Christmas in Italy (Continued)

Christmas in Italy was definitely an interesting experience. We had Christmas dinner with my host family on Christmas Eve and they told me that it's traditional to wait until midnight on Christmas Eve and then you can open presents (traditional or not, I went along with it, who wants to wait to open gifts?). I got some wonderful gifts including Fruit Loops and Raisin Bran, so I was a happy kid. On Christmas Day, we went to an evening mass and walked around the church looking at all the different nativity sets. Italy is much more about the religious side of the holiday, as opposed to the commercial side. I have several photos from the holiday. Some are of our nativity, some are from the beach, one is all of my Christmas gifts, and the puppy was bought by my host mother's brother while he was here and he named the puppy Casey. Casey will be trained to be a rescue dog. Happy New Year's everyone!

Christmas in Italy

Unlike Halloween or Thanksgiving, Christmas is just as popular here as it is in the United States. The traditions are the same and Cagliari is lit up with Christmas lights. Santa is called 'Babbo Natale', or Father Christmas. They do decorate trees but the trees are nearly always plastic because pine trees don't grow in Sardinia. We exchange gifts on Christmas and go to Christmas morning mass. Italians do Christmas shopping just like Americans, pushing and shoving in stores to buy gifts for their families. This is a hard time of the year for me, as I have to be away from my family for Christmas and New Year's, but at least the traditions are the same. I feel a little more at home this way.

Casu Marzu

After hearing about a Sardinian cheese called Casu Marzu from my Spanish teacher, I decided to ask around and read up on it. I think it's definitely worth a post, as it's very interesting. Casu Marzu literally means "rotten cheese" in Sardinian, a language that is similar to Spanish but now almost non-existent in Sardinia, which is good, because I already have one language to learn. Anyway, the cheese is now illegal and can only be purchased on the black market due to various health risks involved with decomposing cheese. Essentially, the cheese, which comes from sheep milk, is eaten after its decomposition point. Inside, the cheese is crawling with live insect larvae, which makes the cheese taste better, or so I've heard. The cheese becomes very soft, almost like a liquid. Right away, I thought this sounded disgusting so I asked my English teacher here if she had ever tried it. She said that she had and that it was actually extremely tasty. Some people remove the worms before eating the cheese while others like the taste better with the larvae still intact. My English teacher told me that she takes out the worms.