The wonderful photo above, by Alessia Pignetti, shows her grandmother using the iconic o'panar, a basket or bucket lift used to bring groceries up to apartments in and around the Naples area. Old apartments MINUS elevators PLUS a bucket PLUS some rope EQUALS Italian Ingenuity at its best. Italians have all sorts of roadblocks in their way as they live their Vita Bella, but still find ways to get around their problems. That's being a true, furbo Italian! The o'panar (also called a Panaro - bread basket) is an especially great tool for elderly nonnas, living in an un-airconditioned top floor apartment, in the heat of the City of Naples or Sorrento or other towns in Campania. Their legs perhaps failing from a lifetime of walking the many hills in their environment, o'panar is used daily to lift up deliveries of milk, cheese and eggs, produce, a fast food delivery, or other supplies brought to them by their never-too-far-away offspring. You can imagine how dangerous it can be when Nonna loads a couple of sharp knives or scissors into the bucket to send down to l'arrontino--the knife-sharpener--on his weekly visits! Instead of traditional wicker baskets, many nowadays use plastic buckets, but in a bright blue color--perhaps for visibility so that unaware passersby on the street below can see it coming down (often just dropped) and avoid being smashed in their testa. So, if you're even in Campania visiting Naples or Sorrento or Salerno... look up, or should I say, heads up! --Jerry Finzi Please, stop by our SURVEY and spend 60 seconds telling us how we could make our blog better! Grazie! Copyright, 2016, Jerry Finzi/Grand Voyage Italy - All rights reserved You can also follow Grand Voyage Italy on: Google+ StumbleUpon Tumblr
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Italians Becoming Americans: Columbus Park, Little Italy, NY - Shoeshine Boys Playing Marbles5/9/2016 Rome is getting old. In April, Romans celebrate its 2,769th birthday. (Complaining about catching up to the Beatles song, "When I'm 64" is a little ridiculous when compared to Rome's age). Every year in April, Rome celebrates its old age with parades and other events all around the city. One of the symbols of the Eternal city is the bronze she-wolf and symbol of Rome "Lupa Capitolina" which is now at the Capitoline museum. Rome's history begins with a legend of love, lust, jealously and murder almost three thousand years ago. The pagan god Mars, smitten by the beauty of a Vestal Virgin, made his way into her temple to sleep with her. When the disgraced Vestal gave birth to twin boys, remarkable for their size and beauty, the evil tribal king ordered the infants thrown in the Tiber River. The cradle containing the babies drifted downstream and washed ashore at the base of the Palatine hill, named for Pale, a goddess of shepherds. There, according to legend, a lupa (she-wolf) suckled the twins Romulus and Remus. Historians think the nursing wolf was more than likely a human woman--in Latin, the word Lupa was slang for prostitute, and brothels were known as lupanaria. During ongoing excavations on the Palatine hill, archaeologists recently discovered what could be the original lupercale, the cave that sheltered the twin boys and that later served as a shrine for their worship. As the boys grew, they were instrumental in building a small town on the banks of the Tiber. The Italian capital's official founding date is 21 April. On that date, according to the legend, the brothers got into a terrible argument over their town, and Romulus killed his brother Remus in order to declare himself both ruler and founder. Obviously pleased with himself (and, apparently, his recent murder of his brother), he named the new city after himself. Egotistical guy, huh? Archaeological research and discoveries suggests the date of the beginnings of Rome is roughly correct. They estimate that the area had actually been populated since about 1000 BC, but 753 BC symbolically and officially marks the beginning of the Rome we still see ruins of today. Since then, the city's had a fairly volatile trajectory: first a small Latin village, then capital of a giant Mediterranean empire, then a bit of a ghost town dominated by the Pope, before finally becoming capital once again of a reunited Italy in the 19th century. As the graph shows, the city's population grew dramatically over time. Look at the dip during the Fall of the Roman Empire at 476 AD and its growth after the late 1800s brought unification to Italy: The Roman roots are still at the core of modern day Rome---even the man hole covers, emblazoned with S.P.Q.R., the ancient Latin abbreviation for the Senatus Populusque Romani (the senate and people of Rome). Modern day Romans insist that the letters really stand for Sono pazzi questi Romani. (They're crazy, these Romans). Buon compleanno, Roma! --Jerry Finzi Please, stop by our SURVEY and spend 60 seconds telling us how we could make our blog better! Grazie! You can also follow Grand Voyage Italy on: Google+ StumbleUpon Tumblr When my father was a young immigrant man in Hoboken, NJ, he and his brother pooled their meager resources and bought what Dad called their "three legged horse" and cart. Because the horse was lame in one leg, they got a great deal on him. Apparently, the cart wasn't in great shape, either. But this allowed them the opportunity to take their cart down to the docks and sell fruit and vegetables to the sailors coming off the many ships docking in Hoboken at the time. They didn't make a lot of money, but it helped them survive...
