Beautiful Bern

Wednesday, July 18, 2006

The smell of salt water fills the air together with the sound of rushing water where I sit aside the breakwater for the Aare River below Bern. The Aare, rising in the Bernese Alps and fed by several glaciers, is the longest river contained entirely in Switzerland. It immerges from the dam-impounded Grimmel lake and weaves its way northward through the country until it joins the Rhine river near Waldshut Germany. Here, below Bern, it is a beautiful blue-green color. Locals and tourists alike swim and raft down the section of the river that precedes the breakwater. From my perch I can see the Cathedral high above to the right and Parliament to the left.

I have been discovering long forgotten memories of my little girl self as I have walked the streets and hills of Switzerland, filling me all over again with a child-like love for this fairy tale land

Bern, the capital of Switzerland, is a beautiful city. The shopping areas near the train station are bustling with people and trams. As you pass the Prison Tower, the city-pace slows a bit until you pass the Clock Tower where it becomes a pleasant tourist meander. Flags representing the 27 cantons (states) of Switzerland line the street, extending from the limestone green buildings that are accented by beautiful window boxes filled with red and pink flowers. The city has a playful fairy-tale like quality with fountains every block or so adorned with statues depicting legendary and fairy tale figures. The Pied Piper, a favorite from my childhood, plays an eternal song before the Prison Tower. A bear masked in what appears to be a hockey mask (called Zahringen), guards the entrance to the Clock Tower from the other direction. Lady Justice stands with her scales in perpetual balance at the end of the long fairy tale like road. The most entertaining statue is the mean, ferocious ogre captured by the sculptor in the act of eating a small child. The child’s head is almost completely inside the ogre’s mouth as the ogre prepares to bite it off. Other children captured by the ogre surround his body, faces frozen in terror for they know they are next. Can’t you hear the mothers of long ago now? “If you don’t behave, that ogre is going to eat you too!”

The statues are bright and colorful bringing to mind the pictures of fairy-tale books read long ago. While the Germans may have written most of our fairy-tales I think the Swiss must have illustrated them. Even the Swiss passport is a child’s delight, filled with frolicking colorful pages and color-book pictures of the same heroes and heroines of the legends and fairy-tales from days gone by.

Unlike the majority of European cities, Bern has suffered neither war nor fire damage since the 1400’s. It is beautifully preserved. The buildings were made of limestone and are a charming shade of green –somewhere between a pastel baby green and a light army green. It doesn’t sound pretty, but it is quite lovely with its many nuanced shades, especially with the accenting flower boxes scattered here and there from windows and balconies. Limestone is an unusually soft stone. Unlike the roughly cut stone that gives Italian towns that rustic, lovingly worn look, this stone is cut with clean flat edges, giving the buildings a pristine look worthy of the Swiss reputation for fastidiousness.

You don’t need to read a tourist book to know that the bear is the symbol of Bern. There are bears everywhere – they adorn the statues, the buildings, the towers, rings in the jewelry stores, tourist bags, t-shirts, and postcards. The Bern canton flag boasts a bear as well. If thousands of inanimate bears aren’t enough, you can find live ones at the bear pit across the river at the end of the old town. They are the laziest bears I have ever seen. Sitting on their back ends, they place their paws together in prayer for a peanut. Any peanut that comes in the vicinity of their head they catch with a slow roll of the head in one direction or the other. Any peanut that can’t be easily caught with a minimum of movement, they can’t be bothered with. There is even a bear watching me now as I type. No not a live one, though the statue that stands in the midst of the rushing breakwater is certainly life sized!

The path to reach the breakwater runs from the bear pits down alongside the river and is desolate except the random picnicking family or lone swimmer. There are benches everywhere for a little rest looking out over the water from beneath a canopy of trees and dappled sunlight. It is amazing to find such a peaceful, solitary, still place this close to the city center. Eventually the trail comes to an opening with a handful of restaurants looking out over the breakwater, many boasting lounge chairs and young girls decked in long white aprons to bring the cocktail of your choice. I can’t afford to breathe in Switzerland much less drink a cocktail so I settled on the free, yet still cushioned, bench to write - though now I must continue on…

Four hours later I am settled at a little café clicking away at the keyboard once again. When I left my riverside spot I scaled the 45+ degree slope back up to the city to see the Parliament building in its full splendor. Unfortunately they are in the midst of renovation so I couldn’t get a very good view though it must be astonishing without all the scaffolding around it. Normally it is open to the public and any joe schmoe is welcome to listen in on the deliberation. I sat awhile and watched the children (and even parents) playing in the randomly shooting water fountains that have replaced the ugly parking lot that was once an eyesore. Now it is not only a lovely plaza, but one filled with the delighted cries and laughter of children. What a wonderful incentive for the lawmakers! Watching the ‘future’ playing endlessly in the square below their hallowed halls.

