Mostly organized from Paris through Twitter and Facebook - but also locally advertised,
the 5-day old items' sale at Granny's has been a village attraction and a success story...
Here's a slideshow of a 2-day sale that I had, in fact, to extend to five days: quite
simply, people kept coming driven by word of mouth and curiosity.
[Except for the granite building, sold a few days ago, the property is still for sale].
___
... of sardinian sand.
One video and a few pictures, taken 5 days ago in the morning at the mouth of the river
Flumendosa, closed at this time of the year for reasons related to farmed fish, particularly
grey mullets (muggine-i), whose roe pouch is very appreciated as a delicacy under the
(italian) name of 'bottarga'.
[G@ttoGiallo]
Italian river Flumendosa, rises in the Gennargentu Mountains in southeastern Sardinia, Italy, and flows
127 km (79 miles) west and southeast, entering the Tyrrhenian Sea near Muravera and Villaputzu.
The Ente Autonomo del Flumendosa, a dam and irrigation project, was established in 1946 to develop
the resources of the Flumendosa River basin. [Britannica.com].
Far away, the marina of Porto Corallo.
(Click to see some other beautiful places).
___
If you're curious enough and want to know about the river's basin geomorphology, well,
help yourself HERE.
... or : "Su ohi de s'accabadora"*
After a phone call with a friend recalling some conversations with old people
on a topic that has always been a taboo, I just googled two keywords :
Accabadora and mazzoccu.
- The "femina accabadora" or "agabbadora" (Span. v. acabar) is the woman
who completes the task - meaning she "helps" to pass away or, in short, a
"terminator". This character used to be an old woman dressed in black, veiled
face - often the midwife of the village, who was called to end the agony of the
dying when it lasted too long, causing unnecessary suffering.
Her task accomplished, she moved away. Her performance was not paid
with money, but rewarded with flour, salt, lard or other common items.
It was an ancestral form of euthanasia, practiced in cases of extreme necessity.
- The "mazzoccu" or "mazzolu" is a piece of wild olive wood, T-shaped like
a hammer (more info here to translate).
Like all items related to the most secret rites and traditions, this tool was kept
carefully hidden, when people didn't get rid of. However, one of them is still
visible at the Galluras ethnographic museum, in Luras.
A single sharp blow of this instrument on the temporal bone was supposed
to end the agony, though sometimes choking with a hand or a pillow was
enough to stop a weak breath of life. The accabadora's performance was
so fast it appeared to be painless...
The latest reported activities of the Accabadora
would have occurred in Luras (1929) and in
Orgosolo (1952), although someone believes
that the last case would be as more recent as
in 2003.
The Luras case is certainly emblematic : when
a 70 years old man passed away - with some
help from such a black angel, the local police
and prosecutor were unanimous in reporting
the act to a humanitarian context, so the woman wasn't convicted and the
case was filed.
[luoghimisteriosi]
Infos gathered thanks to :
- Contusu.it
- Galluras.it
- A. Satta.pdf
Alberto La Marmora and William Henry Smith were the first to report this primitive
practice of euthanasia in Sardinia in their travel journals, in the early 19th century.
___
* [the sentence "su ohi de s'accabadora" means "the last lament of the dying"].
The pigeons arrived in my granny's village sometime in the eighties.
Nowadays I think there are more pigeons than sheeps, cows and goats all together
and they breed faster than flying rabbits !
I discovered these two chicks in the old granite house's balcony, while doing
the yearly clean up routine - checking the windows still close and fighting back
the ivy which obstinately tries to sneak inside.
I think they were less than one week old.
Three days later, some grey feathers mixed up to the previous yellow...
Last time I went to check their growth, six days later, eyes were wide open and
size had doubled. Good luck chicks !
__________
First, taxi to CdG airport...
Here the french twin towers, from the A3 highway.
(Sleeping tight... maybe a long distance traveler).
In the smocking area.
Welcome on board, G@tto !
...your wardrobe is on the way.
Flying over the Alps and the Côte d'Azur, Nice.
Landing at Cagliari-Elmas airport.
Taxi to Cagliari/road station to catch the last car for SV...
then on the SS125 road, for a 60 km trip to Granny's house...
once more !
__________
I am a gourmet and I am uncompromising on cooking matters. 
Only when in Italy, I dare
to order pasta in restaurants
and pasta with lobster only
in restaurants near the sea.
So this summer I did it...
but the unbelievable happened !
Look at this lobster and bavette dish... you can see at once it's uneatable :
- overcooked bavette,
- tomato sauce looking boiled,
- and the lobster, poor sea's queen !
they definitely buried it under a shroud of braised tomatoes !
Amen.
But, after all, Sardinia isn't (or wasn't) a fishers' island and local traditional gastronomy
rather turns around roasted meat.
I won't tell the restaurant name, because they made a commercial 'gesture', offering
a fruit salade with lemon sorbet and even a home made lemoncello.
____
... I've recorded around the south-east coast for PPG's friends !
(G@ttoGiallo/2008 - use the menu for more)
* Look here for beaches & other places.
... G@ttoGiallo of course !
and back to PPG with this...
Monte Nai
Capo Ferrato
(also published by "A Photo a Day from Planet Earth").
Just clear water at Cala Pira
Feraxi beach
Nice places, isn't it ?
Maybe you'd like to go there and see by yourselves next summer, uh ?
Cheerio !
_____________________________________________________
Early 2009/Update > The Capo Ferrato's picture has been stolen
by a guy named Moses Francis - together with other authors' pics
for an illegal use on his site Flickrville.
_____________________________________________________
Monte Narba is the site of an old mine's district (silver ore) in south/east Sardinia,
Sarrabus' hills, Italy.
Closed down and deserted for too many years - it was operating mostly from 17th
to the beginning of 19th century. it will probably come back to life one of these days
as a... well, let's wait and see.
Let me show you the place... (slideshow)
(by G@ttoGiallo)
Geological map of the district & site map
(Thanks to "Mines of Sardinia" and its minetramps)Come on ! follow G@ttoGiallo's footsteps on Sardinian sands !
