Permit de Séjour (Residence Permit)

As a foreign student in Switzerland, it was brought to my attention that in order to obtain a year long VISA I must go to the Cantonal Foreign Police of Neuchâtel and register myself as a resident. Note: the VISA I DID receive was only good for up to 3 months.

What was not brought to my attention was that this needed to be done within the first 8 days of my arrival. I was now on day 3.

Luckily, Cerena (another Ambassadorial Scholar from Virginia who will also be studying in Neuchâtel!) passed the news on to me. She found out from her Swiss Embassy that it was necessary to register as soon as possible. Thank God she told me or else ... well, or else I'd be illegal! And that would not be fun.

So I began to do some research. Everything I found said to go to the "Contrôle des Habitants". I would need to bring my passport (entry VISA included of course), 2 picture IDs, my acceptance letter to UniNe (Université de Neuchâtel) and my Letter of Financial Guarantee from Rotary. When I contacted the Swiss Embassy in Atlanta, I had two different people tell me two different things. The first person I spoke with told me to go to the Contrôle des Habitants, just like I was planning to do. The other person told me I was completely wrong. That I needed to go to the Migration Office and sort things out there. I was then given a website and I found out that I needed at least 3 more documents to bring with me. This was becoming more difficult than expected. By the time I discovered that I needed 3 more print outs, I did not have access to a printer. I decided to turn to my roommates for inspiration. One of them, Elnour, suggested that I talk to the man who owns Planete Bleue and who also happens to live here.

Feeling a little nervous, I rang the directors doorbell. A few seconds passed until finally an older gentleman answered. In my most polite French I apologized for disturbing him and asked if there was a printer I could use. His response could not have been more warm and welcoming. He went above and beyond in helping me and was extremely impressed that I was going to study Sociology in Neuchâtel.

All night I stressed about where I needed to go and if I was forgetting anything. I only had one shot at getting this done the right way. Note: Since it's the summer, a lot of people are on vacation and the Controle des Habitants office was only open from 8 to Noon this week.

I made sure to catch an early train to Neuchâtel and managed to find the office.

The process could not have been less painful :) It in fact, went a lot smoother than I was expecting (which was admittedly, the worst). I didn't even have to go to the Office Of Migration - the Controle des Habitants sent it over for me! I was in and out in about 20 minutes.

So, having much more time than I was expecting, I decided to explore the city I will soon be living in.

I am so excited. Neuchâtel is gorgeous... everyone seemed extremely nice and helpful, the city was clean, and I felt safe. I didn't feel like I disappeared in the hustle and bustle like I sometimes feel like I do in Lausanne.

I first decided to make my way to the Lake, which did not take long at all. All along the lake are bike/jogging paths...














After a walk along the lake, I went into the city a little bit.








And then discovered one of the greatest things to have come out of Switzerland...

Chocolate

EDIT! Okay, so this is just now occurring to me, but I think a Rotarian owns this shop! If it's the person who I think it is, he was actually the president of Rotary Club of Neuchâtel last year!

Mmmmm.... :D


So after about an hour of walking around, I decided that it was time to go back to Lausanne.

Even though I only had a small sample of Neuchâtel, I can tell that I'm really going to enjoy living there... :D