HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SIMI!

Hi, folks – Simi here!

Yes, I’m a big girl of 9 today and a dog’s life just gets better and better!

This morning I found this Christmas photo of us taken back in cold old Cardiff in 1999, my first Christmas with my Mummy. [I don't remember my very first one!] We’ve still got our tree and I used to chew the decorations on the lower branches – well, what did she expect, with her dried orange slices and cranberry rings? – but now we’re in Sicily she buys nice, big poinsettias for me to dig up. [I did that on Saturday and I must say she didn’t seem all that pleased!]

Do you like my card? I can read Italian quite well now so I know it says, “Thank you, because we always play together” - when she hasn’t got her nose stuck in a book, that is! Look, I sneaked a photo of our lounge so you can see that she’s not joking when she tells you she’s got all these books! Sometimes I have to nudge her really hard and bark like crazy to remind her it’s walkies time! She didn’t want me to show you the room as she’s afraid you’ll look at the dust but I’m sure you won’t do that when you can admire my “Mister Tyrey” toy that I left on the settee specially! Talking of toys, I got this new stringy one for my birthday presie. I’ve been throwing it about but I think I’ll give it a good chew later. Oh, yes, I nearly forgot to tell you that we’ve got our paw socks up in plenty of time. Mummy assures me Santa Paws is coming through the lounge window this year!

The last photo is for Auntie jmb because I read her comment in Mummy’s post yesterday. [I can read Australian and Canadian, too! Did she tell you our cousin came all the way from Australia-land to see me last week?] I’ve got 3 beds, Auntie, but I like to snuggle up in Mummy’s bed best – that’s what she bought it for, after all!

Well, that’s all for now but I’ll be back before Christmas to cheer up all my readers! Auguri, everybody, in the meantime! Oh, my Mummy wants a word: “Cara Simi, I’d have been so happy 9 years ago today if I’d known you were just coming into the world! Tanti, tanti auguri darling .”

EARLY REGALI

As I've mentioned before, shops and businesses here who value your custom like to give you a Christmas gift, so we have got this rather large umbrella from Raffaele the hairdresser and a new, pretty dog bed for a pretty girl from the pet store. As you see, Simi isn't quite sure of it yet! I think this giving of little gifts is a good practice because it does cheer you up and make you feel a certain warmth towards the particular shop or business. [And I could do with some warmth right now - it's freezing here tonight and I am cold even with the heating on.]

And look what came in the post today! For the first time in 3 years, I 'll be able to make cranberry sauce! My friend did pack them well.

I've had a good day at work and have enjoyed being kissed by all the students whom I will not see again before Christmas, even though they hardly know me! Many are rescheduling their lessons next week so as not to miss out on their hours. This is still a revelation to me, having taught in the UK where most will use any excuse not to come to lessons!


I want to thank jmb and Shades for getting my blog header back! It's been playing up for weeks and at the weekend virtually disappeared - it's all blogger's fault, I gather - making me want to take a hammer to the computer and causing Simi to be very busy drying my tears of exasperation! Grazie, cari amici del Blogpower.

CAPELLO

The new England football manager has promised to learn English within a month. All I can say is that I'd love to know who his English tutor will be, for anyone who has taught or learned a foreign language knows that it takes years to perfect and that you never stop learning. Hotel managers and waiters who boast that they are "fluent in 6 languages" are no such thing; they have a certain knowledge of these languages "for special purposes", not true fluency and they annoy me because they can make serious language students feel inferior. Anyway, Mr or Ms-Miracle-Tutor, I take my cappello [hat - what a pity it isn't spelt the same way as our protagonist's surname!] off to you, if you can do it.

Feliz Navidad - Three Tenors

A Spanish Christmas song for you today, although in this version Pavarotti chimes in with a verse in Italian. This song always has me dancing around the Christmas tree!

BUONGIORNO TRISTEZZA

Poor, embattled Italy: the government is, as always, tottering on the brink of collapse; the north is paralysed by snow as I write; a truck drivers’ strike has caused chaos for most of the past week; and on Thursday the New York Times reported that Italians are the most depressed people in Europe. This has really ruffled the feathers of some politicians and newspaper columnists!

“Depressed”, of course, is not the image that the rest of the world has of this mainly sunny land where you find what is, arguably, the best cuisine in the world. “Depressed” is not the word that comes to mind as you watch Italians go about their daily business: observe them proudly wearing the latest fashion, adjusting their already perfect shop window displays, chattering in any bar, interacting with children or simply being themselves and you cannot help admiring their tolerance, openness and seemingly relaxed ways.

They have a “summer culture” of stopping work and transferring their whole lives to the sea which has led me to believe that their young people, in particular, have a wonderful existence. Yet does it mask something? An unwillingness to compete with the rest of the world by working flat out, 24/7, may be a healthy stance but is it realistic in modern times? The close-knit family life that many Italians have is the envy of Britons yet this, too, may not be all it seems: is the unmarried son or daughter who lives at home well into his / her thirties or beyond and who never travels afraid of the world outside that cocoon? Surely Italy needs its young people to be dynamic, given its ageing population?

