Buon Capodanno!

“Christmas with your family, New Year’s with whomever you want,” goes the Italian saying.

New Year’s Eve is a huge tradition in Italy, with the obligatory cenone ("mega-dinner") and a traditional brindisi ("toast") at midnight… not to mention the fireworks!

As for the dinner, frequently people eat out at restaurants that have put together enormous (and usually enormously expensive!) menus. My mother-in-law says she heard that the evening’s menu at Harry’s Bar was going for 900 euros!

Needless to say, with the exchange rate working against us, we joined the ranks of the apparently record number of Italians (who have massive inflation working against them) having their cenone at home!

There’s so much regional diversity of traditions in Italy that, as far as I know, there’s only one dish that everybody agrees that you absolutely have to eat on Capodanno. That’s lentils! Eating lentils is supposed to bring you money in the New Year, kind of like how eating black-eyed peas in the south of the US is supposed to bring good luck for the upcoming year. (Luckily, not only did I eat the requisite lentils, but I even found black-eyed peas here for once, so maybe this year will really be a lucky one!)

As for the rest of our feast, my husband was the chef du jour and, to his credit, the meal was fantastic! Antipasti galore, fettucine with smoked salmon in a cream sauce, not to mention the long-awaited (or dreaded, as the case may be... more on that later, together with his recipes, if he lets me post 'em...) cotechino! And our toast at midnight was accompanied by French champagne. Mmm!!

But this New Year’s in Venice was without fireworks. For years, the city apparently hasn’t had the funds to offer, like nearby towns do, an official fireworks show.

Official fireworks or no, Italians frequently fire off their own, like the famous private ones around Naples every year (like in the picture at right). Big 'uns, sometimes to their own detriment. I remember not too many years ago that there were over a thousand people injured and several killed, particularly in the region around Naples. Even this year, that region topped the list for its share of the nation’s nearly 600 fireworks-related injuries, and the only fireworks-related death was linked to a malfunctioning homemade one. (Some of these, among the several metric tons of illegal fireworks confiscated by the police in the days immediately preceding capodanno, were appparently even given fake “tradenames,” like that of Brazillian soccer hero “Maradona,” or –my favorite! – “Ratzinger.”)

But fireworks, legal or otherwise, were out of the question in Venice last night, particularly in Saint Mark’s Square, the ceremonial center of the city. Rightly so, because of the potential damage they could cause to the basilica or renaissance monuments…

Too bad there was not any public celebration to take the place of the forbidden fireworks, though… such as that of cities like Verona which organized festive concerts for residents and visitors alike.

But this is a long-standing beef I have with Venice, love the city though I do… Always forbidding visitors to do things like *gasp* eating in Saint Mark’s Square! I understand the reasons why they don’t want folks to do it, but they just put up little signs and then fine people when they do, rather than taking the effort to educate people about, or even provide them with, alternatives.

Still, I guess we'll see whether or not, as the French say (and the Italians heartily agree), "the more things change, the more they stay the same"! In the meantime, my greatest wishes to all for a fortunate and peaceful 2006 (including, not least, Venice, the city's relatively few remaining residents, its many, many visitors, and those who love it no matter where they are!)