Julian's Geneva Report

A month ago (29 April to 5 May) while Sara was learning the "single mom" ropes, Julian was enjoying a business trip to Switzerland. Following is his belated report about the trip.

One of the attractive advantages to a career as a professor is the perquisite of somewhat exotic travel. If one possesses sufficient resources (*), then, in addition to the essential major conferences that one regularly attends to preserve professional “credibility”, one can also cherry-pick meetings held in select locales that one has always wanted to visit. And sometimes one is fortunate enough to find that both of these requirements can actually occur simultaneously. Such was the case recently when Julian attended a conference in Geneva – his first visit to Switzerland.

In the past, Sara and I have always travelled together as a couple to the various conferences and were delighted to be able to include Zoe on our trip to Armenia last Fall (we blogged about it here and here) – really, who needs to go to Disney World when you have an opportunity to take your child to Yerevan instead? Unfortunately, the timing of this Geneva trip necessitated that Sara remain behind in Toronto to cope with Zoe and Chengis alone.

For those not totally familiar with Swiss geography, Geneva is a city flanked by snow-capped mountain ranges with a population of about 200,000 located in the South-West, French-speaking region of the country – essentially right on the border with France. Coincidentally, the city is also positioned on a body of water named Lake Geneva. You immediately receive a good sense of the country’s stereotypical character as soon as you land – the train trip from the airport to the city centre is free and takes 6 minutes (not 5 or 7, this IS Switzerland). And these trains run every 20 minutes (at least). Furthermore, anyone with a hotel reservation automatically receives free, unlimited access to all public transportation (bus, train, tram). This works! But who would really want to take advantage of this option, when Geneva is so incredibly walkable, particularly around the lake shore?

The highlight of Geneva is, obviously, the waterfront which has a promenade and public park surrounding the lake. There would seem to be an enforced height restriction on all buildings, so that nothing is more than about 6 storeys high – a pleasant alternative to the many urban concrete jungles in North American and elsewhere. The old, fortified, citadel portion of the city offers a labyrinth of attractive, traffic-free, winding walks in which the same “road” assumes multiple different identities along the way – rendering maps somewhat ineffective. But a perfect place for exploring this wonderful city on foot. Very attractively, the (Swiss-) French influence is pervasive – an ethnically diverse selection of small, sidewalk cafes predominates many streets and these are often packed with customers throughout the day. Definitely a café-culture! Think of it as a slice of French culture that actually functions impeccably due to the Swiss efficiency. And you simply have to love a country in which the options presented for your breakfast beverage are always “café, thé, ou chocolat?”.

This picture provides an idea of the uniformity of building heights and the relatively narrow streets that permit car access.The Jet d’EauPromenade and public gardens that encircle Lake Geneva
View of the UN BuildingAn interesting carousel on the waterfront that Zoe would have enjoyed riding Various pictures and perspectives from around Geneva:

The official languages of Switzerland are French, German and Italian (and technically Romanisch) with each language dominant in specific regions. As with many European cultures, it is possible to function in English, but far more fun to attempt to operate solely in that country’s language. Anyone in Kazakhstan for a period of time, can appreciate that you have to learn some basic Russian in order to survive (fortunately I know considerably more French than Russian). Operating in French is interesting from two perspectives. Firstly, the locals will know that you are “foreign” but be hard-pressed to guess from where exactly – best to keep them guessing. And more humourously, tourists (almost exclusively the Americans and the English) will ask you questions in REALLY LOUD ENGLISH – I had never previously experienced this phenomenon and can now appreciate why others find it is so annoying…it frequently provoked me to respond in heavily French-accented, halting English (the Devil made me do it!).

The conference, itself, was very successful (that Swiss efficiency thing, again) and opened up numerous new contacts and avenues for potential research collaborations. It was held at the University of Geneva and treated its participants in the way we certainly wish to become accustomed (i.e. first-class facilities, first-class food, wine available during all “coffee” breaks, etc. etc.). And the final conference reception was held at, what else, a 5-star restaurant estate located on the shore of Lake Geneva. Who could ask for anything more? (Well, it would have been nicer to have been accompanied by Sara and Zoe, but…).

The 5-star location for the conference receptionView of Lake Geneva from the pre-dinner, Swiss wine and Swiss cheese reception on the restaurant’s patio (somebody has to live this life)Speaking of wine …during one of the session breaks, some of us took a few bottles over to one of the parks in order to enjoy the wonderful Spring sunshine. The Swiss have a wonderful grape varietal called Perlan, by the way. Anyhow, we were subsequently accosted by a policeman who was clearly distressed with our actions. While we initially thought that we were violating some local statutes regarding public alcohol consumption, it turned out that the only source of his anguish was us sitting on the grass in the public park. Sometimes you really have to love and respect European culture and values!

One of the major evaluations that I use to determine the relative attractiveness of any location is to assess whether or not I would/could actually want to live there should the appropriate opportunity arise. With respect to Geneva, the answer would be an unqualified yes!

(*) Note to all non-academic blog readers (i.e. everyone except Sne?): Counter to the common perception, teaching comprises less than one third of the job requirements of a professor. In a publish-or-perish world, academic success is measured by research productivity and by the funding generated external to your specific institution. It is this outside funding which is used to finance all conference travel – it is not “University money”.

Note to all academic blog readers who have adopted, or plan to adopt, from Kazakhstan (i.e. would there be anyone out there other than Sne interested in this?): KIMEP, the well-funded, private, English-language university in Almaty holds numerous conferences throughout the year should one wish to venture back to Kazakhstan for a few days to simultaneously show the country to one’s child of Kazakh origins. KIMEP also frequently have visiting positions available should one be ambitious enough to try to combine one’s adoption timeline with establishing professional connections and additional income…maybe when we go for number three?