There have also been a few things
happening around the city of Bologna that are worth mentioning, if only to give
you a better idea of my home.
Sometime
in February, there was a massive
concert celebrating a recently-deceased Italian singer Lucio Dalla at which
many other semi-famous Italian singers came and sang the artist’s original
songs in order to honor his memory. I didn’t realize how big of a deal it was
until Viola, Sami and I made our way to the city center and we discovered that
the entire city of Bologna was crammed into Piazza
Maggiore and the surrounding streets. The concert itself was just in front
of the Neptune statue in the piazza, but people were milling about the streets
as far back as the two towers. The music was being projected on speakers
everywhere and there were multiple screens showing what was happening on the
main stage. It was, essentially, one big city-wide party. There is no
open-container law in Italy, so everyone was drinking and toasting one another
in the streets. People had climbed on top of dumpsters and newspaper stands
(which are fairly tall) and were sitting on them, swaying back and forth while
singing, their arms wrapped around each other’s shoulders. It was an odd
combination of students and the elderly and middle-aged adults and families
with small children. The closer we got to the stage, the more people there
were, but Viola seemed determined to drag us right to the front. We ended up
stepping on a lot of people’s toes (literally and figuratively) and only
managed not to lose each other by holding hands and forming a human chain the
entire way. There was one particularly amusing moment in the throngs of the
crowd in which a grungy old homeless man got his daily thrill when pinching me
from behind, but he was not prepared for the furious glare and violent “HEY!”
that came his way afterwards and he quickly pushed his way through the people
to get away from me. The concert overall was really fun, but we couldn’t find
Marta anywhere (we had originally said that we would meet her there) and
eventually we gave up trying to push to the front of the crowd and snagged some
gelato before heading back to Forni.
Incredibly squished!
Climbing for a better view
Something
interesting that has been occurring in Piazza
Maggiore on a regular basis: every week or so, a man wearing that infamous
mask from the movie V for Vendetta
comes into the piazza with two short step-stools. He then sets them opposite of
each other with a good amount of space in between the two and encourages random
passersby to join him in discussion. A circle forms around the stools and
citizens of Bologna take turns standing up on the stools to express their
opinions on politics, religion, social issues, etc. The masked man serves as a
sort of mediator of discussion, often jumping up on the stool himself and
telling everyone what he thinks. This is just one of the many examples of
Bologna’s revolutionary leanings…although this is mild in comparison to what
the city looked like in the 70’s (the Italian government had to send in army
tanks to stop a student revolution) I still find it so interesting. Just like the concert, this crowd also has a mixed
combination of the elderly, businessmen, grungy students, and respectable
ladies in high heels and Prada purses. I love that Italians are so interested
in discussing issues that we, as Americans, sometimes shy away from. It is well-known
that bringing up politics at family reunions is taboo back in the States,
whereas here, your personal political leanings are discussed every day in the
bars, the classrooms, the gelateria’s,
the city piazza’s. Although Italy’s current political situation is not the
strongest, its citizens at least seem somewhat more educated on the issues than
the general American population is. And if they’re not actually as educated as
I think they are…well, at least they’re talking
about the issues openly.
Piazza Verdi is also an essential component
of the heart and soul of Bologna mainly because it is the center of activity
for students. This piazza is cut through by Via
Zamboni, the street with the most UNIBO buildings, and it is just a
one-minute walk from ECCO’s office. At UMW we have Ball Circle or Seaco…UNIBO
students have Piazza Verdi. At any
time during the day, you can find university students there, talking or
drinking or eating or all of the above. It is a central location for graduation
celebrations (la laurea) in which
students wear this Greek/Roman laurel of leaves (I should probably just say
Roman, but I always think of the Greeks first) about their heads as opposed to
the voluminous folds of our own American cap and gown. The outfits that
accompany these laurels vary from nice, classy dresses to out-of-control
inflatable pig suits. People gather around the recent graduate, holding them up
on their shoulders, singing songs that I still don’t understand or occasionally
throwing eggs at the graduates or running through the streets playing music and
yelling. Italian universities don’t seem to have any specific, set graduation
days like we do. They have many of them that happen throughout each semester,
which are entirely dependent on when the students themselves finish with all of
their courses. I don’t understand it completely, but it’s always fun to watch.
Piazza Verdi has also become even more
popular in the warmer months. On the weekends, the piazza was always popular
late at night, but the biting, cold winter nights did not encourage people to
stay out there that long, no matter how warm that wine made you. But recently,
the weather in Bologna has—miraculously—taken a turn for the better. As a
result, Piazza Verdi has become one
of the most social spots of the city at night. Even on weeknights, you can find
hundreds of students sitting out on the ground in the piazza, talking and
drinking the night away. It is so much fun.
I am loving Bologna’s new spring weather; it’s as if the entire city has come
alive.
And
finally, my own little claim to fame: in March, Bologna celebrated la Festa della Donne…International
Women’s Day. Apparently this is a worldwide phenomenon, but of course America
barely celebrates it. Italy, however, is very eager to sell little, puffy
mimosa flowers to everyone for you to give to other women on every street
corner at long tables filled with pollen and yellow buds. The money goes
towards helping women shelters and abuse prevention centers. Rebecca, Lydia and
I knew little about the celebration, but we decided to buy each other flowers
anyways while in Piazza Maggiore.
Just our luck: this was the moment in which a news crew came up to the table
and asked us rapidly in Italian if we had a few moments to talk about our
opinions on la Festa delle Donne.
Flustered more by the huge camera and microphone in our faces than the prospect
of speaking Italian, we stuttered nervously long enough for the men to realize
that we were not, in fact, Italian and I heard the interviewer mutter rather
critically under his breath: stranieri.
Foreigners.
I
tend to get a little offended when Italians think I’m stupid just because I am
not a native speaker, so I then informed the man that regardless of being stranieri, we could still understand
him. I suppose he thought this snippy response was an invitation for an
interview, because he promptly swung the microphone back into my face and began
asking me questions on the festa:
what did the celebration mean to us? What did we think it meant? As foreigners,
what were our opinions of the celebration so far? And most importantly, why did
you buy yourselves flowers? Shouldn’t a man buy them for you?
“I
do not have a need of a man to have flowers,” Lydia jumped in suddenly in
Italian at this point of the interview, her justified women’s-power ideals
surpassing any nerves she had about speaking in an Italian television interview.
“When I can buy flowers for me. And for friends.” Our Italian didn’t flow
perfectly, but we got the idea across: America may not celebrate International
Women’s Day very extensively, but we certainly didn’t need to celebrate it with
men by our side, as is often an Italian cultural understanding (please don’t
get me started on gender inequality here. Because it’s everywhere).
I
honestly forgot about the interview. I don’t have a tv in my apartment and I
didn’t think to look for the interview on the internet. Then, a few weeks ago,
I was walking with my elementary class down the stairs as the final bell rang
and we were heading towards the door to the outer courtyard where anxious
parents wait for their children to emerge, with the same level of reaction upon
seeing them that you typically see at an airport arrivals gate. One of the
little girls (her name is Karina) tugged on my sleeve and informed me that she
had seen me on the news, on tv. At first, I was really confused, as the memory
of the interview had completely slipped my mind. Karina reminded me with, “You
had flowers for the Festa delle Donne
and I saw you on the tv! I showed you to my mom!”
Breaking
news folks: I am a celebrity on Bologna’s local news channel. I’ll be sending
you all autographs as soon as I can get my agent to organize everything.
