The celebration of Sunday rituals is one of the best examples of Italian lifestyle that has persevered throughout the centuries. In fact on Italian calendars and time schedules Sunday is referred to as “festa” to distinguish it from weekdays.
The peaceful quiet of a Sunday morning is a welcome change to the hustle and bustle of weekday traffic noise. One can awake to the sounds of church bells announcing that soon it will be time for Mass.
And so Sundays begin with Mass at your neighborhood church
Sant’Ambrogio Church
Next off to the neighborhood bakery or pasticceria to pick up dessert for Sunday 1:00 lunch which is the main meal of the day. While picking up your dessert, might as well enjoy a cappuccino and pastry to serve as your after Mass breakfast.
Pasticceria Nencioni
A couple of more stops could include the Forno or bread shop, for your freshly baked bread as well as the Newsstand, Edicola, to pick up your Sunday paper.
Many families, or the parent who is not cooking the Sunday meal (or if lucky the grandparents are preparing the feast as only they know how to do), will accompany their child to the neighborhood park for an hour or so. Good idea to work up an appetite…
Piazza Massimo D’Azeglio
So after the huge feast, well what else, turn on the TV and root for your favorite soccer team and/or take a nap.
Weather permitting it’s time for an afternoon stroll or “Quattro passi”
Work up some more appetite and then Sunday night pizza in a pizzeria!
When I was younger, I often thought of liberating myself from what I then thought was just too structured and slow for the way I should spend my day. Now I realize there is much wisdom to the idea of some tradition and ritual. The rhythm of this way of life seems to put my body, mind and soul at ease. The beauty of a Buona Domenica.
Now for your enjoyment a clip from the 1950’s version of the Italian Sunday Ed Sullivan show:
fondlyfromflorence&beyond 