I'm from Daytona Beach. I thought I could handle bikers. No sir, I cannot. The "bikers" here (and I use that term loosely) are ridiculous! Without fail when we are stopped at a red light bikers will weave in between cars until they are at the front of the line in a "new lane" they just created. The biker gangs back home obey more rules of the road than these wanna-be's here. They are maniacs, and one day I will see a terrible accident involving a motorcycle and a driver that has had enough and just hits the biker. There is a thing called kharma.
2. Electrical outlets.
Moving here I knew electrical outlets would be an issue. What I didn't realize was you don't just need a converter for our US products. Example: We bought a toaster at a store called Conforama in Siwtzerland. Upon arriving home I feverishly opened my new toaster ready to toast to my little hearts delight. Nto quite. We bought the product in Swizterland, we live in France. Even though I can get to Switzerland in 10 minutes, I cannot plug my Swiss toaster in without a converter. I still haven't had toast.
3. The weakness of the US Dollar
This week we read an article on CNN that kicked us in the stomach. Geneva is the 4th most expensive city for expatriots that live in Europe but earn US Dollars. Everything is expensive here, and the euro is kicking the dollars ass. Geneva, which uses swiss-franc as currency, is full of investment bankers and people who don't care if dinner is equivalent to $30 per person. Back home Ronny and I would have a date night at Chili's or somewhere every 10 days or so. There is no analogue of Chili's here...we are literally picking one restaurant over another because of a $3 difference in prices.
4. The price of gas
Gas here is purchased by the liter. In Geneva at the BP station gas is 1.57 CHF per liter. There is so much math involved (that Ronny does because I need paper to do the math and he does it in his head) in trying to convert CHF to Dollars and then liters to gallons. When all is said and done, gas is about $6.00 per gallon or more.
5. Drying Clothes
This is something that mainly bothers me because I do most of the laundry. There is no way we will ever get caught up on laundry because it takes two days (if the weather is bad) for clothes to dry. We don't have a clothes line, we have clothes racks. It doesn't work that well. You can only do one load a day, and the washing machine is very small. I now know why Europeans iron everything. It helps ensure clothes are dry. Turn off the steam feature and you have a drying machine! A clothes dryer is something I really miss.
I've always been blown away by the price of gas in Europe; I remember it being a little confusing because at first I thought it was surprisingly reasonable until I realized that the price was per liter and you had to multiply it by a factor of 4.
ReplyDeleteThe flip side of the coin is that I think public transportation is generally better, though it sounds like the bus to you isn't entirely convenient, but when we were there we would often take the train if we went to visit anywhere nearby. Also, I think many French people walk to the stores to do all their grocery shopping but I don't know i that's possible for you.