It's Not All Work

While Michelle and I are working and learning a lot, we have tons of fun here in Calatafimi! A couple nights ago, we went out in a nearby town to celebrate Jack's time WWOOFing with us. (Incidentally, every bar in Calatafimi was closed, so we weren't actually having fun in our town...tomato tomato [toe-MAH-toe].) The guy in charge of the land here, Nicola, took us to a happening place where the live band included an accordion player. It was SO FUN! (Michelle and I wondered what Nicola's wife thought of the fact that he was out with four 20-somethings while she was at home with two kids under the age of three...but I digress.)

Speaking of Nicola, he took us to meet a drummer one night. Michelle and I had no idea this would be taking place. We just got in the car with our fellow WWOOFers and followed Nicola. He had us park outside a cafe, and we walked through a normal-looking door into a music studio. Amund got to play the drums for a minute, which was really therapeutic for him, I think, as he normally plays the drums for hours each day. (Side note: Amund is a drummer, composer, music engineer, etc.)

We WWOOFers were also able to tour the unfinished Greek temple in the area called Segesta. We saw an agora, a theater, and the only mosque in Sicily on this ancient site. Parts of the excavations were from the fifth century BC, so this particular piece of earth was rife with the history of Sicily. 

Wouldn't you know that you get one day off a week and wind up seeing your cousins in Palermo! It is one of the most lovely things in the world to see people you know in places where you don't expect them, or really just where you're not used to seeing them. 

We (when I say "we," I mean Michelle, Amund, Corbin, Mallory, and I) had a fantastic day buying fruits and veggies, walking the streets of the city, and visiting the Palatine Chapel (which, according to Angus, is the most beautiful place in the world). Palermo is quite cool architecturally, and the sweet people Michelle and I met early on during the harvest provided great recommendations for Corbin and Mallory to enjoy the end of their Italian honeymoon. Tutto era bellisimo! (That verb was Google translated, as I've neither studied nor learned the verbs.)

This is nicknamed "the fountain of shame" because there are a bunch of naked
statues surrounding it, and the commissioner had it built right in between two
churches in 1575. The churchgoers were appalled, but it's actually quite lovely.

Cheesing it in front of the
Quattro Canti (four corners)

The outside of the Royal Palace and Palatine Chapel: look at all those different
architectural styles!

Inside the chapel

You can't tell that I enjoyed my
Islamic art and architecture class
in college, can you?

Outside the Massimo Theater, for
all you Godfather fans.

Articulating with Angus

I have had the privilege of living with priceless British humour for the past two weeks, and it would be greedy of me to keep these quotes from you, blog readers. Please keep in mind that these selected quotes of Angus are only the ones I remember at the end of the day. Similar words flow constantly from his mouth. If you desire a more realistic sound and visual, please imagine that all of these sentences were spoken by Senator Palpatine from Star Wars. I'm hoping to get some video and/or voice recording from another WWOOFer soon. Enjoy! 

People are getting to be so much alike, and it's all terribly boring. This is coming from someone who used to take meeting minutes in Shakespearean English, and no one ever knew what the hell I was saying.

I hate the word "awesome." I hate the way it's used in America. "Awesome" is meant to describe a vision of God or something that focuses you on the Divine. In America, it means "interesting."

All you have to do is what you want.

All you have to do is wear trainers, short trousers, a brazier, something over it, and you can do whatever the hell you want.

That's absolute nonsense!

My birthday is the 26th of December, and my rival's is the day before. He means Jesus. And he constantly compares himself to Jesus.

Eighty-five-year-old man was explaining to us how he fell, and Angus interrupted: I think you fell because you saw a pretty girl and wanted to be rescued by her.

I had a brush with the King of Ethiopia once. The Princess of Abu Dhabi couldn't seem to get it through her head that the center of Rome was the Spanish Steps, so she told the king, "I'm at Valentino's!"

Once in London, I heard a man getting brutally beaten in the apartment above me, and so I called the police and said, "I'm going up!" I'm not a particularly brave person, but what saved me was the fact that I said I had called the police. I got eleven cuts on my head. The man hit me with a silver candlestick.

