My notes on Zurich and Switzerland

Yesterday I was at Street Parade 2006. This annual event which started in 1992 with a mere 2000 people is considered the craziest event in Zurich and now draws huge crowds. Last year was a record year with over 1 million people. Yesterday's cold weather made this number 800,000. Not bad for a city of 360,000.
Crowd was messy, music --or noise-- was techno (gross) , earth shaking sound volume was unbearable even with my earplugs. I thought this is mass lunacy. Appearantly this event is not addressing my age nor taste. But 1 million bass addicts can't be wrong I guess. Most attendants seem to be teens.
Bass was not the only addiction. I saw quite a few on grass and some reminded me extacy or similar substances.
Like many art events of our times the contribution of technology was ubiqutious and the works of sound and light engineers were impressive.
A 60 meter high ferris Wheel, with its special lightning effects fit well too.

As you would easily notice train system here is very efficient and comprehensive. SBB, railway authority, has a very good web site as well. For best train deals you should check clickandrail Switzerland. It is an e-ticket system and you must have Acrobat software and a printer to print the ticket beforehand. From time to time they are offering other good deals. For instance last winter they offered a country-wide first class day-pass for only 55CHF.
For best international train deals you should check clickandrail international. You get very good deals even if you don't have halbtax card. Travelling from Zurich to Dusseldorf on a ICE for a mere 40 CHF makes you feel good. In the past it was only towards Germany. Now Italy and Austria were also added. You can also check DB Surf&Rail to find similar internet-only deals and travel easily.
For France there is a fast TGV train between Geneva and Paris. And for Italy Cisalpino Express service is also convenient. It is a private company where SBB is a partner.

I guess the state of the rich has always been an interesting topic ( publication of the first “rich list” goes back to 1892.) as a Turkish saying goes “the wealth of the rich, makes poor man’s tongue tired (or busy)”.
The recent announcements of the wealthiest about their philanthropy initiatives attracted lots of media coverage -and some interesting statistics. So, as any statistics on the wealth related issues obviously cite Zurich, I decided to make my tongue (or keyboard) busy.
There are a lot of rich –with liquid financial assets of more than $1Million- people in the world. Swiss Unit of Merrill Lynch says there are 8.7M of them controlling a whopping $33Trillion in assets. Among them 85,000 of them are the super rich (over $30M)
185,000 of the $ millionaires are Swiss (excluding their primary house) and the top 100 of them hold CHF370Billion in assets. But the remaining part of the population must be doing well too.
According to a World Bank report Swiss people are the wealthiest in the World. (in 1928 was the 2nd ) per capita Wealth is 816,913 CHF or 648,241USD. Second richest is Denmark with 575k$. Germans’ wealth is almost 30% less with 496k$. Another study shows Zurich is the city with the highest net income.
On the other hand Mercer’s recent study claims that Zurich is now 9th most expensive city (down from 7th) trailing Geneva and far behind of Moscow..

For those of you who like to go further and read about IQ-wealth relation may read this article written by some weird guys. It claims there is a direct link.

Public transportation is perfect and certainly more convenient than driving. Unless you stay far away from the city, public transportation is better and quite often faster. ZVV is the authority and has an English website. There are detailed information about all the aspects of it so I'll just add a few things

• 3 days ZurichCard gives you a very good value and would be ideal for your guests as it covers the airport too.
• There is a running promotion for the after 9 o'clock cards
• Monthly card is really a great value (your halb-tax card is no good here). Normally the monthly card is issued to the bearer. If you personalize your card you get a small discount but if you forgot your card and caught, you later bring it (in 10 days) and just pay 5 chf instead of 80 chf fine.
• If there is an accident or whatever and your tram stops running, they announce it (in German) and within minutes dispatch a substitute bus. I came across such incidents twice and the efficiency was amazing.
• In some stops i.e. EscherWiyz Platz, the connection you see on the map may be on the bridge above and you should take the ladders. Once I was naive enough to look for it at the same level.
• Pets are allowed and if there are more than one in the car, it gets awful.
• McDonalds is offering a bike rental service. You have to supply a photo-ID and 20 chf deposit then it is free.

