Back from the USA

Back home. Heat. Absolute quite. Parking paradise.
It is August and everyone is still away.
But we are here. Juggling jet-lag, finishing off work upstairs with our Romanian workmen and shuffling our son back and forth to volley practice morning and afternoon while he navigates the empty city streets with his "foglio rosa" or driving permit.

Cross-cultural highlights from our US trip to Alaska and California.

Best air conditioning moment. Exiting the Fairbanks, Alaska airport into 50 degree (F) temperature with drizzle conditions only to enter a hotel shuttle van with blaring air conditioning -- a true cultural mystery. No oil shortage in Alaska for sure! Italians (and the rest of the world) will never, never understand the American obsession for extreme air conditioning.

Great signs telling us what to do and not to do: No diving into a hot tub?
And why would you try to climb on top of an oil pipeline, unless you were really, really stupid?
Notice the bullet holes? Guess that sign worked.

The food thing: just too much of it.
Mexican burritos for four (more like eight?).

Delta airline "snack" -- a choice of chips, granola bars (pure fats and sugar) or salted peanuts. First class got a wider variety of chips. How lucky!

Bus stop just outside Anchorage (tire blow) at 6:30. EVERYONE broke out the snack food, what else is there to do when a tire blows out but eat.

We had great food on our trip. Very often. No time interval to get hungry and the next meal was already on its way. We tried to have dinner at 10:00 in Santa Barbara, but at that hour you can only drink -- if you are over 21.

The drinking thing. My 18 and 19 year olds couldn't enter a bar with their 21 and 23 year old cousins even just to hear the band that was playing and have a coke....They all ended up hanging out in a hotel room instead. A great American experience, being carded and sent to hide out in a room. I suppose this produces responsible adults.

Organization: fantastic! Cruise West was the best, even under the stress of a tire blow-out. The timing, organization, attention to detail, customer service, care was amazing to watch -- American expectations in the sphere of customer service are indeed very high. We, instead, stood in awe as they catered to our every possible need.

Horizontal hierarchy: The captain, engineer, hotel manager were all there helping pass our luggage along up the plank together with their hard-working staff. Objective-driven teamwork at its best. No "barone" allowed, all for one and one for all. Almost shocking to watch.

Dryers: An Anchorage moment.

Nature: A Santa Barbara moment.

A domani,
E

Primo Maggio a Trento

Greetings from Trento.

I guess my cultural moment for the day is the odd inclusive feeling I am having as I intrude on my 19 year-old son's life. Over the past few days, we have been out to dinner one evening, an ice cream another and several walks about town -- all with one or more of his friends, meeting up off on as kids do. He is fine with having me hang around and so are his friends. They may leave me off before continuing the evening, but no one feels uncomfortable. Although this just may be a personal thing, I think that there is an "Italian family" component that leads to a different process for becoming independent.

In the meantime, I shall just enjoy my last day.

One note on "il primo maggio" that celebrates the worker. Like all non-Catholic holiudays, this one is also often full of tensions -- the relationship of the worker and society as both change over time. This has always been a day full of demonstrations on one side and concerts in the piazza on the other (to appease the masses).

Our "labor day" is instead a celebration of "work" not "the worker" -- the difference is subtle, but significant.

a domani,
E

April 25

Yesterday was a holiday, but you may be asking yourself, “why”?

A non-Catholic holiday is a rarity, and April 25 is one of three -- festive in some ways and full of tension in others. It’s about “liberation” and “resistance” -- a day to celebrate the birthday of Italian democracy and its rediscovered national independence. So why is it also full of tension? Italy is an old world yet young county and April 25th underlines the second. Although it achieved unification in 1860 (adding Rome in 1870), April 25, 1945 marks the beginning of Italy as a truly independent, democratic state, only 62 ago, and the wounds that were inflicted to reach this milestone are still not completely closed, opening annually to ooze for the occasion.

The Resistance (i partigiani) fought against the Fascist state (la Repubblica di Salò after September 8, 1943) and finally won out as Italy finished off WWII, with the support of the allies, on the “right” side. The political left and right come to arms on this day. The extreme left doesn’t like how the left in general has moved center stage. The right has its skeletons in the closet that it has locked away as it also moves center stage. But on this day, everyone is forced to remember and assess and judge and this can lead to demonstrations in piazza and lots of noise. It is never a tranquil day with picnics in the park.

President Napolitano spent the holiday on the island of Cefalonia in the Ionian Sea with his Greek counterpart. 9,600 out of 12,000 Italian soldiers were killed by Nazi forces on this idyllic island in the Fall of 1943. The two forces had only the day before been on the same side, but the tide turned, Italy joined the Allies and the Nazis attacked their new enemy. We visited this island a few summers ago and you still get a very real sense of this history and the blood shed on these pristine shores.