Some time ago I concluded that what I find myself at odds with so often is basically a culture of acceptance, both of the status quo and of unfavourable situations; a prevailing mind-set of “It’s always been like this so that’s the way it always will be” and “We can’t do anything about it” . Strangely enough, I was using an article about Jane Tomlinson’s posthumous award as a reading text yesterday with a private student. When we discussed Jane’s brave efforts to raise money for cancer research, my student’s reaction was that such a negative situation is rarely turned into something positive here. Earlier this year I was talking about the McCann case with a friend whose reaction to the “Find Madeleine” campaign was, “ Why? They won’t find her now”. [This was right at the beginning.] “But they’ve got to do something!” I cried. My friend looked at me incredulously. I wonder how much of this “acceptance culture” is due to the influence of the Catholic Church and how much is a philosophy learnt the hard way by a nation that has seen so much" triumph and disaster"? I note that Beppe Severgnini is quoted at the end of the NYT article: “The [Italian] malaise is: 'I can see all that but I can’t change it. ' ”

Never mind, Italy: exasperating as you are, this ex-pat still loves you! Have a better 2008, my beloved, adopted country.

CHRISTMAS AT MR T'S

Our wonderful local salumeria is decked out and stocked up for Christmas.

POSTAL MERIDIEM?

Whilst it was very thoughtful of the Post Office to translate this notice on Modica's letter boxes into English to help the tourists out, there is NOT a postal collection at midnight as the notice implies. Even "last collection" is a misnomer as there is only one collection a day, at noon!

COUSINFESTS

My cousin left on the 1 pm Catania coach today and I was so sad as we waved goodbye. I am a sentimental soul really and hate goodbyes of any sort as I have had too many of them in my life . Cousin and I have never been close but he was kind to me when I was a student, even paying for my first trip to Paris and he is one of only three people in the world with whom I can reminisce about my Dad [the other two being an elderly second cousin in Swansea and a first cousin in New Zealand]. While he was here there was something so comfortingly familiar about some of his gestures and mannerisms, reminding me a little of my Dad but mostly of my Great Aunt Mabel who lived with us and was a big part of all our lives, with the result that I couldn't quite work out how I felt - and still can't. Simi took to him immediately and I realised how much of my Dad there is in cousin when he greeted and petted her just as Dad would have done. Cousin is 17 years older than me and, as I hadn't seen him since 1992, I wondered, as I left him at that bus stop, if we shall ever see each other again.

Enough melancholy! During cousin's visit I managed to get him into the seasonal griddled panettone with cotognata for breakfast habit - he didn't take much corrupting - one which I think he will import into Oz, and "forced" him into having an aperitivo before 11 am yesterday morning. The manager of the Altro Posto couldn't have made more of a fuss of us and I was just wondering why they were being so slow in serving the g & ts when I saw them place a tray of antipasti on the counter hotplate: they'd been waiting for these complimentary "bites" to be ready. Just as we were about to leave they said, "Oh, no, you can't, for our mini- pizze have just come out of the oven" and so we were "persuaded" to try some of these, too.

Of course, I had to introduce cousin to the most important [Sicilian] man in my life, Raffaele the hairdresser and we were made a great fuss of there, too. We had to have coffee, and, busy though the salon was, Raff found time to admire cousin's family photos and cousin his. Thus are bonds between nations formed. Linda was in Raffaele's so we were invited to afternoon tea with her and Gino - a bit of a rushed one as I had to be in work for 6pm - and we feasted upon Linda's almond biscuits, more cotognata and Gino's freshly picked mandarin oranges.

Above you can see some images of the feast we had at Marco and Giovanna's on Wednesday: pork in aspic [meats in aspic are very popular as antipasti here and can be bought], a tray of focacce, Giovanna's fruit salad, a tray of bought dolci I took along as I had no time to make a dessert and Giovanna's cobaita [a very hard version of torrone made at Xmas and containing sesame seeds, which were introduced into Sicily by the Arabs]. Yesterday at lunchtime I fed cousin my pineapple and rocket salad, chicken bocconcini [without the blanched chive "ribbons" with which I usually adorn them as no chives were available, which was probably just as well considering that the things take about 3 hours to assemble when I use these!] two kinds of olives and my "Prague casserole" with herb-roasted potatoes. I'd offered to take cousin out to lunch but he prefers home cooking and this lot is what he got! - Fruit and liqueurs for dessert.

A plea and a promise: Please, please, does anyone out there know how to fix the blog header? Normal blog visiting will resume tomorrow.

WHACKY WEDNESDAY

Sorry, folks, I'm a bit late - or early, depending where you are and which way you look at it. I'm not going to change the date and time settings and even pretend it's still Wednesday but I had a whacky one!

First of all, I managed to get my cards for destinations outside Italy posted on Wednesday morning, at my third attempt to do so, and with "only" a forty-minute wait. Two weeks before Christmas and only one prodotti postali counter was open - grrrr! The little elderly gentleman sitting next to me in the post office seemed to regard it all as some sort of game and drove me crazy by reading out aloud every single number as it came up on the display board, then nudging me to ensure I agreed it was number C [for bill -paying] 9,122 , P for [prodotti postali] number 45, 960 or whatever.

I had so many errands to do in out- of -the -way places afterwards that I decided to hire a taxi to get around. You may not think this matter newsworthy, reader, but finding a taxi in Modica is no easy task. For a start, the [usually one-man] businesses don't advertise much, if at all, so you need to know someone who knows a taxi man. Then you call said taxi man. You explain where you want to go, as I did yesterday, and he asks you what time you want to make your journey. You say "9 am" and he says, "What about 10.30 am?" If you're me, you acquiesce because if you cannot find another driver this one may have changed his mind by the time you call back! Anyway, I am pleased to be able to report that he turned up on time, was pleasant, helped me so much with all my various packages and charged so little that I gave him an enormous tip.

