The assumption is that you have already received an offer letter for internship in Switzerland :P
All facts mentioned are of the period when I went to intern. They might have changed. So here goes.
The major Swiss Universities are EPFL and ETH Zurich for IIT students.
If you plan early enough, you can actually manage to get Swiss Air return tickets as the cheapest options.
There is a flight daily from Mumbai to Zurich. From Zurich, it is best to take a train to your destination city. I made the mistake of taking a flight from Zurich to Geneva and then a train to Lausanne.
The trains in Switzerland are run by SBB. The first thing to do after getting your luggage from the airport is to buy a SBB Half fare card. Valid for a year, it reduces all your tickets to half the price. If you are going to do even the slight amount of traveling, you will recover its cost very very soon. Trust me on this one. And if you are even a little adventurous and an evening traveler, the Track 7 card will prove to be really useful too. I highly recommend it. To buy these at the station, you have to ask at a CFF (railway) desk. Keep your Swiss address and passport pictures handy along with cash.
Find all the information you need on SBB site. You are going to be seeing a lot of this website.
Local Transport in Lausanne
Buying a monthly pass for 41 francs is advisable. It covers both metro and buses. You can get that made from the SBB counter at EPFL or at Lausanne Flon. Otherwise, each normal journey costs 2 francs with half fare card.
Luckily, I was picked up from railway station on my first day. Otherwise, normally there is some problem to manage all that luggage and finding your way about in the a new country.
Staying
Among the 6 student accommodations, Bourdonnette (where I stayed), part of Cedres and Ochettes have apartment systems. Rhodanie and Falaises are more like a dorm. All of them have some advantages and disadvantages. Bourdonnette worked really really well for me.
Your first 10-15 days might be cold. So take some warm clothes. Especially, if you are not from North India and used to some amount of cold. If possible, take something for the night. Bedsheets, pillows and all are not included in your room rent. Though you can take them from your house manager for around 50 francs which is not so bad.
If you are not staying in an apartment, do take cooking utensils and food from India else you might have to buy there and that is not cheap.
Take atleast 500 francs from India for your initial expenditure including Half fare card.
Shopping and Food
All shopping is done at Migros and Denner supermarkets. Migros is the cheapest. Denner is cheaper for some things. The most important thing: Migros doesn't have Alcohol and cigarettes. Denner \m/
Shops in Switzerland usually close at 6:30 or 7 pm. Even earlier on Saturday and on Sunday everything is closed. Migros at Ouchy is an exception.
There are also Indian shops close to Avenue de France and one under Lausanne station.
Do take health insurance from India with large remuneration. Around 100 000 USD upwards.
Post questions in comments.
More travel and living advice later. Have fun in Europe.
Showing posts with label Switzerland. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Switzerland. Show all posts
Monday, October 26, 2009
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
First party and police encounter in Europe
For the sake of holding my word, I shall not use the real names of other interns. Of course, it gives me creative freedom to come up with names.
Petrifinna Disturbson (from now on mentioned as PD)- not known for his oral skills unlike some similar sounding female artist in the opposite corner of the world - and I had been 3 days in Switzerland. The first three days had been a myriad of emotions ranging from awe, joy, delight, surprise, hope and excitement. We had been staying in a youth hostel till the time we could move into our student accommodation. It was really something to stay there.
Happenings ranged from hitting with my broken french on a runaway French girl who couldn't speak English while PD watched (we bumped into her boyfriend soon enough :( ) to gorging on the breakfast included in our stay to walking along the incredibly beautiful lake Geneva which makes you think that paradise is here to meeting this gang of high school kids and see the really hot make-shift photo-shoot in the hostel lounge by the girls there to meeting this guy who had been walking around Europe for a couple of years.
So the third day, PD and I say goodbye and are dropped to our respective student hostels. PD's Spanish roommate told us that there's a party there tonight. A surge of excitement rushed through us, after all, who doesn't imagine himself/herself in an European student party.