For electronics and household goods, Switzerland is a relatively cheap country in Europe. Probably because of lower VAT rates, you get good deals. Keep an eye on Mediamarkt’s promotions. I found the best deals there. Manor also gives radical discounts from time to time. Migros (M-electronics) deals can be noteworthy too. I bought a laptop for instance. The price was good but more importantly it came with two years of warranty.
Two big chains, interdiscount and Fust try to give an impression that everything they sell is on sale, but this is hardly the case. Dell is of course a price leader of online world.
To find really good electronics deals you should go to smaller shops or choose online shopping. For that you can check http://www.toppreise.ch/. It is a good price comparison website. However I never purchased anything from the small shops listed there yet. I am a very strong believer of e-commerce. But it obviously requires caution. For instance Teri, a user from families-in-Zurich group recently posted the following: (I replaced the name with xyz)
posted last week that the on line electronics company xyz.ch
refuses to refund my money for a digital camera that I ordered on June 14th. I have sent them numerous emails saying that i am leaving today for 6 weeks. I have said that i needed the camera that their internet site claimed was in stock at the time of ordering the last two weekends for world cup games and for my summer vacation that i am leaving for today. I have made it clear to them that i will not even be here when the camera arrives and it will be returned anyway.

xyz.ch has ignored my emails, phone calls and my money is still not back in my account.

I feel like they have stolen my money. Do consumers have no rights in this country? the law says i can return anything to an commercial establishment within 5 business days for a full refund.

What can i do? Does anyone have any advice how i can get my 450 francs back? I prepaid into their account. I will NEVER do this again for anything.

Does anyone have any advice on how i can get my money back? I would appreciate tremendously any help or insight that anyone can offer.

Teri,
A very frustrated consumer!

I think American Authors like to use something Swiss in their novels. Dan Brown is one example. In both Da Vinci code and Angels and Demons you notice that.
I just finished Grisham’s novel “the broker”. There, a walk from HB to Paradeplatz (my daily path) is depicted. I can’t say he is 100% correct but it is interesting to read your daily path in a bestseller. I would love to hear other examples.

For groceries, the near-duopoly of Migros / Coop and their high prices may be annoying so the best way would be to buy a deep freezer and stock up when you got a better deal.
They both publish thick weekly magazines with subjects of general interest and deals. Subscription is free.
There are other chains like Aldi, Denner, Carrefour, Spar. It seems Aldi offers the best prices however Swiss Aldi is still a lot more expensive than Aldi Germany. You may also check small shops run by families. -Like the neighborhood shops of Pakistanis in the UK-. They may offer good food deals on meat and fresh vegetables. I know three of them near Altstetten where I live.
Noteworthy:

• Both Migros and Coop offers loyalty cards. Neither of them is impressive. You rarely get exclusive deals for the card holders. Migros gives back a mere 1% (vouchers are sent to your address), Coop’s program is based on points and you get even less or around. In exchange, you give your entire consumer info. I wonder why a nation so keen on their privacy is so willing to share this precious information for so little. But as a marketing professional, I can only admire this astonishing success of the Migros/Coop (nowhere you can build up such a database easily) and I believe their database makes them much stronger against new entrants.
• Smaller Coop shops near business districts are more likely offer last minute deals (or Saturday deals) than bigger ones.
• They both have carry awful lot of co-branded products and Migros claims its M-Budget line is a cult among Swiss. I am not sure on that.
• Surprisingly few Coop/Migros stores accept credit cards. However as they recently released their own co-branded credit cards, this may change.
• They both are big conglomerates with many sister brands. i.e. Globus, Frey, Anna’s Best, Candida for Migros, and Import Parfumerie, Interdiscount, Betty Bossi for Coop

I coincidentally learned that Google has a full-cycle European Engineering Centre here in Zurich. I have engineering background and I always admired what Google has been doing. Their hiring schemes are very interesting. They pursue top talent and seemingly make them happy. (for an insider blog see) In the States they advertised once a complex mathematical problem and only those who solve it could enter their HR web page.
I remember a movie scene where Navy recruiters were yelling to a young crowd: “We want the best, only the best nothing but the best”. I think Google is the Navy of the Geekdom and wants the best. If you feel you are among them, Google might be offering great jobs in this great city.
a quarter century ago that would’ve been my dream job.

