DRAGON FUEL: PASTA & PRIDE 

By Rita Giordano 
Philadelphia Inquirer Staff Writer 
Friday, August 3, 2001
(Excerpted) 

If company's coming, you cook. It's an Italian no-brainer.

So when Jody Della Barba heard that a team from Italy was coming here to 
compete in this week's World Dragon Boat Racing Championships, she did what 
she had to - volunteered her South Philadelphia home and got going on the 
menu:

Pasta (and plenty of it), sausage, chicken, stuffed peppers, bread, 
everything needed for an intimate little dinner.

For, say, 65.  No problem.

"To me, it would be weird not to do it," said Della Barba, who works as a 
secretary for a city judge and heads the Girard Estate Area Residents. "When 
you go to Italy, they're always so good, so hospitable."

She's right: It's the Philadelphia region's turn to play host. And ordinary 
Joes and business people are stepping up big time to extend a multicultural 
welcome to 2,000 athletes from 15 countries and other parts of the United 
States. 

In some cases, those coming forward belong to local ethnic communities 
embracing visitors from their or their families' homelands. 

There are so many international guests that it's got people almost giddy. The 
organizers also got a great response - and a lesson in the region's diversity 
- from the many and varied artists and performers who agreed to provide 
riverside entertainment this weekend. Fairmount Park Commission staffers say 
they can't keep up with the calls from those offering to be goodwill 
ambassadors.I'm probably going to have 400 or 500," said Toni Nash, director 
of the commission's Office of Community Affairs and Special Projects.

Many callers want to come the aid of their former countrymen, she said. Case 
in point:... Russia, South African, Irish, Cambodian, Canada, Hungary, 
Poland, Macao, Taipei, Vietnam, China,Cambodia, Philipines.... 

And then there are the Italians.

Granted, dragon boats may not be as well known in Italian circles as bocci, 
but people still have to eat. And so when Dante Mattioni, attorney for the 
local Italian Consul General, began reaching out to friends, including Della 
Barba, the help poured forth.

Philadelphia restaurants La Vigna, Momma Maria and Panorama and Celebrations, 
a Bensalem caterer, agreed to take turns feeding the Italian delegation.

Della Barba's up tomorrow. When she and her husband, Victor, open their home, 
it will include the backyard, the front and the sides; they figure they'll 
need all the space they can get.

Plus, they got a permit to close their street. And not one neighbor minded, 
Della Barba said.

Italian merchants - including Esposito's Meats, DiBruno's House of Cheese, 
Giordano's produce, Termini's and Lanci's bakeries - have come through, too, 
with food.

And Italian American businesspeople and community leaders put up the cash.

Now it's up to Della Barba to cook. And she's undaunted.

"I had a party for my daughter in October, an engagement party," she said. "I 
had 160."

Still, all this...presents a dilemma: Whom do you root for?

Mattioni, the lawyer, is pulling for the Italians, of course, but frets that 
they won't have long to get acclimated.

"Our group is going to have to do it on courage," he said, "and pasta."
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Rita Giordano's e-mail address is rgiordano@phillynews.com.