Archive for the 'Outside Rome' Category

05
Jun

Water in Venice: 100% Public

100% Pubblica: Initiative to Reduce Bottled Water Consumption

As summer sets in, tourists visiting Venice will find fountains feature unexpectedly high on this year’s sightseeing tours as the city council aims to reduce waste in the world’s biggest consumer of mineral water.

A new initiative to cut down on bottled water consumption, called “100% Public,” is being launched today, World Environment Day.

Tourists are being given empty water bottles with the message “Don’t throw me away, re-use me!” and a map indicating the 122 fountains flowing with water from the city’s aqueducts (see below), inviting them to quench their thirst directly from the source.

Venice was chosen for the launch of the scheme due to its obvious links with water and its role as a tourist center. However there are plans to take the project to Italy’s other major cities.

Italians are the world’s largest consumers of bottled water, even though the natural water in Italy’s fountains is some of the cleanest in the world.

The campaign offers people the chance to cut waste and save money at the same time.

(via Reuters, from an article by Olivia Scarlett and Paul Casciato)

Map of Water Fountains in Venice

14
May

Ecco Italy in Charlottesville, Virginia

Ecco Italy Collage

What do you do if you’re a busy Italophile living in Charlottesville, VA and your schedule keeps you from visiting Italy as often as you’d like? You make your way to the Main Street Market to visit Verity Blue, an Italian boutique that serves a mean cappuccino and a downright delicious gelato.

But what if you want more than an immediate Italian fix for your stomach? What if your ears long to hear the music of the Italian language, your eyes are desperate for the beauty of the boot-shaped peninsula, your tongue wants to gyrate across a long Italian “rrrr,” and your hands wish they knew how to create the beautiful, simple food for which Italy is so well known?

Then you’ll need to pay a visit to Ecco Italy, an innovative and Italo-centric learning center located just above Verity Blue. Founded by Christina Ball, a former academic with a lot of entrepreneurial spirit, Ecco Italy offers Italian language courses (as well as French and Spanish!) for beginning and intermediate learners, as well as more specialized courses such as “Book Club Italiano,” “Cinema Chat,” and “Ecco Opera.”

Best of all, this is not your conventional school room language course. The friendly atmosphere of Ecco Italy invites students to hang around, to get to know their teachers and their fellow students, and to partake of a wide variety of cultural events–from lectures to cooking classes to wine tastings.

And, if you do find that you’re headed to Italy, Christina and her team at Ecco Italy can advise you (or even escort you!). Their travel services include a sister language school in Todi, an apartment for rent in Pisa, and a brilliantly conceived crash course in Italian language and culture that includes history lessons, basic language practice, cultural orientation, wine tastings, and travel advice.

A few years ago, we at the eCool Compound had the good fortune to meet Christina Ball, owner and director of Ecco Italy. We were impressed and charmed, and, thus, we were thrilled when she recently agreed to an interview with eCool. We hope you enjoy reading about Christina and Ecco Italy. We only wish we lived a bit closer so that we could be part of the “Little Italy” she’s created in Charlottesville.


Ecco Italy is a great idea! What compelled your to start this company and/or how did you come up with the idea for Ecco Italy?

I always knew I was too creative, too enthusiastic for academia. Still, it wasn’t until 2004, 6 years after earning my doctorate in Italian Literature from Yale, that all of the pieces fell into place for Ecco Italy in Charlottesville, Virginia. I had always dreamed of running my own school, a place without grades, a classroom that opened out onto the marketplace and the world, a place where conversation would be more important than written tests, where students of all ages would be encouraged to pursue their dream of “becoming Italian” in a supportive and beautiful environment.

Charlottesville is not only the home of Thomas Jefferson - a huge Europhile - and his University of Virginia, but it’s also a place with a sophisticated and varied cultural scene, a constant stream of interesting visitors and a strong local food and wine presence. Especially in recent years, many people have fled bigger cities and stressful jobs to seek a higher quality of life in Charlottesville. Somehow, it seems that when people pause for a moment in life to focus on themselves and their long-neglected dreams, Italian makes a dramatic appearance.

