This is a ridge of the Jura Mountains, to be seen behind our village. There are seven ridges alltogether, stretching to various Kantons in Switzerland. Here concourse has another meaning. Not just a meeting of the paths and roads, but a meeting of the languages. We speak Swiss German in our region, but when you transverse over the mountaing ridges, you suddenly find that the people living in the other areas are speaking French. The language changes from East to West, beginning with Gernan and transforming to French.

We also have our various dialects mainly in the German speaking parts. I speak basically Solothrn german, our local dialect, but as you travel across the mountaing ridges, you eventually arrive in Basel where everyone speaks Basel German. Of course we Swiss understand most of the various dialects, perhaps not always French.

The strange thing is that the word “Concourse” in German has the meaning of bankruptcy.