Switzerland has a federal system similar to ours in the US. Some matters are decided at the national level while most are decided at the canton (or state) level. The rest are made at either the regional (similar to our counties) or the city level. What is different, and rather smart I think, is that rather than the people electing a President to head the executive branch, the 200 or so canton representatives, who are elected by the people, elect seven members every four years to act together as the head of the executive branch. Each year, one member is named President, but more in the sense of a head of a committee rather than the primary source of power. Interestingly, these seven members, as well as the other representatives, conduct themselves as mere citizens. They take coffee or have lunch at cafes near the Parliament without any fuss or fanfare. No secret service agents. No elitism. Members walk to work down the streets of Bern like every other citizen, greeting people they know with a smile and a nod.

What I did not know – and am probably the only one who didn’t – is Switzerland is not a part of the European Union. They are truly an island – surrounded on all sides by members of the Union. The people I spoke to believe they will join one day but not until it is undoubtedly in the absolute prime interest of the Swiss people. As a people they differ dramatically. The country has four official languages – French, German, Italian, and Romansche (a little spoken dialect that survived from the old Roman outposts generally left untouched by time) and, I’d say, four official color schemes with what seems to be equal numbers of blondes, brunettes, and black haired people with a sprinkling of Irish red. I’ve never seen so many blondes, some with blue eyes so light you can’t help but stare. Even though the languages and skin tones are different, there seems to be something identifiably Swiss about many of them – perhaps it is the long, thin, often downward drawn faces; perhaps the somewhat timid, yet wanting to appease personalities, perhaps it is just because I’m walking Swiss streets and think I can actually tell a Swiss from a German! Wherever the people working are from, they are always friendly, acknowledging you with a hello or a nod when you enter any shop or restaurant. As soon as they deduce your mother tongue, they switch to that language even if all they know are the few words necessary to help you or get your dinner to you. The waitress serving me now obviously never studied English. This became apparent when she asked “Rice and Potatoes?” Being hungry I replied, “Sure, why not!” She looked at my quizzically. It took me a moment to realize she meant, “Rice or potatoes?” Still, she tried her best to communicate with me entirely in English, the gentleman at the table next to me in German, and the ones across from me in French. This linguistic nimbleness is a beautiful quality, I think, and is a special treat for travelers accustomed to trying to order ham and ending up with pigs’ feet.

From the Parliament I headed to the Cathedral where I trudged up all 390 stairs to the top for a breathtaking view of the city below. The Cathedral is smaller but similar to Notre Dame with gargoyles and odd characters extending from the walls, and the swirling braces along the length of the Cathedral. Someday I must take an art and architecture course to learn the names of all those things! The pews were aligned to face the pulpit which was placed more or less in the center of the church, giving it a very different feel than the Catholic cathedrals of Italy. The stained glass work was both beautiful and interesting, especially the entire panel of figures interacting with a skeleton. I’ll have to do some research to find out what that was all about. I lit a candle for posterity sake and made my way out to wander the streets and take pictures of the statues. Don’t forget all pictures are posted on the website in photo albums with names of the city if you want to see pictures of the things I write about.

Thus far I really like Switzerland, with the exception of the prices. Costs are outrageous, especially to eat in a restaurant. Even the little sidewalk cafes charge 20 – 25 Swiss francs for an entree (approximately 18-22 US dollars). I can’t imagine what the real restaurants cost. It is by far the most expensive place I have been. But the clean streets, the perfectly run train system, the friendly people, the charming architecture, and the breathtaking countryside make it difficult to complain about anything, much less money.

I had forgotten that I once had a fascination for Switzerland as a child. Presumably it was brought on by the book “Heidi”. In my mind’s eye there is a perfect view of that little pigtail-braided-blonde girl running down flower covered slopes crying in delight “Grandfather, grandfather!” This memory has always been part of my repertoire – easily accessed when someone mentioned Switzerland or braids or any other related concept. But I had forgotten all the other experiences during this fascination - how I used to walk around yodeling, believing I was actually quite good and thinking maybe one day I would go to Switzerland and become a great yodeler; how I used to dream of living in one of those perfect high pitched houses with the dormer windows and the flower boxes and the shutters that opened outward off oval windows creating little half moons on the side of the house. I’ve loved dormers all my life, even designed the house in Plano with dormers, but had completely forgotten the love was started with a love for the little Swiss houses I had seen in books I checked out at the library. I had forgotten too that I found the Pied Piper in those journeys and used to pretend to play the flute as the tarantulas and preying mantises and scorpions would follow me (I did grow up in Texas, remember.) I forgot how much I wanted a cuckoo clock. It seems I remember somehow getting my hands on a little one, not much larger than a cassette tape box, but I don’t remember where it came from. For years I sang Edelweiss to myself in the dark of the night when I was walking alone or swinging in a deserted park, but I had forgotten that I loved the song originally because it was related to this country that I loved as a child. In a very surreal way, I have been discovering long forgotten memories of my little girl self as I have walked the streets and hills of Switzerland, filling me all over again with a child-like love for this fairy tale land.