My cousin from Australia, my father's cousin, second cousin or first cousin once removed [I can never get that right - to Italians he is simply un cugino] arrived this afternoon for a two-day visit. [He has been doing academic research in Venice.] This has been planned for ages and of course I didn't expect to be working fixed hours when he arrived. His bus was due in 15 minutes after I started work this afternoon and I was planning to despatch the above-mentioned taxi driver to the terminus to collect him and bring him to wait at the school but, as so often, my dear friend Marco came to the rescue. He not only collected my cousin but gave him the "grand tour" of Modica and generally entertained him till I finished work at 7.30 pm. I had cooked for the occasion [it will keep] but last night Marco rang me and invited us to supper at his home, and as cousin is a sociable sort of chap, I accepted. We all had a great time and I think a new student exchange between Modica and Oz might be on the cards!

Cousin leaves on Friday morning and we have worked out that he needs to catch the 1pm coach to Catania. "I'll phone Mr T the taxi man tomorrow so that he can take us down to the terminus in Modica Bassa", I informed him. "What? - A day in advance?!" asked cousin incredulously. "Oh, yes", said I, "pazienza"!

Posting patterns here back to normal by Friday evening, hopefully.

BIGLIETTINI DI AUGURI

I am determined to get my Christmas cards written before I go to work this afternoon. Whether I'll get them sent off is another matter, depending on how long the queue is at the Post Office. It was snaking out of the door this morning.

Italians, as I have mentioned before, do not normally send cards to people they are likely to see every day or during the festivities. They prefer to telephone their greetings. So when they come into my house, they ask, "Are all these cards from this year?" [As if I would keep last year's!] Then I explain to them, as I have been explaining to some private students of mine this week, that the "Christmas card list" is important to British people and that we cross off those who have offended us in some way during the year and those who did not send a card last Christmas. When I tell them that we even send cards to colleagues and neighbours whom we don't like, they roar with laughter and exclaim, "Quanto siete pazzi! - You're all mad!"

A TRIP AROUND THE TINSEL

It took me from 5 pm till way past midnight last night to get all my Christmas ornaments, tree, lights and general seasonal tat out and looking as I like them. [James, I warn you, you are going to hate this post! Leslie, did you finish your Christmas decorations?] Mind you, this time estimate includes turning out the storeroom as well!


For a long time after my wonderful Dad died, I just didn't want to know about Christmas and, in our grief, Mum and I would set each other off so badly that, during the first few years of her widowhood, she would beg me to just go away for Christmas! And I did - and only now do I realise what an act of love, on her part, that was.

Then Mum died too, I came to Sicily at Christmas and relearned love and, four years after my mother's death, suddenly realised that I could enjoy Christmas again. I may not be a practising Christian, but it is, for me, a season of remembrance of love and the joy it brings.

When I photographed some of my "special Christmas things" earlier today, I ended up with over 40 shots! So here I have mostly included only those that have, at least, a Sicilian resonance :

1. Chiara gave me this tree ornament in 1993, the first Christmas I spent in Sicily.

2. I received this "perfumed tree" ormament here that year too, from a delightful child who is now a delightful young woman.

3. Christmas 1999 and I was not in Sicily. But a dear friend here sent me these tree decorations. They are actually bluer in hue than the photo shows. I could have used them as earrings, too!

4. I was given this beautifully scented pomander by a friend this very Saturday, at Chiara's. I will treasure it for years to come.

5. Chiara's mother gave me this "crib" last year. I think it is so simple yet so lovely.

6. "Leonardo" my plant holder has a festive load! He has also acquired a necklace.

7. I call these my "Egyptian angels" because they were given to me by a UK student who was, on his own admission, rather "relaxed" when it came to lesson attendance. Nevertheless, without ceding his own identity, he had worked out what it took to be accepted in an adopted country and participated in our festivals in ways that he thought he could. I always think of him when I unwrap my "angels" at Christmas and hope that life in the UK is treating him kindly.

8. My jardinière in the hallway gets festive.

9. My "Santa" light won't quite fit an Italian window and no one can see him from outside because of the shutters. But he has seen me through too many Christmases not to be appreciated now!

10. This "choir" ornament was given to me by dear Sicilian friends in 1995.

11. Miniature cribs are an art form here and are made of all sorts of materials. Again, it was my dear friend Linda, Chiara's mother, who sent me this "matchbox" one a few years ago. It was, I think, made in Peru, and I treasure it.

12. My mother gave me this candle over 20 years ago. He is an important part of Christmas for Simi and me!

Lastly, some years ago a friend watched me decorating my tree and told me I was doing it all wrong because I put the lights on last: "Yes", I said, "because I may want to light certain items". "Oh, no", she reiterated, "lights on first! " But what if a lamp "goes", reader? I confess that I cannot change the things - well, not without cutting my fingers, anyway - so I always just go and buy a new set. [Yes, if dear James is still reading, here is another example of my Micawberness!] So what do you do, readers - lights first or last?

Must go now: new job went all right [I think] but exhausted! Please excuse lack of visiting tonight. By the way, I just can't get the spacing right in this post!

