Ideas for a winter holiday season (2) : what to do in Bologna

5^th January. Michelle and I went to see Moonrise kingdom by Wes Anderson at a cinema house. Beautiful film: lyrical and melancholic, about the power of commitment and love. With Bill Murray, Bruce Willis and Edward Norton in unexpected grotesques roles. Indeed worth seeing.

Their faces speak for themselves, but the film is not just ironic,
there is a red tragedy thread about feelings and human relationships
in nowadays America.

Then we took two flutes of dessert passito wine in a delightful tavern called Rovescio (inside out) in via Pietralata 75, which I will describe soon since it is one of my favorite taverns!

Stylish, rustic at the same time, elegant wines, and an
exceptional chef Raffaele Fierro:
http://www.rovescio.it/

6^th January: Epiphany in a Joyce’s sense. I cannot describe my emotions about this days, cause I wish to keep them locked inside me, privately in gentle custody so to say, yet I have the chance to offer a short sketch of what happened!

The sense of Epiphany is to find something or someone, partially knowing what
you are going to face, partially abandoning your intelligence to something
irrational as marvel.

Michelle and I went to Cesenatico, a fair sea-town on the Adriatic sea. We desired to walk along the shore with the low-tide. We came across a wonderful and luminous nativity scene on the very canal, built up on a project by Leonardo da Vinci. 

The nativity scene took place on the boats! The water reflexion in darkness
was particularly fascinating.

At a local festivity market, I also bought a tunisian tajine (whose virtues I will soon retell!) and finally we had a nutritious snack, based on piadina crescione or cassone, a typical local dish, which might remind the attentive eater to an Irish potato bread combined to a Greek pita (piadina – pizza – pita indeed share the same semantic root). 

Sectioned crescione: yummy! Below the recipe, offered by the wise-ful
Giallo Zafferano!

7^th January. Michelle and I had a tête-à-tête breakfast in a modern café, called Travel caffé located in via Arcoveggio 74. Having breakfast with Michelle is like picking up again and again the first apple with no fear of a divine chastisement. There the bartender, Luigi, a friend, does one of the best coffees in Bologna. He once was a baker so his croissants as well are really special. Two days after I ate there again six pizzette…the corresponding amount of calories would have probably killed a polar bear and took a macchiato. 

"One pulls another" (una tira l'altra) says an idiomatic italian expression,
meaning that you cannot restrain from scarfing down them all.

I favourably remember that day, since Michelle came back for lunch after work and it is a joy when imagination and Reality merge together.

A true macchiato at Travel caffè, one of those moments during which
you regret the Spanish Armada didn't break through the English lines!
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Travel-Caffè-Bologna/130842420303995

8^th January. I had a long and profound conversation with Lord Ricard, blogger of Vox Clamantis in deserto - RQ. Afterwords, Claudette and Fabiao joined me for lunch: two amazing friends brought ashore like bottle messages by a glorious Erasmus in Edinburgh, some years ago. We had a range of antipasti followed by linguine with home made pesto (which came directly from last summer garden-harvest), then a splendid chicken with vegetables in the Tunisian tajine, and finally an angel food cake. We were able to survive only because of the excellent Nero d’Avola from the sun-drenched provinces of Oriental Sicily and a Dolcetto d'Alba from the Langhe Region, in Piemonte, at the borders with sweet France.

This mysterious terracotta object provides a phenomenal alternative to pan-preparation.

During the evening, instead, I attended dinner again at the Rovescio tavern with twelve friends (equally distributed between female and male friends) and luckily enough we were not thirteen. No one actually wishes to be appointed as the Messiah:

The last supper by Valentin de Boulogne, 1625-1626,
Rome, National Art Gallery (Museo Corsini).

9^th January. I had a long phone conversation with Katie, otherwise called the hummingbird. Michelle came back again for lunch! During the afternoon, I went out with Christine for a green tea with wild roses at Il mondo di Eutèpia, a terrible name for a outstanding tea house in via Testoni 5/d. Eutèpia derives from Eu + tòpos (good place), so in itself is a pretty welcoming name, but the oddity of Ancient Greek makes this threshold a bit awkward to decipher. 

The evening instead was embellished by an experiment: three couples and the Beermisù, a version of Tiramisù made with beer... We shall come back on this! By now, enjoy my art-attack in tracing a beer mug on the wet cocoa powder:

Beer-me-su!

10^th January. I met father Laurence, a cherished teacher, and now a friend, who educated me to the sense of humbleness, not through teaching but through concrete example. We went to Matusel a distinct restaurant in the University area, precisely in via Bertoloni 2. Michelle joined us and took a vast plate of grilled vegetables. 

A welcoming combination between art and food,
wood and soft lights: the staff is very kind and zealous,
vegetarians are never left on their own:
http://www.matusel.it/

Then I went book hunting: despite I would have liked to keep calm and spend nothing, I ended up with five books. Then I took a tea again at Eutèpia with my best friend Martina and Frederick, the most knowledgeable man about atomic bombs and China I know. Finally, I went to Hannah a true friend, who’s always a wonderful conversationalist: despite we are very different, our dialogues do not suffer of any sort of rigidness, yet we feel free to express ourselves with dignity and openness.

Green tea with magnolia blossoms: ravishing.
http://www.mondodieutepia.com/ [unfortunately in Italian only]

Last nights are often sad. Personally I felt miserable. I would have liked to let Time flow slower: hearts need to knit that subtle knot which makes us lovers, paraphrasing John Donne’s Ecstasy. No net, hook or string could trap my wish and fulfil it: instead my desire of departure-procrastination fell somewhere in tall grass, forgotten and out of reach: the following morning came out quickly and the suitcase was still on its way to be done.

Emigrants bring sorrow and hope in their suitcases,
dandys often travel escorted by manageable palate dreams.

11^th January. With Death in my heart, I had to say goodbye to Michelle, took again two flights and two BA meals and landed safely in Edinburgh: an Urban Eat wrap with mozzarella and pesto, and a snack made of sparkling water and crisps or sparkling crisps and salty water?

...to be continued...