Early morning mist has given way to sparkling sunshine and twenty-four degrees.
We flee Carmine's Hallowe'en ghosts for more rational quarters.
Watch this space...
Wednesday, 31 October 2007
Tuesday, 30 October 2007
A measure of immortality
Fourteen degrees at 8am, fourteen degrees at 1pm. Damp. Santa Agata, on the hillside above Cannobio, drifts gently in and out of the fog.
Cannobio is full of candles and flowers, carried in the hands of rather elegantly-dressed people in the direction of the cimitero. All Souls is in full swing. As an English Protestant, I've come to prefer the Catholic All Souls to Hallowe'en and its Hollywood horror. Perhaps by going to the cemetery and reading the names of the dead who lie there, seeing their faces again, cleaning up and arranging things as we would in our own homes, we give them some measure of immortality.
Cannobio is full of candles and flowers, carried in the hands of rather elegantly-dressed people in the direction of the cimitero. All Souls is in full swing. As an English Protestant, I've come to prefer the Catholic All Souls to Hallowe'en and its Hollywood horror. Perhaps by going to the cemetery and reading the names of the dead who lie there, seeing their faces again, cleaning up and arranging things as we would in our own homes, we give them some measure of immortality.
Helicopter Day
October 29, 2007 : Seventeen degrees and mostly sunny.
Much excitement this afternoon as we are visited by beings from on high.
Three viaggi of the helicopter, bringing firewood for neighbours intending to spend the next two months here.
We hear the sound of the rotors from a distance. AJ looks at me, I look at AJ. I sweep B up and we belt up two flights to the attic...Here, with our noses pressed against the window, the helicopter, today red with a yellow streak, is about ten feet away. B is standing on tippy-toe, grasping the window sill, her eyes big. AJ is flat against the wall, straining to see the action while still feeling relatively safe.
Later, AJ relates in a mixture of German, Italian and English the visit of the helicopter. He must be excited to mix his languages so!
He's seen so many helicopter flights, up close and exhilirating, that you'd think he wouldn't turn a hair. In the past few years three roofs have been refurbished, requiring numerous flights with pallets of granite piode (roofing stones), ten-feet-long pine beams, cement, sand, cement mixers, scaffolding, you name it, all dangling perilously from the end of a long rope.
Today's mission was fairly simple. A bag of chopped wood deposited in a garden. No electricity cables, no narrow spaces. But I've seen pallets of piode deposited on scaffolding three feet wide, beams ditto, and other loads four or five feet wide placed gently down in a street that's only six feet wide. The best pilot I've seen was a young woman who was able to deposit six pallets in neat piles on a terrace only a foot larger than themselves with plant pots on the wall, and flying dashingly away without doing any damage whatsoever.
Why do we need a helicopter delivery? See October 2007 Una Piccola Complicazione.
Monday, 29 October 2007
All Souls Mass
October 28, 2007 : Seventeen degrees and fine with patchy sunshine. I'm starting to understand what a wide meteorological vocabulary you need if you're going to describe the weather every day.
Today is All Souls mass at the Chiesa di San Gottardo in Carmine Superiore. We have mass only five times a year up here, so it's usually an occasion. All Souls is when we remember all the dead of the village, a line going back more than 1,000 years. With the sad death of Arturo Albertella last week, it was even more poignant today.
Giuliano told me at my first All Souls mass that this is the occasion in the calendar when, traditionally, everyone takes their smart, black winter coat out of mothballs for the winter. But only once in my five years here has the weather been cold enough.
More grist to the climate change mill?
Today is All Souls mass at the Chiesa di San Gottardo in Carmine Superiore. We have mass only five times a year up here, so it's usually an occasion. All Souls is when we remember all the dead of the village, a line going back more than 1,000 years. With the sad death of Arturo Albertella last week, it was even more poignant today.
Giuliano told me at my first All Souls mass that this is the occasion in the calendar when, traditionally, everyone takes their smart, black winter coat out of mothballs for the winter. But only once in my five years here has the weather been cold enough.
More grist to the climate change mill?
Saturday, 27 October 2007
Transformations
Eighteen degrees and fine. A beautiful mackerel-sky sunset this evening brought everyone out of their houses to watch. And for a moment, when the hills of Lombardy turned russet, it seemed that I was looking, not at the foothills of the Alps, but the mountains of Andalucia's Sierra Nevada.
Friday, 26 October 2007
Castagna season
October 26, 2007 : Nine degrees at 8am, ten degrees at 1pm. And raining.
The chickens of Carmine Superiore are upset. Not just because the rain is drip-drip-dripping in under their neck feathers, or because the mud is getting between their toes. No. The chickens are upset because they are being bombarded by hard round prickly things all day, and, frankly, it pisses them off.
October is castagna season in Piemonte, which means anyone venturing into the woods is likely to be hit on the head by hard round prickly things. And plenty of people are to be seen in the woods at this time of year, bent double, plastic carrier bags in hand, collecting the burnished brown sweet chestnuts while trying to avoid prickles in the paw.
Long before Conad the Barbarian opened his chain of over-priced supermarkets selling cardboard bread, the people of this region survived for much of the winter on foods made from chestnut flour. The chestnuts were boiled, laboriously shelled and then the kernel was ground into flour. It’s still possible to see several massive stone mortars used for just this purpose dotted around Carmine Superiore. And various people in the village still use old recipes to make chestnut-flour cakes topped with chestnut-flavoured icing and dotted with chestnuts. Delicious! Really.
Today, the annual bombardment is the cue for the celebration of the Grande Castagnata in town and village squares across the region. A fire of brushwood is made under a metal tripod six or seven feet high. Hung from the tripod by hand-forged chains is an enormous shallow pan with a perforated bottom (cue an Ealing Comedies comment from my father...) and a very long handle. This is filled with chestnuts and they are roasted in the flames. Every so often, the burliest person present gives a giant heave on the panhandle and the chestnuts jump en masse rather like a pancake on Pancake Day. If the burliest person available is already too drunk to do his duty, there's always a wizened ninety-something in widow's weeds and flowery slippers ready to step in and prove that it's really all in the wrist action.
Many people take this as an opportunity to return to the villages of their birth (or their parents’ birth), and to wear local traditional dress or little hats with feathers in. On tap is last year’s grappa, or perhaps the more sophisticated vin brulee. And there will definitely be a slightly out-of-tune marching band tootling along in the background. To complete the picture, everyone, young and old, local or foreigner, will have black fingers before the day is out from prizing open the scorched chestnut shells to get at the warm, starchy nut inside.
The chickens of Carmine Superiore are upset, but everyone else is enjoying castagna season in Piemonte.
The chickens of Carmine Superiore are upset. Not just because the rain is drip-drip-dripping in under their neck feathers, or because the mud is getting between their toes. No. The chickens are upset because they are being bombarded by hard round prickly things all day, and, frankly, it pisses them off.
October is castagna season in Piemonte, which means anyone venturing into the woods is likely to be hit on the head by hard round prickly things. And plenty of people are to be seen in the woods at this time of year, bent double, plastic carrier bags in hand, collecting the burnished brown sweet chestnuts while trying to avoid prickles in the paw.
Long before Conad the Barbarian opened his chain of over-priced supermarkets selling cardboard bread, the people of this region survived for much of the winter on foods made from chestnut flour. The chestnuts were boiled, laboriously shelled and then the kernel was ground into flour. It’s still possible to see several massive stone mortars used for just this purpose dotted around Carmine Superiore. And various people in the village still use old recipes to make chestnut-flour cakes topped with chestnut-flavoured icing and dotted with chestnuts. Delicious! Really.
Today, the annual bombardment is the cue for the celebration of the Grande Castagnata in town and village squares across the region. A fire of brushwood is made under a metal tripod six or seven feet high. Hung from the tripod by hand-forged chains is an enormous shallow pan with a perforated bottom (cue an Ealing Comedies comment from my father...) and a very long handle. This is filled with chestnuts and they are roasted in the flames. Every so often, the burliest person present gives a giant heave on the panhandle and the chestnuts jump en masse rather like a pancake on Pancake Day. If the burliest person available is already too drunk to do his duty, there's always a wizened ninety-something in widow's weeds and flowery slippers ready to step in and prove that it's really all in the wrist action.
Many people take this as an opportunity to return to the villages of their birth (or their parents’ birth), and to wear local traditional dress or little hats with feathers in. On tap is last year’s grappa, or perhaps the more sophisticated vin brulee. And there will definitely be a slightly out-of-tune marching band tootling along in the background. To complete the picture, everyone, young and old, local or foreigner, will have black fingers before the day is out from prizing open the scorched chestnut shells to get at the warm, starchy nut inside.
The chickens of Carmine Superiore are upset, but everyone else is enjoying castagna season in Piemonte.
Thursday, 25 October 2007
Happy Birthday AJ
October 25, 2007 : Nine degrees at 8am. Overcast and drizzling. A spatter of snow on the mountain peaks and a procession of fire salamanders on the path. Seventeen degrees with the sun peeping through at 1pm.
Happy Birthday AJ.
Happy Birthday AJ.
Wednesday, 24 October 2007
AJ's big breakthrough
October 24, 2007 : Eleven degrees at 8am. Overcast and raining. Let's hope the rain serves some purpose and lays the incendio to rest for good.
Today is the much-looked-for day!
AJ ran through the school-room door straight into the arms of his Maestra Antonella with her Etruscan good looks and her huge hoop earrings (much-mentioned by AJ during bedtime pillow-talk).
He didn't look back.
Sigh. This is how it feels to have your son leave you for another woman.
Today is the much-looked-for day!
AJ ran through the school-room door straight into the arms of his Maestra Antonella with her Etruscan good looks and her huge hoop earrings (much-mentioned by AJ during bedtime pillow-talk).
He didn't look back.
Sigh. This is how it feels to have your son leave you for another woman.
Tuesday, 23 October 2007
Aerial display
Six degrees again this morning, and more bright sunshine. Twenty degrees by lunchtime. The air is devoid of moisture. The garden's parched, the wooden bathtub's leaking and my hands feel like the dead leaves in the hand-cream ads.
There’s a layer of black fog lying across the lake at about 500m, and all Cannobio's noses - be they snub, aquiline, Roman, or tip-tilted, red, white, black or blue, large, small, button or pointed - all Cannobio's noses are wrinkled at the unmistakable smell of smoke :
A forest fire in Valle Cannobina. A big forest fire. Not on the scale of the California Wildfires now making headlines all over the world, but for us a major affair. Four helicopters and two Canadair planes sporting the bright yellow and red livery of the Protezione Civile have, for the last three days, been plying between lake and mountainside, drawing up water from the lake and hurling it at the flames.
For us, a spectacular flying display. The planes barrel two at a time down the valley at high speed, banking sharply above AJ’s scuola materna and dipping for a minute or so behind the houses lining the lungolago to scoop up a load. Then back into sight, rear end drooping and flying impossibly slowly back across the piazza, so low you can see the St Christopher around the pilot’s neck. With each pass, the asilo windows rattle and the children glance at their teachers for a moment before going on with their play.
For us a spectacular display of skill and stamina.
But for the wildlife?
What happens to the fish? Surely some are scooped up? And the deer, the badgers, the foxes, the martens and the wild boar, the snakes and the birds? Is there someone out there from the Corpo Forestale who can tell me what happens to them when there’s a fire, but also, when hundreds of tonnes of water are dropped on them from a great height and without warning? Or can we rest easy in the assumption that they are long gone?
There’s a layer of black fog lying across the lake at about 500m, and all Cannobio's noses - be they snub, aquiline, Roman, or tip-tilted, red, white, black or blue, large, small, button or pointed - all Cannobio's noses are wrinkled at the unmistakable smell of smoke :
A forest fire in Valle Cannobina. A big forest fire. Not on the scale of the California Wildfires now making headlines all over the world, but for us a major affair. Four helicopters and two Canadair planes sporting the bright yellow and red livery of the Protezione Civile have, for the last three days, been plying between lake and mountainside, drawing up water from the lake and hurling it at the flames.
For us, a spectacular flying display. The planes barrel two at a time down the valley at high speed, banking sharply above AJ’s scuola materna and dipping for a minute or so behind the houses lining the lungolago to scoop up a load. Then back into sight, rear end drooping and flying impossibly slowly back across the piazza, so low you can see the St Christopher around the pilot’s neck. With each pass, the asilo windows rattle and the children glance at their teachers for a moment before going on with their play.