CHIARA'S FESTA

Some images from a scrumptious spread yesterday: a simple but very pretty way of serving grapefruit from Chiara's garden; a salad of lettuce, brown bread that has been oven-crisped, grana cheese, pear and apple; lasagne with a spinach filling; good, local bread; stuffing balls; chicken which has been marinated in and filled with fruit [Chiara is going to give me the recipe for this so when I have it I will share it with you]. A jolly British trifle was served for dessert, along with the biscuits I baked yesterday, plus various cakes and pastries that guests had brought along: I couldn't get pictures of any of these before they were cut, demolished and scoffed!

Alex Baroni - Tu scendi dalle stelle [Live]

As today marks the official beginning of Christmas celebrations in Italy, I thought I'd leave you, tonight, with this most beloved of Italian carols, sung by the much missed Alex Baroni.

BAKING MORNING

A festa today at Chiara's to celebrate the beginning of the Christmas season in Italy. Whilst December 8th is an official holiday, many more shops opened both this morning and again this evening than last year. I do hope it doesn't become like the UK where hardly any bank holiday is really a holiday any more. Chiara had asked me to bake these orange biscuits as she thought they would go well with dessert. [She likes to serve up a British trifle!] Here the flour is different, the butter is different and the ovens are temperamental so they always turn out more crumbly and delicate than they would in Britain. But they tasted all right and all were eaten!

LA VITA È BELLA

It has been a beautiful sunny day, I am in the "land of lands" and on the territory of the Gattopardo. What is more, this morning I got me a job! I'm fed up with the insecurity of doing "a bit here, a bit there" and have now been offered a significant number of teaching hours in the same language school. The school's proprietors called me on Wednesday, out of the blue, and I went to see them yesterday, coming back with the impression that I'd be offered some work, but I didn't know how much: I also thought it would be after Christmas. However, they called me again last night and asked if I would go in this morning to discuss a timetable so of course I did. I was greeted with , "Hello, this is your timetable and this is your office". "An office?!" I exclaimed [after I got up off the floor] and we all had a good giggle. "And you start on Monday", they added. They have all sorts of students, of all ages, abilities and levels, with varying types of problems with English. I will sort them out.

I do hope this will be a turning point as I've been very low about work lately and things have become a little hairy financially: it's my own fault that I haven't pushed my CV around before now but I had a position of considerable responsibility in secondary teaching at a young age in Britain and I've had enough of "selling" my skills. There is also a lot of my gambling father in me: I don't gamble with money but I do take risks in this life and never get off my butt till I have to. Once I do, though, watch out!

Please wish me luck, reader...

Two more trivial events to report today:

The water lorry arrived at 5pm. "I came at midday and you were out!" cried the driver accusingly. Now, as he can turn up at any time between 6.30 am and 10 pm I wouldn't have much of a life if I waited in, would I? "And there was nobody else in!" he continued. Hardly my fault, either, but pazienza... I just signed the form and wished him the compliments of the season.

I have cleared my ironing pile! - Well, not personally. I looked at it on Wednesday and thought, "To hell with it" but, with no Virgil to guide me, took it to the dry cleaner's instead. I collected it tonight and it's all so beautifully done that I don't recognise half my garments. "If it's too heavy for you to carry back I'll bring it round when we close", offered the shop owner kindly. I managed but I do appreciate this aspect of Sicilian service. I promise I won't let it get that bad again....

L'ALBERO DI RAFFAELE

Only Raffaele the hairdresser would think of decorating his tree with champagne flutes filled with red roses and I thought you'd like to see it.

It really is time I got l'albero di Welshcakes up but getting at my Christmas decorations means turning out my storeroom. Domani....

A LEGAL LOOPHOLE

Non-Italians wishing to marry an Italian citizen in Italy used to have to present only a passport or an equivalent issued by a consulate. Now, however, the Mayor of Caravaggio [a leghista stronghold in Bergamo province] has issued a bye-law requiring them to present a residence permit. Obviously, you have to be in the country legally to obtain one so this law primarily targets illegal immigrants who may be marrying an Italian in order to acquire citizenship. "If a non-Italian applies for residence, we send the municipal police to check that all installations in the house meet legal requirements", stated the Mayor. A visit from the municipal police is standard practice in Italy when you apply for residenza [and without residenza you can do nothing, believe me] and I don't think it's a bad idea. My own police visit lasted about 30 seconds, long enough for the policeman to observe that I had furniture in the house and did not appear to be destitute but no one checked the installations! You can read the relevant articles in English here and in Italian here.

Meanwhile, the woman Mayor of Romano d'Ezzolino [Vicenza] has said that if a non-EU citizen applies to marry and she has any doubts as to the purpose of the intended wedding, she will call the police. She has also ensured that certain grants and benefits available in her town will be paid only to Italians and EU citizens. She enjoys enormous support.

What do you think?

Peace on earth and goodwill to all men.

MY PROTECTOR

There is a certain breed of Italian male - not all of them, by any means - that considers a "good morning" from a woman an invitation to much more. One such male lives near here and has several times propositioned me. I have always been very cold with him and offered him no encouragement whatsoever but it took him over a year to get the message. Then one day this summer he made a very personal remark to me and I told him in no uncertain terms what I thought of that. Since then, I haven't spoken to him or acknowledged him in any way, even crossing the road when I have seen him approaching. I am nearly always out with Simi when I see him and so it was this morning when we encountered one another on a narrow stretch of pavement. "If I speak to you" he asked, "will your dog go for me?" He seriously thought he was in danger from Simi ! Well, I decided it's Christmas and it is a bit awkward always ignoring him so I said that of course she wouldn't and wished him a good day. Simi would like to add something at this point: "Hmm - I thought, 'You can greet my mummy, Mister, but lay a hand on her and see what you get!' " Quite.