In addition to teaching undergrads, I taught a popular continuing ed night course at UVA called “All Aboard Italy” a sort of traveler’s Italian class. It was always full and at the end of the eight weeks the students, ranging in age from 22-82, would always beg me to teach them more Italian, to take them to Italy with me. After the third term of “All Aboard” in 2003, I was sure that there was a market for Ecco Italy here in Virginia, and when I was offered a beautiful space above an Italian café and farm table store downtown, there was no saying no.

My first class back in the fall of 2004, conversational Italian for beginners, had 5 wonderful students – including a young poet, an engineer who designed parts for Ferrari cars and a retired opera singer. Over the next few years, my vision took hold and I gradually added more language and culture classes – Cinema Chat (conversation through Italian film), Buon Viaggio: Italian for Travelers and Dreamers, a Book Club Italiano, Ecco Cibo regional Italian cooking and culture classes. I also added travel and business consulting and training to the mix.

By 2006 I had 6 Italian courses on the curriculum and about 200 students and, since the model was so popular, I added a Spanish division (Spain on Main) and French division in 2007. (note: Soon the center’s name will be changed to SPEAK Language and Culture Center – just for clarity’s sake! Ecco Italy will refer only to the Italian component)

Would you describe the kinds of opportunities offered by Ecco Italy?

Ecco Italy (if we consider the Italian part only – not the entire center with Spanish and French) is an oasis for the Italophile or for anyone desiring to appreciate life a bit more through language and culture. We offer a range of classes for everyone from the traveler needing to learn the basics (greetings, pronunciation, ordering, etc.) to nearly fluent speakers looking to practice what they know through stimulating discussion topics and activities.

Now that we have a “sister school” in Italy – La Lingua, La Vita in Todi (Umbria), we also offer the chance to be fully immersed in the language and culture of Italy through our Two Weeks in Todi course held in Todi (and Roma!) each September.

We also love to foster community and education through our cultural events such as wine tastings, events in conjunction with local book and film festivals and guest speakers such as our recent lecture on Rossini in Paris by an opera expert.

How is learning at Ecco Italy different from taking the normal evening language course?

First of all, the location and the living room/dining room décor of the colorful classroom (farm table, stylish couches, a big flat screen tv) are a refreshing change from the fluorescent lights and monochrome furnishings of the typical university classroom. There is often music playing when students arrive, and they may be carrying a cappuccino and a pastry as they take their seats around the farm table.

Lessons in our classroom are highly interactive and filled with partner activities, games, film clips and even occasional food (cheeses, gelato) and wine tastings. Instructors often take the students on “field trips” to the bakery or the cheese shop of the coffee bar so that students get the chance to use their language skills in a setting that’s as real as possible. I often get behind the bar and take orders for gelati and espressi from my students in italiano (luckily, the real baristi do the making and the serving!). I took my recent Buon Viaggio class to our swank new Italian wine bar in Charlottesville, enoteca, for a lesson on Italian regional wines and wine tasting. Anything to keep it fresh, to get people moving and speaking and to bring us as close as possible to the real thing – being in Italia.

Beyond just learning the language, what do you hope that clients at Ecco Italy will take home with them?

One of the most rewarding comments I’ve received from a student is that classes at Ecco Italy make them believe that change and seemingly unrealizable dreams (i.e. someday speaking Italian and traveling to Italy) are in fact, possible. I often overhear students saying that Ecco Italy is their “social life”, that it is the highpoint of their week or day, that it has turned on a light inside of them that they never want to extinguish. That’s pretty incredible to hear and is the fuel that keeps me going when, as multiple hat-wearing owner/director/manager/instructor, I run out of steam!

How would you describe the Ecco Italy community?

It’s a very diverse (all ages, professions, linguistic skill levels) and supportive community that’s luckily growing by the week. A person might sign up for a beginner’s class for an upcoming trip, but before they know it they’re attending cooking classes, French events and coming to Todi with me and their new friends!

I’ve had everyone from stay-at-home parents to massage therapists, graduate students and bestselling writers in my classes, and this variety serves to create a kind of “family-style” approach to education. Instead of competing, students support each other and this is vital since, for adults, foreign language learning can often bring to the surface deep insecurities and fears.

What is your most popular course offering?