For us a spectacular display of skill and stamina.
But for the wildlife?
What happens to the fish? Surely some are scooped up? And the deer, the badgers, the foxes, the martens and the wild boar, the snakes and the birds? Is there someone out there from the Corpo Forestale who can tell me what happens to them when there’s a fire, but also, when hundreds of tonnes of water are dropped on them from a great height and without warning? Or can we rest easy in the assumption that they are long gone?
Monday, 22 October 2007
Book Notes No. 1 : The Black Violin by Maxence Fermine
October 22, 2007 : SIX degrees for the scuola run this morning and a high wind whistling in the chimneys.
Just finished reading The Black Violin (actually, I started and finished in one sitting - or lying - I read in bed mostly). An intriguing and magical tale of passion for music, the artistry of the instrument-maker and the dehumanising effects of war. A short and thoroughly enjoyable read.
The Acorn Book Company is a small press making really lovely books at a decent price. I would do almost anything to see publishing like this continue in the face of the mass-market juggernauts of the publishing world.
But despite the pleasing cover, the tactile paper and the careful typesetting, one thing seems to have been forgotten.
The Acorn Book Company is a small press making really lovely books at a decent price. I would do almost anything to see publishing like this continue in the face of the mass-market juggernauts of the publishing world.
But despite the pleasing cover, the tactile paper and the careful typesetting, one thing seems to have been forgotten.
We don’t just look at books. We also read them.
And, Acorn Books, you need a proofreader.
He/she won’t be expensive. A professional proofreader with 20 or more years experience chasing semi-colons back to their colon and painstakingly checking Mandarin transliterations will cheerfully set you back less than the minimum wage. He/she might even work for free on such worthy titles as those published by Acorn Books even though the mortgage is in arrears, the kids need new dictionaries and the Citroen Deux Chevaux wants tyres. (Personally, I’d hold out for a twenty-quid Amazon voucher, but they always said I was too hard-nosed to be successful in publishing.)
Your proofreader will almost certainly be highly qualified - with at least eight years of higher education, culminating, possibly, in a PhD thesis on the saxon genitive. He/she is probably fluent in more than two living languages and a student of far too many dead ones to be healthy. He/she is no doubt an accredited member of the Society of Freelance Editors and Proofreaders and a passionate activist in the Apostrophe Protection Society. He/she can quote large tracts of Judith Butcher’s seminal work on copy-editing, and will be able to dispute Hart’s Rules with the best of 'em (preferably down the pub with a pint of Old Hookey and a fire burning in the grate)(1).
And the proofreader is always keen to tell you he/she is used to working to tight deadlines – especially that special category of deadline known in the trade as ‘Yesterday’.
Remember, Acorn Books, you’re making books for people who read, so get yer hyphens right!
Bibliography
Fermine, Maxence (trans. Chris Mulhern), The Black Violin, Acorn Book Company 2003. ISBN 978-0953420568.
Butcher, Judith, Drake, Caroline & Leach, Maureen, Butcher's Copy-editing: The Cambridge Handbook for Editors, Copy-editors and Proofreaders, CUP 2006. ISBN 978-0521847131.(2)
R.M. Ritter (Adapter) Hart's Rules for Compositors and Readers at the University Press, Oxford, OUP 2005. ISBN 978-0198610410.(3)
(1) Do they still make Old Hookey? Anyone?
(2) Now why can’t they leave things alone? Butcher’s, it seems, is no longer Butcher’s. Hmmph.
(3) And Hart’s Rules is no longer Hart’s. Double Hmmph.
And, Acorn Books, you need a proofreader.
He/she won’t be expensive. A professional proofreader with 20 or more years experience chasing semi-colons back to their colon and painstakingly checking Mandarin transliterations will cheerfully set you back less than the minimum wage. He/she might even work for free on such worthy titles as those published by Acorn Books even though the mortgage is in arrears, the kids need new dictionaries and the Citroen Deux Chevaux wants tyres. (Personally, I’d hold out for a twenty-quid Amazon voucher, but they always said I was too hard-nosed to be successful in publishing.)
Your proofreader will almost certainly be highly qualified - with at least eight years of higher education, culminating, possibly, in a PhD thesis on the saxon genitive. He/she is probably fluent in more than two living languages and a student of far too many dead ones to be healthy. He/she is no doubt an accredited member of the Society of Freelance Editors and Proofreaders and a passionate activist in the Apostrophe Protection Society. He/she can quote large tracts of Judith Butcher’s seminal work on copy-editing, and will be able to dispute Hart’s Rules with the best of 'em (preferably down the pub with a pint of Old Hookey and a fire burning in the grate)(1).
And the proofreader is always keen to tell you he/she is used to working to tight deadlines – especially that special category of deadline known in the trade as ‘Yesterday’.
Remember, Acorn Books, you’re making books for people who read, so get yer hyphens right!
Bibliography
Fermine, Maxence (trans. Chris Mulhern), The Black Violin, Acorn Book Company 2003. ISBN 978-0953420568.
Butcher, Judith, Drake, Caroline & Leach, Maureen, Butcher's Copy-editing: The Cambridge Handbook for Editors, Copy-editors and Proofreaders, CUP 2006. ISBN 978-0521847131.(2)
R.M. Ritter (Adapter) Hart's Rules for Compositors and Readers at the University Press, Oxford, OUP 2005. ISBN 978-0198610410.(3)
(1) Do they still make Old Hookey? Anyone?
(2) Now why can’t they leave things alone? Butcher’s, it seems, is no longer Butcher’s. Hmmph.
(3) And Hart’s Rules is no longer Hart’s. Double Hmmph.
Sunday, 21 October 2007
Saturday, 20 October 2007
Friday, 19 October 2007
Reported conversations No. 1
Eighteen degrees and sunny. Everything seems to have turned a shade beyond blue today. The lake, the sky, the distant mountains and even the air between.
AJ to Mama : What are these?
Mama to AJ : (Aargh!) Wrinkles, dear.
AJ to Mama : I want to count them.
Mama to AJ : (Yikes!) Okay, dear.
AJ to Mama : One, two ... three ... what comes after three?
Mama : (Phew!)
AJ to Mama : What are these?
Mama to AJ : (Aargh!) Wrinkles, dear.
AJ to Mama : I want to count them.
Mama to AJ : (Yikes!) Okay, dear.
AJ to Mama : One, two ... three ... what comes after three?
Mama : (Phew!)
Thursday, 18 October 2007
Gardener's Questions No. 1
Ten degrees and damp for the 8am scuola run this morning. Twenty-four degrees and dry for the scuola run at lunchtime. Last night for the first time this year it felt cold in AJ’s bedroom.
Anyone know anything about Jasminum officinale?
Do the leaves turn red in autumn?
Or are two of my jasmine plants dying because I’m an inept gardener?
And can someone tell me why this plant is also called Poet's Jasmine?
Answers in the comments box, please!
Anyone know anything about Jasminum officinale? Do the leaves turn red in autumn?
Or are two of my jasmine plants dying because I’m an inept gardener?
And can someone tell me why this plant is also called Poet's Jasmine?
Answers in the comments box, please!
Wednesday, 17 October 2007
The chicken and the egg
Eighteen degrees. The baby-pink sunrise has given way to hazy sunshine.A big day!
Our first home-grown brood of beautiful Bionda Piemontese hens has started laying.
A couple of years ago, a neighbour offered us the use of a piece of land with some flat bits (quite rare around here). And we decided that the flat bits might be large enough for a chicken house and a couple of girlies.
Today, there is a grand palazzo of a pollaio (that’s a chicken coop to you and me), and at the last count 17 inhabitants, almost all home bred in the Artifical Hen. Numbers rise and fall : as the number of chickens in the coop falls, so the number of chickens in the freezer rises. Cruel, you say? Delicious, I reply.
Apart from supplying us with eggs, meat and great stock, the chicks also serve another vital purpose in our home. They devour much of the food the kids reject.
If you have children, you need chickens!
Pasta, bread, baby formula, cake, cheese rinds, vegetarian baby food of any kind, biscuits, porridge and all sorts of cereals. They come running from the furthest corners of the garden at the merest glint of the stainless-steel chicken-treat bowl. Between the compost, the chickens and the cats, we throw away almost no foodstuffs at all. And that’s great when the rubbish depository is 100m down.
While with two little ones and no baby-sitter, walking half a kilometre uphill in a rainstorm to feed them is less fun than originally anticipated, I like keeping chickens.
I never thought I’d like keeping chickens. I never thought I’d keep chickens – strictly city, that’s me.
But you know what? Useful, tasty and productive as they are, chickens bring one further benefit.
They make me laugh.
Kids not eating/sleeping/behaving themselves?
The chicks make me laugh.
Husband away too often and too long on business?
The chicks make me laugh.
House an inch thick with builder's dust again?
The chicks me laugh!
Copyright © Louise Bostock 2007, 2008. All rights reserved. Please ask first.
Tuesday, 16 October 2007
Monday, 15 October 2007
Sunday, 14 October 2007
Saturday, 13 October 2007
Not-so strange goings on
Twenty-five degrees. A stunning, summery day starting with a Hollywood sunrise and gold sunlight splashed across the hillside, and moving on to downright perfect, with lowering mist this evening for interest.
The neighbour famed for forgetting his keys has done it again.
The neighbour famed for forgetting his keys has done it again.
Friday, 12 October 2007
AJ at Scuola Materna
Twenty-one degrees and sunny.
Picture this scene : a stern stone Victorian-style building with large, high windows. A flight of wide steps leads up to the heavy wooden door with its oversized, over-ornate handle. Two-stories, with a high classical cornice. A bouquet of flags waves grandly below. This could be police headquarters or city hall. But it isn’t. The words chiselled onto the cornice are ominous : Asilo dell Infanzia. Bedlam for Bambini, then?
In one of the windows the white face of a little boy emerges from the gloom. The eyes are swollen with crying and the cheeks are wet. Holding back his tears, he waves gamely and blows a heartfelt kiss.
AJ has just completed a month at our local scuola materna in Cannobio and every day is a scene from Oliver Twist.
Scuola materna is the first step in the Italian school system. It can also be called ‘asilo’ (1), ‘scuola dell infanzia’ or ‘asilo dell infanzia’. Not to be confused with ‘asilo nido’, a nursery which takes children at a much earlier age.
Scuola materna takes children from the year in which they are three to the year in which they are six. After this they graduate to the slightly less imposing scuola elementare down the road.
Registration took place in January, when posters appeared around the comune inviting parents to register for the following September. In Cannobio this year it seems there were not enough children to make a viable class, and intake includes a number of children born in early 2005 as well as 2004.
It’s not obligatory to send your child, and you can choose between a half day (8:15am-1:15pm) or a full day (until 4:15pm). Those staying all day take a nap in the afternoon, and all children eat lunch at the school (I guess as a way of ensuring that all kids get at least one balanced meal a day – if they eat it, which AJ currently doesn’t). Parents pay for lunch, which is called, interestingly, ‘mensa’.
Scuola materna is paid for by the state, although parents are asked to provide materials such as paper, tissues, wipes, etc.
Scuola materna isn’t a bit like the play groups of the UK. Here, there is a clear didactical aim. Although there is a strong element of play, this is clearly a school environment, and by the third year, children are being introduced to their letters and numbers.
AJ has had a rough first month. He started by catching every bug on offer and was continuously poorly for the first three weeks. He and his sister have to be up at 6:30 to walk down the blessed hill and catch the bus in time, and walking back up in the afternoon after five hours of scuola is a tall order. He has sat through numerous lunches without eating anything but bread and water, despite what are probably the constant urgings of his teachers and the pressure of his peers. Not having eaten anything since 7am also doesn’t help in his walk up the hill at 2pm.
The policy on parents is that they place the child in the schoolroom and then leave. Even on the very first day – no wimpy ‘settling in’ with Mama on hand for security (and translations – AJ speaks decent German and English but as yet very little Italian). I can’t decide whether this aspect has been harder for me or for him. It’s against every natural urge to leave your child crying bitterly in a roomful of strangers, and my heart is in pieces every time I leave him.
Still, while it’s been a bumpy ride, there are signs that one day soon he’ll run into the classroom without a backward glance, eat a hearty lunch and come out with better Italian than mine.