Afterward, I met my flatmates and it turned out that Guillem, from Barcelona was a real party guy and we decided to go out and have fun. There is beer, music and not-so-great-girls but everyone is having a great time. PD sees that everyone around is drinking and decides that now is the time for him to jump into the world of beer drinkers. Full of resolve, he goes and gets himself a can and says - 'kabhi na kabhi to peena hi tha'. After initial sip, he has a characteristic emotion on his face that shows that he is being made to drink some evil potion. After that, PD does not say a word in rest of the party.
At around 12, we decide to head out to the city center. PD is not with us as he doesn't have a bicycle. Last minute hurrying, catching the last metro and dragging our bikes into it leave us all a little out of breath. The disc in the city center is my first in Europe and it is pure fun. 3-4 beers down doesn't hurt as well.
Guillem and I decide to leave back by our bicycles around 3AM. It is all downhill up to our apartment and a chilly breeze is blowing. Riding down the slope, with cool wind blowing across you and cans of beer inside you at 3AM in Switzerland after just 3 days in Europe is a feeling that I cannot even begin to describe. And just then across the corner, there's a police car and police stops us at the traffic signal. The feeling that I mentioned earlier just evaporated on the spot.
He starts to speak in French. Guillem understands French perfectly and I a little bit but we decided to play it dumb. We both were like sorry, we don't speak French, do you speak English. Turns out that he could. FML.
We didn't have lights on our bicycle at night. I was like, aaj jail me bhi baithna padega kya!! But, thankfully, he didn't take breath analyzer test. Told us to go by the pavement and carry bicycle lights in the future (which we never did).
Both of us had a laugh about it after coming back. And so went my first party.
Petrifinna Disturbson (from now on mentioned as PD)- not known for his oral skills unlike some similar sounding female artist in the opposite corner of the world - and I had been 3 days in Switzerland. The first three days had been a myriad of emotions ranging from awe, joy, delight, surprise, hope and excitement. We had been staying in a youth hostel till the time we could move into our student accommodation. It was really something to stay there.
Happenings ranged from hitting with my broken french on a runaway French girl who couldn't speak English while PD watched (we bumped into her boyfriend soon enough :( ) to gorging on the breakfast included in our stay to walking along the incredibly beautiful lake Geneva which makes you think that paradise is here to meeting this gang of high school kids and see the really hot make-shift photo-shoot in the hostel lounge by the girls there to meeting this guy who had been walking around Europe for a couple of years.
So the third day, PD and I say goodbye and are dropped to our respective student hostels. PD's Spanish roommate told us that there's a party there tonight. A surge of excitement rushed through us, after all, who doesn't imagine himself/herself in an European student party.
Afterward, I met my flatmates and it turned out that Guillem, from Barcelona was a real party guy and we decided to go out and have fun. There is beer, music and not-so-great-girls but everyone is having a great time. PD sees that everyone around is drinking and decides that now is the time for him to jump into the world of beer drinkers. Full of resolve, he goes and gets himself a can and says - 'kabhi na kabhi to peena hi tha'. After initial sip, he has a characteristic emotion on his face that shows that he is being made to drink some evil potion. After that, PD does not say a word in rest of the party.
At around 12, we decide to head out to the city center. PD is not with us as he doesn't have a bicycle. Last minute hurrying, catching the last metro and dragging our bikes into it leave us all a little out of breath. The disc in the city center is my first in Europe and it is pure fun. 3-4 beers down doesn't hurt as well.
Guillem and I decide to leave back by our bicycles around 3AM. It is all downhill up to our apartment and a chilly breeze is blowing. Riding down the slope, with cool wind blowing across you and cans of beer inside you at 3AM in Switzerland after just 3 days in Europe is a feeling that I cannot even begin to describe. And just then across the corner, there's a police car and police stops us at the traffic signal. The feeling that I mentioned earlier just evaporated on the spot.
He starts to speak in French. Guillem understands French perfectly and I a little bit but we decided to play it dumb. We both were like sorry, we don't speak French, do you speak English. Turns out that he could. FML.
We didn't have lights on our bicycle at night. I was like, aaj jail me bhi baithna padega kya!! But, thankfully, he didn't take breath analyzer test. Told us to go by the pavement and carry bicycle lights in the future (which we never did).
Both of us had a laugh about it after coming back. And so went my first party.
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