In the same way many immigrant men started their own small street vendor businesses, that in many cases eventually evolved into brick and mortar shops where their entire family worked, or they would hire compatriots as they also emigrated from their home villages in Italy. Eventually these clusters of vendors, shops and tenements became the Little Italys of America, merging Italians into becoming true Americans. Italians didn't arrive with much money, but they did come with many varied skills: tailors, cheese makers, butchers, bakers, carpenters, masons and much, much more... --Jerry Finzi
Then one night driving back to our Cosona agriturismo in the dark of night, my headlights came upon a heard of sheep huddled near the roadside. I stopped to take a photo and out of the darkness we heard growling and barking from two sheep dogs. They were the white fluffy type--which are raised with the sheep as puppies. They think they ARE sheep, and do anything to protect their flock. Again, no shepherd, just the dogs doing their job. Most dogs in Italy are just pets. City dogs are usually tiny and leashed or carried. Many are cute. Lucas had a great time getting to know some of them. One of his favorites are the pugs we met in Matera we call the "Twins", although the owner said they weren't related. I imagine their real names are Francesco and Marcos. They look very Italian with their old man, social club, people-watching persona. In towns and cities you see many small lap dogs--small like everything else in Italy, perhaps due to the small apartments and homes. These dogs have personalities similar to the owners--some vibrant, others sweet and lazy, a few fat, all have an eye out for trouble, many are stubborn but all with those deep, passionate Italian eyes--like Giancarlo Gianinni has. However, I did see few owners of incredibly cute fluffy dogs treat them badly--smacking, hitting and even kicking to stop bad behavior. (Dog Whisperer where are you?) There was one "lady"--a mom--we saw in Vinci while having gelati... she was gabbing to her friend as she was walking and tripped over her little white dog, threw a fit and smacked him for tripping her! Even her kids had that same tail-between-their-legs look about them. Some people!
In Italy dogs are pretty much allowed everywhere--even in cafes and restaurants. There are some rules, although I don't think anyone cares about rules for dogs. For example, many towns have some pretty serious dog poop problems. I stepped in dog poop a few times, Lisa only once, but Lucas was luckier--few people seem to pick up after their pets. I've read that in cash strapped Naples, one new scheme for drumming up money is to start keeping a DNA database of dogs and then testing DNA in dog poop so they can hit owners up for fines as high as 700 bucks! No kidding. (Check it out here.) If they can't get the city workers to pick up the garbage, how are they going to get anyone to pick up after their dogs? People don't care because the government allows their city to remain filthy. And how many poop DNA inspectors would they need to hire? How are they going to get DNA samples of each and every one of the estimated 80,000 dogs pooping on the streets of Naples? How about trying to stop the humans in Naples from peeing on the streets? That would be progress indeed! Dog houses. I didn't see any like we have in the States, but I did see masonry ones. A dog has a nice life when he has fancy villa style digs in the courtyard of a villa or castle. It might be cold inside, but then again, this is Italy where a cool floor might help a dog get by during the Dog Days of October... --Jerry Finzi You can also follow Grand Voyage Italy on: Google+ StumbleUpon Tumblr Copyright 2016, Jerry Finzi/Grand Voyage Italy - All Rights Reserved
Some say Italians are strange. Perhaps so, but some of their strangeness might be due the the passionate and often unusual way they live their lives... and end them. Moka espresso pot pioneer and marketer, Renato Bialetti, died in February and was laid to rest. (Read the GVI article HERE) But he was not laid to rest in the way most Catholics are in Italy... With the deceased body being viewed and kissed by all, a procession to the cemetery on the outskirts of town, and the coffin placed into a concrete mausoleum with a photo of the person on the front plaque. You see, Alfonzo Bialetti, Renato's father, was the inventor of the Moka pot, but it was Renato who was the genius responsible for marketing the Moka as the world knows it today. It was his huge mustache that inspired the little character that is emblazoned on every Moka pot sold in the world. He is the one responsible for marketing the Moka to people outside of Italy and Europe. So it should be considered appropriate that as his last, big marketing campaign, Bialetti was was cremated and his ashes were placed in a huge Bialetti Moka pot. The priest from St. Thomas the Apostle in Montebuglio, Lombardy held a funeral mass, swung the incense around the Moka and put Renato to rest. In Italy, there is a lack of space for new burials, but this wasn't the reason for the cremation and placing Bialetti's ashes into a Moka. He will be interred in the family's cemetery plot in Omegna, Lombardy. Renato something knew about great public relations.
