Part 5: Reconstructing Jesus with midgets and bums in Foggia and Cerignola

---

---

Armanda lives next to a cemetery that isn’t a cemetery. It’s a long-running field throughout the ancient city of Cerignola, pocked with stone stumps.
When I called her for specific directions, she knew exactly the place I described - even though it wasn’t a cemetery; just the ruined foundation of a huge old building.
I had no idea - as she helped me park my Vespa under her building and turned the secret keys to access her home on the private third floor - that Armanda was the most talented visual artist I had ever met. That changed the moment she opened the door to her gallery/home.
I was floored; it was as cluttered as my grandma Bernie’s home, except it was wall-to-wall with amazing art. There must be hundreds of paintings in here. Her most compelling work, to me, are her pieces from the 1970s where she extracts the shapes in the human body and expresses them exclusively.
I wondered around her home for hours, absorbing all of this sensory input. She fed me food of ridiculously good quality (pasta and vegetables), and then introduced me to the most extensive music collection I have ever seen outside of the CSUC Music Library.

Touring the city

We pulled ourselves away from this just long enough to take a stroll through the city.
Her family used to own the building, and Armanda explained that they had run an old-fashioned furniture store in the basement for 150 years - until people stopped buying quality furniture.
As we walked, she pointed to a plaque on a building and said it memorialized her great-grandfather: Nicola Zingarelli. If you don’t recognize Zingarelli’s name, he is famous for creating the very first Italian language dictionary in the 19th century.
There is a world famous gelato bar just across the street. Down the alley we visited the oldest church in the city, and a ceramics laboratory. She took me through an area with children playing in the street, and showed me where all the mob bosses live.

The restoration of Christ

She introduced me to her friend Michele, who restores church icons. His workshop was too cinematic to believe. Like a hospital patient having an operation, Jesus lay outstretched on a table, while Michele painted the faces of young and beautiful saints. His cat sat attentively, tied by a leash to a chair.
Michele said he received work over the Internet from all over the world, and he took us across the street to see his ancient home in a 500-year-old building. He made good use of natural materials, and the light over his table was crafted from a crooked tree branch that looked like it was more comfortable in his den than out in the forest. His shelving was made from more tree branches, that seemed to fit together in an unnaturally solid way that only seems to happen in Hollywood prop studios.
Later I went out for a drink with Armanda’s nephew (also named Michele), who plays the drums in a progressive rock band. It was Monday, and relatively early, and the town was fairly dead. We sat at a bar, and talked in spite of the projection screen television that did it’s best to interrupt all conversation. What is it with Italians and TV or telephones while dining? Michele introduced me to about a dozen progressive rock bands of great quality, lending me some of his best collection during my visit.

My ancestral town of Foggia totally sucks

Maybe it’s the cold rain. Maybe it’s the lack of a tourist office to orient myself, or this aimless wandering that wrecks my style. I don’t know, but it sucks.
The best part of my visit to Foggia, one of my ancestral cities, was the midget who handed me a coupon for the extreme-looking circus coming to town. I usually never take anything that people try to hand me on the street - but a midget could be passing out used syringes and I would probably take it. (Note to self: Hire midgets for promotions…)
The coolest person I met in the whole town was a well-dressed bum named Giancarlo who approached me while I was eating a €.69 loaf of bread on a park bench in the rain. He wanted to know if he could have some of my wine. I gave him the rest of my €1 carton, and suddenly he was my best friend.
The weather was horrid, and it rained for the rest of the afternoon as I headed back to Cerignola. Just outside Foggia is the Barilla factory, where they produce most of the Italian pasta sold in the United States. You can smell it from a couple of kilometers away. As I rode I caught wind of it, and noted the familiar fragrance. Suddenly, to no astonishment at all, there was the massive factory with its towers belching out pasta scent. I was proud to see the Barilla factory in one of my ancestral towns.
After this short visit, it was time to head North toward San Marino and my other ancestral town of San Ginesio.

---

Photos

Armanda
Armanda is the incarnation of her own Tiger.

Circus
Doesn't this look like the most awesome circus ever??? I missed it by one day.

Armanda (Zingarelli)
Armanda standing below the plaque of her great-grandfather Nicolus Zingarelli.

Tiger
Hey look Armanda has the same tiger they have in the Salem Weekly office!

Comments

[anonymous]

What an inspiring kitchen, thanks for tuning in on that and for sharing it with the rest of the world.