India vs. Switzerland

        India seems like almost the complete opposite from Switzerland. The contrasts between the countries have been striking for us and there have been some tough adjustments from the comforts we’re used to, such as the toilet situation, showering, dirt, smells, etc. Switzerland runs like a well-oiled machine. It seems like most people know where they fit into Swiss society and live fairly well-off. There are also programs and services for those less fortunate. I can’t remember seeing a single homeless person the entire time we were in the country. At night in Chennai, you have to watch where you step so you don’t step on the many people sleeping on the street and there are many, many beggars.

            Switzerland is also almost impossibly clean. Any trash on the streets is cleaned up soon and people just don’t litter. In India, however, it’s very hard to find a trash can. People don’t even seem to want them, they just throw trash on the ground wherever they are or dump it somewhere. There are mountains of trash around the city and you can see lots of it on the edges of waterways and floating down rivers. We were here for over a week before I saw a garbage truck for the first time.     

            I don’t understand how Chennai functions. It seems like buildings just pop up whenever someone wants them to and small businesses just come and go. The city is a lot of small roads and completely unorganized urban sprawl, at least to my eyes. It’s no wonder Indians don’t really use an addresses to get places, they just keep asking people on the street how to get somewhere. Switzerland is very decentralized in terms of the cantons (the Swiss equivalent of states), but at the same time each canton is very centralized around the government. For instance, everybody is required to pay the government for a basic health insurance policy and one of our faculty members, who lived in Geneva for several years, described the country as a police state. Apparently, every apartment building has a concierge who reports basic information about the residents to the government. Thus, it’s very difficult to be an illegal immigrant in Switzerland.

            Somewhat strangely, though, some of us feel freer in India than we did in Switzerland. Everybody follows the rules in Switzerland and there are steep fines for those who break them. You have a lot more flexibility in that respect in India. The Swiss also appear to have a clear definition of who is Swiss and who is not. There are a lot of Turkish and some African immigrants in Switzerland, but the Swiss seem to put them outside of Swiss society and they’re a very hot topic in politics. A couple of years ago, there was a law passed in Switzerland to ban the construction of new minarets for the Muslim population. Chennai seems more like a mix of Hindus, Christians, Muslims, Sikhs, and some immigrants here and there.