Friday, September 4 – Build me a Wall
Before I go any further, I should talk about the Murabilia home base city of Lucca.
This Tuscan town, located about one hour from the coast, is known as the walled city. Lucca’s wall project, which is over four miles in length and 90’ thick, was built to keep out undesirables from the nearby Julius Caeser established, Republic of Florence. The wall project began in 1504, and was completed a mere 144 years later…and you probably thought Trumps’ wall along the Mexican border was taking a long time. The modern Renaissance era wall that exists today actually replaced an earlier Roman wall, from 180 AD. Outside the wall is a waterway, which can be used to flood the area, creating a moat, thereby making it even more difficult for invaders to penetrate.
The current wall is constructed of rocks, bricks, and soil. Today, the top of the wall is home to a massive tree allee, and is used as a walking/jogging trail, and to host public events like the Murabilia Garden Festival.
The wall contains six gates into the city, now used for traffic, and eleven bulwarks, which were designed for defensive military purposes. Naturalized in the cracks of the wall are an array of dryland ferns, and an abundance of capers (Capparis spinosa). Many of the caper plants are well over 50 years of age. Although these are thought to be a Mediterranean native, since they have been grown here so long, it turns out that they may actually have an Asian origin.
Lucca features and array of Medieval, Romanesque, and Renaissance architecture. I’m not going to pretend that I have any idea what these buildings are, but I know that they are darn old. The late composer/opera maven, Giacomo Puccini ( La bohème (1896), Tosca (1900), and Madama Butterfly (1904), is a Lucca native, so he is honored throughout the city.
Today is the first day of the Murabilia Festival, which is held on top of the giant wall. Our day began at 9am as we met the rest of the expert judging teams, which came from around the world. The judging was quite different from anything which I’d been involved in before. Our task was to judge the nursery booths who were vending at the show. The judging was divided into three teams; one for woody plants, one for perennial plants, and one for house plants. The problem was that many of the vendors sold more than one category of plant, so deciding which category a nursery belonged was at best random.
The judging took over four hours, primarily because it involved quite a bit of socializing with the vendors, who were strangely, able to be present, and converse with the judges…something that would never be allowed in the US. Our judging panel for perennials, consisted of Sue Wynn-Jones of Crug Farms in Wales, Rosie Atkinson of the UK, and Razvan Chisu, a Transylvania native, and now Social Media specialist for the Trees and Shrubs On-line project.
As the temperature rose to 94 degrees with 70% humidity, the need for moisture breaks rose significantly. Then, we had to stop mid-judging, for a long-winded introduction to the festival, by everyone who was even remotely involved with the show. As it turns out, it’s quite common in Italy, for everyone involved in a project to be given their two minutes of fame, to drone on about the event.
Instead of hot tub booths like in the US, non-plant booths were selling food stuffs, including a staggering array of cheeses, locally cured meats, pizza, and of course, plenty of alcohol. Unlike in the US, when you order coffee, here, the cup comes with only ½” of liquid. Although I didn’t indulge, a full cup of this is reportedly able to propel you into low Earth orbit, at least as high as Elon’s Starlink satellites.
Part 6 coming tomorrow!