1ST MAY

  Hi everybody,

I’m Paolo,

Just want to tell you how I celebrated 1^st May.  But before that I’ll tell you what I’ve found out about this festivity. I won’t bore you , I promise. Just a little information.

I searched the net and read an interesting chapter from the book “Calendario “ by A. Cattabiani  (a good book if you want to know everything about festivals).

May 1^st  is  the International Workers’ Day   that commemorates the struggle of working people in the world.  It dates back to the 1880s in the USA with the fight for an eight-hour work day. The heart of the movement was in Chicago where during a labour rally organized to protest against the brutality of the police,  a bomb was thrown to the police and the police responded by firing into the crowd killing one person and injuring many others.

The Church has accepted this festivity and consecrated it to the first saint “worker”, St Joseph. So in 1956 Pope Pius XII instituted the feast of St Joseph the Worker.

It is just a coincidence  but May Day used to celebrate the coming of summer, it marked the triumph of light over darkness.  The earliest May Day celebrations appeared in pre-Christian times, with the festival of Flora, the Roman goddess of flowers, and the Walpurgis Night celebrations of the  Germanic countries. It is also associated with the festival of Beltaine, of Celtic origin.  Still nowadays in some regions of Italy, like Tuscany, Umbria, Liguria, there are traditional festivals called “Calendimaggio” . During the festival the “maggerini” go from door to door to sing songs about nature, spring, seasons, love. They are joyful songs celebrating  rebirth and new life.

 The following photos were taken in Macerata  and give you an idea about how people celebrated 1^st May : near the public gardens  there were stalls  and also a band giving a concert. Pity the weather in the afternoon was not very good and the rain interrupted the concert a lot of times !

Anyway the really great  concert is in Rome , it is organized  by  the Labour Unions every year  and it is  broadcast live by the third channel of the state TV (Rai 3).  A lot of famous bands and singers are involved and a lot of young people go to Rome to enjoy music and have fun. I wish I had gone.

This is my miserable 1^st May.

It was a day when everything went wrong. I went to Mogliano to have a picnic as many people do on this day. They fill their picnic basket with a lot of good things ,the typical food is cheese (pecorino) and broad beans and off they go, ready to enjoy themselves. I too wanted to have fun but:    
I got up late, I was in a hurry and  so forgot to take my bagpipe.   
I also forgot to take   chips  for my friend. My task was to buy chips for everybody.   
I got to Mogliano at 1pm, very late,  and while we were having lunch it started to rain. So we decided to go home.   
While we were going home my friend  realized he had lost his  i-Phone.
Just the icing on the cake!