Last Tuesday I attended an event which took place at Hallenstadion, Zurich’s largest sports arena. There, CH-FR football game is broadcasted live. Sponsored by COOP, you had an exiting environment to watch the game, food and drink for only 5chf.
I don’t like and understand football so I was there to watch the crowd -and learn more about COOPs marketing stunt.- (Philips did an even better one in Frankfurt in Main Fan Fest. See picture)

Notes:

• With the betterment of the projection and sound technologies, watching live events in other venues will be even more popular. For me, it is even better than the real thing since I can’t see well. But a friend of mine reminded me that this spectacle watching culture is as old as Romans and any change requires a radical paradigm shift which is unlikely and watching a game on the screen is more like watching an online-game for which we don’t need a real match. We even talked about national teams of game players competing in the cyber world of FIFA2020 online-game. (He is a sound engineer and he also taught me how the experience can be boasted with sound tricks in places like Hallenstadon.)
• They are very calm. Unless there is a close shave, nobody yells, sing or swear. I think this is something to appreciate or even admire as our guys get truly crazy, but the other day I went to Mexico-Iran game and being among Mexicans was a much more pleasant experience.
• Maybe it is only me, but the alcohol consumption among young kids seemed to me frightening. I have seen many kids (looking under 15) already drunk before the game. I wonder how serious this problem is? It was also noticeable that they were smoking in no-smoking zones. It should be the rebellious nature of youth, if not the trend is terrifying.
• Football is boring, no matter what.

Using base line telephones here is not so cheap as you get in the States or in Germany nor getting a line is a snap. For the process (albeit a bit pessimistic) you can check here.
Since you’ll need a high speed internet connection anyway, if you are making long and frequent international calls, skype or similar web based technologies would suit better. I am using Skype to talk to my daughter living in Istanbul. Beside it is free, the sound quality is far better than the base lines and you can always add written texts, file downloads etc during the conversation. I found it nice as we sometimes study math together.
Switzerland is doing real good in broadband business and with 23.1 connection per 100 inhabitants, it is the 5th best wired country on OECD. Your major broadband internet options are: Bluewin, Cablecom and sunrise
I found the best broadband internet connection deal from Bluwin but it really depends on the running promotion. Two months after I bought Cablecom was the best …

This wikipedia report has detailed information on this subject.

Starbucks here offers free wireless internet option. But you have to consume something for every half hour. If you need an internet café, you have surprisingly few options. One in HB and one near Central. There used to be one in Staufacher but not anymore. And for 5chf for half an hour it is not cheap at all. I found this list for the internet cafes in Zurich but it is hardly helpful.

There are also telephone cards where you call an 800 number and talk with better terms. As usual, their prices and features change radically. For instance Flash card offers very good rates to Turkey. Call2 is famous too.

For cellular phones, there are several players. Most well known three are Swisscom, Orange and Sunrise. There are many resellers selling other operators’ product as well. Notable ones are Migros, Coop Mobilzone and Phonehouse. If you’ll be here for a short while best telephone deals are pre-paid ones. For longer terms I found Orange the best (assuming you need a new phone). However roaming charges are exorbitant. So try to get one in each country you visit frequently (if any). If you think the inevitable language barrier is something to avoid than this website can give you some relief

To rent a DVD, CityVideo has a wide collection but quite expensive. Instead, a membership to Pestalozzi library can give access to a good collection of DVDs for free. (You pay a negligible annual fee first) You can rent 3 DVDs at a time and keep them for a week. They have a big audio library too. Another nice thing, almost all the disks are full releases (i.e both have English soundtrack, subtitles and text for the hearing disabled) At CityVideo this is not the case.
On the other hand I found some DVDs (from Pestalozzi) are overused and did not work properly. A few jumps are OK but if it stops running just before the detective unearths the hidden villain, it gets nasty. No problem so far with CityVideo disks.
Barkat stores carry lots of Bollywood DVDs from India and sell them under 10 frank.
MediaMarkt last year had a very big DVD sale. You can also find good deals at InterDiscount too. For instance nowadays some good titles are on sale and go for 9.95 each

