaceful but a bit awkward to wander around in graveyards, especially when you walk in to a group of people about to bury one of their loved ones. I am not a big fan of the church and I am not sure but I might not even be a member any more but whenever it comes to funerals they are doing a great job. I read a couple of years ago that now when people are not believers anymore they go around spreading their ashes a bit everywhere and that in some places in Switzerland, like Zermatt, they start becoming really annoyed with all Germans going there to spread the ashes of their dead. I think it is more that they annoyed with Germans in general because ashes are biodegradable and unless you believe in ghosts I don't see why they should create any trouble.

In France they are still striking as that is what they do best. It is quite difficult to sympathize with the French movement that are against lifting the retirement age from 60 to 62 when all countries I have ever lived in have a retirement age of 65. The poor frenchies might also loose their 35 hour work week which must be really hard when all their neighboring countries are working 40 hours a week. I am not claiming that there are not problems in France and their economy but if they worked a bit more and went on strike a bit less I am sure that many problems would solve themselves. The most ridiculous thing is when the Lyceens (people in high school) are also manifesting as if the "old people" are taking their jobs. It is so obvious that they are just happy to skip classes and hardly know what they are protesting against. No wonder they will not get any jobs when they graduate if they spend all their time demonstrating in the streets instead of learning something useful. In the end they can't all become union leaders. I know I sound terribly conservative but sometimes I just can't grasp what planet these French people are living on.

In Switzerland the extreme right party SVP has a new slogan "Swiss votes SVP" which is a rather silly slogan as only Swiss people have the right to vote. I guess they expect 100% of the votes in the next election.

October 20, 2010

A really nice walk is to go from the ETH, passing the University and then down to the Kunsthaus where there is currently a great Picasso retrospective from his early years until 1932. It is more or less the same exhibition that Picasso himself set up in Zürich more than 70 years ago. If you are interested in art there is a well done audio guiding that explains all his different phases. If you are not interested in art it is still very beautiful to walk around there. Without any difficult interpretations Picasso simply made fantastic paintings and you don't need to have specific knowledge or passion for art to enjoy that.

October 13, 2010

Bahnhof Enge and around in kreis 2. This is a really beautiful part of the city that I visit much too rarely.

This week is indeed the week of the miners. The 33 miners trapped in a mine in Chile all got rescued and the longest tunnel in the world, the basis tunnel of the Gothard pass here in Switzerland, 57 km long, was finished. Both exploits were huge successes, the miners in Chile was saved 2 months ahead of schedule and the two tubes of the Gothard tunnel met at only 8 cm divergence. I hope that the aftermath of the events will be as positive as the feelings this week. When your trapped in a black hole for almost three month I guess a lot of things will happen in your head, apparently one guy decided to get married but I wonder how many of the guys decided to get a divorce or make another radical change in their lives. You can do an awful lot of thinking in three months. I am also curious to see how many of them that will stay in the mining industry.

With all the glory being cast on the miners this week I wonder if this will be the new dream job for young boys.

September 28, 2010

A walk on the Züriberg, where you can be pretty sure that people have more money than you do. It is not that they necessarily earn more money than you do. Take the Züri king of brats, Carl Hirschman, that everybody loves to hate who has zero declared income but still lived permanently in a suite in Hotel Dolder (see photo above) until he got thrown out for too much partying. On Züriberg you also find the headquarter of FIFA.

In the swiss parliament they discussed yesterday whether music should have the same importance in school as sports. The debate was mainly focused about what music bring to individuals but music in school, free for all, can actually turn out to be a rather good business. In Sweden we always had free music classes for everybody who wished to learn an instrument or to form a group. Now Sweden is the third largest music exporter in the world with hundreds of millions of benefice, only exceeded by the US and UK.

On Sunday the World War 1 will officially end and be put into history as Germany will do the last payment of the reparation determined in the Treaty of Versailles in 1919. It will be about 94 million dollars and one can only imagine how a German taxpayer must feel paying this 92-year old dept in these hard times of financial crisis.

