,,They are dancing on the table in the other room’’, my girlfriend said. I couldn’t believe it but when I went to take a look I saw a stable full of people that were singing, screaming and dancing to the brisk tunes of traditional Slovenian Oberkrainer music. Osmice (eights) is much more than a culinary festival, it’s a party on the farm.
Back in the days that Slovenia was still part of the Habsburg Monarchy empress Maria Teresa only allowed farmers to sell their surpluses of wine and meats eight days a year. Although times have changed the tradition survived in the region around Trieste. Some farms still open their doors to the public for eight days and serve their homemade wines and meats.
After discovering the Kras-region by bike on saturday, we drove by car to the top of a hill close to the town of Sezana, at a stone’s throw from the Italian border. Through a winding narrow road we reached a farm that was surrounded by parked cars. Inside there were rows of long tables along which people drank from big unlabelled bottles of wine and ate from plates full of prosciutto and other homemade meats and cheeses.
The mood already seemed good when we sat at the only table that was still available. But things really started to get ecstatic after the band made its entrance a good half hour later. While I set my teeth in the sausage of the main dish, I heard the sounds of people going out of their mind in the adjacent stable. When I stood up to take a look, I also turned out to be quite an eye catcher. I saw people staring at my legs which were dressed in tights. I forget to bring my jeans and had to walk around my cycling pants. But on a farm where wine was consumed as water on a summer day and where the people were dancing on tables I fortunately wasn’t that much out of the ordinary with ‘sexy’ outfit.
A little taste of Osmice (around 6 pm):
ljubljanees.com 