Giulia Scarpaleggia

AT) Your blog is not only beautiful but provides delicious recipes. How long have you been writing it, and what factors inspire you to write (ie. how do you come up with the recipe or post ideas?)

GS) I started my blog on the 1st day of February 2009, so it’s almost three years now. I started a blog, after mo

re than one year of passionate foodblog reading, because I wanted something to call mine, a place to post recipes, photos and my thoughts about daily life.

At the beginning I was into foreign and ethnic food, so I was inspired by this desire to experiment whatever was far from my daily culinary world.

Then I started to feel the urge to explore the world that everyone – especially those abroad – loves, and where I had the good fate to live: Tuscany. So back to home cooking and family recipes, to discover my roots and my smell and taste memories.

Now my focus is the ingredient. I look for fresh, seasonal, preferably local produce. I’m not a fanatic or a control freak, but my aim is to use the best products of the season, and from there to develop a recipe.

Usually each recipe is related to a story, and the story is inspired by my life, my dreams or my memories of the childhood. I’m quite a romantic person!

Mac and cheese, click for her awesome recipe!

2) Tell us about the services you are now offering in person, beyond the blog.

My first cooking class for foreigners dates back to 2006, and it was a way to spend a different evening with an American friend. I realized there was something special in cooking together with people belonging to different food cultures because it gave us the chance to understand us better, and I managed to show to the fullest what my region was through ingredients and cooking rituals. This is the main reason I enjoy teaching cooking classes.

Now my basic offer is a three hour hands-on cooking class during which we have the chance to create a complete menu, from appetizer to dessert, using only the freshest seasonal ingredients. Every dish is usually introduced by a family story or a local tradition, because this is how I learned to cook, listening to my grandma’s or mum’s stories in the kitchen and watching their movements among pots and pans. The class  can be held in my family kitchen, located in a traditional country house in the heart of the Tuscan countryside, between Siena and Florence or, by request, in a rented villa or apartment.

Along with cooking classes there is also the option to take tours to a local cheese farm, a beautiful and rustic organic podere, and a farming estate producing Chianti Classico wine, Extravirgin Olive Oil, and raising the rare Cinta Senese pigs.

I’m also organizing two week long tours with the Art centre Verrocchio in Casole d’Elsa (Siena), with three hands-on cooking classes, daily trips to markets and local farms, to have a firsthand experience of our production: wine, extra virgin olive oil, goat cheese and pecorino cheese, Chianina, Cinta senese and seasonal vegetables.

The last idea I had was inspired by my friends’ requests: a custom cooking class. Juls’ Kitchen on Demand was the solution:  you choose the theme of the class, you call me and I arrive directly at your doorstep with my car loaded with pots, pans and supplies. I just need a kitchen that may contain from 5 up to 10 people and some basic equipment, the rest is up to me!

zucchini!

3) You’ve taken a big risk during a moment of crises. What makes you think that this business will work?

My dreams, my hopes and a sturdy faith in fairytales!

This is how I face my life, if I have a dream I do all that I can to realize it, and my dream is to have an independent job related to food: cooking food, teaching how to cook food, writing about food and taking pictures of food.

In this serious moment the old style secure jobs are even more impossible to obtain, I think the solution is to invest time, strength and sleepless hours to discover and pursue your passion, because it’s the only richness that doesn’t lose value!

Besides this, you need planning: I’ve been blogging for three years now and teaching cooking classes for more than one year as a second job. So, when my primary job ended I was not left alone in the dark, I had already contacts, skills and ideas for the future, now I have also the time to turn them into reality.

Last but not least, I live in Tuscany and I love Tuscany. Isn’t it one of the best places in the world to deal with food?

4) Big dreams or plans for the future?

My aim is to become a food writer along with a cooking class teacher, because I re-discovered after so many years how I love to write, I’m actually in love with words, and I feel a powerful energy when I tap on my keyboard, telling stories, recipes and episodes related to food. Maybe I am just a wordy person, but, seriously, I feel the urge to write!

Next to my literary ambitions, have I ever told you I love England? Yep, I love England, London, English humour, the English people and even the English rain, oh, and Jamie Oliver as well! So one of my big plans is to teach a few Tuscan cooking classes in England, once in a while, but I’m still working on this project!

5) As you know, I recently failed at making gnocchi. When I sign up for a gnocchi making lesson with you, what vegetarian menu would you propose to go around them?

It will depend on the season, because I strictly use seasonal produce, but there could be a soup – ribollita, pappa al pomodoro, acquacotta, panzanella -, a raw salad with nuts and honey, some roasted vegetables or a vegetable flan (I love spinach flan!), and obviously a dessert, from tiramisu to tiny rice cakes, my favourite as a child.

Catch up with Giulia at her blog Juls’ Kitchen or book a lesson by emailing her at juls@julskitchen.com. I wish her all the best and look forward to our vegetarian cooking lesson!

“The term ‘luthier’ came about in the 14th century, when people played lutes, and luthiers made (and fixed) the instrument. As lutes fell out of favour and people started playing more violins, violas, and the like, the luthier’s business evolved towards these new instruments.” Stefano indicates a twelve-stringed guitar propped up against the wall: “the first guitars had five pairs of strings because they were a variation of the lute,” which, he explained, has a variable number of strings, most often eight. Now you’d be hard pressed to find someone who plays the lute (or Renaissance music), and the luthier in the literal sense of the term is a rare figure serving a niche market.

Stefano defines himself as a modern luthier – his business card says “Liuteria Moderna” and is illustrated with a psychedelic pattern of electric guitars. The more we talk, the more I figure out that his approach to his profession, and the way he got into it, is both modern and pragmatic, and has nothing of the romance that we normally associate with Italian ‘artisans‘ – a term I doubt he’d use to define himself. Stefano did not apprentice to a master luthier at the age of 16, as I’d imagined, nor does he pontificate about perfect harmonics. He does not feel a connection to the Florentine tradition of artisans nor to the Pratese tradition of making tangible products.

“Ci vuole manualità,” he says – it takes manual ability to do this job, and from the way he speaks of it, working on guitars is pretty simple stuff. Although there is one professional school in Cremona that offers an intensive instrument-maker program, there is little specific training available to luthiers. Stefano came to it pretty much by chance. He had been living in the USA for a decade with his American wife and two kids when they decided to make the move back to Italy in 2006, and a friend offered him a job fixing guitars in a workshop in Florence (he’s since branched out on his own). Before this, Stefano worked in home improvement. His main contact with guitars was playing them: he started at the age of 13, was in a few amateur bands, but stopped when he took up the job of luthier. Sad, no? Not to him: “This work is more satisfying, less ephemeral, than making music,” Stefano says.

Garage workshop

Inside the workshop

We get back to my initial question of how one becomes a luthier, and by this time I’ve pretty much figured it out. Like many in this field, Stefano is self taught. “It’s pretty simple. You take apart an instrument, you think about how the parts fit together, their properties, how they work, and you put it back together… Ci vuole manualità.” As if being good with one’s hands is all it takes. Talking with him, you understand that he knows his stuff, he understands good work and good sound, but he won’t bore a non guitar-head like me with the details.

New bone bridge for 12-string guitar

The bread and butter of Stefano’s job is fixing guitars. I look around the workshop and see about half a dozen guitars in various states of disrepair, amongst skateboards, fishing and knife hobbyist magazines, packs of guitar strings, shells for mother of pearl inlay and deer antlers. Work comes in waves – now, January, is a busy time, as was earlier last year when a client’s wife threw his collection of thirteen basses out the window (guess she’d had enough of that riff from “smoke on the water”).

He shows me a few examples of repair jobs and explains the importance of balancing time and cost with functional needs and the cost of the instrument to start. In each case he’ll discuss with the client what needs to be done, and might offer more or less economical solutions. In the case of a break or crack, sometimes the best solution is a simple repair rather than aiming for a perfect aesthetic result which would require stripping and refinishing. This is especially true now that the finishes on guitars are a shiny, almost plastic shell.

Broken head, fixed, no finish

Does Stefano make custom guitars? He could, but he rarely makes guitars from scratch. It’s just not economical, he explains: for every person who dreams of building the perfect custom guitar, there’s a detractor who says it has no resale value. The fact is that the cost of a handmade guitar, even by the most famous of makers (like Sadowsky Guitars in New York), doesn’t go much beyond 4000 dollars. Working alone, it might take 2-3 months to build a guitar, and it’d be hard to survive on the proceeds. As I said, Stefano’s approach is pragmatic. It makes more economic sense to customize and fix guitars than to build them.

Is there a future in this business? Do kids still play guitar? Yes and no. There are always professional musicians and amateur guitar lovers, and there are still kids who take music lessons. Instruments will always be involved in accidents, and Stefano can help with that. But he has no trouble applying his skills transversally: as he moved from construction to guitar repair, he just as easily could be crafting anything else. He showed me a beautifully smooth knife that he was inspired to make with some leftover stainless steel that he recuperated from a friend’s business: the patient shaping and planing of the handmade knife uses the same skills as planing the body of a guitar.

Stefano is a maker. The kind of person who produces tangible objects that are the past of our economy, but also its future. Makers are a new trend (not that Stefano is trying to be trendy), a kind of backlash in a historic moment overly based on intangible monetary exchanges and service industries (including people like me who make a living writing blogs), rather than on manufacture. Long live those with manual ability and the patience to carry it out!

Bring your broken guitars and your customization dreams to Stefano Giusti in Prato, tel +39 3348921598, email stevostevo68@gmail.com.

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The theme of this month’s Italy Blogging Roundtable is Crafts. Read what the other writing knights have to say on the subject:

• Rebecca writes of Crafts in Umbria
• Jessica ambitiously has come up with The Guide to Crafts in Italy
• Gloria writes of lovely Wood, Leather and Flowers (which kinda reminds me of a Donatello statue lecture given by an undergraduate prof of mine on what you can do with leather and feathers… but assume Gloria’s post is not about erotic crafts!)
• and Melanie comes in with Marble Run: Shopping for Traditional Marbled Products in Italy

Pamela at home (with her outdoor hearth)

Like anyone with a good sense of hospitality, Pamela first offered us cappuccino (made by her artist husband Johnny, and approved by my Italian husband Tommaso) and an olive oil cake made by a particularly talented student at the day before’s cooking class, and we got to talking about many things that were not cookbooks. As with any two expats who meet, one goes over “how we got here.” Pamela moved with her husband and daughter (now 14) when the latter was nearing school age and her many research trips to Italy seemed less practical than just settling down here.

