Buon Natale!

Babbo Natale Sighting

I compromised on my real beard policy this year...

For the Italian kids, this was just a photo op with the equivalent of a cardboard cutout. The Epiphany and La Befana still are much more significant.

But for Jack, this Italian Santa was serious business. He even checked out the mailbox to make sure his letter would get to the REAL Santa.

Frosted Firenze

Florence was pounded by 7 to 12 inches of snow yesterday. The soccer game was cancelled. Cars were at a standstill on the highway. A train was stuck in Livorno for 7 hours.

Still, that didn't stop Utah-hardened Jack from making the most of it. He pulled on his Size 5 snow pants (six inches of leg showing) and plowed in.

Unfortunately, this snow is a week early and isn't likely to last for a white Christmas...

Family Values

Like the family decals plastered on minivans and suburbans throughout Utah (you know, where you get to see a stick figure for each of the six kids plus the dog...), these "bimbo a bordo"stickers are ubiquitous in Tuscany.

Conveniently shaped like a street sign, some even include the baby's name for a personal jolt of guilt.

It all seems to be a vain effort by new parents to get their fellow Italians to drive a little more slowly. Or break with genetics and stop tailgating....

2 Euro Panettone

Tastes just as good as the 20 euro variety...

I LOVE Italy.

Chains of Love

Amore conquers all....even the carabinieri.

After the local police cut all the love locks off the fence around the Cellini statue on Ponte Vecchio, Italian youth valiantly pressed on:

They moved around the corner and adorned this chain outside the Uffizzi with their declarations of love.

Taking out the Trash

Has a whole new meaning with these space-age contraptions. Firenze's mayor is taking a page from less garbage-challenged European countries and trying to train locals to deposit their refuse underground.

I can't blame him. They look--and smell--much nicer than the steaming, stanking rows of dumpsters we've gotten used to. "Beauty + Respect" indeed.

Still, I have yet to see anyone using them. They're a little intimidating.

Street Art--Italian Style

Is it just me? Or is there an uncanny resemblance between this first station of the cross at the steps to Piazzale Michelangelo and this "do not enter" sign near Piazza Ferucci?

Could be an incredible coincidence.....OR, the city has hired the same modern artist who did the religious art to create street art.

Only in Italy.

Ugly Americans

Americans get the brunt of Italians' disdain for tourists (this despite the place being overrun by entitled Brits for two centuries, but I digress) and most of the blame rests with Yankee students run amok.

Italian restaurateurs tell stories of prissy daughters who go to lunch with their parents for their first day in Florence. By the next night, after the parents are gone, the girl is puking in the street after much too much to drink. Who can resist a legal drinking age of 16? Not us!

So...the city is opening a sort of community center at Palazzo Giovane to keep foreign students out of trouble: "We want to offer a unique experience of citizenship to these young people and not a 'Disneyland' ride through a world of globalized partying, where context is cancelled in the haze of alcohol and the particulars of such an experience are lost in a drunken stupor," wrote Cristina Giachi in The Florentine.

Sigh.

Getting it

They say that understanding humor is one of the last steps to learning a new language. So....when I giggled a bit at these notepads, I felt like I'd finally arrived.

Get it? Double-o-sette? (Fette are slices...)

Bloodsuckers

Eight mosquito bites waiting at the school bus stop at 4:30 p.m....

The thing you forget, the thing they don't mention in the midst of all this glorious Renaissance: Firenze is, essentially, one big riverbed. Vermin are to be expected. And Florentines are

prosaic about the variety and sheer volume of biting bugs they live with (including the worst--the Zanzare tigre, a striped little bugger that bites all

day long and survives until November).

They've developed all sorts of electrical plug-ins with either toxic chemicals or natural rosemary/lavender/eucalyptus essences to drive the mosquitoes out of the room. There are potions and creams for after the bite--including one made in New Hampshire (how come we Americans don't know about this?).

And still...no window screens.

Chiuso

Gas strike. All the service stations on the highway closed last night and will stay closed until Sept. 18. It's one way to slow down the Autostrade....

My theory: They figure all the natives, the ones who might get angry, are busy getting their kids settled in school. And, of course, the strike will lift in time for one last trip to the beach.

Power to the people!