September 22, 2010

The new sport center at Science City, ETH Hönggerberg. The fancy building stood two years before it got completely flooded during the rains in July. Now it has to be dried out for a cost of 2 million Swiss francs and will only open again in October.

In the elections in Sweden the left made the most disastrous election ever whereas the right Alliansen made made a big move forward. No wonder when the left goes so far into people meddling in peoples private lives and removing their rights to their own choices as to encouraging the Swedish women to use a breast pump in order to give the maternity leave to the fathers. It is difficult to compare the Swedish left and right with the blocks in other countries as the Swedish right still is pretty left of the right in other countries. The biggest chock in the election was that the extreme right party made it into the parliament making neither of the blocks being capable of forming a majority.

In Switzerland two new members of the Federal Council was elected today, one of which was a woman. This is the first time ever that there is a majority of women in the government. Not that it really matters as the Swiss government is known to have almost zero power but one can only hope that it will be a trendsetter for different areas.

September 1, 2010

ETH Hönggerberg.

A crazy pastor in Florida wants to organize a burning of the Koran. This is an event that should, if media had any conscience, have passed unnoticed and no one would have cared. Instead media all over the world are blowing up the story and Obama needed to comment and beg the pastor not to go through with it. It is pure idiocy that media take notice of these kind of affaires. Of course fundamentalists think that we are evil if it gets published every time a wacko gets a crazy idea in his head. On the other hand it might be fair, because every time a group of 10 or more Muslims burn a western flag it gets exploited in the same way to make all the westerners believe that the entire Muslim world is worked up about a theme that the 95% of the people don't care about at all. I guess that we just have to taste a scope of our own medicine.

August 25, 2010

Josefwiese with a nice café in the park and a picture from the Hardbrücke station.

A large part of the Americans are all worked up about a new Mosque that will be built close to Ground Zero in New York. It is such a shame that they don't take this opportunity to show the Muslim world that they are supposed to be a country of tolerance and freedom of religion. You can question whether these people know if there is a difference between fundamentalists and moderates. They call Ground Zero a sacred place but it is only too sacred for a mosque but not too sacred for a strip club that is in the same block. As Obama is supporting the building of the mosque the Americans are taking it out on him and 1 out of 5 seriously believes that Obama is a Muslim. Scary that these 20% also have the right to vote.

In Chile 33 miners are trapped in a collapsed mine and their saving is estimated to take four months. I can't imagine what it must be like to be trapped underground like that for such a long time, four minutes would be too long for me. They can get supplies but the hole that they are drilling to get them out is too small for nine of them to get out unless they loose weight. That's what I call a motivation to diet!

August 18, 2010

Sihlquai (upper image), the place to go if you look for sex (and are willing to pay for it) or for a new passport (middle image). If you note the little sign in the lower left corner you see that there was indeed an entry for trolleys, you just had to walk around the entire block to get there. Due to the new biometric passports you are then kindly requested to make your 4 weeks old baby to hold his head still and straight and his eyes opened and fixed at the same spot for 5 seconds in order for the new, specialized camera to focus. It is always so nice to see how totally in touch authorities are with reality when they invent new regulations. Thanks to the lovely and patient people working at the passbüro we managed after only 14 attempts.

After that my baby and I had a well deserved coffee at Josefstrasse (lower image).

Yesterday the people in Switzerland collected 13 millions swiss francs to the floobding victims in Pakistan. It is a good thing but I always get a funny feeling of trying to buy away my bad conscience of not doing anything that really matters.

A couple of weeks ago Wikileaks published about 90'000 confidential reports concerning the Afghan war. The U.S. has condemned them as irresponsible whereas other thinks it is important things to reveal. What is a bit scary in the world at the moment is that nobody has any trust in any kind of authorities anymore. Today, we almost take for granted that we are being fooled and kept in the dark. I can really miss the trust I used to have when I was a child seeing the US as the heroes saving the world from all evil as when they helped Europe beat Hitler. I think that we have almost become too critical against them, especially in Afghanistan. It is not as if they went into a peaceful paradise with their tanks. Afghanistan has known nothing but war as long as people can remember and one additional reason to go to war against the Taliban, a part from the terrorist one, is for the women. Under the Taliban rule the conditions for the women are absolutely horrendous, they have absolutely no human value, no right to work, no right to health-care, not even to make sound with their shoes against the pavement when they walk on the street. In addition to that they can be stoned to death for the mere suspicion of having been seen with a man that is not a relative or their husband. It is awful what is happening to the afghan people in the war but I honestly don't believe it used to be much better.

