Of all the associations our synapses automatically fire off when someone mentions Italy, food is probably the one most often made. It's a sensuous thing (as most things Italian are), and I'm as much a victim of our preconditioning as anyone. Hearing the clattering symphony of plates making their way to the table in wrinkled hands as I stroll the cobbled alleys of a hilltop village at lunchtime never fails to conjure images of steaming pasta and the babble of multiple conversations around a table that is cosy, comforting, and convivial.
Pasta? Almost always, yes, not least in this neck of the woods, where this quintessential primo piatto is more often than not followed by pork (or some other meat). Which is what made La Coroncina so different last weekend. Now there are more opinions about the quality of restaurants in this area than there are culinary establishments, ranging from the romantically-inspired view that all the food here is good, to complaints about a lack of variation and overcooked meat. But regardless of your proclivity, there truly is only one word to describe La Coroncina, snuggled as it is amongst the hills of Italy's pork belt - unique.
It's unique for one primary reason - it's vegetarian. In and of itself, this is sufficient reason to get the permanent black marker out to score it from over 90% of locals' restaurant lists. Indeed, when our part-time Australian neighbours took their garden maintenance man and an Irish meat-and-potatoes friend there, they described it as "a religious experience", most likely heading home afterwards to scour the fridge, praying for a beastly chunk of salami.
Now I like my meat as much as the next carnivore, but I also appreciate good food for what it is, whether there is muscle in it or not. (My favourite restaurant in Columbus, Ohio, with its ample supply of quality steak houses, was indeed vegan.) And that's exactly what La Coroncina is - good. Very good, in fact. It's a real testament to imagination, with a variety of seasonal dishes that inspire curiosity with their originality and moans of pleasure at their medley of flavours - cream of yellow tomato soup with ricotta and basil, layered aubergine slices with pine nuts and mint, ...
The welcome is warm too - diminutive Melania with her shock of blond/white hair is friendly, attentive, and a constant smiling presence. We effectively had the run of the place too, with only one other dining couple (locals, somewhat to my surprise), in a beautifully restored farmhouse. The agriturismo is officially classified as organic - you can find more information (including the menu) on their web site: www.agriturismocoroncina.it.
That was Friday. Saturday threw my taste buds so far in the other direction as to give them culinary whiplash. With his mop of long, thick, graying hair and his dental discontinuities, our neighbour Sergio is a wiry local character that's always entertaining to be around. Aside from having done a marvellous job with our patio, he throws an end-of-summer party each year, to which we are typically invited. With the promise of a hearty, meaty menu, HRH - a marchigiano in the making, whose suspicion of a vegetarian restaurant prompted him to decline the invitation to La Coroncina the night before - readily sacrificed Saturday night out with his friends to join his old man up at the local church.
While it's hosted by Sergio, it seems that most of the work was done by the Mari family, who own the house he lives in and who produce a range of delectable honeys from their hives spread over the province. Husbands, wives, daughters and sons ferried trays piled high with the steaming contents of the most classic of marchigiano meals. Around the church hall tables and hard chairs, Sergio and his friends engaged in the most simple and amicable of pastimes - talking and eating, with each enjoying equal priority. Amid the clamorous echos of competing conversations, we flattened numerous platters of first tagliatelle al ragù di cinghiale (pasta with wild boar sauce) and then roast lamb with roast potatoes, all served on paper plates. Wine from Giuliano's vines on the hill next door flowed generously, his daughter capped it all with a delectable tiramsù, and Giuliano brought out his precious acqua miele (literally "honey water", an ancient distilled liquor made from honey, water, and grapes). We ate, drank, and chatted to satisfaction and beyond, until we just couldn't any more.
Simple. Delicious. Warm and friendly. In short, a classic marchigiano evening.
Life here may be difficult at times, but if I'm able - just every now and then - to enjoy a weekend of such delicious diversity, I'd say I'm a rather lucky man.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Camping in the mountains - Part 2
If you're interested in reading about the event that these pictures portray, take a look at the Part 1 blog entry.
Monday, August 23, 2010
Camping in the mountains - Part 1
For nature lovers, the Sibillini mountains are a dream - airy ridges, narrow gorges, forested valleys, alpine plains, and legends to fit their mystical feel. From spring to autumn, its most popular trails are busy with seasoned and sometime hikers, most often in large gregarious groups, lending the experience a distinctly sociable Italian flavour. However, often you can find a place all to yourself, and you can feel as if you're the only person in the world, with nothing but the wind, the river, and the birds complementing the stillness.
As an occasional but keen camper, I've often hankered after spending a night in such surrounds, and so after years of procrastination, we finally gave it a whirl. Now there are numerous campsites available, with designated sites, water and toilets, and the accompanying social buzz that characterizes any gathering of more than one person in this country. But our aim was solitude and the still night of the mountains, away from noise, light, and convenience, while still being accessible enough to be able to camp next to the supply-carrying car. We found it near Castelluccio in Umbria's alpine plain, the Piano Grande - a site tailor-made for our purposes, on the fringe of the forest with marvellous views of the mountains, totally out of sight of the town and the plain's organized and bustling campsites. It was as if the site had been conjured out of a description based on my wishful preferences. There was even a ring of stones for a fire, with a healthy stack of wood neatly piled next to it.
Sitting round a blazing campfire with meat sizzling on the grill and the crescent moon rising in the evening sky over the forest takes you about as far away from the daily grind as you could imagine, and when we stumbled upon the fact that it was our fifteenth wedding anniversary - we're not very good with such dates - it completed the scene. Marche's second highest peak (or Umbria's highest, depending on which map you reference), La Cima del Redentore (2,448m), was etched against the deepening blues of the heavens, prompting ambitious thoughts of the next day's walk to one of the central Apennines' premier destinations - Lago di Pilato.
Our ambition to do the full Redentore-Pilato loop ended up being tempered by the hot weather and our physical condition, since we hadn't done a long hike in quite some time. Even so, the direct Lago di Pilato round trip took us around 8 hours (with breaks, including at least an hour at the lake), covering about 18km. The resulting burnt foreheads and aching legs aside, it's a wonderful place, nestled in a bowl at 1,940m between Redentore and the central Apennine's highest point, Monte Vettore, the twin lakes glittering "like the glasses of a rattlesnake", according to local myth expert Giuseppe Santarelli.
The lake is named after Pontius Pilate, who - according to one of many legends - requested Emperor Tiberius to load his body on to an ox cart after his death (which itself is somewhat vague) "and left to the power of fate." The oxen, masochists that they were, chugged up the mountains to this very spot - remote and accessible only with extreme difficulty - and subsequently deposited his body in the lake. Another legend claims that the lake turned blood red at precisely the moment of Christ's crucifixion, while yet another that leaves suddenly sprouted on the surrounding slopes in the shape of joined hands pierced by nails. The tiny rare freshwater shrimp that turns the waters red at spawning time flapped about the shallows like bulging-eyed fledglings learning to fly, perhaps smiling at their role in the creation of a legend.
Whatever the truth, it's a popular destination, and on our visit was buzzing with the satisfied acclaims, camera shutters, and reclining snores of numerous hiking pilgrims. On our return trip we met a mountain runner charging recklessly down a steep slope, and a gentleman clad in nothing but a towel and a skimpy swimsuit, adding distinct colour to an already multi-hued cast.
Needless to say, there was less activity around the campfire that night, but not so in the surrounding forest, where combative grunts interrupted the still night, suggesting a family of cinghiale (wild boar) in the neighbourhood. But we were wrong - just before turning in, a bluster of hooves and snorts drew us out to see a herd of horses come galloping out of the trees. Wild horses? Sort of ... The Piano Grande down below is a favourite of horse people, some of whom spend several weeks up here as part of the annual holiday. There are some who have "retired" or released their horses into the semi-wild here, giving them the freedom to roam as they will. We've encountered such herds before, and one needs to treat them with respect - get too close and the dominant male will suggest in no uncertain terms that you're quite close enough. Seeing their shadowy frames careening out of the forest as if escaping an unseen foe, gave a feel of being part of some dark medieval tale, but we were tired enough to sleep soundly in spite of our imaginations.
After packing up the next morning - leaving no trace of our presence - we headed for Castelluccio and the daily capuccino fix (there are some luxuries that simply can't be given up), our creaking bodies told us that the planned hike for the day (a short one) was not a starter in the continuing heat. So we headed for Norcia instead, and a taste of Umbria's premier salami town, but that's another story.
All in all, a perfect getaway, and our camping fix accomplished. The freezer blocks held out just long enough in the mid-summer heat to keep the dairy and other perishables fresh, although the absence of a grocery store and butcher in Castelluccio - it must be the only such town in pork-mad central Italy - did impact the planned menu.
It would be remiss of me to omit mentioning that, strictly speaking, free camping and fires outside of the designated areas are not allowed within the Sibillini National Park. Which makes the rather obvious campsite we stayed at, along with its fire ring, rather curious. But let's not forget - this is Italy after all.
For a photographic experience of the trip, see Part 2 of this entry.