I think we should tie him up by his heels and slit his throat. Then Michelle jokingly chimed in with something about beating him to a pulp, and Angus added: In acid.

Foie gras is the continuous force-feeding of geese until they die. Their livers are delicious! Caterina mentioned how awful it must be for the birds and how they can't fly away. Yes, lovey, we must just accept the fact that we're not too nice to animals.

You know that I'm quite interested in Persia. I was on the Caspian Sea once, and the man who was taking me there didn't much care for the Shah. Only the Shah is supposed to eat golden caviar, and so I was given golden caviar on the Caspian Sea.

When asked if he ever danced the tango: I once broke a woman in half while dancing the tango. Points to hip Right there! Blood everywhere. I convinced the police that it hadn't happened.

My body metabolizes everything. I'm telling you I don't get fat. I burn everything. There is a fire inside my body that burns everything.

I'll give you a quote for your blog! I was once in bed with a countess from France, and her husband telephoned me right then. He said, "I'm taking the first flight from Paris to London, and I'm going to kill you with my revolver." True story. What happened? I don't know. He missed the flight.

My secretary used to bring a bottle of champagne into work every morning to start the day. Advertising in London in the '60s was mad! Everyone had 10 lovers. Emily makes a frowny face. Now you CAN'T go and judge a time in history by your own time's perspective. I'm telling you, it was NORMAL.

I hope you were enlightened by this brief glimpse into our life here in Calatafimi. For more information, please chick here.

The Olive Press

 After three days of picking olives by hand, we finally harvested enough to go to the press. Most years, farmers are able to press the olives every day, but since the harvest is so sparse this year, it took us three times as long to pick enough olives to reach the weight minimum for getting oil. The usual yield throughout the harvest season for Caterina's family is 700 liters of oil. If they get 25 percent of that this year, they'll be doing really well, I think. The press was quite involved, and the workers were kind enough to let us have a look around. Here's a short clip of the cleaning and pressing process:

The last step is the separation of oil and water after they squeeze the daylights out of the packets of olive mush.

 

We celebrated with a traditional Sicilian sandwich of bread, oil, tomatoes, onions, anchovies, and cheese. The land manager Nicola made it for us and joined us for the rest of dinner. DELICIOUS!

65 liters of fresh olive oil

Nicola is wheeling the oil to the car.

Jesus is at the olive press. Welcome to Sicily.

Rome in Pictures

There is so much to say about Rome. So much. For me and Michelle, one the most important parts of visiting Rome is getting to see our friend Martin who is studying there. He has been so good to us! He's like part parent (He insists on paying for us and calls to check up on us when we're in town.) and part tour guide (He always knows more than we do about whatever church we step inside.). Because of Martin, we've had a pretty unique experience there.

Here are just a few pictures with captions to keep you up-to-date on what we've seen:

At PNAC on a library tour--largest collection of books in English in Rome

St. Mary Major

Pieces of Jesus's manger are inside the gold casing.

This is just a candlestick holder.

FRIENDS ARE FUN

St. Peter's Square

Typical Italian breakfast

St. John Lateran, the cathedral of Rome

The Laterans were an Italian family whose land was used to build the cathedral.
I'm assuming this is their crest, but don't quote me.

I think this was a portable Peruvian shrine to Mary.

Santa Scala: The Holy Stairs that Jesus ascended and descended
before Pontius Pilate during His Passion in Jerusalem.

St. Paul Outside the Wall

Doors depicting the life of St. Paul

Martin and Michelle know a Wheeling man who is friends with
the owner of this Steelers bar in Rome. Small world!

Olives with the Mollica Family

We shuffled lazily down the gravel road back to the old stone (but recently renovated) house. The sun was setting quietly over the mountains, and the town of Calatafimi paled in the distance, nestled between the hills. The day's harvest was through, and we had spent the last hour of sunlight relaxing by the infinity pool. Within the next couple of hours, we'd be sipping wine with our host and awaiting the arrival of the newest WWOOFer from Norway, Amund (like "almond" without the "l"). Then we would be heading up to "the compound" for a big, fun, and noisy Mollica family dinner.

