It's the "Country" side

This morning I awoke to the sound of a rooster crowing. Actually, every morning this month, that rooster has been my wake up call. I do believe he gets up earlier every day, and usually before the first hint of daylight.

We live in a rural area of Italy. Growing up on a farm, as I did, and spending most of my career working on behalf of agribusiness organizations, as I have, seeing how another area farms is always interesting to me. Italy has given me no end of farming practices to observe and wonder about.

Vineyards are everywhere. Grapevines run along property lines, they border gardens, They cover patios. We have a grapevine in Iowa. I know how many grapes our one vine produces. It makes me wonder what everyone does with all the grapes. Do they all make wine or juice? Do they contract their vines to someone else who picks and processes? Are what appear to be 'garden' grapes really small farms?

Olive trees are also everywhere, in the valleys and climbing terraces to the top of the surrounding hills, interspersed with gardens. We’ve seen large bundles of netting and expect they must cover the trees to ward off birds. But what are the plastic bottles that hang from some trees for?

Four-foot by four-foot plastic cubes store irrigation water for gardens, but how do they irrigate farm fields? And are the fields of sunflowers grown for flowers or seeds or oil?

As a farm girl, I could spend another month here finding answers to all my questions.

One answer I already know is how to stop that rooster from crowing so early in the morning. But my neighbors may not agree.

Ciao!

Living with history

If you lived with a Roman aqueduct running through your yard, would you think about history differently?  I asked myself that today when we biked for a mile or so along the base of an aqueduct built in the 17^th Century that still stands between Guamo and Lucca, Italy.

The aqueducts run, literally, through peoples’ yards, they frame the entrances to restaurants, they span roads, villages, cities.

On the east coast, my niece and her family live in Pennsylvania, home to Gettysburg and the Liberty Bell. My feeling when visiting them is that history comes alive when you can walk in the field where President Lincoln gave his famous Gettysburg Address or see the chairs in Freedom Hall where Benjamin Franklin or Thomas Jefferson or James Adams debated the tenants of democracy.

How much more would that connection to those who came before be true if you lived in an area where history went back 500, 700, 1,000 years? What would that mean to the way you thought about your life and actions. What would that mean to the way you thought about preserving the environment or being involved in the issues of the day?

We in Iowa have a very short history. We have yet to celebrate our state’s bicentennial. We have the Effigy Mounds near Guttenburg, created by ancient peoples more than a thousand years ago. But these mounds are enclosed in a park and blend with the nature that surrounds them and covered them up until recent years. They do not have the same aura as a church built in 800 AD or the Roman aqueducts that might stand right outside your door.

History in Italy is literally at every turn in the road. I don’t have an answer. I’m just curious.

How do you think about the history of where you live? Would seeing an aqueduct outside your door ever become so common you forgot about it?

Ciao!

Celebrating a national Italian holiday

We hit the roads on our bikes this morning eager to burn off the energy we'd built up when an all-day rain kept us inside. At first we didn’t notice it, but by the time we reached our planned turn around point, we both remarked on how light the traffic was. What we noticed most was more bikers.

We didn’t think about why it was light. We were just grateful.  It made a Thursday ride feel more like Sunday.

Because we hadn’t been to the grocery on Wednesday, we elected to pick up a few things at the conclusion of our ride. I was apprehensive when we coasted to a stop in the completely empty supermarket parking lot. Not a car in sight. The store lights were dark.

We studied the signs on the doors. One sign explained that on Wednesday, they would be open the longer Thursday hours. Nothing said, and ‘Oh, by the way, we’ll be closed on Thursday.’

Is June 2 a holiday? Somehow we missed the memo. That would explain why the traffic was so light and why the supermarket – and every other story in the area (now that we paid attention) was closed. We fired up our Internet connection when we got back home.

Indeed, June 2 is an Italian national holiday celebrating the Festa della Repubblica. In 1946 Italians voted in favor of the republican form of government.

We remarked that very few holidays cause Dahl’s and Hy-Vee to close their doors. In fact, U.S. stores do land office business on most holidays.  So far, we haven’t seen fireworks. No parades. But people are taking a day off. We celebrated, too, by writing – again.

Since our refrigerator was all but empty, we were grateful the local deli was open. We picked up some pasta, an apple, and a bottle of wine.

We toast the Italian Festa della Repubblica. Salut!

Ciao!

In search of the perfect gelato

If you look up the definition of Italy in the dictionary, at least one of the entries must be ‘gelato.’ Gelato is ubiquitous.  Even bars sell gelato.

On our orientation tour of the neighborhood, our landlady pointed out two gelato places within walking distance of our house. One a local deli. One an artisanal company that specializes in only gelato. We have made it a nightly ritual to close out the day with a gelato cone from one of these places.

If you have not had gelato, it’s in the ice cream category - more creamy, with a more intense flavor, but with less butterfat. The flavors are wide ranging, including the common – strawberry and chocolate, to the more unusual – lemon, hazelnut, and coconut.

Gelato is so rich, the servings are small – often the size of a plum. And that’s just fine. A scoop or two of good gelato leaves you feeling decadent and pampered. Walking to get it makes it even more okay.

We debate which gelato is the best. Mary favors the lemon of Pappa Grappa – the artisanal gelato store. I am most fond of a coffee and chocolate combination at the local deli. We agree the gelato in Florence fell far short. Though we only tried one of hundreds of gelato stores.

The only bad gelato is one we can’t get. The artisanal place is only open Thursday – Tuesday. The deli is open every day, but we have walked there twice to find the gelato counter empty. Like tonight.

What is a day without gelato? Incomplete.

Ciao!