Renu Chahil-Graf a freelance writer

Renu Chahil-Graf

Renu is a freelance writer working globally. Her writing is published in LeNews Switzerland, Sommelier India, Cornell University News, and other publications, as credited.

Renu has a Ph.D. from Cornell University. Prior to her career as a writer, she worked for various United Nations organisations, in locations spanning New York to Nairobi, Bangkok to Brasilia...

She runs the eclectic Divonne Book Club and organises live music concerts in Renu's Music Room.

Renu's Music Room

Sitar Maestro Ikhlaq Husain stirs the emotions with North Indian classical ragas .>>

Sing along with traditional Irish and American tunes and songs with John Intrator and Jean-Michel Pache .>>

The man behind a film festival spanning 5 continents

Only someone with very broad shoulders would take on a film festival covering five continents! This someone is Hervé Gransart, director of a festival now in its 12th year. This year ...>>

Move over Montreux. True Jazz lovers go to Cully

On a sunny spring evening, the setting by the shore of Lake Geneva blows the mind away. It does not get better than this picture-postcard Swiss locale. It’s not just the lake but the 30 kilometre backdrop of.... >>

PUGLIA : A gastronome’s delight

White-washed stone huts known as “trulli” in the village of Alberobello, which are still inhabitated

Matera, a UNESCO World Heritage site, where the local population lived in caves till as recently as the 1950s, takes your breath away.

Renu Chahil-Graf heads to the heel of Italy and falls head over heels in love ... >>

Saas Fee Stories

Antonia Andenmatten

Saas-Fee Stories is a work in progress. It aims to show the evolution of a Swiss mountain village from poverty to prosperity to ... >>

Basel Fasnacht – Renu reports from the ground

Like me, many expats in Geneva are determined to go to the famous Basler Fasnacht. But year after year they ruminate and decide they’ll go next year. And it’s not only expats. A charming Swiss lady I met on the train this morning confessed that ...>>

Latest Update

May I Invite you to Dance ?

TThat was my request to M. Vincent Scattolin, the Mayor of Divonne at the annual luncheon for the elderly. I guess ...

Puis-je vous inviter à danser ?

Read it in French

When will our Beloved Thermes in Divonne-les-Bains Reopen?

It was not that I specifically sought out Divonne-les-Bains (a popular French village on the border of Switzerland), as a place to live...

Marjolein Bos - following her spirit !

Two words come to mind when you think of Marjolein: Courageous and Creative!

Postcard from the Sky

Published in Sommelier India, Issue 3, 2023

These days almost all airlines offer free wine on their flights — often of indifferent quality, sometimes drinkable, sometimes not. Of course,

it also depends on which class one ...

Poems

To my own darling sister, 2

In 1956 I wrote a poem with the above title.

Version 2 was delivered at her Bhog (funeral) in Delhi on 16 April 2023

Manju loved music, so we recite this in Qawwali metre:

Oh Manju, our very dear

Renu's Music Room

Get warmed up in chilly January with a hot Jazz-Bossanova Quartet

Beautiful Bubbles from the Hills of Veneto

Published in Sommelier India Spring 2021

Renu Chahil-Graf falls in love with the Prosecco region, recently recognised as a UNESCO Heritage site.

A Visit to Château de Chambord & The Loire Valley

Published in Sommelier India 6th December 2020

Despite the constant October rain in Paris, the continued silent spread of the coronavirus and the not so convenient dates, it was hard to resist the invitation from Christie’s to participate in a press visit to Chambord in the Loire region of France.

Postcard From the Venice Film Festival 2020

Published in Sommelier India October 2020

All good sense advised not to travel in the time of Covid-19. Definitely not to Italy, and most definitely, not to a Film Festival, oh the crowds! But when good sense does not prevail, as sometimes in my case, there are wonderful surprises.

Teatime : Harvard scientist Dr Navid Madani interviews Dr Renu Chahil-Graf

The man behind a film festival spanning 5 continents

Cornell Club of Switzerland - back to hiking

You never can keep the Swiss away from hiking, even if it has to be appropriately distanced. Sure enough, popping up in the inbox was an invitation from the hike promoter of the Cornell Club of Switzerland, Dr. Professor Jürg Hari, announcing a walk in the Emmental region.