'Like My Mama Used to Make It!'

For my British readers, you will have surely recognised by now where the inspiration for this post's title comes from, put on a fony Italo-American accent, drown your four fingers towards your thumb,reached your lips and blown noisy kisses in the air, vigorously begun to gesticulate in uncoordinated patterns and read the sentence again, out loud this time,(possibly even stroke your fake black mustache..) and hopefully chuckled to yourself.. For those overseas, however, 'Like Mama Used to Make It' is the catch-phrase from a series of tv ads for "Dolmio", producers of 'allegedly' Italian style pasta sauces made in Holland and tasting as Italian as sushi is a vegan Moroccan dish! Last night I watched a little bit of "The Goodfellas"with Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci and Ray Liotta. To much of my amusement, this movie portrayed a lot of, paradoxically realistic idiosyncrasies about the Mafia culture and Italians abroad in general. My friend's dad calls me "the Irish Mob" -'coz I am Italian, bossy, and have a funny distinctive Northern Irish twang in my miscellaneous English accent - go figure! Often people ask me if the mafia is a fictionary concept invented by Marlon Brando and Al Pacino, but it is so not! In as ridiculous as it may sound that one of the G8 nations, world leader for culture and arts (not to mention football) who's forefathers conceived the foundations for most international jiuridical systems, Italy is a country ruled by three legal entities: the Constitution, the Papacy and the Mafia.

"Coffee and Cigarettes, 2003"

In last night's movie, a Jewish American young lady marries a top Irish gang member of the mob (Ray Liotta). She often repeated over the course of the film that even things which should have appalled her, or at least raised her suspicion over her husband's whereabouts, suddenly became 'normal'. Likewise, most Italians stopped raising questions a long time ago and comfortably cohabit with this entangled concoction of legal systems, illegality and chaos..little nothing ever happened. We are just like 'the three wise monkeys': Don't hear, don't speak, don't see! I, on the contrary, could tell you a million and one stories about it. Like when they stole my dad's motorbike and,instead of calling the cops, we called my uncle who called a friend of his who has a friend who knows somebody...long story short: we got the bike back in less than an hour for the modest price of £100. Convenient,ah? Or do you need a ticket for a sold out concert? There is always a friend. Really don't fancy wearing that seatbelt that creases your freshly ironed fake Valentino's? Wear a t-shirt with a seatbelt drawn over it (available in most shops)...and the list could go on and on and on. Mysteriously, it all becomes 'normal' like sipping coffee sitting at the table outside a family run cafe in the piazza, or shopping at the market. I don't condone any of this, but I can see why people find it funny... Here is to the Italians' inventiveness, humor and 'gift of the gab'!