I have a couple of questions about the language requirement. You said you speak spotty French. Is that A1 or A2 level? I have working on my French language skills reading, writing, speaking. I have taken in the past so it is easier for me than German.
I hope you post how everything turned out for you.
Thank you!
Tom
And I thimk there are more than 4 lakes on the Border, TI alone has 4.
Thank you for the information it is a huge help.
All the information you are asking for is there.
Hint: San Francisco and French.
Wishing you the best of luck, and feel free to ask any other questions you may have!
07/2021: Write to embassy to ask about full list of documents for application.
08/2021: Send the application.
11/2021: Interview. It was a video call because of Covid. Language was German, it lasted about 45' minutes and my wife was asked the usual questions. Quite relaxed meeting, it helps that her German skills are good.
05/2022: Our references received the questionnaire from SEM.
07/2022: The embassy forwarded (via email) two scanned forms from SEM about public safety/order and our marital status. As we were in Switzerland at that time, we sent them back per mail immediately.
I guess we are close
Jelmoli, Globus and Manor?
No idea where poor people shop.
Ant update on your passport.? I am in the same position as you, waiting to hear since 4 weeks so was wondering if you have an update.?
I had the same questions plus one more I didn't see here:
ā¢Name 3 Swiss watch brands
Then
ā¢For the name sports / name instruments, this I found very hard -- as the Alpenhorn and Schwingen/Lutte are pretty much the only famous ones. My wife and I had never even heard of Hornuss (we mostly lived in Suisse Romande - 12 years in CH for me overall). I'm not sure if he gave me credit for saying "Alpenhorn and uh... yodel??" instead of Schweizerorgeli.
And also for the heimatsort / lieu d'origine, you also have to describe the flag of that canton. I did not know the flag of St Gallen, a canton which my wife's great-grandfather lived in, and no one in her family has lived in since like 1930. The heimatsort system is kind of glad, but lucky for her great-grandfather, because otherwise he has only had female descendants at the current generation (across like 8 cousins & 2nd cousins, so quite a male:female ratio in that family tree!), so I will be the only one in his line to carry on the heimatsort of his tiny village in St Gallen...
The guy interviewing us I think also had a bit of fun with it, asking some extra questions that I don't think were actually part of the exam, like what is the special ingredient in Rivella (milk serum).
There was also a question "are you and your spouse more than 15 years apart in age" which was not the case for us, but it also went along with the questions like is one of you a drug dealer or a prostitute, etc, that have been mentioned before. I don't remember the 15 year difference being mentioned in the other threads about citizenship interviews abroad.
Apparently they do about 10 facilitated naturalizations per year for all of Benelux (all in The Hague), so it seems to be a surprisingly unusual occurrence!
Our interview was all in French (I have C1 level), but he welcomed me and we chatted a few minutes in English (my native language) and we talked a little bit in German (me) and Swiss German (him) just to get some idea of my language skills. I don't think it would have mattered if I exclusively spoke in French, but it was good to show my mediocre-conversational German (middle-B1) since I had lived on both sides of the RoĢstrigraben.
He also said that in 3 years of doing the process in Benelux, he had never seen someone not get citizenship after advancing to the interview stage - although some people don't get that far if they don't meet the initial criteria check.
The interview was about 75 minutes, plus maybe 15 minutes of just regular chatting before and after. He said the interview was unusually fast, since I knew the answers extremely well - but most applicants either haven't lived in Switzerland at all, or haven't lived there very long. The only thing I actually had to study was the 7 national council members, and what department they were directing.
Edit: Also there was no written part. The 15 minutes before the oral questionnaire also included maybe 5-7 minutes of him flipping through my printed application -- the one I had sent in duplicate by mail several weeks ago -- to make sure it had all the necessary documents.