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Child's artwork will hang in Italy By MELISSA MARTIN Medford Mayor Lindsay Berryman will take a third-grader's artwork to Italy when she attends opening ceremonies at a truffle festival in Alba next month. Drawn by 8-year-old Jessie Hocking of Medford, the picture of two children standing on the earth with a burnt-orange flowering tree growing from it will hang in Scuola Elementare G. Rodani, a grade school in Alba, Italy. The picture will be presented during Alba's 71st Fiera Del Tartufo D'Alba, a festival that promotes the region's truffles and wines. "You might think a truffle is made of chocolate," Berryman told Grace Christian School students in Medford. "But it's a fungus that grows wild in the forests and is sniffed out by pigs." At a cost of $1,500 per pound for some varieties, the golf-ball-size delicacy is so expensive and rare that it only has to be thinly grated on scrambled eggs, pasta or cheese dishes to yield its famous taste. "It tastes musty and moldy, but it's a strong, pungent flavor," said Judy Morris, a Medford watercolor artist and retired South Medford High art teacher. She's also traveling to Italy for the festival. "It's quite a delicacy." This will be the mayor's first trip to Alba, Medford's sister city for the past 41 years. It's Berryman's vacation, but she will act in her official capacity during the opening ceremonies for the month-long event. She may have to ride a paoli, or donkey, in the festival's parade that draws bigger crowds than Medford's Pear Blossom event. The opening festivities feature folks from the city's seven precincts dressed in Renaissance costumes that depict medieval tales, said Liz Smith, sister city coordinator. "If it rains that weekend they will postpone it to the next weekend," Morris said. "They have such elaborate costumes they don't want to get them wet." But between beautiful costumes, donkey rides and food and wine exhibits, the mayor will offer Italians a view of the world from a third-grader's eyes. A spelling bee champion in first grade, Hocking is a third-grader at Grace Christian School, which has exchanged art with Alba students during a Christmas festival sponsored by an Italian radio station. "It gives students even more pride in their work to realize they are sending their art to another country and representing our country," said Grace Christian art teacher Susan Whipple, an acrylic artist from Jacksonville. "And students are giving their art as a gift to others." Hocking's colorful art was picked out of 75 other third-grade drawings. "When I heard my name called I thought to myself, 'I cannot believe this,' " Hocking said. Whipple gave her students the Alba sister city assignment after a request from the mayor, who has a rotating gallery in her City Hall office. "Children's art is so colorful and warm and inviting," Berryman said. "I look at it when I need something uplifting." Reach reporter Melissa Martin at 776-4497, or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.