Camping with the Boy Scouts

I don't know how many of you know this, but I am a Boy Scout.  Yes, this is Eleanor.  You see, the Scouts here have been coed for years-- only they never actually changed the name.  I'm in the group that's age sixteen to, well, whenever you quit, around twenty-one or so.
This weekend we had our first camping trip of the season!  Sunday was to be the opening of the new season (yes, at the end of October!), celebrated in a town 13 km away.  So of course, we were going to hike and camp the night out up there-- what else?
We started off by driving a little ways to the start of the hiking trail so that we wouldn't have to walk along the autostrada.  Then we hiked.  And hiked.  We clambered down dirt paths, skirted around freshly plowed  fields, skipped over rivulets, and a few of us slid down some of the hills on our bottoms (well, nearly) because of the mud.  Because, yes, it was the one rainy day of the month.  It actually started off beautifully, cool but warm enough that we were all sweating in our sky-blue shirts and navy-blue shorts as we made our way up the hills.  Every so often it would sprinkle just enough to cool us off.
Just as we were starting to pant a little, we came across a house with an apple tree next to the road.  The apples were the best I've ever tasted-- tiny (1 1/2" diameter) but crisp and flavorful.  After two or three each, we continued onward, after admiring the view of our starting point, now several mountaintops away.
Right around the time that we reached the paved road, it started to rain.  For real, this time.  At first I barely noticed it, but after a little while I tried to rub my hands together to warm them up, only to discover to my (rather numb) surprise that the were as wet as if I'd been running them under the faucet!  So I did the only thing that I could: shrugged and kept walking.
About twenty minutes after we started to feel sorry for ourselves (and three, four hours after we started the trek) we came to the church that was hosting the event.  And waited outside for ten minutes while they tried to figure out what to do with us.  Eventually we made our way to the other side of town (a sweet place, inhabitants numbering in the hundreds), where we found an empty yard in a neighborhood and a tiny church with "1495" inscribed above the door.  This would prove to be our home base.  We stomped the mud off of our shoes as best we were able, wiped off our hands on any dry surface we could find, and tramped inside.  Wearily, we plunked our backpacks down and dragged some of the pews over to make a semicircle.  Changed clothes.  Plotted.
I went out with a couple others to meet the Scouts who had opted not to walk but to drive up with the supplies for the celebration the next day, as well as the firewood.  Yes, we were in the middle of town, but what does that have to do with campfires?  We built one right across the road from the church later that night, although I did have to describe to them what s'mores are!
For dinner, we regrouped inside of the church, pulled out the gas stoves, and prepared whatever we had brought-- in this case, the girls had breaded chicken (fried in olive oil, of course, carried up in an old water bottle) and peas.  The boys ate spaghetti.
After setting up our tents in the field during a break in the rain, we said goodnight around midnight.  I actually slept really well, despite sitting up in the middle of the night and scaring my tentmate half to death.  In the morning, while we were fighting to pack up the tents in freezing, blow-you-over wind, the others were all sharing their horror stories of sleeplessness.  I just stifled a yawn and breathed on my hands.
As soon as the tents were put away, we made a dash for the church and started on breakfast-- coffee and cookies.  We jumped around a little to keep ourselves from freezing to death (the Scouts uniform requires shorts), cleaned up the chapel, and made our way back to the first church-- let the festivities begin!  But that's for my mother to share...
Eleanor

My Doily Stress...

I had my lacemaking class last Thursday.  I had already delayed said class by a week (making it three weeks from the previous lesson) because I "hadn't had time" to finish my homework.

The trouble was, I still hadn't finished the homework. Not even close. So Tuesday I sat down and worked on it all my free hours (and then some -- I sent someone else to shop for me).  Wednesday?  I don't remember what, but something came up.  Oh!  I know -- choir rehearsal.  So I was looking at pulling an all-nighter to finish my...doily.

Gulping, I finally faced up to my failures and called my teacher (Laura).  She gladly delayed the class one more day.  In the meantime, my eldest had baldly told me not to be ridiculous and get stressed about something so trivial.  Isn't she wise?

Here it is -- my 3 week and one day doily:

Isn't it pretty?  Laura had pity on me, though, and gave me a much smaller project for this week's assignment.  It involves a new stitch which is beautiful and pleasantly quick to complete.