In this big open kitchen made for conviviality, she showed me some of her books. For a woman who has written over a dozen books and runs one of Food & Wine’s top ten culinary workshops in Italy, she’s extremely modest and down to earth. As I flipped through Pamela’s books i found that some aspects that had struck me about Cucina Povera turn out to be present in her earlier books too, especially Italian Food Artisans, though this latest is a real masterpiece.

“Cucina Povera: Tuscan Peasant Cooking” – translated literally as “poor food” – has a printed hard cover, rough edged heavy pages, and warm photography. If you judge a book by its cover, this one’s already a winner. And when I got it, I wondered how I, far from a foodie, would review a cookbook beyond its cover. Yeah, I can cook and bake (I’ve even posted a few recipes on this blog – see Tommaso’s grandma’s crostata for example). But I am not one who can evaluate if one ribollita is more authentic than the next. No problem here; I have been saved by the bell book.

Cucina Povera is a book to have, to read and to look at, even if you have no idea how to make soffritto or skin hazelnuts (the book tells you how to, anyway). It’s not a reference book to use to look up recipes – though you could do that – but rather one that merits a proper read before shelving it in the kitchen or displaying it on the coffee table. The 40-page introduction could be expanded into a whole book, in my opinion, and it’s primarily about this part that I asked Pamela during my visit.

As we sat at the large table that Pamela uses for cooking classes, I asked her my first hard, critical question. Cucina Povera, I said, is this a manifesto? Why should we be eating this way, now? It didn’t seem to me that the book stated that all essential “why”, and as a good scholar I was taught that every essay or book had to do so. “It’s not a manifesto.” responds Pamela. Her own interest in thrifty cooking came from her mother’s Depression-era habits; here in Italy she found a kindred approach in many peoples’ kitchens. Many Tuscan dishes, it turns out, come from humble ingredients and embody a concept of re-use and saving.

Cavolo nero in Pamela's garden

Rather than a manifesto that says we should all eat this way – which I’d suggest would be pretty impractical for your average American, or for anyone who doesn’t have time to cook a soup for three days – the book is a preservation of an important phase in Italian culinary history that will be lost with the passing of the elder generation. Pamela traveled to every part of Tuscany to gather these tales. You get the sense that she probably ate her way through a lot of country kitchens in the process, so it may not have been terribly arduous.

Jokes aside, Pamela sat down with some of the oldest people in Tuscany, the real preservers of tradition, the best cooks in the land, and asked them what they ate in hard times. It’s not a question you can casually pop to anyone who survived Nazi occupation. She drew out a lot of hard stories; almost every person in front of her was in tears at some point. Writing the book, she had to make some difficult choices about length and content, knowing that the cookbook genre requires recipes after a short introduction, but her heart was so involved in telling these peoples’ stories.

Elena Servi, one of Pitigliano's last 3 Jewish residents

These grandmas and grandpas generously share their recipes, which have been adapted to American measurements and ingredients when necessary. Each dish is beautifully photographed, displayed in an impressive array of appropriately rustic tableware and settings. Some recipes show the versions cooked by the interviewees. My favourite photos are those of the old people themselves. They’re in typical Tuscan settings and photographed with wonderful natural light.  Although photographer Andrea Wyner was not with Pamela during the whole process of her research, you get the impression that they traveled together for a year, for both people and food are captured in such a natural way.

Ilvana and Diana, Pietrasanta

There’s no doubt that Pamela’s a good talker and a good listener. We quickly wiled away hours and I started to understand how she got all these stories out of people. What’s her modus operandi? “Taxi drivers and bars,” she says. A small town barman might direct her to a patron, to his mother, to someone who will introduce her to the right person to get the story. It takes time and patience. With all this time spent talking, our stomachs are quite ready for lunch.

Lunch in Monticchiello

We went to Enoteca La Porta in nearby Monticchiello, where owner Daria is a somellier and friend; Pamela often takes groups here for a wine tasting experience. I had the most generously dressed tagliatelle al tartufo ever, while Pamela and Tommaso enjoyed the steak “tagliata” with shaved raw porcini mushrooms on top and perfectly matched wine by the glass.

What I ate

Daria, owner of La Porta

The weather was changing that day so we ate inside, missing out on the restaurant’s gorgeous terrace. When the rain stopped after lunch we explored the very cute town and I took a few photos (see the flickr gallery below).

Book giveaway

The publisher has generously offered a copy of this book to give away to one lucky, hungry reader.

How to win? Just comment on this blog post. Sure, I’d appreciate it if you’d like my facebook page and share this blog with your friends, but I can’t force you.

What should you write? Anything. Tell me why you want this book, tell us your best money saving kitchen tip, recount your best tuscan eating or cooking experience, say what recipe you hope to find in this book, or what you’ve learned from Pamela in the past.

A few rules. Comments close at midnight european time on Halloween, October 31 2011. Contest open worldwide. You must register your comment with a valid email address and respond to the winning notification within 48 hours. Winner will be chosen by random draw.

Hey if you don’t win you can always buy the book here!

Me in Venice

This is a kind of personal post. And it’s so rare and out of character that there is not even a category on this blog into which I can easily slot it. But I have to write it. Here’s why.

Today is the first post in an “Italy blogging Roundtable” to which I have been invited. Five of us will be writing assigned topics each month. Depending on how you look at it, I’m either in really good company or I have some stiff “competition”.

The topic chosen by Jessica of Why Go Italy is “Why I write about Italy“. I assume she has a good answer. Rebecca “at Brigolante” is sure to come up with something self-deprecating, hilarious, and terribly profound that has me saying “why didn’t I write that”, until I realize that our experiences and personalities are so different, I simply could never have written it. Gloria known as “Casina di Rosa” will have an ironic, Italian take on the matter and it will be well thought through and perfectly written on At Home in Tuscany. From Melanie of Italofile Blog, I’m not sure what to expect. As she’s not in Italy right now, I’m really curious to know what her answer will be.

And me? Why do I write about Italy? What do I get out of writing this blog? Is there any possible non-narcissistic excuse for wanting to document everything I see?

Because it’s where I am (and I like it)

Had I married a man from Iceland and not from Florence, would I blog about Iceland? Maybe. It depends how much there is to do in Iceland. After 12 years here, I still have plenty left to see, experience, and learn (unlike Rebecca, for example, I have not attended a pig slaughtering, nor one of Gloria’s dad’s grape harvests). There’s no need to remind you that Italy boasts a ridiculous range of territories, climates, and regions and I haven’t seen half of them. But even here in Tuscany, I find myself constantly amazed.

A google image search for Monet + Rouen

Recently I co-hosted Slow Art Day in Florence; we picked paintings in the exhibit “Picasso Miro Dali” at Palazzo Strozzi that participants had to focus on for 10-15 minutes. We looked at how Dalí painted numerous views from his family’s summer home in Cadaqués and I wondered why he kept painting the same place. Or why Monet kept painting the same Cathedral at Rouen. The two artists had similar goals of capturing light, though for the Catalan artist it was also an issue of capturing a sense of place.

For each of us, there are some things we never tire of looking at. For me, it’s the view from our summer home in Maremma that I find myself staring out at and photographing frequently. The slight changes in the trees and valley as the seasons and days progress continues to hold my attention. Whatever your medium, if you’re trying to get a grip on the true essence of something, repetition seems to be a good approach. So I keep writing about Italy and Tuscany.

Yet another sunset in Sticciano

Because it makes me go out and do things

Hard at work posting information on the go.

Having a blog is a commitment. If you don’t write for a while, you feel guilty (even if probably nobody else really notices my absence). And so comes the Saturday that I say to Tommaso “we have to go out and ‘fare le cose’…” or “do things”. This is code for blog photo/story mission. Most of the time these things are within an hour’s drive of either Florence or Sticciano and are chosen by looking at a map and cross-referencing it with the Touring Club red guide. My husband will tag along on any artistic mission so long as he gets properly fed, preferably at a Slow Food restaurant. He generally documents the voyage with his iphone, posting on facebook as we go, while I check in on Foursquare using my Android.

The way I travel when I have to write about it is probably different than how I’d experience a place “just for myself”. There’s pressure to remember to photograph not just what’s beautiful but what I realize needs to be documented. And I find myself constructing posts on the fly, making sure I get the story or information necessary to recount it to my readers. There’s no question that I benefit from this process as I pay much more attention to what I see when I know that I have an audience who will enjoy my sharing it.

Is this terribly narcissistic? Is it wrong to go out and do something (like waking up at a ridiculous hour to take photos for the blog) just because you can share it. Maybe, but I’m not sure that’s a bad thing.

Because of the community

And speaking of sharing… Arttrav’s been around since 2004, but things really picked up in 2009 when I started using social networks and “met” other Italy bloggers. We “like” each others’ posts on facebook, and probably consist of a lot of each others’ traffic, too. Knowing that I’m not writing in a vacuum but that I’m part of a great, generous community is one of the factors that keeps me going. So Jessica’s idea to start a blogging roundtable fits perfectly into this context, allowing us to create an even stronger link (pun intended) to each other.

Blogger roundtable posts

• Because it’s not Florence everywhere… and because it’s home. from At Home in Tuscany
• What Can I Write About Italy That Hasn’t Been Written Before? from Italofile
• Why I Write About Italy from WhyGo Italy
• Why I write about Italy by Rebecca “Brigolante”

Historyteachers Amy & Herb during a recent shoot (Napoleon)

If you thought history was boring in school, it’s because you didn’t have Amy Burvall as your teacher. This Hawaii educator, better known as part of the youtube duo “Historyteachers“, sets accurate historical information to the 80s music we all know and love (think: happily singing about burning at the stake to a tune by Human League). And then shows the video in the classroom.

