A home in Switzerland

I was told, finding a job in Zurich is easier than finding a place to live. And it´s true! I was really lucky to find someone who was willing to give me a place in a shared flat without inviting me for an audition first. It´s a place to live until the end of the month, but it´s a good start. The last few days I spent looking for a place to live for next month and at first wasn't very lucky with this. I don't like this strange habit in large cities of letting prospective flatmates audition for a place and compete against each other. I doubt that you can get to know a person in one evening and besides, it´s not like you're living together forever. It´s only a few months!



Prices for a room in a shared flat range from around 400 to 1000 Swiss Francs. That´s about £230 to £590 per month for a small room that´s usually about a 20 minute tram ride from the centre. Of course there are more expensive ones and ones that are even farther from the city as well. Rooms in Zurich are so expensive that quite a few people sublet them when they're on holiday for a week or two. I wouldn't be comfortable with the idea of living in someones room for a few months, when they leave all their personal stuff behind. Isn't that taking exchange a bit to literally? I mean it´s not wife swap or something. I don't want to live someone else´s life for a while (do I get their friends and jobs too?). What also cracks me up is the emphasis on "wooden floors". It'll cost you a fortune and is in the middle of nowhere but it has wooden floors! I don't care if the floor is wooden, carpet, lino or concrete! Besides, they almost all have wooden floors, it´s not like this would sell it to me.



Rant over, I am a lucky bastard not only once, but twice. When I went to the office of the association which is managing the place I'm staying in for this month, to sign my contract, I asked if there were any other rooms available from next month. At first I got the same answer that I got when I asked them in an email before: Everything is booked out two months in advance. But then the lady suddenly remembered a room that she had previously missed. It´s a 14 square metre furnished student bedroom for 340 Francs, available from the 1st of March. It matches the description of my current room exactly and it´s at the same address—just one floor up. "I would take it if I were you" she said and so I did. I'm very lucky to get a room that cheap. It´s not what I dreamed of, but I was in doubt that I'd get a romantic little timber house in the mountains with a cow outside that wears a bell around it´s neck waiting to give me milk for my muesli anyway.



This one is a 20 minute tram ride from the centre, it´s by the lake, it´s warm and quiet. The room and desk are huge, it´s got a modern kitchen with a touch control ceramic hob, lots of storage space. No romantic wooden blinds but outside shutters that lock out light completely. The only downside for me is that it´s shared between 12 people but on the other hand, the Swiss are rather clean. The flat upstairs is supposed to be cleaner than the one I'm living in until the end of the month but this one is actually not anywhere near as dirty as the average English student flat.

On the plus side, I'll have an easier moving day and I can delete the numerous 'flat-sharing in Zurich' feeds and enjoy the week without flat hunting and settle in before uni starts next week. Oh, my address until March will be:

Pascal Raabe
Tannenrauchstrasse 35
bei Karipidis / BK 210
8038 Zürich
Switzerland

From March then you can send me postcards and love letters to

Pascal Raabe
Tannenrauchstrasse 35 / BK 305
8038 Zürich
Switzerland

If you wish to call me, my mobile number in Switzerland is

+41788546934