We all hope he will rest in eternal peace, that is, if all that espresso doesn't keep him up. Every time we pick up a Moka pot we'll imagine him inside... Jerry Finzi You can also follow Grand Voyage Italy on: Google+ StumbleUpon Tumblr The following video has Dion DiMucci in an interview talking about when his record company pushed him to record an Italian language version of Donna Donna the Prima Donna. It's an interesting and funny story of how the Italian version came about with a twist at the end... The next video has the audio of the Italian version (Donna La Prima Donna) as marketed in Italy in October of 1963 (with a bonus song... You're Mine.) The flip side of the Prima Donna record in Italy was Perchè ti amo (He'll only hurt you). And here's Dion singing Donna Donna the Prima Donna at a 2015 event in Las Vegas... This is the first post in a new series called Italians Becoming Americans in which I will post historic photos of what life was like for Italian immigrants when they first came to the United States. Enjoy the history... In 1903, Savino Di Palo made the decision to voyage to America. He left behind family, friends and his small farm, as many men (even my own grandfather) were doing to find a way out of the poverty and strife that was rampant in Italy at the time. He was from the small village of Montemilone, in the mountains of Basilicata. Savino opened a latteria (dairy) in New York’s Little Italy in 1910. It took 4 years for him to send for his family to join him in the new life. In 1925, Savino’s daughter Concetta, opened up a latteria of her own called Di Palo’s on the corner of Mott and Grand Streets. They sold handmade cheeses and fresh milk ladled from large milk cans, delivered fresh from nearby farms. They are still known for artisan cheeses and Italian specialties.
Di Palo's website. The Pontifical Swiss Guards have been protecting the Popes and the Vatican since 1506... think about that. Over 500 years of tradition and military valor. They may seem a bit frilly to modern eyes, but underneath the traditional Renaissance garb, they are all well trained, special forces selected especially from the Swiss Army for the Vatican detail. The Swiss Guard is also the smallest army in the world with typically only about 125 soldiers and officers serving at at a time. There are strict requirements: You must be a Swiss man, younger than 30, a minimum 5' 8" tall, be a Catholic with a high school diploma or higher. Your Swiss military service must be with good merits. You can't be married when you come into the Guard, but can marry later on. You must serve for at least two years at the Vatican. Guardsmen (no women yet) are paid a tax free salary of €1,300 per month. Many think that Michelangelo designed their uniforms, but actually their original uniforms were slight modifications of the outfits worn by the Swiss arm at that time with the addition of the crossed keys symbol of the Vatican. The modern uniforms we see when visiting the Vatican today are actually a redesign by one of the Guard's own... Commandant Jules Repond (1910-1921). Repond studied the frescoes in the Vatican itself for the inspiration that led to the colors of the Medici (blue, red, yellow) on the Guards medieval, (and what some see as) clown-like outfits. He also introduced the fairly simple beret as the main headgear, although the metal and ostrich feathered helmet (called a morion) are still used for full dress assembly (along with white gloves). The Pierrot-like ruffled collar was morphed into a simplistic white collar. For everyday outfits, they wear a simple purple uniform which still maintains a Renaissance flair. Although the Swiss Guard is supposed to be a rigidly trained, elite military group, Pope Francis sees it a bit differently. The Pope was angered after he saw a young Swiss guard standing outside his papal suite all night. The Pontiff told the young man to sit down for a rest, but the Guard replied that sitting was against strict orders. Apparently, the Pope replied, "I give the orders around here" and brought the guard a cappuccino. Because of this event and others he witnessed, Pope Francis fired the chief officer of the Guard, Colonel Daniel Rudolf Anrig for being "too strict" in 2014. Another deciding factor was Pope discovering that Colonel Anrig had moved into a luxurious apartment over the Swiss Guard's barracks in the Vatican. Still, the Swiss Guard remains a tough, intensely trained army to protect the both the Pope and the treasures contained at the Vatican and St. Peter's Basilica. There are the Guard that are apparent to all visitors, with their colorful dress, but there are also members with more stealthy duties akin to the U.S. Secret Service. Whenever you see the Pope in public, they surround him looking away from the Pontiff into the crowd. They all are packing some pretty serious heat: fully automatic and compact Sig 552 machine guns are hidden under their jackets. But don't write off the soldiers on public duty... they receive specialized training with their Renaissance-age weapons, and are very cable of using their 9-foot long steel pike to stop an attacker or terrorist. There is also a arsenal of weapons, both modern and old, that the soldiers train with constantly with. Of course, handguns are used... notably the SIG P220 pistol. Besides the Swiss Guard, the Pope and Vatican City itself is protected by the 200 year old Gendarmeria Corpo della Città del Vaticano (Gendarmerie Corps of Vatican City State)--its own uniformed police force. They are on duty in St. Peter's Square, direct traffic (both pedestrian and vehicular), and investigate crime within the Vatican City boundaries. Essentially, they are the State Police of Vatican City. They are even trained in counter-terrorism, explosive ordinance disposal and anti-sabotage techniques. In addition to all this, there is an infrastructure to go along with all of the Papal protection, led by the Inspector General of the Vatican. It's the Inspector General that leads security teams when the Pope has a state visit somewhere in the world.
