It is isn't every day that footage of a Federal Councilor answering a question in Parliament goes globally viral on YouTube. On September 29, Federal Councilor Hans-Rudolf Merz found the fine print of the answer he was reading--an explanation of regulations governing the import of spiced meats--incredibly funny and succumbed to uncontrollable laughter as he read.Merz, days from retiring gracefully from government, and with a well-earned reputation for stolidity, brought down the house with this highly uncharacteristic incapacity to control his laughter.
The three or four people on the planet who have yet to see this should simply type "Hans-Rudolf Merz" into the YouTube search window. Or go to Swiss TV (type "sf.tv" and search for "Lachanfall Merz") if you are a purist and want to see it in its earliest broadcast form.
When Boston University colleagues started sending me e-mails about this, I knew that the footage was inherently funny—even for people who knew not a word of German. But, as Thomas Hurter, Nationalrat from Schaffhausen, explained during a recent visit to Boston University, the incident was all the funnier because of who Merz is and his reputation for rock-ribbed correctness. Hurter was on the floor of Parliament for the outburst and says it was even funnier if you were there.
Lest you think that only American universities can be . . . a bit . . . wobbly. The Swiss People's Party (SVP) will hold its December 4 nationwide meeting of delegates outdoors in a meadow in Canton Vaud. The University of Lausanne declined to give the SVP space for its meeting. Anonymous pamphlets had called for the smashing of windows at the facility where the meeting would have been held and puncturing the tires of SVP delegates. So, on security grounds the University declined to offer space and the SVP will conduct its meeting under the open sky in the style of a town meeting on land owned by an SVP parliamentarian. Sounds bracing. (This from the Tages-Anzeiger, November 18)
Less wobbly was the Great Council of Canton Valais which by a 114 to 13 vote rejected the clemency appeal of the“Hanfbauer” (marijuana farmer—it sounds more impressive in German) Bernard Rappaz. Rappaz is serving a five year and eight month sentence for various offenses related to the production of marijuana. He has conducted a widely publicized hunger strike in protest. But the Great Council—which deliberates on such matters in executive session—was decidely unmoved.
On October 15 the Swiss celebrated the completion of the “NEAT” the new 57 kilometer tunnel under the Gotthard Pass that dramatically increases the capacity for rail transport on the North-South axis. It took 17 minutes—extensively filmed--for the massive boring machine “Sissi” to cut through the remaining 1.5 meter wall of stone to the cheers of a waiting crowed of officials, engineers, reporters, and, tunnel builders (“Mineure”). Tunnel workers from the north and south sides met—workers from the south climbing through a small door in the front of the boring machine. One of the orange-clad workers (Hubert Baer) placed a statue of Saint Barbara, patron saint of miners, in a shrine devoted to the eight miners who lost their lives during the project.
In a somewhat backhanded feature in its English-language on-line edition, the German Spiegel magazine acknowledged the engineering triumph (the tunnel is the world’s longest and was completed ahead of schedule) and the significance of the project for Europe—after first reciting a list of recent Swiss embarassments. It seemed an odd way to compliment a neighbor.