Zurich is a peculiar place in this regard. You see the listings of movie theaters everywhere. All major newspapers run those lists as well. It is the same list -and same design- everywhere and it also includes porn movies. (Another weird thing: to have child films and porn on the same list)
I found the listings at 20 Minutes' web site very good. It gives you all the details (albeit in German) . You have many options, some with parking some very centrally located. They all seem to have state of the art equipment and nice seating and they all look very American. I think this is epidemic. When I am abroad, if there is time to kill I go to movies and I have recently been to theaters in Santiago, Lisbon, Athens and they all virtually the same.
For old fashioned cinema experience, one example is a movie theater called Uto Studio at Kalkbrite (on the route of tram 2 and 3). They run good films after they are taken out from the mainstream.
And for being a "better film lover", arthouse kinos give you a good option especially if you are fed up with the holywood releases. Those theaters are small but located centrally.
There are several film events during the summer. Last year there was supposed to be one in UetliBerg but then cancelled. I was anxiously waiting for it as the night view of the city would be a great background. I am told that it is cancelled due to the pressure from environmentalist groups claiming that the late night movies hinder the comfort of animals. I could not confirm that but if it is true, wowww ! Thanks to lack of animals, this year's intereting venue is the airport. (off-topic: I heard a similar story about the summer time zone practise. Swiss did not start it for many years because the cows were having problems to adapt! I guess that needs confirmation too.)
Films are played with original soundtrack and both German and French subtitles.
I don’t know and did not hear much about Swiss Cinema. Maybe there is not much to talk about. (But as with anything else, it is also very well documented and there is even a dedicated web site and many books) I noticed three Swiss films so far. One was about a kosher practicing Jewish lady who wants to marry but finds out there are only 3 possible candidates in Zurich. And the other was about the last day of Swissair. I wish I had enough German to understand these two.
A recent survey stated Zurich as the most expensive place for the movie-goers in Europe. However, Monday is the day to go for those on budget. You pay 12 franks instead of 18.

Switzerland has a very prestigious newspaper called Neue Zürcher Zeitung NZZ. I like its English pages and recommend everybody. They also have a nice theme-based magazine called Folio. (I consider it a very serious looking version of Benetton’s Colors Magazine.) The last edition of NZZ Folio is about lunch and it reminded me to write about it.
There are quite a few restaurants catering all tastes. (So much so that as it was recently reported, in Canton Zurich there are 2600 more “food delivery enterprises” -i.e restaurants, imbisses etc- than it should.) Restaurant business has one of the highest bankruptcy rates here. I think it is understandable. Because there are only two segments. For the full fledged restaurants, the choice is abundant, and the quality is good, however a two course simple lunch with a drink may easily fetch 50 CHF. So if you seek a more affordable option, (beside Döner ladens and other junk food) Migros, Coop and Manor Restaurants come handy. Among them Migros restaurants’ daily menu (at 10 CHF) gives you the best price/performance ratio. (Especially after 1 pm when the beverages are free). However my personal choice is Manor. The problem is they all are always very crowded during the lunch time. I tend to think there is a tendency towards creating a middle segment where seating is causal and there is no waiter to serve but you can eat for instance, a decent sushi lunch for around 20.- CHF. (you may consider it an entrepreneurial tip)
You think people here are obsessed with “gesundheit”. But it seems to be paying off as they have the second longest life-expectancy rate in the world. So you easily find all sorts of “healthy” foods, salads etc. Also I am told that the oldest vegetarian restaurant is in Zurich. I ate there once and it was packed.