I actually have a highly-developed sense of danger and I think it comes from having travelled so much alone: some time ago, on a school trip to Normandy, our group was staying in a hostel in a seemingly quiet part of the town. In the evening, we teachers were taking it in turns to pop to the bar across the square for 10 minutes and a woman colleague and I had just left the hostel to cross the deserted square when I put a hand out and said, "I don't think we should go any further. Let's hurry back in." Just as we reached the hostel door we heard twigs snapping on either side of us and the sound of running. I hadn't heard or seen anything - I just sensed it, whereas my married colleague had sensed nothing. I'm sure we would have been mugged or worse had we continued across the square. I do not sense any danger with regard to this man but I do know that any lowering of my defences would be seen as encouragement and I am NOT interested.

Above is a photo of Simi, my darling protector, at 8 weeks old. She is going to be a big girl of 9 this Christmas.

AN OFFER I CAN REFUSE

Sky Italia are forever calling to offer me a sports package. "Thank you, but I hate sport", I tell them candidly, over and over again. "What, all of it?" asked one of their gentlemen employees incredulously a few months ago. "That's right", I assured him. One or two of the women who call giggle conspiratorially and sound almost envious when I tell them there is no one else in the house to enjoy the sport and I do add that my dog hates it too, just to convince them of my madness, whilst the men usually hang up abruptly and presumably hasten to bother the next subscriber on their list. You'd think they'd have grasped the idea by now and I can only assume that they keep calling because they don't believe me.

Well, here I was last night, chilling out with a gin and tonic and absent-mindedly watching Sky, when one of those on-screen messages appeared: "We have a Christmas gift for you!" it exclaimed. "That's jolly decent of them", I remarked to Simi and eagerly pressed the leggi [read] button. And what was this wondrous present? - I can watch sports channels free of charge over Christmas! Gee, thanks, guys.... [I angrily switched over to Rai .]

IN WHICH I LOSE MY PAZIENZA - AND REGAIN IT

My local supermarket closes at 1.30 pm and reopens at 4.30 pm, but most other shops in the via Sacro Cuore close for the afternoon at 1pm on the dot. So I'm afraid I lost my hard-won pazienza when, finding myself in the supermarket at 12.40 pm., and still with an errand to do in the computer shop, the man who is supposed to weigh your fruit and vegetables was nowhere to be seen [they are weighed at that counter here, not at the checkout as in Britain]. I had expected this to be a fast shop, as I'd only gone in for some washing up liquid, a lettuce and a packet of basil [which is usually sold in irritating plastic bags here]. I eventually espied the gentleman down at the deli counter, where he had taken some water melon he had sliced to be weighed on their larger scale and wrapped. He wasn't preparing it for a waiting customer; he was just going to put it out on display. There were several of us standing around by now and he certainly saw us; couldn't he have left the anguria for a minute? I'm ashamed to say that I got so impatient that I started waving my bag of basil at him and stamping my feet, reader. Then the woman behind me put her selected goods down on the counter next to the scales, with the result that when the elusive assistant did come back he picked these up first! By then I was doing a Victor Meldrew and one look at my face was enough to make "Mr Anguria" slap a ticket on the basil quickly! Why, then, if the basil packs all cost the same, are they not already priced? - That will remain one of the mysteries of Sicilian life.

I am quite hopeless with houseplants as I always under or over-water them, but it's Christmas and I do love poinsettias. I bought this one from a lorry on the way back: "Is it very heavy?" I asked the stallholder. "Well, yes, but I'll carry it to your house for you", he replied, and so he did. He does see me passing with Simi every day, so knew that I live near, though not the exact street, and I appreciated his kindness. I also got the second plant, whatever it may be, free. My faith in Sicilian human nature was restored by the time I got home!

A WINDOW FOR JMB

My fellow-blogpowerer and friend jmb's favourite colour is red, as her regular readers will know, so I think this Christmas window in the via Sacro Cuore, one of Modica's smartest shopping streets, was designed with her in mind. It's a sign, jmb: come and visit Sicily again!

Do visit jmb's always interesting blog if you do not know it - you will find her in reflective mood today. She has recently coordinated and posted the 4th monthly roundup of blogpower posts and has done a brilliant job: there is something for everybody there.

OLIVE ALLA WELSHCAKES

I have shown you how olives straight from the tree are prepared here and also, some time ago, posted my friend Concetta' s olive recipe. Now here is an olive recipe which I have made up myself and which I use to flavour cured but unstoned black olives:

Put a little balsamic vinegar and just a drizzle of olive oil [because you don't want it to solidify in the fridge] into a bowl. Add the olives, a goodly pinch of coarse seasalt [I think wet Sicilian seasalt is best, but then, I am biased] a slice or two of deseeded red chilli pepper, some fennel seeds, sprigs of young, fresh thyme, a bayleaf and some dried origano. Squeeze a little lemon juice over then mix it all up with a teaspoon. Add a slice of lemon to garnish. You can eat these immediately or they will keep, covered with clingfilm, for two weeks or so in the fridge.

IL GATTOPARDO - A MODERN CLASSIC

I don’t know quite why, browsing in a bookshop in Pinner, North London in 1967, I picked up a paperback entitled The Leopard, a novel written by one Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa. I was studying for A levels in English Lit., French and Spanish at the time, so had no specific interest in Italy. [How that was to change!] However, the book looked interesting enough for me to buy and when I got home and started reading it I was immediately fascinated. Since then I have read it many times in Italian, “taught” it and have, of course, seen the wonderful film based upon it, in which Burt Lancaster, as the Prince of Salina, gives the performance of his life.