Ci vuole tempo, as they say.
(1) while the connection to the word asylum is there in an English-speaking mind, I understand the Italian doesn't bear this undertone.
Picture this scene : a stern stone Victorian-style building with large, high windows. A flight of wide steps leads up to the heavy wooden door with its oversized, over-ornate handle. Two-stories, with a high classical cornice. A bouquet of flags waves grandly below. This could be police headquarters or city hall. But it isn’t. The words chiselled onto the cornice are ominous : Asilo dell Infanzia. Bedlam for Bambini, then?
In one of the windows the white face of a little boy emerges from the gloom. The eyes are swollen with crying and the cheeks are wet. Holding back his tears, he waves gamely and blows a heartfelt kiss.
AJ has just completed a month at our local scuola materna in Cannobio and every day is a scene from Oliver Twist.
Scuola materna is the first step in the Italian school system. It can also be called ‘asilo’ (1), ‘scuola dell infanzia’ or ‘asilo dell infanzia’. Not to be confused with ‘asilo nido’, a nursery which takes children at a much earlier age.
Scuola materna takes children from the year in which they are three to the year in which they are six. After this they graduate to the slightly less imposing scuola elementare down the road.
Registration took place in January, when posters appeared around the comune inviting parents to register for the following September. In Cannobio this year it seems there were not enough children to make a viable class, and intake includes a number of children born in early 2005 as well as 2004.
It’s not obligatory to send your child, and you can choose between a half day (8:15am-1:15pm) or a full day (until 4:15pm). Those staying all day take a nap in the afternoon, and all children eat lunch at the school (I guess as a way of ensuring that all kids get at least one balanced meal a day – if they eat it, which AJ currently doesn’t). Parents pay for lunch, which is called, interestingly, ‘mensa’.
Scuola materna is paid for by the state, although parents are asked to provide materials such as paper, tissues, wipes, etc.
Scuola materna isn’t a bit like the play groups of the UK. Here, there is a clear didactical aim. Although there is a strong element of play, this is clearly a school environment, and by the third year, children are being introduced to their letters and numbers.
AJ has had a rough first month. He started by catching every bug on offer and was continuously poorly for the first three weeks. He and his sister have to be up at 6:30 to walk down the blessed hill and catch the bus in time, and walking back up in the afternoon after five hours of scuola is a tall order. He has sat through numerous lunches without eating anything but bread and water, despite what are probably the constant urgings of his teachers and the pressure of his peers. Not having eaten anything since 7am also doesn’t help in his walk up the hill at 2pm.
The policy on parents is that they place the child in the schoolroom and then leave. Even on the very first day – no wimpy ‘settling in’ with Mama on hand for security (and translations – AJ speaks decent German and English but as yet very little Italian). I can’t decide whether this aspect has been harder for me or for him. It’s against every natural urge to leave your child crying bitterly in a roomful of strangers, and my heart is in pieces every time I leave him.
Still, while it’s been a bumpy ride, there are signs that one day soon he’ll run into the classroom without a backward glance, eat a hearty lunch and come out with better Italian than mine.
Ci vuole tempo, as they say.
(1) while the connection to the word asylum is there in an English-speaking mind, I understand the Italian doesn't bear this undertone.
Thursday, 11 October 2007
Tuesday, 9 October 2007
Not breast-feeding
October 9, 2007 : Twenty-one degrees. Bright sunshine but with a little whisper of autumn in the air. Something to do with the falling leaves, perhaps.
After a week of empirical study in which B spent most of her time either crying or biting me in a rage, here are some tips on what to do when trying to stop breast-feeding your 1 year + .
After a week of empirical study in which B spent most of her time either crying or biting me in a rage, here are some tips on what to do when trying to stop breast-feeding your 1 year + .
Go cold turkey; then you can experience one last time that wonderful hyper-engorged feeling
Wait until she has a cough so that her throat’s like sandpaper; then she’ll be too preoccupied with rejecting cough mixture to worry that she’s no longer being fed
Do it when her gums look like the Dolomites with new molars making their presence felt; you’ll be able to check teething progress every time she yells for the breast
Take a bus journey of 30 minutes or more at what would have been feeding time; her screaming will drown out the dross technopop they play, and the other passengers will have someone to stare at
Wait until you have house-guests and you can spread the nighttime no-sleep misery even further.
Make sure you can tick each point for a truly unforgettable breast-feeding cessation experience.
Poor B.
Monday, 8 October 2007
Strange goings on…
Twenty-four degrees, mostly overcast, clammy.
In the balmy nights of Carmine summers, when the residents sleep with open windows, and lightning streaks silently across the skyline, strange things sometimes happen.
A few months ago, on just such a night, I awoke at about 3am. I lay awake, straining my ears to try to separate out the gentle sounds of Carmine Superiore’s slumber. A resident’s snoring, the running of the streams, the woodland owls, the snuffle of a wild boar, the far distant humming of a goods train across the lake in Lombardy. What had woken me? Did one of the children cry out in sleep?
The first alien sound I identified was the rattling of a ladder. Perhaps my neighbour, then, had arrived. Well-known for leaving his keys behind four hours away, he was more than twice seen extracting a ladder from its cradle and insinuating himself into his house by unexpected avenues.
Then I heard something else.
Voices.
Strange. Statistics would have us believe that by this late hour burglars have already slunk off to their beds, and besides, no self-respecting burglar would be making this kind of noise – would he? (For statistics also tell us that the vast majority of burglars ARE men.)
I felt for my specs, got up, went over to the window as quietly as possible, and looked out. Ah. First I located the ladder sound. A light breeze was rattling the ladder strung to a wall in the next-door garden. It wasn't some masked man heaving it up the hill after all.
And then the voices took up my attention. Two people were sitting together on the bench way up the path. They sat by the signpost under the light of the ‘street’ lamp (well, it’s hardly a street), just where the path splits : up for Molinesc and Cannobio, down for Carmine Inferiore.
Two people sitting on the bench, chatting and laughing. A canoodling couple, perhaps, out on an amorous adventure.
As I watched, one of the figures stood up and I drew in my breath sharply. A man. Definitely.
Definitely, because in the words of David Byrne he was buck naked.
The other stood up too. Not a woman, but another man. Also starkers. I smiled an involuntary smile of disbelief and continued to watch as they jogged along towards the nucleus of the village, passing the end of ‘our street’ and up the great broad steps towards the church, where they were no longer visible.
There was much whooping and shouting in the churchyard, before I once again heard the patter of naked feet. And saw them streaking back past the house and on up by the gardens. Reaching a rocky incline, they slowed before disappearing under the canopy of trees, leaving my incredulity as the only sign that they had ever been there.
HAD they ever been there? If not, what does my vision say for the state of mind that conjured it? Was I overcome by the erotic stillness of the summer evening? Or rendered momentarily insane by the triple stresses of child-rearing, house-painting and daily hill-walking?
If what I saw was real, and two high-spirited blokes had come jogging around Carmine that night, having left their clothes under a riverside rock perhaps, or in a neat pile on some bar-stool, WHAT on earth were they doing? And why? When they could have been tucked up in bed (or sprawled on the floor) with the world spinning happily and the beginnings of a hangover headache mustering up in their temporal lobes.
If you can enlighten me, I’d rest happier in the knowledge I hadn’t momentarily paid a visit to La-La land.
In the balmy nights of Carmine summers, when the residents sleep with open windows, and lightning streaks silently across the skyline, strange things sometimes happen.
A few months ago, on just such a night, I awoke at about 3am. I lay awake, straining my ears to try to separate out the gentle sounds of Carmine Superiore’s slumber. A resident’s snoring, the running of the streams, the woodland owls, the snuffle of a wild boar, the far distant humming of a goods train across the lake in Lombardy. What had woken me? Did one of the children cry out in sleep?
The first alien sound I identified was the rattling of a ladder. Perhaps my neighbour, then, had arrived. Well-known for leaving his keys behind four hours away, he was more than twice seen extracting a ladder from its cradle and insinuating himself into his house by unexpected avenues.
Then I heard something else.
Voices.
Strange. Statistics would have us believe that by this late hour burglars have already slunk off to their beds, and besides, no self-respecting burglar would be making this kind of noise – would he? (For statistics also tell us that the vast majority of burglars ARE men.)
I felt for my specs, got up, went over to the window as quietly as possible, and looked out. Ah. First I located the ladder sound. A light breeze was rattling the ladder strung to a wall in the next-door garden. It wasn't some masked man heaving it up the hill after all.
And then the voices took up my attention. Two people were sitting together on the bench way up the path. They sat by the signpost under the light of the ‘street’ lamp (well, it’s hardly a street), just where the path splits : up for Molinesc and Cannobio, down for Carmine Inferiore.
Two people sitting on the bench, chatting and laughing. A canoodling couple, perhaps, out on an amorous adventure.
As I watched, one of the figures stood up and I drew in my breath sharply. A man. Definitely.
Definitely, because in the words of David Byrne he was buck naked.
The other stood up too. Not a woman, but another man. Also starkers. I smiled an involuntary smile of disbelief and continued to watch as they jogged along towards the nucleus of the village, passing the end of ‘our street’ and up the great broad steps towards the church, where they were no longer visible.
There was much whooping and shouting in the churchyard, before I once again heard the patter of naked feet. And saw them streaking back past the house and on up by the gardens. Reaching a rocky incline, they slowed before disappearing under the canopy of trees, leaving my incredulity as the only sign that they had ever been there.
HAD they ever been there? If not, what does my vision say for the state of mind that conjured it? Was I overcome by the erotic stillness of the summer evening? Or rendered momentarily insane by the triple stresses of child-rearing, house-painting and daily hill-walking?
If what I saw was real, and two high-spirited blokes had come jogging around Carmine that night, having left their clothes under a riverside rock perhaps, or in a neat pile on some bar-stool, WHAT on earth were they doing? And why? When they could have been tucked up in bed (or sprawled on the floor) with the world spinning happily and the beginnings of a hangover headache mustering up in their temporal lobes.
If you can enlighten me, I’d rest happier in the knowledge I hadn’t momentarily paid a visit to La-La land.
Copyright © Louise Bostock 2007, 2008. All rights reserved. Please ask first.
Sunday, 7 October 2007
A perfect Sunday
Twenty-six degrees, sunny with a breeze.
A perfect Sunday for walking in the woods. With one child examining every leaf, every stick, every stone in minute, adult-mind-numbing detail. And the other screaming, and screaming, and screaming for her teeth, her cold and her lack of Mama's breast.
A perfect Sunday for walking in the woods. With one child examining every leaf, every stick, every stone in minute, adult-mind-numbing detail. And the other screaming, and screaming, and screaming for her teeth, her cold and her lack of Mama's breast.
Saturday, 6 October 2007
Friday, 5 October 2007
Carmine people
Twenty-four degrees, sunny with deep blue skies.
They say that Lago Maggiore has its own micro-climate. Certainly, Milan, no more than 100km away, usually has different weather to Carmine Superiore. And visitors often remark on the unusual mixture of temperate and Mediterranean plants to be found here.
Just as Carmine and the lake have curiously unique weather, so Carmine also has a unique social culture.
Carmine society is a patchwork of people. First, there are those whose families have owned property in Carmine Superiore for decades, if not longer. The Agostis, the Geninazzis, the Feuerstein-Chieras, the Ricottis. There are the families who bought houses here, mostly in the 70s, mostly German and all as vacation houses. There are those who live in Carmine Inferiore, Cannobio and Cannero but maintain a strong connection with the place and are often to be seen here. Many bear the Carmine surname; many are from the Albertella family.
There are those who, like us, in some way or another have made it possible to live here permanently.
And then there is the large number of friends and relatives who come regularly for visits, but who are more than just tourists, maintaining as they do ongoing friendships and traditions here.
These people come from all social strata, and many speak more than one language. Some speak as many as four, fluently. Fly the Italian flag here and you’re telling only a small part of the story. Fly the European flag and you’re getting warmer. Like it or not, this is modern Europe in an ancient setting.
For each of these people I suspect Carmine Superiore is something different : a holiday home, a unique restoration project, a place to raise children away from the hustle of urban life, the paese of one’s family. But I think I’ve detected a single thread in everyone’s characterisation of Carmine life. That thread is laissez-faire.
