A little bit of culture shock when they arrived.

My mother's hometown of Fossa, AQ, Italia looks like every other town in Italy.  What might seem ordinary about her town is what's beautiful about Italy.

From Piemonte to Sicilia, towns that resemble Fossa are visible outside the driver and passenger windows during a weekend drive.  They are all different.  They all have different feasts, patron saints, nicknames and their own dialect.

To help you understand what a visual, cultural and environmental shock Canada was to these people, I will spend today's post showing you around Fossa.

Before we go on, let me take a step backwards.  This topic has been on my mind long before I took this course.  In the spring of 2015, I was enrolled in GEOG1F90 at Brock, Human Geography.  We spent much of the course discussing "Sense of Place".  In a nutshell, a Sense of Place is the relationship one has with the geography, landscape, architecture and people of a specific place.  A
"place" is a "space" that has been given significance by somebody.  It's a little more complicated than that, but for this purpose, it's enough.

For most Italians, they left towns that were built vertically on mountain sides where there were always family and friends within walking distance, homes packed close together and activity abound.

In a very profound way, the way they interacted with their environment completely governed their lives.  If you've been to a mountain side town you know that people live below and above you, down the ramp, up the ramp, there are tunnels everywhere that connect streets.  You do a lot of walking where cars don't fit and you see and talk to everybody.  If you could not walk, you were screwed because these towns are not exactly "wheelchair friendly".

I am very familiar with Fossa.  I experienced the closeness between my mother's home and those of her relatives.  I've seen how the landscape and layout of the town affects how they interact, how they move about, how children play, how they support each each other and how they communicate.  Yelling out the window was not an uncommon method of communication.

Everybody from your town attended the town's feast and the feasts of the neighbouring towns.  You did not make other plans for the night of the feast.

Pacentro, AQ, Italia

My father is from Pacentro, AQ, Italia.  He is a Pacentrano.  He has been Canadian 66 of his 81 years and he is still Pacentrano.  There are hundreds of Pacentrani in Welland.  When the older Italians see me, they consider me a Pacentrano.

Every Pacentrano displays a panoramic picture of their home town somwhere in their house.  When I had my office I also had a big picture of Pacentro.  Their trademark is their version of the "Twin Towers"

When my father arrived in Welland, he found a town that was flat (no mountains), spread out homes and friends lived a car ride away. No mountains, sloped cobblestone streets and buzzing activity, but he had a lot of paesani nearby as they grew roots in Welland together.

My mother's situation was a bit different.  There is nobody from Fossa in Welland.   N.O.B.O.D.Y. There is a family in Toronto, a handful in Detroit and Ohio and the rest went to Melbourne, Australia. Her two older brothers are in Australia and her sister is in Detroit.

Alone or in a group, until Welland became home, these people were placeless.

Fossa was deemed unsafe and shut down by an earthquake on April 6, 2009 .  For me, it was very upsetting and sad.  For my mother, it was a serious blow that has left its mark on her.  That day, I developed an unshakeable appreciation for how strong that link was to their home.  I think about today's refugees who were forcefully displaced and have to come to grips with not having a place of their own and dealing with the destruction of what was their place.

Here is what my mother (and many) left behind before she came to, what appeared to be, a flat, geographically boring town.  Welland is a great place, but the "place" would have been a major adjustment.

We always bug my mom that she was born after the war and my dad before the war, he came on a boat, she on a plane, he came 1950 and she in 1965, etc.  But when I really think about it, I think the move here was for more difficult on her than it was on him.

The 21 pictures below are of Fossa.  To tour her town with Google Street View (Pre-Earthquake) click below.  I set you up with my late Nonna's house on the left (Satellite dish on the back window).  The underpass ahead of you is Via Madonna Del Grotte, the main street.  Notice how everything to the right or left is either a ramp or stairway, going up or down.  Rarely a flat right or left turn.

https://www.google.ca/maps/@42.2919476,13.488399,3a,75y,55.27h,79.5t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s50c9uXCVPPDFtlVy4W5bmA!2e0!7i13312!8i6656!6m1!1e1?hl=en

The cover of her town's monthly magazine for ex-patriots.

How did they build that there?

Notice how it's built almost vertically

The "necropoli", an ancient Roman burial ground unearthed during the
90s below Fossa.  it's still being investigated by archeologists.  I am sure
somebody who owed somebody else money is buried there.

Games during the "Sagra da Bistecca" festival

Not a bad view, eh?

In case you get bored of the previous view.

Nice.

An ancient church built in the 13th century.  This is "La chiesa di Santa Maria ad Cryptas."
Before the other church was built, this had the Crypt used where they put their
dead.  The church was whitewashed 100s of years ago and when the whitewash was removed
they discovered unbelievable artwork.  Traced to the Early Renaissance, on the right
side of the front wall is a painting of the Virgin Mart breastfeeding Baby Jesus.  Art students from
all over Europe come to see the artwork.   Standing inside this church is an experience that is
difficult to explain.  The artwork in overwhelming.  You know how to get inside?  You go to the
house next door, yell up to the balcony.  The husband or wife will come out, thrown down the key and
when you're done, you call back up when they they arrive you throw the key back up.

Seriously.

Check out the church at this link  Santa Maria ad Cryptus.  Thankfully, the church was spared from the earthquake.

Another nice view.

Some of those inner circular roads trace the wall that used to surround
the town.  Every town had a wall in case the next town attacked.  

All views that show the church steeple warm my heart.  Unfortunately
the steeple was a casualty of the earthquake.

The seminary at the top of the mountain, Sante Angelo D'Ocre.

I'm not an animal .. I appreciate art.

Ah, the steeple

Yes, it looks this hectic from all angles.  Every town. (I just noticed this picture is
post-earthquake.  The tallest structure on the right is what was the church's steeple.)

Another classic view of Fossa.

The contrast of a small town against a big mountain.  There was damage in the town
but the integrity of the mountain face is what forced the government to deem the town unsafe.

Postcard.

Now it's personal.  This is the view from my late Nonna's back window.  The white house below and to the
right with the two archways and two windows is their old barn converted to be a house by my aunt.

Before the earthquake.  From right to left: My Nonna's sister's house (Zia Filomena),
the former "Bar Il Ponte", ramp leading up to the street behind the bar, the underpass that leads to
the main street down through the town (Via Madonna Del Grotte), a small ramp leading up to Via Fulnillo,
my Nonn'a street and the house attached to the left side of the ramp is my Nonna's house, 3 via Fulnillo.
How close is close? If you go up that ramp and turn right behind the bar, about 30m down that street are
where my Nonna's parents lived.  About 40m down Fulnillo lived my Nonno's parents.