Thanks to recent media attention, the 50 videos uploaded since 2008 by Amy Burvall and her colleague Herb Mahelona have over one million views on youtube and a ton of positive comments too! My mom actually sent me the link to “Renaissance Man” (set to Blister in the Sun by the Violent Femmes) since she knew I’d want to blog about it, and she’s been carefully watching every video they’ve made.

More than just blog about it, how about asking Amy Burvall to tell us about it – especially to tell us about how she’s using videos in the classroom! Here’s our interview.

Interview with Amy Burvall

AMK: From a didactic point of view, clearly you’re looking to reach the new media-savvy generation and it’s working great. Can you tell us more about how you use each video in the classroom?

Amy Burvall in full 80s mode (Martin Luther)

Yes, I think it works great. Students say they can’t get our lyrics out of their heads, which is a good (albeit sometimes annoying) thing. At first I would use them to wrap up a unit in a fun way, and encourage students to use them as study guides prior to an assessment. Now I also use them as “hooks” to introduce a lesson and get them interested… that way I can refer back to things in the video and they can visualize what I’m talking about.

It also works to discuss synthesis of information (research- based) into a more creative, multi-media format that can be shared with a wide variety of people. Much better than the old student-writes-research-paper-only-for-the-teachers’-eyes-and 2-people-max-benefit.

We live in a culture of remixing and mash-ups, but students enjoy discussing the benefits and drawbacks of appropriation of art (we do a mini unit on parodies of Renaissance art).

I focus quite a bit on the power of art (listen to me Simon Schama and Nigel Spivey!) and its influence from and on History. That’s why I try to incorporate a lot of famous works in the vids (we will be doing more of that), and the students can discuss our work as art, as well as the songs of the original artists that we’ve re-purposed. [AMK: Like in Renaissance Man below.]

It is of course necessary to go over the points in class. I try not to be biased but really we are telling a story and A LOT has to be left out in a 2-5 minute song that fits to a rhyme scheme (we have to re-work things, but try not to be incorrect, per se).

We can also play around with words because it’s basically poetry (see Shakespeare video when I say “taming of the shrewing”).

AMK: So, does each video relate to a lesson unit? Some might say you can’t reduce a period of history to three minutes. How do you make sure that students also take in “the whole” – including material not in the videos?

Most do relate to a unit I teach, but I am now teaching a different course that begins at the Renaissance and need to get to writing more modern history songs. The problem is, the topics are endless! People have asked us to do American History, but that is not where my passion lies and it’s hard to write something in a forced way.

My classes are 90 minutes, so a 3 minutes video does NOT replace any normal instruction or educational activities. The songs are really meant to be an overview of major points or vocabulary. The only exception would be some of the songs that I write in the first person, from the point of view of that character (see “Odyssey”).

AMK: The Star article mentions that you are having students create their own videos. Can you tell us more about this?

A while back students suggested they do similar videos as a culminating project option (I stress option since I always give a variety of project choices – not everyone is comfortable with this sort of performing). Each year they get better and better, and I am surprised how many students, who aren’t even in the school choir, want to do this project.

They have a very detailed project/task description and since we are an IB school we use rubrics based on certain criteria rather than traditional letter grades. This is great because a student’s video might be awesome, but their lyrics could be shallow and not reflect evidence of appropriate research.

During the process students must narrow down a topic, choose a song to parody (though some have written original ones!), compose several drafts of lyrics, record using GarageBand, watch and critique existing videos, storyboard their video, plan filming, organize costumes and props, shoot video, and edit. After the project they write an extensive reflection. A 3 minute video can take 1 month for a high schooler – plus we are doing other things. There will always be tech problems to deal with! That’s a learning curve for some, but those that plan well and storyboard out everything and save often are usually good to go.

I let them use friends in the videos but always this is an individual project. I have had students write the lyrics and produce the video but have a more talented friend sing the song or perform.

The student turns in the movie file digitally (usually Quicktime) or burns it to a dvd. One year we got so into it we had awards like the MTV awards! Students came up with the categories, like “most Historical”, “Best editing”, “Most entertaining”, etc. Some students have posted to Youtube if they have an account (see my favourites on youtube for one example).

Some students have used this idea for other classes, or for their IB personal project.

AMK: Using social media or new teaching techniques of any sort can be… disruptive. How has your school supported your video-making?

My school has been extremely supportive – they have even purchased more tech equipment for student use (mics, green screen, laptops, etc.) They are getting a kick out of the publicity Herb and I have been getting. I think quite a few schools in Hawaii are trying harder to reach 21st century learners with more collaboration, inquiry-based learning, and technology integration.

AMK: The videos are really well produced! Do you actually own a blue- or green- screen? And where do you get the video clips?

All the equipment used is our own, except for the green screen (we used to use a wall and now use an official screen). We both have Macs, and Herb purchased a ton of Adobe software. He is a musician in his own right, so all of the instruments, mixing board, recording equipment, etc. are his. When I have students do vids, they usually purchase a karaoke style version of the song from iTunes, or find a midi file online.

A lot of the clips we use are from classic films (Spartacus, Cleopatra [below], or check out that really old one in Pompeii), or documentaries (History Channel, BBC, A and Etc.). A lot of times it’s films I show some or all of in class. We are trying to get away from that now and use more art from the period and/or original animation (Herb creates in Flash). Sometimes we’re using clips from 10 films, so editing gets tricky.

That is one major reason we are not selling any of our videos – until we get explicit permission to do so, we cannot. So, we haven’t really made a cent from anything we’ve done. If anything, we’ll create original games and lesson extensions to go with our videos and sell those.

AMK: Do you have a list of periods or topics that you want to cover that you are checking off, or does inspiration just come to you?

I do! I have a running list of songs I love and want to cover and topics of people and events or time periods. At the moment I am busy so I have a bunch of half-written songs lurking around.

The best songs are ones where the inspiration just came to me… like while driving in the car. Some lyrics are meant to sound like the original (those are the most memorable) but some just match the feel of the music.

AMK: Plans for the future?

Yes, a website is in the works; the url will be www.historyteacherz.com but nothing is up yet… we are in the planning sages but I assure you it will be fab!

With hearty thanks to Amy for taking the time to answer my questions, I hope this encourages others to use video in a creative way in the classroom! Historyteachers is now on twitter @historyteacherz and also has a facebook fan page. Now, for homework, go watch at least three videos…

And for another example of video use in coursework, see the student biographical films about female artists that I did with 300-level university students.

I’m pleased to be able to introduce an unusual form of expat blog. Annie Campbell is from Missouri and has been living in Florence for five years; her boyfriend Fabio is a native Florentine. Together they write Appuntamento Pizza, a blog of Florence pizza reviews.

After maybe a year of dating several pizzerias, my boyfriend and I could never remember which ones we had already met, which ones we had liked, which ones we never wanted to see again. We were in search of the best pizza in Florence, but we lacked a good method for doing so.

Appuntamento Pizza’s original function was to act as a personal (yet, shared) archive of Florentine pizzerias. In arrogance we blogged, certain that our words would provide information, or at least amusement, for some lonely souls in search of tasty margheritas… I’m talking about pizzas, here.

We give the phone number, the address, and our opinions (in English and Italian) on the experience to be expected at the over 42 pizzerias we’ve reviewed so far (with hundreds to come!). For our readers, the blog has become a sort of glorified yellow pages. Still far from our hopeless dream of becoming rich and famous bloggers, we do have the occasional fan, if I may use that term, who writes us for advice on their pizza problems. We LOVE getting feedback and suggestions on which pizzerias to try. It’s our goal to eat at each and every pizzeria in Florence (and surroundings!) and to then return for a second visit. We’re going to be busy for a while!

Method in our madness

For the most part, Fabio and I usually order the margherita. It’s more his theory than mine that one can only judge a pizza’s worth by the scrutiny of its base form (see our first review of La Smorfia). We have been known to get the occasional pizza con porcini, and I rarely pass up a pizza with potatoes.

A pizza is judged, primarily, on its three key components: the crust, the tomato sauce, and the mozzarella. Pizzas are given a vote out of ten.

The pizzas come to the table. They are appraised from an aesthetic point of view. The photo is taken. We take our first bites, together. Silence. Either a smile and a head nod emerge, or the raised eyebrows that appeared at the sight of the pizza form a grimace. The first halves of our pizzas are consumed in quiet contemplation. Then we begin to talk, and, more or less, we usually agree. I seem to be a little less forgiving as a reviewer than Fabio.

We say Tuesday night is our Pizza Nite, but some weeks it doesn’t work out that way…but we don’t mention this to the readers of the blog.

Is there anything bad about pizza blogging?

arttrav note: I asked Annie if there were downsides to their self-appointed job as pizza experts, and not surprisingly, there are…

We love pizza blogging, but there ARE some downers that come with the responsibility:

• Sometimes we’d just like to go back to one of our favorite pizzerias, but our sense of duty won’t allow it. We have hundreds of pizzerias to visit, and we accept that it will be years before we are able to make a repeat trip.
• With a mission like ours, one discovers quickly that there are waaaay more bad pizzerias than good ones, and nausea is a common side effect, but the struggling pizzas are always more fun to review and that helps drive us on.
• More than once I’ve had to settle for a less-than-perfect photo, as it was made clear – usually in non-verbal ways – that photography wasn’t quite as appreciated as our business was.
• Fabio and I have sadly noted that now that we have become expert pizza conisseurs, an average pizza is no longer good enough for us. We can’t just simply EAT a pizza. Instead, we’re analyzing every bite.
• Surprisingly, we have had to deal with a bit of borderline-hate mail.

Our top-voted pizzerias to date are: Gustapizza, Enziono’s at Caffé Italiano, and Il Pizzaiuolo.

It’s a tough job but someone’s gotta do it. It’s a sacrifice for all of us – now check Appuntamento Pizza before you test out that new pizzeria!

Arttrav has strong opinions about pizza too.

SEGIN (2009): gold 900/1000, sapphire. D=4,1 cm, H= 2,9 cm. Museum of Fine Arts of Boston

In Etruria, not far from Viterbo, in a small town called Corchiano lives and works a goldsmith by the unusual name of “Akelo”. Okay, his real name is Andrea Cagnetti and he creates Etruscan-inspired jewelry using a particular and beautiful technique of granulation that he re-discovered. Recognized by important museums worldwide (such as the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston), he grants arttrav this interview.

