Random Though #4

This one is a little more serious than the other random thoughts.

I am currently taking a class titled Mafia, Murder, Mystery: A look a the history of the Sicilian Mafia. It is an immensely interesting class for a number of reasons. First of all my professor, an Italian born American who teaches in Perugia, has an ex-husband who is in the anti-mafia task force in the Sicilian Carabinieri (Carabinieri is equivalent to military police). So already she comes into the course with some great insider knowledge. Secondly, we are using both American and Italian films to study the gang. I am excited to see how Italian films capture mafiosi and mafia families.

But the most important reason why this class is so interesting to me is because I really do not know how to feel every time I step out of class. For years my mother has chastised my brothers and I for watching and enjoying films like The Godfather and Goodfellas. These films are critically acclaimed and to this day very popular, despite being 20 to 40 years old. But my mother has a point; those mafia films glamorize a completely destructive lifestyle. The men in these stories have no regard for the basic human right to life, and the women live in fear of their husbands. It truly is a sad commentary on people trapped in a world of violence.

Sometimes while I am in class I think to myself about how amazing the level of influence a small island like Sicily has on the world. The mafia has done so much worldwide. It can give one a sense of pride. I think to myself," I am from there, my people did this, they changed the world."

And then the next sentence of that idea comes crashing out of the sky. Oh they have changed the world. They have made it worse. They breed fear and death and violence. That is not something to be proud of.

I had a simple assignment last week. My class was told to read the introduction of a book titled "Cosa Nostra" by John Dickie; a book that has been referred to as the greatest collection of mafia history. After reading the introduction we were to write a simple paragraph on our thoughts regarding the introduction. I made the following comparison: "I do not know how I feel about learning about the mafia yet. It is like hearing your recent ancestors come from a great warrior nation full of cannibals." It would be hard to be proud of the military conquests of said people when you know their history is stained with the compulsive desire for the taste of human flesh.

I will mention something happier now! I leave for Munich tomorrow morning and I am taking the train the whole way there. This is the view I expect:




BE JEALOUS