Growing up with both English and Italian family, I’ve always been fascinated by how each side of my family, living in different countries, do all sorts of things so differently.
For me, at home, my two cultures have always been blended into one, but it’s fun to look at each one in isolation and compare the differences.
Christmas is the first thing that springs to mind. I remember, when I was really young, staying with family in Bari and being taken to what I now know as Basilica di San Nicola, a church, and being told it was where Santa’s grave was. Yep, it turns out this church is where Saint Nicholas’s remains are, and seeing as though I grew up in England Santa to me was, well, Santa. However, in Italy, traditionally it isn’t Santa Claus who brings presents, it’s La Befana, a witch, who brings presents in January – the date of the Epiphany. Christmas dinner is a drastically difference experience too. Forget turkey and the trimmings because Italians prefer to eat seafood courses on the big day.
In my new book, It’s All Sun and Games, main character Robin attends a wedding in Italy, so I had a lot of fun writing about the different wedding traditions there. Italian weddings are a blast. There are traditional dances (like Tarantella dancing) and fun songs, with parties going on into the night, but the main event has to be the food. The courses just keep coming – it isn’t unusual to have more than ten over the course of the day. There are some really fun and unique traditions too – things that I think make the day really special. For example, there is a tradition where someone takes the groom’s tie and cuts it up into little pieces, and sells those pieces to the guests, to raise money for the bride and groom. All guests leave Italian weddings with a souvenir though – Bomboniere are given to guests to thank them for attending the big day. Usually, it’s multi-coloured sugared almonds wrapped up in cute little bags.
Another interesting difference, when Italian women get married, is that in Italy women don’t take their husband’s surname, they keep their own. Kids, however, do take their dad’s name.
It’s fascinating because here in the UK our wedding traditions seem so normal to us. It’s only when you see them through the eyes of someone from another country that you realise how bizarre it is that we always call it a wedding breakfast, no matter what time we eat it – never mind the idea of a lucky wedding chimney sweep turning up to kiss the bride.