It really changes! Since my core group that’s been with me from the beginning is still with me, our intermediate morning classes are always full. But I’d say Buon Viaggio and anything involving food and wine are also quite popular for those not pursuing a long-term dream of fluency.

Ecco Cibo must be a real bonus for the participants in the cooking class—what would you say is the primary difference between cooking in Italy and cooking in America?

Italy still eats and drinks regionally – something we are just learning to do here in the U.S. these days. Here in the States we favor new flavors and cuisines (for the most part) and love being able to get Maine lobster in Chicago, San Francisco sourdough in South Carolina, strawberries in December.

When I am in Umbria with my group in September, we drink Sagrantino and Orvieto wines, eat porcini-chick pea soup and thick umbricelli pasta coated in black truffle paste. The students return to Virginia understanding that there is no such thing as “Italian cuisine”, but instead there is Umbrian cuisine, Tuscan cuisine, Roman cuisine etc. Like the Italians themselves, Italian food has deep local roots and we can only fully appreciate this truth by eating our way around its 20 delightfully distinct regions – one of my personal life goals!

Italy is one of the top travel destinations for Americans. Why do you think Americans are so attracted to Italy?

It seems to me that the Italians, whether it’s true or not (I’m married to one!), have a lifestyle that most Americans crave and romanticize. In the eyes of most Americans, Italians still maintain many of the values that many feel are slipping away from us in the U.S. – long lunches and even longer vacations, the chance to be more than your profession, a sense of being grounded by both geography and family, a sense of style and elegance, the overarching importance of beauty (human, natural, artistic, culinary) and, of course, the melodic language.

What advice do you offer your clients as they prepare for trips to Italy?

I encourage them from the start to explore and learn about the incredible geographic, cultural, culinary diversity of Italy. I also encourage them to look closely at themselves and their own likes, dislikes and dreams. If someone loves nature, beaches and small towns, they will certainly be happier in Maremma or Puglia than Florence or Milan.

Often people have a very limited view of Italy at first, and they are constantly surprised by the things they learn in class – that there are cities called Parma and Reggio where “Parmigiano-Reggiano” is made, that unemployment is high, or that big families are no longer the norm in Italy.

Would you share with us your favorite place in Italy and tell us why it’s so special to you?

This is a hard one! I suppose part of the reason why so many of travelers start planning their next trip to Italy as soon as they get home is because each new place we discover becomes a special favorite place. My own favorite places shift over time and with my own changing life. I am quickly falling in love with the tranquil hilltown of Todi and the surrounding Umbrian countryside, but I am also a new resident of Pisa (my husband and I bought an apartment in a medieval Casa Torre/Tower House last year).

As I spend more time in Pisa’s relatively unexplored (by tourists) historic center, shopping at the market just outside my door, sipping wine in Piazza Vettovaglie packed with Pisans, taking a scooter-ride to nearby beaches – it is quickly becoming my new favorite place, my new home.

But there’s one place in Italy that has been my eternal favorite ever since my first visit to Italy in 1985: Roma. Wandering the streets and river banks of Rome’s Trastevere and Ghetto neighborhoods in the late summer is an experience I constantly crave when I’m home in Virginia. It’s both blissfully peaceful and energizingly urban at the same time. Everything radiates warmth and beauty. Only in Rome have the otherwise conflicting powers of chaos and mystery declared an eternal truce.

25
Apr

15 Minutes of Fame

Mafia Graffiti in Palermo

The Cathedral of Palermo - known for its spectacular array of medieval tombs and sculpture - is today graced with a new work of art. An Andy Warhol style graffiti featuring the face of mob boss Matteo Messina Denaro has appeared on a wall that separates the church from nearby Piazza Setteangeli. The portraits were based on the last known photo of the fugitive boss.

The nearby text reads “Messina Denaro - the Last!” Newspaper reports suggest that the initials F.A. (above, surrounded by a circle) may be those of the artist.

So who is the guy being praised (or blamed?) in spray-on street style? He’s a really bad guy - one of Italy’s most wanted fugitives, one of the world’s largest drug dealers (according to the FBI), and a man who’s definitely already had his 15 minutes of fame. A leader of Cosa Nostra, Matteo Messina Denaro became known nationally 2001, when the magazine L’Espresso put him on the cover with the headline: Ecco il nuovo capo della mafia (”Here is the new boss of the Mafia”).

