From a Valley Far, Far Away

Despite the fact that there is a mountain in my backyard, the Swiss consider Solothurn to be located in the "flatlands." I will never forget meeting the sister of a friend who is originally from Davos, the famous Alpine ski resort. "How long have you lived in this area?" I asked her in my perky, American, small-talky kind of way. "Oh, I moved to the flatlands about three years ago," was her breezy reply. The flatlands? Really? The village in which we live, Bellach, is already at nearly 1,500 feet elevation, and it sits at the foot of mountain chain whose highest peak easily rises another 4,000 feet heavenward.  These Jura Mountains form a stately, undulating boarder to France and stretch the entire northern length of the country, while the Alps, facing them in the south, reach up in craggy, jagged gestures to the heavens. Switzerland is a lot of things in my opinion, flat not being one of them.

Though the point, in fact, is a different one. To the outside observer, especially someone from an English-speaking country where strangers are considered "just friends you haven't met yet," the Swiss, be they from Solothurn, Aargau or Bern, are most definitely a mountain folk who have cultivated a suspicion of strangers from neighboring valleys for hundreds and hundreds of years. Coupled with this wariness is an equally engrained politeness with which they dutifully greet strangers along the streets and walkways of their villages. Teeth clenched and eyes averted, the Swiss mumble out the greeting of their choice, whether they feel like it or not. "Grüezi" is the most famous Swiss greeting, the one seen plastered on airport terminals in Zurich or Basel beneath bosomed blonds, their thick hair in braids, their tanned arms bearing bouquets of Alpine wildflowers. But indeed, "Grüezi" is seldom heard here in canton Solothurn where the more guttural "Grüessech" takes precedence. Beyond that, "Gueta Morge" is also an acceptable early-morning variation, reserved for those delicate times when the requisite muscles of the mandible are not sufficiently warmed up to produce a truly convincing "Grüessech."

As is my want, I have been going on an early-morning walk here since pretty much they day we arrived. Some mornings I walk along the foot of the mountains which takes me by grazing cows and scenic farmhouses, but my favorite walk is into the woods and straight upward for about thirty minutes. It constitutes excellent exercise for me and is probably not worth mentioning as exercise for the average Swiss person. On this walk, I tend to meet the same people over and over again. And in my overly emotive American way, I tend to greet them with a big smile and the heartiest, most convincing "grüessech" I can muster. My exertions are usually met by a stony stare, perhaps even a scowl, but always also with a grudging reply.

One afternoon this summer, six-year-old Leo and I were out riding bicycles through the village streets. Since I was trying to teach him some traffic rules, I was shouting directions at him loudly in English. When lo and behold, we ran into one of the ladies who has been scowling at me for years now on my morning walk. Hearing the English, she stopped in her tracks and looked at me in bewilderment. "You speak English?" she asked, wide-eyed. "Why yes! I am American," I called out cheerfully from beneath my bike helmet, already perhaps providing her with too much information. To my surprise, however, this intimate confession did not seem to make her too uncomfortable. Instead, I literally watched as understanding dawned on her face. "You are the one who always smiles!" she said, smiling herself for the first time ever in my presence. I laughed in reply and listened intently as she went on to tell me in halting English about a sister who lives in Canada and a recent trip there. It was as if shifting to English finally gave her permission to share something about herself with a perfect stranger, someone from a valley far, far away. Ever since then, when we meet each other at various altitudes in the woods, she smiles and we have a brief, pleasant exchange -- which to me now feels quite bizarre in its normality.  

On a recent trip home to the States, to that part of North Carolina which the locals tenderly refer to as the "foothills" but which for the Swiss would clearly be the "flatlands," I got up the morning after my arrival and went on an early walk. Jetlagged and disoriented, I wandered the expansive streets of my childhood neighborhood and marveled at the hugeness of the American sky when I came upon a Mexican man strewing some mulch in a neighbor's front yard. Only half awake and with half of my brain still back in Switzerland, I smiled broadly at him and greeted him with my heartiest "GRÜESSECH!" I can only imagine what he must have told his wife and kids that night around the dinner table: He had met a strange woman in the early morning hours-- someone from a valley far, far away.