What is the meaning of your chosen name, Akelo?

In Greek mythology and in italic populations, Acheloo, son of Oceano and Teti, was the god of water, essential element of life. With this name I wish to make clear the deep connection between my creations and the past – that appears remote but is in fact alive in western culture and in our collective consciousness.

And you live in Corchiano? Why the choice of this small town?

Akelo - portrait

I was born in Corchiano in the province of Viterbo, and I recently moved back here. I travel a lot for exhibits and tv shows, but I couldn’t imagine living elsewhere – I don’t want to give up the quality of life that is possible here, as well as my friends, the land of my origins, where I feel comfortable. Here I am at the center of the terra degli etruschi – the world of the Etruscans – where they believe that the mythical city of Fescennia once was. An area that is perfect for one who wishes to discover the mysteries of Etruscan civilization. In fact, I highly recommend a visit to the Ampitheatre of Sutri, the town of Falerii Veteres and the Piramide di Bomarzo which are all just a few kilometers away from my town.

Tell us about your artistic training.

I’ve always been so strongly attracted by antique coins that I just had to follow that path. The most interesting aspect for me was the way they were made. I decided to study art and archaeology through which i could access texts about antique goldsmithing. Reading Pliny the Elder, Vitruvius, Dioscoride and alchemical treatise I conducted a kind of investigation in an attempt to immerse myself in this past.

One of the problems with this method of study is that these texts are often not very well translated – those experts in linguistics were not experts in the art of jewelry. Using the most erudite texts possible I developed a method that I believe 100% accurately reflects the methods of the past.

Jabbah (1995)

And this technique that you use, called granulation, are you the only person who does it? What is it, exactly?

Izar (2001), gold 900/1000, garnets

Yes, granulation is one of the most difficult, fascinating, and frequently discussed methods of antique goldsmithing. It calls for the fusion of small gold balls (granules) to a gold base, following of course a drawing or plan. I create human figures, zoomorphic shapes, geometric decorations. The similar use of much smaller granules – 0.1 mm in diameter – is called “pulviscolo”. In both techniques there are two main difficulties: first, to produce such small granules; second to fuse them to a base without losing their perfect sphericity. And all this without leaving any trace of the fusion work, of course!

Some have said that I use a magic potion of the Etruscans that I discovered… cute, but exaggerated. There is a kind of potion: it’s the liquid composed of three substances suggested by certain Latin authors that is necessary to fix the granules to the base. Otherwise, though, there’s no magic: just practise, patience, and a careful eye. A lot of patience – an important piece of jewelry can take about a month to complete.

What is the best part of your profession?

The calm and silence into which I immerse myself when I work. It’s changed my approach to life in general. I use strong lenses to view my work in a macroscopic way that effects everything I see now. It’s… intriguing!

The artist at work

All photos © Akelo – Andrea Cagnetti – All Right Reserved – Used with permission.

For more information: www.akelo.it

Sarah interviews local youths on "the steps" - photo: Antonio Carloni

Many of you will know that I really love Cortona; I lived and worked there for a year not long ago, and I maintain that it’s weathered the tourist onslaught after Francis Mayes’ book rather well – with a good cultural programme at the local teatro and most importantly it still has schools for the local kids. Now a documentary, currently in production phase, takes up a similar argument. What happens when a small town (Cortona has about 1500 residents inside the city walls) becomes the destination for 400,000 tourists per year?

The Genius of a Place is a feature-length documentary about sustainable development, told in accessible, personal, palpable terms. It’s the story of a woman, Sarah Marder, who fell in love with a place, was saddened to see it change, and decided to ask others what they thought. During six shoots in Cortona over an 18-month period, Sarah asked dozens of people for their opinions, starting with Frances Mayes, the author of “Under the Tuscan Sun”. She also spoke to storeowners, students, the Mayor, journalists, retired people, farmers, artisans, waitresses, foreign residents and visitors, all in attempt to understand what others thought about how the genius of Cortona (and other beautiful places around the world) could be preserved for future generations.

I asked Sarah three questions about Cortona and sustainable tourism. I think her answers – and this film – should get us thinking about the dichotomy between preservation and progress when it comes to tourism in Tuscany, an issue that has not escaped me in this past year that I’ve worked to promote it.

Do you think Cortona has suffered from the tourist influx?

I think Cortona, like so many other places, has both gained and lost  through the touristic influx.  It’s a bit like a wave that comes up on a beach, both depositing things and taking others away.  Tourism has breathed economic life back into the town.  Having very little industrial activity, until the boom in tourism Cortona offered few job opportunities and locals often felt the need to move away to find work.  Tourism has undoubtedly created jobs and brought welcome income.

I suspect that tourism has directly or indirectly allowed for projects such as the renovation of Cortona’s wonderful Etruscan Museum (MAEC). Moreover, that same museum will soon host an important Etruscan collection visiting from the Louvre. This is just one example of an important cultural event that probably would not have been possible if it weren’t for the name Cortona has made for itself thanks to foreign tourism.

On the other hand, as the town orients itself in a way to capture more and more tourism, some authenticity is inevitably lost in the process.  Stores serving residents’ needs gradually give way to eateries, art galleries and boutiques which cater to visitors’ spending habits rather than to the daily shopping of the small, local population.  Prices tend to rise and make it difficult for locals to shop in their neighborhood, as they always have done.  Housing and rental prices tend to rise too.  Moreover, the height of the tourist season tends to strain the infrastructure and facilities in a way that didn’t happen in the past.  Also, it’s hard for merchants to deal with such a massive influx in the summer months and then such a slow trickle of visitors during the winter. Most businesses need relatively constant year-round activity to prosper. It would be wrong to say that Cortona has either “suffered” or “gained” through tourism.  It’d be more accurate to say it’s been a mixed blessing.

What can Cortona and towns like it do to avoid ending up like San Gimignano?

This is a multi-faceted issue and I’d risk drastic oversimplification if I offered a list of “dos” and “don’t’s”.  All communities find themselves dealing with complex tradeoffs as they grapple with the challenge of finding ways to balance economic growth with the preservation of what makes them special, livable and sustainable.  This is true regardless of whether their development  comes from tour buses, a factory or a big new shopping center.  Residents understandably seek economic growth and yet they also regret some of the changes that development brings to their place.

Anyway, if I were to make a single suggestion, I’d say the best thing they can do is commit on a long-term basis to take care of this place that they love, the same way that parents implicitly commit to taking care of their children. They can join together with others to take stock of what they have in their special place: what needs to be protected, what needs to be maintained and what is under-utilized or appreciated and could be further developed in some way. They can become stewards who consciously work together to recognize, cultivate and protect the genius of their place.  They would use this as a guiding principle as they make development-related decisions so that they balance people needs with the place’s needs.  Each community has to do its own inventory-taking and caretaking because each community is unique, the same way that each person is unique.

We’d do well to contemplate that man shapes the destiny of the places that he inhabits so if we want a place to prosper, we need to arrange our lives in a way that will allow that to occur.

What can travelers do, on a personal level, to both experience and encourage authenticity in the Italian experience?

Authenticity is a slippery and subjective concept. What happens in a lot of touristic destinations is that visitors show up with a mental image of what is “authentic” for that place while it is actually a stereotype and gradually the local residents start offering this “authentic” experience to please the visitors. It can become all woven together. For me, authenticity in Italy or anywhere else in the world is just normal life of local residents. It’s where they go to buy their toothpaste, how they cook their lunch or what they do with their children after school.

I don’t think that visitors can do much to encourage authenticity, because it’s really about life outside of the realm of tourism.  How can they experience it is a different question.  The best way to have an authentic experience is just to slow down and settle into a community as well as you can. Go to the local grocery store, shop for vegetables at the street market, take public transportation, eat at the unpretentious place where local people go. In short, try to live as locals do. As they say, “when in Rome…”. Of course, if a visitor can also learn some of the language and make friends with local people,  maybe even sharing some meals together, this will dramatically improve the depth of the experience.  This goes for whether someone is traveling to Italy, Indonesia or Indiana!

Film information

The film is being produced by Sarah Marder and OLO Creative Farm, a production house based in Como. They are now in the process of editing their 3000 minutes of footage into a 90 minute film.  Viewers will not only be treated to the gorgeous Tuscan scenery but also to interviews with celebrities such as Anthony Hopkins and Lorenzo “Jovanotti” Cherubini, an Italian superstar singer/songwriter who comes from Cortona.  The film is on track for completion late in 2011 (and of course arttrav will let you know of any screenings in Italy!). You can follow them on facebook and check out the trailer (above).

hooray for http://www.blogday.org/

Being a full time blogger means not just writing blogs, but keeping on top of the ones everyone else writes. For work I have to read everything people write about Tuscany, but sometimes my searches or other people’s links lead me to bloggers located in other parts of Italy. Being on twitter is also a great way to meet and dialogue with other bloggers and to discover blogs and news I’d have never found without the help of social networks!

Today, August 31st, is Blog Day, and on this day we’re supposed to name 5 blogs that we recently discovered or that might be a little outside of our usual reading material. I don’t know how I am going to narrow this down to only 5 blogs. Just this past month – despite being on holiday for 2 weeks of it – I have “digitally met” a world-wide full-time blogger and a sicilian dweller who deserve a mention… but this post must also mention some of my perennial favourites. So here goes, in no particular order.

Italy blogs

Italytutto: For her, every day is blog day. I love the weekly roundup of best blog posts about Italy; in fact this is one of my favourite sources for finding more reading material.

My new Sicilian correspondant, Jann, writes Baroquesicily.com – don’t miss her hilarious post about the recent trend of Sicilians wearing speedos at the beach.

What would I do without Gloria “@casinadirosa” who writes At Home in Tuscany? I think nobody would retweet my @arttrav and @tuscanyart tweets if she didn’t do it first!

James of Wandering Italy Blog has a quick and dry sense of humour and I usually agree with all his observations. Recent posts are mostly about food but sometimes he weighs in on Italy’s absurdities and that’s when I love him most.