As an occasional but keen camper, I've often hankered after spending a night in such surrounds, and so after years of procrastination, we finally gave it a whirl. Now there are numerous campsites available, with designated sites, water and toilets, and the accompanying social buzz that characterizes any gathering of more than one person in this country. But our aim was solitude and the still night of the mountains, away from noise, light, and convenience, while still being accessible enough to be able to camp next to the supply-carrying car. We found it near Castelluccio in Umbria's alpine plain, the Piano Grande - a site tailor-made for our purposes, on the fringe of the forest with marvellous views of the mountains, totally out of sight of the town and the plain's organized and bustling campsites. It was as if the site had been conjured out of a description based on my wishful preferences. There was even a ring of stones for a fire, with a healthy stack of wood neatly piled next to it.
Sitting round a blazing campfire with meat sizzling on the grill and the crescent moon rising in the evening sky over the forest takes you about as far away from the daily grind as you could imagine, and when we stumbled upon the fact that it was our fifteenth wedding anniversary - we're not very good with such dates - it completed the scene. Marche's second highest peak (or Umbria's highest, depending on which map you reference), La Cima del Redentore (2,448m), was etched against the deepening blues of the heavens, prompting ambitious thoughts of the next day's walk to one of the central Apennines' premier destinations - Lago di Pilato.
Our ambition to do the full Redentore-Pilato loop ended up being tempered by the hot weather and our physical condition, since we hadn't done a long hike in quite some time. Even so, the direct Lago di Pilato round trip took us around 8 hours (with breaks, including at least an hour at the lake), covering about 18km. The resulting burnt foreheads and aching legs aside, it's a wonderful place, nestled in a bowl at 1,940m between Redentore and the central Apennine's highest point, Monte Vettore, the twin lakes glittering "like the glasses of a rattlesnake", according to local myth expert Giuseppe Santarelli.
The lake is named after Pontius Pilate, who - according to one of many legends - requested Emperor Tiberius to load his body on to an ox cart after his death (which itself is somewhat vague) "and left to the power of fate." The oxen, masochists that they were, chugged up the mountains to this very spot - remote and accessible only with extreme difficulty - and subsequently deposited his body in the lake. Another legend claims that the lake turned blood red at precisely the moment of Christ's crucifixion, while yet another that leaves suddenly sprouted on the surrounding slopes in the shape of joined hands pierced by nails. The tiny rare freshwater shrimp that turns the waters red at spawning time flapped about the shallows like bulging-eyed fledglings learning to fly, perhaps smiling at their role in the creation of a legend.
Whatever the truth, it's a popular destination, and on our visit was buzzing with the satisfied acclaims, camera shutters, and reclining snores of numerous hiking pilgrims. On our return trip we met a mountain runner charging recklessly down a steep slope, and a gentleman clad in nothing but a towel and a skimpy swimsuit, adding distinct colour to an already multi-hued cast.
Needless to say, there was less activity around the campfire that night, but not so in the surrounding forest, where combative grunts interrupted the still night, suggesting a family of cinghiale (wild boar) in the neighbourhood. But we were wrong - just before turning in, a bluster of hooves and snorts drew us out to see a herd of horses come galloping out of the trees. Wild horses? Sort of ... The Piano Grande down below is a favourite of horse people, some of whom spend several weeks up here as part of the annual holiday. There are some who have "retired" or released their horses into the semi-wild here, giving them the freedom to roam as they will. We've encountered such herds before, and one needs to treat them with respect - get too close and the dominant male will suggest in no uncertain terms that you're quite close enough. Seeing their shadowy frames careening out of the forest as if escaping an unseen foe, gave a feel of being part of some dark medieval tale, but we were tired enough to sleep soundly in spite of our imaginations.
After packing up the next morning - leaving no trace of our presence - we headed for Castelluccio and the daily capuccino fix (there are some luxuries that simply can't be given up), our creaking bodies told us that the planned hike for the day (a short one) was not a starter in the continuing heat. So we headed for Norcia instead, and a taste of Umbria's premier salami town, but that's another story.
All in all, a perfect getaway, and our camping fix accomplished. The freezer blocks held out just long enough in the mid-summer heat to keep the dairy and other perishables fresh, although the absence of a grocery store and butcher in Castelluccio - it must be the only such town in pork-mad central Italy - did impact the planned menu.
It would be remiss of me to omit mentioning that, strictly speaking, free camping and fires outside of the designated areas are not allowed within the Sibillini National Park. Which makes the rather obvious campsite we stayed at, along with its fire ring, rather curious. But let's not forget - this is Italy after all.
For a photographic experience of the trip, see Part 2 of this entry.
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Festivals: Montelago Celtic Festival (Serravalle di Chienti)
Given where we are - in a deeply traditional part of central Italy - the Montelago Celtic festival is best described in a single word: unique. Ringed by peaks of the central Apennines, the high Colfiorito plain on the Umbrian border comes alive over the course of a weekend in a feast of colour, sound, and humanity.
"Colour, sound, humanity ... unique?" I hear you justifiably ask. OK, consider this - there were enough kilts on display to suggest a McFellini family reunion (although the black Megadeth T-shirts that offset their tartan pleats were a tad incongruous). Then there was the all-night concert which ended after sunrise, a not unheard of phenomenon in these parts ... except for the fact that The Wild Rover by a band from Lazio named The Shire ended the musical festivities after a stream of Celtic favourites throughout the night. (A local marchigiano band named Mortimer McGrave closed out Friday's lineup.) Tossing the caber, McEwans Scottish ale, and a Tolkein booth (amongst many other similar attractions) added a flavour that these hills - and others in the region - have seldom (if ever) tasted prior to Montelago's first bash eight years ago.
But away from the stage, and the food, drink and craft stands, it's the life in tent city that defines the festival. A broad arc of coloured domes, gazebos, A-frames, and who-knows-what border one side of the site, with setups ranging from the sophisticated to the fleeting. Our neighbours, who obviously got there early, had their site neatly pegged out and cordoned off, military style, with a covered outdoor area and sheeted entranceway meticulously pegged down, citronella candles laid out symmetrically to repel the anticipated coordinated (and symmetrical) mosquito attack. Their shoes and boots stood neatly in paired obedience outside the sleeping area. The mosquitoes never came, obviously deterred by such organized defence, but it was all we could do to stop from mischievously disturbing the candles' symmetry and fussing the shoe ranks.
In front of us was an open-sided gazebo with an equally open-ended invitation for strangers and kin alike to join their festivities, while a few sites down a couple of night owls had draped their canvas loosely over a very low horizontal support constructed out of those flexible tent rods meant for the sides - if any thought had gone into its construction, it was fleeting, with only one object in mind: haste. Every now and then a chorus of voices would join forces to herald a developing primal roar, sweeping around tent city like a wind.
The majority of regalers seemed to be in their twenties, something of a surprise I must say - I expected more thirty- and forty-somethings - but despite their not inconsiderable overindulgence in a diverse menu of liquid refreshment (with predictable purgative results), there wasn't a hint of tension, confrontation, or anger. And this to me is what makes it uniquely Italian (or perhaps central-rural Italian) - the spirit of friendliness and camaraderie of a group of young revellers out on a weekend adventure. It's one of the many reasons that makes living here such a pleasure.
As for the music, it was pretty good all round, although the featured group on Saturday - coming on stage at 1:30 am on Sunday morning - was outstanding. Kila is an acclaimed seven-piece band from Dublin, playing a range of rousing music with Celtic overtones that was several notches ahead of their fellow performers. Well worth the trip on its own. Last year featured Spanish bagpipe virtuoso Hevia, demonstrating the organizers' continuing efforts to attract world-class headlining acts.
As we packed up and left at around 8:30 am on Sunday - as part of an extremely well-organized and civilized exodus - I reflected on why it took me four years to finally make it to this festival. But one thing's for sure - it won't be another four before I'm back again.
The Montelago Celtic festival is typically held on the second weekend in August. Details of the festival can be found online at www.artenomade.com.
"Colour, sound, humanity ... unique?" I hear you justifiably ask. OK, consider this - there were enough kilts on display to suggest a McFellini family reunion (although the black Megadeth T-shirts that offset their tartan pleats were a tad incongruous). Then there was the all-night concert which ended after sunrise, a not unheard of phenomenon in these parts ... except for the fact that The Wild Rover by a band from Lazio named The Shire ended the musical festivities after a stream of Celtic favourites throughout the night. (A local marchigiano band named Mortimer McGrave closed out Friday's lineup.) Tossing the caber, McEwans Scottish ale, and a Tolkein booth (amongst many other similar attractions) added a flavour that these hills - and others in the region - have seldom (if ever) tasted prior to Montelago's first bash eight years ago.
But away from the stage, and the food, drink and craft stands, it's the life in tent city that defines the festival. A broad arc of coloured domes, gazebos, A-frames, and who-knows-what border one side of the site, with setups ranging from the sophisticated to the fleeting. Our neighbours, who obviously got there early, had their site neatly pegged out and cordoned off, military style, with a covered outdoor area and sheeted entranceway meticulously pegged down, citronella candles laid out symmetrically to repel the anticipated coordinated (and symmetrical) mosquito attack. Their shoes and boots stood neatly in paired obedience outside the sleeping area. The mosquitoes never came, obviously deterred by such organized defence, but it was all we could do to stop from mischievously disturbing the candles' symmetry and fussing the shoe ranks.