Known for being a ruthless playboy mafioso and womaniser, driving an expensive Porsche sports car, and wearing a Rolex Daytona watch, Ray Ban sunglasses and clothes from Armani and Versace, Messina Denaro has been a fugitive since 1993 when he was involved in the bomb attacks that shook Sicily and killed prosecutors Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino.

Palermo Mafia Graffiti

19
Apr

Don’t Touch My Radio

Graffiti from Venice, Italy

Also spotted in Venice last week - while roaming the furtherest reaches of Dorsodoro.  Just what event(s) - we wonder - provoked the expression of this sentiment?

18
Apr

Figura Serpentinata

Snake Shoes in Venice, Italy

Artists in the sixteenth century spent their time trying to master the figura serpentinata - an idea that takes on a whole new meaning when one gazes upon these splendid snake skin shoes we found in a shop window on a back street in Venice. Displayed amongst a host of other lovely and handmade offerings, this headstrong pair of scarpe serpentinate initially sent us recoiling in shock and surprise (yep, that’s a little snake tongue sticking out of the head on the right), but then we became fascinated, even obsessed, and found ourselves slithering back up to the window for another look, and another, and another, until we convinced ourselves that one could cut quite a bella figura in these shoes if one were just brave enough to wear them.

Snake Shoes in Venice, Italy

04
Apr

Counting Sheep in Torino

Sheep

(ANSA) - Turin, April 3 - For the second year in a row, sheep are being used to trim the lawns of this city’s parks and save the taxpayer some money.

The first herd of sheep arrived Thursday at the Meisino park, a vast area of land along the Po River on the city’s eastern outskirts, while a second herd will be brought to the Sangone park on Monday.

The two herds will graze in the parks for two months and officials believe this will save the city some 30,000 euros in gardeners’ fees.

Last year herds were used in three city parks, including cattle in the Maddalena park.

This year it was decided not to use cattle because they produced significantly more manure that sheep.

A total of 700 sheep and 16 newborn lambs were brought to the Meisino park and belong to Chieri shepherd Federico Tombolato.

Sheep in the Streets of Torino, Italy

”I came here last year as well and it worked out really well. The city saved money and kept the park clean, while I saved money by not having to rent fields to graze my sheep,” Tombolato said.

The sheep are kept in a fenced-in areas for a few days. They are then moved to other pens while the area is kept closed to the public for a couple of days to allow time for the land to settle and the grass to seed.

”There are some minor inconveniences for the public but the initiative has a naturalistic value and is even educational, allowing people, especially young people, to come into contact with and learn more about animals,” a city park official observed.

After their two-month tour of duty in the parks, the sheep are brought into the mountains for the hot summer months.

Sheep on the Streets of Torino, Italy

02
Apr

Neapolitan Street Scenes

Egg Vendor in Naples, Italy

Yep, folks. We’ve been spending a bit of time outside the Eternal City and we’ve been snapping photos as we walk the streets of such European metropolises as Paris and Naples. Knowing that our audience appreciates all things Italian, today we bring you some Neapolitan street scenes - all shot while roaming Via dei Tribunali in search of una vera pizza.

In comparison with Rome, Naples is another planet. In many ways, it is a city with two personalities - one mired in despair and disrepair (see the egg vendor above) and the other consumed with the exuberant celebration of life’s simple pleasures.

Street Scene in Naples, Italy

What produced this bipolar approach to life? Throughout the past 2500 years, Naples has been a trophy passed from one invading culture to another - first from the Greeks to the Romans, then from the Byzantines to the Normans, and then from the Angovins to the Bourbons, before finally becoming part of the newly formed country of Italy in the mid-19th century.

Such hot-potato handling of the city has made the population inventive above all - a trait clearly displayed when a white car pimped out with a loudspeaker and boxes of battery-operated toys blared its way up Via dei Tribunali announcing, “Toys for sale! Only two euro! Dolls! Cars! Batteries included.” (see below)

Moving Market in Naples, Italy

And then there’s the craziness of Naples. People, cars, and motorini swirl at rapid pace and in traffic patterns unseen elsewhere on the Italian peninsula. “See Naples and Die,” they said during the city’s Golden Age during Bourbon occupation, making reference to the drop-dead beauty of this city’s architecture and its geographical location. Today the words mean something else entirely. One dares not traverse a Neapolitan street in a distracted state of mind, as pickpockets, scooters, and cars all threaten your well-being.