As you can see, Pope Francis, and all that is contained in Vatican City are well protected... well proven by the 3 hour long lines trying to get into St. Peters Basilica! So, when visiting the Vatican, take all the photos of the Swiss Guard that you like... just remember, they are not clowns... they are real, workaday soldiers dedicated to their task-- to protect the Pontiff. --Jerry Finzi You can also follow Grand Voyage Italy on: Google+ StumbleUpon Tumblr Mother Mary Angelica of the Annunciation, a Franciscan nun (born Rita Antoinette Rizzo on April 20, 1923) passed away on Easter Sunday, March 27... a befitting day for the TV personality and founder of the broadcast cable television network Eternal Word Television Network (EWTN).
Mother Angelica began broadcasting religious programs from a garage TV studio in 1981 out of Birmingham, Alabama. Over the next twenty years, she developed a media network that included radio, TV, and internet channels as well as printed media. She hosted shows herself until her stroke in 2001 and then went to live in a cloistered monastery in Hanceville until her death at age 92 on March 27, 2016, Easter Sunday. As a young Catholic, all I knew about St. Joseph is what the nuns taught us: that he was a foster parent to Jesus; he worked as a carpenter; and that if your parents were selling their home, burying a little statue of him upside down in your garden would help get a buyer. As a grown man and a father to my Lucas, I realize that St. Joseph's real strength was as a father... He must have been a man of great faith and trust and love to accept Jesus as his own son. La Festa di San Giuseppe (Feast of St. Joseph) on March 19th in Italy is a saint day celebrating the mortal father of Jesus--namely, Joseph. There are two meanings for this day in Italy: as a Name Day to celebrate anyone with the name Giuseppe, Joseph, Josephine or Beppe, but also as La Festa del Papà (alternately, la Festa del Babbo), on which most Italians celebrate their fathers, as we do on Fathers Day. There are some interesting ways to celebrate, but of course, most involve food. For instance, artichokes come to market in March in Italy, so eating artichokes stuffed with a breadcrumb mixture is one way... the breadcrumbs represent sawdust, honoring St. Joseph's life as a carpenter. On St. Joseph's day, tradition calls for sprinkling breadcrumbs on pasta dishes rather than cheese. Then there is Pane di San Giuseppe in which bread dough is fashioned into crosses and other various shapes. Another cerebration dish to make to celebrate St. Joseph or your Dad (my father would have loved this) is to make Pasta cod Sarde (Pasta with Sardines), a traditional meal made with bucatini (hollow, spaghetti-like pasta), raisins, pignoli nuts, fennel, onions and sardines. Then there are the sweet treats... mainly sfinci (alt, sfinge). Some are made like profiteroles or cream puffs and stuffed or topped with either a custard or a sweet ricotta filling and topped with a sour cherry, while others are more like bready, sugared zeppole, some stuffed, some not. There are also others called Zeppole di San Giuseppe that are not bready like what we Italian-Americans buy at Italian festivals called zeppole but are like cream puffs. Bottom line, there are lots of sweets that are made to celebrate St. Joseph's Day, and in Italy, the word "zeppole" is used fairly broadly to refer to many types of fried or baked donuts. In Sicily, during the Middle Ages, people prayed to St. Joseph to bring rain and save them from starvation and drought. The rains came and so did the fava bean crop, which saved the people. Still today, fava beans are part of celebrating St. Joseph--by eating Maccu (a fava bean soup) and carrying a fava bean that has been blessed by a priest in their pocket for good fortune. In the United States, a tradition of wearing red clothing was started to offset the proximity of St. Patrick's Day on which people wear green. Apparently, there is no religious or other significance of wearing red on St. Joseph's Day. On Saturday night for St. Joseph's Day, and to honor my Dad I made a special pizza--a traditional Sfincione which was covered with breadcrumbs on top. My Dad was not a great carpenter, but always loved working with wood and his hands. When I was a boy, he held the wood as I would try using the saw. He was a truly great father, never judging, always there for me. Dad, you would have loved a couple of slices of Sfincione... We miss your smile, Sally Boy...
