Arrived at SBB train at Zürich Hauptbahnhof HB Main station by around 2PM. The first thing I thought was, wow! Such a big train station, Zurich HB Main's probably the biggest and busiest station I have ever been. When I have collected myself, and paid attention to my grumbling tummy, I remembered I needed some cash. I queued to exchange some USD to Swiss Francs, but it's also possible to use Euro's when in Switzerland. I'm glad that one of my Chinese colleague - Jacky whom I have met in Jakarta is en route to Zurich today, so I'll be glad to see the city with someone to take my photo but..I have to deal with the luggage first!
welcome to the land of many C's, clocks, cheese and chocolates!
Accuweather seemed accurate.
Look Lockers
My prayers was heard in a instant when I went up , in fact the entire floor was full of lockers for rent! Superrrr! I made a quick detour to the restroom and paid CHF1.00, that's Php50 ha (for every restroom needs). Back in Manila donation lang pwede na talking to myself. Is there such thing as free here?? I rented the large lockbox to fit my quite big luggage for CHF 9, so finally! For price reference:
Lockbox small (W25/H40/D75) CHF 6 /24 h
Lockbox large (W50/H60/D90) CHF 9 /24 h
See you later luggage!
CH ( Like IKR )
It's quite easy to remember Switzerland's flag. After all, I see this very often in Swiss brands like Wenger,Swatch, Victorinox, Rolex, Tissot, Sultzer etc. Imagine a red square with white flag. Don't mistake it over the Red cross logo and why not - Red Cross founder Jean Henri Dunant's birthplace is Switzerland! Here's what I found from Expatica.
Swiss Canton
Switzerland has 26 cantons which are the federal states of the Swiss confederation. Canton (and not pancit canton, sorry can't help it) is a French word for "political territory" which translates corner, edge..IKR, exactly what our "kanto" meant. The canton of Geneva comprises just one city; the canton of Uri is entirely mountains and valleys; the population of the Zurich canton is over one million, and Zurich itself is just over 300,000. Switzerland is also known as Confederatio Helvetica – which explains its abbreviation CH.
World's Happiest!
CH is one of the world's best places to be born, live and be happy. It was ranked the world's happiest country in 2015, and came second in 2016 (after Denmark) out of 156 countries. According to the Economist Intelligence Unit's (EIU) latest Where to be Born Index (2013), Switzerland was the best country to be born. I also read that Coca-Cola's logo is "by accident" Swiss-inspired with its red cross overlapping forming like that of the Swiss-flag and so thus the tagline - Open happiness.
Oh Sundays be like
It is very interesting to know that Sundays in Switzerland are protected by a long list of social laws – making it illegal to undertake activities such as mowing, hanging out laundry, washing your car or recycling bottles to ensure peace and beauty is maintained. Oh. A peaceful night's sleep is also guaranteed by the Building Laws prohibiting noisy actions after 10pm including peeing standing up, slamming a car door, flushing a toilet or emptying a bath. Ridiculous eh? I remembered also driving Nik when he was in Manila and he was quite surprised that despite all those traffic and crazy drivers, he rarely heard one car honked to another. He thinks Filipino drivers were courteous in a way (uh.uh.) Back in Switzerland, if ever the need to change lane despite putting your signal on you'd get all cars around honking at you and those dirty looks.
First wave: The birthplace of instant coffee
Switzerland was the origin of instant coffee. Nescafe was created by Nestlé in 1938. The Nestlé Company, started by Swiss businessman Henri Nestlé in 1867, buys almost 10 percent of the world’s coffee and cacao bean crops annually. Switzerland is also widely recognised as an international research center, with the private and public sector strongly promoting science and technology.
Le tsokolat
The Swiss eat more chocolate than any other nation in the world! Now that explains why they're happy. Chocolate is a major Swiss export; with 18 Swiss chocolate companies, Switzerland exported almost 115,500 tonnes of chocolate in 2015. They have also invented techniques like conching and tempering to perfect the art of chocolate making.
By 3PM finally saw Jacky after our garbled conversation on the phone "I can't find BK" which translates as where-the-hell-is-it. He was his usual happy- quiet self. We found out later that Burger King is in every corner of the station! Ok, now we know. We confirmed that next avail trip to Uzwil is 630PM. Good. we still have time to relax a bit, and enjoy Zurich.
So shall we?
itsmelory (^.^)
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