Every spring, Morges hosts the Tulip Festival at Parc de l’Indépendance on the shore of Lake Geneva. An eagerly awaited date in an exceptional site opposite the Alps.

The Tulip Festival (no admission charge) lasts six weeks and presents 150,000 tulips of 250 varieties in Parc de l’Indépendance in Morges. The diversity of these banks of flowers remind fans of the tulip’s huge range of shapes and colours.

The first varieties are in bloom in mid-April. They are a great attraction for families who thus inaugurate the first lakeside outgoing of the year. Small animations are regularly organised at the Parc de l’Indépendance. Drinks and snacks are available on site.

As the Tulip Festival was created on the occasion of the 50 years of the Lake Geneva Horticultural Society in 1971, the horticulture apprentices of the Morges Centre for Professional Studies create several banks of flowers every year.

Parc de l’Indépendance is a magnificent site with several monuments and remarkable trees at the mouth of river Morges, which recall the celebrations in 1898, the date of the independence of the Lake Geneva Region.

Nyon is another one lucky town situated on Lake Geneva. It is between Geneva and Lausanne, amid the vineyards of La Côte. Nyon derived its name from one of the Roman towns, Noviodunum or Noiodunum. In the 13th Century the Counts of Savoy built a castle and nowadays this castle, towering over the old town, houses the Museum of History and Porcelain, containing valuable items from the former porcelain manufacturing industry in the town.

We frequently visit Nyon for the flea market that happens every last Sunday of the month. Here you’ll find interesting artifacts and secondhand items for sale, as well as open shops and restaurants (on a Sunday, because most stores in Switzerland are closed).

Reading about the Philippines being ranked last in the global list of rude hosts gave me something to smile about. Curious enough, I dug even further to figure which country got the topmost rank. Et voila, I couldn’t disagree more. As a matter of fact, it even inspired me to blog about my first-time visit to Paris.

It took me half a year, I tell you, because the experience wasn’t been great. Maybe I had high expectations, but who would not? Paris is a traveler’s postcard that’s worth to keep, they say. Paris is the place which all great personalities of then and now have high regards over. Paris is the centerpiece of culture and the arts. Paris is the city of love and lights.

Yet then again, I might sound unfair. We just stayed overnight, so the time spent wasn’t been enough to really enjoy the beauty of this city. Yet then again too, first impressions last and unfortunately, most Parisians who supposed to play a huge role in making our stay as turistas (tourists) a memorable one show why they deserve to be the most rude hosts in the planet. Their wrong attitude towards city-visitors is not hearsay.

After more than a year away, I am going home to the Philippines for vacation. Although there are pretty, new things I have been enjoying in the place I’m living now, like anybody else, I cannot take away the pleasures and the goodies I enjoy in the place I now call home. Boy oh boy, I still miss a lot of things Pinoy!

10. Videoke

Singing on top of your lungs, as if like there’s no tomorrow. Because the louder you are, the closer you get perfect 100. Neighbors screeching in the wee hours of the night, doing it their way. Perhaps, we might also do the same. So to my fellow neighbors, you’ve been forewarned. I’ll sing a series of Bon Jovi, Guns N Roses, Bryan Adams, and fine, a bit of Carpenters too.

Since some of our Pinay friends will come over Friday night, my friend suggested that I cook a Filipino dish that we hardly serve on regular Swiss days. Off we agreed I prepare dinuguan for us.

Dinuguan (in English, it’s either called pork blood stew, blood pudding stew, or chocolate meat) is a Filipino savory stew of meat and/or offal (typically lungs, kidneys, intestines, ears, heart and snout) simmered in a rich, spicy dark gravy of pig blood, garlic, chili (most often siling mahaba), and vinegar. The term dinuguan comes from the Filipino word dugo meaning “blood”.

From the looks of it, it does bring out the creeps for most people here, but dinuguan is not so different with French’s blood sausage, boudin noir, which is mainly made of pork and pig blood. Ours is just that, the meat proudly swims in a pot full of blood sauce.

I’m definitely a Polaroid camera girl. For me, what I’m really excited about is bringing back the artistry and the nature of Polaroid. – Lady Gaga

From life’s simple stuff to grandiose pleasures, bring it on!

1. Logan, my new compact digital camera

12.1 megapixels | 3″ screen | 28 – 392 mm (14×)

From dpreview.com

GPS-enabled 12MP compact superzoom with manual controls, 3 inch LCD and 14x(28-392) zoom lens. Users have the option to shoot Super Slow 340 x 240 movies at 240fps and 1080p24 Full HD video. There is also a Movie Digest mode that records a short video clip right before shooting a still image and then combines one day’s worth of clips into a VGA-resolution video. Canon offers an optional waterproof case for this model.

Overall, the Canon Powershot SX230 HS has a lot going for it, with an elegant body and consistent performance in key areas like autofocus, zoom, and white balance. In a wide variety of shooting situations, we were able to produce very pleasing photographs without too much hassle, which is the entire point of this class of camera. Even when the going got tough, indoors and at night the Canon continued to produce quality photographs.

I hope my memory serves me right. I think I told myself before that my presence at the UP Fair and at the Eraserheads reunion concert, which both occurred two years ago (in separate dates and venues, of course), would be the last straw for me to be sort of “teen-spirited” and ignite the punk rock in me (despite the girly outfits I was wearing at those times). But boy oh boy, was I wrong! Because just three months ago, I attended one of Europe’s most important musical events of the year.

It’s the Paléo Festival, baby.

La fondue crée la bonne humeur.
Fondue isch guet und git e gueti Luune (figugegl).
‘fondue creates a good mood’
- a promotional slogan created for Swiss cheese fondue

Cheese fondue is more popular as a national dish of Switzerland. I’ve been here for more than a year so I would commit a crime only if I haven’t had a taste of it.  Yet fortunately enough, it’s also at this month last year when I enjoyed not only cheese fondue but also raclette, for the first time.

Fondue and raclette are both Swiss and French dishes. Nonetheless cheese fondue in particular, is claimed to be as a Swiss national food during the 1930s by the league of Swiss cheesemakers as a way to increase cheese consumption in the country.

Fondue has also been generalized to other dishes such as chocolate fondue and fondue bourguignonne, where food pieces are dipped into a shared pot of hot liquid. Both terms fondue and raclette are derived from French verbs: fondre meaning ‘to melt’ and racler ‘to scrape.’ From these words, it’s already giving you an idea how these dishes are done.