Americans might have a hard time understanding how big a holiday Pasqua (Easter) is to Italians. In the U.S., you might put Christmas as the number one holiday and Thanksgiving in second place. In Italy, Christmas is first and Easter is a very close second. In a way, Italians celebrate Easter in the same way as we celebrate and give thanks on Thanksgiving, except because of the Miracle of Christ that Easter represents, Italians are giving thanks to Jesus for proving the miracle of everlasting life by dying for our sins and being resurrected again. Easter is a time of rebirth and timed perfectly after a long winter. Easter has been celebrated on a spring Sunday since 325 AD. That is when the Nicean Council decided that Easter should be celebrated on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Spring Equinox, unless the first full moon also rose on a Sunday, in which case Easter would be celebrated the Sunday after that. Easter Sunday still adheres to these rules. Easter follows two other major religious time periods in Italy... First there's Carnevale, during which feasting is enjoyed before the second period... Lent (Quaresima in Italian), during which Christians mimic the forty days Christ spent fasting in the desert before suffering His fate on the cross. As a child, my family observed meatless Fridays but rarely gave up meat during Lent, but in the old days, Catholics were expected to give up far more during Lent: meat, eggs, milk and even fats. This is the reason why many consider the Tuesday before the commencement of Lent as "Fat Tuesday" or Martedì Grasso. People would have one last blast, eating pretty much everything they could that was on the banned list, before the more lean days of lent. During Lent there is the Italian Version of Father's Day, la Festa di San Giuseppe on March 19th. Then one week before Christ's resurrection on Easter Sunday, there is Palm Sunday, which Italians celebrate with the blessing of olive branches and palm leaves in church, celebrating Jesus' arrival in Jerusalem. Priests in Italy knock three times on the church door to symbolize Christ entering. During Lent, many also ask their local priest to bless their homes. Right before Easter Sunday is Holy Thursday, celebrated as la Missa in Cena Domini (the Mass of the Last Supper), during which the priest washes the feet of twelve members of the congregation to represent His Apostles. Next is Holy Friday when Jesus died on the cross, a big deal in the Catholic faith, but an even bigger deal in Italy. Every church has an afternoon mass (bells ring at 3pm) where there is typically a reenactment of the Passion of Christ is celebrated, complete with costumed people and Jesus carrying a large cross. On TV, the Passion is watched from people's homes. Right before Easter is Holy Saturday when a solemn mass is held without music or singing and late in the evening there is la Veglia di Pasqua (the Easter Vigil), one of the holiest times for Catholics... waiting for Jesus to rise again. Then of course on Sunday is Pasqua itself, with high masses held in every church throughout Italy. Most cities and villages have special festivals and celebrations, such as the Scoppio del Carro in Florence--the centerpiece of the celebration is towering cart with fireworks which has been displaying smoke and fire for three centuries. The Monday following Easter is known as Pasquetta (little Easter) which is also a national holiday when people stay home from work and spend the day with their families and friends. One of the more entertaining events held on Pasquetta is the Palio dell'Uovo (Egg Races) in the town of Tredozio, in Emilia-Romagna. Attendees dress in medieval costumes and have all sorts of competitions involving eggs... throwing, balancing, eating, etc. It's a colorful way to start the spring season. In the Sicilian town of Pietraperzia, thousands celebrate on Good Friday with the celebration called U Signuri di li fasci (Lord of the bands), when families tie large white ribbons onto a central large crucifix in the piazza, looking like a huge Maypole. This ritual has gone on since the year 12th century for each family in the town to make a solemn pledge of loyalty to Christ. On Easter Sunday in the Lombardy town of Bormio, the have an ancient folk festival called Il Pasquali with a procession of shepherds and shepherdesses dressed in traditional garb, along with a parade floats with various historical, religious and modern themes. And yes, Easter Eggs do lay a big part of the Easter celebrations in Italy. The Latin phrase "Omne vivum ex ovo" is very fitting for this special time of year. Translated it means, "All life comes from the egg." A great representation of the everlasting life and rebirth that Christ promised, and the new life all around Italy during the emerging Spring. Originally during Lent, hard boiled eggs were used to make eggs last longer as one of the few sources of protein during the long fasting season. In times past, they were dyed red on Good Friday to represent Christ's blood. Nowadays, besides ceramic decorative eggs and multicolored dyed eggs, the most popular trend is to