We have friendships and we help one another, but we take care to respect one another’s privacy and to mind our own business, as much as you can when you live close enough to experience one neighbour’s toilet habits, hear another's baby burp or watch yet another's tv. And it seems to me that Carmine’s version of laissez-faire has at its foundation the precious freedom to do what it takes, to invent ways of being that are pertinent to the physical situation, to draw one’s own line.
The authorities generally have no business here, and unless summoned, they usually leave Carmine to itself. This is for me an indication that Carmine society is essentially a healthy one, rather than one in which people need go in fear for lack of uniformed protection. For sure, a five-minute walk through the woods would be no obstacle to the forces of law and order should they be required.
I'm not suggesting that Carmine is some sort of utopia, or some strange anarchic commune. But somehow, and really what I'm trying to articulate, is that amid all the coming and going, amid the patchwork of social and cultural backgrounds, amid the periodic clash of motives, needs and desires, Carmine works.
On its own terms. In its own way.
And does it work well?
That's for you, Dear Reader, to decide.
They say that Lago Maggiore has its own micro-climate. Certainly, Milan, no more than 100km away, usually has different weather to Carmine Superiore. And visitors often remark on the unusual mixture of temperate and Mediterranean plants to be found here.
Just as Carmine and the lake have curiously unique weather, so Carmine also has a unique social culture.
Carmine society is a patchwork of people. First, there are those whose families have owned property in Carmine Superiore for decades, if not longer. The Agostis, the Geninazzis, the Feuerstein-Chieras, the Ricottis. There are the families who bought houses here, mostly in the 70s, mostly German and all as vacation houses. There are those who live in Carmine Inferiore, Cannobio and Cannero but maintain a strong connection with the place and are often to be seen here. Many bear the Carmine surname; many are from the Albertella family.
There are those who, like us, in some way or another have made it possible to live here permanently.
And then there is the large number of friends and relatives who come regularly for visits, but who are more than just tourists, maintaining as they do ongoing friendships and traditions here.
These people come from all social strata, and many speak more than one language. Some speak as many as four, fluently. Fly the Italian flag here and you’re telling only a small part of the story. Fly the European flag and you’re getting warmer. Like it or not, this is modern Europe in an ancient setting.
For each of these people I suspect Carmine Superiore is something different : a holiday home, a unique restoration project, a place to raise children away from the hustle of urban life, the paese of one’s family. But I think I’ve detected a single thread in everyone’s characterisation of Carmine life. That thread is laissez-faire.
We have friendships and we help one another, but we take care to respect one another’s privacy and to mind our own business, as much as you can when you live close enough to experience one neighbour’s toilet habits, hear another's baby burp or watch yet another's tv. And it seems to me that Carmine’s version of laissez-faire has at its foundation the precious freedom to do what it takes, to invent ways of being that are pertinent to the physical situation, to draw one’s own line.
The authorities generally have no business here, and unless summoned, they usually leave Carmine to itself. This is for me an indication that Carmine society is essentially a healthy one, rather than one in which people need go in fear for lack of uniformed protection. For sure, a five-minute walk through the woods would be no obstacle to the forces of law and order should they be required.
I'm not suggesting that Carmine is some sort of utopia, or some strange anarchic commune. But somehow, and really what I'm trying to articulate, is that amid all the coming and going, amid the patchwork of social and cultural backgrounds, amid the periodic clash of motives, needs and desires, Carmine works.
On its own terms. In its own way.
And does it work well?
That's for you, Dear Reader, to decide.
Thursday, 4 October 2007
Breast-feeding (or not)
Twenty-eight degrees, partly sunny, but humid. Showers earlier.
B is no longer breast-feeding.
As of today.
This is the first time in almost four years that I’m not either pregnant or feeding.
Hooray!
From the moment I knew I was pregnant, I just accepted that I would breast-feed. But as a mother-over-40, some people - shockingly - seemed to doubt that I could do it. Even before I gave birth to AJ there were signs that society in general believed that it would be a miracle if I managed it. Everything I read in books and magazines implied that being able to feed your child is the exception rather than the rule. And not being able to was just one of a raft of problems to be faced especially by older mothers. Even at the hospital, when I hadn’t swapped colostrum for full-cream by throwing-out time, I was advised to go straight out and buy formula and bottles and be prepared to go synthetic.
What utter rubbish.
Most women’s inability to feed comes from tiredness, poor diet or lack of support. AJ cried in the evenings for six weeks, and I almost caved in to the frequent suggestions that he was crying for hunger and I should change to formula. This despite the fact that he was putting on weight so quickly that at the neonatal clinic I was dubbed the latteria (the dairy).
M decided it for me. He told me I was too lazy to do what it took to bottle-feed. And he was right. Why buy the stuff, make it up, lug it around (up and down the hill I mentioned yesterday, for instance), then sterilise the bottles, when I was producing it myself, the right formula, the right temperature, anytime, anywhere and without fear of poisoning the little sucker with bacteria in the teat.
By the way, it is also possible to breast-feed while asleep…
In the event, the kids have both had 15 months of home-brew, and I think they’ve benefited in many ways. Neither of them ever wanted or had a soother. Neither of them was sick during the first year. Both expanded as they should in the first crucial months, and both went on to solids with no ill effects.
Here are my tips for successful breast-feeding :
I’ve loved being able to feed my children. But after 44 months of pregnancy and breast-feeding, while I can’t help feeling nostalgic for those tender, intimate moments that help to make it all worthwhile, I’m still glad it’s over.
B is no longer breast-feeding.
As of today.
This is the first time in almost four years that I’m not either pregnant or feeding.
Hooray!
From the moment I knew I was pregnant, I just accepted that I would breast-feed. But as a mother-over-40, some people - shockingly - seemed to doubt that I could do it. Even before I gave birth to AJ there were signs that society in general believed that it would be a miracle if I managed it. Everything I read in books and magazines implied that being able to feed your child is the exception rather than the rule. And not being able to was just one of a raft of problems to be faced especially by older mothers. Even at the hospital, when I hadn’t swapped colostrum for full-cream by throwing-out time, I was advised to go straight out and buy formula and bottles and be prepared to go synthetic.
What utter rubbish.
Most women’s inability to feed comes from tiredness, poor diet or lack of support. AJ cried in the evenings for six weeks, and I almost caved in to the frequent suggestions that he was crying for hunger and I should change to formula. This despite the fact that he was putting on weight so quickly that at the neonatal clinic I was dubbed the latteria (the dairy).
M decided it for me. He told me I was too lazy to do what it took to bottle-feed. And he was right. Why buy the stuff, make it up, lug it around (up and down the hill I mentioned yesterday, for instance), then sterilise the bottles, when I was producing it myself, the right formula, the right temperature, anytime, anywhere and without fear of poisoning the little sucker with bacteria in the teat.
By the way, it is also possible to breast-feed while asleep…
In the event, the kids have both had 15 months of home-brew, and I think they’ve benefited in many ways. Neither of them ever wanted or had a soother. Neither of them was sick during the first year. Both expanded as they should in the first crucial months, and both went on to solids with no ill effects.
Here are my tips for successful breast-feeding :
Eat like a horse. Double portions of everything. Freshly cooked fresh produce, not diet food or processed rubbish. Don’t worry about your weight - you have the rest of your life to get back into shape if that’s important to you (especially if you have to walk up a hill like the one I mentioned yesterday).
Drink like a fish. Water. Drink until it’s coming out of your ears.
Observe the quarantina - 40 days’ home rest. Arrange for other people to do the cooking, the cleaning and taking the strain with other little ones. Forget going out. And if you’re feeling under par, don’t apologise for turning visitors away. Enjoy resting.
Latch ’em on as soon as possible after they take that first breath. The vast majority of them know how to do it, and, given half a chance, they also know where to find it. Besides, it keeps them quiet so they don’t disturb whoever’s wielding the needle down below.
Hold the baby close : belly to belly, nose to nipple. Position the head half way along your forearm, not in the crook of your elbow.
Feed on demand. Anywhere and everywhere. Let them suck as much or as little as they want. Listen to the baby, and not the baby-gurus.
I’ve loved being able to feed my children. But after 44 months of pregnancy and breast-feeding, while I can’t help feeling nostalgic for those tender, intimate moments that help to make it all worthwhile, I’m still glad it’s over.
Una Piccola Complicazione
Twenty-seven degress. Another lovely day.
I've said before that Carmine Superiore stands on an outcrop of rock overlooking Lago Maggiore. It looks something like this.
What I didn't mention is that it is at about 300m above sea level. The lower village, Carmine Inferiore, is at about 200m above sea level.
And herein lies the piccola complicazione.
To get to Carmine Superiore you have to go up 100m, but there is no road for cars. Access is via the mulattiera - the mule track from Carmine Inferiore - or on the Via delle Genti, a hiking route from Cannero Riviera through the hillside woods to Carmine and then onwards to Cannobio and beyond.
The mulattiera is, shall we say, a stiff walk - sensible shoes recommended.
Think walking upstairs.
Think walking upstairs for 10 minutes.
Think shopping.
Think 6 months pregnant with 10-kilo toddler in the carrier on the back, in the midday sun.
Think 9-kilo baby in the carrier on the back, and exhausted 12.5-kilo toddler in your arms (that was today).
Now think :
half an hour away from parturition with contractions coming every 2 minutes.
25-kilo sacks of chicken feed…
20 cases of Burgundy…
60 tonnes of granite for the new roof…
60 tonnes of granite from the old roof...
And now think :
doors, windows, toilets, the bath, bunk beds, wood burning stoves, sofas, sacks of cement, plaster, buckets of whitewash...
The walk up, and the steep and rocky terrain when you get here, informs almost everything we do. Nothing with wheels really works here : I have no pushchair here, and poor AJ has no bicycle, wheeled suitcases are liable to lose their wheels and wheeled trolleys or wheelbarrows are just liabilities.
Living in Carmine, one can understand those ancient civilisations that are known to have understood wheels and even to have made children's toys with wheels, but stubbornly insisted on carrying heavy loads on animals or on people's backs. Not backward stupidity. Just the dictates of necessity.
Is it any wonder then, that after five years the most precious of my possessions are still languishing in an attic in East London?
More than a thousand books.
I've said before that Carmine Superiore stands on an outcrop of rock overlooking Lago Maggiore. It looks something like this.
What I didn't mention is that it is at about 300m above sea level. The lower village, Carmine Inferiore, is at about 200m above sea level.
And herein lies the piccola complicazione.
To get to Carmine Superiore you have to go up 100m, but there is no road for cars. Access is via the mulattiera - the mule track from Carmine Inferiore - or on the Via delle Genti, a hiking route from Cannero Riviera through the hillside woods to Carmine and then onwards to Cannobio and beyond.
The mulattiera is, shall we say, a stiff walk - sensible shoes recommended.
Think walking upstairs.
Think walking upstairs for 10 minutes.
Think shopping.
Think 6 months pregnant with 10-kilo toddler in the carrier on the back, in the midday sun.
Think 9-kilo baby in the carrier on the back, and exhausted 12.5-kilo toddler in your arms (that was today).
Now think :
half an hour away from parturition with contractions coming every 2 minutes.
25-kilo sacks of chicken feed…
20 cases of Burgundy…
60 tonnes of granite for the new roof…
60 tonnes of granite from the old roof...
And now think :
doors, windows, toilets, the bath, bunk beds, wood burning stoves, sofas, sacks of cement, plaster, buckets of whitewash...
The walk up, and the steep and rocky terrain when you get here, informs almost everything we do. Nothing with wheels really works here : I have no pushchair here, and poor AJ has no bicycle, wheeled suitcases are liable to lose their wheels and wheeled trolleys or wheelbarrows are just liabilities.
Living in Carmine, one can understand those ancient civilisations that are known to have understood wheels and even to have made children's toys with wheels, but stubbornly insisted on carrying heavy loads on animals or on people's backs. Not backward stupidity. Just the dictates of necessity.
Is it any wonder then, that after five years the most precious of my possessions are still languishing in an attic in East London?
More than a thousand books.
Copyright © Louise Bostock 2007, 2008. All rights reserved. Please ask first.
Tuesday, 2 October 2007
Monday, 1 October 2007
The weather indoors
Twenty degrees in the sunshine, and warmer promised. Outlook good.
