Night life is the right life

For a small town without much tourist business, Fidenza seems to have a lot going on. Here are a few of the local events we've attended lately or at least walked by.

Beach volley
A couple weekends ago a big fenced-in patch of sand appeared in the middle of the main square. The town was putting on a tournament of "beach volley," which is what Italians call beach volleyball. I'm not sure they even play regular volleyball, but "beach volley" is a thing.

The team with the colored arm sleeves was sponsored by a local sporting-goods store.

Last year when we visited our friends down south, Fernando, who is a fireman by profession, was telling us that he'd been working seven days a week helping out after a big earthquake in a town not far from their village, Montagano. And the next week he was heading to Sweden. I asked if he was doing earthquake relief in Sweden. (Do they have earthquakes there?) His wife guffawed--he and the rest of the local fire department team were traveling to Oslo to play in a "beach volley" tournament. 

I have to say that the level of play in Fidenza was not terribly high, and there wasn't much of a crowd. Apparently "beach volley" is not a big deal here, at least not yet.

Basketball 
After a few days of beach volley the sand disappeared, replaced with a big blue plastic basketball court. Pallacanestro (literally "ball basket") is really popular in Italy these days; after decades of watching people move balls around with only their feet, it must be thrilling to see them passing, dribbling, and shooting with their hands.

I was alerted to the start of play one evening when vintage pop music began blaring from the piazza, followed by highly amplified voices that even a non-Italian speaker could have identified as excited sports commentary.

I am not a sports fan, but I loved hearing the announcer yell "Gran canestro!" and "Un blocco irregolare!" as the players rocketed back and forth across the court and the crowd whooped and cheered.

Like the beach volley teams, the basketball players included both men and women, although the beach-volley gender ratio skewed female and basketball the other way. (I wondered if there was a diversity requirement--in several basketball match-ups both sides seemed to have one rather short woman and lots of tall men.) And as with beach volley, the basketball players were amateurs, sponsored by local businesses. But the hoopsters were a bit more adept and certainly their audience was bigger and more engaged.

The games continued every evening for two weeks. I felt sorry for the folks who live on the piazza, because the blaring loudspeakers were aimed right at their windows, and the action went on every night till 11:30 or 12. We are about a block away and I was grateful our bedroom is on the back of the apartment.

Cooking contest
One night when I went out to get a gelato and watch some basketball I discovered that the other side of the piazza had become the stage for a cooking contest.

In front of the town hall, bleachers had been set up. They looked out over four or five camp kitchens that faced a long table: the judges. Two or three people in white paper toques were working away at each of the little kitchens, and every so often one team or the other would present a dish to the judges and then the young woman who was acting as master of ceremonies would read off the numbers on the Olympic-style cards the judges held up, rating each dish's presentation, technique, and taste. ("Sette, otto, sette, nove...")

I suffer daily frustration here because I am always missing the point of stories and being baffled by what people are saying. But rarely am I as frustrated as I was that evening. The mistress of ceremonies chattered away, the contestants and judges and members of the audience were all talking a mile a minute, but I couldn't understand anything about who these cooks were and what they were making. Nor was I able to find any mention of this event afterward on the town's web site or in the Parma newspaper. I guess it will forever remain a mystery.

La Corrida
One evening when it was still light and basketball wasn't yet underway, Danny and I noticed that a talent contest seemed to be underway. Some kind of dinner had been held in front of the town hall, and now a noisy MC was bringing a series of performers up to a little stage to perform for the assembled diners. One older man gave a slightly out-of-tune but throbbingly emotional performance of a ballad on the theme of love's grandeur and another read a poem that was, I think, about military veterans. A young lady warbled a more up-to-date love song, and then another older fellow gave a halting performance of yet another tune. All four were obviously amateurs, and when they were done the crowd at the tables was urged to determine the winner by their applause. (The first singer was the clear winner, and he was indeed the last weak of the four.)

As best I can remember, this was the winning performance.

I couldn't understand why a banner emblazoned "La Corrida" (The Bullfight) was hanging above these goings-on, since it didn't seem to have anything to do with bulls. (In the photo it's the smaller banner; the larger one above is an Amnesty International protest of the murder of Giulio Regeni, an Italian who was apparently tortured and murdered by the Egyptian authorities in 2016.)

Later I learned that the event in Fidenza was evidently a salute to a popular TV show called (in Italian) "The Bullfight--Amateurs in Jeopardy." (I hope this link works back in the U.S.) It's a bit like the old "Gong Show," with various peculiar individuals displaying their talents or lack thereof and the audience weighing in with applause if they like the performance and with noisemakers when they don't. It seems pretty horrifying.

Here again there didn't seem to be any information I could lay hands on afterward about who'd put this event on and who the competitors were. An awful lot here seems to be communicated by word of mouth, and I'm not in the loop. 

Festa medievale
Not everything happens in the Piazza Garibaldi. Earlier this month Pam mentioned that her choir would be singing one Sunday at a little church on the outskirts of town, and then we saw posters about a "Medieval Festival" and realized her choir was part of the festivities, which also included servings of tortelli and other delicacies made by a squad of church ladies. We couldn't stay away.

We walked out to the church along the path of the Via Francigena, a pilgrimage route that runs from London's Canterbury Cathedral to Rome and that dates back more than a thousand years. The tiny church on whose grounds the festival was held is surrounded by fields of hay and alleys of mulberry trees (silkworms were once cultivated here).

Pam's choir sang a short program of plainchant and sacred songs, accompanied by recorder and lute. For the livelier numbers Pam played the tambour. 

The little church is named after Thomas a Beckett who, as Archbishop of Canterbury, fought to maintain the church's power against that of King Henry 11. When Beckett took the Via Francigena to Rome--perhaps to report on King Henry's misdeeds--he is said to have stopped by this church along the way.

In 1170 the king had the "turbulent priest" murdered. Not long afterward Beckett was named a Catholic saint, and the church was named Chiesa di San Tommaso Becket in his honor.

The festa is an annual fundraiser for the little church and drew an enthusiastic crowd.

Indeed, their enthusiasm was so great that it was almost impossible to hear the second half of the choir program, a set of "tavern songs" performed on the church steps. Italians eating, drinking, and socializing create a mighty roar.

Youngsters in medieval costumes ferried pasta, grilled boar, wine, beer, and other comestibles to the mob of diners, including us. We opted for cheese tortelli, pisarei (a dish of pasta dumplings and beans), and spalla cotta, a local specialty reminiscent of corned beef.

The food was terrific, as expected. The church ladies knew what they were doing. But Pam and Romano wanted to go back to Fidenza proper for a post-performance drink, so I didn't stick around to take pictures of the medieval entertainment. A fire-eater and a snake charmer were promised on the poster, but I didn't see any sign of them. This youngster in knightly garb was the only image I managed to capture before we went off to drink spritzes in the piazza.

The festa was a big success. But tragically, the person taking the proceeds to the bank was reportedly mugged en route and all the money was stolen. This was a shocking development in a town that seems to have very little crime and so much civic spirit. Here again I haven't been able to find any news about when or how this happened, whether the crime has been solved, or how the church is going to recoup. 

Clearly Fidenza needs its own hometown paper. Maybe when my Italian gets a bit stronger...