Set in the Risorgimento, Il Gattopardo [= "The Leopard” because there was a leopard, serval or ocelot in the coat of arms of the author's family] is the story of the last years of don Fabrizio Corbera, Prince of Salina, who cannot come to terms with the changes in Sicilian society which the unification of Italy will bring.

We meet his nephew, Tancredi, who is expected to marry the Prince’s daughter, Concetta, but falls in love with Angelica Sedàra, the daughter of a rich but non-aristocratic politician, thus breaking poor Concetta’s heart. Tancredi’s marriage symbolises the transfer of power in Sicily from the aristocracy to a corrupt new middle class.

The novel is about all this and more and I have to warn you that I find the ending unbearably sad. Yet I believe it is a key to understanding Sicily today. Here is one of my favourite passages from the book. Regular readers of this blog will know which parts resonate with me!

Don Fabrizio explains his refusal of a seat in the new Senate: “ Be patient now, Chevally. We Sicilians have become accustomed, by a long, a very long hegemony of rulers who were not of our religion and did not speak our language,to split hairs. If we had not done so we’d never have coped with Byzantine tax gatherers, with Berber Emirs, with Spanish viceroys. Now the bent is endemic, we’re made like that…… All Sicilian self-expression, even the most violent, is really wish-fulfilment; our sensuality is a hankering for oblivian, our shooting and knifing a hankering for death; our languour, our exotic vices, a hankering for voluptuous immobility, that is for death again; our meditative air is that of a void wanting to scrutinise the enigmas of Nirvana……. I said Sicilians, I should have added Sicily, the atmosphere, the climate, the landscape of Sicily. Those are the forces which have formed our minds together and perhaps more than alien pressure and various foreign invasions: this landscape which knows no mean between sensuous sag and hellish drought; which is never pretty, never ordinary, never relaxed, as should be a country made for rational beings to live in…..Six times thirty days of sun sheer down upon our heads; this summer of ours which is as long and glum as a Russian winter and which we struggle against with less success. If a Sicilian worked hard in any of those months he would expend energy enough for three. Then water is either lacking altogether or has to be carried from so far that every drop is paid for by a drop of sweat… This violence of landscape, this cruelty of climate, this continual tension is everything…. I don’t deny that a few Sicilians may succeed in breaking the spell of the island; but they would have to leave it very young….[else] they will remain convinced that their country is basically calumniated like all other countries, that the civilised norm is here, the oddities elsewhere.”

If you are going to read Il Gattopardo, or have already read it and are interested in its author, I do recommend David Gilmour’s biography of Tomasi di Lampedusa, The Last Leopard, for this, too, is a story of an aristocrat at odds with his times.

Sadly, the Donnafugata mentioned in the novel has virtually disappeared and is not the one near here, but take a walk around Baroque Modica and especially Baroque Ragusa and you may sense, as I do, the ghost of the Prince of Salina echoing your every step. I am so grateful that I can do that every day now, if I wish!

THE LEOPARD - 1963 - Luchino Visconti

For your enjoyment. I could only find a French version of the Waltz scene. Much of the film was shot in this part of Sicily.

LOVE ME, LOVE MY HAIRDRESSER

Eccomi with Raffaele this morning.

OF WATER AND WIRES

The condominio's water supply ran out once more early this morning. "Oh, no!" I thought. "They'll all blame me again." But actually I had remembered to phone on Friday to request a refill and had been hoping that it would arrive yesterday. I decided I was going to have to call the comune office before lunchtime and beg them to come today, but at midday I was out with Simi and, from the far end of the main road, saw the water lorry turn into our side-street. I knew no one else was in at the condominio and the lorry obviously can't get in until someone opens the barrier across our courtyard, so Simi and I dashed back [she wasn't very impressed as she was in mid-poo and here was her mummy yelling, "Hurry up! Haven't got time now!" - I do pick it up, by the way, so there was that to be done too] but she entered into the spirit of the occasion once we got into our street: imagine, reader, the madwoman and her dog running up the street, me shouting "Signore! Aspetti! - Wait!" as the lorry prepared its escape and Simi barking joyfully. Anyway, we arrived at the barrier, opened it and forestalled the getaway so now we have water for another 10 days. The thing I hate most about these waterless mornings is the waste of perfume: I never go anywhere - indeed I never stay in - without drenching myself in Paris [a scent which lasts on me] and of course I'm straight into the shower once the water is back on. I resent that waste of the first spraying - do you think I could get perfume compensation payments from the comune?

Now, gentlemen look away for a moment: Girls, it is time to revisit the intimi shop! One of my Italian black number bras has given up the ghost- you know that moment when everything seems to be defying gravity to your satisfaction and all of a sudden - boyng....!! .. and there is part of the underwiring inelegantly protruding where your cleavage is meant to be? You push it back down but it boyngs again and you fear it will sock you in the eye before long. Well, that's what happened to me today so it's yet another trip to one of those stores tomorrow!

PIZZA 'N' GEL

The trattoria in the little square has changed hands and become a pizzeria-trattoria so Irma and I have just been around there to check it out. Irma had the porcini mushroom pizza whilst I chose the bresaola, rocket and grana cheese one. For dessert, lemon gel was on offer and this one was very prettily presented. Gel is one of my favourite Sicilian desserts and I posted a recipe for it here. I think this pizzeria passes muster!

