The air is heavy with passion. Languages and accents are colliding with each other as they fall from lips. Drumming is occurring and it is so loud that I can feel my heartbeat pulsing in my ears. Tapestries and blankets hang, busy with distracting patterns and colors. And in the midst of the noise, the piercing energy and deafening excitement, I notice the uncommon silence of the Pomodoro Regina di Torre Canne. Long red dresses with intricate designs clothe the women who sit, silently, weaving string like a paintbrush through fluffy white cotton.
As I shake the hand of Anella, the only lady at the table able to speak with me in english, I notice the roughness of her palms. The thick calluses earned from years on the job. Anella wears a similar dress as the other women but she wears a different attitude. She looks around age 25 and as she begins telling me the story of her families business and heritage, I notice a kind of pride and gratefulness in the way she speaks. Her words flow with surety, she knows her heritage well. This company means the world to her.
In this culture, women are born into the production of regina's, a local tomato. These tomatoes are grown in costal areas. The harvesting season for regina's begins in July and lasts roughly for the entirety of that month. While a large part of the tomatoes produced during this time are sold, another portion of the harvest is produced in order to months later be thread with cotton.
When a woman is born in this area, the certainty of becoming part of the harvesting process for regina's leaves no room for considering other options. It is a custom. It is deeply woven into the culture. While gender roles are changing in the world around, the change comes much slower here, as it must first pierce through generations of family tradition and history.
The richness of the regina tomato is just a glimpse at the richness of the culture in which they were developed. In addition to the vibrant red dresses the women wear and the loud patterns which line the trims of the dresses, the culture includes a different kind of vibrancy and patience in their practice that is undeniable. Apulian women spend hours tying bundles of tomatoes together to for later consumption.
Much of what is visible through the Apulian women and their work with tomatoes can be translated into a metaphor for their lives. While many modern American women are given an immense freedom with their career paths and futures, these Apulian women remain locked in a heritage that feels almost impossible to break the barriers between tradition and progressing into a new era.
Culture tells us being a women means beauty, elegance, femininity, compliance. I love the way these Apulian women do their work. With strength and dignity and a quiet loudness that is undeniable. I love the way these Apulian women wear red and yellow and other vibrant colors that mesmerize your eyes. I love the way these women speak sweetly to each other, hum softly amongst one another and show the whole world that they are more then what it might think just by looking at them. That they aren't just sitting back and accepting a lack of progression. That they are embracing the beauty of their culture and still redefining what it means to be a woman in even the slightest ways.
