Just like you said, it's all relative, it depends on the person's priorities in life... Nice article though! :-)

Julian: it's best for YOU, there's no argument there. I'm just saying that the fact it's best for some, doesn't mean it's best for everyone. 

Please tell me you didn't write that article, Nir!  I thought the 2nd article much more interesting (and not written by a 5-year old - quote: If you break a law and the policeman catches you, you gonna pay a big fine and he will have no mercy on you... please.....), if only for this following observation:

"So if you ask people in a life-satisfaction survey: Looking back at your life, how satisfied are you with what you achieved?, most Swiss will tell you extremely satisfied, more than any other country in the world. However if you ask: How many times have you laughed this week? Switzerland will come out near the bottom".

Hahahahahaaaaaaa! (That's the sound of all the expats enjoying themselves....)

I didn't write the article or any of the replies to it. You can see the name of the writers next to what they wrote

The discussion on Quora is interesting but full of stereotypes.  One can't help asking himself if some posters really lived in CH.  

First of all, there is a big difference between the two sides of the Röstigraben.  Secondly, most of the qualities of Switzerland are idealized.  But I agree that its quality of life makes it probably the best place to live for an expat.

The article is quite  full of bovine intestinal matter. 

My toughts are...ehi Switzerland ain't perfect, but is far better than the country I come from(Italy). Here I can make a decent living, everyone pays taxes(kinda ironic....) food is reasonably ok(at least in French Switzerland)people are not "warm" like the americans or italians(great..tehy mind their own business and I do not need to pretend I am interested in the blubbering of my neighbour on the airplane) roads are clean, public transport efficient. Plus I love the unassuming and quiet service I get here in hotels and restaurant...if there's one thing that makes me homicidal in the US is the "great" service I get from the overly smiling and aggressively kinf sevice you get in restaurant(yes, I am not too friendly towards people I do not know).

Weather sucks for some months....but here I can afford vacations which I could not in IT....so perfect? hell no. but is miles ahead of most places I've lived and I lived in quite many places...between which Luxembourg(would not go back even dead!!) Finland(Talking about cold people and crap weather) Germany(Koeln great, Dusseldorf also, Munich sucks like a blackhole) France and UK. but obviously this is my opinion only :)

Sure if I could get 60% ofmy Swiss salary back in Italy I would move in no time.....

Gennaro S - In Geneva. From Italy.

"if there's one thing that makes me homicidal in the US is the "great" service I get from the overly smiling and aggressively kind sevice you get in restaurants" 

So now we have a clue to all the shootings and killings in the USA. never thought it was due to the great service in restaurants.

Well, I could imagine (and even perhaps understand) there can be a point when the trotting out of effusive textbook phrases accompanied by the “smile school” grimace are just too much and the recipient flips.

If you think people are not fun here so Why You stay???...Probably because you have a better payed job?...People are all fun in your country?????

Anyway there is always positive & negative sides in all countries..and you have a choice...

Well I did not mean to say people are not fun. quite the opposite, but they are indeed more reserved...which in my book is a good thning as I do not enjoy people being overly nosy about my private life. I actually love it over here. However is not my home. MY home is Italy, period.Maybe in 2 /3 years time I will also consider this place home, but when your long time friends and family is not around is a tad difficultthat it will ever become home. 

That said...I love it here.

Hell no....I am not even able to shoot a watergun. Just I find it a tad annoying(to put it mildly) that when you enter in a restaurant in US and you get greeted by this very loud and fake smile and "Sir I love you being here" when reality is the poor waiter has a crappy wage and that is his way to earn the tips.

Well you are also forgetting one thing...expats bitching about their host country is a norm. it is not they do not like it, is a form of cultural survival. I had swiss friends bitching about Germany back in Koeln and last time I checked they are still there and still bitching. but married and with kids and with no intention to live...that's how it is. Don't take it personal.

Is there a "best" country? Probably not, as each individual's perceptions are different. We lived for quite a number of years in a large island in the southern Hemisphere which some people might give their right arm for [and which shall necessarily be nameless]. We were desperately unhappy there - life there did not suit us at all! Then by chance we were transferred to Belgium.

Now, this small, wet, flat country would not be everyone's choice, especially as the taxes are extremely high, but after our previous 5.5 years of misery, we revelled in the culture and civilisation.

So it is definitely a matter of horses for courses and we have found, living on three different continents, that as one becomes older, priorities also change meaning that where one feels comfortable and content, that is the "best", at least for the time being.

Just my two-pennyworth

I’m a British expat but in trailing my Swiss husband I’ve also been a Swiss expat in four different countries and it’s been my observation that the Swiss can carp about their host country just as much, if not more, than expats do in Geneva yet they have no compunction in continuing to live and even retire in the country they belie so much.

Sorry what I wrote was to Caroline ...

not you...

No problem, but thanks for the message.

