TalTech New Year’s Stories: Mountain hiking on the first day of the year
Simone Pizzagalli, from Italy. Early stage researcher and PhD candidate at the Department of Mechanical Engineering.
The time around New Year’s is perfect to reflect about the events of previous year, set goals and resolutions for the next, and simply enjoy some free time with a good food in a good company. Here is how TalTech international researchers and employees are doing it.
My typical New Year
“I usually celebrate New Year with family or friends. Nothing really special about it, just a lot of food and drinks. Some friends used to go to the cinema. I did for a couple of years too. I’m not really obsessed about this celebration as many people in my country are. A sort of dinner/party is organized at someone’s place at the last minute: lots of fun, games and maybe some firework on the street.
Another thing I like to do on the 1st day of the year is mountain hiking. Nobody is around and everything is really quiet and silent.”
Typical New Year in Italy
“I might sound repetitive, but everything usually focuses on eating and drinking a lot. Fireworks are also quite typical, more food and drinks and, depending on the region, more fireworks and maybe some crazy thing like throwing old stuff from the window or the balcony. Literally the old year goes out of the window. I actually never saw it. It might even be a myth. Only once, in Rome, there were indeed objects falling from somewhere and smashing on the street. But I had too many drinks to remember what they were. One thing that usually people eat are lentils and generally around midnight. They say it brings good luck or money.”
A New Year to remember
“There is a funny story about a particular New Year celebration. It was, I think, 2006 or 2007 I don’t remember precisely. We went for dinner at a friend’s place. I was a Master’s student in The Netherlands at that time. We were a well-sorted group of German, Iranian, Macedonian, Chinese and Italian friends and classmates. As usual we organized a common dinner with food from every country. Another Italian guy joined, with his Korean girlfriend. They were not really friends of anyone in the group. Somehow, they self-invited themselves to the dinner based on some common acquaintances.
At the end of the story we had dinner, some drinks and started eating dessert. The Italian guy had brought a cake. The thing is that he cooked it, let’s say, with some special ingredient which is perfectly legal in Holland, and he did not tell anyone about that. The evening ended up kind of funny but terribly wrong with only two persons surviving the cake just because they were in the kitchen while everyone else had taken a second or third slice. Including myself.”
Your 2020
“I would not say anything about this year. What happened in 2020 stays in 2020. Let’s hope it is going to end fast.”
How do you plan to celebrate this New Year?
“At home and with close relatives as Covid restrictions are quite tough in Italy.”
Goals and resolutions for 2021
“I don’t want to think about any resolution for the coming year. Everything is somehow always going differently than planned both in a positive and negative way. I’ll just try to survive.”
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