Love,

Alexandra

And Again...

A few days ago, I went on another field trip. This time it was to Perugia (a full THIRTY minutes away!). It was with the language branch of the school. We went to a school theater and there was a man who did tours, helping people in German. He lives in New York City when he is not giving tours, and he spoke NO Italian. The course was OBVIOUSLY intended for younger children. Here are some links to some of the songs that we were supposed to dance to: Heidi Einstein, I'm Cool, Out of Time and Italians and Germans. Why we had to go to Perugia to see THAT, I don't know. But it got me off of a somewhat hard day at school...
Ciao,
Florence

Olives under pressure

 Today I had a mysterious caller whom I could not for the life of me understand.  He called back twice, and I pretended we were cut off because I was hoping it was a wrong number.  The same caller tried me a third time, and I finally figured out that it was Nonno Enrico!  For those of you who didn't follow our last adventures here, Nonno Enrico ("Grandpa Henry") is the man with the olive oil.

I had asked him last time I'd seen him to let me know when he'd be pressing his olives, because I wanted to see the mill and the process.  Today was a good day!

You understand that he speaks in a dialect, he's older, and it's really hard (for me) to speak Italian on the phone.  When I got off the phone, I wasn't really positive that I'd understood our transaction.  When I invited the children along, I presented it as follows:

I'm going on a field trip to see olives being pressed.

I don't know where the mill is.

I don't know how long it will take.

I don't know what's involved.

I don't even know for sure that I understood our conversation.

I only know that I'm meeting Nonno Enrico at 2:00 at his shop.

At which point, Florence chimed in brightly with, "You don't even know that!" With a laugh, I had to rephrase it as, "I only know that I'm going down to Nonno Enrico's shop at 2, and I might meet him there."

As luck would have it, I understood properly! And he was there! So we followed him down a road I'd not yet explored.  At the end of it was a metal shed; I parked where he gestured, and then walked around the shed to find Eleonora -- not my Eleanor, but the woman who works at the school supply store.  The folks at the school supply store and I are best buddies by now; that is to say, I have paid several months' worth of the electric bills, courtesy of school book lists.  And Eleonora has been very helpful the whole time, so it was a very pleasant surprise!

I wasn't sure what to expect, but I thought it would either be very high-tech or very ...ahem... rustic.  Let me tell you, they take their olives seriously here.  The process, while small scale, was pristine, finely controlled, and thoroughly delightful.

On the theory that a picture is worth a pile of description, I'll start my photo (and video) essay here, and will be quiet -- with the exception of explanatory captions.

Our welcoming sign

Nonno Enrico and his van

Olives!

Nonno Enrico and Jeremy feeling like strongmen.

Florence making them feel like weaklings.

Enrico's bin for this trip.

Bringing the olives to be weighed.

Olives on the scale

The scale and book.

The record book

First hopper! The rattle of olives was great.

Another view of the first hopper

I also have a video, but it's sideways (sorry):

A dead olive on the ground -- amazing how oily they really are!

This is a shaking conveyor belt that gets out the initial trash/sticks/leaves.

The leaves end up in the bin

Shaking olives

I have a video of them shaking:

Inside the production area (which is immaculate) -- first step: bathe the olives!

Conveyor belt feeding the olives to their bath.

Closeup of the belt.  The dams are made of wood...glued on?

Olives doing the backstroke

Olives swimming:

Out of the bath, into another hopper...which leads to the masher!

The masher.  The first chamber grinds the olives (unseen) and the bottom two  chambers mix the mush with water, where the mash is heated to 80 degrees Fahrenheit for an hour.  If you get close to the grille (below) the smell is rather pungent -- the aromatics are enough to give me an instant sinus headache.

The mixing chambers on video: 

The control panel ensuring the olives are kept at the right temperature.

The tag on the masher -- each person's olives are done separately.

Now the slurry is sent to the centrifuge (the first one), where the liquids and solids are separated. The machinery is made in Foligno, not far from Todi.

Jeremy and Florence inspecting the liquid coming off the first centrifuge.

Next centrifuge.  This separates the oil from the water.

A closer view of the second centrifuge.  Notice the higher spout on the right (oil) and the lower on the left (icky water and olive guck).

Liquid arriving from the first centrifuge.

Closeup of the liquid.  It really looks rather nasty.  The brown particles are olive guck.

