You know you're Swiss IF...
1. you complain if your bus/train/tram is more than 5 minutes late. Make that 1 minute
2. you've ever been confused with a Swede
3. you laugh when Americans believe that Swiss Miss is a Swiss product, but then have no clue that Nestlé and Rolex ARE
4. you get frustrated if you go grocery shopping abroad and there aren't at least 10 different kinds of chocolate and 15 kinds of cheese available
5. you have learned three to four languages and think this is completely normal
6. you have ever been asked - upon stating your nationality - whether you live in the mountains and whether you can yodel (mhm...I think I can answer that one with YES)
7. you can pronounce "Chuchichäschtli" and you know what it means
8. you have ever been asked who the president of Switzerland is and then failed miserably trying to explain why you've lost track (Aha..here we go, im am completely NOT a stupid swiss person, you lots juat didnt believe my explanation)
9. you know what "Röschti" are and you have crossed the "Röschtigrabe" at some point
10. you went to a state-funded ski camp every year with your classmates in high school (The coolest ever, english kids are soooo deprived)
11. to you, skis are like the extensions of your feet, because you've skied since you could walk
12. you are amused when people ask you what language is spoken in your home country and/or you have to explain that "Swiss" is not a language, that there are four national languages and none of them is called "Swiss"!
13. you owned a Swatch growing up... or still do
14. you've ever seen "Sandmännchen" dubbed into Romansch (Romansch is a language that doesnt really exist anymore...how cool is it to have a language that doesnt exist anymore???)
15. as a female, you give all your friends three kisses on the cheeks as a greeting (yes, we are a kiss loving nation...and we give real hugs, not polite ones)
16. you love Migros and you swear that some of their products are better than anything you've ever seen elsewhere
17. you've ever been asked by your non-Swiss friends to intervene in a fight and used "hey, I'm Swiss" as an excuse not to
18. your country has six different public television channels in three different languages - and you don't think this is unusual
19. you get amused when you see Swiss German people being subtitled on German television
20. you firmly believe it is more important to do things accurately than to do them quickly
21. you were legally allowed to drink beer and wine at the age of sixteen
22. you walked to kindergarten without supervision, wearing a large orange triangle around your neck
23. you think it's normal that everyone has a bunker underneath their house, or is registered for one of the public bunkers under the school building, for emergency situations... by the way, here's a fun thing to do: invite over some of your foreign friends (Americans make very good candidates) and take a picture of the look on their face when they SEE the bunker. Priceless!
24. when being asked to explain how certain things work in your country, you have to use the phrase "it differs for each canton, so..."
25. you are asked to vote on a "Referendum" or "Initiative" at least 3 or 4 times a year
26. you are used to drinking from any public fountain in the street unless there is a warning sign that says "no drinking water" (I tried that once in Brazil...urg!)
27. you grew up believing all cows must wear bells
28. you think that driving somewhere for four hours is a hell of a long time
29. you get slightly irritated or at least confused if your foreign visitors ask to see a chocolate factory
30. you know what Betty Bossi books and products are and have bought one
31. you know someone that collects the tin foil lids from coffee cream tubs
32. you don't see where the problem is when every male citizen who has been to the army has an assault rifle under his bed
33. you have to pay twice the price for museum entries because you're not a citizen of the EU, although you live in Europe!
34. you are in a non-European country and can hear people talking Swiss German and just go up and strike up a conversation with a complete stranger
35. no matter how much of a "bad-ass" you think you are, you will still pick up your candy wrapper off the floor if an old lady asks you too
36. you think everything is cheap abroad compared to Swiss prices!
7 comments:
Lol, that was funny. But I can't believe that Swiss people don't know who the president is...
Surely that can't be possible ;)
(Seriously, they don't)
And I don't think the 60,000 Romansch speakers would agree with you that it's dead...
Point 22...
What's that about?!
Its like an orange triangle you hang around your neck when your little, it refelects the light of cars etc so it glows when its darkish weather...it comes down to your tummie in a V shape...its complicated to explain, I think I have to take you hoem to show you :-D
My comment didn't get posted!
I tried not to be offensive!
Honestly, I didnt see your comment... I usualy get an E-Mail when someone comments, I didnt for that! And with dead I mean you cant learn it; theres is no school that teaches it or something, there isnt really a grammatical structure to it an even in the most remote villages where still everyone speaks rumantsch they have to speak one of the "official" swiss languages in school...All our main signgs are 3 lingual (italien, french and german), but no longer rumantsch...so maybe dead was an exageration, but its more dying (diying? Diyng? aaaarrrrrrrgh!) than living.
I didn't mean the orange triangle bit (as odd as that sounds...) I mean the bit about small children being allowed to walk to school by themselves! Lol...
Oh Katie, you ll have to come to switzerland with me...its a country where small childern CAN go to Kindergarten on their own...trust me, been there done that :-D They you ll always go to a kindergarten very close to where you live and the kids go in little groups (all the neighbour kids go together)and your parents walk you there the first day, explaining where to be careful etc. and then you just go on your own...I find it just as odd that kids in england who live next door to school need someone to bring them and pick them up and if you dont do it your a bad parent.
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