Yes, folks, this is real life for me and Michelle. Perfect weather. Breathtaking landscape. Lovely people--they really do have the sun in their hearts! Today we went to Mass and the beach, and our hosts allowed us to borrow their car. Life is good.

The olive harvest, in my humble opinion, is more fun than the grape harvest. Perhaps that's because it's less sticky. Perhaps that's because there are no yellow jackets flying around the olives. It could be that this harvest is for the families' personal use, so it's not as if they are relying on the production for their livelihood. It's much less stressful. There are more people to help, and there is less work to be done this year. The people we've been working with are genuinely warm and friendly and Sicilian. Whatever the reason, the olive harvest is the harvest for me.


Before now, I never knew that I had been missing out on one of the simple joys of life: climbing an olive tree to pick olives. There's nothing like using multiple muscle groups, balance, strategy, etc. to perform a task that directly translates into your community's food consumption. It's a group effort, too. Two or more people can be in the tree bending down branches for the larger group combing them off the tree. Or the group on the ground can pick the outer olives while the group in the tree picks the olives in the middle branches. Spreading and then folding up the nets are other aspects of harvesting that require a bit of logical reasoning, which I like.

Each moment of the harvest is a little different, depending on the goals of the farmer for the day. Sometimes, it's just like this:




Other times, it's a little less romantic:

Oh, you probably don't know what I mean when I say "the compound," so let me explain. Caterina's father was apparently a well-known judge in Calatafimi back in the day. Most of the children had moved out of town, but when the earthquake of 1968 came about and the family was later given money to rebuild, Caterina, Paolo, and Francesco all built homes right beside that of their mother and father. Each Mollica child also seems to have some type of guest home as well, and we stay in Caterina and Angus's guest house. Whenever we have family dinners, we have them "upstairs," that is to say up the hill from the guest house in the group of family houses. I believe Angus affectionately dubbed that area "the compound."

Here are some photos of the fun family atmosphere we are blessed to enjoy in Calatafimi:

Paolo--our chef and head farmer
for the day--grilling while chatting
with Bruno--Antonello's nephew.

Antonello--childhood friend of Paolo--
holding up "first oil," which is the green
virgin olive oil that comes straight from the press.

This is a Sicilian favorite: first oil
with fresh ricotta or bread. I had both.

These are the young and lovely Sicilians we know (minus Antonello)
with Michelle. From left: Giorgio--Antonello's son, Paola--Paolo's daughter,
Laura--daughter of another family friend, Bruno--Giorgio's cousin. 

View of Calatafimi from the Castle Eufemio

Italian Men Happen Round 1

Michelle and I got our first dose of creepy men in Italy while we were staying in Rome. Our host, actually, at the bed and breakfast where we were staying was hilariously forward. His English wasn't very good, but it was better than my Italian, so we spoke in English. He told me I reminded him of his ex-girlfriend. He asked me where I lived in America because he wanted to know how far it was away from NYC. When he asked me where in the US was beautiful and I started describing the Grand Canyon, he almost had a conniption. When he said beauty, apparently he meant women. He told me he would stay in the US at my home in my bed. I told him he would most certainly not be doing that. He later came into our room (the door was open) just to look me up and down. I mean it was for effect. Then he reintroduced himself to me, like we had gotten off on the wrong foot or something. By the time Michelle and I left to visit our friend in the city, our host was shirtless and telling us goodbye.

When we got in that night, our host's cousin was there. He seemed super pleasant and not erotic. Then he said, "Come with me," and I conveniently followed him to his room (once again, open door). He asked me if I wanted tea. I said I didn't think so. Then he explained to me that it was "soft tea," which I think is chamomile. I said I was already tired enough to hit the hay and go straight to sleep, and then he asked me if I wanted a massage. I said no. Then we stared at each other awkwardly until I just walked out of the room. Oops.

In Conca del Marini, Michelle and I decided we would take a tour of the Emerald Cave, which contains an underwater Nativity scene, as well as beautiful naturally-lit waters. When the boat driver saw us, it was already game, set, match. He asked us where we were from, how old we were, if we had boyfriends close by, where we were staying, the usual, etc. He wanted to get drinks with us, and even though we explained that we had our own car, he wanted to drive us. When the other boat driver saw us, he started yelling, "Baby, baby! Come with me tonight!" When I shook my head no, he wanted to know why not. I told him we were already pending on another offer from his friend, and then that turned into, "Oh, the four of us are going together!"