Since there are not enough art history blogs out there, let’s toss in “M” of Alberti’s Window – not always about Italian art, but sometimes it is. In the same breath, the newish “Three Pipe Problem” blog by H. Hiyazi also concentrates on some great italian art.

And two more special mentions

Audrey of uncorneredmarket is a world traveller who is planning a return trip to Tuscany – that’s how we got in touch last week and I’m enjoying reading something a little different in her posts about South America and Asia.

Finally, for blog day I want to thank Jessie of Wandering Educators for support and concrete tips last year when I decided to re-launch arttrav “alla grande”!

Robert once left a comment on arttrav, and since then we’ve had a great email correpondence in preparation for his Florence trip later this month. I love his strange blog, Neon Poisoning. He’s on the lookout for… strange things, worldwide. The photo to the left is the kind of thing he usually appreciates – Tinkertown in Sandia Park NM, posted on his flickr. Here are his results for Florence.

The Internet, a modern marvel. From my apartment in Houston, TX, it has provided me with research and contacts for a first-time visit to Florence. It helped me discover the website you’re reading and through a generous offer, an invitation to guest blog about my travels and preparations as a result of conversations with website founder, Alexandra.

The undeniable beauty of Florence is on display in gorgeous photos posted on Flickr and described in assorted blog posts around the Internet.  It’s a piece of cake to find office travel guides and comprehensive reviews online (Fodors, New York Times, Lonely Planet).  Google searches with “My Florence trip” will find visitors raving about personal trips to the Duomo, Ponte Vecchio and the Uffizi.  And, for centuries, traveler have visited the Piazza della Signoria and Palazzo Vecchio, Ponte Vecchio, Galleria degli Uffizi, Boboli Garden and Pitti Palace.  

But there is also the weird traveler, one who skews away from the average, who’s fussy inclinations leave them dissatisfied with the straight and narrow and looking of the unusual and odd.  There are resources for myself and those who like their city’s served with a side of the eccentric.  London has Quirky London Tours and the newly published Secret London: An Unusual Guide, collaborative travel site Nothing to See Here is international in scope and everything the fifty state’s have to offer can be found on Roadside America.

There is no Not For Tourist guide to Florence, and since the best sources of such attractions often come from locals, my lack of language skills keeps me from reading any websites other than English ones.  In the hunt for the offbeat, Atlas Obscura is a good starting point for Italy on the whole.  ”A compendium of this age’s wonders, curiosities, and esoterica… with the goal of cataloging all of the singular, eccentric, bizarre, fantastical, and strange out-of-the-way places that get left out of traditional travel guidebooks and are ignored by the average tourist.”  Dylan Thuras and Michelle Enemark, of Curious Expeditions also travel the world, “devoted to unearthing and documenting the wondrous, the macabre, and the obscure from around the globe.”  Between the two websites, they have unearthed intriguing Florence destinations like the oldest still-operating pharmacy in the world, Galileo’s middle finger, and  La Specola, “the largest and most famous wax anatomical collection anywhere in the world”

Lastly, I have to add the Casa del Formaggio, a destination with a sense of humor and lacking in some taste.  With even the author of the post unsure of where he found it, the House of Cheese might put me on a wild goose chase through Florence.  And often the best places are the one stumbled upon while trying to arrive somewhere else.

Editor’s note: Robert will be happy to know that there is also a Casa del Prosiutto, which is a simple, cheap restaurant in Vicchio about an hour’s train ride from Florence (but don’t try to get to the restaurant from the train station by foot). A display of prosciutto greets you at the door and you can have your cured meat sliced and slapped onto bread. Sadly his visit is in the winter, and without a vehicle, or else I’d suggest the Niki de St. Phalle Tarot Card park in Maremma, about which I will write this summer.

Readers – can we help Robert by suggesting other weird, odd, obscure things to do in Florence?

A look back at 2009 through arttrav - how the most significant moments in my year turned into posts.

We started off 2009 with a guided visit of Lucca in early January by new friends Fabio and Laura from FlorenceIN. We have since become close friends, in touch weekly if not daily, while FlorenceIN has become a fixture in our lives. I have a reprise of this visit planned for January 4th 2010 to check out Lucca’s contemporary art scene!

In February, poor arttrav got none of my attention as I was happily teaching art history to undergrads for UGA Cortona and commuting quite a distance to do so.

The Danube

By March I finally got my act together and was able to post the photographs I had taken the month before of the newly restored Fountain of the Four Rivers by Bernini. This article has had a lot of success thanks to Google and interest driven up by the movie Angels and Demons.

April marked the end of the Spring 2009 term at UGA Cortona. I asked students in my “Women and Art” class to each make a biographical video about a woman artist other than Artemisia Gentileschi, and posted these videos online. My favourite is the video about Lavinia Fontana.
Soon afterwards I found myself with extra time on my hands and plenty of energy; this is when we restyled arttrav with the current wordpress theme and launched into facebook and twitter with great enthusiasm.

In May I saw the presentation of a newly restored painting by Artemisia Gentileschi, about which I wrote a review. I finally met Jane Fortune – from afar – at this event, though it took another 6 months to meet her in person and hear about the rest of her “Invisible Women” project.

June was all about “the cheese video” – how to make pecorino cheese – which has some serious (unrealized) viral potential .

In July I gave a talk at a FlorenceIN meeting on “Mediating Cultural Exchange” that represented a major turning point in my life; I met Costanza from Fondazione Sistema Toscana, which led to my current job as arts editor for the Regione Toscana’s Social Media Team. Thanks to FlorenceIN (soon to be renamed ToscanaIN) I’ve met many active residents in Florence and become one myself.
I also launched the arttrav Italy writing contest this month, and was amazed at how many sponsors were willing to offer prizes.

In August it was hot and I wanted to avoid downtown whenever possible; I explored my own area and wrote about “off the beaten track” Florence: the museum and convent of San Salvi.

My favourite article from September is an interview with artist Stefano Giovacchino who was chosen to install his large paper sculptures in Lucca’s piazza dell’Ampiteatro as part of the anteprima of Cartasia, the biennale of contemporary art dedicated to paper as medium. I am starting to get more interested in contemporary art, and predict that there will be more offerings of this sort in Tuscany in 2010 (all of which will be covered on arttrav, or on the website that I write for work, TuscanyArts).
Also in late September I wrote an article commenting on a local government document called Florence is the Next Florence. I actually came up with this phrase which is now the slogan for arts and culture in the new city administration.

On October 25th, Florence’s mayor made Piazza Duomo pedestrian-only, and arttrav was there. It was a pretty big deal. Read the announcement and read about my experience of the space that day (with photos too).

In November, everybody LOVED Pamela Marasco’s contest-winning article in the Tuscany category about truffles and thermal baths in Tuscany.

In December, some of my best articles were written for publication by others. I was happy to be given an advance copy of Jane Fortune’s Invisible Women for review by and in The Florentine; for work I went to see the show Manipulating Reality at the Strozzina, the review of which was first published on the turismo.intoscana blog.

2009 was a great year; with hopes that 2010 will bring great art and events, and enough time to write about them. Happy New Year to all my regular readers; with many thanks to you for giving me reason to keep writing.

I am happy to announce the winners below. The winning essays will be published every Tuesday starting October 6^th (I had said Sundays in the guidelines, but more people read arttrav on Tuesdays than on any other day, so let’s make them happy).

If you want to be sure to read them all, follow @arttrav on twitter, join the facebook fanpage, or the LinkedIn group.

The articles will be published in this order; links will be added each week.

This photo shows Lillie in her kayak.

AT: Please introduce yourself: your name, age, and the state in which you liveI am Lillie. I am 7. I live in Michigan.

AT: What is your website? Is it your own website or do you contribute to it along with others?

Our site is Wandering Educators. I contribute to the site, with others. I am working on my own website, it is in development. It will be focused on fashion. For the Wandering Educators site, I write articles on books, author and illustrator interviews, about our trips, things we see, and more. I wrote about Mary Poppins in Chicago, our trip to the Michigan Renaissance Fair last summer, etc.

Lillie in Chicago

AT: And what is your “job” for that website? Do you write about something in particular? How often do you write?

I am the special children’s reporter. I write about things kids would be interested in, like books. It is mostly books. We get lots of books to review. I write at least once a month.

AT: What do you want to be when you grow up?

I will be myself. I want to DO many things – most likely a dolphin researcher, but I am also interested in archaeology (ancient Egypt), fashion design, writing and illustrating books, dancing, and creating art.

AT: Do you like to travel? What is the coolest place you have been? What did you like about it?

TOTALLY! Without travel, I would faint for ten hundred weeks.

I love travel because of the great food, and the theater. I especially love the wonderful view if you’re in a hotel that is up so high – just don’t get jittery! I can’t wait to go to Paris. I love the Eiffel Tower. Mom says it is so cool and tall. I haven’t been outside of the US yet. We are planning a trip for next year, though.

Here is lillie white water rafting. You can't see her: she is covered by the water.

My favorite place is Seattle. I love the great food, and the water there, and my uncle Ben lives there. I also love visiting art museums – we go to any art museums when we travel. I also love waterparks – we are going to one next week!

When I was 3 I went whitewater rafting, I LOVED it. So I would like to go whitewater rafting many more times. We kayak a lot at our lake.

AT: I come from North America like you do, but now I live in Italy. Do you know anything about Italy? Just go for it – name the first things that come to mind. They can be people, places, foods, words, anything.

What comes to mind about Italy is: Ciao Marco! The wonderful view. The FOOD! Spaghetti, pizza, gelato, olive oil, yummy bread. Ides of March – et tu, Brute. Rome. Venice and boats. Espresso. Julius Caesar, Marc Antony and Cleopatra, Romulus and Remus. Fashion! Leaning tower of Pisa. Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou, Romeo. Pompeii. Part of Europe. Parmesan cheese. Italy is shaped like a boot, kicking a ball (Sicily).

AT: Where do you long to travel?

At the science museum in MN

I can’t wait to go to France (and Switzerland – cheese and chocolate). I want to go to France to see awesome sights,

Eiffel Tower, great art, great cheese and bread, fashion.

I want to go to Italy.

And I REALLY want to go to Egypt. Abu Simbel. Luxor. Valley of the Kings. Pyramids. Great food. Felucca on the Nile, alligators.