La Spiaggia in Citta

Borrowing an idea from Paris, the young and hip mayor of Florence has authorized vendors to set up temporary "beaches" on the embankments of the Arno.

This one near Ponte Vespucci is the most elaborate. Unfortunately, these beaches end up looking a bit like trailer parks--complete with above-ground pools and white plastic chairs.

This is the equivalent of Labor Day weekend--the last break before the kids start school Sept 15. So, despite the lack of glam, the embankment is full of sunbathers determined to tan their hides to a rich mahogany.

Full Disclosure: Vespucci beach is also the summertime location of the bane of our existence--the Damn Band. A sort of open-mike night, every night, the beach turns into a rather pathetic night club where local acts attempt to draw tourists down with mediocre covers of The Doors, Dire Straits and Italian pop.

On a beautiful September day, it's much more benign....

Amore di Funghi

I decided I'd figure out what all this craziness is about.... http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/aug/29/italian-mountain-mushrooms-claim-lives

The rest of the year, porcini are only available as shriveled little clumps. This fall is my window for fresh funghi. But rather than tromping through the woods, I paid $15 a pound.

a Piedi

The Italians have several speeds on foot: Most take a passeggiata (stroll) at a speed that drives many Americans crazy. If you're serious about it, you "cammino" (walk) or "corro" (run). Today, I went "footing" (jogging).

It goes without saying (but I will anyway): the Italians don't have a group of language purity watchdogs like the French do to ban such linguistic hybrids...

Islamophobia

Thousands of miles and an ocean of political correctness away from the opportunistic hand-wringing over the Ground Zero mosque, Italians blithely celebrate their crusading past. Every June and September, the town of Arezzo (an hour southeast of Florence) stages the Giostra del Saracino.

Part Renaissance fair, part mosh pit, the joust commemorates the town's rebuff of Medieval Arab raids. These days, the festival consists of three events: a procession around town of "royal" couples, spear-and crossbow-wielding "crusaders" and "knights" on prancing horses; a flag-throwing show by gymnasts from around the commune (think of that scene in "Under the Tuscan Sun"); and the "joust" with a wooden, dark-skinned foreign invader.

Sensitive, this is not. Huffington Post would have a field day: Two turban-wearing "Saracens" are marched into Piazza Grande behind a magistrate. The "joust" is with a wooden, dark-skinned foreign invader. (Of course, my camera batteries died and the only electronics store I could find open was run by two very helpful, Muslim Pakistanis.)

So, in spite of ourselves, we got into it. It's impossible not to appreciate dozens of Italian women pulling out lovingly preserved velvet dresses and woolen tunics twice a year. And hundreds of Italian men wearing tights? All this for what is, in essence, a neighborhood sporting event. All the winner gets is a carved golden lance and bar bragging rights for a year.

The rules go something like this: Each of four quartiere train two riders to point a lance at the target in the wooden Saracen's left hand. The living Saracens do double duty--covering the target as soon as the lance hits. A sequestered jury inspects the target and the lance (broken lances are double the points). Then, a guy in a funny hat reads the score aloud to the segregated, jeering/cheering crowd (they're behind barricades and nets and surrounded by police, of course).

This year's joust remained relatively calm despite three-fourths of the crowd's general disgust for one jouster who switched teams this year (from Porta Santo Spirito to Porta Crucifera--as Brent says, the LeBron James of this event) and the minor scandal when someone seated in the VIP section threw a small bottle of water at him as his lance hit the target. The carabinieri quickly hustled him away for his own safety. The Porta Crucifera crowd looked ready to jump the fence.

In the end, he broke his lance, doubled his points and Porta Crucifera went wild....

Lost in Translation

These are the closest thing to green onions/ scallions I can find right now. They look a little more like baby shallots.... Oh well, they taste the same.

Crispy Petunias

The mayor of Florence asked all those who could to plant balcony boxes this summer in an attempt to beautify the city. And I did my part.

Easier said than done.

Two rosemary and lavender plants bit the dust. And this is what my flowers look like after a summer of Firenze's heat and sun....

Watercolors

My love for European shutters and doors found new inspiration in Cote/Provence.

