The Beer festival at Castelnuovo is held every year and although we hadn’t been for over two years, although Richard reminded me it is more like five years ago! – (doesn’t time fly), the other night a small group of us set off for what we thought would be a night of beer and festivities, like in the good old days.
Now, “am I turning into one of those grumpy old women”, I ask myself. You know, one of those women who relish in the past often caught quoting “the good ole days”.
We recounted the scene of the last time that we went, the large beer tent identical to those that would appear at the October Festival in Germany later in the year, the orchestra all clad in their lederhosen trousers and outfits encouraging all of us reprobates to raise our steins, sing, cheer and drink.
The festival I remember was a crazy mixture of food, drinks (and lots more drinks), bad but fun music and lots of laughter and frivolity, united in having a good time the golden oldies (i.e. me) and the youngsters, standing on tables, laughing and dancing the night away.
I do have to stop and keep asking myself, “is it me that has changed?” Perhaps I am turning into an old lady. But I do have to say that I respond to this statement with a resounding “NO”. Things are changing around us and I would say not always for the better.
I have to say The Beer Festival was certainly one of them. Perhaps we just went on the wrong night although we thought that Friday night would have been the most popular and best night of the weekend. How wrong were we!
When we arrived at around 9.30pm we were surprised at how few people there were, in years gone by it would have been heaving, but we put it down to it being early yet and more would arrive later in the evening.
With all of the empty tables our party of five was able to sit right at the front, right in front of the orchestra (or rather unlike the last time, the band of five, whom we were convinced were infact, Mum, Dad, Son and Uncle) were comparably small and consisted of Mum on electric keyboard holding the show, Son on drums and Dad and Uncle on trumpets. Of course, we have no proof of this its just how we labeled them.
Especially after the drummer walked off in a strop, followed closely by the trumpeter (Dad), who returned talked to Mum who also went off stage and for at least 15 minutes we were all left in stunned silence, before Mum returned and did a solo stint. Bizzare!
Whilst settling down to eat our “Stinco and Chips” the group played the same three oomph – pah songs over and over again. The young man on the drums was obviously bored as our source of entertainment became the funny faces he was pulling and the rolling of his eyes, usually in opposite directions.
At one stage the two men we labeled them Dad and Uncle took to the floor with their trumpets; they then took two strange contraptions that they stuck on the end of the trumpets after dipping in a bowl of…. I was almost impressed as I thought they were going to blow bubbles whilst playing a tune, no it wasn’t soapy water it was petrol, which they then set light to and gyrated around the floor with this thing on the end of their trumpets on fire.
We all looked at each other it was a strange floor show, but the best was yet to come when the dance troop entered the room from one of the side entrances, first we heard the German Marching tune, not really knowing what was going to happen and it was only by chance that we glanced in the right direction. There were ten young men and ten young girls, beautifully dressed, the girls on the boys arms but as they marched in through the tent to the center aisle and up to the stage, the girls smiled uncomfortably and all of the men where marching and saluting, actually performing the Hitler Salute. Hand to the shoulder and then flicked out to the side in time to the music.
Now we all looked at each other in stunned silence and one word flew into all of our minds, “Surreal”, it was a strange but surreal moment. We couldn’t help but to snigger more from embarrassment or because we felt a tad uncomfortable.
The night didn’t end there though, it continued through a formal presentation of presentations, for what we have no idea. As the announcements were in German mixed with Italian, but none of us could make hide nor hair of what was happening. The marching music would commence a member of the group or at one stage the local syndicate was asked to wait at the side of the allocated dance floor, two of the girls would march towards them, then one either side would march them back to the stage to receive their medal.
Then the dance troop set to do their act not all of the girls were petite infact some where quite large and they went through a mixture of rock and roll songs, and made an attempt to keep in time with the music, whilst one of the smaller girls was constantly dropped, or they fell onto the floor and the highlight for the men of the whole performance was the times the girls flashed their frilly knickers.
There was a little heart fluttering moment as someone decided to liven up the evening and threw a banger near our table, it exploded and caught us all by surprise, the second less so.
The evening didn’t get any better, no one else turned up infact by about 10.30pm there was only us and a handful of others left, the main crowd consisted of the dancers and staff. It was now time to leave, so we tried the White Night at Piazza Fiat in Barga.
There was certainly more life there, it was packed however we didn’t stay very long, we certainly felt our age here as there were a bevy of youngsters, it was more like a kindergarden. Although I have to say they were all enjoying the music and the atmosphere was great.
It was a strange evening.
Article by Sensone
