The feast of San Giovanni in Oneglia

If you grew up in Oneglia, San Giovanni is not, first of all, a religious feast. It is the day school ended and summer began.

It falls on June 24th, and it is the feast of the patron saint. Around here, though, nobody calls it that: we say Ineja, the name Oneglia has always given it. This year is the forty-sixth edition, running from June 19th to 29th, eleven full days, with the heart of it all down at the port, between Banchina Aicardi and Calata Cuneo.

In those days the port changes its face. There is MercantIneja, the market that opens in the afternoon and runs late, with stallholders from half of Italy. There are concerts and shows every evening, things for the children, even a film screened in the square. And there is the race, "La Zucchetta di San Giovanni", winding through the old town and the cycle path. But if I had to tell you one single thing to do, it would be another: eat at the stalls.

It is called Ineja Food, and the kitchen is run by the volunteers of the Committee. Don't expect anything staged: it is the most honest way I know to taste the cooking of this place, because it is made by the people of Oneglia, for the people of Oneglia. You wander among the stalls and you find stoccafisso all'onegliese, brandacujun, fish zemin, fried squid, fried anchovies, minestrone, cundiun. Every evening there is a dish dedicated to a local product. You take a plate, a craft beer, and you sit down with the port in front of you. (About stoccafisso and brandacujun, sooner or later, I will have to tell you properly: they deserve a chapter of their own.)

The port of Oneglia and its fishing boats, where the festival's fish comes from.

The 24th, the patron saint's day, has a different rhythm. In the late afternoon there are the Solemn Vespers, and at 6.30 pm the procession sets out and crosses the centre of Oneglia. I have known that procession forever: Franco Blengini, the baker I told you about, walked in it for years, a few steps from his bakery in Piazza San Giovanni. In Oneglia the saint, the bread and the people hold together like this.

The church of San Giovanni Battista, on the square in Oneglia.

But the San Giovanni I carry in my heart is the one from my school days.

Back then Calata Cuneo, for ten months a year, was deserted. In the evening we kids went to the other side, to the marina of Porto Maurizio, where all the life was. After all, between Oneglia and Porto there is an old rivalry: two different towns, divided by the Impero stream, that Mussolini fused into one in 1923 and named Imperia, after that very stream that separates them. The people of Porto still make the joke: the only beautiful thing about Oneglia is the view of Porto Maurizio.

On San Giovanni, though, the tune changed. For those few days Oneglia woke up, the quay filled with lights and stalls and the smell of frying that followed you all along the port, and the place to be became, at last, ours. A small revenge, once a year.

And then there was the thing that, as a boy, mattered most of all. San Giovanni fell with the end of school, and it was the first time we were allowed out in the evening on a weekday. During the year you could only go out at the weekend, because the next day there were lessons; the patron saint's feast was the green light. School ended, summer began, and you realised it right there, in the middle of the crowd, one evening in late June, with the feeling of three whole months ahead and nothing to do but live them.

The moment we all waited for, though, came at night. Around eleven the fireworks begin to rise from the sea, in front of the port, and thousands of people fill the quay with their faces turned up. That is where San Giovanni is at its best: you don't just watch the fireworks, you see them twice, in the sky and mirrored on the water. For a few minutes the whole of Oneglia stands still, looking at the same thing.

A tip from someone who grew up here: don't arrive at the last minute. On the night of the 24th the port fills up, and the good spots on the quay go to those who come early. Take a stroll among the stalls, eat without rushing, and when the crowd starts pressing towards the water you know it won't be long.

Much has changed today. Calata Cuneo is no longer deserted: it is full of bars and restaurants, alive all year round, and it has become one of the loveliest places to stop in the evening. The festival has grown too. But on the night of the 24th, when the fireworks open over the sea and the port is left open-mouthed, Oneglia goes back to being the one from before.

Calata Cuneo in the evening, alive with people and cafés, in Oneglia.

If you are here these days, look no further. Go down to the quay around eleven, grab something from Ineja Food, and look up. That is how, in these parts, summer begins.