On our ten-minute cruise through this cave--with other people on our boat--our driver continued to talk to us. At one point, he used his paddle to splash the blue, well-lit water to give a diamond effect, and he started shouting, "Diamonds! Diamonds! Tiffany! Dior! Dolce and Gabanna! Emily! Michelle!" He was kind of funny. When we saw the underwater scene, he started yelling, "Baby Jesus! Maria! All the animals! It's a miracle!"

He held my hand as I got off the boat and tried to sweet talk me and Michelle into getting drinks with him and his friend. When we declined, he asked us to wait 20 minutes until he "closed the cave" so that we could "take a dip" in the water. I'm telling you what, people, that's just too forward. We actually considered the offer for drinks, too, because we were definitely at that point in our trip where we sat together in silence because we didn't have anything to say to one another, but we really wanted to talk to someone. Thankfully, we met our Australian friend that evening, so all was well with the world.

Calatafimi Day One

Now we're in Calatafimi. Let me just say that no one tours Calatafimi unless you're interested in the Temple of Segeste. We had to tell the bus driver several times that we did, in fact, want to go to Calatafimi. We were on the side of the road frantically trying to open up the bus's storage bin while another bus driver tried to convince our driver not to pull away without us. The driver on the side of the road yelled at one point, "Push the button!" and then, "Pull!" We made it.

We were greeted by an old British man (Scottish, actually, whose dad grew up in India and Afghanistan) who led us to a dirty old car and said, "Here's the Rolls Royce. Sorry it's like Times Square here in town." As we were pulling up to the house, he said, "Now you're going to be met by four dogs barking violently, but they are in no way violent." As if on cue, two of the dogs were paw in paw, ferociously baring their teeth at one another. "Oh no! They won't hurt each other. This is just a supremacy fight. What a fine impression they've made!"

Angus is his name. He has what I like to call daily nuggets of wisdom. He asked Michelle and me how our Italian was, and unlike most people, he was using our answer as a frame of reference for the experience we've had in Italy so far. When we said that our Italian was poor, this was his reply: "The two best ways to learn Italian are food and lovers. You two evidently haven't been too hungry here nor have you had an Italian lover."

He told us that there are perks to living down a bumpy road. "Bad roads tend to be great for securing privacy." As he and his "lovey" of 45 years (WOOOOO!) were leaving for the night, however, he said, "And be sure to lock up because the entire town now knows you have arrived."

Angus loves his wine. After his wine at lunch, he leaned back in his chair and said to me, "You're very Irish." I asked if the red curly hair gave me away, and he said yes but that also my attitude toward life was Irish. I don't exactly know what that means, but he mentioned that he liked the Irish. He also likes the British and the Scots, so that doesn't tell anyone anything really.

Caterina is lower maintenance and lower in intensity than our last hostess, and Michelle and I already like her. She balances Angus's dry British humor quite well. She was born in Palermo, and many of her relatives live near Catalafimi. Not only is this great because we have a big family dinner with them this evening, but it's good because Angus and Caterina's olive harvest isn't good this year. In fact, no one has a lot of olives on their trees in this part of Sicily. But the good news is that, while we finished harvesting all the fruit in their grove today, we can spend the rest of our time here picking from Caterina's family's trees. (I wouldn't be surprised if the price of organic olive oil rises this year, especially since the organic farms in Tuscany didn't see their olive trees produce much fruit this year either.)

We currently have the large guest house to ourselves, although two other WWOOFers are joining us from Sweden and Great Britain on Saturday. We have the nicest shower we've had since coming to Italy. The house is decorated with years' worth of art from all over the world, and it's stunning. In the evenings before dinner, we will most likely continue listening to classical music with our hosts. They've already offered to let us use their car when we're free. This farming experience will be quite different from our last one, to say the least. I'll try to keep you posted on it!

Oh, and here's a gem from the evening!

