Celebrating Your Inner Italian
In Italy, the mind and all the senses are always engaged. Everything there has a meaning and occupies a place that is part of a larger whole. The Italophile is a person who seeks to understand what all of this means.
– Fred Plotkin, Italy for the Gourmet Traveler
Get in touch with your Inner Italian — practice yoga. “Now we’ll prepare for Surya Namaskara. . . Sun Salutations. . .Buon Giorno Sole,” says my yoga teacher Tina. While most yoga students would recognize the Sanskrit and English terms for this classic series of warming-up poses, this Italian nickname “Good Day, Sun” would surely elicit puzzled expressions. Tina, who could easily qualify for title of “the sweetest woman in the world,” is humoring me with the “Buon Giorno Sole” and we smile at the reference. She’s heard my story about Italy and yoga.
As with so many good things in my life, I have Italy to thank for yoga. I had been curious about it for many years but was always just a bit too busy to go to the effort to learn more.
Then, several years ago on a research trip to Italy, I stayed for a few weeks in Rome with Anna, a delightful mother of three who was, of all things, a yoga teacher. She spent hours in the bedroom working on her lesson plans and traveled up to Florence once a week to study for her certification.
I was intrigued. It seemed so exotic to me that Italians could be into yoga. From my unenlightened perspective, the two seemed worlds apart-Italy the epitome of sensuality and yoga the height of asceticism. But as my visit ran its course, yoga people kept presenting themselves quite unannounced. Iris, a charming and knowledgeable arts and culinary guide, mentioned how restorative her Iyengar practice was. And Jo, an author and cooking teacher, shared that she and her husband of many years practiced yoga with a teacher who came several times a week to their grand old apartment in the heart of Rome.
Wow. Good things do come in threes. Meeting this trio of beautiful, talented, vibrant women was my invitation to enter this ancient practice of unifying body and mind, the sensual and the ascetic. These days, practicing yoga helps me to be calm and centered, living fully in the moment, savoring all that comes my way. Come to think of it, that’s a very Italian way to live.
What activities help you stay in touch with your Inner Italian? Leave a Comment and share.
How to feel healthier and happier? Just say “yes” to the Mediterranean style of eating following the model of southern Italy and neighboring countries. For inspiration, Gale Maleskey R.D., shows us how in the February 2009 issue of Better Homes & Gardens with her aritcle “The Way to Eat Now.” (Sorry, the yummy chocolate cupcakes on the cover are not part of the program.)
We’re also pleased that Cooking Up an Italian Life is included in the recommended reads at the end of the article. The Mediterranean Diet has long been championed by health researchers and the nonprofit Oldways Preservation Trust which has created a Mediterranean Food Pyramid. If indulging in seasonal fruits and vegetables, extra-virgin olive oil, red wine, herbs, nuts, seafood and grains is the plan, then, yes, we can.
Do you eat Mediterranean? Leave a comment and share your thoughts.
“Life is a banquet and most suckers are starving to death.”
—Auntie Mame
A tavola non si invecchia.
“At the table one doesn’t grow old.”
—Italian proverb