give chocolate eggs as presents during the Easter season. On our modern Julian calendar, March is the third month of the year, but to ancient Romans, Martius (as it was called) was the first month of each new year. It makes sense when you think about it. Right now in Italy, the flowers are blooming all over the place. Things are growing, the weather is warm again and it makes sense to think of Spring as the beginning--the birth--of a new year. The Romans celebrated holidays from the first through the Ides of March (on the 15th) to bring in their New Year. The most important celebration on the Ides was to the god Jupiter, the supreme deity, but also to Anna Perenna, the goddess of the year itself. Anna Perenna was more popular with the plebeians of Rome who drank, played games and had picnics. Later, in Imperial Rome, the Ides began a week long celebration for several various festivals. The so called "Ides" of a given month refer to the midpoint of a month, for some months (like March) falling on the 16th, and on others falling on the 13th day--all governed by the phases of the moon. The Ides on the ancient Roman calendar was on the new year's first new moon. The Romans didn't use day numbers, but counted backwards from given points in the month... the Nones (5th or 7th, depending on the length of the month), the Ides (13th or 15th), and the Kalends (1st of the following month). Of course, we all know that in modern times, the Ides of March is the day that Julius Caesar was assassinated in 44 BC. Shakespeare tells the tale in his classical play Julius Caesar... Caesar was stabbed to death by a crowd of his opponents, with Brutus and Cassius at the lead. A seer foretold that Caesar would come to an end on the Ides, but when the day came he saw the seer on the street and laughed in his face, saying that nothing bad had happened, but the seer answered back, "...Yet". Recently, researchers think they have found the exact location of where Julius was stabbed 23 times by the group of senators... at the Largo di Torre Argentina, in the center of Rome not far from the Pantheon, known nowadays to tourists and Romans alike for the tram station adjacent to the site and all the feral cats that live among the ruins. Ancient texts always claimed that Caesar was killed in the Curia of Pompey, a theater at the site, but until recently no archeological evidence could be found. In 2012 a large concrete marker was found which was erected as a monument to Caesar by his loyal followers after his death... All those cats seem to be wandering and waiting for Caesars return... You can hear their call... "miao, miao... miao..." Oh, I almost forgot... Felix Annus Novus! (That's Happy New Year in Latin.) --Jerry Finzi You can also follow Grand Voyage Italy on: Google+ StumbleUpon Tumblr Click on the photo above to play the video of spaghetti being harvested I'm not a gullible man. Even as a boy, I wasn't one to believe everything I was told... I always asked questions. I read books, and my entire set of encyclopedia and my Atlas. I loved science and the arts. But as an 12 year old watching the old Jack Parr show in 1963, I tended to to go by the old adage, "Seeing is believing"--especially if you see it on TV! What I saw was a very legitimate sounding short documentary film with a very scholarly, British voice talking about the spaghetti harvest in Switzerland, but then mentioning the "tremendous scale of the Italian's... (harvest)" and the "vast spaghetti plantations in the Po valley". From that point on, until I was in my early twenties, I actually believed there was some sort of special tree or bush in Italy that produced some sort of spaghetti... fruit, pod or otherwise. It wasn't until I saw Jack Parr himself talking about the hoax on the Tonight Show in the early 1970s that I learned the embarrassing truth--a "truth" that I would argue about with my non-Italian friends growing up. Parr claimed they didn't get a single call about the segment--that people bought it hook, line and sinker. Ok, so maybe I was a bit gullible. But it was a very convincing documentary film, produced originally as a serious film for, of all things, a news show... and besides, I was only 12! On April 1, 1957--April F0ol's Day--the BBC television show Panorama aired the short "documentary" about the "spaghetti harvest" in Ticino, Switzerland. The film shows spaghetti trees ripe with long strands of spaghetti and a Swiss farming family harvesting by hand, putting the spaghetti into baskets and then carefully laying them out to dry in the "warm Alpine sun." Some viewers bought it entirely and called BBC to find out where they could buy some of the "real spaghetti". Many British gardeners wanted to know how to buy a spaghetti bush for their own garden. Others were very angry that a joke was portrayed as a serious subject on a real news program. Still others--like me--just tucked this into their knowledge banks, unquestioningly and carried it as a "truth" throughout their lives, being even more convinced every time they heard the expression "fresh pasta"... of course, that must be referring to the real stuff fresh picked from