Register for the 2018 Zurich Writers Workshop

Yodelers,

The Frau needs another mental break from her own country.

Luckily she has a good excuse to take one.

The 2018 Zurich Writers Workshop, which will be held April 13-15, is going to feature two very different, but equally great workshops: Food & Travel Writing with Adam H. Graham and Drafting and Revision with Michelle Bailat-Jones. 

Registration just opened and The Frau would love to see some of her fellow Yodelers in April. 

If you can’t commit to the full weekend, it’s possible to just attend Pitch Perfect in Zurich, which will be held on Sunday, April 15th. Pitch Perfect in Zurich will offer live feedback on anything a writer might pitch to an editor: from query letters, freelance magazine and newspaper pitches, to personal essay pitches. To reflect reality, the participants will pitch the instructors ahead of time via email, and besides providing feedback on each submission, the panelists will discuss which submissions caught their eye in their packed inbox and why.

In any case, mid-April is a great time to visit Zurich thanks to the spring festival, Sechseläuten, where a snowman called the Böögg will be set on fire on April 16th to predict the summer weather. So enjoy a writing weekend, and then end it with a bang, the Böögg version.

Life in the U.S. after Switzerland. Sad.

Yodelers,

One thing has become clear: The Frau needs a mental break from her own country.

To think: she gave up a permanent Swiss residence permit for non-stop psychological abuse from her own government. What a horrible trade. Sad.

The good news is this: The Frau will get the mental break she needs in a few months. She is headed back to her beloved Switzerland for a little while.

The Zurich Writers Workshop, which will be held May 12-14, 2017, is The Frau’s main excuse for heading back to Switzerland. The workshop is going to feature two amazing New York Times bestselling authors, Susan Jane Gilman and Jill Alexander Essbaum (remember that Zurich-based novel, Hausfrau?). Registration just opened and The Frau would love to see some of her fellow Yodelers over the weekend. If you can’t commit to the full weekend, it’s possible to just attend the Sunday afternoon panel, Career Paths for Writers. On this panel, The Frau will be speaking about how to make a living as a writer. And she’ll be joined by New York Times travel journalist Adam H Graham as well as by featured workshop authors Susan and Jill.

It’s strange to think about this, but after she visits Switzerland, if the U.S. doesn’t let The Frau back in her own country because of some yet-unknown un-constitutional whim, she won’t mind. It will give her the excuse she needs to try to find another country to call home—she’s done this before, after all. 

It’s all so disappointing though. The Frau wanted to love her country again, but it’s not easy to be an American right now. In fact, it’s really, really horrible to be an American right now.

The only good news is that there are millions of Americans who agree with The Frau about the way things are going and are doing everything they can to act against what is happening. The Frau is part of several grassroots groups at the moment and is excited by the energy that is gathering against the horror. In the end, The Frau has to believe that the millions of well-meaning Americans will triumph. The ones who believe in immigration, in diversity, in equal rights, and in the constitution that promises to uphold them all.

  

One Year in the U.S.

Ja, ja, yodelers. The Frau is officially one year into her repatriation experiment.

It hasn’t been an easy year. As Dr. Nan M. Sussman, who researches expat and repat issues has said, repatriation is harder than expatriation.

Dr. Sussman is right.

She’s also correct in saying that it takes at least a year to feel comfortable in your home country again.

One year in, The Frau feels better. She’s not exactly 100% American (will she ever be?) and many American things still piss her off (certain political parties especially) but alas. The Frau is happier than she’s been in a year.

Which begs the question:

Will The Frau return to Switzerland next year?

She doesn’t know. She is returning to Switzerland this month to see how it feels to be there after a year away. Will Switzerland feel like home? Or will it feel like a foreign country? Or somewhere in between?

Only one thing is now certain: the desire to return abroad, whether it is next year or in ten years, will always be there for The Frau. She wrote about this recently for the Wall Street Journal in a piece called The Eternal Expatriate. Once an expat, always an expat, yodelers.

The Frau is excited about her upcoming trip to Switzerland though. (Warning: small promotional blurb ahead.)

For those who are interested, she is speaking on repatriation and expatriate issues as well as reading essays from her work-in-progress, American Life: 30 Things I Wish I’d Known, at an event sponsored by the American Women’s Club of Zurich. It will be held October 16, 2015 at the BellaVista Wine Bar from 6:30-8:30 p.m. Contrary to popular belief, you do not need to be either an American or a woman to attend. See flyer.

The Frau is also teaching at the Zurich Writers Workshop from October 23-25, 2015. There are still a few spots available if you’re interested in attending.

5 Reasons to attend the 2015 Zurich Writers Workshop

As some of you know, The Frau co-founded the Zurich Writers Workshop in 2010, back when she longed for an English-language writing community in Zurich.

Founding the workshop taught her that sometimes as a foreigner, if there’s not something you want in your country of residence, you have to create it yourself. Then you don’t feel so foreign.

In any case, since the founding of the Zurich Writers Workshop, many other English-language writing opportunities have emerged in Zurich thanks to groups like The Woolf and Writers on Board. In fact, there are more options for English-language writers in Zurich than ever before.

Which brings us to the sixth annual Zurich Writers Workshop, which will take place October 23-25, 2015. The Frau has the honor of teaching one of the courses and she would love to see you there.

 

In addition to two intensive workshops, the weekend also includes a Sunday afternoon author reading and panel discussion, which is open to the public (although prior registration is necessary).

Here are five reasons you should attend, brought to you by the very biased opinion of The Frau:

1.    You’ll learn how to improve your fiction writing. Emylia Hall is ZWW’s fiction author in residence this year. The author of three novels, including one set in Lausanne, she'll be teaching a workshop on the craft of fiction with a focus on sense of place. Students will also have the opportunity to have their worked critiqued.