In front of us was an open-sided gazebo with an equally open-ended invitation for strangers and kin alike to join their festivities, while a few sites down a couple of night owls had draped their canvas loosely over a very low horizontal support constructed out of those flexible tent rods meant for the sides - if any thought had gone into its construction, it was fleeting, with only one object in mind: haste. Every now and then a chorus of voices would join forces to herald a developing primal roar, sweeping around tent city like a wind.
The majority of regalers seemed to be in their twenties, something of a surprise I must say - I expected more thirty- and forty-somethings - but despite their not inconsiderable overindulgence in a diverse menu of liquid refreshment (with predictable purgative results), there wasn't a hint of tension, confrontation, or anger. And this to me is what makes it uniquely Italian (or perhaps central-rural Italian) - the spirit of friendliness and camaraderie of a group of young revellers out on a weekend adventure. It's one of the many reasons that makes living here such a pleasure.
As for the music, it was pretty good all round, although the featured group on Saturday - coming on stage at 1:30 am on Sunday morning - was outstanding. Kila is an acclaimed seven-piece band from Dublin, playing a range of rousing music with Celtic overtones that was several notches ahead of their fellow performers. Well worth the trip on its own. Last year featured Spanish bagpipe virtuoso Hevia, demonstrating the organizers' continuing efforts to attract world-class headlining acts.
As we packed up and left at around 8:30 am on Sunday - as part of an extremely well-organized and civilized exodus - I reflected on why it took me four years to finally make it to this festival. But one thing's for sure - it won't be another four before I'm back again.
The Montelago Celtic festival is typically held on the second weekend in August. Details of the festival can be found online at www.artenomade.com.
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Festivals: Treia - Disfida del Bracciale (Part 2)
If you're interested in reading about the event that these pictures portray, take a look at the Part 1 blog entry.
Festivals: Treia - Disfida del Bracciale (Part 1)
The Renaissance had a major influence on Italian, European, and even world culture back in the 15th and 16th centuries. But it wasn’t only in the fields of the arts, humanities, and sciences, it also played a significant role in the development of popular sport in Italy. Born in the noble palaces of Tuscany, and based on a combination of tennis and an ancient Greco-Roman game, il pallone col bracciale became the most popular sport of north and central Italy from the late 17th century until as recently as 1930. Using spiked wooden armlets (bracciale), a leather ball was pounded back and forth between two teams of three, with a high wall on one side permitting deflection back into the field of play. Such was its popularity that it spawned full-time professionals and massive followings, particularly in the Piedmont, Emilia-Romagna, and Le Marche, and special courts called sferisteri (singular sferisterio = ball court) were built throughout its popular realm.
The most renowned sferisterio of the time was Macerata’s, which today hosts the illustrious Opera Festival every July and August. The prescribed dimensions for the high wall that borders one side of a sferisterio required a height of between 14 and 20 metres (Macerata’s is 18m), and a length of around 90 metres (Macerata’s is 88m). It also needed to be on the west side of the court to prevent the players from being disturbed by the rays of a setting sun (the game was played in the afternoon). The arena was also used for other activities such as circuses and an Italian form of bullfighting, which was a popular Papal State “sport”.
Le Marche’s other major centre of pallone was just a few kilometers away in Treia, perhaps not surprisingly since it was a privileged man’s sport, and Treia was home to numerous noble families. And it was here, into the wealthy landowner Ercolani family, that the greatest player of the game was born – Carlo Didimi. Such was his prowess that he amassed a substantial fortune from his tournament winnings, on one occasion in 1830 demanding a fee of 600 scudi for a performance – schoolteachers at the time earned 25-30 scudi a year. A strong proponent of the growing unification spirit of the country, he was implicated in the failed 1831 revolution, but was pardoned when Pius IX was elected pope.
On the pallone court, Didimi was a battitore (batter), the player who sets the game in motion with a mighty swipe of the ball tossed by a mandarino (server), who plays no further part in the game. The other two players that participate are the terzino and spalla, who stand in mid- and fore-court respectively. Scores are the same as tennis – 15, 30, 40, game – and the first team to win six games is the victor.
If this year’s finals of Treia’s disfida del bracciale are anything to go by – the competition has been held since 1978, just 100 years after Didimi’s death – the battitore exhibits one quality in spades: attitude. Losing finalists in 2009, the green-sashed Cassero team has a battitore that walks so slowly back to the serving board that I wondered if he was actually going to make it. His attitudinal amble is liberally punctuated with furtive glances to the crowd, all the while keeping a stern, stoic expression on his face. The yellow-sashed Onglavina team – 2009 winners and clear crowd favourites – has a battitore with rather more urgency about him, although the serious attitude and crowd-checking glances are the match of his Cassero counterpart’s.
The game itself is a drama-filled event, with much chest-bumping, primal screaming, and angry self-remonstration. This year’s final dished up an added element of drama, one which my local friends could not remember happening before. Onglavina’s mandarino must be close to 70 years old, and on August 1st the occasion seemed to get to him – his tossed serves to the battitore were all over the show, and on most occasions he (the battitore) was forced to “decline” the first serve, and risk an erratic second. The battitore’s initial anger turned to arm-around-the-shoulder encouragement, but it wasn’t long before the team manager called a halt and replaced the poor fellow with a younger mandarino. Their serving improved dramatically, they got back into the game, having been two down when the original mandarino was replaced, and almost snatched victory. However, after drifting off into the crowd, I never saw the old man again, and I don’t believe he watched out the game. Even though Treia is one of Macerata’s larger towns, it’s still small enough for everyone to know everyone, and with the disfida being its leading event of the year, I’m sure “the replacement of the mandarino” is going to be a talking point for some time.
When Cassero finally won the thing, their team members collapsed in a heap on the ground, soon to be joined by a few groupies who gleefully leapt on to the mound of bodies. Serious stuff, this pallone. But I must say as a first-timer and a lover of ball sports it was really engaging, and I was captivated throughout – the seesawing contest, the emotional charge of the players (and the crowd), and the skill and thumping shots of the protagonists. (To be honest, I’d love to have a go myself.)
The whole thing is preceded by a parade consisting of four groups each dressed in period costume portraying a particular social stratum – artisans, the middle class, nobility, and the peasants. On a sweltering day when shorts and T-shirt constituted a state of overdress, I admire the parade participants for their forbearance in their heavy fabrics and multiple layers, all the way down to the youngsters.
This is a unique festival in the province (and indeed the region, if not the nation), and definitely deserves a visit - it's held in late July/early August. And if you were dubious about the importance of pallone to this area’s history, consider the fact that Goethe wrote about it during his Italian journey in 1786-7, and that Le Marche’s poet laureate Giacomo Leopardi – who was born in the nearby hilltop town of Recanati just eight weeks after Didimi – eulogized its most famous player thus:
The most renowned sferisterio of the time was Macerata’s, which today hosts the illustrious Opera Festival every July and August. The prescribed dimensions for the high wall that borders one side of a sferisterio required a height of between 14 and 20 metres (Macerata’s is 18m), and a length of around 90 metres (Macerata’s is 88m). It also needed to be on the west side of the court to prevent the players from being disturbed by the rays of a setting sun (the game was played in the afternoon). The arena was also used for other activities such as circuses and an Italian form of bullfighting, which was a popular Papal State “sport”.
Le Marche’s other major centre of pallone was just a few kilometers away in Treia, perhaps not surprisingly since it was a privileged man’s sport, and Treia was home to numerous noble families. And it was here, into the wealthy landowner Ercolani family, that the greatest player of the game was born – Carlo Didimi. Such was his prowess that he amassed a substantial fortune from his tournament winnings, on one occasion in 1830 demanding a fee of 600 scudi for a performance – schoolteachers at the time earned 25-30 scudi a year. A strong proponent of the growing unification spirit of the country, he was implicated in the failed 1831 revolution, but was pardoned when Pius IX was elected pope.
On the pallone court, Didimi was a battitore (batter), the player who sets the game in motion with a mighty swipe of the ball tossed by a mandarino (server), who plays no further part in the game. The other two players that participate are the terzino and spalla, who stand in mid- and fore-court respectively. Scores are the same as tennis – 15, 30, 40, game – and the first team to win six games is the victor.
If this year’s finals of Treia’s disfida del bracciale are anything to go by – the competition has been held since 1978, just 100 years after Didimi’s death – the battitore exhibits one quality in spades: attitude. Losing finalists in 2009, the green-sashed Cassero team has a battitore that walks so slowly back to the serving board that I wondered if he was actually going to make it. His attitudinal amble is liberally punctuated with furtive glances to the crowd, all the while keeping a stern, stoic expression on his face. The yellow-sashed Onglavina team – 2009 winners and clear crowd favourites – has a battitore with rather more urgency about him, although the serious attitude and crowd-checking glances are the match of his Cassero counterpart’s.
