tonight...

I didn't really want the evening to end. To celebrate a house purchase, a birthday, and a permesso di soggiorno, there was a street dinner. (No, not all of them mine!)

Not my street, but the street where I first lived in Caprile. It is still my street too. This is where I know everybody's names, where I too can use Caprile telephone, leaning out the window and calling to a neighbour. Sono molto contenta!

Picture this: an ancient village street, foot traffic only. For a party, you simply move the tables out into the street. And the BBQ. Then you knock a few nails into the mortar and hang a few lights. One of the plugs is used for a hairdrier which blows on the embers and gets things happening faster.

Food appears out of three houses. Some of us come from a little further afield.

Conversation is mixed; food, art, photography, weddings, and an intensive perusal of a volume of "Share Your Tears" which has been produced by a friend who borrowed it yesterday. The artist gets a nod of approval from two very learned and severe critics.

Conversation is mainly about the excess of food. We are struggling. I am enjoying my first BBQ in Italy. The stayers move on to the more potent stuff. I mentally review what I wrote yesterday. The little plastic tumblers are tiny. Noone drinks to excess.

Someone calls for speeches. I pursuade my host that at this point we should be dancing on the table tops. We stand on the bench seat, conscious that it is a plastic table under the cloth. He says a few words about being a part of the community. He and I are the two most recent arrivals.

There are calls for a haka. I protest that I cannot perform this, being female. One of the guests affirms this and relates the uproar over the car advertisement here which has women doing the haka. It was withdrawn after protest from New Zealand but occasionally it sneaks back onto the screen. The women here love it. The Maori haka sells cars to Italian women. The world has shrunk, and gone slightly mad at the same time.

It is after midnight. It has been a very good day. Buonanotte a tutti. Photos very soon.