2.    You’ll learn that it only takes 800 words to launch a writing career. The Frau is teaching a workshop called Miniature Memoir: Writing and Publishing Personal Essays. Writing a personal essay is one of the best ways to break into freelancing. During The Frau’s workshop, she will take you from essay idea to international writing career, one miniature memoir at a time.

3.    You’ll be able to ask questions. The author reading and Q&A session on Sunday afternoon, October 25, is open to the public for a fee (with prior registration). The Frau will be reading from her book, Swiss Life: 30 Things I Wish I’d Known as well as from her work-in-progress: American Life: 30 Things I Wish I’d Known and Emylia Hall will be reading from her new novel, The Sea Between Us. And then you’ll have the opportunity to ask everything you’ve ever wanted to know about writing, not writing, life in Switzerland, and life after Switzerland.

4.    You’ll meet other writers. Form critique groups, find a friend, or just get inspired. The workshop welcomes 30 writers from Switzerland and abroad who are as passionate about writing.

5.    You’ll love October in Zurich. October is a stunning time to visit Zurich—if you’re not already there, that is. The leaves peak about the week of the workshop and there are no tourists but still plenty of sunshine. 

Questions? Visit www.zurichwritersworkshop.com

Register now for the 2014 Zurich Writers Worskhop

The Frau would like to inform all yodelers that registration is now open for the 5^th Annual Zurich Writers Workshop, which will take place May 23-25, 2014.

For English-language writing support and inspiration
in a German-speaking world

The Frau co-founded the Zurich Writers Workshop after she learned an important lesson about living abroad: if you want something in your adopted country or city and it doesn’t exist, sometimes you have to create it yourself.

Five years later, English-language writing support in Zurich–thanks to her workshop, and also to Nuance Words–actually exists. In fact, one British writer living in Zurich told The Frau that she didn’t want to move back to London because the writing environment in Zurich was so good. The Frau considered this the best compliment she’s ever gotten.

Anyway, this year, the Zurich Writers Workshop will feature two different courses. The first, taught by Anne Korkeakivi, will focus on both short and long fiction. The second workshop, taught by Chantal Panozzo, aka The Frau, will discuss ways to make a living as an international creative person.

On May 23, Orell Füssli The Bookshop will host a reading featuring both Anne Korkeakivi and Yours Truly. This reading is free and open to the public.

If any of this sounds mildly interesting, you can find out more at zurichwritersworkshop.com

Complain to Create: An expat guide to Switzerland

Sometimes as expats, we complain a lot.

The Frau loves to complain. Don’t most people? It’s entertaining, it’s fun, and it’s a heck of a lot easier to complain about something than to fix whatever it is you’re complaining about.

Let’s complain, shall we?

Switzerland has terrible Mexican food.

Switzerland has expensive rents.

Switzerland has too much fog.

Wasn’t that fun?

In her Swiss career, The Frau has done her fair share of complaining. Had her fair share of Migros Moments. Had her pretty little expat bubble burst more than once.

For instance, seven years ago, The Frau often complained that there was no English writing community in Zurich.

But what the heck did she think she would find in a German-speaking city known more for banks and lawyers than the creative arts?

Who cares? The Frau complained anyway.

But then something crazy happened. After about four years, The Frau decided to stop complaining and start creating. She started asking not what Switzerland could do for her, but what she could do for Switzerland.

So in 2010, she got together with two other Zurich-based writers and started the Zurich Writers Workshop. It wasn’t easy. They were scared no one would come to their big event. They were scared that they could lose the money they’d invested in their mission. But there was one thing they weren’t scared of: their belief that if they thought Zurich needed an English-based writing community then others would think so too.

Now The Frau is pleased to announce the fourth annual Zurich Writers Workshop, which will take place April 12-14, 2013 in Zurich and feature stuff like inspiration, learning, and creativity.

The one thing it won’t feature? Complaining.

Nope.

So join The Frau at the next Zurich Writers Workshop. Or if that’s not your thing, at least join her in her newfound expat mission to create rather than complain. Because as expats, more often than not, what we’re looking for in a place we move to probably isn’t there. So it’s up to us to create it.

Register now for The Frau’s creation, or create your own and let her know about it so she can celebrate it in a future post.

Have you found your place in Switzerland by creating it yourself? Leave a comment. The Frau would like to promote it in a future post.

Study Fiction or Travel Writing in Zurich

The Frau always gets a bit excited about writing workshops, especially when they’re in Zurich and she’s in charge of organizing them.

Anyone want to second my enthusiasm? Because for the third time in two years, there will actually be something in Zurich other than bankers, lawyers, and ladies who lunch. (All kidding aside, Zurich is a beautiful city and worth seeing--here's a Zurich travel article written by yours truly that proves it.)

Anyhow, this spring, the Zurich Writers Workshop will feature two British authors: award-winning novelist Sam North (The Old Country) and Switzerland’s bestselling English-language author, Diccon Bewes (Swiss Watching). The workshop will take place May 18-20, 2012.

The workshop will be divided into two sections, fiction and travel writing/non-fiction. Participants will receive nine hours of instruction in their chosen area, an author reading and apéro at Zurich’s English-language bookstore, Orell Füssli The Bookshop, as well as the option to participate in a literary dinner at Europe’s oldest vegetarian restaurant, Hiltl.

Registration opened today. Space is limited to 15 participants in each section and is filled on a first-come, first-served basis. You can register at www.zurichwritersworkshop.com. Click here to sign up for the mailing list.

Hope to see you in Zurich this spring. And please spread the word!