life in Geneva is boring! jobs market is squeezing! salaries are dropping! Crimes are rising! Apartments are tiny and regies are robbers! Men are single and woman don't want a relationship.Swiss don't like anymore foreigners. Living cost is very high especially comparing to your country even you won't find a curry less than 18 GBP.

Brad, you live in Zurich why are you so critical about Geneva ?

Geneva is what you make it, i have been here for 12 years and its not boring, its usually boring people that find it boring !

Jan please don't listen to Brad as its not true well except for the curry part, but i know where to get a great take away mean for 12chf including a soft drink  so that's not expensive !

Janet : Geneva is undoubtedly a beautiful city with the lake and the river, many lovely buildings and a cosmopolitan population. However, Brad does have a few valid points. Finding accommodation is unquestionably very difficult and prices therefor are unbelievably high. If you do not know about the recent referendum amongst the Swiss voting population, it was not good news for people from the EU wanting to immigrate to CH. Switzerland in general is very expensive which is why some Swiss now live across the border in France and commute daily as the cost of living here in France is lower [we live in Evian-les-Bains]. All our [French] neighbours commute to Lausanne, Vevey or Geneva so they have the best of both worlds.

I teach English to foreign students : one of my lovliest students is half German, half Russian, a highly qualified young lady who nevertheless struggled to find a replacement job and was unemployed for 10 months. So as with everywhere else, there are good points and bad, pluses and minuses but as Oonagh says, life is often what you make of it. Good luck.

Without French language yourself you will be placing yourself in a precarious position for employment...IF your job falters you will struggle to find work

From England you will find the standard of living not much better as you are from a 1st world country and not some godforesaken 3rd world shithole. You will find apartments hard to obtain at a reasonable price - but of good quality - though for the life of me why there are still apartments with single glazing here is beyond me. You will find it cleaner and safer than any city in England (though never 100% clean or safe)

In terms of social life/non work life that depends...if you like winter sports and hiking you'll be having wet dreams in this place IF you like other stuff you will find it very lacking. You will find people very insular and humourless even long term expats!  Restaurants are varied but not that great. Museums are okay . Unless you use geneva as a base it can get boring very quickly. Pop culture and the arts is quite limited. If you have come from a town or village than Geneva may actually seem big...if you come fom a city you'll be perplexed as its basically a big town next to a lake with an airport - to give you a clue you can walk from the airport to the lake within 40 minutes...its tiny really

Hi Brad,

Thanks very much for your views on Geneva, but I have to say Brad we will always have the mountains to cheer us up ;-)).

On the up side I rarely eat curry, so with all the money I will save I will put this towards the expensive rent! :-)  

Hi Oonagh,

Thanks very much for the reply. It sounds like a great mix of beautiful scenery, lovely eclectic mix of cultures and a good social hub.  I will investigate further! :-) Cheers Janet

Hi Sheila,

Thanks very much for the detailed reply. I am curious about your student who is as you say, highly qualified but  took 10 months to secure a new job, may I ask what is her profession ? And is that profession in the minority of job that need to be filled.

I guess it's all subjective depending on yourprofession, skills, experience and qualifications. For example my degree subject is 3D digital design and development, although over a ten years now, but I work in projects and programmes support, so with each job I gain  more skills, that are very relevant to the international jobe market. I have a down to earth, pragmatic approach and I think being an all round multi taster (and so modest) ;-))  helps when applying for jobs. I must say I love languages too and one appeal, of living in Geneva is to become fluent in French as a personal goal.  Thanks again Sheila for the reply.  Cheers Janet

Ha ha make that multi tasker not multi taster @ Sheila ;-))

I'm a long term expat... "insular and humorless" ???? AHEM!!!!

http://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/country_result.jsp?country=Switzerland

Janet : this has just been published in The Local.

Hope it does not affect you, or even that it is entirely correct :

http://www.thelocal.ch/20140225/apartment-seekers-in-switzerland-face-five-month-search

Come over to sunny France!

Why swiss? there are 206 sovereign states maybe you will find a good place. Try China. Somebody in glocals wrote salaries in china are higher than suisse. For example! shanghai. Norway is also worth considering.

French language is also going to give a rough time. I know many people will be against my opinion. But few years before it was much easier to find a job(Especially if you were arrived 12 years before) in Switzerland and you speak only english But these days more and more employers are asking for bilinguals and Now trend of trilingual (French, German and English) is rising. These days most employers only consider English if the job is VERY high skilled. 

Hi Janet! Just saw your thread and wanted to reply! If you already come with a job, I would recommend you to come to Geneva! It is true that finiding work here might be difficult and it is an expensive here to not have an income, but while you have your job your partner has time to move around and try to find his. 

