A family making its own wine at their countryside home on September 25, 2021 in the countryside between Locorotondo and Cisternino, Italy. The Itria valley, famous for its traditional wine harvest, olive groves and ancient stone houses known as trulli is a UNESCO heritage site.
As summer comes to Puglia, in South Italy, increasing numbers of dead locusts can be found in the countryside. Gigantic swarms of these insects are currently wrecking havoc from East Africa to India and even Sardinia in what is quickly becoming a global crisis, and in the midst of a serious drought, the main trigger for this pest, farmers in the Mediterranean region are getting nervous.
According to a recent report by the Polytechnic of Turin, if the current mindset on dealing with the Coronavirus pandemic persists, in the near future Italy might need millions of disposable, single-use breathing masks per month. We all know very well where these masks will go after being used once, and since wearing them might become compulsory at work, in shops, on public transport and even in the streets of our cities, we must learn how to make our own, re-usable masks, unless we want to discharge on Mother Nature the cost of yet another one of our collective delusions.
Cisternino – 7th of May, 2020.
At Il Fico Rosso, Cisternino.