The Australian

After Michelle and I had fought parking traffic all day in Positano and Amalfi, we finally sat down to a 4pm lunch (and cappuccino for me) at a cafe bar in Amalfi. This cafe also had wifi, which was key for us to get to our next place to stay for the night. We were planning on visiting the town's duomo, but after a lengthy conversation with an Italian man about the view from the cemetery (and whether or not we wanted him to take us there), we headed up the long staircase to the top of Amalfi's hill.

We had done hundreds of stairs that day, so we stopped as soon as we got high enough to see the sea over the town--better for sunset pictures. As we were taking in the view, a man coming down the staircase asked us to take his picture, which Michelle took. He was Australian, and his name was Marc (with a "c"). His camera was legit, and he was traveling around Europe for three weeks while on some paid leave that tenured teachers get in Aussie land.

The three of us chatted while he took sunset shots of Amalfi, spoke of how starved we were for fresh English conversation (He told us, "This is the longest conversation I've had with anyone for the past week."), and decided it only made sense that we eat dinner together. We learned a lot about our Australian friend at dinner. I'm talking a full-out sharing session. But hey, it's nice to know he felt comfortable around us. We heard about his childhood antics of ding-dong-ditch and "millennium trolley" (something about a padded shopping cart flying through a fence in the year 2000). We discussed his DJ-ing job and all the stereotypes that he breaks in that line of work. We talked about his Catholic upbringing and study abroad in Rome while at a Jesuit high school. We heard the more personal tales, too, like how he and his girlfriend ended it after five years (really disheartening). Then we got to the really important stuff like how Justin Timberlake is fantastic. Fantastic. Then we found out that it was his birthday the next day. And while Michelle loves birthdays so much that she has a special birthday hat at home, Marc hates celebrating birthdays and wouldn't even let us pay for his meal. And we spent a large part of our first conversation wondering what he was talking about. For instance:

"Do you put tomato (toe-MAH-toe) sauce on your chips?" "You mean, do we put ketchup on our fries?"
"How true do you find it to be that men go to bars looking for love making of the one-night variety?"
"Making out. Ha! We say 'sneaky pash.'" "How do you spell that?" "No one spells it; it's slang."
"What's your camera doing down there? Are you upskirting me?"
"The back of the car is the 'boot' and the front is called the 'bonnet.'"
"Your brands are Adidas (AH-dee-das) and Nike (like "Mike")."
"It looks like algae (al-ghee) on the rocks."

We took a stroll about the city at night and almost witnessed Michelle's death. Marc wanted to get some shots of the moon (Did I mention photography is his primary hobby?), and so we walked down the pier. A man in a blue windbreaker appeared to be sleeping against a fence while two men whispered nearby. Marc passed blue guy. I passed blue guy. While Michelle was passing blue guy, I heard the windbreaker rustle and turned to see blue guy sprinting toward Michelle. He passed her, grabbed a fishing pole, reeled in his line, unhooked a fish and threw it into a bag. It sat there wriggling in a plastic bag for a few minutes while we realized that Michelle was still alive. Scary. I haven't seen someone move that fast since I was on the dunes of Morocco.

Michelle and I had so much fun with this guy with no apparent agenda that we decided to drive five hours completely out of our way the next day to hang out with him in a city built into rocks. It's unlike us to go chasing a stranger across the country, but it really just came down to whether we wanted to see more of the same on the coast or do something new and fun with someone new and fun. Good news! It was ultimately a good decision, and we're getting postcard-worthy photos of the Amalfi Coast--as well as photos from many of Marc's travels--in our inbox sometime next week.


Matera is awesome. If you get a chance, I recommend it. We didn't get to see inside any of the house caves because Michelle and I had places to be that evening, but we hiked and saw some pretty cool formations. We definitely weren't dressed for hiking, however. We tripped and slipped often, but we so enjoyed our unexpected day! At one point we had a group hike going on with people from Finland and San Diego because of our welcoming Australian friend ("No one hates Australia," he told us when he met us.) On our drive onward that night, we were so grateful that God had given us an opportunity for a new adventure. Thanks for the invitation, Australian friend!

Check out some of these pictures of Matera: