Word: feastings
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Enter the Communists. Once a year, Trasteverini hold a Procession of the Madonna del Carmine; they have added to it an additional celebration called the Festa de Nojantri (The Feast of Us Others). Together the two occasions are good for at least two weeks of sports, drinking, feasting, beauty and wine-tippling contests, and a lively spate of knife fights...
...Feast of Us Others had been managed by the Trasteverini themselves until 1917, when the Fascist Dopolavoro (workers' recreation society) tried to turn it into an organized political celebration. "One year," recalls Housewife Felicetta Gaudenzi, "they brought a Negro all the way from Abyssinia to stand at the entrance to the bridge. You paid so much, and you punched him. Then, unless you paid extra, he punched you back...
Last fortnight, as Trastevere prepared for the first Feast of Us Others in a decade, the district's alert Communists saw a chance to step in & take over where the Fascists had left off. But the Communists underestimated the alertness of the opposition. While they were debating ways & means to raise money for the affair, the right wing E.N.A.L. (National Organization for Workers' Welfare) blandly announced that it would sponsor the show this year, promptly received a generous donation from the anti-Communist Il Giornale d'ltalia...
...Prize for the Big Balloon. The frustrated Communists howled. "They are pulling a fast one," shrieked a party newspaper Il Paesa. "The Feast of Us Others is being changed to the Feast of Them There . . . Them There are the people who argue only with 1,000 lira bills . . . people who would change into toothpaste advertising even the pictures of Raphael . . ." The Communists' final blow came when they discovered that the opposition had cornered all police permits for the feast. The police took the position that if the Communists and the anti-Communists both hold processions for the Madonna...
Last week, under a huge canopy of festive lights paid for by the Giornale, Trasteverini thronged happily to the feast. The sponsors had discarded an original plan to crown as "Miss Vino" the Trastevere girl who could drink the most wine, thought it would be even more imprudent to hold a regular beauty contest. "The first," explained a committeeman, "would not be dignified in these times; the second would be too dangerous, because there are too many girls in Trastevere who are the most beautiful...