Today we took a ride around the surroundings of the town of Zug, Switzerland. It's stunningly beautiful; the mountains are completely green, which is generally a rarity worldwide. Usually, grass is dry and scorched by the sun. Here, though, the landscapes really are straight out of a fairytale. Although after Italy I've already gotten used to it, so it doesn't blow my mind quite as much.
The standard of living here is so astronomically high that it's really hard to believe it's real life. If you make 3,000 euros, you can barely scrape by. A normal salary is more like five or six thousand, and plenty of people pull in even more. All the cars are brand new—and not just basic models either, but fully loaded trims. Just a single grilled sausage costs 8 euros. Here, even the bikes used for beer runs are Specialized, complete with a carbon fork. It’s absurd, because back home only a well-off person can afford a bike like that at all, whereas here it’s just for booze trips.
Today was sort of a City Day celebration, or something along those lines. There were tons and tons of people, even though the little town only has a population of about twenty thousand. The rules feel weird to us, which is normal for Switzerland. For instance, at one place you weren't allowed to buy food if there was nowhere to sit. The Swiss love order and planning more than anything else in the world, and it shows. For example, a trash can comes right out of the box with a separate compartment for compost, and the dishwasher has a supply hose for feeding in detergent. Trash sorting is practically a religion here—by glass color, plastic type, and so on and so forth.
Houses are built in terraces so that there's a good view of the mountains or the lake from everywhere. Pedestrians give a thank-you wave when they're let through, even though they get let through almost every single time.
It's really strange, but people smoke a lot here; cigarettes are sold openly everywhere—colorful and appealing—rather than being hidden away and plastered with diseases on the packs like everywhere else nowadays.
I’m staying in a big apartment with a huge balcony, a wonderful shower, and window blinds with a little motor. If it weren't for my friends, I couldn't come anywhere close to affording such beauty and luxury. A huge thank-you to them for their hospitality.
Tomorrow we’re paragliding down from the top of a mountain. I'm crapping myself a bit, but it's too late to back out now. There are six of us lunatics, just like bullets in a revolver's cylinder. I hope this doesn't turn into Russian roulette.