2023.06 June Jubilations

In Germany, the moment you pull out a camera in public, you hear a distant cry of an eagle, diving from hundreds of meters up high, down to snatch its prey. “Mann muss fragen! Kein photos!”  Sometimes this happens before you even turn the camera on. A lot of the time, when it’s pointed away from people. You learn about your offense from a gray-haired old man limping toward you on a stick, who may not be able to read his morning newspaper anymore, but he sure as hell remembers how to spot a glint of light reflecting off a lens three hundred meters away.

In June, however, I had the pleasure of visiting Zurich, one of the major non-participants of the great armed conflicts of last century, who took to the stage of this year’s Eurovision with a hit song, “I Don’t Want to be a Soldier.”

Jokes aside, the Swiss are an amazingly friendly bunch. Lively, adventurous, and open to being photographed. The food there is expensive as fuck, but decent—aside from the Swiss sausage—and Zurich, on my first visit, felt like a place where I could live for a while. Somehow, it has this vibe of a cool university town with lots of young people having a good time by the river, or in the many restaurants (how they can afford them, I’ve no idea) mixed with the professional atmosphere of Europe’s biggest business hubs.

Will visit again, for sure.