While I'm trying to get my head round how to upload some pictures of my own, take a look at the following for some nice shots of Carmine.
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Wednesday, 31 October 2007
Tuesday, 30 October 2007
A measure of immortality
Fourteen degrees at 8am, fourteen degrees at 1pm. Damp. Santa Agata, on the hillside above Cannobio, drifts gently in and out of the fog.
Cannobio is full of candles and flowers, carried in the hands of rather elegantly-dressed people in the direction of the cimitero. All Souls is in full swing. As an English Protestant, I've come to prefer the Catholic All Souls to Hallowe'en and its Hollywood horror. Perhaps by going to the cemetery and reading the names of the dead who lie there, seeing their faces again, cleaning up and arranging things as we would in our own homes, we give them some measure of immortality.
Cannobio is full of candles and flowers, carried in the hands of rather elegantly-dressed people in the direction of the cimitero. All Souls is in full swing. As an English Protestant, I've come to prefer the Catholic All Souls to Hallowe'en and its Hollywood horror. Perhaps by going to the cemetery and reading the names of the dead who lie there, seeing their faces again, cleaning up and arranging things as we would in our own homes, we give them some measure of immortality.
Helicopter Day
October 29, 2007 : Seventeen degrees and mostly sunny.
Much excitement this afternoon as we are visited by beings from on high.
Three viaggi of the helicopter, bringing firewood for neighbours intending to spend the next two months here.
We hear the sound of the rotors from a distance. AJ looks at me, I look at AJ. I sweep B up and we belt up two flights to the attic...Here, with our noses pressed against the window, the helicopter, today red with a yellow streak, is about ten feet away. B is standing on tippy-toe, grasping the window sill, her eyes big. AJ is flat against the wall, straining to see the action while still feeling relatively safe.
Later, AJ relates in a mixture of German, Italian and English the visit of the helicopter. He must be excited to mix his languages so!
He's seen so many helicopter flights, up close and exhilirating, that you'd think he wouldn't turn a hair. In the past few years three roofs have been refurbished, requiring numerous flights with pallets of granite piode (roofing stones), ten-feet-long pine beams, cement, sand, cement mixers, scaffolding, you name it, all dangling perilously from the end of a long rope.
Today's mission was fairly simple. A bag of chopped wood deposited in a garden. No electricity cables, no narrow spaces. But I've seen pallets of piode deposited on scaffolding three feet wide, beams ditto, and other loads four or five feet wide placed gently down in a street that's only six feet wide. The best pilot I've seen was a young woman who was able to deposit six pallets in neat piles on a terrace only a foot larger than themselves with plant pots on the wall, and flying dashingly away without doing any damage whatsoever.
Why do we need a helicopter delivery? See October 2007 Una Piccola Complicazione.
Monday, 29 October 2007
All Souls Mass
October 28, 2007 : Seventeen degrees and fine with patchy sunshine. I'm starting to understand what a wide meteorological vocabulary you need if you're going to describe the weather every day.
Today is All Souls mass at the Chiesa di San Gottardo in Carmine Superiore. We have mass only five times a year up here, so it's usually an occasion. All Souls is when we remember all the dead of the village, a line going back more than 1,000 years. With the sad death of Arturo Albertella last week, it was even more poignant today.
Giuliano told me at my first All Souls mass that this is the occasion in the calendar when, traditionally, everyone takes their smart, black winter coat out of mothballs for the winter. But only once in my five years here has the weather been cold enough.
More grist to the climate change mill?
Today is All Souls mass at the Chiesa di San Gottardo in Carmine Superiore. We have mass only five times a year up here, so it's usually an occasion. All Souls is when we remember all the dead of the village, a line going back more than 1,000 years. With the sad death of Arturo Albertella last week, it was even more poignant today.
Giuliano told me at my first All Souls mass that this is the occasion in the calendar when, traditionally, everyone takes their smart, black winter coat out of mothballs for the winter. But only once in my five years here has the weather been cold enough.
More grist to the climate change mill?
Saturday, 27 October 2007
Transformations
Eighteen degrees and fine. A beautiful mackerel-sky sunset this evening brought everyone out of their houses to watch. And for a moment, when the hills of Lombardy turned russet, it seemed that I was looking, not at the foothills of the Alps, but the mountains of Andalucia's Sierra Nevada.
Friday, 26 October 2007
Castagna season
October 26, 2007 : Nine degrees at 8am, ten degrees at 1pm. And raining.
The chickens of Carmine Superiore are upset. Not just because the rain is drip-drip-dripping in under their neck feathers, or because the mud is getting between their toes. No. The chickens are upset because they are being bombarded by hard round prickly things all day, and, frankly, it pisses them off.
October is castagna season in Piemonte, which means anyone venturing into the woods is likely to be hit on the head by hard round prickly things. And plenty of people are to be seen in the woods at this time of year, bent double, plastic carrier bags in hand, collecting the burnished brown sweet chestnuts while trying to avoid prickles in the paw.
Long before Conad the Barbarian opened his chain of over-priced supermarkets selling cardboard bread, the people of this region survived for much of the winter on foods made from chestnut flour. The chestnuts were boiled, laboriously shelled and then the kernel was ground into flour. It’s still possible to see several massive stone mortars used for just this purpose dotted around Carmine Superiore. And various people in the village still use old recipes to make chestnut-flour cakes topped with chestnut-flavoured icing and dotted with chestnuts. Delicious! Really.
Today, the annual bombardment is the cue for the celebration of the Grande Castagnata in town and village squares across the region. A fire of brushwood is made under a metal tripod six or seven feet high. Hung from the tripod by hand-forged chains is an enormous shallow pan with a perforated bottom (cue an Ealing Comedies comment from my father...) and a very long handle. This is filled with chestnuts and they are roasted in the flames. Every so often, the burliest person present gives a giant heave on the panhandle and the chestnuts jump en masse rather like a pancake on Pancake Day. If the burliest person available is already too drunk to do his duty, there's always a wizened ninety-something in widow's weeds and flowery slippers ready to step in and prove that it's really all in the wrist action.
Many people take this as an opportunity to return to the villages of their birth (or their parents’ birth), and to wear local traditional dress or little hats with feathers in. On tap is last year’s grappa, or perhaps the more sophisticated vin brulee. And there will definitely be a slightly out-of-tune marching band tootling along in the background. To complete the picture, everyone, young and old, local or foreigner, will have black fingers before the day is out from prizing open the scorched chestnut shells to get at the warm, starchy nut inside.
The chickens of Carmine Superiore are upset, but everyone else is enjoying castagna season in Piemonte.
The chickens of Carmine Superiore are upset. Not just because the rain is drip-drip-dripping in under their neck feathers, or because the mud is getting between their toes. No. The chickens are upset because they are being bombarded by hard round prickly things all day, and, frankly, it pisses them off.
October is castagna season in Piemonte, which means anyone venturing into the woods is likely to be hit on the head by hard round prickly things. And plenty of people are to be seen in the woods at this time of year, bent double, plastic carrier bags in hand, collecting the burnished brown sweet chestnuts while trying to avoid prickles in the paw.
Long before Conad the Barbarian opened his chain of over-priced supermarkets selling cardboard bread, the people of this region survived for much of the winter on foods made from chestnut flour. The chestnuts were boiled, laboriously shelled and then the kernel was ground into flour. It’s still possible to see several massive stone mortars used for just this purpose dotted around Carmine Superiore. And various people in the village still use old recipes to make chestnut-flour cakes topped with chestnut-flavoured icing and dotted with chestnuts. Delicious! Really.
Today, the annual bombardment is the cue for the celebration of the Grande Castagnata in town and village squares across the region. A fire of brushwood is made under a metal tripod six or seven feet high. Hung from the tripod by hand-forged chains is an enormous shallow pan with a perforated bottom (cue an Ealing Comedies comment from my father...) and a very long handle. This is filled with chestnuts and they are roasted in the flames. Every so often, the burliest person present gives a giant heave on the panhandle and the chestnuts jump en masse rather like a pancake on Pancake Day. If the burliest person available is already too drunk to do his duty, there's always a wizened ninety-something in widow's weeds and flowery slippers ready to step in and prove that it's really all in the wrist action.
Many people take this as an opportunity to return to the villages of their birth (or their parents’ birth), and to wear local traditional dress or little hats with feathers in. On tap is last year’s grappa, or perhaps the more sophisticated vin brulee. And there will definitely be a slightly out-of-tune marching band tootling along in the background. To complete the picture, everyone, young and old, local or foreigner, will have black fingers before the day is out from prizing open the scorched chestnut shells to get at the warm, starchy nut inside.
The chickens of Carmine Superiore are upset, but everyone else is enjoying castagna season in Piemonte.
Thursday, 25 October 2007
Happy Birthday AJ
October 25, 2007 : Nine degrees at 8am. Overcast and drizzling. A spatter of snow on the mountain peaks and a procession of fire salamanders on the path. Seventeen degrees with the sun peeping through at 1pm.
Happy Birthday AJ.
Happy Birthday AJ.
Wednesday, 24 October 2007
AJ's big breakthrough
October 24, 2007 : Eleven degrees at 8am. Overcast and raining. Let's hope the rain serves some purpose and lays the incendio to rest for good.
Today is the much-looked-for day!
AJ ran through the school-room door straight into the arms of his Maestra Antonella with her Etruscan good looks and her huge hoop earrings (much-mentioned by AJ during bedtime pillow-talk).
He didn't look back.
Sigh. This is how it feels to have your son leave you for another woman.
Today is the much-looked-for day!
AJ ran through the school-room door straight into the arms of his Maestra Antonella with her Etruscan good looks and her huge hoop earrings (much-mentioned by AJ during bedtime pillow-talk).
He didn't look back.
Sigh. This is how it feels to have your son leave you for another woman.
Tuesday, 23 October 2007
Aerial display
Six degrees again this morning, and more bright sunshine. Twenty degrees by lunchtime. The air is devoid of moisture. The garden's parched, the wooden bathtub's leaking and my hands feel like the dead leaves in the hand-cream ads.
There’s a layer of black fog lying across the lake at about 500m, and all Cannobio's noses - be they snub, aquiline, Roman, or tip-tilted, red, white, black or blue, large, small, button or pointed - all Cannobio's noses are wrinkled at the unmistakable smell of smoke :
A forest fire in Valle Cannobina. A big forest fire. Not on the scale of the California Wildfires now making headlines all over the world, but for us a major affair. Four helicopters and two Canadair planes sporting the bright yellow and red livery of the Protezione Civile have, for the last three days, been plying between lake and mountainside, drawing up water from the lake and hurling it at the flames.
For us, a spectacular flying display. The planes barrel two at a time down the valley at high speed, banking sharply above AJ’s scuola materna and dipping for a minute or so behind the houses lining the lungolago to scoop up a load. Then back into sight, rear end drooping and flying impossibly slowly back across the piazza, so low you can see the St Christopher around the pilot’s neck. With each pass, the asilo windows rattle and the children glance at their teachers for a moment before going on with their play.
For us a spectacular display of skill and stamina.
But for the wildlife?
What happens to the fish? Surely some are scooped up? And the deer, the badgers, the foxes, the martens and the wild boar, the snakes and the birds? Is there someone out there from the Corpo Forestale who can tell me what happens to them when there’s a fire, but also, when hundreds of tonnes of water are dropped on them from a great height and without warning? Or can we rest easy in the assumption that they are long gone?
There’s a layer of black fog lying across the lake at about 500m, and all Cannobio's noses - be they snub, aquiline, Roman, or tip-tilted, red, white, black or blue, large, small, button or pointed - all Cannobio's noses are wrinkled at the unmistakable smell of smoke :
A forest fire in Valle Cannobina. A big forest fire. Not on the scale of the California Wildfires now making headlines all over the world, but for us a major affair. Four helicopters and two Canadair planes sporting the bright yellow and red livery of the Protezione Civile have, for the last three days, been plying between lake and mountainside, drawing up water from the lake and hurling it at the flames.
For us, a spectacular flying display. The planes barrel two at a time down the valley at high speed, banking sharply above AJ’s scuola materna and dipping for a minute or so behind the houses lining the lungolago to scoop up a load. Then back into sight, rear end drooping and flying impossibly slowly back across the piazza, so low you can see the St Christopher around the pilot’s neck. With each pass, the asilo windows rattle and the children glance at their teachers for a moment before going on with their play.