the trees! What did I know. Neither my Mother or Grandmother even made fresh spaghetti... only home made ravioli from time to time. I knew they didn't grow on trees! All I ever saw growing up was dried, boxed spaghetti--you know, the fake stuff. The following video gives a behind the scenes take on the Spaghetti Hoax story from a member of the Panorama production team who came up with the idea... The next video shows a further chapter of this hoax broadcast in 1967 in Britain explaining how the spaghetti crop was being ruined by a terrible pest--the spag-worm, or "troglodyte pasta" (of course, a troglodyte refers to a person so stupid because he lives in a cave). And then in 1978, San Giorgio Pasta produced a remake of the Spaghetti Hoax for one of their TV ads... And finally, cooking know-it-all, Martha Stewart (I'm not a fan) got into the act in 2009 with her own little spoof about her Spaghetti Bush, spago officinalis ("official string") trees. Well, I've had a lot more culinary education since being misled by that little April Fool's prank when I was young and impressionable: my Mom and Dad taught with every loving dish they put in front of me; Grandma taught me her authenticity; having home and studio in Manhattan for so many years where varied cuisines are around every corner also taught me; In my 30s, I finally learned how to cook from Julia Child, Craig Clairborne, Marcella Hazan, Mary Ann Esposito and Pierre Franey. I now make fresh pasta with my son, Lucas from time to time. And during our Voyage throughout Italy, I never saw a single strand of spaghetti on a bush, tree or vine. Ever. (I did look, just to be sure.) However, I have since learned that there are actually spaghetti alternatives that grow from Madre Terra. I even grew 2 foot long "snake" beans a few years ago that came pretty close. Here are a few veggie spaghetti alternatives... If you want to make your own, fresh "picked" veggie "spaghetti" at home, pick up a Premium Vegetable Spiralizer from Amazon. It's a lot easier than picking the spaghetti from the trees, collecting in baskets and spreading them out in the sun to dry...
(Damn you, Jack Parr!) --Jerry Finzi You can also follow Grand Voyage Italy on: Google+ StumbleUpon Tumblr When I was growing up in New Jersey, most of my Saturday afternoons would be spent in the Mayfair matinee watching two movies and cartoons for 55 cents. Another 50 cents or so would buy me a Coke, some pretzels and Junior Mints. Many of the films I saw in that dark movie palace were Abbott and Costello films. Lou Costello was the funniest person on the planet--at least to my 10 year old mindset. The photo above shows Lou and Marjorie Reynolds in The Time of their Lives about two Revolutionary War ghosts cursed to spend eternity at the well in which their bodies were dumped. It's one of the best Abbott and Costello films ever. Like me, Costello was also a Jersey boy. He was born Louis Francis Cristillo on March 6, 1906, in Paterson, New Jersey, the son of Helen Rege and Sebastiano Cristillo. His father was Calabrese and his mother had a mixed family background... Italian, French, and Irish. As kids, we always used his famous line, "I'm a baaad boy!" They are playing the old Abbott and Costello shows again on cable TV... watch a few just for a laugh. --Jerry Finzi You can also follow Grand Voyage Italy on: Google+ StumbleUpon Tumblr Members of Black Hand (la Mano Nera) arrested at Fairmont, W. VA.-The Mafia, more commonly known as the Black Hand in West Virginia, reared its ugly head in Marion County in 1908. The members of the Black Hand, all natives of Italy, had banded together with Frank Pisconeri as their president. They carried out a campaign of extortion throughout the county with their victims either Italians or Italians by descent.-(Marion Co Historical Society)
From Wikipedia: Black Hand (Italian: Mano Nera) was a type of extortion racket. It was a method of extortion, not a criminal organization as such, though gangsters of Camorra and the Mafia practiced it. According to a newspaper report in the New York Tribune of June 1912, the Black Hand "...really exists only as a phrase. As an organization such a thing never existed out of the minds of the police. It is a catch phrase made familiar through the newspapers, and the quick witted criminal of Latin extraction lost no time in using it as a nom de crime, which he wrote at the bottom of his blackmailing letters, sometimes - in fact, generally - adding fanciful decorations of his own, such as daggers dripping blood, revolvers spitting fire and bullets, crudely drawn skulls and crossbones and the inevitable sketch of a human hand." Origins The roots of the Black Hand can be traced to the Kingdom of Naples as early as the 1750s. However, the term as normally used in English specifically refers to the organization established by Italian immigrants in the United States during the 1880s who, though fluent in their Southern Italian regional dialects, had no access to Standard Italian or even a grammar school education. A minority of the immigrants formed criminal syndicates, living alongside each other. By 1900, Black Hand