This is the icky water...looks a wee bit worse than stagnant pond water.

Liquid emerging from the second centrifuge.  It really is a poison green -- quite astonishing.  The baffle further separates the oil from any remaining water.

Florence inspecting the oil.

Conveyor in the basement deposits the solids in a pitiful heap.

This regurgitated yuck is sent for hot-pressing and the subsequent poor-quality oil is used in processed foods (think crackers, "With Real Olive Oil!").

An amusing note -- amid all the rotating machinery & conveyor belts (not to mention forklifts!), the drink du jour in the break room is...wine.  One would think there had been miracles in this place: check out the water bottle -- you guessed it! There's wine in there, too!

There's the working fireplace in the corner.  When it gets colder, they'll do bruschetta with the fresh oil.  We've been invited back...Any bets on whether we'll go?

Jeremy, of course, found more machinery to inspect.  This is a seed distributor (and I don't know why I can't come up with the correct English word).

This is an amazing wooden seed sorter which is still used today.  It's spectacular.

Love,

Alexandra

Eurochocolate 2012!

Good news! You get lots of pictures today because we went to the Eurochocolate festival in Perugia.

The Eurochocolate festival is a commercial event to...sell you chocolate! But it is also a great excuse to visit a nearby city and an opportunity to see more chocolate varieties, vendors, and merchandise than you would ever see in a lifetime otherwise.

We traveled to Perugia by train. Here is our beautiful family in transit:













The scenery was like this until we got close to the city:




And then we were there and it was packed! The festival occupies several streets in the center of Perugia, probably two miles in total. This was the crowd on Corso Vannucci, looking towards Piazza IV Novembre:




And looking the other way down the street:




This festival is two weekends and so crowded that it is hard to walk around. Do you think people like chocolate?

Speaking of chocolate, I took those pictures standing next to a chocolate carving stand. Start with a big block of chocolate and start carving away with mallet and chisel:










If it works in the blog you can even see them in action:

This guy looked tired:




Now, carving chocolate creates chocolate shavings, chips, and dust. A lot of it:




So much that they put it up it in bags...




And give it away:




That was not the only chocolate sculpture. The tool in this sculptor's hand is a saw:




The inspiration for this one is in the foreground:




Perugia is another of those cities blessed with a long history. We peeked into the ground floor of a museum near that first chocolate sculpture. The building itself probably dates back to the Renaissance. We thought it was very cute that the original guard room still being used for that same purpose (those are security camera monitors):




Piazza IV Novembre is the center of historic Perugia, and is dominated by the cathedral:







An interesting thing about this cathedral is that it has an outward facing pulpit and crucifix, presumably for those events where only the piazza can hold the crowds:




From the steps you could see the crowds stretching into the distance:




But back to chocolate. Recognize these bears?




James loaded up on those bears. Here is what he scored for 4 Euro:




All the European brand names have to be there:




With lots and lots and lots of chocolate:



















Yes, that last one is a chocolate kebab. I really could not do the variety justice with a few pictures. There were hundreds of vendors from all the European brands to unknown artisan chocolatiers. Block after city block of chocolate.

Italians love chocolate, in everything from breakfast cereal (they use chocolate like Americans use raisins) to coffee. And they get imaginative with it. Some of the things I found in chocolate today: hazelnuts, pecans, pistachios, salt, red pepper, lavender, rose petals, orange peels, lemon, strawberries, raspberries, coffee beans, cocoa nibs, candied fruits, gummy candies, cherries, blackberries, rice, wheat, faro, and "semi di canapa". After some searching for someone who knew the translation we established that those were cannabis seeds.

What wasn't there? American chocolate. I don't imagine Italians think much of Hershey's, but I know that M&Ms are an exotic imported treat.

Of course, not everyone wanted just chocolate. Here are some children you know returning from a side trip to buy sugar sweets:













Florence has one made to look like a fried egg. I assume it didn't taste like one:



Even the end of the outing turned out to be a very successful. Not only did we make it to the train station in time, not only did the anticipated train actually run, but there was even a city bus waiting in Ponto Rio for the trip up the hill to Todi. We didn't have to take two trips in Alexandra's little Fiat 500. Best of all was my wife's brilliance: she had bus tickets in reserve in her purse, ready for just such an event.

Michael