A Clash of Cultures

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 she wanted to experience it.  Signs of American and English influence are everywhere.  Close by our place is a street of the pubs.  There is the Londoner, the Morrison (for Jim Morrison of the Doors) and B.B King's.  There is also a Harry Potter Pub.  Many places now advertise "fast food."  You can always find a McDonalds.  We've seen kids coming out of a popular place with french fries and a Coca Cola in hand.  

On the flip side, there is a move to preserve Sicilian culture and traditions.  While dialects are disappearing due in part to mass media that is broadcast in Dante's Italian, people here embrace the dialect and resist giving it up.  Elena's mom, Mariella, promised us that we'd be speaking Sicilian before we leave.  Elena and Vincenzo (more my generation, even though they're a bit younger)

 have invited us to some of their Sunday night pizza outings with their friends.  Their conversations are totally in Sicilian dialect.  On a side trip to Bronte, we ran into a bunch of high school kids who were part of FAI (Fondo Ambiente Italiano) an organization dedicated to the preservation and enhancement of the cultural heritage of the Italians.  (I wrote most of this earlier today, and now just finished a great dinner with the family tonight.  Another great example of what I'm talking about.  We ended the evening singing christmas songs telling the Christmas story.  We had song sheets as all the songs were in Sicilian.  These were followed by some english Christmas carols, including John Lennon's Happy Xmas, War is Over.)

It's an interesting dichotomy.  Many of us Italian Americans, me included, embrace our Italian heritage and love much about the motherland.  Many dream of relocating here.  But, many Italians, particularly Sicilians, are leaving here and many long to get to the US.  Emigration from Sicily started after the unification of Italy, (1871, I think) and hasn't stopped since.  My grandparents left Sicily at the beginning of 1900's.  Sicily is the Italian region with the highest number of expats, as of 2017, 750,000 Sicilians living elsewhere.  For lack of employment, many young Sicilians leave here for better opportunities.  The last time we visited here, we had a young woman tour guide showing us Mt. Etna.  She explained that almost all of her friends from school have left here, either to the north of Italy, or other countries, as they had no work here.  

I remember my first trip to Sicily and as we were driving around the coast near Taormina heading toward Messina and the land of my grandparents, I thought how could anyone ever  have left such a beautiful part of the world.  But, if you have nothing to eat, you probably can't enjoy anything else.