Medieval Festival at Volterra, Tuscany

It is Sunday 28^th August 2011. Two family friends, my wife and me, are holidaying at Podera S. Barbara, in the tranquil montagna area a few kilometres to the west of Siena, near Simignano, a small hamlet over the hill from Ancaiano, Sovicille, Toscana. Incidentally, Simignano was to be the site for the city that now is Siena, however lack of a suitable water supply changed all that. Anyway, be that as it may, we are off to visit Volterra and enjoy the annual medieval festival that commemorates what the city may have looked like in AD 1398. The journey takes us many miles along a torturous winding road. We are in Italy. We are not alone, Volterra is thronging with people. The festival is obviously an important and popular day for local people and tourists alike. We get our bearings then pay our nine euros entrance fee. Once behind the barriers we encounter AD 1398. As we wander the alleyways and squares our heads spin back and forward trying to catch sight of passing peasants, noblemen and their ladies, all bedecked in realistic looking medieval costume. Bill informed us that we could hire a costume ourselves. We decided not, maybe next time.

Having spent many years working in and with communities back home we were impressed by the commitment of the local people and we assumed, the local authority, or the Volterra equivalent, to make the festival a success. A success it surely was. We are not convinced we would find the same commitment and organisation back home. The place is buzzing with community pride.

We spent some time watching the flag waving, or is it throwing, competition. We understood that this involved groups representing the contrada's of Volterra. A contrada being a community or area within a city. The Palio in Siena involves that city's contradas competing in a horse race. Volterra uses flag throwing. Maybe we have that wrong, it is our best guess. Anyway, it was very entertaining and we were really impressed by the skills displayed.

The streets were full of stalls, where various craftspersons demonstrated their skills and sold their produce and crafts. Probably more interesting to our group were the many food stalls. Mouth watering smells and sights. There were many cheese stalls, mostly varieties of that local delicacy, pecorino. Wonderful. There was a bread stuffed with, to the best of my knowledge, ricotta. I think they said it was called necci, or was that a pasta, not sure. Whatever they call it, I couldn't get enough of it. There were stalls with focaccine and others with medieval sweet treats. No idea what they were called but tasty nonetheless. At one stall I asked if the dark bits in a pastry type knob were chocolate chips. Even the stall holder’s limited English was enough to scold my ignorance. Seems chocolate was not a delicacy in 1398, not by a long shot. My abiding memory will be the smells of cheese and meats roasting.

There were jugglers, costumed people on long stilts, people being dragged through the streets and placed in stocks by a gang of rough looking males carrying a variety of weapons, including fearsome axes and whips. Many of the men wore multi-coloured tights, maybe we should just have hired the gear.

In one square they had a medieval version of line dancing, or perhaps highland dancing, complete with a caller to make sure the participants had some notion of what to do. I recall lots of sinistra, destra and centro instructions being issued, followed by lots of people bouncing first one way then the other. All to lute and flute music. Looked like great fun.

In short, there was never a dull moment, the place was alive from morning until dark. It was a wonderful day and to be recommended.

Another feature; at no time during a long day did I see one drunk person nor anything that even remotely looked threatening. I honestly can say, with some experience, one would struggle to attend such a large, well attended event in the UK, there were thousands there, without some incident to spoil it. In addition I can only recall seeing six police officers all day and they looked pretty laid back. They were toting firearms.

Then off we went back along the twisty, turny road. We stopped in the delightful village of Pieve a Scuola where we sat outside and sampled some local vino rossi and chatted with some local people. They suggested we visit there on the forthcoming Friday evening as it was the start of their annual mushroom festival. Put that in your diary and make sure you call in if in the area.

All in all a very successful day. When next in Toscana give Volterra a whirl, you will enjoy it.

To finish our day we sat in the garden of Pod. S Barbara, listened to crickets, quaffed vino rossi and gazed at the setting sun. Blissful.

To Cook a Roast, or Not

This is a true story, a touching tale of friendship. I have not used real names and I have related the telephone conversation just as it sounded and have not 'translated' it into BBC English.

Peter, Jake and Hughie reside in an area of North Lanarkshire, famous for an alcoholic beverage brewed by Monks in a quite corner of England. The brewers of this dark enticing liquid seem oblivious to it's effect on some of the young and not so young people of this quaint corner of North Lanarkshire. Our trio are connoisseurs of this drink. An expertise gained over many years of experimentation, coupled with a lot of trial and error. Certainly a lot of trials. They are particularly fond of the Monks Brew, not to mention the equally famous, 'Purple Tinnies' supplemented by a large cocktail of other supporting substances, few, if any, legal. This modern tale has a European twist. While Jake and Hughie are home grown, never having ventured too far from the safe haven of their childhood, apart from the occasional train adventure to Glasgow, via Whifflet, that world famous transport hub. Peter on the other hand is an alcoholic from Northern Europe. Our trio brave demonstrate what the European Union had in mind when first conceived. Citizens bonding across boundaries.

To our heart warming tale about team spirit and friendship in this 'dog eat dog' world. Circumstances conspired to split up our trio, our 'three musketeers'. Jake was put on a detoxification programme and to give him a glimmer of a chance, those in power separated him, using family support, from his erstwhile substance sharing partners. So now Jake is lodged with a caring relative in a strange town on the other side of Glasgow. Jake is effectively, to use his own words, 'Gulaged'. Undaunted and not to be outdone our 'trio brave', have technology on their side and several times each day they engage in a mobile telephone conference. They are finding the estrangement hard to take and need to keep in regular contact, particularly with a view to keep Jake 'up to speed', pardon the pun, with 'what's going down', reassuring him that their supply of substances remains intact and urging him not to worry, when he gets back things will be fine. These conversations always start, no matter who calls who, with that quaint old Scottish greeting, 'whits happenin' man'. One assumes learned at Primary School when engaged in a Burns Poetry competition.

One particularly touching call, overheard by Jake's supportive relative, goes along these lines:

Hughie, ' Jake! Peter an I tanned the wee grocer's shop last night and got two crates o' 'Purple Tinnies', fucking magic man. It's a shame yur no here. '

Jake, 'Yis did nut?'

Hughie, 'Fuckin' right we did.”

Jake, 'That's brilliant.'

Hughie, ' That's no aw man. We got a roast an aw'.

Jake, 'Brilliant man, brilliant'.

Hughie, 'We don't know whit tae dae wae it. Like how long dae we cook it fur.'

Jake, 'How fuckin big is it man?'

Hughie, 'Naw, it fits in the oven aw right.'

Jake, 'Naw, a mean, whit dis it weigh.'

Hughie, 'Fucked if a know, ma scales ur too wee.'

Jake, (after seeking advice and guidance from his caring relative) ' Ah think ye should gie it aboot forty five minutes or mibae an oor, am no that sure man, a've never done it afore.'

Hughie, 'Whit gas mark?'

Jake, 'Hus Peter no cooked a roast before?'

Hughie, (after a pause) 'Naw he's no goat a scoobie either. (then after another pause) Fuck it man, we'll jist cut it intae wee slices and fry it. We kin hae it wi some breed. Thanks fur yer help man, we wish ye wur here.'

Two days later Jake moved back to rejoin his friends. It is not clear at this early stage how his detoxification is progressing. Perhaps his cooking skills will relegate his substance use problems to 'the least of his worries'.