A TAXING JOB?

A Milanese prostitute who was unable to explain her affluent lifestyle [she owned six large apartments and two expensive cars] to the satisfaction of the Italian tax authorities has been ordered to pay tax on her income: this sets a precedent and now, in theory, all prostitutes in Italy will have to do so. You can read the whole story here.

Prostitution is tolerated in Italy but exploitation of it is not. In this most Catholic of countires, drive along any major road and you will see the ladies sitting provocatively at the roadside quite openly. As numbers of prostitutes in Italy have increased since the most recent expansion of the EU, the State is now considering fining their clients. Many of the women, from both within and outside the EU, have been “trafficked” into Italy, having been convinced that they were going to bona fide jobs. Then they found themselves having to pay for their journey by working as prostitutes. This law, at least, is an enlightened attempt at a partial solution.

In Britain prostitutes’ organisations have long been campaigning for legalisation, so that their activities would be recognised as “work” and they would therefore pay taxes. Both Ellee and Steven Bainbridge have posted on it , and, like Steven, I find it an issue fraught with difficulties and am not sure where I stand.

The first difficulty is, surely, what exactly is prostitution? What do we call it when someone allows a man or woman to set them up and keep them when there is no love? What is a mistress who accepts material comforts from her lover because she knows he will never offer her marriage? What do we call it when a woman remains in a loveless marriage for economic reasons? Yes, in a marriage there are likely to be other considerations but even so, the line is thin:

“ For the colonel’s lady an' Judy O'Grady
Are sisters under their skins"
wrote Kipling.

Now, I can see the arguments for legalisation and regulation, with health and hygiene issues, protecting the women and getting prostitutes off the streets of residential areas being three of these. But still they have to go somewhere and where would that be? Illegal activity would continue for where there is a business there are surely always those who would try to undercut it. And I’m uneasy with the “People will do it anyway so let’s legalise it” school of thought because that could be applied to anything.

The nineteenth century reformer Josephine Butler’s main objection to regulation was inequality, with the law recognising no fault in the male client; however, she also objected in principle to what, in her eyes, amounted to State sponsorship of immorality. Butler was largely responsible for the repeal of the Contagious Disease Acts in Britain: under these Acts the women were humiliated, subjected to brutal “health” checks and generally treated inhumanely. If there were regulation today, I’m not suggesting that it would be handled so insensitively but I doubt whether all the implications have been thought through.

And yet..… as so often in life, a situation you know of personally can change your thinking or cause you to question it. I have a friend who has a brain-damaged son. Now an adult, he has sexual desires like everybody else. These have sometimes been manifested in disturbing ways. “I’d pay for him to visit a prostitute if there was a way of finding a clean one!” my friend cried to me in desperation after one of these incidents. This, I believe, is an aspect of the matter which few legislators have considered.


One thing I am sure about: I get angry when prostitution is called a “profession” and, although I am more sympathetic than not towards women who feel they have no choice but to ply this trade, they are not feminists and they are not liberated women. For the trafficked women or for those otherwise forced into this way of life, I feel nothing but sorrow and the situation makes me wonder how much has really changed since Josephine Butler’s day.

So: fine the clients / punish those who profit from the activity / punish the prostitutes themselves / legalise and regulate – what do you think?

KICKING UP A DUST

Raffaele the hairdresser's salon is on the first floor of the via Sacro Cuore's palazzo di vetro or "glass building". As I entered this morning, I could hear the raised voices upstairs from the ground floor. When I walked into the salon, Raffaele was standing in the middle of it, gesticulating wildly and shouting, whilst his staff gesticulated back and spoke loudly at the same time. If you weren't used to Italians, you'd have thought they were all really angry but they were just having a discussion about the shortcomings of the salon's cleaner. All of a sudden Raffaele yelled, "I'll show you!" leapt onto a chair, ran his fingers over the top of a mirror and triumphantly displayed the dust on them. Now, he is a short man, so how he knew of the existence of this dust on the high mirror I cannot imagine, unless he was born with "dust antennae" like my friend Gina, who can spot a speck from three miles away.

I also know of a woman here who has managed to minimalise minimalism: she will have nothing in her house beyond the bare necessities in case the extra items should gather dust and at home she is never without a duster in her hand, springing into action to remove minute particles the second she espies them. This hardly makes for a relaxing visit should you pay her a call. I should invite her around, reader, for wouldn't she have the whale of a time among my 5700 + books and 912+ ornaments?!

When Raffaele finally turned to the matter of my hair, I breathed a sigh of relief - he is lovely but you do need your pazienza in the salon sometimes - and he fiddled with my locks for a few minutes, then used both dryer and brush to point at some other spot which the unfortunate cleaner had missed, thus beginning the informal "staff meeting" all over again, with other clients chiming in and tutting at the inadequate cleaning too. The fourth time this happened, he glanced at me and understood my cynical smile and he has probably guessed that I am telling you all about it now. I'm glad he doesn't come to my apartment to inspect my housework!

My hair is a little redder today.



If you want a really good laugh, do have a look at this on pinkacorn's site - it has made my day!

WAR, RESPECT AND REMEMBRANCE

The words on the postcard are: "Je vois, bien souvent, ma maman pleurer. Je sèche ses pleurs avec un baiser - I often see my mother crying and I dry her tears with a kiss."