I want to go to Greece to visit my aunt. And see the Parthenon – I love drawing the Parthenon. Awesome swimming, great food – I love Greek Salad. Meteora and ride up the cliffs in a basket!

I want to go to everywhere, in the whole wide world, actually. We read a book, Africa Trek, that made me want to walk around Africa. We read books about the world all the time.

I know that I will be a constant traveler, because I like to learn about new things and places. I love food from around the world. I like to meet kids and people from all over – it is so interesting.

Thank you for talking with me. Kids should travel! Lillie is out. Peace!

Arttrav wishes to thank this wonderful, cheese-loving young lady for her enthusiasm, and her mom both for acting as intermediary for this interview and for teaching so much to her daughter about the big world out there.

If you’re a kid who wants to travel, or a parent who wants to travel with children, check out the review of the Kids Europe Italy discovery journal, and the many books on kid stuff in the arttrav amazon bookstore.

This summer I had the pleasure to meet Judy Witts Francini, known to all of us in the blogosphere as Divina Cucina - whose business card reads “food writer – market maven – cooking teacher – culinary guide – italian life coach”. Over lunch in Certaldo, we talked about her new cookbook “Secrets from my Tuscan Kitchen”, which has already sold 700 copies and is in its second printing.

“If you don’t have a Tuscan mother-in-law – or if you have one you hope to impress – buy this book.”

Judy generously gave me a copy of the book to review, and one copy to give away to you! At the end of this review you’ll find a question which you must answer correctly in the comments section of this post for a chance to win the book.

Judy told me that the genesis of this book was the 20 years she spent teaching cooking in Florence. She did these market tours at San Lorenzo where she and the group chose their ingredients and then went to her kitchen to make lunch. Since they never knew what they’d end up cooking until they got the ingredients, she had to figure out the best way to supply people with take-home copies of the recipes. In the end, she gave her students handwritten notes and menus in a kind of photocopied book. All along, she would have loved to publish a cookbook… but she never had time to write it.

She took the plunge last year, closed the cooking school, moved to the Tuscany countryside of Certaldo, and sat down to write the book. It was important to her to keep the handmade, handwritten feeling of her cooking-school book, so she chose to self-publish in order to have control over a number of interesting design factors. One of the things I appreciate the most about this book is that it is printed on off-white Fabriano paper. Fabriano is one of the earliest producers of paper in Italy. The mill began in the 13^th century. It does not come cheap, and Judy has not spared any paper either, because recipes are printed only on one side, leaving room for your notes on the other, lined page. The ink chosen is brown, which looks very classy on this paper. The font is a custom designed handwriting font that reproduces Judy’s own neat printing. The binding is hand stiched and very solid – with the only drawback that you have to try to kill it to make the book lie flat while you’re cooking!

Judy says:

“The first time you try a recipe, it is new

The second time, you correct it

The third time you make it, it is yours.”

In a totally unnecessary bid to write a very complete book review, I decided to test a few recipes. I’ve been living in Tuscany for 10 years and have had the benefit of learning how to cook Italian-style from my husband and his family, so I have never followed a recipe for Tuscan food. Nor, come to think of it, do I often follow any recipes at all, other than baking. Tuscan food is wonderfully simple. The point is to have few ingredients and that they should be evident in the final product. (I usually contrast this to the French love of smothering things in sauce.) So these are not difficult recipes, but they are really useful. There are a few things in the Tuscan diet that I did not know how to make but that I like, and now I know I can consult the book for them. Not to mention all the meat recipes which I may tackle some time if I have non-veggie guests over for dinner.

So. First I tried the Salsa di Noci (Walnut sauce). I have always thought that this was a cream sauce, and so was pleased to see that the recipe calls for no cream: walnuts, garlic (omitted), bread soaked in milk, oil and salt, tossed in the blender. My blender chose to die halfway through this process, but it turned out good anyway. This can be eaten directly on bread (crostini) or served on fresh pasta or ravioli. We had it on green spinach ravioli filled with pecorino ricotta.

Like the seal on the front of the book says, these recipes have the “Tuscan Husband Seal of Approval”. Indeed, my Tuscan husband was in seventh heaven.

The second recipe I tested was pappa al pomodoro, which is a thick tomato and bread soup. I have always like this and thought it was hard to make, but it was so easy (said husband saw that I was finished preparing it and said “that’s it?!”). It is a warm, filling, cheap and easy meal. I think this is going to be something I’ll make weekly this winter.

It’s Sunday, and while those of you living in places that have Sunday shopping probably do not recall this predicament, being Sunday night usually means scraping around for ingredients to make dinner. One thing I always have in the house is stale bread (often unfortunately moldy, too), a tin of tomatoes, and onions, so yay, I could make the pappa. (Actually, the recipe called for a leek, but I substituted a certaldo red onion.) I also learned why most peoples’ pappa burns my tongue – it has peperoncino (hot pepper) in it. I omitted both this and the garlic.

From making this soup I learned that one should follow the amounts that Judy provides in the recipe at least once. I did not have enough bread (requires 1 pound or about 450 grams)… I had about 200 grams of bread, so I tried, with faulty math, to apply a 2/5 ratio to the amounts and ended up with something rather too solid. This emergency was easily averted with some water and extra tomato, and the results were excellent.

This meal was also Tuscan husband approved, and I have expanded my culinary vocabulary by approximately 20%.

Thanks again to Judy for the great conversation, for taking me to lunch, and for giving me this book and the many opportunities it brings me to impress friends and family through my cooking. Click here to buy your own copy of Secrets from my Tuscan Kitchen… or try to win a copy…

Now, for the book giveaway!

You can win a copy of Divina Cucina’s Recipes, donated generously by the author, if you can correctly answer this question – and yes, spelling counts:

“What is the name of the typical fish soup from Livorno?”

Post your answer in the comments section of this article. I will not approve the comments for 48 hours, so you cannot see the other answers. The first person to correctly answer and correctly spell this soup wins the book! And yes, there’s a recipe for this in Diva’s book on page 143!

The winner’s name will be announced in the article, via twitter, and via the arttrav facebook fan page. I will contact you via the email that you use to leave your comment (which will not be published) for your mailing address, and then endeavour to mail out the book asap.  This contest is open to everyone except Judy and my mother .

The winner is Melissa Harshman, who responded within 10 minutes of this post going online, with the correct spelling of Cacciucco. I just love saying cacciucco, don’t you?

In this photo you can see the paper diamonds in their urban setting – if you think this is surreal, you should hear about how they were moved into place!

AT: Please tell us a little about yourself!

Stefano Giovacchini: I was born in Lucca in 1975 and studied at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Firenze from where I graduated in 2001 with a thesis on Color Design. After that I had an internship at the museum of Fine Arts in Brussels, and have studied the application of color also at the University in Milan. I now work as a creative artist and designer in Lucca, painting, doing graphics, and designing with color. Currently I run Di.Segno, a company that does color projects and domestic mural projects: www.disegnodesign.it

AT: What is Cartasia? Can you tell us something about the history of paper in Lucca?

SG: Cartasia (www.cartasia.it) is a Biennale of Contemporary art now in its 5^th year; an event related to the artistic use of paper and its derivatives. First I should clarify why this would be in Lucca – in this province, they make almost all the packing and transport as well as domestic-use paper for all of Italy. Furthermore, there are companies that make paper-marking machinery here in the province of Lucca whose clients are all over the world. So, paper is one of Lucca’s major economic channels. It seems that they were already making paper in the province of Lucca back in the 1200’s when it was just brought to Europe by the ‘mores’.

So, I consider it entirely normal that there be an event that puts into the spotlight Lucca’s role in the paper business, but also one that addresses it from an artistic point of view, one that points out the aesthetic and creative role of this product. Also, as we’re in this economic crisis right now, I’d like to point out how artists can help evolve, distinguish, and promote paper and the paper industry.

diamonds in the rough!

AT: Well put! How did you get the occasion to participate?

SG: I submitted a proposal in the international competition organized by Cartasia – the theme is “paper and creativity as renewable resources”. 170 artists responded, 10 were selected to show their works in July 2010, while I was chosen as the inaugural artist whose work is being shown this September, which is a very important month for Lucca.

AT: I’m really impressed – you have a huge installation in what is probably the most prestigious piazza in the city of Lucca! I read that your work is intended to signify the precious aspects of two renewable resources: paper and creativity. What role did PLACE have in the way in which the final work was constructed and placed?

SG: actually, having my work in that piazza was more than I expected! In fact, for the proposal I had suggested a smaller project for another piazza, the Piazza del Giglio (del teatro). But they liked my idea so much that they asked me to make it larger and think about how to put it in piazza dell’ampiteatro, which Cartasia also considers the most prestigious space. In the past 5 events, an Italian has won this location only twice, so I am really honoured.

The ampitheatre’s shape easily lends itself as backdrop or site for my diamonds – a precious but also popular container, coherent with the language of the material and shape used – a precious object or space made of traditiona, poor, recyclable material.

Just made it out the door

AT: I noticed from the photos on your website that you made the diamonds in a warehouse in Lucca and then transported them one by one in the streets of Lucca. That must have been quite the experience! How far did you walk and what were the reactions of people who saw this process?

SG: The transport was perhaps the most interesting part of the work. Three of us moved each single diamond on a cart, passing by some of the most significant areas of the city, from the ex-tabacco factory, along the urban walls, in front of piazza San Frediano with its mosaic fronted church, along via Fillungo which is the principle road since Lucca’s Roman foundation, all the way to piazza dell’Anfiteatro. This was about 1.5 kilometers.

through the streets of lucca

People we encountered on this road did not fully understand the object being transported. They understood the shape, but not its weight, use, or material. Many were fascinated by the surreal event that happened before their eyes. It is not every day that you see a 3.5 meter diameter diamond made of paper being walked through the city by three people.

Some streets are rather narrow!

AT: That’s exactly what I thought when I saw the photos. I hope you made a video too!! You must have made the works to measure in consideration of getting out the door from the building in which you made it, but did you encounter any really tight squeezes on the road?

SG: Yes, it turns out that the entranceway to the piazza dell’Anfiteatro is narrower than I thought, so we had to go around via an external road and enter through a side door!

