Some Place Called Abruzzo

I spent last week traveling through a region of Italy called the Abruzzo. It's right in the middle of the country, closest to Rome (which is in the bordering region, Lazio).



I went with these people:


L to R: Tiziano, Andrea, Sara, Guido. They are not posing in this photo. Poor Guido was entrusted the main leadership of the journey, which is probably why he looks so devastated in this photo (though everyone else looks pretty desperate too). This trip would've been impossible for me without them. Though there were moments when they couldn't understand the locals' accents any better than I could.



This was a work trip. For reasons that are complicated and related to business and politics, we were assigned to do a research project on a certain part of the region known as the Valle Roveto. The idea was, we'd go there and come back with an idea of its feasibility as a tourist site. While isolated, the Abruzzo has been gaining fame as a tourist destination because if its amazing scenery (wildlife, basically), cuisine (lots of sheep's cheese and meat) and religious traditions. It's supposed to have a lot of unique stuff going on because of the isolation of the mountains, meaning that the Catholic church couldn't check up on the way everyone was behaving. This is great news for a region with poverty issues. However, the Valle Roveto has not gotten the memo about tourism. When we began our pre-trip research, I was assigned to call the tourist office in the regional capital, L'Aquila, to ask about options in the Valle.

After calling me back repeatedly, the director of the regional tourist office finally gave up. "Don't go," she said. "There's nothing there. It's pointless for tourists. No services, nothing. It's better if you just rent a car and drive through it."


(This is a photo from a day in which we spent hours looking for a place to eat.)

Obviously this was not an option, since we had to complete our project. But it was an ominous sign.



Perspectives did not improve upon our arrival. We reached Capistrello, our home base, and were quite depressed at the surroundings. Try to picture northern New Jersey, but transplanted into Italy. Sad! It quickly became clear that not much was going on in the Valle Roveto. We noted that in Capistrello the nightlife enfolded thusly: there were two bars, 10 feet apart and open on alternate nights. One was called "My Bar", the other was called "The First Bar" (jokes about His Bar and The Second Bar abounded). Activities included playing other regions' folk music for free on the semi-decrepit jukeboxes, card games, and arguments. By our second day, we knew the name of the local barfly: Monica. Heavy drinkers would have a ball, though. We bought fourteen drinks for $20. Plus potato chips. (To my mom: fourteen drinks for five people, three of whom are over 5'10", is not that much!)



The truth is that we saw a lot of gorgeous stuff during the week. But we had a lot more fun observing the locals, both humans and animals.



First off, all secondary roads (including the regional highways) were a hazard to drivers. The herd of cows walking uphill should've been a decent sign.




However, we were totally unprepared for the horses we came upon, grazing (??) in the middle of the road. Not to mention the villagers who were keeping horses in their garage.


(Tiziano running a horse off the road - a major road, may I add - so that we could go on.)

Other bizarre sightings included horses lying down asleep (also partially in the road!!), with absolutely no fear of cars. There was also the particularly eery sight of a field in which EVERY SINGLE COW was sitting or lying on the ground. Have you ever seen a cow rest its chin on the ground? Neither had we.



We took this to be a metaphor for the depression of the region. Even the cows can't be bothered to stand up.

This was taken even further when we drove through a town and saw a dog lying down in the middle of the central 4-way intersection. Our only possible conclusion was that he had been overcome by the lack of food and other facilities in the area, and he was aiming for a quick death under the wheels of a truck. Unfortunately, the place was so empty that there weren't even any big vehicles.

We enjoyed ourselves, though.



This wine bar will live in my mind forever because I was very embarrassed to find myself locked in the bathroom. The proprietor had me pass the key under the door so that he could save me. It only takes one glass of wine for me to lose my door-opening abilities.

I took lots of photos.



This photo confirms the stereotype of perpetually cool Italians.



Finally, we ate a lot.



We ate too much, actually. Too much meat in particular: Abruzzo is known for hunting. In five days I ate SEVEN different kinds of meat (beef, veal, lamb, chicken, wild boar, roe deer, and stag). Don't ever eat stag. But boar is good.

Fall Foliage?

I miss fall in New England! Within the space of a few weeks, Bologna got chilly and sunny, just like home in the fall. And every time I step on a leaf and hear it crunch, I get a pang of homesickness. I realized that despite all this Italy traveling, I've never missed a fall on the East Coast. Oh, apple picking . . . pumpkin carving . . . hot cider.



No complaints about Italy, though. A fourth addition to our house just arrived: Francesca, from Puglia. She studies international marketing and is finishing her thesis. I'd forgotten what it was like to live with three other people in my house - I've gotten too accustomed to Massimo's tortured love life. But now it looks like the various players at Via Avesella are in place. Somehow, after seeing 14 apartments last November in search of a normal, clean, non-smoking place, I have ended up as the only non-smoker in my house. How did that happen? I'm prepared to wage war, though. Here is my question: why do smokers think that non-smokers can't smell the remnants of their surreptitious smoking? I always know when someone has been sneaking around.

Next week I'm going with some coworkers to the Abruzzo, a region a few hours south. It's very rural. I'm really excited, actually. This article helped me. There are various political work-related motivations behind this trip, which for me translates (among other things) into lots and lots of photos. But I think it'll be fun, too, since 5 people under the age of 30, with a car and a credit card . . . well, we can't go wrong.



My choir has re-started with a bang. We have about 5 concerts this month. The nicest moment, though, was the reappearance of a beloved tenor, Elio. He's known for his eccentricity (he frequently fixes my bike during rehearsal, so that I begin my journey home and find out that my tires have been pumped) and his penchant for throwing hard candy at us while we're singing (the sopranos sit right in front of him). We appreciate it, since it's good candy. Anyway, he was hospitalized in late July for an aortic aneurysm, and it was extremely extremely serious. He was back and healthy yesterday, though - even if he's moving a little bit slower. We gave him a deafening round of applause, and he responded by throwing a whole bag of candy at our conductor. I knew he was himself when he offered me a perfectly yellow banana in a shoebox lid (being used as a tray, I think) at the end of practice. "Are you hungry?" I was! It was a good banana - I ate it during work today.