Thanks GL Editor: Madame Ellen Wallace for such a fancy title for my blog!

I am indeed new to Geneva. Or at least as “new” as I can be at two years and six months of having arrived at Cointrin Airport from JFK carrying three oversized suitcases, a roll-up mattress, a jet-lagged 8-year-old girl, and a 2.5 feet tall Sheppard-Hound dog who stood scared in her grander-than-life cage. -How is that for an introduction?-.

My "new" hometown

Tricky thing is, until recently, I kept a certain distance from “some of Geneva”. Freelancing when I wanted to (and I did not want to most of the time), and only taking on projects I cared about (and I did not care about that many either).

And so one day I realized I had started to discover things about Geneva that I should have found out a long time ago. Yes indeed a sad turn of events. Please, do not mistake me for someone who has “refused” to “integrate” -as my French teacher would say. Not at all.

An expat, who veni, vidi, vici Geneva for six months -before leaving again- said to me: “you’re a Genevan vet”. She did not mean vet as in animal doctor. She meant vet as in veteran. Moi, a veteran? In a revolving-door culture of expats in Geneva, a veteran could be anyone who stays more than one year. So… I might be after all a -reluctant- vet.

I guess I am discovering Geneva, sort of: backwards. I admit it is a rather peculiar way to discover Geneva. What I have found out is that I learn something new about my new home everyday. Mostly, through other expats, immigrants and the few Swiss I have met along the way.

Thus, this blog is a public exploration of Geneva done with “a little help from my friends.”

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