For us a spectacular display of skill and stamina.
But for the wildlife?
What happens to the fish? Surely some are scooped up? And the deer, the badgers, the foxes, the martens and the wild boar, the snakes and the birds? Is there someone out there from the Corpo Forestale who can tell me what happens to them when there’s a fire, but also, when hundreds of tonnes of water are dropped on them from a great height and without warning? Or can we rest easy in the assumption that they are long gone?
Monday, 22 October 2007
Book Notes No. 1 : The Black Violin by Maxence Fermine
October 22, 2007 : SIX degrees for the scuola run this morning and a high wind whistling in the chimneys.
Just finished reading The Black Violin (actually, I started and finished in one sitting - or lying - I read in bed mostly). An intriguing and magical tale of passion for music, the artistry of the instrument-maker and the dehumanising effects of war. A short and thoroughly enjoyable read.
The Acorn Book Company is a small press making really lovely books at a decent price. I would do almost anything to see publishing like this continue in the face of the mass-market juggernauts of the publishing world.
But despite the pleasing cover, the tactile paper and the careful typesetting, one thing seems to have been forgotten.
The Acorn Book Company is a small press making really lovely books at a decent price. I would do almost anything to see publishing like this continue in the face of the mass-market juggernauts of the publishing world.
But despite the pleasing cover, the tactile paper and the careful typesetting, one thing seems to have been forgotten.
We don’t just look at books. We also read them.
And, Acorn Books, you need a proofreader.
He/she won’t be expensive. A professional proofreader with 20 or more years experience chasing semi-colons back to their colon and painstakingly checking Mandarin transliterations will cheerfully set you back less than the minimum wage. He/she might even work for free on such worthy titles as those published by Acorn Books even though the mortgage is in arrears, the kids need new dictionaries and the Citroen Deux Chevaux wants tyres. (Personally, I’d hold out for a twenty-quid Amazon voucher, but they always said I was too hard-nosed to be successful in publishing.)
Your proofreader will almost certainly be highly qualified - with at least eight years of higher education, culminating, possibly, in a PhD thesis on the saxon genitive. He/she is probably fluent in more than two living languages and a student of far too many dead ones to be healthy. He/she is no doubt an accredited member of the Society of Freelance Editors and Proofreaders and a passionate activist in the Apostrophe Protection Society. He/she can quote large tracts of Judith Butcher’s seminal work on copy-editing, and will be able to dispute Hart’s Rules with the best of 'em (preferably down the pub with a pint of Old Hookey and a fire burning in the grate)(1).
And the proofreader is always keen to tell you he/she is used to working to tight deadlines – especially that special category of deadline known in the trade as ‘Yesterday’.
Remember, Acorn Books, you’re making books for people who read, so get yer hyphens right!
Bibliography
Fermine, Maxence (trans. Chris Mulhern), The Black Violin, Acorn Book Company 2003. ISBN 978-0953420568.
Butcher, Judith, Drake, Caroline & Leach, Maureen, Butcher's Copy-editing: The Cambridge Handbook for Editors, Copy-editors and Proofreaders, CUP 2006. ISBN 978-0521847131.(2)
R.M. Ritter (Adapter) Hart's Rules for Compositors and Readers at the University Press, Oxford, OUP 2005. ISBN 978-0198610410.(3)
(1) Do they still make Old Hookey? Anyone?
(2) Now why can’t they leave things alone? Butcher’s, it seems, is no longer Butcher’s. Hmmph.
(3) And Hart’s Rules is no longer Hart’s. Double Hmmph.
And, Acorn Books, you need a proofreader.
He/she won’t be expensive. A professional proofreader with 20 or more years experience chasing semi-colons back to their colon and painstakingly checking Mandarin transliterations will cheerfully set you back less than the minimum wage. He/she might even work for free on such worthy titles as those published by Acorn Books even though the mortgage is in arrears, the kids need new dictionaries and the Citroen Deux Chevaux wants tyres. (Personally, I’d hold out for a twenty-quid Amazon voucher, but they always said I was too hard-nosed to be successful in publishing.)
Your proofreader will almost certainly be highly qualified - with at least eight years of higher education, culminating, possibly, in a PhD thesis on the saxon genitive. He/she is probably fluent in more than two living languages and a student of far too many dead ones to be healthy. He/she is no doubt an accredited member of the Society of Freelance Editors and Proofreaders and a passionate activist in the Apostrophe Protection Society. He/she can quote large tracts of Judith Butcher’s seminal work on copy-editing, and will be able to dispute Hart’s Rules with the best of 'em (preferably down the pub with a pint of Old Hookey and a fire burning in the grate)(1).
And the proofreader is always keen to tell you he/she is used to working to tight deadlines – especially that special category of deadline known in the trade as ‘Yesterday’.
Remember, Acorn Books, you’re making books for people who read, so get yer hyphens right!
Bibliography
Fermine, Maxence (trans. Chris Mulhern), The Black Violin, Acorn Book Company 2003. ISBN 978-0953420568.
Butcher, Judith, Drake, Caroline & Leach, Maureen, Butcher's Copy-editing: The Cambridge Handbook for Editors, Copy-editors and Proofreaders, CUP 2006. ISBN 978-0521847131.(2)
R.M. Ritter (Adapter) Hart's Rules for Compositors and Readers at the University Press, Oxford, OUP 2005. ISBN 978-0198610410.(3)
(1) Do they still make Old Hookey? Anyone?
(2) Now why can’t they leave things alone? Butcher’s, it seems, is no longer Butcher’s. Hmmph.
(3) And Hart’s Rules is no longer Hart’s. Double Hmmph.
Sunday, 21 October 2007
Saturday, 20 October 2007
Friday, 19 October 2007
Reported conversations No. 1
Eighteen degrees and sunny. Everything seems to have turned a shade beyond blue today. The lake, the sky, the distant mountains and even the air between.
AJ to Mama : What are these?
Mama to AJ : (Aargh!) Wrinkles, dear.
AJ to Mama : I want to count them.
Mama to AJ : (Yikes!) Okay, dear.
AJ to Mama : One, two ... three ... what comes after three?
Mama : (Phew!)
AJ to Mama : What are these?
Mama to AJ : (Aargh!) Wrinkles, dear.
AJ to Mama : I want to count them.
Mama to AJ : (Yikes!) Okay, dear.
AJ to Mama : One, two ... three ... what comes after three?
Mama : (Phew!)
Thursday, 18 October 2007
Gardener's Questions No. 1
Ten degrees and damp for the 8am scuola run this morning. Twenty-four degrees and dry for the scuola run at lunchtime. Last night for the first time this year it felt cold in AJ’s bedroom.
Anyone know anything about Jasminum officinale?
Do the leaves turn red in autumn?
Or are two of my jasmine plants dying because I’m an inept gardener?
And can someone tell me why this plant is also called Poet's Jasmine?
Answers in the comments box, please!
Anyone know anything about Jasminum officinale? Do the leaves turn red in autumn?
Or are two of my jasmine plants dying because I’m an inept gardener?
And can someone tell me why this plant is also called Poet's Jasmine?
Answers in the comments box, please!
Wednesday, 17 October 2007
The chicken and the egg
Eighteen degrees. The baby-pink sunrise has given way to hazy sunshine.A big day!
Our first home-grown brood of beautiful Bionda Piemontese hens has started laying.
A couple of years ago, a neighbour offered us the use of a piece of land with some flat bits (quite rare around here). And we decided that the flat bits might be large enough for a chicken house and a couple of girlies.
Today, there is a grand palazzo of a pollaio (that’s a chicken coop to you and me), and at the last count 17 inhabitants, almost all home bred in the Artifical Hen. Numbers rise and fall : as the number of chickens in the coop falls, so the number of chickens in the freezer rises. Cruel, you say? Delicious, I reply.
Apart from supplying us with eggs, meat and great stock, the chicks also serve another vital purpose in our home. They devour much of the food the kids reject.
If you have children, you need chickens!
Pasta, bread, baby formula, cake, cheese rinds, vegetarian baby food of any kind, biscuits, porridge and all sorts of cereals. They come running from the furthest corners of the garden at the merest glint of the stainless-steel chicken-treat bowl. Between the compost, the chickens and the cats, we throw away almost no foodstuffs at all. And that’s great when the rubbish depository is 100m down.
While with two little ones and no baby-sitter, walking half a kilometre uphill in a rainstorm to feed them is less fun than originally anticipated, I like keeping chickens.
I never thought I’d like keeping chickens. I never thought I’d keep chickens – strictly city, that’s me.
But you know what? Useful, tasty and productive as they are, chickens bring one further benefit.
They make me laugh.
Kids not eating/sleeping/behaving themselves?
The chicks make me laugh.
Husband away too often and too long on business?
The chicks make me laugh.
House an inch thick with builder's dust again?
The chicks me laugh!
Copyright © Louise Bostock 2007, 2008. All rights reserved. Please ask first.
Tuesday, 16 October 2007
Monday, 15 October 2007
Sunday, 14 October 2007
Saturday, 13 October 2007
Not-so strange goings on
Twenty-five degrees. A stunning, summery day starting with a Hollywood sunrise and gold sunlight splashed across the hillside, and moving on to downright perfect, with lowering mist this evening for interest.
The neighbour famed for forgetting his keys has done it again.
The neighbour famed for forgetting his keys has done it again.
Friday, 12 October 2007
AJ at Scuola Materna
Twenty-one degrees and sunny.
Picture this scene : a stern stone Victorian-style building with large, high windows. A flight of wide steps leads up to the heavy wooden door with its oversized, over-ornate handle. Two-stories, with a high classical cornice. A bouquet of flags waves grandly below. This could be police headquarters or city hall. But it isn’t. The words chiselled onto the cornice are ominous : Asilo dell Infanzia. Bedlam for Bambini, then?
In one of the windows the white face of a little boy emerges from the gloom. The eyes are swollen with crying and the cheeks are wet. Holding back his tears, he waves gamely and blows a heartfelt kiss.
AJ has just completed a month at our local scuola materna in Cannobio and every day is a scene from Oliver Twist.
Scuola materna is the first step in the Italian school system. It can also be called ‘asilo’ (1), ‘scuola dell infanzia’ or ‘asilo dell infanzia’. Not to be confused with ‘asilo nido’, a nursery which takes children at a much earlier age.
Scuola materna takes children from the year in which they are three to the year in which they are six. After this they graduate to the slightly less imposing scuola elementare down the road.
Registration took place in January, when posters appeared around the comune inviting parents to register for the following September. In Cannobio this year it seems there were not enough children to make a viable class, and intake includes a number of children born in early 2005 as well as 2004.
It’s not obligatory to send your child, and you can choose between a half day (8:15am-1:15pm) or a full day (until 4:15pm). Those staying all day take a nap in the afternoon, and all children eat lunch at the school (I guess as a way of ensuring that all kids get at least one balanced meal a day – if they eat it, which AJ currently doesn’t). Parents pay for lunch, which is called, interestingly, ‘mensa’.
Scuola materna is paid for by the state, although parents are asked to provide materials such as paper, tissues, wipes, etc.
Scuola materna isn’t a bit like the play groups of the UK. Here, there is a clear didactical aim. Although there is a strong element of play, this is clearly a school environment, and by the third year, children are being introduced to their letters and numbers.
AJ has had a rough first month. He started by catching every bug on offer and was continuously poorly for the first three weeks. He and his sister have to be up at 6:30 to walk down the blessed hill and catch the bus in time, and walking back up in the afternoon after five hours of scuola is a tall order. He has sat through numerous lunches without eating anything but bread and water, despite what are probably the constant urgings of his teachers and the pressure of his peers. Not having eaten anything since 7am also doesn’t help in his walk up the hill at 2pm.
The policy on parents is that they place the child in the schoolroom and then leave. Even on the very first day – no wimpy ‘settling in’ with Mama on hand for security (and translations – AJ speaks decent German and English but as yet very little Italian). I can’t decide whether this aspect has been harder for me or for him. It’s against every natural urge to leave your child crying bitterly in a roomful of strangers, and my heart is in pieces every time I leave him.
Still, while it’s been a bumpy ride, there are signs that one day soon he’ll run into the classroom without a backward glance, eat a hearty lunch and come out with better Italian than mine.
Ci vuole tempo, as they say.
