Corona: How Laax Highlanders Keep Calm

How the Highlanders Challenge Corona: “I don’t have to get on the bus”

Despite the Crown, a lot is happening in the Grisons holiday region of Flims-Laax-Falera. Most of the locals take it stoically, but not all.

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A splendid day in the Flims-Laax-Falera ski area. In front of the ski lifts, snow sports enthusiasts line up just as well as all-terrain vehicles with license plates from Schwyzer, Zuger and Zurich on the main street.

Graubünden let the trains run, despite more than 4,000 corona infections in Switzerland each day and calls from lowland hospitals. Guests are happy to spend a few carefree days in the snow. The capacity restrictions on the elevators and the guard dogs at the valley station take away their fear of the virus. Furthermore, for a long time it was not possible to go to the bar and had to eat out.

The view of the Unterländer has already been described. But how are the mountain people? The staff who work in the valley while everyone is on the slopes and the locals who make themselves at home in the vacation destinations. A hairdresser, a shopkeeper, a local saleswoman, a baker deliveryman, and a retired landlady tell stories.

The hairdresser of the valley station

A sign at the bottom of the Crap-Sogn-Gion-Bahn in Laax announces to customers: “Care to pamper your hands” is available at the Gauch hairdresser. Tracey Verboom is sweeping the hair of the last customer in the store. Most of them don’t want their hands, but rather their hair to be beautiful. “It’s going very well,” says the 30-year-old through the mask on which a broad smile is etched. “They are full”.

Verboom has two jobs. She also works as a flight attendant. There is less to do in the air now than there is already. So he is happier with the work in the mountains. You feel safe from the virus thanks to the mask and because the valley station lounge offers enough space to keep your distance.

She thinks it’s good that the railways have limited their capacity. It seems less fantastic to her that each canton does what it wants. That creates uncertainty.

The ski rental company

In the “Meini – Sport und Mode” showcase, the mannequins wear silver and gold down jackets, helmets and ski goggles. You are the only ones who, despite the lack of a mask, are not disturbed by the security guards.

Inside, the rush is limited. The customer limit (40 people in the basement, 20 on the top floor) is easily met.

Ask the owner Wolfgang Gruber: How is it going? “Miserable,” he says and laughs. He takes out his smartphone. The ski area app shows how many people are currently away from home. There are 6533 inhabitants. “On days like this it is usually 18,000,” he says. Consequently, rent fewer skis and snowboards. Feel that Germans and English are staying away. If you are arriving by plane, you don’t bring your own skis, but you rent them on the spot. But this business is no longer applicable.

Masks work well for that. After all. Wolfang Gruber runs the sports store together with his wife. Daughter Riccarda and her husband Michael Habegger have also been with the company since September. Riccarda Habegger acts as the hygiene officer. The qualified paramedic explains in the client magazine how the sports business is dealing with the virus:

You are also aware that the situation can change at any time and adjustments are needed.

The worried baker

During a tour of Flims, Laax and Falera, it is noted that whoever sees the situation as critical does not want to confront the newspaper. Anyone who says publicly that they would rather fewer tourists come is threatened with contaminating their nests. After all, tourists bring money to town. For example, there is the man who delivers fresh nut croissants from the bakery to the branches. He has lived in the village for two decades. He says:

The baker is worried. With so many tourists from all over Switzerland and abroad, it is only a matter of time before the new mutation of the virus spreads in town. He shrugs and drives off in the van with the bakery logo on it.

Volg’s Saleswoman

It was a crazy year for salesperson Judith Schnider. He still remembers how his store’s toilet paper ran out in the spring.

Schnider is one of thousands of saleswomen who have been completely uneasy about customers. And this when there were no Plexiglas or masks. On August 1, Federal President Simonetta Sommaruga invited them to the Rütli on behalf of all the vendors. Schnider is, so to speak, an officially confirmed Corona heroine. He takes the second wave with great serenity and says:

Schnider really enjoyed the party at the Rütli. Saleswoman is not a respected job, so she was more than happy to be valued. And that of the federal president.

And what do you think of the government today, when Switzerland has a lot to complain about in international comparison? “I don’t want to be in the position of the politician and have to make decisions,” says Schnider. Criticizing is easy, and often the critics themselves do nothing to improve the situation.

Schnider takes the combination of the virus’s new mutation and tourist flows in stride. “The salespeople don’t have time to think about that,” he says. But you know that some older residents are concerned.

The retired landlady and the shuttle bus

A town away in Falera, 78-year-old pensioner Berti pushes her Postiwägeli to the Volg. His last name does not necessarily have to be in the newspaper, he says and smiles under his mask.

Berti was a landlady for 40 years. Now she is enjoying her retirement and is happy to have become a great grandmother. She exudes the serenity of a woman who has seen a lot. She briefly recounts an anecdote from the 1960s when customs officers detained her in the English Channel as an au pair for a British family without a passport. He had to stay there all night.

In principle, he is not afraid of Corona or the mutation of the English virus. However, her mood cannot be described as carefree. She says:

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She thinks the elevators are working. Where should all the inhabitants of the lowlands be, who let the village grow from 600 souls to 3000 inhabitants? And finally, innkeepers and sporting goods dealers have to make a living too.

She has a great understanding with young people who drink mulled wine a few meters away and are once warned by a Securitas. She says of her own generation:

She herself co-founded the local section of the Samaritan Association. They rarely looked after her as well as these days.