The certificate in the second photo hangs in my sitting room: it is the honourable discharge certificate issued to my paternal grandfather, one of many signed by King George V and handed out to the maimed of World War 1. Blinded at the Battle of Jutland, my grandfather never saw his son, my father. A career naval officer, he had travelled far and wide; I remember , as a child, our house being filled with silks and artefacts he had brought from China, until they just wore away or got broken over time. I like to think that he visited Sicily and felt the sun on his face before the darkness engulfed him. Before moving here, I considered giving the certificate to the Maritime Museum in Swansea – they had expressed some interest in having it – but I just couldn’t let it go.

I thought about telling this story on November 11th but did not, [a] because there is no commemoration here on that day and [b] because although I of course respect and feel deeply for my fallen or wounded countrymen in any war, I have issues with the current war and so felt it best to remain silent. I am not, I would like to point out, a pacifist; I should be but I am not. I will now break that silence in view of what happened at the weekend:

Many of my fellow-Blogpowerers were incensed at this and I understand their anger. Daily Referendum, James, Cllr Tony Sharp and Lord Nazh all posted on it immediately [I apologise if I have left anyone out] and I agree with much of what they have to say. James said, “I would dearly love to see some sort of post, some sort of comment from the womenfolk to assure me we haven’t gone stark, raving mad.” I commented on his site; now here is the post, though I’m not sure you are going to like it, James.

According to the report, a woman, or two women, behaved abusively towards badly injured servicemen using an area of her/their local swimming pool as part of their rehabilitation. That is, of course, appalling and I am not in any way excusing the women. Indeed, I hope that, had I been there, I would have had the courage to challenge them. But I would not have asked them “What have you ever done for your country?” Instead, I would have tried to find out what exactly their reasons were and would have tried to remonstrate with them. I am not for a moment suggesting that I would have done this totally calmly as I would have been angry, too. I would probably have got myself beaten up or worse, in today’s Britain. Much has been written about the fact that it was women who behaved in this way: yet I can imagine, because I have witnessed similar behaviour, that it could have come from young men, too. The most likely reason for their behaviour is, I believe, sheer ignorance. I would be willing to bet that they would have made similar remarks to any group of disabled people, and I would have been just as incensed: I hope my fellow-Blogpowerers would have been, too.

I have read that in the USA, the women would have been immediately taken to task in no uncertain terms and there are three possible reasons why this apparently did not happen in Britain: [1] maybe there just weren’t many people about [2] those who were about feared for their jobs or violent consequences [both of which suggest sad truths about our society] and [3] we just do not have the unquestioning patriotism of Americans. We do not put our hands on our hearts the minute the chords of our National Anthem strike up and I, for one, will stand for Mae Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau but will not rise for God Save the Queen [ or at least, there are very few occasions when I would]. I think this questioning society is, on the whole, a good development and one of the quotes I liked to leave my A level students with was this, from Winifred Holtby’s South Riding:
“Question everything – even what I’m saying now. Especially, perhaps, what I say. Question everyone in authority, and see that you get sensible answers to your questions.”
I never read them the next part, because it would not have been appropriate, but I think it is worth quoting here:
“Vow as much love to your country as you like; serve to the death if that is necessary… But, I implore you, do not forget to question.”
Without questioning, there would have been no resistance at all to tyrants through the ages.

Let us not confuse questioning, however, with lack of deference, which is probably a good thing, and lack of respect, which is not. Yet I cannot agree with James that our troops deserve, at all times, unquestioning respect: for if that is so, I would be required to respect those who had done this. General Montgomery, I read, regarded rape as a mere by-product of war; how can I respect that or “teach” others to do so?

James also asks, in the comments, whether women could just say “Thank you to our brave men who fought to protect us" without bringing feminism into it: I’ll leave aside the feminist issue but would point out that women have always been both the victims and complicit in war: wives and mothers of sons waited in dread for the telegrams in both World Wars, just as they dread the appearance at the door of the officer in a suit today, whilst in WW1 some women were as fooled by the propaganda as their menfolk, and, in giving out white feathers to non-combatants and generally egging the men on, were as responsible as their government for encouraging the whole bloody mess. In both wars, there were unsung heroines and today women are also front line soldiers. So it is no longer possible to conjure up an image of the “little woman at home who couldn’t defend herself”.

When the shelling on the western front stopped on Xmas Eve, 1914, and both sides saw sense and played football instead of slaughtering each other, I suspect that the reaction of many women was, “If they can lay down arms for an hour or two, why can’t they stop the entire war?” and I don’t think this thought was far from the minds of many combatants either. Or, as John Lennon and others were later to put it, “What if they gave a war and nobody came?” If only!

I do not believe, you see, that going to war always makes your country – or, god forbid, someone else’s – a “safer place”. Wars have been and are being fought over language, territory, the colour of people’s skin, slavery, oil, an abstract noun and, most often, the ambitions of unscrupulous politicians who never get near the firing line. Remember the reactions of the politicians in Fahrenheit 9/11 when Michael Moore suggests they sign their own sons and daughters into the military? “No way!” their faces said.

Only very rarely is war really fought for “freedom” and when it is, it seems to me, those in power and their supporters do not seem very keen upon upholding the freedom to dissent, or to abhor war: I have been criticised in Britain, in November, our season of remembrance, for wearing a white peace poppy along with the red remembrance one. Yet I often think of the blind sailor who never saw his son and my way of respecting and remembering him and those like him is to campaign for peace.