PREPAREDNESS IN B MINOR

Last week, my wife and I went to the opera – expecting culture, drama, and, inevitably, an overpriced glass of champagne (but that's part of the experience). What we didn't expect was a full-scale disaster preparedness briefing before the curtain even rose.

The announcement, delivered in both Japanese and English, wasn’t just about turning off your phone or refraining from illegal filming. No, this was a detailed monologue on earthquake resistance, fireproof architecture, and emergency evacuation plans, spoken with the confidence of someone who had tested every scenario.

Even after almost three decades in this country, this was a first for me!

It wouldn't have surprised me if they had handed out helmets along with the programme booklet, but I guess that would have clashed with everyone's formal attire. Instead, together with the usual bag stuffed with leaflets about upcoming concerts, there was an entire A4 sheet dedicated to earthquake response procedure – in Japanese on one side, and in English, Chinese and Korean on the other. Along with detailed instructions, we also found a stern reminder to "keep hold of our ticket" in the event of a major tremor, though the reason for this is not quite clear to me. Refund policy perhaps? Then again, getting our money back in the event of a major tectonic shake-up would probably be the least of our worries...

One thing is clear: Japan does not mess around when it comes to disaster preparedness.

But neither does Switzerland. Earthquakes may not be high on the list of existential threats in the Alpine nation, but the Swiss are nevertheless prepared.

Switzerland's pièce de résistance? Bunkers.

With 370,000 nuclear bunkers, Switzerland boasts more survival shelters than coffee shops – each meticulously designed to withstand total annihilation with the kind of precision normally reserved for luxury watches. If the world ever collapses, Swiss citizens won’t scramble for safety. They’ll simply check the manual, nod approvingly, and calmly retreat to their fortified cocoons.

But would these shelters actually work if the world went boom?

Well, history provides a few clues. Take "Sonnenberg", one of the world's biggest civilian bunkers, designed to shelter 20,000 people – until officials realised that, logistically, it really couldn’t. During a 1987 trial run, emergency teams managed to set up only a fraction of the necessary infrastructure, and – minor detail – they couldn’t close one of the 350-tonne concrete doors. Small issue, really. Just the part meant to, you know, keep nuclear fallout out.

By the way, "Sonnenberg" is located in the heart of the city of Lucerne and offers guided tours. So, if you're visiting the city and fancy "going underground", that's the place to go (Sonnenberg). The Swiss are nothing if not pragmatic – if the bunker does not quite live up to its expectations as a nuclear winter retreat, at least it can serve as a tourist attraction, right?

Bunker ownership in Switzerland isn’t just encouraged – it’s the law. That’s right: Swiss disaster planning is as compulsory as recycling, train punctuality, and pretending not to recognise your neighbour in the lift.

Until as recently as 2012, each building needed to have their own nuclear shelter. I guess that gives you a clue as to why hardly anyone can afford a house in Switzerland.

Today, individual homes are exempt, but every citizen is still guaranteed a spot in a shelter – whether privately owned or managed by the municipality. And inside? Ventilation systems with more settings than a high-end car, glorified buckets for toilets, and all the essentials for surviving in style. Larger shelters sport a command kitchen large enough to stew an entire cow, and steel racks filled with tins labelled “Überlebensnahrung” (“survival food”), which sounds reassuring until you realise nobody actually knows what’s in them.

In peacetime, these bunkers serve far more creative purposes. With the world currently (more or less) intact, Switzerland has turned its survival shelters into wine cellars, cheese-aging vaults, paintball arenas, private saunas, and the world’s most acoustically perfect underground drum practice rooms. Because when the apocalypse comes, the Swiss will definitely not be caught without a hobby.

However, because bunkers must be made operational within five days if needed, this re-purposing creates some logistical challenges and would certainly call for some large-scale wine-tasting sessions to free up space for actual people.

Back to the opera: a major quake in Japan is far more likely than Switzerland suddenly needing to activate its survival vaults, so when I heard the earthquake announcement, I briefly imagined how inconvenient a tremor mid-performance would be.

But one minute into the show, I was so utterly enthralled by Rossini's tunes that any thought of tectonic catastrophe vanished entirely. Because when the music and drama are this good, even the ground knows better than to interrupt.