Franco and the festa

Never (ever) underestimate the importance of your local festa in Italy. Tomorrow this little chapel will be the location of ours so I stopped to speak with Franco who’s the organiser. Mass is at 3pm but he’s looking for volunteers. I offered and then almost immediately regretted it. I can’t quite figure out the politics involved. Franco, neighbour further down the road, is not the president of the pro-loco group. The president is Marco, neighbour not so far down the road. But this is Franco’s show so after a chat about local history, we agreed we’d be seeing each other tomorrow. I just need to decide whether to throw myself into the mix and become fully Italian – that is be a first-time participant in the actual organisation of the local festa….if nothing else I guess there will be good local Italian red wine to be had.