Good Friday in Penne

Friday, April 10, 2009. The day starts grey and foggy, which is perhaps proper for this Good Friday, which has been declared a national day of mourning for the earthquake victims. Stone and Figlia have a little lunch at the around-the-corner restaurant, while Jake buys a newspaper and walks the town trying to locate the bus station. Later we all three continue to explore Penne, trying to find out exactly where to buy bus tickets, and discussing the logistics of getting Figlia back to Pescara on Tuesday, dropping off our rental car (which is due back Wednesday), and then getting us to Rome for our flight home a day early, just in case of Italian transportation problems.

All around Penne there had been notices of “Santo Venerdi,” which we took to mean a procession of some sort on Good Friday. Indeed there was. From our terrace we saw people heading to the main piazza so we joined in. The crowd is not as large as we had thought it would be; and it is very quiet. The procession begins with a young man in rather simple vestments carrying a cross. Behind him comes a group of nuns, then two lines of elderly women dressed in black, several men play drums that set the slow marching beat, and then two smartly dressed Italian soldiers in full formal regalia. The crowd is growing by the minute and now the piazza seems completely full of people.

Minutes later, passing under the arch that guards the little street which runs in front of our apartment, comes one of the displays we had seen yesterday in the church: six men carry the crucifixion display on their shoulders like pallbearers. All six wear black hoods with only openings for their eyes. Unlike the procession in Assisi, we can see no one taking pictures and have to take ours somewhat furtively. Next comes, this time quite literally, six more pallbearers; they carry on their shoulders the supine Christ who lies on an elaborately embroidered robe or blanket. Finally, Mary makes her entrance in the gathering darkness, sword still in her heart, in a dark purple and gold robe worthy of Hollywood. The procession stops now and then to push its way through the crowd, and like the procession we saw in Assisi, there are prayers and hymns broadcast over several sets of mobile speakers. (We have subsequently learned that what we saw was “The Procession of the Dead Christ,” and dates back to the 16th century.)

We wait till Mary is out of sight at the far end of the piazza and then go for dinner at our favorite around-the-corner place, Osteria Del Leone, which is great as always. We exit the restaurant to find it is raining rather heavily (as if the heavens are weeping for the earthquake dead?) and we are happy we only have to make a two minute dash to home. In the apartment Stone uses her troubleshooting skills to get the complicated satellite TV to work, and Jake gets to watch some of the Masters Golf Tournament before we all go to sleep for another night of tremor-free sleep.