Romandie

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23 October 2022 - Valais

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We call the French part of Switzerland Romandie, I guess, because it was settled by the Romans. But like all of Schweiz there were Gauls here before. I came for the Genuss-Marathon which it turns out is not a marathon at all, but an allday hike through wine country with copious degustations. That is, you're basically going from stop to stop with delicious wine and food. It's hard to imagine a more perfect Saturday except, not running. Small sacrifices. So I gave my first system design interview in Lausanne Friday and then yesterday was this not run and today I am traveling back to the Germanic world. It's been a strange weekend of new experiences and somehow I am still Forrest Gumping my way through life. I was reminded of this by the Bollywood remake of the film, Lal Singh Chaddha, which we watched last weekend. Aamir Khan played the lead and no doubt had a hand in the writing. Twenty years ago in college my sister Jaime had a poster of him on her dorm room wall from Lagaan because that movie was our entrepôt to Indian cinema. Then I waited tables alongside a lovely woman whose name I have forgotten that lent me DVDs of the best films India was making at the turn of the century. Shah Rukh Khan was not a household name yet, but he certainly was in our household. America is not a nation, but an idea. So is Switzerland. Looking back at the partitions of India, Cyprus, Ireland, ... I increasingly think the idea of a nation, a birthland, a fatherland or a motherland is a cursed meme. I can't vote in Norway, where Wogsland is and my paternal ancestors came from. Nor Saxony nor Hesse nor Deutschland nor England nor Ireland nor anywhere else than the U S of A. These are the nations of my heritage. And yet Switzerland is the place in Europe I call home. Poland existed for centuries despite being stateless. You can't keep a good culture down. The Soviets kept half of the land after the 1940's partition, but in England or Norway society couldn't function without them. And now the Russians are trying to eliminate Ukraine. Terrible. If I were a young Ernest Hemingway I would race to the front to help them. But Vietnam draft dodger Bill Clinton was president when I was young, so my idea of societal responsibility is somewhat different. Swiss, actually. Neutrality as a default. Increasingly I think these are the grown-ups in the room. But why does war still exist at all? If a United Federation of Planets were to judge our candidacy like on Star Trek, what would they say? Why don't Serbia, Albania, Turkey, etc. have a clear path to membership in the European Union? Cui bono? I'll just keep running.