San Paolo di Civitate #2

Pepe's Vineyard

I certainly don't want to get bogged down in the semantics of the vintner for that would be an oddly dissonant treatment of Pepe's vineyard. You see, when about 90% of a vineyard's produce is consumed by the family and family friends, money becomes an essentially redundant motivation. This naturally creates better wine. 
    I do however feel it necessary to give a brief overview of how I earned my keep whilst living in San Paolo. Indeed, I should point out that I was paid largely in the wine I helped make. This in turn transposes it into the ichor that coursed through my veins throughout my stay. Bacchus was my boss, and a fair and jolly boss he was.

    San Paolo is located in the Apulia region, an area so known for it's viticulture that the Greeks called it 'Oenotria', that is 'the land of wine.' During the last twenty years or so,  modernisation has swept through Southern Italian Vineyards and improved farming methods and output. Gladly, Pepe's Vineyard has thus far remained out of the reach of modernisation's cold hand. Farming methods were traditional, tiresome and absolutely brilliant.

Now Pepe (above) is my great uncle. He retired about twenty years ago and works everyday on his vineyard only to make sure his family have wine with dinner every night. Such a motivation ensures his whole life is centered around wine, food and family. And whilst I was there I started to subscribe to values of this simple but ultimately rewarding lifestyle. To drink the wine that you have helped create is an incredibly edifying experience. I really couldn't care less if some deem it anachronistic. Certainly it was hard work, but I'm glad it was. I don't want to get too Jamie Oliver on you, but actually putting the effort in to make something as opposed to just buying it really is incredibly rewarding.
    In the picture above, you'll see Pepe rotivating the soil with an ingenious little invention made from an old bicycle. I would spend all day with this bicycle (it never really got a name) churning the soil up and down the vineyard. My hands were blistered. My neck was sunburnt. My back developed an ephemeral hunch from stooping under the vines (clearly designed for smaller Italian men). But when we arrived home with a few bottles of red and met Antonietta, (who had been slaving in the kitchen all day her self) we felt we had earned the food. Now I know I'll be accused of androcentrism by speaking so fondly of an overtly patriarchal system. That is not my intention. I'm simply propounding the idea that work and effort and love are the key ingredients to any truly successful meal. And in an age where convenience is encouraged and laziness birthed, I will endeavour never to forget that. I will ensure that work, however it is allocated, will be put in to keeping family dinners at the very center of my day.

D.