Focaccia Blues vs McDonald’s

There is a movie in Italy at the moment, called “Focaccia blues”. It tells the true story or a baker, Luca Digesù, from Altamura, who was not frighten when, some years ago, in his delightful village in the Murgia region, near Bari, the colossus of big distribution, McDonald’s, finally arrived. He challenged the very powerful fast food multination company with the only weapons he had: the art of bread and focaccia making or, in other words, with baked pizza with tomato, extra virgin olive and oregano. He won, forcing the defeated colossus of repetitiveness and homologation to close and to withdraw from Altamura. The baker victory is the victory of land and of local identity that is expressed through the people that works respecting its own origins, its history and traditions. Who love its land is bearer of these values and he is not ready to barter or sell them at low cost for any reason. He is not influenced by external influences because he knows that this would mean to put at risk his own identity. Only who loves his land and respects his traditions is able to get the best from other territories without corrupting them. But only admire them. The colossus McDonald’s, on the contrary, doesn’t mind these things, ‘cause it is only busy in making money, and to use this money to destroy who hinders its way. Luca was one of the latter; but he won. So, he was able to drive McDonald’s out his Altamura and to inspire a movie, too. Our wish is that movie could make many people think about this story, in particular, all that people that, day by day, doesn’t respect its identity, and destroy the unique true good we have: the land.
by Pasquale Di Lena 06 July 2009 TN 6 Year 1