Saying hello, the Swiss way.

Recently I was going somewhere. Somewhere important. On the bus. Late, of course; Swiss timeliness results from nature, not nurture, hence any attempt to inculcate it in me despite my continued presence in this country of millisecond-worthy precision would be ill-fated.

When I was a driver, in the country where cars are revered as an extension of one's personality (or is that just in Southern California?), late was fine. When you're driving, the minutes you're running behind can just be transferred to the minutes past the designated appointment time you will actually arrive. Now, though, I'm a bus-taker, and the problem with late when you're taking a bus is that the minutes you're running behind are augmented by the five, ten, twenty minutes you must spend waiting for the bus following the one you've just missed – a bigger problem.

So, I was late. And I was about to miss the bus. The one I needed leaves from a busy transportation hub in the center of town on a route I'm not familiar with. Scurrying along with fingers crossed, I turned the corner and saw with dismay that it was already at the stop. At least, what I thought was the bus I needed was already at the stop. I was almost certain but not quite.

Fortunately, the driver was standing outside it, smoking, which allowed me enough time to run over and hop on just as he was starting the engine, having put out his cigarette and climbed back in. Feeling the pressure of a busload of waiting passengers and a driver with his foot ready to press down the accelerator, I hastily asked him if this was indeed the bus I needed, leaving my route map tucked away in my pocket.

"Excuse me," I panted breathlessly, "is this the bus that stops at [the place I wanted to go, pronounced with my anglophone accent]?"

He turned slowly around and fixed me with a stern and disapproving gaze. "Mais bonjooooouuuurrrr, Madame," he purred with an eyebrow raised.

Which was not just a simple hello. I knew what it meant – I've seen that raised eyebrow before. It meant that I was being reprimanded for forgetting to go through a polite round of greetings before offering my excuses and asking my question. For doing the Swiss equivalent of getting somebody's attention with, "Hey, you!"

Cringing but undaunted, I said a quick bonjour and plunged forward: "Is this the bus that stops at [the place I wanted to go, pronounced with my anglophone accent]?"

He looked a bit incredulous and did not un-raise his eyebrow. "To where?"

I repeated the stop name.

"No. You need another line to go there." And he revved the engine.

I frowned skeptically. It was possible that I was mistaken. Busload of waiting passengers and impatient driver be damned, I pulled out the map and looked it over. I was not mistaken. I pointed out the stop to him. "This line doesn't go here?"

"Oohhh! You want to go to [the place I wanted to go, pronounced with his French accent]! Oohhh! Yes, you can take this bus."

I thought so ... and as I thanked him and headed towards a seat, I sensed what might have been his slight disappointment at the failure of an attempt to give me my just rewards for being so rude. Perhaps I'm ungenerous or overly sensitive; perhaps the mix-up was genuinely due to my anglophone pronunciation of the stop name. But assuming the begrudgingness of his aid really was due to my missing bonjour, this is how I imagine the conversation could have gone if I'd had some real Swiss manners about me when I'd first hopped onto the bus:

"Bonjour, Monsieur [pant, pant]."

"Bonjour, Madame."

"Excuse me, Monsieur, is this the bus that stops at [the place I wanted to go, pronounced with my anglophone accent]?"

"Yes, Madame. [The place I wanted to go, pronounced with his French accent] is seven stops from here."

"Good. Thank you very much."

"You're welcome. Good day, Madame."

"Good day, Monsieur."

Coming from a culture where a straightforward excuse me at the beginning and then thanks at the end would suffice in this context, I have difficulty forcing a conversation pattern that I find drawn-out and time-consuming, and, as such, potentially even impolite for the asking and answering of a simple question.

But in this country where these exchanges of greetings, thanks, and wishes for a good day (and then perhaps even thanks for the wishes for a good day; just be sure not to ask, "How are you?") are customary and expected in almost every situation, it is me who is impolite. I know it's important to integrate and to habituate oneself to the habits, customs, and manners of the country where one finds oneself, so I willingly took this well-deserved lessons on Swiss manners.

But only because at the end of it, I arrived just on time.

Bloggie friends, what is your worst foreign-culture faux pas? Or your funniest?

this in no way resembles a Swiss bus.
borrowed ethically from source