Spring has sprung

Zurich, Switzerland - Spring has mostly arrived. This week was warm (mostly 15-20 Celsius) and sunny. I say "mostly" because winter is not going out quietly: next week, the forecast predicts snow. But generally speaking, the temperatures are up, the sun is out, and the flowers are blooming.

People in the streets

The spring weather has brought people out of their cramped apartments and onto the streets. Literally. Regular readers may recall from a post I wrote about a year ago that our neighborhood is famous for the cherry blossoms. This draws in a number of blossom-gawkers, some of whom position themselves in the middle of the street in various poses while confused drivers try to navigate there way around them. Today, we saw two girls set up a tripod in a crosswalk and then sit (not stand) in the middle of the street while the phone took photographs. This was not appreciated by the passing Swiss drivers, one of whom even had the temerity to lightly tap his horn (scandal!).

The local platz, Idaplatz, is now regularly populated by young and old alike. Kids are dashing around the paved sidewalk perimeter on scooters while adults huddle around the fountain snacking on charcuterie and drinking Feldschlösschen, occasionally smoking and playing bocce. Few are masked and likely none are vaccinated.

Flowers for Easter

In Zurich, the Reformed Church fills some of the fountains in the old town with roses around Easter in order to inspire hope. It's a lovely sentiment and the flowers and fountains are indeed beautiful, though these days my hopefulness is more or less tied to the pace of vaccinations in Switzerland (which is rather slow). Hannah and I took a run through the old town and made gratuitous use of portrait mode in the process of documenting this for you. You're welcome.

Melchsee-Frutt

Hannah and I got in one last snowshoeing hurrah last weekend. Or we intended to. I forgot my boots and only brought my running sneakers and so we were relegated to a winter hike on paths that were groomed by tractors.

Regardless, it was lovely. We visited Melchsee-Frutt, a mountain resort village at 2,255 meters that is only accessible via gondola. It is known for its skiing, ice fishing, and climbing. The day was bright and sunny and this was lovely except that it left Hannah with a sunburn along the edge of her scalp. Of course, this burn prompted about 24 hours of distress in which Hannah made numerous trips to the bathroom mirror to make increasingly obsessive and neurotic examinations of her hairline. She's fine.

Racism in Switzerland

Politically, our first year here was one of utter embarrassment. As Americans, we felt a persistent shame about the racist buffoon who sat in the White House. More recently, Switzerland has shown some of its own prejudice. By a narrow majority, the country voted to ban the wearing of a burqa or niqab in public, approximately 10 years after it banned the building of minarets. I should highlight here that I did not pay close attention to this referendum and I certainly did not follow the discussion of it in the local Swiss press. I'm sure there were nuances that I do not entirely appreciate. Also, it's worth noting that this type of law is not unique to Switzerland (France, Belgium and Austria have similar laws).

Supporters of the ban appear to have argued that it was necessary for two reasons. First, to protect women from oppression. According to the University of Lucerne, there are approximately 20-40 women in Switzerland (total) that wear the niqab and none who wear the burqa. Of those, it's unclear how many are wearing it involuntarily. Secondly, supporters said the ban would help to to stop violent street protesters and football hooligans, who sometimes wear masks (the ban was not worded to exclusively target burqas and niqabs). Face coverings at protests and sport events are already banned in 15 of Switzerland’s 26 cantons.

I don't doubt that many people were motivated by these considerations. However, to the casual observer, the advertisements posted around Switzerland seemed to have little to do with either of these issues but appear rather more concerned with the encroachment of dangerous Muslims in Swiss society. Below is one such advertisement ("Stop Extremism").

Both the burqa ban and the minaret ban were launched by the Egerkingen Committee, which has links to Switzerland's rightwing people's party. I thought it would be worth highlighting some of the other campaign advertisements from the Swiss People's Party and the way they have depicted foreigners. You might see a pattern, since they're not exactly subtle.