Latest / The World Knowledge / The Hope Hidden in Every Challenge

Transcript

The Hope Hidden in Every Challenge · The World Knowledge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Well, good morning, listeners. Thank you for listening to Lament
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: of Hope podcast, and thank you for listening, watching, whichever
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: platform you're on.
• 0:08
  Speaker 2: That's a very good question. I think that there are
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: several answers to that question. A few things that spring
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: to mind, or at least that apply to my own
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: personal experience, are the memories that are connected to food.
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: So I've got very, very strong memories connected not only
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: to the taste of specific foods, but also to their flavor,
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: to their smell, to what they smell like. For instance,
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: there is a particular pie that is a sweet pie
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: that is baked in Italy in the area of Naples
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: in the period around Easter. And it's made with orange
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: blossom water. So whenever my dad used to make it
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: at home, the whole house would smell like orange blossom.
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: And he made like 30 or 40 of these pies
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: because he used to give them away to friends and
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: family as a present for his to celebrate Easter. So
• 1:06
  Speaker 2: in my mind, every time I smell that, my head
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: goes immediately to my childhood years in my original family,
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: my mom and dad. in their house with my dad
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: baking these things for half of the village, essentially. So
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: I think the same thing goes for the taste of
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: some food that remind me of my grandmother, for example.
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: She used to make this particular type of pasta weekly, regularly,
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: every Wednesday. And every time I smell garlics frying in
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: olive oil with some olives in it, the smell and
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: the taste... brings me back to those days and that time.
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: So I think that there is an element of sensorial
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: linkage between every person and their past memories. And the
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: food is a very good representation of this. It's a
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: very good channel to bring out all those memories, usually good,
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: but not necessarily bad. good, and that's why it becomes
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: so important, it becomes such a radical part of everybody's personality.
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: On top of that, there is a bit of a
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: peculiar approach to food that is quintessentially Italian. It's the
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: fact that not only it's important to, for Italians, not
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: only is important the recipe itself that shows that belonging
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: to that particular region of Italy, but there is a
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: common ground all around the country in Italy where food
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: is considered way more than just its calorific value. So
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: it's not considered as fuel, but when you eat together,
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: you're sharing a social moment. The TV is off, and
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: that's the time when the family comes together, everybody talks
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: to each other, everybody's sitting around the table. You know,
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: there is that convivial slash social element to it that
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: is way beyond just the flavour of what you're eating.
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: You know, is that still... what it's like in Italy
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: for families, you think? Because in America, I mean, this
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: obviously isn't new news, but I mean, we're very busy.
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: There are not, you know, busyness is very idolized, I'd say.
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: You know, if you're busy, it's a good thing. And
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: so people don't have meals together often. And then when
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: you meet a family that has a meal together, you're
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: kind of stunned because, you know, it's like, whoa. it
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: feels like you're going back to the 1950s or something
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: for a second. Um, so I was, is like in Italy,
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: is that still the case that families.
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: Really spend a lot of time? So the, that, that
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: culture that you're referring to, uh, uh, if you're that busy,
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: that it's good, it must be good. Um, that type
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: of culture is percolating also in, uh, uh, throughout Italy. Um,
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: and throughout the whole country, really. So it's not as
• 4:21
  Speaker 2: easy as it used to be to have meals together.
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: When I was a kid, we used to have lunch
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: and dinner as a family together. So the table would
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: be set out with a tablecloth at lunch and at
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: dinner regularly every single day. The situation now is slightly different,
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: and lunches have become slightly more complicated for people to
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: meet up because People keep working all the way through
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: to late afternoon. So dinner has become the only opportunity
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: where the whole family can come together. But having said that,
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: at least in my house, for example, and I don't
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: even live in Italy any longer, we always come together
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: for dinner. The kids have got their own meal at school, obviously,
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: but we always eat together at least once a day
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: for dinner. And during the weekend when the kids are
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: at home, it's lunch and dinner, not just lunch. But
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: I have to say that there is...