operations were firmly established in the Italian-American communities of major cities including New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, New Orleans, Scranton, San Francisco, Olean, NY and Detroit. In 1907, a Black Hand headquarters was discovered in Hillsville, Pennsylvania, a village located a few miles west of New Castle, Pennsylvania. The Black Hand in Hillsville established a school designed to train members in the use of the stiletto. Although more successful immigrants were usually targeted, possibly as many as 90% of Italian immigrants and workmen in New York and other communities were threatened with extortion. Typical Black Hand tactics involved sending a letter to a victim threatening bodily harm, kidnapping, arson, or murder. The letter demanded a specified amount of money to be delivered to a specific place. It was decorated with threatening symbols like a smoking gun, hangman's noose, skull, or knife dripping with blood or piercing a human heart, and was in many instances, signed with a hand, "held up in the universal gesture of warning", imprinted or drawn in thick black ink. According to author/historian Mike Dash, "it was this last feature that inspired a journalist writing for The New York Herald to refer to the communications as "Black Hand" letters—a name that stuck, and indeed, soon became synonymous with crime in Little Italy." The term "Black Hand" (in Italian: Mano Nera, and in Sicilian: Manu Niura) was readily adopted by the American press and generalized to the idea of an organized criminal conspiracy, which came to be known as "The Black Hand Society". The tenor Enrico Caruso received a Black Hand letter, on which a black hand and dagger were drawn, demanding $2,000. Caruso decided to pay, "and, when this fact became public knowledge, was rewarded for his capitulation with 'a stack of threatening letters a foot high,' including another from the same gang for $15,000." Realizing the extortionists would continue to demand money, he reported the incident to the police who, arranging for Caruso to drop off the money at a prearranged spot, arrested two Italian-American businessmen who retrieved the money. Carrying loads on one's head goes back to prehistory times. Before the advent of the wheel and carts, and before man learned how to domesticate animals like goats, donkeys, oxen and horses to carry their loads, he learned that balancing a load on his head was a simple, efficient method of moving large loads from one place to another. Before roads, often the easiest path from point A to point B was as straight as a person could walk... usually up and over hills and rugged terrain, when even wheels couldn't traverse. It was a fairly efficient method of moving heavy or bulky things. In fact, scientific controlled studies have proven that up to 20% of a person's weight could be carried on the head without any additional physical exertion, and up to 70% of their body weight could be carried with a moderate level of cardiovascular exertion. This means that a woman of 150 pounds could potentially handle a load weighing over 100 pounds carried on her head. In ancient Egyptian, there was the Ritual of Repentance, where (as example) a thief would repent for his sin by carrying a basin of burning coals on top of his head. Even the Book of Proverbs mentions this type of gesture even trying to have an enemy repent... "If your enemy is hungry, give him food to eat; if he is thirsty, give him water to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head, and the Lord will reward you". Carrying loads on the head is still vary common in many developing countries of the world... and when you think of it, parts if Italy might have been still "developing" up until unification in the late 1800s. Still today, you might see someone carrying a load on their head. It might be a casual shopper in an open air market carrying home a bulk package of toilet tissue or basket of tomatoes. In harvest time you might still see people carrying loads of lemons or olives or chestnuts on their heads. Typically, when carrying a particularly heavy load, a wrapping of cloth in the shape of a donut is placed on the head first to cushion and help balance the load. As early photographers witnessed, many types of street vendors throughout Italy also carried their wares on their heads... pots and pans, produce, fish, musical instruments and even furniture. Even children learned early on how carrying things on their heads was a practical way to get the job done. They helped with chores, harvests, deliveries and before child labor laws, many worked hard hours, with under the mentorship of their parent or as an apprentice. Of course, women in Italy did more than their share of the labor, too. They carried water, firewood, bread, sacks of flour and other loads during harvest time. They even would carry their baby in a basket on top of their head when traveling back and forth from fieldwork. And when Italians emigrated to America, they weren't shy about carrying on the carrying tradition in the Little Italys that sprung up.
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