Yet, amidst the chaos, there’s also a stillness to Naples. Time stops here - or at least it proceeds according to its own schedule. Swarming streets aside, one is led to believe that nothing has changed for centuries and that nothing will ever change, for the weight of history hangs heavy here, affecting everyone and everything.

Rosticceria in Naples, Italy

01
Apr

Collect Them All! Candidates in the Creche

Figurines of Barak Obama, Hillary Clinton and John McCain from Naples

In Naples, the making of figurines for creche scenes is centuries-old local craft.  Twelve months a year,  both sides of Via di San Gregorio Armeno in Naples are crowded with workshops displaying newborn Baby Jesuses, prayerful Virgin Marys, swooping cherubs, gift-bearing kings, and humble shepherds.  But that’s not all.  Because Italians like to include slices of daily life in their presepi or nativity scenes, there’s also a charming assortment of butchers, bakers, and pizza makers available to liven up your stable when there’s just no room in the inn.

Not surprisingly, each year some of these creche-crafters bow to temptation and spend their time making figurines of contemporary notables.  Giuseppe Ferigno created a 40 centimeter figure of Luciano Pavarotti after his death last fall, while figurines of other superstars like soccer great Francesco Totti can be found up and down the street.

Now, however, for the first time since the Bill Clinton-Monica Lewinsky scandal, American politics are getting serious play in the world of Neapolitan creche figures.  We’re happy to report that on a recent trip to Naples we found that figurines of Barak Obama, John McCain, and Hillary Clinton are  available to populate your manger scene (see above).

So, go ahead.  You’re just sitting around waiting for the Pennsylvania primary, right?  Jump a train or plane to Napoli and score a few of these fabulous figurines.  You’ll be glad you did when Christmas rolls around - they’ll look great next to the wise men!

28
Mar

Photo Friday Paris: Roman Redux

Tomb of Napoleon in Paris

Faithful readers may have noticed that we’ve been skimping on posts this week. That’s because some of us here at the eCool Compound took advantage of the Easter holidays and spent most of the week in Paris. While there we were continually reminded of Rome - particularly when looking at all things Napoleonic.

On this Photo Friday, Susan Sanders offers us a Parisian image that is Roman in scope and scale. The gargantuan Tomb of Napoleon Bonaparte at Les Invalides belies his physique but speaks volumes about his imperial ambitions.

Made of Russian porphyry (as Egyptian porphyry - that used to create the tombs of the Roman Emperors was out of stock), the massive sarcophagus rests under a gilded dome that reaches some 350 feet into the gray Parisian sky.

The imperial tomb - certainly meant to recall those in which Roman rulers like Hadrian were laid to rest - is positioned on axis with an altar covered by a canopy or baldacchino undeniably reminiscent of that which covers the Papal altar in Saint Peter’s Basilica.

So much Rome, so little time.

For more photographs by Susan Sanders, visit her Rome With A View blog.

15
Mar

Photo Saturday: Turning the Page

Collapsed Election Posters in Rome.  Photo by Susan Sanders.

At the moment, Italy is in the middle of intense political campaigns leading up to the mid-April election in which a new government will be selected to replace the collapsed regime of Roman Prodi.  In Rome, that means political posters are everywhere!  Walls are caked in layers of them.  Special billboards are elected street side to accommodate the overflow.  And each time a poster is put up, it’s only a matter of hours or days until it’s covered by another.

One artist in Rome recently likened the layers of political propaganda to an electoral lasagna, but an archaeological comparison might be just as apt, for the superimposed  posters certainly attest to the constantly changing and shifting current of thoughts and words by which Italian history is being made.

In a recent downpour, many heavy layers of these posters collapsed into heaps on the street, almost as if Mother Nature was wiping the slate clean, and photographer Susan Sanders snapped a shot of the political fallout that subsequently lined the streets of Rome.

For more photographs of Rome by Susan, visit her blog: Rome With A View.




 

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