(1) while the connection to the word asylum is there in an English-speaking mind, I understand the Italian doesn't bear this undertone.
Picture this scene : a stern stone Victorian-style building with large, high windows. A flight of wide steps leads up to the heavy wooden door with its oversized, over-ornate handle. Two-stories, with a high classical cornice. A bouquet of flags waves grandly below. This could be police headquarters or city hall. But it isn’t. The words chiselled onto the cornice are ominous : Asilo dell Infanzia. Bedlam for Bambini, then?
In one of the windows the white face of a little boy emerges from the gloom. The eyes are swollen with crying and the cheeks are wet. Holding back his tears, he waves gamely and blows a heartfelt kiss.
AJ has just completed a month at our local scuola materna in Cannobio and every day is a scene from Oliver Twist.
Scuola materna is the first step in the Italian school system. It can also be called ‘asilo’ (1), ‘scuola dell infanzia’ or ‘asilo dell infanzia’. Not to be confused with ‘asilo nido’, a nursery which takes children at a much earlier age.
Scuola materna takes children from the year in which they are three to the year in which they are six. After this they graduate to the slightly less imposing scuola elementare down the road.
Registration took place in January, when posters appeared around the comune inviting parents to register for the following September. In Cannobio this year it seems there were not enough children to make a viable class, and intake includes a number of children born in early 2005 as well as 2004.
It’s not obligatory to send your child, and you can choose between a half day (8:15am-1:15pm) or a full day (until 4:15pm). Those staying all day take a nap in the afternoon, and all children eat lunch at the school (I guess as a way of ensuring that all kids get at least one balanced meal a day – if they eat it, which AJ currently doesn’t). Parents pay for lunch, which is called, interestingly, ‘mensa’.
Scuola materna is paid for by the state, although parents are asked to provide materials such as paper, tissues, wipes, etc.
Scuola materna isn’t a bit like the play groups of the UK. Here, there is a clear didactical aim. Although there is a strong element of play, this is clearly a school environment, and by the third year, children are being introduced to their letters and numbers.
AJ has had a rough first month. He started by catching every bug on offer and was continuously poorly for the first three weeks. He and his sister have to be up at 6:30 to walk down the blessed hill and catch the bus in time, and walking back up in the afternoon after five hours of scuola is a tall order. He has sat through numerous lunches without eating anything but bread and water, despite what are probably the constant urgings of his teachers and the pressure of his peers. Not having eaten anything since 7am also doesn’t help in his walk up the hill at 2pm.
The policy on parents is that they place the child in the schoolroom and then leave. Even on the very first day – no wimpy ‘settling in’ with Mama on hand for security (and translations – AJ speaks decent German and English but as yet very little Italian). I can’t decide whether this aspect has been harder for me or for him. It’s against every natural urge to leave your child crying bitterly in a roomful of strangers, and my heart is in pieces every time I leave him.
Still, while it’s been a bumpy ride, there are signs that one day soon he’ll run into the classroom without a backward glance, eat a hearty lunch and come out with better Italian than mine.
Ci vuole tempo, as they say.
(1) while the connection to the word asylum is there in an English-speaking mind, I understand the Italian doesn't bear this undertone.
Thursday, 11 October 2007
Tuesday, 9 October 2007
Not breast-feeding
October 9, 2007 : Twenty-one degrees. Bright sunshine but with a little whisper of autumn in the air. Something to do with the falling leaves, perhaps.
After a week of empirical study in which B spent most of her time either crying or biting me in a rage, here are some tips on what to do when trying to stop breast-feeding your 1 year + .
After a week of empirical study in which B spent most of her time either crying or biting me in a rage, here are some tips on what to do when trying to stop breast-feeding your 1 year + .
Go cold turkey; then you can experience one last time that wonderful hyper-engorged feeling
Wait until she has a cough so that her throat’s like sandpaper; then she’ll be too preoccupied with rejecting cough mixture to worry that she’s no longer being fed
Do it when her gums look like the Dolomites with new molars making their presence felt; you’ll be able to check teething progress every time she yells for the breast
Take a bus journey of 30 minutes or more at what would have been feeding time; her screaming will drown out the dross technopop they play, and the other passengers will have someone to stare at
Wait until you have house-guests and you can spread the nighttime no-sleep misery even further.
Make sure you can tick each point for a truly unforgettable breast-feeding cessation experience.
Poor B.
Monday, 8 October 2007
Strange goings on…
Twenty-four degrees, mostly overcast, clammy.
In the balmy nights of Carmine summers, when the residents sleep with open windows, and lightning streaks silently across the skyline, strange things sometimes happen.
A few months ago, on just such a night, I awoke at about 3am. I lay awake, straining my ears to try to separate out the gentle sounds of Carmine Superiore’s slumber. A resident’s snoring, the running of the streams, the woodland owls, the snuffle of a wild boar, the far distant humming of a goods train across the lake in Lombardy. What had woken me? Did one of the children cry out in sleep?
The first alien sound I identified was the rattling of a ladder. Perhaps my neighbour, then, had arrived. Well-known for leaving his keys behind four hours away, he was more than twice seen extracting a ladder from its cradle and insinuating himself into his house by unexpected avenues.
Then I heard something else.
Voices.
Strange. Statistics would have us believe that by this late hour burglars have already slunk off to their beds, and besides, no self-respecting burglar would be making this kind of noise – would he? (For statistics also tell us that the vast majority of burglars ARE men.)
I felt for my specs, got up, went over to the window as quietly as possible, and looked out. Ah. First I located the ladder sound. A light breeze was rattling the ladder strung to a wall in the next-door garden. It wasn't some masked man heaving it up the hill after all.
And then the voices took up my attention. Two people were sitting together on the bench way up the path. They sat by the signpost under the light of the ‘street’ lamp (well, it’s hardly a street), just where the path splits : up for Molinesc and Cannobio, down for Carmine Inferiore.
Two people sitting on the bench, chatting and laughing. A canoodling couple, perhaps, out on an amorous adventure.
As I watched, one of the figures stood up and I drew in my breath sharply. A man. Definitely.
Definitely, because in the words of David Byrne he was buck naked.
The other stood up too. Not a woman, but another man. Also starkers. I smiled an involuntary smile of disbelief and continued to watch as they jogged along towards the nucleus of the village, passing the end of ‘our street’ and up the great broad steps towards the church, where they were no longer visible.
There was much whooping and shouting in the churchyard, before I once again heard the patter of naked feet. And saw them streaking back past the house and on up by the gardens. Reaching a rocky incline, they slowed before disappearing under the canopy of trees, leaving my incredulity as the only sign that they had ever been there.
HAD they ever been there? If not, what does my vision say for the state of mind that conjured it? Was I overcome by the erotic stillness of the summer evening? Or rendered momentarily insane by the triple stresses of child-rearing, house-painting and daily hill-walking?
If what I saw was real, and two high-spirited blokes had come jogging around Carmine that night, having left their clothes under a riverside rock perhaps, or in a neat pile on some bar-stool, WHAT on earth were they doing? And why? When they could have been tucked up in bed (or sprawled on the floor) with the world spinning happily and the beginnings of a hangover headache mustering up in their temporal lobes.
If you can enlighten me, I’d rest happier in the knowledge I hadn’t momentarily paid a visit to La-La land.
In the balmy nights of Carmine summers, when the residents sleep with open windows, and lightning streaks silently across the skyline, strange things sometimes happen.
A few months ago, on just such a night, I awoke at about 3am. I lay awake, straining my ears to try to separate out the gentle sounds of Carmine Superiore’s slumber. A resident’s snoring, the running of the streams, the woodland owls, the snuffle of a wild boar, the far distant humming of a goods train across the lake in Lombardy. What had woken me? Did one of the children cry out in sleep?
The first alien sound I identified was the rattling of a ladder. Perhaps my neighbour, then, had arrived. Well-known for leaving his keys behind four hours away, he was more than twice seen extracting a ladder from its cradle and insinuating himself into his house by unexpected avenues.
Then I heard something else.
Voices.
Strange. Statistics would have us believe that by this late hour burglars have already slunk off to their beds, and besides, no self-respecting burglar would be making this kind of noise – would he? (For statistics also tell us that the vast majority of burglars ARE men.)
I felt for my specs, got up, went over to the window as quietly as possible, and looked out. Ah. First I located the ladder sound. A light breeze was rattling the ladder strung to a wall in the next-door garden. It wasn't some masked man heaving it up the hill after all.
And then the voices took up my attention. Two people were sitting together on the bench way up the path. They sat by the signpost under the light of the ‘street’ lamp (well, it’s hardly a street), just where the path splits : up for Molinesc and Cannobio, down for Carmine Inferiore.
Two people sitting on the bench, chatting and laughing. A canoodling couple, perhaps, out on an amorous adventure.
As I watched, one of the figures stood up and I drew in my breath sharply. A man. Definitely.
Definitely, because in the words of David Byrne he was buck naked.
The other stood up too. Not a woman, but another man. Also starkers. I smiled an involuntary smile of disbelief and continued to watch as they jogged along towards the nucleus of the village, passing the end of ‘our street’ and up the great broad steps towards the church, where they were no longer visible.
There was much whooping and shouting in the churchyard, before I once again heard the patter of naked feet. And saw them streaking back past the house and on up by the gardens. Reaching a rocky incline, they slowed before disappearing under the canopy of trees, leaving my incredulity as the only sign that they had ever been there.
HAD they ever been there? If not, what does my vision say for the state of mind that conjured it? Was I overcome by the erotic stillness of the summer evening? Or rendered momentarily insane by the triple stresses of child-rearing, house-painting and daily hill-walking?
If what I saw was real, and two high-spirited blokes had come jogging around Carmine that night, having left their clothes under a riverside rock perhaps, or in a neat pile on some bar-stool, WHAT on earth were they doing? And why? When they could have been tucked up in bed (or sprawled on the floor) with the world spinning happily and the beginnings of a hangover headache mustering up in their temporal lobes.
If you can enlighten me, I’d rest happier in the knowledge I hadn’t momentarily paid a visit to La-La land.
Copyright © Louise Bostock 2007, 2008. All rights reserved. Please ask first.
Sunday, 7 October 2007
A perfect Sunday
Twenty-six degrees, sunny with a breeze.
A perfect Sunday for walking in the woods. With one child examining every leaf, every stick, every stone in minute, adult-mind-numbing detail. And the other screaming, and screaming, and screaming for her teeth, her cold and her lack of Mama's breast.
A perfect Sunday for walking in the woods. With one child examining every leaf, every stick, every stone in minute, adult-mind-numbing detail. And the other screaming, and screaming, and screaming for her teeth, her cold and her lack of Mama's breast.
Saturday, 6 October 2007
Friday, 5 October 2007
Carmine people
Twenty-four degrees, sunny with deep blue skies.
They say that Lago Maggiore has its own micro-climate. Certainly, Milan, no more than 100km away, usually has different weather to Carmine Superiore. And visitors often remark on the unusual mixture of temperate and Mediterranean plants to be found here.
Just as Carmine and the lake have curiously unique weather, so Carmine also has a unique social culture.
Carmine society is a patchwork of people. First, there are those whose families have owned property in Carmine Superiore for decades, if not longer. The Agostis, the Geninazzis, the Feuerstein-Chieras, the Ricottis. There are the families who bought houses here, mostly in the 70s, mostly German and all as vacation houses. There are those who live in Carmine Inferiore, Cannobio and Cannero but maintain a strong connection with the place and are often to be seen here. Many bear the Carmine surname; many are from the Albertella family.
There are those who, like us, in some way or another have made it possible to live here permanently.
And then there is the large number of friends and relatives who come regularly for visits, but who are more than just tourists, maintaining as they do ongoing friendships and traditions here.
These people come from all social strata, and many speak more than one language. Some speak as many as four, fluently. Fly the Italian flag here and you’re telling only a small part of the story. Fly the European flag and you’re getting warmer. Like it or not, this is modern Europe in an ancient setting.
For each of these people I suspect Carmine Superiore is something different : a holiday home, a unique restoration project, a place to raise children away from the hustle of urban life, the paese of one’s family. But I think I’ve detected a single thread in everyone’s characterisation of Carmine life. That thread is laissez-faire.
