All Chiefs and No Indians - No. 28 - Liechtenstein
Q: What’s the difference between Sealand or The Principality of Hutt River and Liechtenstein?
A: Presumably Princes Maximilian and Alois didn’t colour in their own coat of arms with felt tips but otherwise not as much as you’d think.
Friends who work at my own Department will be interested to know that there are more registered businesses than citizens in Liechtenstein. Though presumably they aren’t fearing the economic downturn so much, there’s no empty hole where the Woolies used to be; instead there’s a Swarkovski shop a Rolex shop and a big art gallery where everything’s for sale - natch.
I was unsure about whether Guy would let us make the day trip there - he had specified ‘No Phileas Fogg 80 Days Around the World shit’ but he thankfully relented. This was because with the scarily punctual Swiss train service, we could get there and back in less time than I spent shopping in Westfield last week (4.5 hrs).
The journey was absolutely beautiful - liechtenstein is basically the flat bit of dried up Rhine river bed between two mountain ranges, one of which is Swiss and the other is Austrian. When you stand in the capital Vaduz you can basically see the two ends of the country. I’m saying country because in truth I still don’t really understand the difference between principalities and countries. Though I did see that Gibraltar had their own athletes in the Berlin Games this week so I’ll be adding that to my evidence of it counting in its own right.