The game itself is a drama-filled event, with much chest-bumping, primal screaming, and angry self-remonstration. This year’s final dished up an added element of drama, one which my local friends could not remember happening before. Onglavina’s mandarino must be close to 70 years old, and on August 1st the occasion seemed to get to him – his tossed serves to the battitore were all over the show, and on most occasions he (the battitore) was forced to “decline” the first serve, and risk an erratic second. The battitore’s initial anger turned to arm-around-the-shoulder encouragement, but it wasn’t long before the team manager called a halt and replaced the poor fellow with a younger mandarino. Their serving improved dramatically, they got back into the game, having been two down when the original mandarino was replaced, and almost snatched victory. However, after drifting off into the crowd, I never saw the old man again, and I don’t believe he watched out the game. Even though Treia is one of Macerata’s larger towns, it’s still small enough for everyone to know everyone, and with the disfida being its leading event of the year, I’m sure “the replacement of the mandarino” is going to be a talking point for some time.
When Cassero finally won the thing, their team members collapsed in a heap on the ground, soon to be joined by a few groupies who gleefully leapt on to the mound of bodies. Serious stuff, this pallone. But I must say as a first-timer and a lover of ball sports it was really engaging, and I was captivated throughout – the seesawing contest, the emotional charge of the players (and the crowd), and the skill and thumping shots of the protagonists. (To be honest, I’d love to have a go myself.)
The whole thing is preceded by a parade consisting of four groups each dressed in period costume portraying a particular social stratum – artisans, the middle class, nobility, and the peasants. On a sweltering day when shorts and T-shirt constituted a state of overdress, I admire the parade participants for their forbearance in their heavy fabrics and multiple layers, all the way down to the youngsters.
This is a unique festival in the province (and indeed the region, if not the nation), and definitely deserves a visit - it's held in late July/early August. And if you were dubious about the importance of pallone to this area’s history, consider the fact that Goethe wrote about it during his Italian journey in 1786-7, and that Le Marche’s poet laureate Giacomo Leopardi – who was born in the nearby hilltop town of Recanati just eight weeks after Didimi – eulogized its most famous player thus:
The face of glory and her pleasant voice,
O fortunate youth, now recognize,
And how much nobler than effeminate sloth
Are manhood's tested energies.
Take heed, O generous champion, take heed,
If thou thy name by worthy thought or deed,
From Time's all-sweeping current couldst redeem;
Take heed, and lift thy heart to high desires!
The amphitheatre's applause, the public voice,
Now summon thee to deeds illustrious;
Exulting in thy lusty youth.
In thee, to-day, thy country dear
Beholds her heroes old again appear.
If you're interested in seeing a few pictures of the event, have a look at the Part 2 blog entry.
Friday, July 16, 2010
You know you've arrived ...
Arguably the most singular announcement of your arrival in the Italian countryside is the Bee. Not just your common-or-garden lower-case bee, but one with a capital "B". Or "A" rather, since "bee" in Italian is "ape" (pronounced ah-pay), and here we're talking about the ubiquitous and quintessential Ape. Now the intent is not to heap disrespect on the magnificent worker that supplies us with that godly nectar, honey, but rather to profile an aspect of living in the rolling hills of central Italy.
First built in post-war Italy to help kick-start an economy populated by millions with meagre financial means, the little three-wheeler Ape with a small flatbed and cab has become a fixture of Italian life, and constitutes many a contadino's sole means of transport. Baby brother to its urban predecessor the Vespa (wasp), its buzz is a constant among the hills of rural Italy, its little motor whining up steep hills with the ardour and work ethic of its namesake insect cousin.
First built in post-war Italy to help kick-start an economy populated by millions with meagre financial means, the little three-wheeler Ape with a small flatbed and cab has become a fixture of Italian life, and constitutes many a contadino's sole means of transport. Baby brother to its urban predecessor the Vespa (wasp), its buzz is a constant among the hills of rural Italy, its little motor whining up steep hills with the ardour and work ethic of its namesake insect cousin.
Not only does it serve the needs of the rural smallholder, it also gives a modicum of independence to the country's fourteen-year-olds, whose landmark birthday gives them the right to drive the 50cc version after having taken the test. And they take advantage - drive through any village out in the countryside of a summer evening, and there's a veritable hive of them congregated in the piazza, drivers and hangers-on buzzing around them in sociable amity. 
Which brings me to my point: one certain fourteen-year-old recently took - and passed - the written driving test which enable him to drive one legally. And it just so happens that said youth - known as HRH to (one-time) regular readers of this blog - has one, acquired for a small sum about two months ago. A vintage 1976 model, it has now passed inspection, had a few things fixed up, and been insured, thus preparing itself for the independence onslaught that lays in store. As HRH (and I) will attest, driving them is not the simple matter it seems at first blush. The absence of a fourth wheel gives cornering a whole new meaning, and their reputation for tipping over is well-founded. The severed side mirror - now sitting glass-less and forlorn on the steps in our house - bears testament to this proclivity, the result of a near-introduction to a tree that found itself in the way of a sharper-than-advisable turn on one of HRH's early learning forays. The downside of the misfortune has its corollary, however, in the added caution HRH now exercises when approaching turns.
Another learning experience has been the emergence of HRH's apparent inheritance of a trait that both his parents possess - an uncomfortable relationship with things mechanical. Unlike their more modern brethren, the older Apes do not have a starter button, but rather a stiff lever that one has to pull with some force to get it to sputter into life. Whether the Ape was in gear (as I maintain) or not when HRH tried to start it some 10 days ago is perhaps beside the point - he ripped it off its soldered base, leaving it waving somewhat uselessly in the stifling confines of the cab ... and therefore unstartable by mechanized means. Until we had it re-soldered - for which the generous solderer charged nothing - HRH was reduced to giving it running starts down hills in order to get it started for the jaunts he took around the roads of our rural paradise.
But that is all behind us now. Last night he provided his own transport to and fro the local festival, and this morning at 6:45 took off to catch a bus to the coast from a stop some 8km from our house. For the first time ever, we found ourselves in the luxurious situation of being able to slumber on, rather than performing the heretofore parental task of taking him to the bus. Early morning schooldays in the next school year paint an equally desirable scenario, leaving us with the sole task of getting him up and feeding him before launching him on his buzz off to catch the bus ... alone. For all the advantages, however, there are also several other sides to the coin. The obvious one is the concern for his safety, and we will now be faced with the prospect of waiting up for his safe arrival home on those nights he decides to stay out late. But perhaps the bigger one is the start of a new phase of his and our lives. He now has the independence that he has for so long craved, giving him a new world to explore. While this in and of itself is not a bad thing - indeed, I look forward to observing his new experiences - it also means he will be taking a step away from us. And as any parent will know, this type of change is difficult to go through. From one perspective, I'm going to miss those drop-off and pick-up trips.
But if any event signals his sinking of roots into the earth here, getting an Ape is as profound as anything he's done before. Not that he isn't integrated - on the contrary, he's more integrated than his foreigner parents. Amongst his friends, he's the only one who passed the driving test, and is therefore the only one legally bopping around under his own steam, leaving him a step ahead of his peers on the Italian growth curve. Seeing his smile as he takes off up the driveway in his own vehicle tells its own story - methinks he's happy with the whole situation. I guess we'll now have to start saving for that Fiat Panda ...
Sunday, May 17, 2009
When in the Italian countryside ...
Spring is probably my favourite season here - warm days, cool nights, green everywhere, wildflowers blooming, trips to the mountains, and a busy bustle on the streets. Things don't just grow in this time - they explode into life, bursting out of their slumber and smothering the landscape with their colour. It's a phenomenon.
Of course, this applies everywhere - out in the fields, up on the slopes ... and in our garden. We've arrived - by a sort of natural evolution - at a horses-for-courses division of labour: Maria does the artistic work, nurturing and helping things to grow, while I'm the destructive maintenance man, cutting the grass, cutting the trees, and gathering up the detritus for burning and stacking for next winter's fire.
So an arduous week of cutting back our garden jungle back in April was barely over before I had to start again, given the vigourous growth that the warmth and moisture contrived to foster. It's one of those tasks that induces sighs and prompts thoughts of other "necessary" tasks to divert from the pressing need to get out there. Eventually you realize that it can't be delayed any further, and so out you go ... only to discover that your trusty lawnmower or weed-eater/strimmer or some other machine is not as eager as you are (and that's saying something). All of which brings me to the point of this post ... buy Italian.
First of all, rule #1 for garden machines with engines - they will break down, and they will need to be fixed. Rule #1a (applies to rural Italy) - if it's not an Italian machine, they can't fix it. Italians tend to be a tad xenophobic, which could be interpreted as nationalistic when it comes to cars, clothes, household appliances ... and garden machines: they (almost) always buy Italian. Consequently, when one takes in the German mower or strimmer for repair, the response is invariably the same: "Where am I going to get the parts?" If said machine is Italian, however, parts are readily available, technicians know how they work, and often there's a replacement available while your machine is being fixed. Now I can't speak for the big cities, or even further north, so maybe this is just a regional rule.
The Germans are very proud of their workmanship, and so initially I didn't resist the inclination of my German wife to procure gadgets and gizmos on her fairly regular trips home. But now I know. Even German machines break down, and I'm getting a bit tired of having to coax neighbours' and friends' mowers and strimmers and such out of their clutches so that I can delay the inevitable overrunning of our property and our house from the green advance.