Prime Minister Romano Prodi (of the political left) back in Rome acknowledged that Italy “is on the road to political reconciliation, even if we still need more time.”

The Mayor of Milan, Letizia Moratti (of the political right), got a round of applause as she finished her intervention in the Piazza Duomo, “Long live free Milan, long live the Republic, long live Italy and…… long live the Resistance.” Maybe the time for political reconciliation is not so far off.

A domani,
E

Abbacchio al forno

I was just thinking about last Easter.

On Good Friday, I received a desperate phone call from my husband, “Come quick, a client delivered a gift that I can’t bring home on the motorino.” Before I could respond, he had hung up.

A little peeved at this trip to the office in late morning traffic, I grumbled on over only to find a lamb hanging over the small office refrigerator by the secretary’s desk. From head to tail it came up to my chest and now I understood the urgency and the motorino issue.

Off I rushed, with the item wrapped in a few bags on my outstretched arms like a corpse in the night, and into the arms of Stefano, my local macellaio before he closed shop at 1:30. He clucked at my good fortune and the fine work of art in my arms and took special care in cutting it up into manageable pieces, innards aside and all nicely wrapped in that special Italian meat-wrapping paper.

Well, we certainly had a proper Italian Easter family lunch on the terrace, complete with abbacchio al forno con patate. No mint jelly, though (we don't want to shock the natives).

I can see all you Americans out there grimacing at the thought of an entire, skinned animal being carried around, but guess what, it is the same thing that you find all nicely packaged in plastic at the supermarket. Funny though that while Americans are so far removed from "real" food in its primary state, there are so many more American vegetarians and vegans etc than Italian ones. Italians happily eat it all, in moderation, even with the whole works on the plate – fish heads and bones, lamb innards and whatever else, as long as it is fresh and well prepared.

All I can say, is that we all thoroughly enjoyed the best abbacchio ever – for sure it was fresh!

A domani,
E

The picture is from today. Stefano remembers my abbacchio from last year, but posed for me with a smaller version that was handy in the backroom.

Holiday Cards and Calls

Christmas cards arrive – from friends and family in the US. Phone calls and text messages with holiday greetings – from friends and family in Italy. Hmmmm there is a cultural difference here.

One is on the time front. We plan ahead in incremental linear steps – the family foto taken on summer vacation and later transformed into a card. Then comes the computer address lists, labels, stamps and the whole thing in the mail. The message is: I have been thinking about you for some time in order to get this card organized and in the mail. You have the honor of being on my Christmas card list and are therefore in my thoughts and heart. Here, there is a grand mad rush on Christmas Eve that barely leaves time for phone calls and text messages. The message is: I am thinking of you NOW and I really want to communicate that to you NOW – immediacy is the key.

Another is on the communication front. Italians are just part of a more oral oriented society. They talk, a lot, and a written note just seems aloof and impersonal. A card represents a one-sided communication in reference to a past emotional state, not a verbal interaction like a quick call with all its warmth and urgency.

I appreciate the cards and the calls and even the text messages. It is nice to be thought of during the holidays.

A domani,
E

Holiday Moments

Holidays bring on lots of "moments" even in the best of circumstances when surrounded by family and friends and your own long-standing rites and rituals. Living abroad during the holidays brings on a bit of nostalgia, even for the parts you didn’t really like – eggnog and elderly aunts with facial hair for example.

In Italy, Christmas has lots of its own rituals, which I pick and choose among, but it is mainly about food and family and the emphasis on food can bring on a cultural moment. Every conversation I overheard or participated in during the week before Christmas was about Christmas Eve and Christmas day menus and with whom each of these festive meals would be shared. No singing Christmas carols by the fireplace, very little talk about the gift giving part, none about the religious part, just food and food and more of it!

Appearances, attention to aesthetics, good taste and the grand “show” take the stage – a moment in the year for this fundamental aspect of Italian culture to stand up and shine in all its glory.

I decided to give myself a special gift and take a day off from La Bella Figura. For the first time in a few years, I spent Christmas with just my husband and two children and we went to the seaside south of Rome on the 24th for a nice fish lunch and walk on the empty beach in the warm winter sun -- everyone else was frantically preparing for Christmas eve dinner. We opened a few presents on the 24th from relatives and the rest on the 25th before sitting down to an American Christmas meal – which actually turned out to be a good looking show and tasty too!

Menu:
Cream of artichoke soup
Turkey with chestnut stuffing
Mashed potatoes, peas, carrots and pearl onions
No pumpkin pie though – no one likes it in my Italian family – just lots of pandoro, torrone and walnuts.
Vino novello to accompany it all and a round of espresso (no cappuccino) to finish it off.

Today’s menu: Turkey soup, of course!

Hope you all had a Buon Natale and Santo Stefano!

A domani,
E