R.

recently, in preparation for my swiss naturalsation, a friend asked my what don't i like about the swiss? my answer came surprisingly quick. i don't like the fact that they hardly question anything! they accept, almost without question rules that are "imposed" upon them. i.e. no washing machines in your apartment, no flushing of toilets after 10pm. no satellite antennas on your balcony, and the list is endless. nobody has ever questioned these impositions. i find it somewhat sad that a country that has the infrastructure to create referendums to vote on almost anything, tacitly refrain from raising objections.

"no washing machines in your apartment, no flushing of toilets after 10pm."

That is something I have never see in my entire swiss experience 8 years. I've always wondered if this was really a "thing" in some places.

Even German-Swiss friends I've visited had a washing machine at home and didn't mind fluching the toilets even at 3am.

Yes, this is often the case, although one finds it less these days. However, it does still exist. A left-over from the 1960s/1970s etc. when there were even stricter rules. And people complained [often to the police] with far more regularity for the slightest infringement.

Yoyo lolo - you should come and try living in my apartment!!  

No use of washing machines - even in your own apartment - after 8pm.  I got reported (to the Regie and I OWN my apartment!) for a spin cycle that didn't finish until 8.15pm.

You're not allowed to use the communal washing/drying room after 8pm in spite of the fact it's in the basement in an area that was obviously built as a nuclear fall out shelter where you could murder the neighbour's dog (and yes, I've been VERY tempted!) and no-one would hear it bark.

I've been reported for using the gardener's hose (god forbid) to rinse off my car (on a Saturday), reported for hoovering the inside of my car (even threatening to call the police) because I did it in the visitor's parking spot outside and not in the garage.

Reported for listening to my TV after 10pm on a sweltering hot night because my window was open.

But what's really pathetic is that the previous owner said all my neighbours were lovely and she'd never had any complaints.

But then she was Swiss and I'm not.....

Honestly, it's like we are not living in the same country.

Well at least I've learn something today.

Carolyn isn’t exaggerating.  I’ve known of many similar instances.  And in Geneva, I once rented a room without checking the permitted use of the all-in-one bathroom.  (Well, is it normal to do so?)  Anyway, I soon discovered that it was out of bounds for even washing my hands, let alone using the shower or the loo, as of 9 p.m., because that was when the landlady went to sleep!  Needless to say, I moved out as soon as I could.

Some years later, my husband and I were in pokey temporary accommodation in Kloten where we had no option but to follow the strict timetable for the use of the laundry machine in the basement.  The key had to be collected from and returned to the concièrge at prescribed hours and too bad if a work or other commitment prevented you from taking up your once-every-three-weeks scheduled slot.  If you missed it you lost it.

However, these hiccups are much less frequent now in the newer apartment blocks, but they do still exist in older buildings.

And as Epicure rightly said, it’s incredible that such ludicrous rules and regulations are so passively accepted by the mass of the population as being “normal”.

OK guys, yawll are very welcome to come over and live on the "poor" side of the Lake where we are................... for those who want to party into the night, no restrictions!!!

[well, not with flushing the loo anyway]

Well, the French have always been very pragmatic about bodily functions.

You can add to it the story of the guy that was requested to fill in 17 forms to build a BBQ in his garden.  And the craziness of the rule of requesting a medical certificate to install an air conditioner.

On the other hand, if you're a tenant, you are subjected to the whims of your landlord as there are very few laws to protect you, and the laws who exist are full of loopholes.

> everyone pays taxes(kinda ironic....)

Hi Gennaro, don't be so sure of it. There is a lot of tax evasion amongst rich people here, too.

In the canton of Geneva there is even a legalized tax fraud, the system of forfaits fiscaux which allows a millionaire to take residence in Switzerland by negotiating with the government the taxes he's willing to pay, no questions asked. In this way a tycoon can pay a very little percentage on his fortune. Of course, middle class people like you and me are the fessi who pay their taxes in full.

Let's make it clear, it is a citizen's duty to pay taxes. I'd just like rich people to pay them, too.   

ha ha ha,

Ca va? Oui très bien... (my wife just cheated on me but yes, all is so very very fine). 

And no, we don't have relationship issues: we never argue!

It looks like we're living in different countries, indeed.

In the building I'm currently living, neighbours not only happily make noise after midnight, but also do works and use vacuum cleaners and washing machines on Sundays.

One of the apartments is occupied by a young junkie that, twice a week, used to come home drunk between 2 and 5 AM, waking up the whole building by slamming doors, screaming, and using the shower.  He did that for months, regardless of all our complaints, until his downstairs neighbour made a petition (signed by all other neighbours) and sent it to the Régie.  He calmed down for a while, then his downstairs neighbour moved and he is starting doing it again.

Seriously, I've been living in Southern Italy and I had less uncivilized neighbours there.

Best country - it is where you have family and friends(usually the country where you was born:). Among others, for me Switzerland is one of the most comfortable countries to live, just sometimes I a bit feel lack of freedom because of too strict rules.