In Italy, historic preservation sensibilities require that shutters throughout Tuscany (and much of the rest of the country) be painted dark green. So, the shades of white, gray and Impressionist Blue we saw in the South of France were eyecandy.

Discovered this window in a little hilltop town called Le Bar sur Loup....

Les Baguettes

Like the Cote, I figured all the blather about French bread was just that. But not so!

Our Italian grocery store, Esselunga, imports the dough it bakes in waves every day from France. And, don't get me wrong, those baguettes are a relief from unsalted Pane Toscano.

But they're nothing compared to the bread the French carry like kindling under their arms. The bread stores have it down to a science with something like a vending machine: plug your money in and pull out a hot baguette.

Something about that crust and the size of the holes in the middle. Slap some mozarella and tomato inside and it's heaven. Zero condiments required.

No wonder you find half-eaten stumps tucked away on window sills and steps throughout the south of France. Lunch doesn't require much more....

Cote d'Azur

I loved "To Catch a Thief" and "French Kiss" as much as the next girl. But I have to confess: I think the French Riviera is overrated....

The slips of sand are the size of Bardot's bikini, a hamburger goes for 14 euros (and who would want one anyway?), and, despite what Hollywood depicts, you spend more time stuck in traffic than whizzing around la Grande Corniche with the top town.

That said, rather than a parade of North African refugees hawking made-in-China designer knockoffs for some Fagin character in the shadows, the French beach featured a father and son ringing little bells to sell their candied almonds. Every so often, they'd drop a sample on our towels.

Dog Days

Last year, I was too disoriented to notice the signs of Ferie, Italy's obligatory two-week August vacation: Empty parking spots on Ponte Vespucci. Handwritten signs appearing in successive waves in restaurant and shop windows ("Chiuso per ferie, 1 Agosto - 22 Agosto"--See you in a month, essentially.) Bad service. No one but tourists on the streets.

This weekend, it will get worse as the rest of the Florentines who haven't gone to the country/beach/mountains for Feragosto Aug. 15 leave town in a mass exodus.

I only knew it as "the time without broccoli." I searched endlessly through Mercato Centrale and the boutique grocery stores that cater to hotels for the only green thing Jack will eat.

This year, it's all good: I found the frozen vegetable mix at Esselunga. And then, there are the sunflowers (not my photo, credit: paradoxplace)....Really, they look like this.

Coffee House Rules

Italians are disgusted by American coffee. We may have introduced the modern world to the stuff, but they perfected it. And they've been spoiled; they're used to paying 1 to 2 euros for the deepest, richest espresso you'll ever drink.

When Italians visit the States, inevitably, some well-meaning American will tell them they can get their caffeine fix at Starbucks, which only makes it worse. One of our American friends here tells her local amici to think of Starbucks' menu as "coffee-flavored beverages"-- then they won't mind paying $6 for a cup of only passable dark water with two flavorings in a cup the size of a soda.

Tourists in Italy immediately identify themselves as American if they order cappucino after noon. No milk in coffee except for breakfast! If you absolutely can't take the late-afternoon espresso dark with a spoon of sugar as they do, the only acceptable exception is a macchiato...But I digress.

Needless to say, It's stressful to make coffee for Italians. Luckily, one of our Italian friends took pity on us after one dinner party. He was disturbed to find my Bialetti shiny as new--a year after I bought it.

So, some rules for a proper Moka: Never wash the pot with soap and water. If you do, you'll lose all the greasy coffee residue that lines the pot and keeps the aluminum taste out of the brew. Simply rinse with hot water. Use three heaping teaspoons of grounds--no more. Poke the grounds three times with a toothpick. Then put the pot on to boil. Turn it off as soon as you hear bubbling. Don't wait until the pot is full or the moka will be burned.

Techno Trash

At one point in time, I loved techno music--the mindless, thumping beat great for working out and gyrating en masse in a dance club. And after a year in Florence, I've been dunked into techno again. It's like a soundtrack to life: You catch snippets walking past clubs, sitting in traffic, eating lunch in a trattoria.

But after hearing superslow remakes of the Eurythmics' "Sweet Dreams," the disco song

"Le Freak" and Nouvelle Vague's cover of "Master and Servant" (they should have left the Depeche Mode original alone), I was getting disgusted. Some things are sacred!

