OHANA means FAMILY....
and FAMILY means no one gets left behind or forgotten..
Lilo &Stich
Hey people!
How are you? I know it's been a while since my last post, I'm sorry...I've just been crazy busy with life, you know.
I had an exam session in the middle of March and then it was Easter, with all the family things to do, and then classes started again (yeeey...) so, yeah, no much free time lately.
Anyway, after a very loooong winter, it seems like spring is actually arriving! I really hope so, because I love seeing the nature starting to grow again: all the green little leaves, all the amazing and colorful flowers...They kind of grow everywere, so it looks a bit like your town is been taken over by nature...and that's great!
So, other than enjoying the weather, I've also really enjoyed celebrating Easter this year.
In Italy every festivity is not only a religious or a 'national' festivity, it's also an excuse to spend some time with your family. Indeed, even if you're not very religious (as my family and I), there are still a lot of traditions that the family follows every year during the festivity.
We all meet for lunch. And whith all, I mean EVERYONE: my close family (mom, dad, my sister and I), my cousins' family (my aunt, my uncle, my consins), my other cousin's family (my aunt, my uncle, if he's not working, and my little cousin), my aunt Anna and my grandparents (all four of them). Then, sometimes, there are also my cousins's grandmother and other relatives. So yeah, a big family reunion. (and we don't even have such a big family, some people, especially in the South of Italy, have much bigger families because they keep in touch with all the cousins and relatives they have).
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| My FAMILY!! |
Anyway, where was I? Oh, right, the luch. Ok, so forget any possible idea you can have of lunch (if you're not italian of course), and try to imagine this: we arrive at the place of the lunch (usually held in the biggest house, in my case, my cousins's house) at about noon, bringing a dish that we cooked the day before (or in the morning), but not any dish, the dish that we agreed we would make. I
explain my self better, this lunches are pretty important, so they require a lot of organization and usually the different courses are so many that the 'cooking work' as to be divided among the different relatives (even if my aunt Anna and my grandma usually do more than the others, they just really love cooking).
So we get there with our dish and we start chatting with everyone (we haven't seen each other in a while, especially me, since I stay in Venice most of the time now) and at the same time we help whoever needs help ahah. And then, finally, it's lunch time!!
We sit down at the huge table at the centre of the room (it's probably 1.00 or 1.30 p.m. by now) and we start the lunch. In my family we usually don't have appetizers, but we have a couple of first course (different types of pasta, like lasagne, ravioli,ect.), then the second course, for Easter usually lamb and vegetables, and then deserts and fruits, after this for the adults there is cofee and grappa.
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| Ravioli: some with butter and some with meatsauce (ragù) |
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| Lasagne |
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| Lamb (second course) |
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| Vegetables: peppers, eggplants, zucchini |
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| Deserts! Tiramisù, pastiera (Easter cake) and others |
The thing is, between one course and the other a lot of time goes by, so that we can chat, take family pictures,....start digesting the food ahaha. So, yeah it usually lasts until 4.00/4.30 pm, then the granparents and the little cousins usually go home (they are pretty tired by now) and the rest starts cleaning and putting things back into place. Then we go for a walk or we watch a movie together.
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| Giulia (cousin), Eleonora (sister), me, Marco (cousin) at the beach for a walk, after the Easter lunch |
It's a really magical day that you get to spend with your family. And this year, I can say that I felt all the magic. It had been a while since I had last seen most of my relatives and I didn't realize just how much I missed them. It was great seeing all of them and getting to spend some time with them too. So, yeah, it truly was a very good day, one of those that I will remember looking back and I'll never be grateful enough for the amazing family that I have: they are always so supportive and ready to help.
Remeber they are the ones that will always be there for you, no matter what, so be nice with them, even if you don't always get along, because they all love you.
This was a bit different than my usual post, but I just wanted to share this with you,
hope you liked it,
Thanks for reading,
Love, Fennec Fox
