Daily Life In Italy in Summer

Maybe some people are wondering just what daily life in Italy is like in summer. Well, once the warm weather hits this country, the routine in the north does change a little.

First of all, most of the schools in Italy close for summer at the end of June, which means many children suddenly find themselves with not much to do, while many of their parents are still working.

Families With Children

What Italians generally do when the schools close, especially whose wives don’t work, is take the kids to the sea or the mountains, while the husband stays in the city or town to work. When both parents have jobs, Italian children are sent to their grand parents, who either have or have rented houses or apartments down on the coast or up in the cool of the mountains. The 30°C+ heat in Italian cities can become oppressive and potentially dangerous for very young children.

For many Milanese, the coast generally means the Liguria region, the area on both sides of Genova. However some, especially those with family down in the south of Italy, may well send their children down to grand parents or relations down in the southern areas of Italy.

Those who do not have grand parents or relations, and who have the resources, will have a ‘colf’, which is basically a nanny who is often employed full time to look after younger children. Sometimes, the colf will take the children out of Milan, and at weekends parents will join the children. … Continue Reading

Ghoulish Gastronomy in Tuscany

Deep in the depths of Tuscany, not too far from a delightful little place called Anghiari, which is on the border with Umbria, there is the hauntingly interesting restaurant the Locanda al Castello di Sorci.

Now, this restaurant, which seems to have a good reputation for its culinary expertise incidentally, has a little extra on its menu, in the form of the ghost of a certain Baldaccio d’Anghiari, who used to own the castle. … Continue Reading

How to Interpret Italian Street Names

Had or having trouble trying to work out just how Italian street signs work? In that case, this post may help you. Or add to your confusion!

Italy has a lovely habit of naming its streets and roads after well known figures from history, saints and well known areas (to Italians) of Italy. Generally, the people after which some streets are named are Italians, but by no means always. Indeed, we have a street near us which is named after Lord Byron.

As I’m sure you will agree, this method of naming streets is charming. This being the case, you wouldn’t think that such a system might cause problems, but it certainly does, and it is not only hapless tourists who are caught out, but even Italians themselves. Why? You might well ask.

White on White Signs

One of the slight problems with this system is that the street signs, usually small white rectangular marble plaques, are often placed on white walls, generally on corners, but sometimes just after the corner, at about 2.5 to 3 metres above street level. This means they can be difficult to spot at times, if they are there, that is. They may be on one side of a junction, but not on the other. These signs may also be shrouded by greenery, just to add some spice to life. And these signs tend to become cream coloured in time, which makes them yet more difficult to spot, especially at night. Reflective street signs are not common, if indeed they exist here. Reflective signs are used for major destinations, like towns, cities and villages, though.

OK, so seeing and finding the signs can be a problem, but at least they are generally there, and if you know the name of the street, you’ll be fine. Well, not necessarily… Read on, if you are brave enough. … Continue Reading

Interesting Gorgonzola

UPDATE 2

I have spoken to Lorenzo of La Via lattea, the award winning slow food company behind this this delightful cheese, and a whole host of other interesting cheese products as well, as I have discovered. Full contact details have now been added to my original The Gorgonzola of the Gods post, and they do speak English too. The company can export pretty well anywhere, if requested. However remember that La Via lattea’s products are natural, and will suffer if travel times are excessive. … Continue Reading

A Cat’s Chance in Hell

If you were unaware, which you may be if you are not from Italy, most of the public TV stations here are influenced by Italy’s rag tag bunch of political masters. This means that the news is presented in such a way as to support the ruling junta.

People are aware of this, especially Antonio Di Pietro‘s Italia dei Valori political party, which is about the only party which is attempting to represent the wishes of the Italian people. Trying to make the TV channels here a little more impartial is also one of Di Pietro’s aims. (The English version of Di Pietro’s web site is not working at the moment – I wonder why).

To achieve this purpose, Di Pietro, along with Italy’s Radical party got together to propose Leoluca Orlando for the position of president of the body which watches over Italy’s RAI state TV network. Only the candidature is being firmly blocked by Berlusconi’s boys, who obviously fear losing the ability to manipulate the way in which RAI is operated.

In protest, Italy’s Radicals have staged a sit-in at the premises of the watchdog which monitors RAI.

As a matter of interest, Leoluca Orlando is an ex-mayor of Palermo, and is strongly anti-mafia. This is something which may not endear him to all those politicians whose fingers are stuck in Italy’s pie, and who have ‘friends’ whose wishes must be respected.

Despite the support of Italy’s Radical party and their mini-protest, Mr Orlando has a cat’s chance in hell of winning the presidency, which will be handed to someone much more ‘friendly’. Just wait and see.

Billionaire’s Beef

This post was inspired by this lovely little comment from a post over at Bleeding Espresso:

Please let’s ignore the fact that Berlusconi has fooled a majority of Italians into voting him into office a third time, OK? And also that my local party lost as well. Instead let’s move on to happier, comforting topics.

Like food.

Well, being a wee bit mischievous, as I am, I wondered if I could mix food and politics, so I asked myself: ‘Now just what is Berluconi’s favourite food?’. A quick hop onto the internet via good old Google, and I found that the Corriere della Sera had broached this very question to the tanned man, according to Italian blog Tagliatelle Vaganti.  I can’t track down the actual Corriere della Sera article though.

So, just what is Italy’s most persecuted, but virtually immune from prosecution, billionaire’s favourite food? … Continue Reading