Then, I heard Gramophonedzie's cover of the Peggy Lee/Benny Goodman standard, "Why Don't You Do Right?"

The album is only out in the UK right now. But check out the video here:

It's THE song for summer 2010.

Pushed Over

Nothing is sacred. According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the leaning tower of Pisa is no longer the leaningest tower in the world:

After five centuries of comfort in that spot, the tower's 4-degree tilt has been knocked out of the record books by the Capital Gate building in Abu Dhabi, a 35-story architectural marvel engineered deliberately to lean. It slants at an 18-degree slope.

I still think more people will visit Pisa...

Al Mare

This is the "American Beach" at Pisa. The only thing American about it is the number of soldiers from Camp Darby and the burgers at the concession stand. Otherwise, it's like every other hyper-developed Italian beach--from the wall of orange umbrellas and beach chairs to the Caprese Salad and Speedos.

Not a bad way to spend a Saturday...

Public Education Cuts, Italian Style

Here's what happens when government cuts funding for the public schools in Italy: Thousands of Tuscans with kids in tow march along the Lungarno to criticize slicing away at art and music--"fundamental" programs for a good education.

They're also upset about a new law that requires schools to hire "local"--but not necessarily the best qualified or most experienced--teachers.

It all made me wonder what would happen if Utahns took to the streets to protest the state's "We're No. 49!" per-pupil spending...

Memorial Day in Italy

Like most Americans, I'd forgotten the military history of this holiday. It always seems to be overshadowed by barbecues, start-of-summer sales and white shoe season...

Not this year. At the Florence American Cemetery, it's impossible to ignore the 4,400 marble crosses and stars of David and the massive wall carved with the names of many of the young American GIs killed in 1944-45 during the campaign to liberate Italy.

Current Italian and American soldiers and airmen turn out in force every year. Italian re-enactors don pristine woolen American uniforms and proudly pose for pictures with the kids. This year, Brig. General Charles Estes, a Utah native stationed in Germany, tried to shore up the alliance by noting Italians and Americans have been fighting side by side for 65 years (if you include Iraq and Afghanistan).

And there was a slight controversy as his Italian Counterpart, Gen. D. Marco Bertolini, Tuscany Regional Commander of the Italian Army, chastised his own country today for neglecting to honor the soldiers who gave their lives in the war and the veterans still alive today.

Inevitably, April 25 commemorations of "Liberation Day" turn into political debates between the current Communist Party and the ruling Conservatives. The Communists have co-opted the history of World War II Italian partisans who fought alongside the Allies and declared themselves the political party that saved Italy. And the conservatives hate being compared to Mussolini's fascists who nominally shared similar ideology 70 years ago. Add to that the tension between the middle of the country (a communist/liberal stronghold) and conservative blocks in the north and south.

One Italian woman said she'd been waiting years to hear that from another Italian's lips. "Without the Americans," she said, "we'd be speaking German or Russian."

But then, we looked around us at hillside villas, many gobbled up by German investors in the 80s and 90s. Ah, she said with a shrug, "We say: What the Panzer couldn't conquer, the (deutsch)mark did."

Typical Italian humor...

Wild Greens

Driving through Tuscany in the spring you'll happen upon natives clambering up and down the hillsides, clutching bunches of what looks like grass in their hands. A few weeks later, the bunches appear in town: Agretti, or Barba di Frate (Friar's Beard). They look a bit like chives and have a slight onion-y smell.

I had to search UK websites for a recipes. Turns out, a bit of olive oil, garlic, and salt and pepper was all it required...

Summer Fashion

A sea of linen has appeared in the markets--sundresses, tunics and camp shirts in white, navy, tan and, occasionally, red. But those are for women of a certain generation (over 25).

Younger fashionistas seem to prefer long, tight t-shirts printed with faces. Audrey Hepburn from "Breakfast at Tiffany's," Charlise Theron and rhinestone cowgirls are the favorites.

And, of course, there's always Marilyn...

Oltrarno Guerillas

The more uptight residents of Oltrarno (the neighborhood across the river) are upset about counterculture incursions into what was -- and still is -- the alt part of the city:

At the end of April, a group calling itself the Movement for the Emancipation of Poetry plastered amateur prose throughout the Santo Spirito neighborhood: odes to "Arianna," for example, or the line above-- "I'm wonderful. Everyone else is crazy."

