The Geneva Cow Herd

The first cow was outside UBS, a white life-sized plastic statue covered in tiny red hearts. I had just gotten off the night train. It was not quite seven on a Saturday morning. A publicity thing by the bank, I thought, as I went in to get money from my account via the ATM.

But then on the trolley, I passed another life-sized cow and another and another and another and…

Each was decorated differently. One black cow had golden horns, tail, and feet. One had a map of Carouge, the arty-farty section of Geneva. The hide of a rhino decorated a cow. Some were in psychedelic colors. Cow after original cow turned up all over the city.

I know Switzerland is known for its cows. I learned this on my first Saturday living in the tiny Jura town of Môtiers where the cows outnumber the residents ten to one. That morning I woke to a clanging of cow bells. It was so loud my two Japanese chins (now gone to the great dog biscuit factory in the sky) dived under my bed. I was braver and went to look. About thirty cows marched down the street, some veering off to drink out of the fountain in front of my house. That night they marched back. It was a daily occurrence in the spring and fall. In the winter they stayed in the barns.

I love the Alpinage, the cow parade where the flowers are wound around the cows’ horns. The Queen cow, the cow the other cows look up to, has the most elaborate bouquet – a table top sized Christmas tree of flowers. She wears the largest bell, another status symbol. I have wondered if the position is worth the extra weight of the bell, but maybe that just shows that if I were a cow, my leadership qualities would not be sufficient to qualify for queen cowdom. Cow herders follow dressed in native costumes; there is music as the cows are put on trucks for their trek up into the mountains for a summer grazing on sweet grass. The grass in the villages below is cut for hay for winter eating.

I have not yet found out why there are plaster cows all over Geneva. I think it is one of those things that I prefer not to know. It is more fun just looking.