Yesterday I participated in an unusual city tour called “the ghost walk”. The guide, a Brit, was probably a comedy performer in theaters and used to do similar tours in York. He said “York has the highest ghost population per square meter” but Zurich did not fare bad either.
It took almost 70 minutes and I enjoyed it very much. Historical information conveyed with good British sarcasm makes this tour a nice option for the summer evenings. And for a 15CHF it is a bargain by Swiss standards. He appearently is a professional and quick enough to tailor the jokes according with the audience.
You can find this nice gentleman in black attire (and most probably with a cane protecting himself from the evil ghosts) at Paradeplatz near the fountain at 19:30 at any warm evening till autumn. (When I mentioned by blog he said please write about me but did not even mention a discount. So exact change please...)

I am a subscriber to the swapandshop yahoo group where expats living here post their messages for the things they like swap or sell. It seems the expat community of Switzerland is using IKEA very often.
It is quite affordable and the IKEA quality is well tested. There are two near Zurich and I am happy with our IKEA stuff. However IKEA charges a lot for the shipment (sometimes more than the goods bought) so you better do it yourself and arrange it beforehand.
For those seeking higher quality, the furniture shop called Möbel Phister has a near cult status here. Everybody talks about it. I bought quite a few from there and the quality is very good but I’ve yet to figure out where the fame is coming. It’s good but not as impressive as the ones you see in Milan.
The opposite end is Brocki shops selling everything used. They are often charity organizations reselling things given to them and using the proceedings to help the needy. (So it might be a good idea to give them what you don't need when you are leaving.)
I use those shops very often for the books (a real treasure hunt for me) but there are a lot of furniture as well. If you have a special talent of mix-and-match you should surely check as you can find some great designer stuff being sold rather cheap.
For a extended list of furniture shops check this
Well, I think this covers all budgets and tastes however you may obviously prefer the last alternative: Renting. They don’t quote prices in their web site but I don’t think they are addressing the price sensitive people. Knowing their existence is good though. (another option)

www.ebookers.ch is good for a broad comparison and finding the best deal. So start there.

I don't know why but if you like to rent a car from Avis, http://www.avis.com/ gives you better deals than you get from http://www.avis.ch/. Also, despite the claims to the contrary, Avis is often cheaper than Sixt.
Also of note...

• www.sixti.ch theoretically offers you a Smart car for a mere 8.- CHF per day. The practise is a bit different but worths checking.
• If you rent from an airport or the main train stations you may pay something extra. I did not try here but in Avis Germany if you pay this airport sucharge you can drop your car to any airport location in Germany with no extra charge simply by calling beforehand. I found it very convenient.
• For many years they didn't carry diesel cars here until a year ago. If you are going to ride for a long trip on highways you may prefer a diesel car as it gives you around 40% savings over benzin.
• For your kids you must have a child seat. You may rent it from the rental company easily but they charge a lot for each rental so if you are planning to rent several times you better buy yours.

Sixt offers long term rentals and you may consider it instead of purchasing a car since it comes in a complete package saving you from the maintenance hassle. They even get your vingette..

You may of course consider buying a car. Purchasing a car is easy and relatively cheap. Here you can find a very good car purchasing guide in Switzerland (in English). A few notes:

I found luxury cars surprisingly affordable. For instance a 2000 model Audi A8 can be purchased under 20k. (Minimum wage here is around 3k) This means it costs more or less the same with a similar aged A6 and I am sure it will be thoroughly maintained. I found it weird and I am told that here you are expected to drive a car in line with your social status and if you drive a car belonging to the “upper class”, it is considered snobbish. I did not find it convincing as in my apartment’s parking, you can see cars ranging from Panda to Range Rover. Nevertheless it is noticeable and I wouldn’t mind if I look snobbish while cruising on an A8 that I can afford.

Another interesting thing here is, there are too many garages selling used cars (and very few shops selling –new- furniture, opposite oddity). So you can shop around and there is 90% chance of having one such shop within walking distance from your home.

You may also check the following web sites where you can find all sorts of car. (there are at least 10 brands I have never heard of before) In these sites I didn’t see many users selling their cars directly however. It seems people prefer to buy/sell through garages, to avoid a lemon I guess. Or call it Swiss conservatism.