AT: the work is of course made of paper, and there is an emphasis on recycling in your description. What happens if it rains? And what happens to the work when the month’s show is over?

SG: The corrugated paper used for this installation had to be treated against the elements with a resin that unfortunately makes it not recyclable in a traditional sense. It can however be re-used: the larger diamonds will be dis-assembled but the smaller ones (2.5 meters) will be re-used by the organizers of Cartasia for future promotions.

Stefano’s piece is on view from September 5^th to October 3d 2009.
In Piazza Felice Orsi-Porcari there is another installation work by Enzo Iorio.

All Photos are by Silvia Vercelli.

Installation in the piazza

As many of you know, I do not have kids, but I’ve used this book in its digital download form to come up with ideas to keep younger visitors to Florence occupied. Now I have the print version in my hands because it’s one of the prizes for the arttrav writing contest, and I felt it deserved a full review.

Let me make clear that you can order this book in either download or print form. The download is a great deal, but it takes time because you have to print it out, cut it to size, and bind it. The advantage to this is that you can customize it yourself. This can be a pre-trip activity with the kids, OR can be done by adults to edit out things that are not age-appropriate or relevant to where you are visiting in Italy. Also, if you’re like me, you might be inspired to come up with some more activities, print them in the same style, and add to the book. For example, inspired by the “Vehicle Variety” checklist on page 96, I came up with a bunch of pictures of the newest 50cc engined and electric vehicles to invade the city, and a list of related questions.

The printed form comes spiral bound so it easily lies flat for optimum reading, writing, and colouring in. It is half A4 size and light enough to carry around all day so that you can whip it out when the kid gets bored.

The table of contents is divided topically into some of the most important aspects of Italian life. Food and Gelato is first on the list and was much appreciated by my 11 and 13 year old half brother and sister, who endeavoured to sample all the flavours on the gelato checklist found on page 8. Other categories are: shopping, churches and religion, every day life and popular culture, art and architecture, history, geography, cars and road fun, and then some specific exercises and local activities.

Most of the observations on Italian culture are bang on, and bringing them to kids’ attention helps them understand and deal with something different. As someone who lives here, I forget how weird it must be to an American child that time is read on a 24 hour clock, that the evil eye is still a concern, or that people talk with their hands… all points brought up by this book.

Pat Byrne knows all the tricks to get kids looking at and interested in what’s around them. Frankly, these tricks work on my university students too. Her activities ask children to observe (look at the euros and make a list of the denominations) and compare (in the USA, green is equated with money. Does that work here?). This book helps remind us that while adults might visit a place like Florence for the museums, for kids everything around them is new and worth observing. We can try to direct their attention to what we think is most important, but in understanding a culture, we might best combine our observation of architectural styles (page 72) with that of how Italians line up for the bus (page 53).

If you bring your child to Italy, make it a learning and fun experience with this book. Arttrav has other book recommendations for travel with children – please see the Arttrav Bookstore section dedicated to KID STUFF!

For more information, see Kids Europe: www.kidseurope.com

The book can be purchased on Amazon.com:

But seriously. Social media are a really useful way for me to reach my readers. They join one or more groups that i’ve set up, and they are notified of new events and articles posted. I’ve found the same social media wonderful for learning what other bloggers are up to, and for keeping on top of events and happenings in Tuscany and Italy.

Here are some of the ways you can get closer to arttrav:

1. Google Friend connect: add yourself using an existing google login via the “widget” (box) in the bottom right hand menu of this website.
2. Join the arttrav group on LinkedIn, the “serious” network, and participate in discussions.
3. Become a “fan” on Facebook
4. Sign up to follow @arttrav on twitter

And here are some ways for arttrav to get closer to you!

1. Post your travel-related twitter @ name in the comments section of this post.
2. Feel free to post comments on any other post.
3. If you have an idea for a guest post on arttrav, I’d be happy to hear from you.
4. take part in the arttrav italy writing contest.

My students ponder Raphael at the Vatican

Studying abroad can be an exciting time for students.  Intercultural experiences are exciting, sometimes frightening, transformative, and often life-changing.  You are now living in a new culture, with norms that are entirely different from what you’re used to at home. Maybe gender roles are different in your new culture, or food, or transportation, or you miss being away from your family (and possibly adapting to a new host family).  You’re also studying and learning a new subject, in a place that is probably integral to that subject! But you’ve got all kinds of feelings about cultural differences and adapting to living in this new country.

 A natural response to these cross-cultural differences is termed cross-cultural adjustment (also known as culture learning or culture shock). Cross-cultural adjustment encompasses both learning about your new culture, and of learning your home culture in a new way. Things that seemed normal at home can take on a greater importance when you are in a new culture.  You miss your friends and family at home, and homesickness can set in.

Before leaving, predeparture orientation and language programs can be an extremely important tool for preparing students for an intercultural experience. The orientations can provide both culture-specific knowledge, as well as culture-general knowledge that serves to educate learners about cross-cultural issues and generally reduce uncertainty about the upcoming intercultural experience. You can prepare by learning the language, exploring your new home through travel guides and the internet, and finding new friends overseas before you go. However, what a student brings into the experience can affect their time studying abroad and intercultural adjustment.  Being flexible, open-minded, eager to learn, self-aware, curious, and possessing communication skills can do much to facilitate a great intercultural experience.

Once you’re there, one of the best ways to both adapt to a new culture and push through homesickness is to immerse yourself into your new culture. Learning another culture is a long and complex process, requiring a constant shifting of one’s frames of reference and learning from one’s companions and surroundings.  Learn more about where you are. Experience more of the culture – through restaurants, language, new friends, art, music, and time spent enjoying important attractions or parks.  You’ll become more excited about your new home and eager to share it with your loved ones.

The nature of life for an intercultural being is joyful – but also difficult at times. You must challenge yourself to grow, experience new things, travel, and continue to learn. Once you’ve started down that path, it is impossible to reverse course. But once you’ve started down that path, you also won’t want to. Curiosity and the desire to learn about others – people, cultures, languages, food, differences – is now within your very self.

Jessie Voigts has a PhD in international education and is the Publisher of Wandering Educators.

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AT: Your platform addresses issues of work, family, and volunteerism, but also focuses quite a bit on culture and tourism, which I want to discuss today. It’s interesting to me because in this time of “crisis”, there’s so much talk of cutting cultural activities, and yet tourism in Florence depends on them…

LDB: Indeed! The fact is that culture and tourism are natural resources in Florence. We need to take the greatest possible advantage of this in order to gain economic benefit, but there’s a careful balance between that and the degradation of the city…

AT: … so many tourists that downtown is crowded, impractical, dirty…

LDB: … we can redirect the tourists, encourage a healthier attitude, and make Florence a better place for its residents, as well as a great place to visit time and time again, through a series of specific actions that I propose in my campaign.

AT: We see totally eye to eye on this. Let’s go over those points one by one.

LDB: The first point is that we should have more contemporary exhibitions in this city–

AT: — I was going to suggest that!! My study abroad students complained about the lack of modern and contemporary art in Italy.

LDB: Why should we have to go to Rome to see something fresh and new? It seems that Florence gears all its

Checking out the show at Palazzo Strozzi

blockbuster exhibitions to tourists, with tried and true content that’s just not that exciting.

AT: yup, though I’d maintain that tourists, too, would be happy to see something new.

LDB: In fact, one of the problems is that, while cities like Paris and London create exciting proposals on a regular basis that keep bringing people back, Florence is a place you go once in your life. You can see it and figure it won’t change much, so why use up your few weeks of holiday coming back when you can go see something else.

AT: so if we create a more lively contemporary art scene, we’d have people come back more often.

LDB: Yes, and we’d also create a cultural offer that is of greater interest to locals.

AT: Locals and italians traveling from a lesser distance… and also, ideas generate ideas. Artists need fresh ideas to keep creating…

LDB: …more contemporary art would generate greater cultural dialogue in the city! Plus, we could use some of the revenue from these avant-garde shows and re-invest in our young cultural producers, which is my next point in fact. The city should encourage growth in this sector, and for that, we can tap into the revenue of blockbuster shows as well as various offshoots that could be put on in relation to those shows.

AT: I know so many wonderfully qualified italians with graduate degrees in art history or masters in tourism, and they get the most preposterous offers to work for free! Too many friends have had to change direction in order to have a paid job.

LDB: Revenue from certain exhibitions could indeed be put into creating paid internships in this sector, which then should lead to concrete jobs, not just end after the contract ends.

AT: The other issue I see is that there are too few opportunities for young people not only to gain experience, but also to express themselves through publication in a sector that tends to be quite conservative and closed. Are there any really exciting local art journals that mix analysis with art news?

LDB: There is Exibart, which is Florentine, but I’m not sure it does what you’re suggesting. We could propose the creation of a peer-reviewed arts journal and an always up-to-date website that would be an opportunity for intellectual and artistic exchange for art historians, critics, and artists.

AT: Sounds fabulous. Let’s move down your list of points… You’re suggesting branding products for sale at museums?

LDB: Yes. I love design. The Met and the MOMA for example have such cool stuff for sale at their museum stores. Co-branded products are a great way to involve both new and established designers.

AT: hey! You could launch a contest for young artists to make museum products… in the journal!

LDB: see, it all fits together. Another issue, and I know it’s one that you’re really interested in since you’ve written about it on your website, is sustainable tourism. The city needs to actively promote sustainable tourism and discourage… what’s it called, “mordi e fuggi”…

AT: ha! Uh… fast food tourism? Mass tourism I guess… encourage “slow travel”, like “slow food”… I try to do that with arttrav, as does the website slowtrav. I think many people are becoming attuned to this idea now, and it’s better for the city as well as for their own experience. All it takes is a little education…

Laura wants baby Francesco to grow up in the best city in the world

LDB: like the creation of an informational pamphlet to help tourists act responsibly in our city… Plus, by making the city more beautiful, more clean, I think we can encourage more decent comportment. Now, I have two further points in my culture platform that are more related to the needs of locals. One is that the culture of Florence should be accessible to Florentines at a reasonable price, and with better opening hours.