August 11, 2010

Even though I have been too busy, or maybe too lazy, to write anything during the summer doesn't mean that I haven't been around enjoying Zürich in some of the endless ways that it has to offer in the summer.

Cooling down with a swim in the Limmat at Ober Letten.

Another swim in the Limmat at the charming Unter Letten.

A relaxing walk in the forest on Hönggerberg with a coffee at Grünwald.

Enjoying the view over Zürich from polyterasse in from of the ETH.

Just because I have been lazy this summer doesn't mean that everyone has been. Entire Switzerland seems to be a huge "baustelle".

The Prime Tower, still under construction but just passed the limit of becoming the highest building in Switzerland.

Switzerland has always been a rather liberal country when it comes to drugs and even though the consumption is not yet legal, report after report by experts in federal commissions keep on insisting that all drug consumption should be legal. Not to encourage the consumption but to better be able to fight against the dependencies. Although the experts seem to be united on the topic the public isn't, a couple of years ago there was a vote for the legalization of cannabis that was rejected. To the big disappointment of the cannabis grower Bernard Rappaz, who until very recently was in prison for drug dealing. To protest against his punishment and to favor the legalization of cannabis Rappaz went on a thirst strike this summer and the authorities got confronted with the choice of letting him die or to force feed him. In the end they went for the second option and Rappaz could serve the rest of his punishment at home with a personal guard. Is he a hero standing up for his beliefs or is he a junkie? People are of different opinions but most people are not so happy about using their tax money to pay for him being guarded at home. Anyway, Rappaz is now comfortably at home and can start thinking about on how to reorient his business towards pharmacies, to where he can sell his weed legally for medical purposes from 2011.

Pakistan is being washed away by rains and landslides and Russia is burning due to an extreme heat. Is this another effect of the global warming caused by humans? Probably. Will it make us change? Probably not. We are indeed very resistant to changing our habits by choice even though we are constantly forced to change for adapting to a changing world. According to the famous physicist Stephen Hawkings we have less than 200 years to spread into space to save the human race. Well, throughout the history of mankind we have always believed that we are doomed in one way or the other, through the wrath of God, through the atomic bombs, through the swine flu etc. We have always been very innovative in predicting ways to our extinction. We should definitely do our best to keep our planet clean but I think that there are more urgent reasons for doing so than fear of Armageddon, such as for instance the luxury of clean air and clean oceans.

July, 2010

The beginning of July has been incredibly hot, July 14 it was 37°C. In Zürich there are currently only two options to survive the heat. Either you go swimming in the lake or the river or you hide in an air conditioned public place. The two upper pictures are from Badi Mythenquai by the lake if you chose the first option and the last two pictures are at Sihlcity where yo can go for the second option, namely afternoon cinema. Sihlcity has a really big american style cinema palace where each toilet has its own little screen showing film trailers.

I'm not sure if it is the heat that has soften my brain so much that I couldn't make myself turn on the computer or if it is the World Cup in football (soccer) that anyway made it impossible for any real news to get through. For a person who is not the slightest interested in football it was easier just to shut down all external information and just worry about how to kill Spanish slugs (or killer snails as we call them in Sweden) and whether or not the dengue fever is really coming to Europe as a consequence of the global warming.

The thing currently dominating the news is the corruption scandals in France which is rather difficult to care about unless you are actually French. It is quite peculiar to see a country where people in general are so politically engaged that the politicians are so far away from the people (the "small people" as a particularly unpopular swede would have expressed it). But on the other hand, as the French goes on strike for about anything these days, what means are left when something really happens? That was by the way the most funny thing that happened during the World Cup, not even there the French could deny their true nature and the French national team went on strike during the competition. What other team in the world could ever have come up with such an idea?