Wednesday, November 7, 2007

Welcome to the Town Tour

Thank you for being patient and waiting for our town tour; our human was out of town and the computer was off. We would like to thank our friends Momo the cat, Momo the dog, Sassy, Asta, Captain Jack and Dante for sticking around to join us on the tour. We would also like to invite you, the reader, along for the walk.

We live in a quiet, little town called Fusignano (pronounced Foo- see- nyah-no), we call it Fusi for short. It is a good, size town, not too big and not too small. Fusi is located in Emilia Romagna in the province of Ravenna. There are around 8,000 humans living here and countless more animals. Nothing much exciting happens in Fusi, but the people are friendly and life is tranquil.

The tour starts at our house. We live in a nice home at the end of quiet street that is lined with trees. Our house is the last one on the street and it is bordered by a small river called the Senio.

Are you ready for a walk into town?


This is our street, you can see that autumn is in full swing here. Soon the trees will be bare and then the fog will arrive. Late fall and winter can be very foggy in this part of Italy. In fact, this area (near the Delta Po region) is quiet famous for the fog. We think it is pretty, of course we always enjoy it from the warmth and comfort of our home. Are you getting tired? Don't worry, the town center is just a few blocks away.


This is our main square, called a piazza in Italian. The town piazza is a very important part of Italian life; you could say it is the heart of the town. Here you will always find people gathered either talking business or just gossiping. In the summer months there are concerts and after midnight mass, on Christmas eve, there is a party complete with live music, a bonfire and plenty of spiced, hot wine.

This small church was almost destroyed during world war two. In fact, most of our town was bombed as it was the scene of the front for four moths during the winter of 1945. When the allies liberated Fusignano that spring, there were only few building left and most the historical sites were gone. This church is now used as a shrine to the local fallen Italian soldiers. You could say this little church is the symbol of the town. Shall we hop on the steps for a photo? Everyone say cheese....



Let's continue on our tour. To the left is one of the few prewar buildings that survived. It is a private residence; some lucky people and their lucky pets get to live inside of it.



Up on the right another one of the few old building left in Fusi. It once was the town hospital, but now half of it is a pharmacy and the other half is an art museum. Our human male born here one wintry night many years ago.

We don't know about you guys, but all of this walking is making us thirsty. Are you ready to stop and rest your paws awhile? Let's stop off at a cafe to grab a drink and a snack. Cafes are a very important part of Italian life, there seems to be one (or more) on every block. Go inside anytime of the day and you almost surely find someone stopping in for a quick drink (usually some sort of coffee drink). This one is one of our favorite cafes, Bar Republica. We like this bar because this building is also another that survived the war. The facade of the building hasn't been touched since and, if you closely, you can still see bullet holes in it to this day.

Can we get you a cappuccino, espresso, or cafe latte? Who wants a snack? Have a seat and we will take care of everything. It is fun to just sit outside on a nice day and watch the traffic. How about another picture? CHEESE!


Did you see what is across the street? That is an authentic English telephone box! You are probably curious to know what an English telephone box is doing in Italy. Well, Fusiganno has a sister city on England and years ago they gave the telephone box to the town as a gift and as a sign of their friendship. It really works! Why don't we see if we can all fit inside at the same time!
Well, it is getting late so we had better get back home.

We had a great time showing our friends around our home. We have to come to love it here and hope that you all have enjoyed your visit.

12 comments:

Sassy Kat said...

What a wonderful tour we had of your town. I am still laughing about us all in the phone booth. I still have a slight hurt on my head from someone's paw that was ontop of me. My favorite part was the cafe, it was a nice view of the street from our chairs.

Mr. Hendrix said...

what a wonderful tour you gave! i felt like i was there. what a great cafe!

your home is lovely and your town looks like a great place to walk thru. i wish we had more walking places here in the US.

i'm indoor only so i'm ok just being in my house, but i know my beans would like to be able to walk to the store and stuff.

The Cat Realm said...

I absolutely love the pictures! Especially all the tour participants ion the telephone booth....

Angel MoMo and Charlotte said...

Thanks for a wonderful tour of your town. I enjoyed it immensely. Love the cafe and that mad cramp into the phone booth. SS did it with her friends at Oxford - at their sizes! Sometimes you wonder at these grad students and their mentality.

Asta said...

Roscoe and Opus!
Thank you so vewy much!!!
I had the best time!
I love the piazzas and the houses and the chuwches and the food! it was twuly pawsome I can't thank you enough! you live in a bootiful place I hope to come back with my pawents sometime!
smoochie kisses
Asta

Juno said...

Opus and Roscoe! :)
I have to keep that group shot in my album. Unfortunately I am not able to see the phone booth pic but hopefully later.

Thank you so much again for this wonderful tour in your bootiful town. Everything, I mean EVERYTHING looks great in your town. Your home, road, church...everything is so bootiful. I have to visit you again sometime soon!

Momo xoxo

Juno said...

I can see the second group shot and the phone booth shot now!! I am so glad!!!! :) The booth photo is hilarious!!! I have to keep all these photos!

Momo xoxo

Texas Espresso said...

Loved the tour! Looks like a nice town =) ya'll are very good tour guides - you should help your human with her business!

Leslie said...

Great post!

Captain Jack and Sir Dante said...

The tour was so much fun! Thanks for inviting us - we loved learning more about your town!

Team Tabby said...

Thanks so much for the guided tour of Fusi, we loved it. Very charming place. Mom would love a coffee at the cafe and we would both love to go in that phone booth sometime.

Moe & Mindy

Just Ducky said...

Pretty little town. Mum got out the map thingy and look up where you lived. Now she knows better where you are.