It's going to take diligence to keep this mantra in full sight, because Italy is not Europe's cheapest country - in fact, it's generally more expensive than its neighbours, in many cases by some distance. But I know that any temptation to buy German engineering at a cheaper price is false economy, pushes the limits of neighbourly friendship to a degree I'd rather not, and ultimately makes for more work than the initial substantial load. I put this new-found wisdom to work recently, buying a top-of-the-range strimmer - Italian, of course.
But it doesn't end there. Just buying Italian doesn't always cover all the bases. If you've got a go-to guy for fixing all these things, he's the guy you need to buy it from. Only then will the not-to-be-sneezed-at Italian proclivity for going the extra yard kick in. Hence we bought the strimmer from Roberto, who rewarded our final acceptance of the rule by giving us a nice discount off the substantial price.
So for those thinking of bringing your appliances over here when you move - without even starting on the different electrical requirements if you're coming from the US - unless you're absolutely positive that your fearless flamethrower will never, ever stutter and stumble, sell it. Buy a new one when you get here. It's taken me over two years to learn this valuable lesson, but I have now reached the point of integration where my automatic response - with unflinching conviction - to any who has bought a new watchamacallit, is this: "Is it Italian?"
Of course, this applies everywhere - out in the fields, up on the slopes ... and in our garden. We've arrived - by a sort of natural evolution - at a horses-for-courses division of labour: Maria does the artistic work, nurturing and helping things to grow, while I'm the destructive maintenance man, cutting the grass, cutting the trees, and gathering up the detritus for burning and stacking for next winter's fire.
So an arduous week of cutting back our garden jungle back in April was barely over before I had to start again, given the vigourous growth that the warmth and moisture contrived to foster. It's one of those tasks that induces sighs and prompts thoughts of other "necessary" tasks to divert from the pressing need to get out there. Eventually you realize that it can't be delayed any further, and so out you go ... only to discover that your trusty lawnmower or weed-eater/strimmer or some other machine is not as eager as you are (and that's saying something). All of which brings me to the point of this post ... buy Italian.
First of all, rule #1 for garden machines with engines - they will break down, and they will need to be fixed. Rule #1a (applies to rural Italy) - if it's not an Italian machine, they can't fix it. Italians tend to be a tad xenophobic, which could be interpreted as nationalistic when it comes to cars, clothes, household appliances ... and garden machines: they (almost) always buy Italian. Consequently, when one takes in the German mower or strimmer for repair, the response is invariably the same: "Where am I going to get the parts?" If said machine is Italian, however, parts are readily available, technicians know how they work, and often there's a replacement available while your machine is being fixed. Now I can't speak for the big cities, or even further north, so maybe this is just a regional rule.
The Germans are very proud of their workmanship, and so initially I didn't resist the inclination of my German wife to procure gadgets and gizmos on her fairly regular trips home. But now I know. Even German machines break down, and I'm getting a bit tired of having to coax neighbours' and friends' mowers and strimmers and such out of their clutches so that I can delay the inevitable overrunning of our property and our house from the green advance.
It's going to take diligence to keep this mantra in full sight, because Italy is not Europe's cheapest country - in fact, it's generally more expensive than its neighbours, in many cases by some distance. But I know that any temptation to buy German engineering at a cheaper price is false economy, pushes the limits of neighbourly friendship to a degree I'd rather not, and ultimately makes for more work than the initial substantial load. I put this new-found wisdom to work recently, buying a top-of-the-range strimmer - Italian, of course.
But it doesn't end there. Just buying Italian doesn't always cover all the bases. If you've got a go-to guy for fixing all these things, he's the guy you need to buy it from. Only then will the not-to-be-sneezed-at Italian proclivity for going the extra yard kick in. Hence we bought the strimmer from Roberto, who rewarded our final acceptance of the rule by giving us a nice discount off the substantial price.
So for those thinking of bringing your appliances over here when you move - without even starting on the different electrical requirements if you're coming from the US - unless you're absolutely positive that your fearless flamethrower will never, ever stutter and stumble, sell it. Buy a new one when you get here. It's taken me over two years to learn this valuable lesson, but I have now reached the point of integration where my automatic response - with unflinching conviction - to any who has bought a new watchamacallit, is this: "Is it Italian?"
Monday, April 06, 2009
Italy stops
There are several phenomena that tumble without effort into the category of "reality checks". From a purely individual experience point of view, heart attack, near-drowning, brain seizure, for example, would all typically qualify. From a shared experience perspective, one thinks naturally of tidal waves, war, ... and earthquakes. We just had one of the last-named here in central Italy, and - like all its brethren phenomena - it has left me checking my reality.
The first impetus to do so came in the middle of dreamtime just over a week ago, when a shaking bed bothered me awake. After looking to see if our new family acquisition, Zack the "well-built" ginger tabby, was the cause - he was nowhere to be found - Maria and I exchanged thoughts: "Was that an earth tremor?" I agreed without fully believing it.
After feeling five of the countless aftershocks - including one last night (April 14th) - I'm now believing. The ruins of L'Aquila and its neighbouring towns ... the 294 dead ... the 1000-plus injured ... the 40,000 homeless ... all make it dreadfully, thought-provokingly real.
In planetary terms, it was a mere shudder, a shiver up the backbone - in this case the spine of the Apennines, which run down the middle of central Italy. In geological terms, it was caused by friction between the African and Eurasian tectonic plates - Africa is supposedly marching north towards Europe at the rate of 2 cm a year (invoking all sorts of symbolic thoughts). In human terms, it makes us realize how powerless and unmighty we are when measured against the sheer raw dominance of the earth as it flexes itself (for us ignorants) in apparently random jerks.
So much for economic crises, so much for border disputes, so much for nuclear arms races ... if we felt every one of the 6-plus-magnitude earthquakes that occur somewhere in the world every three days - we miss most because they occur out at sea - these other human-instigated things might seem less worthy to expend valuable energy on. I, for one, found Easter Sunday's exhilarating breezes on the Apennines a little more invigorating than normal as they blew over the proliferating crocuses sticking their heads out of the recently snow-free soil to check out what spring's all about.
Naturally Abruzzo's earthquake conjured memories in our area of the similar-strength 1997 earthquake that destroyed the Basilica of Assisi in Umbria just over the mountains, causing significant damage here in Le Marche as well. In fact, back in 2006 for the first 3 months of Julius's school life in Colmurano just 4 km away, he went to classes in a prefabricated building while the reparations of the main school's damages from the quake were being completed. While much of this lengthy restoration period can be ascribed to the lethargic leviathan that is Italian bureaucracy, it does give a sense of how long it will take before the poor people of L'Aquila can return to their homes.
One upshot of the 1997 quake was the increased stringency of building regulations on earthquake damage containment. Our house, for example, had to be fitted with a steel collar before it could pass structural muster. And maybe that's why it just felt like the bed was shaking the other night and not the whole house.
However, after all's said and done and we're finished with our existential reflections and spiritual confirmations, it really is quite something to live through, an earthquake. I've experienced a few, including a fairly major one in Los Angeles some 20 years ago, and on each occasion I've never failed to be in awe of what's happening in the moment when the whole building starts shaking. Everything stops. If someone's nearby, you look them more directly in the eye than at virtually any other time, and make a connection in that instant that few other experiences can match. Emotions, thoughts, physical sensations collide in an instant to provide an experience that can never quite be adequately described in words. And you're left with the deepest of memories, the most profound of reflections which arise from those singular glances - sometimes between strangers - when you look directly into each other's soul ...
The first impetus to do so came in the middle of dreamtime just over a week ago, when a shaking bed bothered me awake. After looking to see if our new family acquisition, Zack the "well-built" ginger tabby, was the cause - he was nowhere to be found - Maria and I exchanged thoughts: "Was that an earth tremor?" I agreed without fully believing it.
After feeling five of the countless aftershocks - including one last night (April 14th) - I'm now believing. The ruins of L'Aquila and its neighbouring towns ... the 294 dead ... the 1000-plus injured ... the 40,000 homeless ... all make it dreadfully, thought-provokingly real.
In planetary terms, it was a mere shudder, a shiver up the backbone - in this case the spine of the Apennines, which run down the middle of central Italy. In geological terms, it was caused by friction between the African and Eurasian tectonic plates - Africa is supposedly marching north towards Europe at the rate of 2 cm a year (invoking all sorts of symbolic thoughts). In human terms, it makes us realize how powerless and unmighty we are when measured against the sheer raw dominance of the earth as it flexes itself (for us ignorants) in apparently random jerks.
So much for economic crises, so much for border disputes, so much for nuclear arms races ... if we felt every one of the 6-plus-magnitude earthquakes that occur somewhere in the world every three days - we miss most because they occur out at sea - these other human-instigated things might seem less worthy to expend valuable energy on. I, for one, found Easter Sunday's exhilarating breezes on the Apennines a little more invigorating than normal as they blew over the proliferating crocuses sticking their heads out of the recently snow-free soil to check out what spring's all about.