• http://www.autoscout.ch/
  http://www.auto24.ch
  http://www.auto-online.ch
• http://www.car4you.ch
• http://www.bluewin.carweb.ch/

A large swiss auction site, www.ricardo.ch worths checking too

For car insurance you can check this document from www.comparis.ch

There are good web sites for studying German online. BBC’s program is my favorite. About.com has an interesting list: Top 1,000 most frequently used words in German. You may check how far you have gone there.
Given its reputation, DW’s online offering seemed to be very poor to me. On the other hand they offer "glossary attached reading" which can be a great tool for glossary development.
There are quite a few online dictionaries as well. My favorite is a University of Munich project: LEO. There are other examples like interlingua and for those who have deeper interest, this link gives more than a hundred web addresses. This one is wide but does not look serious. (Even has a link titled "how to swear in German"). This one has link for online translation tools. By the way, my browser has a tool: "translate page into English". It works very well for me but I forgot how did I find it. At my home computer I just installed google's toolbar tool and set the WordTranslator into German. Now when I drag the mouse on any word its German translation pops up. I loved this feature.

Note: A friend of mine suggested me a multimedia site called Lina and Leo from Goethe Institute. I just checked it and found it nice.

Switzerland has probably the most scenic routes on earth. All the countryside looks as if manicured. There are many nice spots only accessible with cars So not enjoying this feast, especially during early spring while zillions of flowers blossoming would be a mistake.
It is said that Swiss people do not want any new highways. I did not understand whether it is an environmental concern or they already have enough. However the network is impressive. Very well charted and maintained. There are usual spots and times of congestion but in general the traffic is pretty smooth.
There is a good article about motoring in Switzerland here. I like to add a few things.

• If you are using a car with a navigator and cruising for fun, set the “avoid motorway” option, hit a mountain way and you are likely to be taken to interesting places through mountain routes. However, since it is a complex network, your navigator sometimes may take you through Italy or Austria for a shortcut so you better carry your passport. This happened to me and I had to return from the Italian border.
• Parking zones with white lines mean free unlimited parking but I have seen only two of them Zurich so far. Both in obscure places. So consider it 'paid parking' all the time.
• Parking areas are controlled all the time so don't even think of parking "for a few minutes".
• You should set the parking disk at the time you parked and not the time you'll leave. (other parking meters gives you a ticket stating the time you should leave) I learned this for 80CHF
• You must buckle up even in the parking lot too.
  Noteworthy: For good panoramic views of mountains check this, for cities check this

• This is not one of my key concerns :-) but if you are making awful lot of money, where you stay matters as you will be taxed accordingly.
• Another interesting fact is you can’t leave the house except March and September. The usual 3 months advance notice applies on top of this rule. So if you decide to leave in January you may have to wait till September. I still did not understand how this rule came up. But it is peculiar to Zurich region I guess.
• I thought families with children from the lower income groups should be suffering from high rental costs. But then I am told that the City owns many property and provides with affordable housing for the underprivileged..
• SBB, railway operator is a key player in Swiss real estate market with a portfolio worths 6 Billion. Their last project near Zurich HB has a total value of 1.5 Billion. I found it unusual.
• A rather weird thing (at least for me) here is the doors are made in a way that they can be opened from the outside. Well, it is difficult to put into words. Normally, (Like most office doors here) when you leave the home you just close the door and it is locked. Here you should lock it with your key. Similarly when you entered home you should lock it too. I forgot it the other day and I saw an intruder popping out in the living room, a 3 years old kid of our neighbors. That intrusion didn’t pose a big threat but this practice surely leaves our homes vulnerable and no local could explain me the merit of it

One of the most expensive things in Zurich is the cost of housing. Real Estate is the most capital intensive market here and the total value of real estate inventory is a mind-boggling CHF 2.6 Trillion. Though a recent study released in Business Guide puts Zurich behind NewYork, London and Paris it is still very expensive and an average 3 room unfurnished apartment costs 2,000 CHF per month.

However building quality is superb and you are likely to get a very well maintained property. In many cases you will also get a shared laundry room with washer/drier and a cellar. Kitchens are often fully equipped as well. So the houses feel wider than they really are. The top 4 real estate websites are as follows:

• http://www.immoscout.ch/
  http://www.homegate.ch/
• Immo.search.ch
• http://www.immobilien.ch/

I like immoscout’s easy mapping and better filtering while homegate gives you easier navigation. I noticed newspapers and similar resources worth checking as well. I saw a few ads which have not appeared on the internet.

