In one word, the city is simply majestic. Geneva has its own ambiance but it lacks the "typical" Swiss feeling and more of a "global UN" atmosphere. On the contrary, the city of Bern itself is a UNESCO heritage so you can feel the richness, history, and culture of city as you just walk around.
The origin of the name of Bern is unknown, but of course the most well-known is "bear". The flag of the canton of Bern is the bear and there is also a bear park in the middle of the city. Too bad it was under construction!
We stayed in an Airbnb which was fantastic. Our host, Jonas was fantastic and stayed at his 3 story traditional Swiss house. Highly recommended!
The most confusing to me about Bern is that it's a bilingual canton: French and German, well Swiss-German to be exact. Sure, everyone in Geneva speaks English but when you speak French you speak only French and when you speak English, you only speak English. But in Bern, things seems to be a bit mixed. For example, Swiss-German for "Hi" is "Grützi". But in Bern, they say "Salut". Thank you is also in French, "Merci". Hence, the standard conversation at store is "Salut, ___Swiss German___, Merci". I sound a bit redneck-ish, but I guess I'm still not used to the fact that the country I am in speaks multiple languages. It's always nerve racking for me to even travel across the country as people don't speak my language (although I repeat, Swiss people do speak English so it's not too bad). However, as I would discover later in Zermatt, people even in Swiss-German speaking cantons so speak French and people were much more responsive and friendly once they knew I wasn't a tourist but one of them and that I come from a French canton. And that was my two cents on the languages in Switzerland.
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