Then, May 3, police discovered vegetables, camomile and fruit trees planted in the planters around the church. According to The Florentine, authorities also found a small pot plant. (Oh the humanity! Marijuana found in an artistic enclave!) The guerilla gardeners pledged (threatened) to retake the piazza this summer.

Residents complain that the poetry will damage the historic buildings. MEP guerillas claim the paper is attached using a mixture of water, sugar and tonic--all it needs is a good rainstorm, they say.

They may be wrong about that: Where the poetry has been scraped off, it seems to take the first layer of paint with it.

I guess we'll see if there are lingering bad feelings about that "all-natural" glue....

New Fruit

The fruit is changing with the season. Oranges are being replaced by ciliegia (cherries), albicocca (apricots) and these....

The color of apricots, in the shape and texture of kiwis with alarming seeds the size of olives. We'd call them loquats. The Italian word is "nespole."

Just Call Me Doc

In Italy, I've discovered I get an assumed boost in status as the proud holder of a bachelor's degree (even if it IS in one of the borderline social "sciences"). Technically, I could be called "doctor" -- or dottoressa, Dott.essa for short.

It's the Food

In honor of Festa della mamma, an Italian website surveyed 400 foreign exchange students from 50 countries, asking who has the best mothers. The winner, of course, was Italy. The 17-year-old students said Italian mothers always find time for their children.

I think a good pastasciutta probably pushes Italian mammas over the top....

Groundhog Day, Italian Style

The Italians have something similar on April 3: "Terzo aprilante, quaranta di' durante..." (If it rains on that day, you can expect 40 more days of rain until summer.)

Given that two weeks of April were enchanted, I'm assuming we're in for several more weeks of this.

Equally ominous: The first 12 days of January are supposed to predict the weather for the months of the year. Early January was wet...

The Great Race

The Mille Miglia rolled through town yesterday--classic car after classic car putting through Piazza Signoria. Even my son, who normally doesn't pay much attention to these things, got into it: shouting "not old" at the newer model "service" cars from BMW and Mercedes.

Now a two-day endurance road rally from Brescia to Rome and back, the Mille Miglia used to be an annual, 1,500 km, 20-hour race from 1927 to 1957. It inspired carmakers like

Alfa Romeo, Ferrari, Maserati and Porsche to design GT or grand touring cars. It was disrupted only by World War II and cancelled in 1957 after a Ferrari blew a tire and killed nine spectators.

Today, the only cars allowed are cars that participated in the original races over those 30 years. We noticed plates from as far away as Japan and Canada. And Jack saw a suspicious number of modern Ferraris...

It reminded me a little of "The Great Race."

The Day the Music Died

Despite a sellout crowd for Strauss' "The Woman Without a Shadow" (in my opinion, he should have stuck with waltzes) and the presence of Sophie Loren (I was THIS close) on opening night, Maggio Musicale Fiorentino company members are in full protest.

Last month, Italy's president signed a decree reducing salaries and allowing early retirement for female musicians and dancers (lowering the age from 52 to 45-years-old) in an effort to save money. According to The Florentine, from 2004 to 2008, the lyric and symphonic foundations in the country (not the major national symphonies and opera companies) lost 100 million euro--70 percent of that money goes toward salaries.

The musicians say it will be the death of the theater. To make the point, they've been hanging sheets with scrawled messages outside the windows of Teatro Communale (not a lot of poster board in the country, apparently).

On strike, they cancelled the May 2 performance.

And yet, Florentines still crammed the ticket window on a Saturday morning....

Tanti Auguri a Me

Lunch at the Four Seasons, Firenze. First, a look around the 15th-century villa (a former papal residence with the largest private garden in town). Restoring this frieze (discovered after construction started) delayed the opening for three years.

Then, the food: Semolina and black cabbage soup, beef tagliata and pistachio creme brulee with birthday greetings written in nutella.

Blue period

I've been noticing the work of a particular graffiti artist. He gets around town--leaving this bulldog face on a garage door near Santo Spirito, on a crumbling brick utility building in the suburbs and on the bathrooms in Cascine....