Heidi for a day

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiicola!

It's great...to be...a Michigan Wolverine! (errrrrrr...cow)

Bar-in-a-dog....WOOF!

Mel, Julie and me


After staying up late on friday night, watching Eurotrip while gorgin on Italian coco puffs dipped in Nutella, we (myself, Julie from U of M, and Mel the pink haired engineer from Colorado) woke up at the butt-crack of dawn to go into the mountains, and watch the festival of Desalpe. It takes place in the mountain village of St. Cergue, and is the day when farmers move their cows from the summer high paturages, to lower ones for the winter.

We boarded the train with another sprinting finish, after unsuccessful attempts to navigate Geneva public transportation in the wee hours (buses just don't show up! I wonder if the driver slept through his alarm....). We changed trains in Nyon, another city on the lake, and then took a little red train up the mountain. Sitting on that train, you could definitely tell its destination was a tourist attraction: out of 50 or so people in our car, the only language I heard being spoken was English!

Arriving in St. Cergue, we walked the main street and checked out the vendors (mainly cheese, baked goods, and handicrafts), wondering what time the parade would start. We ventured down a hill and tasted absinthe cookies (YUCK!), and saw a whole cow being roasted on a spit! (But really, what better way to celebrate les vaches then to slaughter, roast and eat one while its brothers and sisters are walking past....MOOOOOO?!?)

Suddenly, we heard commotion from up the hill on the main street...the cows were coming! We took off sprinting, fishing through purses to assume camera ready position at the top. We reached the main street just in time to get a couple charming shots of cow ass, completely missing out on their flower crowns, elaborate bells and adorable faces. At this point I was thinking, "god this is like the tour de France, everyone makes a huge deal over it and it passes before you can blink or get a photo!" Needless to say, I was starting to get a little pissed that I'd forfeited one half of my precious sleeping in days.....

Thankfully several more herds of cattle descended through the streets. They were really cute, *almost* enough to offset the noxious smell permeating the fresh mountain air. My favorite was the one with the maize and blue couronne (I definitely had the urge to run out and play the "da da da, da da da da da da, da da da da da ...GO BLUE cheer on a REAL cow bell, but I was able to restrain myself), and the one named Kristoph (shout out to KC, love ya cuz'!), which was beautifully embroidered into his bell collar. The other highlight was that the "Friends of Bernese Mountain dogs" club was there, and no less than 20 beautiful black, white and borown pups that reminded me so much of my little Kodi baby. One group had even decorated their dogs with flowers, and had them pulling carts with little kids in the back through the village streets (SO adorable!). There was also a St. Bernard that made Kodi (120 lb. Newfoundland) look like one of Paris Hilton's lap dogs, with a traditional wooden water barrel around its neck. When I went to pet it, I heard its owner telling someone that "c'est l'alcool dedans.... (there's alcohol inside), and that they were handing out to the farmers as they walked their cows down the mountain!

At this point the streets were "toutes mouillées" (all wet) and practically covered in muddy cow pie. Julie and me both got hit with "souvenirs" from our bovine friends, mine splattered right across my Michigan sweatshirt (maybe the cow crap gave them a little extra oomph to beat the golden gophers??) Oh well, at least I only had jeans and a hoodie on.....a wave of perverse pleasure washed over me in seeing a woman who tried to make bermuda shorts with heels work at the cow festival, and had splatterings of cow dung all over the bottom half of her legs, not to mention little piles stuck in cocentric circles around the point of her heel.

The rest of the day was for napping and bumming around, since the family went to Chamonix for the weekend. I spent some time looking for flights home over Christmas, and actually found one at a decent price, which means I now have a tough decision to make, and quick. I need to make a list of all the pros and cons, and start deciding STAT. But today is a cloudy, rainy day...and some thé, le canapé, and the Fountainhead are calling my name. Important decisions to be made plus tard.