Italy in June _____________________________________________________________________________________________
by Nicole Moore
In a small town in Northern Italy called Mortegliano — an hour from Venezia by train and an hour or so's drive from the Slovenian border — there is an enchanting inn named Ai Tre Amici from which one can hear the church bell chime each and every morning. And every year for the past several, the provincial towns surrounding Mortegliano have participated in a rotating jazz festival of sorts, with musicians from all over the world playing each night a different venue…
In this quaint little Italian town, the paved roads meander easily among cobblestone sides, as many of the residents — young et old — choose to cycle and walk instead of drive...
And here there still exists a sweetness of youthful love: a young man wearing a tiny silver band with his girlfriend’s name engraved within, an awkward kiss with her endeared in front of a giggling group of girlfriends before she rushes off with them excitedly; and all of this under the romantically strewn lights of a town square with intones of jazz in the air.
Conversations that began during the settling of day continue in a nook at night over glasses of red wine poured oft from a deep emerald-green bottle (the true sign of organic home-grown) betwixt many lavish folds of night.
And in the morning Mama gives her orders in tendered and raspy authority, or bends slowly on arithmetic knees to attend the pink-belled, yellow-stamen flowers.
At night the cobbled sidewalks may lead you to some sudden opening upon a cozy pavilion of restaurants nearly hidden amongst tall streets and old-world building facades.
(I enjoy a quiet stroll amongst them, bamboo growing tall above me underneath the night. Then a trinket of laughter echoes somewhere and One speeds by, fast on the go…)
In the days and unto the night, Mama's son Manlio — tall and handsome with a family of his own — can be found tending bar, making sure that the days end easily beneath umbrella and lamplight on the inn-front sidewalk, under the hanging eaves of any of an eve… shhhh…inhabitants of the olden buildings are sleeping now…
And then one very particular afternoon holds court to a New Orleans style second-line parade; the festive music and dance taking place through the main street in Mortegliano during the hustle and bustle of market day. With wares hanging and stacked for display, people meander the stalls while a beautifully jazz-fashioned lady in flapper flare and a young fellow in solemn black tie skip and tap their way in the role of grand marshals through the aft of day, leading the musicians and the following-dancers in processional. (The dancers carry umbrellas, a tradition borne of communities in New Orleans of the 1800s during funeral marches and used to symbolize the ascension of a soul to heaven — now twirled just as oft as signs of respective celebration (or perhaps understanding)..
Here the vegetation is lush, the leaves grand, the stalks tall and strong, and the vines buoyant and heavy-laden with the yet unripe green grapes of June.
And the food may well be the endless joy of the Fruili region. Organically and regionally produced: sweet eggplant, succulent rabbit, and chicken stuffed; pulled day-long-braised pork cheek and potato-based minestrone soup with the tiniest bits of carrots and with green pees, pesto pasta, and an anti-pasta with each and every meal... …followed always by the sparkling refresh of San Pellegrino poured oft from a large clear, basin-bowled pitcher.
And wine as endless as if poured from the fattened fingers of Bacchus himself! Yes see, sometimes wine too is like water, it seems...
One very spritely drink (though certainly an acquired taste) is Gingerina, an orange bitters-soda of sorts said to sooth upset. Ah, and then there is the staple: proscuitto! Deliciously and butter-thinly sliced cured ham that one can wrapped around a crispy breadstick or pair with slices of cantaloupe and green pear. And while one will certainly feel the fullness of a grande meal, the sharp lower pains typical of modified and hormone-injected foods is absent here. For pizza though, you will likely find no better than on the magnificent City streets of New York. (One pizzeria in Udine did have a slightly intriguing, though more befuddling pizza pie with French fries and something akin to the weenies of the beenies, but I veered from that and stayed course with a more traditional slice. Who knows though, perhaps that was the pie to try, but it just didn’t look the part…) But I could ask nothing more of the sweet little Gnocchi I had on two occasions separate, one bathed in tomato and the other in a delicate cream-pesto sauce!
So, while one might think that to experience Italy you should visit Rome and Venice, Florence or Verona, perhaps if chance arise try instead a small provincial town in say, Northern Italy? where you can easily take a trip to the Adriatic coast, or sit down to a succulent head-on seafood dish , or enjoy a simpler place that I am sure is still in an earlier sun-bathed time…
Let's just hope your bags get there! Because as one lui said in the most wonderfully thick and raspy voice spiced with the humor of a honey-sweetened cigar, "Yes, well once I went to the airport and I asked them please to send one bag to Austria and one to Vienna, and the attendant said Sorry sir, we cannot do that and I asked But why?You did it the last time!"
Then a deep and hearty laugh-rumbling fills a tiny Euro car, and this particular lui takes me on my way!
Land near me little bird, before you take flight again
