First day in Zurich

We made it to Zurich!  In fact, everything went so smoothly, it might have been the easiest move ever.  Our flights were non-eventful, and even the ten-hour flight to Paris from the US didn't feel that long.  Thanks to Darren's German skills, our cab ride to our new place was also a breeze.  For November, we will be living in temporary housing.

Our building that we are living in right now

Most of the buildings are quite old, but the units sometimes have been renovated.  Therefore, the outside of the building isn't a good indication of the condition of apartments inside.  But this building we are in looks newer than most on the block.  I am a fan of the orange because it is bright and happy.  So the cab dropped us off and they already had Darren's name on the buzzer!  The Swiss are so efficient and orderly, I am going to love it here.

So we each had two large suitcases, a backpack, and we had a duffel bag, which had not been a big problem until we arrived at our place to find out that our apartment was on the fifth floor and the building did not have an elevator...

Our gaggle of suitcases

So Darren and I (yes, I did help, thank you) huffed and puffed our way up five flights of stairs with bags weighing around 60 pounds.  Needless to say, I don't think we will worrying about exercising since it will be a workout just to get to our apartment everyday and we will be walking everywhere.  I am actually super excited about this.  This is what I loved about Boston.  I think life is much more pleasant when you are getting exercise as part of your daily routine, instead of having to set aside time to get your heart going.

All the stairs we climbed

Our front door, I'm lazy and not going to rotate the picture

So this is our temporary apartment.  It's nice, but smaller than we are used to.  This first picture is of the bedroom.  The beds are a little different than we are used to.  They put two separate "twin" (I'm not actually sure of the size) mattresses together in one frame and give you two separate sets of bedding.  I have no idea why the beds are like this, but I refuse to let this discourage me from sleeping in the middle to get some cuddle time in.

The bedroom

The view from the balcony in the bedroom

The living room

The kitchen complete with mini fridge and mini dishwasher

The view from the other balcony off of the kitchen

We also went over to Darren's work yesterday to check it out.  We live just two minutes away from it.  The Zurich office has around 500 people.

Even though the experience has been a bit overwhelming at the moment, I'm definitely glad we are here.  I have been studying German, but I suddenly can't remember any of it when people are talking to me, so there's a lot of room for improvement. Plus, I'm pretty jet-lagged right now.  But the scenery is lovely.  Look how beautiful it is!  At first I was hoping we could get here earlier to enjoy some warm weather, but fall here is beautiful!

The view from the top floor of Darren's building

The Alps in the background, holy cow

The first month or two will be an adjustment period with having to go pick up our visas, finding a more permanent place, and figuring out what I'm doing with my time here, but it will all work out.  So our expat adventure begins!