a malaysian abroad

You know a malaysian abroad has to do equal justice to “my” three countries, right?  So here goes.. after having tackled the autocomplete suggestions relating to “do Malaysians…” and “do Americans…” today we look at the Swiss!

Oh my.  Most of the ten are stand-alone questions too!  What have I gotten myself into?!  LoL!  Well, here goes….

Do Swiss people speak English / What do the Swiss speak?
Switzerland has FOUR official languages: German, French, Italian and an ancient Romansch spoken only in like one valley or something.  In school, children are taught at least two of the three languages, plus English.  As such, my mother can boast of knowing (not necessarily speaking or being fluent in) five languages: French, German, Italian, English and Malay.  I can lay claim to 3 ½: English, Malay, French and (Italian & Spanish).

Do Swiss mountain dogs shed?

Zughund by sennenhunde.at

First, did you know that there are actually four different types of Sennenhund, or Swiss mountain dogs?  All four have the same markings, and are differentiated mainly by size. You can see in this image a short-haired Greater Swiss Mountain Dog vs a long-haired Bernese Mountain Dog: these two are about the same height, but the Bernese tends to be half the weight of the Greater.  The other two breeds are the Appenzeller and Entlebucher Mountain Dogs.

Thanks to dogsbreedinfo.com I found out that the Bernese requires lots of grooming and is a seasonal heavy shedder.  The other three have easy grooming needs and are average shedders.

Do Swiss Army watches have batteries?
Looking at the Victorinox website, they have self-winding watches, those that require manual winding, and battery-powered ones. A cool feature of those with batteries is that the watch will have an end-of-life indicator — the second hand will pause for 2-4 seconds then speeds back up to the correct time — to tell you when you need to get the battery changed. Do note that Victorinox recommends getting the battery changed at authorised dealers or service centers otherwise its warranty is void.

Do Swiss banks pay interest?
Yes.  If you have an account containing Swiss francs, it’s at a pretty low rate, and there’s a witholding tax levied as well.  If you have an account for foreign currencies, the money goes into a money market fund where interest is earned.

Do Swiss men like black women?
Wow. Ummm. I’d like to think that Swiss men, like men in general, have preferences that range over the entire spectrum of choices, including black women.

Do Swiss balls work?
Sure!  Swiss women are getting impregnated all the time!  Duh!

Wait, what?  Ohhhhh you mean that which is also known as a body ball, fitness ball, gym ball, pilates ball, Pezzi ball, stability ball, therapy ball, or yoga ball?  Riiiiiight!  Yeah, they work too.  Good for core muscles.  And there’s a related How to do Swiss ball crunches? question; here’s a video that I found informative:

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What do Swiss people eat?
Did you know that in 2008, the average Swiss consumed twenty one kilograms of cheese?  And 2007’s figure for chocolate consumption was 12.3 kilograms.   So yeah.  Cheese. Chocolate.  Of course that’s not all, so check out wikipedia and TravelLady for more info.Interestingly, there were no questions about whether or not Swiss tourists need visas for certain countries: anyone want to speculate why that might be the case?

… and there you have it, dear readers, the final part of what I hope to be many more trilogies of autocomplete-inspired posts!  Hope you had as much fun reading as I had putting these posts together.

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