I think I’ve written about crime in Italy before but I read the papers a lot to see what’s going and crime is always right there. Today there are two articles of thieves right next to each other that take the cake, so to speak. One article shames the scum that had the nerve to steal a Madonna statue from a cemetery tombstone. True these thieves are lowlifes as described by the article. On the other side was a band of thieves that stole, can you believe this, 200 cubic meters of olive oil. They went into a plant at night evidently with their own tanker truck and made out with 60,000 euros worth of olive oil. What the ___? Who __? I don’t understand and I guess I will never.
Also in the news, Sant’ Antonio Abate and fires again. It seems Novoli jumps the gun as January 17th is Antonio’s official day (check your Italian calendars). Last night while I was in the gym there were more fires in honor of this saint. It seems smaller communities (with more farmers) are more connected to this saint because after all he was the saint for animals and those people that work the fields relied on their animals in the past. I’m trying to make sense of the article. It seems the fire portion of the celebration is for the soul as well as for Sant Antonio. It makes some mention “to warm and light the way for souls in the middle of the cold dark winter” (the fire in Brindisi was held in Piazza Anime or Soul Piazza? literally) but why now? I’m not sure.
Also for another proseptive on Novoli and Brindisi for that matter check another American in Brindisi....
Brindisi Travel Blog
2 comments:
Hi Jeff,
I like the missing olive oil story -- truly Italian! Being from the city (Rome) I don't know much about S.Antonio but it is true that down South saints in general play a larger role in everyday life.
This way off the topic but THE COLTS ARE GOING TO THE SUPER BOWL! I am not a big sports fan, but this is huge! Don't ya just wish you were Indy right about now? I sure do!
Cyn
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