Naturally Abruzzo's earthquake conjured memories in our area of the similar-strength 1997 earthquake that destroyed the Basilica of Assisi in Umbria just over the mountains, causing significant damage here in Le Marche as well. In fact, back in 2006 for the first 3 months of Julius's school life in Colmurano just 4 km away, he went to classes in a prefabricated building while the reparations of the main school's damages from the quake were being completed. While much of this lengthy restoration period can be ascribed to the lethargic leviathan that is Italian bureaucracy, it does give a sense of how long it will take before the poor people of L'Aquila can return to their homes.
One upshot of the 1997 quake was the increased stringency of building regulations on earthquake damage containment. Our house, for example, had to be fitted with a steel collar before it could pass structural muster. And maybe that's why it just felt like the bed was shaking the other night and not the whole house.
However, after all's said and done and we're finished with our existential reflections and spiritual confirmations, it really is quite something to live through, an earthquake. I've experienced a few, including a fairly major one in Los Angeles some 20 years ago, and on each occasion I've never failed to be in awe of what's happening in the moment when the whole building starts shaking. Everything stops. If someone's nearby, you look them more directly in the eye than at virtually any other time, and make a connection in that instant that few other experiences can match. Emotions, thoughts, physical sensations collide in an instant to provide an experience that can never quite be adequately described in words. And you're left with the deepest of memories, the most profound of reflections which arise from those singular glances - sometimes between strangers - when you look directly into each other's soul ...
Friday, January 16, 2009
It's been a while...
I think I recognize this place, I was here about a month ago. But it seems like an awfully long time ago, during which rather a lot has taken place.
First there was Christmas, enjoyed with 3 other English and Italian families, and then the trip to a bitterly cold Germany for an enjoyable family time and social New Year's celebration. Even though Maria did most of the driving (not least because we went in her car), and it's entirely on 2/3-lane highways (i.e. it's not complicated driving), I must say it's a long 1,060 km journey up there and back - 12 hours each way, thanks to traffic buildup in a few places - and doing it 3 times a year as Maria did in 2008 would be daunting for me. But it's no surprise that she did, the option to be able to hop in a car at short notice to go and see her aging parents being one of the motivators to move here in the first place - not so easy when you're 3 expensive flights and an ocean away as we were in North Carolina.
Then - as it has been for the last 13 years and will always be the case - just a week after the seasonal festivities were eking their last (January 6th - Epiphany or La Befana in Italy - is a big holiday here), HRH's birthday was upon us (on January 8th). This year was different, though - he officially became a teenager, even though he's been practicing at it unofficially for some time. Pretty low key, all in all, despite the momentous milestone that it was. Even our ruse to take him out of school for the day in order to give him his first skiing experience was scuppered - it was a total white-out up at our local ski resort, Sassotetto, and we had to "resort" to sledding blind down the deserted ski slopes - visibility was less than 10m. (There are a couple of photos on my Facebook page of the new towering teenager.)
But these aren't the reasons for the delay in keeping this blog up to date. It's rather the fault of a new initiative I've started with an English friend here - a monthly magazine in English about life and events in our province, Macerata. With modest initial intentions, we started with an email transmission to a list we developed from our own contacts, and after two months it's grown organically by about 50%. Feedback has been positive, and we're now looking at approaching advertisers, and indeed have been approached by one or two already. So far so good.
But it takes an awful amount of time, hence my absence from this place. One of the most frustrating parts of it is dealing with the local municipalities (comuni), who we're fairly reliant upon for the events (festivals, music and dance performances, etc) that form a core part of the magazine's motivation. Our first edition had a rather inauspicious start, at least as far as Tolentino and Sarnano were concerned - we received Tolentino's listing of December events on the 12th (of December), and Sarnano's on the 16th! The magazine goes out on the first of the month, as it should do to be useful for the month in question. I must have made over a dozen calls to my contact in Tolentino, every one of which yielded a promise to get me the info "the next day", and two personal visits to my Sarnano contact produced that quintessential Italian gesture that I've now become so familiar with - the shrug of the shoulders.
But on we tread. And it feels good. Not having had a consistent, ongoing "job" for a while, and finding the adjustment from employed to self-employed to be a real "learning" experience, having monthly deadlines is actually rather refreshing.
Not to mention, of course, the fact that I'm in charge of the monthly wine column, which entails visits to all the wineries in the province ...
(If anyone's interested in receiving a copy of Macerata Monthly, send me an email at duncan@maceratamonthly.com. So far we're simply sending out a PDF copy by email. We'll probably post them online at some point in the future, but I'm not sure when. As I said, it's a modest beginning...)
First there was Christmas, enjoyed with 3 other English and Italian families, and then the trip to a bitterly cold Germany for an enjoyable family time and social New Year's celebration. Even though Maria did most of the driving (not least because we went in her car), and it's entirely on 2/3-lane highways (i.e. it's not complicated driving), I must say it's a long 1,060 km journey up there and back - 12 hours each way, thanks to traffic buildup in a few places - and doing it 3 times a year as Maria did in 2008 would be daunting for me. But it's no surprise that she did, the option to be able to hop in a car at short notice to go and see her aging parents being one of the motivators to move here in the first place - not so easy when you're 3 expensive flights and an ocean away as we were in North Carolina.
Then - as it has been for the last 13 years and will always be the case - just a week after the seasonal festivities were eking their last (January 6th - Epiphany or La Befana in Italy - is a big holiday here), HRH's birthday was upon us (on January 8th). This year was different, though - he officially became a teenager, even though he's been practicing at it unofficially for some time. Pretty low key, all in all, despite the momentous milestone that it was. Even our ruse to take him out of school for the day in order to give him his first skiing experience was scuppered - it was a total white-out up at our local ski resort, Sassotetto, and we had to "resort" to sledding blind down the deserted ski slopes - visibility was less than 10m. (There are a couple of photos on my Facebook page of the new towering teenager.)
But these aren't the reasons for the delay in keeping this blog up to date. It's rather the fault of a new initiative I've started with an English friend here - a monthly magazine in English about life and events in our province, Macerata. With modest initial intentions, we started with an email transmission to a list we developed from our own contacts, and after two months it's grown organically by about 50%. Feedback has been positive, and we're now looking at approaching advertisers, and indeed have been approached by one or two already. So far so good.
But it takes an awful amount of time, hence my absence from this place. One of the most frustrating parts of it is dealing with the local municipalities (comuni), who we're fairly reliant upon for the events (festivals, music and dance performances, etc) that form a core part of the magazine's motivation. Our first edition had a rather inauspicious start, at least as far as Tolentino and Sarnano were concerned - we received Tolentino's listing of December events on the 12th (of December), and Sarnano's on the 16th! The magazine goes out on the first of the month, as it should do to be useful for the month in question. I must have made over a dozen calls to my contact in Tolentino, every one of which yielded a promise to get me the info "the next day", and two personal visits to my Sarnano contact produced that quintessential Italian gesture that I've now become so familiar with - the shrug of the shoulders.
But on we tread. And it feels good. Not having had a consistent, ongoing "job" for a while, and finding the adjustment from employed to self-employed to be a real "learning" experience, having monthly deadlines is actually rather refreshing.
Not to mention, of course, the fact that I'm in charge of the monthly wine column, which entails visits to all the wineries in the province ...
(If anyone's interested in receiving a copy of Macerata Monthly, send me an email at duncan@maceratamonthly.com. So far we're simply sending out a PDF copy by email. We'll probably post them online at some point in the future, but I'm not sure when. As I said, it's a modest beginning...)
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Drifting a little off the subject
This is a slight – OK, significant – departure from the normal subject of these blogs, but after reading a few articles recently, there’s something inside that’s just compelling me to pass comment. I found the articles in question on the BBC web site – my primary source of news – under the Science category, an occasional destination for me when I see a headline that piques my natural affinity for things extraterrestrial.
You can read the articles in their entirety here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7774287.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7660449.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7725584.stm
Now it’s worth pointing out that I have an innate fascination for things related to journeys into space and the search for other worlds “out there”, so my mind is probably more open than most when reports are subject to the personal credibility test. Even so, wandering through the corridors of the BBC’s space reports is like stepping into another world, and they’re always worth the visit. But these three reports took an extraterrestrial step just a little beyond my credibility threshold, and they left me with an overriding question – are they really serious?
The obvious answer is “Of course they are, these people dedicate their lives to their quest,” and I have to admire them for it. But just scanning through the names involved seems to indicate that it’s a kind of club – Shoskar, Gabriel Gatehouse, Oli Madgett, Charkin, McCaughrean … did they change their names when they chose their vocation, or did their professions choose them? I suspect that if I applied for a job at the Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence Institute, my application would be rejected when they got to “Name”.
Working in these fields also without doubt requires a mind that relishes the prospect of knotting itself into contorted, labyrinthine blobs on a daily basis. Just take the concept of a black hole, for instance. It’s defined as an object whose gravity is so great that nothing – including light – can escape them. Now I have an analytical mind, and like to think that I can occasionally get my head around complex concepts, but this one has my synapses firing off without reply into the very stratosphere where such dark cavities are “found”. Gravity … light … bedfellows … ?
They then go and compound the issue by telling me that the black hole they discovered in our galaxy is four million times heavier than our Sun, which itself – as we all know – weighs a mere two billion billion billion tons, or – more familiarly – 220 duodecillion pounds. Also that it’s 158 thousand, million, million miles from the Earth. Say what now? How heavy and how far? How do they know this, and can I check their calculations? What sort of scale did they use to weigh these things, and what kind of ruler to get the distance? Seems like they rounded off quite heavily there too, immediately raising my suspicions. At least if they’d put it in terms I could relate to – like how many elephants or how many trips to the grocery store, for instance – I might have been able to relate.
Not surprisingly, the observations were made with the Very Scientifically-Named Very Large Telescope – affectionately and curiously known as the “VLT” – in
Thankfully, we don’t need to answer these questions, and we can comfortably move on to the next, particularly satisfying phase of every science study – coining new terms. I’m not sure if coming up with this one to describe the size of this black hole also took 16 years, but they can be confident they came up with a real doozy – “super-massive.” I kid you not. What are they going to call it if they find an even bigger one? Super-duper-massive? Incredibly-mind-bogglingly-huge? So-unbelievably-big-that-it-dwarfs-the-last-one-by-three-duodecillion-times?
Moving on and talking of competitiveness, it seems that the burgeoning social networking movement doesn’t want to be left behind. Either that or they’re on a serious membership drive – they (Bebo) sent out an electronic package to a planet just around the corner, some 20 light years away. According to the report: “Some 501 photos, drawings and text messages were transmitted on Thursday by a giant radio-telescope in
Now that’s all very well, but does this planet have PayPal so they can sign up? And do they have a reliable internet connection? After all, it’s only going to reach there in 2029, by which time all Bebo’s members would have solved Saturday night’s date problem, and even if they hadn’t, how could you be sure that the message’s recipients didn’t age badly?
One of the article’s more illuminating quotes suggests that we may not get a reply: “So if anybody's out there and they find that signal, they at least know it that, in the direction of that star system over there, there must be a planet with some pretty clever things on it.” If this quote is any indication of what’s in that electronic package, I suspect that the recipients might make the Very Disruptive Decision to go and colonize a planet a little further away.
One last thing puzzles me too. The target they chose was a planet called Gliese 581C – why? What was wrong with Gliese 581A and B? Or, for that matter, the exoplanet Fomalhaut b or the three that orbit the star HR 8799?
This last option is the subject of the third article, which raises some teasers of its own. First off, who gets to name stars and planets? For example, I wonder how the residents of Formalhout b would take to being named after a fallen angel and a gatekeeper in Italian witchcraft? And not even an A-grade one at that. At least I’d be able to counter their complaints by saying their name has a little more character than the inhabitants of the HR 8799 solar system can claim. After all, if hurricanes – which are a tad more transient than planets, even if they are full of character – get real names, why not stars? At first blush it appears that there are multiple planet- and star-naming committees, some drawing on their passion for folklore, others on their favourite chemical formula, and yet others opting for a dart-in-the-board method. While they’re at it, why not take suggestions, or name the planets after real people – Bart, or Yogi, or Joe, for instance.
One other thing that emerges from the third article is the apparent reversion in planetary science to terms we can relate to. “Super-massive” broke new ground that way. Now there’s “wobble”, which is what an exoplanet induces in its parent star. It would somehow give me a sense of comfort and confidence if I were selected for a manned space mission to search for life in a far-off solar system, knowing that its star had “wobbled” in the telescopes of astronomers some 11 billion miles away.
But I’m taking things out of context here, and the article clearly states that the “wobble” method is passé. Things have moved on since then, and with today’s technology, they’ve been able to detect that Formalhout b is “the coolest, lowest-mass object ever seen outside our own solar neighbourhood.” How about that as an advertisement – cool and low-mass, bound to fill up its social calendar in a heartbeat. Needless to say, personal visits would only be possible for those able to cover those less-than-precisely-calculated 11 billion miles within a reasonable time, not to mention access to a warm wardrobe. You’d also need to have faith in the assertion of the scientists that it is indeed the coolest and lowest-mass, and be sure that they had no ulterior motive in promoting it thus.
Perhaps the most revealing of indications comes from the concluding quote of the third article – astronomers indeed have a sense of humour, or at least a colourful way of expressing themselves to those of us who spend most of our time on terra firma. When reflecting on the fact that not just one, but three exoplanets have recently been detected, astrophysicist Mark McCaughrean had this to say: “It's like a
And it wouldn’t surprise or concern me if sometime in the future they all had the last laugh at the expense of tongue-in-cheek people like me. After all, while Copernicus was encouraged to publish his heliocentric model – placing the sun at the center of our solar system – in the early 16th century, he delayed it, perhaps for fear of the reaction to his claims. Even then, the heliocentric model had been around for over 2,000 years, first emerging in
So who knows – maybe
Monday, December 08, 2008
Olive picking
It's olive-picking time. November-December, generally. Last year's crop was poor thanks to the lack of rain. This year's is better due the late rains we got in September-October. Last year, our singular tree - buried as it was by others of different varieties around it - produced a total of four olives! This year it was full.
I've covered the mechanics of the process in a previous blog post (here), so won't go into it now. But a couple of things caught my attention this year, prompting this post.
First, I was struck by the tradition of it when I took my chain-saw for the umpteenth time to the local garden machinery repair man. (In our city days, I used to have a dry-cleaning guy; now I have a chain-saw man.) His father, an ever-present fixture at his workshop, hovers around seeking conversation at every opportunity. A few weeks ago he cornered me as soon as I walked in and asked me if we'd finished picking our olives. No clearance check to even see if we had any olive trees to begin with - he just assumed it. After all, why would you live out here if you didn't have any?
He then proceeded to tell me of all the mishaps he'd heard about - a 70-year-old that fell off his ladder to his death in Macerata, an 80-year-old that broke his arm in Loro Piceno, another anziano (senior citizen) who got badly scratched in a fall. Now this is a wide swath of territory that he's talking about, testimony to the enduring efficiency of the bush telegraph. And it's also a dangerous business too, one that's responsible for its fair share of population culling, it seems.
But more than all that it's a testament to the powerful nature of the cycles that still exist out here in the country. November - olive-picking time. No question, there is nothing else. It's porobably more prevalent and deep-rooted as a tradition for the elders than it is for the merely middle-aged, who see it more as a task than anything. So its gravity may be on the wane, leaving me thankful for the old guy who's genuinely interested in our lonely little olive tree.
Second, we're helping some other neighbours - Teresa and Franco - pick their trees this year. They're both in or near their seventies, and have just a daughter to help them with their task. And it's a big one - they have some 450 trees. That's a lot, when it takes a good twenty minutes to a half-hour to clear just one (moderately-fruited) tree.
Now you can't pick the olives when they're wet, and you can't pick in the dark either, so with the surfeit of precipitation we've had lately - combined with the early hour that the sun takes its leave these days - opportunities to clear those trees have been limited. Once the serious frost arrives, or the last appointment for delivery to the olive press comes and goes (for them it's December 15th), it's all over, and the olives will simply be left to rot on the trees.
That's a real shame in anyone's language, but to Teresa it's more like a tragedy. She's an avid biodynamic farmer - simply put, one who works closely with nature's innate cycles, properties, and spirit to nurture her charges - and so she really cares for her plants and their offspring (even if they're destined for the dinner table). And so these various situational aspects have conspired to add to their stress to get it all done.
Being biodynamic also precludes the use of mechanical devices - or at least automated ones - since they have the potential to bruise the olives and stress the trees. So it must all be done by hand. Luckily their trees are all of a stature that ladders are not required, and some of them are not laden with olives.
But 450 - that's a lot, and so we've been helping. I use the term "we" here more liberally than I should - I've been there three days now, Maria's been there probably more than ten. We're still shy of being two-thirds done, and judging by the speed and the weather, I'm not sure they'll all get harvested. Real pity.
On a crisp, clear early-winter's day, when the sun's shining and the effort eventually prompts the pullover to be discarded, it's a classic pastime. Zen comes immediately to mind - breathe, pick, clear the mind, feel the touch of the silvery-green leaves, the smooth skin of the olives, clear the mind, breathe, pick ... Not to mention the chance to exercise my spotty Italian - neither Teresa nor Franco speak English (Teresa speaks a little, but not really enough for a conversation).
And that's why I have to sign off now - to go and pay homage to this age-old tradition, to exercise my spotty Italian, to get my dose of Zen meditation for the day, and to help out some neighbours. Just another day in the Italian countryside.
I've covered the mechanics of the process in a previous blog post (here), so won't go into it now. But a couple of things caught my attention this year, prompting this post.
First, I was struck by the tradition of it when I took my chain-saw for the umpteenth time to the local garden machinery repair man. (In our city days, I used to have a dry-cleaning guy; now I have a chain-saw man.) His father, an ever-present fixture at his workshop, hovers around seeking conversation at every opportunity. A few weeks ago he cornered me as soon as I walked in and asked me if we'd finished picking our olives. No clearance check to even see if we had any olive trees to begin with - he just assumed it. After all, why would you live out here if you didn't have any?
