Swiss Election Results
As predicted the conservative parties did the best in the Swiss elections. The 46 seat house of states still has some elections that need runoffs, but the 200 seat house of representatives is decided. In the house of representatives the most conservative, nationalistic party, The Swiss People’s party, gained the most seats of any party with 11, and has the largest number of seats with 65. The most liberal party, the Socialist party, lost 3 seats and has the second most seats with 43. The third most seats belong to the Radical party (which is a libertarian party), they now have 33 seats and gained 3. The fourth most seats belong to the centrist Christian Democrat party with 28, down 1 from the last election. The biggest losers of the elections are the two green parties that together have 18 seats, down 9 from the last election. The rest of the seats are made up of 5 smaller parties.
Melissa can stay another year.
On Monday (3.5 weeks from when we applied) Melissa’s renewed permit came in the mail, which means she can now live here legally until December 1st 2016. My permit however, still hasn’t arrived, but given how long our initial ones took (4 months) I’m not worried yet.
Day trip to Neuchâtel.
On Saturday we were bored… so we boarded a train to Neuchâtel, Switzerland. The town is about 40 miles north of us, and about 50 minutes by train. Out one window of the train we could see the beautiful fall colors of the Jura mountains, and out the other, farm fields gave way to the scenic shores of Lake Neuchâtel about half way through.
Neuchâtel is in the French language region of Switzerland, the capital of the canton of Neuchâtel, and on the northern end of Lake Neuchâtel. It’s population is smallish at approximately 33,600, but it still has a decent sized old medieval city center, and a large castle with crumbling walls. It’s history with Switzerland is interesting, because it joined the Swiss Confederation in 1815, while still a principality of Prussia. In 1848 a bloodless revolution brought about democracy, but it wasn’t until a mediation with the great powers in 1857 that the Prussian king relinquished his claim.
We arrived in the town at the main train station, which is up a big hill from the touristy part of town. It was a little cloudy and hazy, but we could still just make out the Alps far on the horizon. After walking down steep steps and streets to the bottom of the hill we found a large park on the University of Neuchâtel campus, along the lake. Lake Neuchâtel is pretty big, with a surface area of about 84 square miles, and walking along it feels similar to walking along Lake Geneva.
From the lake park we walked toward the old city, and accidentally wondered into a large expo, kind of like the commercial building at the state fair. I always thought it felt awkward when sales people would try to talk to me as I walk by, but now I know it feels even more awkward when they try to talk to me in French.
When we finally made it to the old city, we wandered around the historic old streets for a while, then made our way up to the castle. The castle seems just like a big old building, that was big enough that they called it a castle. The castle walls though, are more stereotypical with steep drop offs, and tall stone structures for archers to hide behind. Walking along the walls we were given a terrific panoramic view of the city. In the castle compound is also the historic collegiate church of Neuchâtel, build in the 1200’s.
After seeing the castle, we strolled through the old town again on our way back to the train station and our ride home.