We have friendships and we help one another, but we take care to respect one another’s privacy and to mind our own business, as much as you can when you live close enough to experience one neighbour’s toilet habits, hear another's baby burp or watch yet another's tv. And it seems to me that Carmine’s version of laissez-faire has at its foundation the precious freedom to do what it takes, to invent ways of being that are pertinent to the physical situation, to draw one’s own line.
The authorities generally have no business here, and unless summoned, they usually leave Carmine to itself. This is for me an indication that Carmine society is essentially a healthy one, rather than one in which people need go in fear for lack of uniformed protection. For sure, a five-minute walk through the woods would be no obstacle to the forces of law and order should they be required.
I'm not suggesting that Carmine is some sort of utopia, or some strange anarchic commune. But somehow, and really what I'm trying to articulate, is that amid all the coming and going, amid the patchwork of social and cultural backgrounds, amid the periodic clash of motives, needs and desires, Carmine works.
On its own terms. In its own way.
And does it work well?
That's for you, Dear Reader, to decide.
They say that Lago Maggiore has its own micro-climate. Certainly, Milan, no more than 100km away, usually has different weather to Carmine Superiore. And visitors often remark on the unusual mixture of temperate and Mediterranean plants to be found here.
Just as Carmine and the lake have curiously unique weather, so Carmine also has a unique social culture.
Carmine society is a patchwork of people. First, there are those whose families have owned property in Carmine Superiore for decades, if not longer. The Agostis, the Geninazzis, the Feuerstein-Chieras, the Ricottis. There are the families who bought houses here, mostly in the 70s, mostly German and all as vacation houses. There are those who live in Carmine Inferiore, Cannobio and Cannero but maintain a strong connection with the place and are often to be seen here. Many bear the Carmine surname; many are from the Albertella family.
There are those who, like us, in some way or another have made it possible to live here permanently.
And then there is the large number of friends and relatives who come regularly for visits, but who are more than just tourists, maintaining as they do ongoing friendships and traditions here.
These people come from all social strata, and many speak more than one language. Some speak as many as four, fluently. Fly the Italian flag here and you’re telling only a small part of the story. Fly the European flag and you’re getting warmer. Like it or not, this is modern Europe in an ancient setting.
For each of these people I suspect Carmine Superiore is something different : a holiday home, a unique restoration project, a place to raise children away from the hustle of urban life, the paese of one’s family. But I think I’ve detected a single thread in everyone’s characterisation of Carmine life. That thread is laissez-faire.
We have friendships and we help one another, but we take care to respect one another’s privacy and to mind our own business, as much as you can when you live close enough to experience one neighbour’s toilet habits, hear another's baby burp or watch yet another's tv. And it seems to me that Carmine’s version of laissez-faire has at its foundation the precious freedom to do what it takes, to invent ways of being that are pertinent to the physical situation, to draw one’s own line.
The authorities generally have no business here, and unless summoned, they usually leave Carmine to itself. This is for me an indication that Carmine society is essentially a healthy one, rather than one in which people need go in fear for lack of uniformed protection. For sure, a five-minute walk through the woods would be no obstacle to the forces of law and order should they be required.
I'm not suggesting that Carmine is some sort of utopia, or some strange anarchic commune. But somehow, and really what I'm trying to articulate, is that amid all the coming and going, amid the patchwork of social and cultural backgrounds, amid the periodic clash of motives, needs and desires, Carmine works.
On its own terms. In its own way.
And does it work well?
That's for you, Dear Reader, to decide.
Thursday, 4 October 2007
Breast-feeding (or not)
Twenty-eight degrees, partly sunny, but humid. Showers earlier.
B is no longer breast-feeding.
As of today.
This is the first time in almost four years that I’m not either pregnant or feeding.
Hooray!
From the moment I knew I was pregnant, I just accepted that I would breast-feed. But as a mother-over-40, some people - shockingly - seemed to doubt that I could do it. Even before I gave birth to AJ there were signs that society in general believed that it would be a miracle if I managed it. Everything I read in books and magazines implied that being able to feed your child is the exception rather than the rule. And not being able to was just one of a raft of problems to be faced especially by older mothers. Even at the hospital, when I hadn’t swapped colostrum for full-cream by throwing-out time, I was advised to go straight out and buy formula and bottles and be prepared to go synthetic.
What utter rubbish.
Most women’s inability to feed comes from tiredness, poor diet or lack of support. AJ cried in the evenings for six weeks, and I almost caved in to the frequent suggestions that he was crying for hunger and I should change to formula. This despite the fact that he was putting on weight so quickly that at the neonatal clinic I was dubbed the latteria (the dairy).
M decided it for me. He told me I was too lazy to do what it took to bottle-feed. And he was right. Why buy the stuff, make it up, lug it around (up and down the hill I mentioned yesterday, for instance), then sterilise the bottles, when I was producing it myself, the right formula, the right temperature, anytime, anywhere and without fear of poisoning the little sucker with bacteria in the teat.
By the way, it is also possible to breast-feed while asleep…
In the event, the kids have both had 15 months of home-brew, and I think they’ve benefited in many ways. Neither of them ever wanted or had a soother. Neither of them was sick during the first year. Both expanded as they should in the first crucial months, and both went on to solids with no ill effects.
Here are my tips for successful breast-feeding :
I’ve loved being able to feed my children. But after 44 months of pregnancy and breast-feeding, while I can’t help feeling nostalgic for those tender, intimate moments that help to make it all worthwhile, I’m still glad it’s over.
B is no longer breast-feeding.
As of today.
This is the first time in almost four years that I’m not either pregnant or feeding.
Hooray!
From the moment I knew I was pregnant, I just accepted that I would breast-feed. But as a mother-over-40, some people - shockingly - seemed to doubt that I could do it. Even before I gave birth to AJ there were signs that society in general believed that it would be a miracle if I managed it. Everything I read in books and magazines implied that being able to feed your child is the exception rather than the rule. And not being able to was just one of a raft of problems to be faced especially by older mothers. Even at the hospital, when I hadn’t swapped colostrum for full-cream by throwing-out time, I was advised to go straight out and buy formula and bottles and be prepared to go synthetic.
What utter rubbish.
Most women’s inability to feed comes from tiredness, poor diet or lack of support. AJ cried in the evenings for six weeks, and I almost caved in to the frequent suggestions that he was crying for hunger and I should change to formula. This despite the fact that he was putting on weight so quickly that at the neonatal clinic I was dubbed the latteria (the dairy).
M decided it for me. He told me I was too lazy to do what it took to bottle-feed. And he was right. Why buy the stuff, make it up, lug it around (up and down the hill I mentioned yesterday, for instance), then sterilise the bottles, when I was producing it myself, the right formula, the right temperature, anytime, anywhere and without fear of poisoning the little sucker with bacteria in the teat.
By the way, it is also possible to breast-feed while asleep…
In the event, the kids have both had 15 months of home-brew, and I think they’ve benefited in many ways. Neither of them ever wanted or had a soother. Neither of them was sick during the first year. Both expanded as they should in the first crucial months, and both went on to solids with no ill effects.
Here are my tips for successful breast-feeding :
Eat like a horse. Double portions of everything. Freshly cooked fresh produce, not diet food or processed rubbish. Don’t worry about your weight - you have the rest of your life to get back into shape if that’s important to you (especially if you have to walk up a hill like the one I mentioned yesterday).
Drink like a fish. Water. Drink until it’s coming out of your ears.
Observe the quarantina - 40 days’ home rest. Arrange for other people to do the cooking, the cleaning and taking the strain with other little ones. Forget going out. And if you’re feeling under par, don’t apologise for turning visitors away. Enjoy resting.
Latch ’em on as soon as possible after they take that first breath. The vast majority of them know how to do it, and, given half a chance, they also know where to find it. Besides, it keeps them quiet so they don’t disturb whoever’s wielding the needle down below.
Hold the baby close : belly to belly, nose to nipple. Position the head half way along your forearm, not in the crook of your elbow.
Feed on demand. Anywhere and everywhere. Let them suck as much or as little as they want. Listen to the baby, and not the baby-gurus.
I’ve loved being able to feed my children. But after 44 months of pregnancy and breast-feeding, while I can’t help feeling nostalgic for those tender, intimate moments that help to make it all worthwhile, I’m still glad it’s over.
Una Piccola Complicazione
Twenty-seven degress. Another lovely day.
I've said before that Carmine Superiore stands on an outcrop of rock overlooking Lago Maggiore. It looks something like this.
What I didn't mention is that it is at about 300m above sea level. The lower village, Carmine Inferiore, is at about 200m above sea level.
And herein lies the piccola complicazione.
To get to Carmine Superiore you have to go up 100m, but there is no road for cars. Access is via the mulattiera - the mule track from Carmine Inferiore - or on the Via delle Genti, a hiking route from Cannero Riviera through the hillside woods to Carmine and then onwards to Cannobio and beyond.
The mulattiera is, shall we say, a stiff walk - sensible shoes recommended.
Think walking upstairs.
Think walking upstairs for 10 minutes.
Think shopping.
Think 6 months pregnant with 10-kilo toddler in the carrier on the back, in the midday sun.
Think 9-kilo baby in the carrier on the back, and exhausted 12.5-kilo toddler in your arms (that was today).
Now think :
half an hour away from parturition with contractions coming every 2 minutes.
25-kilo sacks of chicken feed…
20 cases of Burgundy…
60 tonnes of granite for the new roof…
60 tonnes of granite from the old roof...
And now think :
doors, windows, toilets, the bath, bunk beds, wood burning stoves, sofas, sacks of cement, plaster, buckets of whitewash...
The walk up, and the steep and rocky terrain when you get here, informs almost everything we do. Nothing with wheels really works here : I have no pushchair here, and poor AJ has no bicycle, wheeled suitcases are liable to lose their wheels and wheeled trolleys or wheelbarrows are just liabilities.
Living in Carmine, one can understand those ancient civilisations that are known to have understood wheels and even to have made children's toys with wheels, but stubbornly insisted on carrying heavy loads on animals or on people's backs. Not backward stupidity. Just the dictates of necessity.
Is it any wonder then, that after five years the most precious of my possessions are still languishing in an attic in East London?
More than a thousand books.
I've said before that Carmine Superiore stands on an outcrop of rock overlooking Lago Maggiore. It looks something like this.
What I didn't mention is that it is at about 300m above sea level. The lower village, Carmine Inferiore, is at about 200m above sea level.
And herein lies the piccola complicazione.
To get to Carmine Superiore you have to go up 100m, but there is no road for cars. Access is via the mulattiera - the mule track from Carmine Inferiore - or on the Via delle Genti, a hiking route from Cannero Riviera through the hillside woods to Carmine and then onwards to Cannobio and beyond.
The mulattiera is, shall we say, a stiff walk - sensible shoes recommended.
Think walking upstairs.
Think walking upstairs for 10 minutes.
Think shopping.
Think 6 months pregnant with 10-kilo toddler in the carrier on the back, in the midday sun.
Think 9-kilo baby in the carrier on the back, and exhausted 12.5-kilo toddler in your arms (that was today).
Now think :
half an hour away from parturition with contractions coming every 2 minutes.
25-kilo sacks of chicken feed…
20 cases of Burgundy…
60 tonnes of granite for the new roof…
60 tonnes of granite from the old roof...
And now think :
doors, windows, toilets, the bath, bunk beds, wood burning stoves, sofas, sacks of cement, plaster, buckets of whitewash...
The walk up, and the steep and rocky terrain when you get here, informs almost everything we do. Nothing with wheels really works here : I have no pushchair here, and poor AJ has no bicycle, wheeled suitcases are liable to lose their wheels and wheeled trolleys or wheelbarrows are just liabilities.
Living in Carmine, one can understand those ancient civilisations that are known to have understood wheels and even to have made children's toys with wheels, but stubbornly insisted on carrying heavy loads on animals or on people's backs. Not backward stupidity. Just the dictates of necessity.
Is it any wonder then, that after five years the most precious of my possessions are still languishing in an attic in East London?
More than a thousand books.
Copyright © Louise Bostock 2007, 2008. All rights reserved. Please ask first.
Tuesday, 2 October 2007
Monday, 1 October 2007
The weather indoors
Twenty degrees in the sunshine, and warmer promised. Outlook good.
While I'm trying to get my head round how to upload some pictures of my own, take a look at the following for some nice shots of Carmine.
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