Swiss couple Daniel and Gabriela Graf, who swopped lives with South African couple Brian and Jo Dick, say they are having a good time in Linden where they are living the Dick family’s lives.
After replacing the couple for a week, the Grafs are expected to go back to their Switzerland home by 21 August even though the two families haven’t met.
Together with their three children Jian, Kuno and Joy, they adopted their new house and new jobs here in Johannesburg, while the Dick family is doing the same at the Graf’s house at a place also called Linden.
A few similar things about the families are that both love cheese and own three cats. The Dick family are recognised cheese sellers in SA, while the Grafs are known for supplying milk for cheese producers in Switzerland.
Through an English-Swiss interpreter, Daniel and Gabriela say the rest is all completely different because they are not used to suburban life, including spending the whole day in the house.
“We are farmers back home, we live on a plot where there are pigs and cattle, and our lives are about farming and doing hard work. In Switzerland we don’t have big animals but here we got face-to-face with elephants, lions, giraffes and buffalo, which was really shocking for us. We really find the game lodge interesting. The popular animals we have ever seen face-to-face back home are wolves.
“We also don’t make use of maids where we come from, maids are for rich people and we were really flattered that we had to be cleaned after by the Dick family’s maid. We are feeling sorry for the maid because it is not like we are used to seeing another person cleaning after us in our house,” said Daniel.
He added that the security measures in South Africa were surprisingly extensive, with the electronic gates and high walls being completely new to him.
“This is not how it is at our own Linden. There we live freely without locking or surrounding ourselves with walls – a little bit strange,” said Daniel.
“Also, we found SA workers underpaid. The friendliness of the SA faces at malls really made us feel at home as well,” said the couple.
Daniel said they enjoyed the Dick family’s cheese and it made them feel like they were in Switzerland.
Gabriela, who spends half a day at the Dick family’s Cheese Gourmet and Deli, said she enjoyed the beautiful garden and the life swopping was an amazing experience she will never forget.
“All I want now is to meet the Dick family,” she said
The swop was organised by Swiss National Television, SRF, as part of Verkehrte Welt, a reality show in which people from Switzerland change places with a family from abroad for a week.
The producer Raphael Hug said this is a travelling documentary aimed at entertainment about tradition, cultural exchange and common ground.
Just like the Dick family, the Grafs received a surprise call from the television proposing the swop .
The Dick family are also expected to be back in South Africa by 21 August.
