Sometimes it seems that there are more buildings under construction than not in central Switzerland. They are filling in gaps between existing building with new construction, and they are knocking down older buildings to erect new structures. Outside the window of our temporary apartment, construction workers were laboring for weeks on a piece of green space, first digging, then adding drainage pipes, then leveling. I’m not sure yet if there will ever be a structure or if they are building a soccer field. They were also constructing a new hockey arena down the street from our complex.
 
Outside the window of our new apartment, we are also treated to a building site. This is a site for a five-story structure partway down the block that swings into action at 7:00 a.m. each weekday on the dot. And on Saturdays they’re usually there for part of the day too. Until today we were able to enjoy the view of a portable toilet from our balcony window, but it has now been removed. Perhaps toilet breaks will occur in the structure from now on. Our own complex is not finished either, so we have been watching painting in various locations such as the underground garage and landscaping work. It is a pleasure to look on new sod after seeing brown clods of dirt for several weeks.
 
I also have a construction site outside my window at work. If all goes according to plan, I will lose much of my current view of green fields and will look at an office building in the near future. And I am part of a construction site while sitting in my own office building, where they are still working on the installation of an elevator after significant renovations were completed before I and the other employees moved in.
 
In addition, we are treated to a construction site when we visit my son’s school, which is in the process of creating a new building for the middle school with a subterranean theater. The site currently looks like a large (very large) hole but they are expecting completion one year from now. So apparently, wherever I go on a regular basis, a construction site is not far away.
 
Before they build anything new, they let everyone know it by erecting poles around the perimeter of the proposed buildings that are as tall as the building will be. You can see them in the photos attached to this post. These two buildings border the far end of my new apartment complex. From the poles it was made clear that this duplex and apartment building were going to be replaced, and as of this week, the yellow one has already been torn down.
 
All of this constructing involves a lot of drilling sounds and usually a group of men dressed in bright blue shirts and orange pants. I don’t mean this in a pejorative sense at all, but from a distance the mean in these outfits remind me of the garden gnomes so prevalent in this area.
 
I must admit that I now look at empty plots of land and wonder if they are building sites. We were hoping that after the new structure down the street and the construction site on the other side of our complex are done, we would have some peace outside our walls. But there is a nice little rectangle of land off to the north of our complex, already cleared, where we have parked our car on occasion. It is just the right size for a compact apartment building. . . .
 
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