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BUON APPETITO IN BELLA ITALIA
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Saturday, 08 December, 2007, 08 : 00 AM [IST]
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Ronita Torcato
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brated the December 3 feast of its patron saint Francis Xavier, but serendipitously in Mumbai, the aristocratic Spaniard who lived for a time in Paris, Venice and Rome, will be sharing his feast day, as of this year, with the Indo-Italian Chamber of Commerce's "Italian Language Day."
Organised within the framework of the "Festa Italiana- Italian Festival", the event saw students of the language, their teachers and folks from the IICC and the Consulate General celebrate the occasion with food (yummy), wine ( ambrosia from Italian vineyards) and music (recorded).
With years of broken Italian and no grammar worth the name, we had stepped into Joss, in the hope of brushing up our non-existent vocabulary. We'd started off by lending our ears to language teachers Valentino and Nicoletta Andreini wax lyrical over bella Italiana, and waited to exhale watching the exquisite landscape in a video presented by Salvatore Ianiello of the Italian Tourism Board.
IICC Secretary-General Sergio Sgambato said the ILD would be an annual affair. He first came to India some 15 years ago as a language teacher. Today, he's head honcho at the chamber which promotes trade between India and Italy.
Nearly 1,50,000 Indian tourists visited Italy in 2006 and as of March 2007, trade between the two countries stood at 5.20 billion euros, including India's exports to Italy worth 3 billion euros. Italian wine companies are hopeful of growth in the Indian wine market that is expected to touch 9 million litres by 2010.
As of now, over 700 importers and exporters from India and Italy benefit from membership of the Chamber, a non-profit organisation recognised by the Italian Government. Naturally, Dottore Fabio Rugge, Consul-General of Italy in Mumbai, was present and, in his brief address, suggested the formation of "an association of Indo-Italians with a love of all things Italian, from food and fashion to art, music and culture."
Between the briefest of brief speeches and sustenance was a quiz based on general knowledge of Italy and Italian culture (won by the Porchetta table consisting of Rena Nunes, Sachin, Bharti and scholarship winner Dipti Desai.)
Dipti and Rena sipped Pinot, we'd settled for a Merlot as we savoured the antipasti (hot and cold appetisers) and watched a fantastico pasta demo by celebrity chef Max Orlati.
Legend has it that Marco Polo (who travelled widely in India) introduced pasta to Italy following his sojourns in the Far East in the late 13th century; but the Chinese were eating noodles as early as 3000 BC and Greek mythology suggests that the Greek God Vulcan invented a device that made strings of dough (the first spaghetti mama mia!).
In Italy, pasta can be traced back to the fourth century BC, where an Etruscan tomb showed a group making what appears to be pasta. Pasta made its way to North America through the English, who discovered it while touring Italy. It was Thomas Jefferson who is credited with bringing the first "macaroni" machine to America in 1789 when he returned home after serving as ambassador to France. There's lots more to tell about nutrition-packed pasta but we will proceed to say that after the prizes were distributed, some students belted out Pavarotti's O Sole Mio before they (ok, make that everyone) fell on the pasta, sauces, cheese, cold cuts and gelatos, Italy's gourmet ice creams which are 100 % vegetarian and contain 66 % less fat than most ice creams. It made a nice finale, I thought. A version of O Sole Mio has been used for decades on British television in advertisements for Cornetto ice cream. And because the song is so popular, invoking the beauty and romance of bella Italia, many hotels and restaurants have been named after it as well.
MILES TO GO
Most political parties may blow hot and cold when it comes to the welfare of the common man, which is why the Shiv Sena's demand for complete waivers of loans to impoverished farmers redounds to its credit, though not the haste with which it has attacked the Vilasrao Deshmukh-led government which had sanctioned Rs 142.70 crore as special assistance to farmers in Maharashtra for 2006-07 after their kharif crop was damaged by pests, diseases and erratic rains.
The dismal fact is that agricultural development has been dropping since 1990. Which is why under the Centrally sponsored National Food Safety Drive for 2007-08, a target of 10 million tonnes rice production, 8 million tonnes wheat and 2 million tonnes pulses has been set. The main objective of the drive is to increase food grain productivity; and production on farmland; generate employment and increase the income of farmers.
This reminds us of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's lament that malnutrition rates for children in India remain among the highest in the world. In a strongly-worded letter sent to state chief ministers, Singh critiqued the failure of a massive programme to improve health and nutrition. His letter said that the programme had been "poorly implemented". Given the fact that half of the world's under-nourished children live in South Asia, with most in India, it's a shame that the country's Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) scheme has not sufficiently lowered child malnourishment levels. Some 50 million children aged six and below are supposed to be covered under the Rs 45bn ($1bn) ICDS scheme which was established in 1975, and is one of the largest childcare systems in the world, providing immunisations, mid-day meals and related means of protecting children's right to food, including maternity entitlements. Regrettably, the ICDS has been marred by corruption.
Last year UNICEF said that the average malnutrition rate in states like Uttar Pradesh was 40%. That is higher than sub-Saharan Africa where it is around 30 % This is despite India running a mid-day meal scheme for children, with 120 million enrolled to receive one hot, nutritious meal free on every school day. Free because almost 300mn Indians still live on less than $1 (44 rupees) a day. Many of these are farmers bankrupted and displaced by agribusiness which directs them to grow export crops instead of staple foods.
WAY TO GO, KAT
Graduation gowns were the favoured mode of dress at the Kuoni Academy of Travel (KAT) Annual Convocation in late November when diplomas were awarded to more than 200 students. KAT is the only private Indian institute to be a member of Asia-Pacific Education & Training Institute in Tourism (APETIT) It has centres in 7 cities and trains over 3000 students annually in hospitality, hotel management, travel and tourism. Doing the honours were Josef Eisele, Consul-General of Switzerland; Anesh Kavle, Regional General Manager Galileo; D Kishore, Commercial Manager-Western Region, Air India; and Natasha Nagpal, Market Development Co-ordinator, Tourism New Zealand. Engaging in a tete a tete over high tea were prominent industry representatives like L Ratnayake, Consul, Sri Lankan Consulate and Vijay Puthran, Senior Manager India-Star Cruises. Zubin Karkaria, CEO & MD, Kuoni Travel Group India awarded SOTC scholarships to the toppers of each batch as well as special awards to those who excelled in German. Special awards to the toppers of the post- graduate batch included 100% reimbursement of fees to the student who stood first; 50% reimbursement to the student who stood second; and 25% reimbursement of fees to the student who ranked third. Way to go, KATers!
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