GiuseppePingitore

  This morning I went to the macelleria (butcher shop) just so I could have something to write about.  Meats are popular in the Catania region.  You can walk down the main street here in town and pass by 5 shops within less than half a mile. They are all good and may vary as to what they specialize in.  One is the Macelleria Equine that specializes in horse meat.  We did have a good meal of horse and ass awhile ago.  Father Giuseppe, who works in Catania, returned one night with horse meet and donkey.  The horse meat was in the form of meatballs and they were excellent.  The donkey was in thin fillets that were grilled.  All was good.  I know, this can open up a whole discussion about whether it's right to eat horse and donkey.  But, if you eat cows, pigs and chickens, what's the difference. Anyway, I love good sausage, and both sides of my Italian families made their own sausage.  The Calabrian (Pingitore's) and the Sicilian (...

 Here's some real excitement.  I got a haircut.  It had been 10 weeks since last time and things were getting a bit shaggy.  Barbering in Sicily is a profession and a real art form going back hundreds of years.  I asked Vincenzo for a recommendation, and he steered me toward his parrucchiere (barber) right down the street, a guy who's been around forever.  I asked Vincenzo's son, Alessandro, and he said Vincenzo's barber was fine, but I'd walk out with not much hair left.  He steered me to his, Diolosà, (which I think might losely translate to "God only knows"), and gave me directions on how to get there.   I set out one morning last week, and found the shop, first walking into what turned out to be the women's side, and they directed me around the corner to the men's.  I wasn't sure if I needed an appointment, and walked in to ask.  There were about 6 empty chairs, and they said come on in.  I had practiced how I was going to expla...

 I suck at poker.  I hate to disclose all of this since it means I can never play poker with any of you as you will know how to take me to the cleaners.  Not that that will be difficult. Vincenzo belongs to a club here.  It seems that there is a club for many different groups of people.  One for white collar workers, one for blue collar.  One for soccer fans, one for union people.  But, all for men.  Vincenzo plays poker at his club probably 3 times a week.  As you walk into the club, there is a large room with many card games going on.  The most popular is the classic, traditional Sicilian card game of Briscola.  I remember my grandpa playing this all the time. Here it is played with a special deck of cards with different characters.  Still the same game, but it would take some study to get up to speed with the game.   My poker experience is with a small group of friends that would get together for a friendly game, maybe ...

One of our first discussions here was with Alessandro (Elena's brother) while he was giving us a quick tour of Biancavilla.  They have two bright and beautiful daughters, ages 11 and 7.  The oldest, loves all things American including music videos.  She is learning english and getting quite proficient at it.  Even her younger sister knows a lot of english and can sing several popular english songs. Alessandro explained that this new generation is all about American influences, and his generation is more on the cusp of change.   We arrived here just after Halloween, a holiday not typically celebrated in Italy.  Elena had her place decorated for Halloween, and said she took some grief for doing so from some of her friends.  They informed her Halloween wasn't Italian.  Elena also wanted a traditional turkey dinner for Thanksgiving, another holiday not celebrated in Italy.  They see so much of the Thanksgiving traditions on TV and in film, that s...

I'm still struggling with my Italian.  10 years ago when I was here, I enrolled in an Italian course.  For three weeks, I spent about 3 1/2 hours a day in class, Monday thru Friday learning Italian.  With only 4 other people in class and only common language being Italian, I started feeling pretty comfortable with Italian by the end of the three weeks.  And, spending evening dinners and weekends with the wonderful Maria Grazia also helped with the language.   But, of course when back in the states, I got lazy and ended up losing ground again.  I even took a couple Italian classes at U of M (free to audit courses there when you are over 63 years old).  But without continually using the language, it gets pretty rusty. I was hopeful that being here full time, I'd get pretty comfortable again with speaking Italian.  Not exactly the case.  During the week, we are pretty much on our own, and our use of Italian tends to be dealing with shop keepers....

     Well, it has only been a little over 10 years since I last posted here. I am now writing from the small town of Biancavilla, just outside of Catania Sicily. I have mixed feelings about starting this up again, and finally decided to give it a try primarily for something to keep me busy from time to time. I started this in 2011 in conjunction with a month sabbatical to Rome (with a week side trip to Sicily.) That was a magical life changing trip and I wrote at the end of each day as a way of processing the experiences of the day. It was good fun, and I enjoyed the comments it engendered. My hesitations now are that I don't see how I can duplicate that experience. And, similar to back then, I really don't know what I have to say of any value or whether anyone would have any interest in my thoughts and ramblings. Also, I feel a bit more inhibited now in what I say, not for any particular reason, and I don't really want to censor myself. But, I landed on giv...