Close your eyes and imagine a gigantic state fair, held along the edge of a lake with a view of the mountains. Replace the corndogs with crepes and double the size of the cotton candy. Do away with the Budweiser in favor of Heineken and mix in Thai, Spanish, Italian, South American, Swiss, German, Chinese, Malaysian, African, and other multinational food for good measure. Have multiple dance floors with various kinds of music. Leave the carnival rides, but have the carnies speak French (keep the scariness of the carnies, though). Keep the garbage output the same, but magically clean the city by the morning. Combine all of these things together, and you have the Fêtes de Genève.
The "Festival of Geneva" is a 10-day party (August 3-13) that has free nightly concerts, amazing food, carnival rides, a regatta, an annual waiter and waitress footrace, an airshow, and fireworks. The fireworks show at the end of the fête draws enough people down to the lakefront so that the floating bridges have to be buffered to handle the extra weight.
For three nights in a row, I managed to wander around from booth to booth, eating things like curry and dönner kebabs, cotton candy and homemade nougat (yes, all at the same time). I even stood politely and bounced my head (as is the proper Genevois-approved way of dancing) to a handful of the bands that played the Jardin Anglais.
See other people's Flickr pics of the fête here.
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