AT: I totally agree. For example, if you’re a member of the Amici degli Uffizi, you get a card to get into all state museums for a lump sum membership fee, and at least we can get into churches without paying, but residents of Florence really should have greater access to their cultural patrimony. Two years ago there were some evening openings of the Uffizi and Accademia and I got together my husband and some friends who admitted to having not been to the Uffizi since grade school!

LDB: well how are we supposed to go? It closes so early on weeknights, and there’s long lines all the time. It costs too much to drop in for an hour, and there is no babysitting service to encourage young parents like us to visit. All of these are aspects around which I hope to encourage change.

AT: When we lived in Atlanta last year, Tommaso and I were members at the HIGH museum. It was a great price, and there were monthly jazz nights with a bar in the museum, and you could just enjoy the music and atmosphere. I’m not saying you can serve drinks in the Uffizi, but surely there are some more flexible spaces in the city that could host events like this that would revitalize Florentines’ relationship with their own art. It would be great to have some things to do in the evening that do not involve going to bars!

LDB: yup! Like, with some kind of universal museum pass that Florentines could purchase, we should encourage regular events, but also the creation of babysitting services and interactive zones that stimulate family learning. Museums can be fun learning and social spaces.

AT: you’re telling me!

…This conversation was rather longer than I can transcribe here, as we moved on to a pizzeria and then to a stylish gelateria. Laura and I see eye to eye on culture and tourism issues as well as on so many other issues that affect our lives here in Florence. She speaks a mile a minute – I admit, sometimes I lose a few points – because her brain works at high speed, and although I’ve only known her about half a year, I’ve been impressed by the way she not only talks about ideas, but really gets things done. It made me wish I could vote in Italy so I could vote for her. So it happened naturally that, as a way to get involved and contribute back to the city that has hosted me for a decade, I’m officially joining Laura as her campaign manager. I’ve never been involved in politics before! If you’re a resident of Florence and can vote, please see her website http://votalaura.wordpress.com/ to read more about Laura’s experience and platform (in italiano ovviamente)…

Me: You met Marco when you came to study abroad in Cortona, Italy. What part of this experience was most important to you?

Arturo: Meeting Marco has been a wonderful experience. I wrote a song about him! The thing about Marco is that he’s a modern man living in a modern world, but at the same time he and his modern world are both rooted in an ancient past. That’s why I’m glad I could take a course in Italian Renaissance Art while I was over here. It allowed me to be come more intimate with that past that has so much to do with where Italy is today. [editor's note: he wrote that, i did not make it up! Not only is AJ a journalism student, but he's a diplomat.]

Me: You were concerned that your portrayal of your Italian professor, Marco, was perhaps too superficial. After all, the guy does have two PhD’s! What did Marco say to this?

Arturo: I haven’t had an in depth discussion with Marco about these lyrics, but I think that’s because we are friends. He can hear in the song and read in the text that I have a deep respect for him. All I have received is smiles and friendly nudges since I first brought the song to Marco. He helped me edit the text because my Italian is broken and grammatically unsound.

Me: Tell us about making the video, once you convinced Marco to do it. Anything funny happen behind the scenes?

Arturo: There definitely would have been a bloopers reel had this been a feature-length film. When we first arrived at the bedroom we were shooting in there was some confusion about how scantily Marco should be clad. I was afraid that when I asked him what he normally wore to bed, he might reply “in the nude.” But then I guess I and the crew would have gotten a real life look at what Renaissance sculpture models looked like, or at least what Michelangelo wished they looked like.

Me: Your video and song test the limits of self-production. For the tech geeks out there, tell us what equipment you used.

Arturo: We’ll just have to leave that up to the expertise of our music and cinema peers to find out. But for everyone else just know that we had enough to make the dream a reality. (Spenser said we shouldn’t tell because the equipment is bottom of the line.)

Me: Does Marco have an email address to receive letters from an onslaught of admirers? And how will you deal with the screaming fans?

Arturo: I would give out Marco’s email address if I thought it was necessary, but given that the uomo already knows half of Italy I’m sure that he’ll have to change it in due time anyway. I will deal with the screaming fans by embracing them all. Love to the people!

Me: Can we have the lyrics?

Arturo: Of course! They’re at the bottom of this page, and translated too.

Songs and contact info: www.myspace.com/arturoinletto

Arttrav encourages friends to forward “Ciao Marco” to all the Marco’s out there, and to everyone else. Let’s help AJ make it to the top. Please give him a 5 star vote on YouTube!

Original Lyrics

Marco é un uomo
Che é molto forte
e meraviglioso
Ha occhi d’argento
A tutte le feste
Balla incantevolemente
Insegna agli studenti
Nella clase di italiano

Pensa molto
Sta cercando qualcosa
Aspetta solo
Un giorno lui trova qualcuno

Le ragazze dicono ciao marco ciao marco
Le ragazze dicono ciao marco ciao marco!

Marco é un uomo
Che é intelligente
Anche é arguto
Sempre parla bene
Lui é di Roma
Una bella città
Va in una macchina
Che é bellissima

Pensa molto
Sta cercando qualcosa
Aspetta solo
Un giorno lui trova qualcuno

Le ragazze dicono ciao marco ciao marco
Le ragazze dicono ciao marco ciao marco!

English translation of lyrics:

Marco is a guy
Who is very strong
He’s great
He has silver eyes
At all the parties
He dances wonderfully
He teaches students
In italian class

He thinks a lot
He’s looking for something
He’s waiting alone
One day he’ll find someone

All the ladies say “Ciao Marco!”, “Ciao Marco!”
All the ladies say “Ciao Marco!”, “Ciao Marco!”

Marco is a guy
Who is very smart
He is also clever
And always talks well
He is from Rome
A lovely city
Goes around in a car
That is really nice

He thinks a lot
He’s looking for something
He’s waiting alone
One day he’ll find someone

All the ladies say “Ciao Marco!”, “Ciao Marco!”
All the ladies say “Ciao Marco!”, “Ciao Marco!”

More Photos!

 

 

 

What to avoid:

1) Any restaurant with a giant plastic chef outside holding up a menu.
2) said menu especially if in four or more languages.
3) suspiciously long menus with tons of variety, ranging from pizza and pasta to fish and meat. As a general rule, it is more likely that a restaurant tends to do one thing really well than everything well.
4) bars with sandwiches displayed in a window facing outside, especially late in the afternoon or evening. If you pass by a closed bar with sandwiches in the window at night, don’t even think of going there the next day.
5) bars with similar outside-facing displays containing prepared plates with assortments of “primi” (pasta). How long have they been sitting there?
6) restaurants that start serving at 6pm. You know that means they cater to Americans. Italians eat out starting at 8pm but usually even later, especially down South.
7) bars and restaurants across from any Duomo (with the exception of in smaller towns).

What to look for:

1) At lunch, bars filled with well-dressed businessmen serving themselves to tables at which you don’t pay extra (for example in Florence, Chiaroscuro on via del Corso).
2) bars with lots of stickers on the window. Look for ones that say “ticket restaurant” (a red circle and blue writing) or “pass”. These bars tend to be frequented by people who work in the area (esp. at lunch), and serve well-priced and fresh “primi” (pasta dishes, vegetables and the like), which are displayed inside in large containers from which they will scoop you out a portion.
3) restaurants that have been accepted as either “Slow Food” or Trattorie d’Italia (and are listed on those guides). Michelin also a valid indicator though less seen these days in italy.
4) small osterie (wine bars) with limited dinner menus. Often these are the places that will tell you about their wines, and serve delicious fresh food to go with it.
5) restaurants with unpretentious decor — wooden benches and paper mats. Best if said restaurant is full of italians.
6) As opposite to point 3 of what to avoid, look for places with limited menus — 3-4 primi and 3-4 secondi, hand written nightly. Some good restaurants will simply dictate the menu to you; this is for the more adventurous, but it is OK to ask first and also to ask them to repeat it very slowly or in halting english!! (In this case, try to get confirmation of prices, too!)
7) small restaurants that are always full and for which you have to reserve. If just arriving in a town, walk around at 6pm to find a place that looks good, and go in to ask about the menu and if they’ll hold you a table for 8pm or later. We’ve found our favourite restaurants this way.

Buy the book: I highly recommend arming yourself with copy of this book by Emily Wise Miller:

To get us going, they projected a computerized reconstruction on the plain brick facade on Sunday February 18, 2007. Here is a photo.

Project by Prof. M. Ruffilli, Prof. G. Morolli, and Natali Multimedia s.r.l.).

The projection included a narration that presented evidence from primary sources, mostly Vasari, of quotations indicating the Medici and Michelangelo’s desire to see the facade finished. Furthermore, the promoters of this project cite the last will and testament of Anna Maria Luisa dei Medici, the “Elettrice Palatina” and last Medici (died Feb. 8th, 1743), who left the family’s possessions to the state, with the condition that nothing would be removed. Funds from the proceeds gained from Medici works of art were to be given in part to the maintenance of San Lorenzo, and apparently to the eventual construction of the facade. Anna Maria herself had a project made for the facade during her lifetime, but this, too, did not come to fruition.

The city of Florence has not yet revealed any monetary estimates of how much a project of this sort would cost, if they decided to do it. Meanwhile, we can consider whether or not it is a good idea. Three points to keep in mind:
1) The projection does not look anything like what Michelangelo had in mind, if we compare it to the wooden model
2) Modern building techniques are different than those of the Renaissance and would render the facade with a machine-made effect that would not be in keeping with the intentions of the Renaissance patrons, the building, or the area.
3) Vasari himself warned against the dangers of trying to imitate Michelangelo’s architecture, which he praises highly despite its departure from the classical canon. This he mentions twice in his Vita, the first time softly: “The license he allowed himself has served as a great encouragement to others to follow his example; and subsequently we have seen the creation of new kinds of fantstic ornamentation containing more of the grotesque than of rule or reason.” The second mention indicates his displeasure at attempts to copy Michelangelo’s architectural style: “certain plebeian and presumptuous architects lacking in disegno have in our times produced all their monstrous things, worse than the German.”

What would Vasari think if we, in 2007, presumed to finish this work according to our (mis?)understanding of Michelangelo’s plan? I think he would have a fit.