Apartments are expensive here but salaries are very high. It is all related. Also, when signing your contract with your future employer, try to negotiate that they pay you the services of a relocation agency. It will make all the difference. At the end, they have the contacts and will make the house hunting experience easier for you. When I moved here I was lucky enough I had one, and it was great! (Welcome Service).

Also, I come from Madrid, a busy city full with party and cultural life, but I love my life here! The lake, the mountains... There are exhibitions, always things going on! You just have to look a bit for them!

http://genevaisnotboring.blogspot.com

Hope you get a great offer and come here soon!

All the best and good luck,

María

Reg the first reply... its true about the curry! 

Geneva is what you make it.  As is Switzerland.  Sure for wild partys the bigger world wide citys are better.  Perhaps you can find better coutry side or activities else wear.  Geneva and Zurich have the complete package on your door step.  You earn good money, the social system is pretty good still.  Yes you pay a lot but perhaps different to the UK you can partially see where some of your money goes.

Lakes and mountains are on your door step.  YOur in the center of Europe with easy and cheap flight routes to where ever you want to go.

If you look out for events and things going on, get involved.  Your be busy every weekend with plenty to do. 

Those who find it boring probably do little more than watch TV in a language they dont understand and dont use whats on the door step to the full advatage

Of course there is no valid answer, sure, what you make of it here entirely depends on who you are, but that's only part of the question.

Something I never see mentioned in this kind of threads is that, given the cost of living and the big variance in salaries, your ability to enjoy Geneva depends a LOT on how much you make.

Try to take this into account when you decide if someone's answer is somewhat applicable to you.

I think this is rubbish!!

Take the UK for example, bar staff in the UK can hardly live on what there paid.  Bar staff in Switzerland can go on fancy holidays to far away places, go out for drinks, enjoy life.  You dont need to earn a fortune to enjoy Switzerland.

How much does fete Geneve cost? Fete de la musique? Sitting by the lake? Hiking in the mountains?  If you want to go to Java and be a horray Henry and thats somehow a quality of life then yes you need to earn a lot, but personally thats not my thing.

"Bar staff in the UK can hardly live on what there (sic) paid. Bar staff in Switzerland can go on fancy holidays to far away places, go out for drinks, enjoy life."

So, some service staff here seems to make a living wage unlike some of their colleagues in another country, I don't see what to take away from that. Also, not everyone in Switzerland is living in a fairy tale of abundance and social justice, I know several people who struggle to make ends meet, in Geneva.

"You dont need to earn a fortune to enjoy Switzerland"

Never did I write anywhere that you need to earn a fortune, but nobody can refute that Geneva is one of the most expensive cities in the world.

"How much does fete Geneve cost? Fete de la musique? Sitting by the lake? Hiking in the mountains?"

In the first part of my answer I did say that it totally depends on you and what you're into, the fact that some of the things you like also happen to be free does not change my point that Geneva is very stratified socially, in fact more so than most other cities of comparable size.

Hi,

I've been living in Geneva for almost five years now.  Just like any city, it has its good and bad.  There are a few things that I do like about it but I am at this point finding it really hard to stay here.  I'm not having much luck with the job market.  I have already worked here for a year and a half for a petroleum company.  Unfortunately, my contract ended and that was it.  I have been looking for work for more than a year with no luck.  

Some people have all the luck here even if they speak no french. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be the same for me.  It is a very expensive city to live in and a good job is definitely necessary.  

Sorry not to respond sooner but we were away in sunny South Africa.

My student is a "he" - a highly qualified programmer, web-designer et al, but with Hungarian as his mother tongue. Ergo whilst he tries valiantly to bring his English up to scratch, he has found it impossible to find work anywhere in CH, despite that he now has a B Permit, thanks to his partner who is gainfully employed in Canton Ticino working for an American company. She at least speaks good English as she was an au pair.

I am concerned for him, as his motivation is slipping to a disastrous level and although I try to chivvy him repeatedly and both me and my OH look consistently for opportunities which might suit him [he is already with Linked-In and is registered with various recruitment agencies] so far we have all been unsuccessful. It is becoming tougher and tougher as employers demand more and more attributes for would-be employees.

Hope I have not put you off!

All the best

I wish your student luck Sheila as well as all the rest of us looking for much needed work here in Switzerland.  It is hard.  It's the hardest I have ever experienced.  I used to be very positive regarding my situation. Now, I can feel my positivity starting to slip away.  

He's lucky to have someone like you who is concerned about him.  We all need support and some uplifting from time to time.  

All the best. 

Frances