He then proceeded to tell me of all the mishaps he'd heard about - a 70-year-old that fell off his ladder to his death in Macerata, an 80-year-old that broke his arm in Loro Piceno, another anziano (senior citizen) who got badly scratched in a fall. Now this is a wide swath of territory that he's talking about, testimony to the enduring efficiency of the bush telegraph. And it's also a dangerous business too, one that's responsible for its fair share of population culling, it seems.
But more than all that it's a testament to the powerful nature of the cycles that still exist out here in the country. November - olive-picking time. No question, there is nothing else. It's porobably more prevalent and deep-rooted as a tradition for the elders than it is for the merely middle-aged, who see it more as a task than anything. So its gravity may be on the wane, leaving me thankful for the old guy who's genuinely interested in our lonely little olive tree.
Second, we're helping some other neighbours - Teresa and Franco - pick their trees this year. They're both in or near their seventies, and have just a daughter to help them with their task. And it's a big one - they have some 450 trees. That's a lot, when it takes a good twenty minutes to a half-hour to clear just one (moderately-fruited) tree.
Now you can't pick the olives when they're wet, and you can't pick in the dark either, so with the surfeit of precipitation we've had lately - combined with the early hour that the sun takes its leave these days - opportunities to clear those trees have been limited. Once the serious frost arrives, or the last appointment for delivery to the olive press comes and goes (for them it's December 15th), it's all over, and the olives will simply be left to rot on the trees.
That's a real shame in anyone's language, but to Teresa it's more like a tragedy. She's an avid biodynamic farmer - simply put, one who works closely with nature's innate cycles, properties, and spirit to nurture her charges - and so she really cares for her plants and their offspring (even if they're destined for the dinner table). And so these various situational aspects have conspired to add to their stress to get it all done.
Being biodynamic also precludes the use of mechanical devices - or at least automated ones - since they have the potential to bruise the olives and stress the trees. So it must all be done by hand. Luckily their trees are all of a stature that ladders are not required, and some of them are not laden with olives.
But 450 - that's a lot, and so we've been helping. I use the term "we" here more liberally than I should - I've been there three days now, Maria's been there probably more than ten. We're still shy of being two-thirds done, and judging by the speed and the weather, I'm not sure they'll all get harvested. Real pity.
On a crisp, clear early-winter's day, when the sun's shining and the effort eventually prompts the pullover to be discarded, it's a classic pastime. Zen comes immediately to mind - breathe, pick, clear the mind, feel the touch of the silvery-green leaves, the smooth skin of the olives, clear the mind, breathe, pick ... Not to mention the chance to exercise my spotty Italian - neither Teresa nor Franco speak English (Teresa speaks a little, but not really enough for a conversation).
And that's why I have to sign off now - to go and pay homage to this age-old tradition, to exercise my spotty Italian, to get my dose of Zen meditation for the day, and to help out some neighbours. Just another day in the Italian countryside.
Friday, November 07, 2008
Silvio and Barack
Not surprisingly, the euphoria emanating from the US on November 5th drifted across the Atlantic to Europe, permeating the atmosphere with an equivalent spirit of hope and promise. Perhaps equally unsurprisingly, one of the first - and arguably the most enthusiastic - of the European leaders to come out with a positive message of congratulations was French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who said: "At a time when we must face huge challenges together, your election has raised enormous hope in France, in Europe and beyond." Others followed - Gordon Brown referred to Obama as "inspirational," "energising," and "progressive," hailing his "vision for the future." Others such as Angela Merkel and Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin were more circumspect, but they were generally positive, and they were all quick to comment.
All except Italy, that is. I kept waiting and searching for an official Italian reaction to the result. Nothing. Perhaps not surprising given the cronyism Berlusconi and Bush practiced. But really - for an event that captured the world's attention, when virtually everything else stood still, surely the Italian leadership could offer more than an awkward and deafening silence? Niente.
Until today. Berlusconi was in Russia this week, and in a press conference, he made his first public reference to the US elections. (At least it was the first that I've read.) And boy was it a clanger - he referred to Obama as "young, handsome, and tanned." Now I must confess that we can't for one moment say we're not used to Silvio's proclivity for back-handers, crudity, and chauvinism, but honestly, doesn't the man have just one classy cell in his decrepit body?
Needless to say, his opponents were quick to jump out in criticism, just as his supporters - at least the few mildly sensitive ones - were no doubt scuttling for the shadows. And what did our noble prime minister do? Called his critics "imbeciles", of course, claiming instead that it was "a great compliment." I haven't been able to canvass any of my neighbours on their reaction to his PR finery, but I can imagine that most will react much as they do, for example, to a foreigner's incomprehensible rantings about the Italian postal service - a shrug of the shoulders, interpretable thus: "That's Berlusconi, what else did you expect?"
Indeed. He's truly a law unto himself, and the product of a unique culture, full as it is of peculiarities and contradictions. Recently the man enacted a law that places members of certain offices (including his own, of course) above the law. In other words, all the corruption charges against him that lie wallowing in the glacial Italian courts are now irrelevant (or at least more irrelevant than they were, if that's possible). And by the time he's ousted from power, the statute of limitations will render those charges as valid as they are now.
I have to believe, though, that the "Obama effect" will have some effect on the youth of this country, and mobilize them into some degree of political awareness. But who knows, Berlusconi's term runs for another four-plus years, and that's a long time for political memory and consciousness to endure.
However, at a minimum everything points to Berlusconi losing his moniker as the US President's biggest pal. Hopefully that'll end up marginalizing him in the power corridors of Europe, and he'll finally be revealed as the fraud and crook that he is. I suspect, though, that this is all just wishful thinking - with Italy's anemic contribution to the Eurozone's faltering GDP, it's just not that important to the Germanies and the Britains and the Frances of this world: whoever the Italians want as their leader, let them have him, they've only got themselves to blame.
So here we, tingling in the afterglow of a historic global event, living in a country whose leader at best makes light of it, and at worst spews out barely-disguised racial insults. Meanwhile, the average Italian gets on with his or her life, struggling to make ends meet, ignoring him as they would an embarassing family member.
As for me, my lot doesn't really change much, I suppose, given my choice of challenge and discovery living in this country. But out here in the rolling hills of Le Marche, I'm thrilled to see the spirit of a nation rise up and bellow its undeniable wish for change. Each day now I feel I can get up with just a little more hope ... and the recognition that, along with millions of others, my vote did actually make a difference.
All except Italy, that is. I kept waiting and searching for an official Italian reaction to the result. Nothing. Perhaps not surprising given the cronyism Berlusconi and Bush practiced. But really - for an event that captured the world's attention, when virtually everything else stood still, surely the Italian leadership could offer more than an awkward and deafening silence? Niente.
Until today. Berlusconi was in Russia this week, and in a press conference, he made his first public reference to the US elections. (At least it was the first that I've read.) And boy was it a clanger - he referred to Obama as "young, handsome, and tanned." Now I must confess that we can't for one moment say we're not used to Silvio's proclivity for back-handers, crudity, and chauvinism, but honestly, doesn't the man have just one classy cell in his decrepit body?
Needless to say, his opponents were quick to jump out in criticism, just as his supporters - at least the few mildly sensitive ones - were no doubt scuttling for the shadows. And what did our noble prime minister do? Called his critics "imbeciles", of course, claiming instead that it was "a great compliment." I haven't been able to canvass any of my neighbours on their reaction to his PR finery, but I can imagine that most will react much as they do, for example, to a foreigner's incomprehensible rantings about the Italian postal service - a shrug of the shoulders, interpretable thus: "That's Berlusconi, what else did you expect?"
Indeed. He's truly a law unto himself, and the product of a unique culture, full as it is of peculiarities and contradictions. Recently the man enacted a law that places members of certain offices (including his own, of course) above the law. In other words, all the corruption charges against him that lie wallowing in the glacial Italian courts are now irrelevant (or at least more irrelevant than they were, if that's possible). And by the time he's ousted from power, the statute of limitations will render those charges as valid as they are now.
I have to believe, though, that the "Obama effect" will have some effect on the youth of this country, and mobilize them into some degree of political awareness. But who knows, Berlusconi's term runs for another four-plus years, and that's a long time for political memory and consciousness to endure.
However, at a minimum everything points to Berlusconi losing his moniker as the US President's biggest pal. Hopefully that'll end up marginalizing him in the power corridors of Europe, and he'll finally be revealed as the fraud and crook that he is. I suspect, though, that this is all just wishful thinking - with Italy's anemic contribution to the Eurozone's faltering GDP, it's just not that important to the Germanies and the Britains and the Frances of this world: whoever the Italians want as their leader, let them have him, they've only got themselves to blame.
So here we, tingling in the afterglow of a historic global event, living in a country whose leader at best makes light of it, and at worst spews out barely-disguised racial insults. Meanwhile, the average Italian gets on with his or her life, struggling to make ends meet, ignoring him as they would an embarassing family member.
As for me, my lot doesn't really change much, I suppose, given my choice of challenge and discovery living in this country. But out here in the rolling hills of Le Marche, I'm thrilled to see the spirit of a nation rise up and bellow its undeniable wish for change. Each day now I feel I can get up with just a little more hope ... and the recognition that, along with millions of others, my vote did actually make a difference.
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