The Wonder of Solitude: A writer’s journey to Trélex (Switzerland)

This post is by Nabin K. Chhetri. a poet and writer based in Scotland with a background in both prose and poetry.

Read more about Nabin on our Friends of Pens page here.

I got accepted at the Trélex residency only after a couple of years of applying. I had gone to Switzerland before, and fell in love with the mountains and the overall landscape. A friend had taken me to the Rhine Falls and Interlaken. This time, I was accepted for a writing residency and was supposed to be in Switzerland for a fortnight. The Society of Authors (UK) was generous enough to offer a grant to cover flight expenses to Geneva. I left Scotland on a grey winter morning. I remember pressing my forehead against the window and looking down as the land changed shape beneath me. Scotland’s familiar patchwork of green vegetation slowly gave way to a rugged landscape, and then, at last, the mountains appeared. I always feel that mountains are living beings.

The view of Geneva Airport, with the Jura Mountains in the background, mesmerised me and reminded me of Nepal. After passport control, as advised by Rebecca, the residency administrator, I walked toward Migros and bought some groceries to carry with me.

From the airport, I took the train to Nyon. Outside the window, the landscape moved past in calm, measured frames across beautiful lakes, chalets and green hills. In Nyon, I walked down toward platform 21 and boarded the small local train. At Trélex, a white clock hung above the platform, and for a moment, I simply stood there with my suitcase beside me, listening to the quiet. I felt as if the place had been waiting for me for hundreds of years. I walked uphill to the residency, following the Google Map on my phone, the road curving gently through the ancient village.

That first evening, I sat by the window of my room watching the light slowly fade past the fields. A thin silhouette of the Jura Mountains appeared like a Chinese painting against the clouds. I felt blessed to witness the nests of birds tightly woven into the treetops. I imagined their chicks stretching their tiny wings, preparing for the moment they would take flight. Everything here was so peaceful, that the calmness outside seemed to bring order to everything within me as well.

Nina, the residency director, said, “You are a writer, you can set up as many tables as you like around the place.” I put one table in the dining room, another opposite the studio, and one inside my room, facing the lush green meadow, always filled with cows grazing, their bells hanging around their necks.

In the mornings, I took a stroll through the village. Later, I made tea and sat at my desk, trying to scribble a few abrupt lines. I went to the small organic shop whenever I needed eggs or bread. The lady, who spoke a few English words, said that the shop sold local produce.

In the afternoons, my favourite spot to write was a café called Boucherie, where I sat every day, ordering a flat white and a butter croissant and working on my book.  I heard customers joke and speak French. I did not understand a word, which made the language more melodious, and I loved the strangeness it lent.

Café, I spent my days writing

In Trélex, everything I did and everything I saw seemed to become a poem. A passing cloud, the slow landing of light on the fields, even the quiet movement of air through the open window, felt as though it wanted to become a sentence. The wind would slip in softly, brushing the curtains, and I would pause, aware that something had already begun forming into meaning. The walks, the long stretches of looking at the mountains, the hours spent doing nothing at all, gradually turned me inward.

Within a few days, I felt my senses take root in the village’s way of life: the cows grazing in distant fields, the horses shifting their weight behind wooden fences, the slow routines of the villagers. These small, living details became my companions.

In places like this, the past has a way of finding you. The child you once were, the younger self you left somewhere along the tracks of time, begins to call out. I found myself thinking about dusty village paths from my childhood, the scent of wet earth after rain, and afternoons spent by canals catching small fish or chasing butterflies. I thought of all those friends who believed we would never part, only to be scattered to wherever their destiny took them. Where might they all be now?  

I would wake up quite early, with only the birds disturbing, while there were still some early-morning stars in the sky, reluctant to fade despite the gradual approach of daylight. I opened the window, inhaling the crisp air, brewed Colombian coffee and started writing.

One day, I visited La Cure,  though it was just a 45-minute journey from Trélex. The village is home to a fascinating hotel that straddles two countries, half in Switzerland and half in France. In some rooms, you could sleep with your head in Switzerland and your feet in France. During World War II, Hitler’s army was permitted to climb seven steps within the premises but was stopped at the eighth, as crossing it would have meant stepping into neutral Switzerland. The hotel’s owner played a courageous role, secretly sheltering hundreds of Jewish refugees during the war.

Time passed quickly. When I left, I didn’t finish all my writing, but I didn’t mind.  I carry the memories of Trélex, not as souvenirs or photographs, but as a quiet weight, a knowledge that for a time I lived and wrote in a place that asked nothing of me except my presence. And that, my friend, is everything.