If what you are looking for is a room for a few months in a family house, this would suit better.

If you need a temporary place better than a hotel room, There are residential suits appropirate for short term stays. One example.

My job does not require it as all my colleguages speak English and mine is a temporary post. But still, once you move here one of the first questions you think is obviously whether you must learn German.
Well, my answer for those who are not planning to live here for good is a cautious "no".

There are a few people in my company who worked both Geneva and Zurich and they all say in Geneva basic French is a matter of survival but here it is not so. I personally can confirm them as I did survive in the past six months easily. Even the registration process which involves the City and the Police went well as public workers seem to be comfortable in handling the process in English. There is a sizable Expat community and a large English library here as well. However learning it certainly helps a lot. But which German?

I have been to Germany many times and to my ear, the German spoken here is as different as Dutch. So some knowledge of German proper may not be immediately helpful here.

It is said that the written German is the same. I am not in a position to validate this however software companies release a different version for Swiss German and a quick look into www.autoscout.de and www.autoscout.ch reveals noticable differences. But I take it for granted.

For the spoken part, it almost amounts to two different languages. Wikipedia's detailed entry on Swiss German gives a lot of information but I found it too technical.
Most courses are for the "German" German but there are courses for the Swiss German too. If you will need it only for Switzerland you may go straight to latter option. On the other hand, the richness of German information available on the web as well as on paper impressed me a lot. If I were younger I would gladly invest my time in learning it well.

Late note on English usage here: I was at the Mark Knopfler concert the other day. He made a few jokes with his hardly articulating English and if the laughers are a clue, all the audience understood him. So again, here is not like the Netherlands where everybody seem to be trilingual, but definitely not like France either.

As you can see from the blogroll, Switzerland is an extremely well documented country. Thanks to their mature tourism industry, they have excelled in marketing everything they have. They even have an organization for national branding. (You can also check your information about Switzerland by taking this quiz.)
So instead of writing about, say, Davos, I'll try to write about parking problems there. So my hours wasted there to find a parking area will turn into a shared experience.
Similarly, English speaking communities' non-profitweb sites and a few commercial sites offer very rich information about Switzerland for those living or moving into here. A few examples:

• http://www.baselexpats.com/pn/html/index.php
  http://www.xpatxchange.ch/
  http://www.expat-expo.info/ or http://www.zurich-relocation.ch/
• There is also an English only radio station in Geneve area

however most of them seem to be addressing only British/Americans or the Europeans at best. For instance a nice web site called Comparis.ch suggests that you can replace your driver license within one year while this rule doesn’t apply to those from Turkey and Portugal (and a ton of others).
A report about the foreign population in Switzerland states that around 60% of all foreigners are from EU/EFTA countries and 40 % from the rest of the world. Including US and Japan we can say that two third of the foreign population is well covered. I will try to address the remaining one-third along with the main body. Ethno-marketing is part of my job and I notice that, that 1/3 is quite vibrant as well. They have over 100 organizations, publications and events. Of course for the first generation Turks, Albanians, Croatians and the like, English was not the most appropriate language to use but things are changing rapidly.

I have been assigned to Zurich 6 months ago and I quickly realized you need help to live better in this city. (You should read the sad tone in ETH students writings)
Locals of Switerland -including seasoned 'guest workers'- think that they have a "system" and they are happy with it. Paying huge sums for a few simple drinks then going miles to enjoy a 10% discount don't bother them. So it is advised to learn and adapt to it. (I must admit, I like the "system" today more then I did in early days, it works)

Here I'll try to share what I learned. I should say, claiming Zurich has the highest living standards in the World is possible, as it is a wonderful city, but this joy comes at a price. Also, as Mercer points out quality of life is different than quality of living and the former is up to you.

I am Turkish and English is not my native language. But at Paradeplatz, where I work, I hear English more often than any other language. So I opted to use "the most common language of the web" for this blog.

Lets see..