drinks

You can think of modern bowling as a distant cousin of bocce. The Latin word bottia (ball) is the root of the Italian word boccia or bocce. During a game a ball is either rolled or tossed underhanded down a long lane with the aim of coming to rest near a smaller target ball called a pallino or boccino. Many people, such as Galileo and DaVinci, played bocce during the Renaissance, seeing its benefits to mind and body. It was also played by emperors, admirals, generals, poets, sculptors and scientists. Bocce was also exported to many countries by Italian migrants, and remains popular with bocce courts and clubs throughout the world. No one really knows how old bocce is. There were stone balls found in Turkey that date to 9,000 B.C. Some say bocce dates back to ancient Egypt (5,200 B.C.), but others argue that Greece was its birthplace around 600 B.C. When you really think about the simplest game a child can play – tossing a stone – you might think of bocce as the very first game man ever played. Even the child’s game of Marbles is based on bocce. Source: orderisda.org/culture/sports/italian-sport-the-history-of...

Doing it with a style.

The Lathouras family's Cafe Royal was just down the road at number 41, and opened soon after brothers Mick, Mark, Jim and Jack emigrated from Turkey and arrived in Bundaberg about 1920. The brothers installed silky oak tables and chairs, refrigeration and a marble soda fountain for making ice-cream sodas, and they imported crockery from England that was embossed with their own Lathouras Brothers logo. As business improved, they opened a second cafe, called the Elite Cafe, with mirror-back bars, glass shelves holding glasses and ice-cream dishes, and paintings of their ice-creams and drinks on the mirrors. The menu in those days was mainly light refreshments, such as ham and eggs, toasted sandwiches, fresh fruit, and tea and coffee, as well as ice cream sodas, malted milks and milkshakes. Later the menu grew, with grills, roasts of the day, fish and chips, casseroles, soups and three-course meals. As the brothers started to get married and have families, the running of the cafes changed hands over the years, with Jack's sons George and Theo teaming up with Mick's brother-in-law, Con Catimergis, to take over the Elite in 1957. Mark was able to buy the freehold of the Cafe Royal and an old theatre building at the rear - facing Woongarra St - the Queen's Theatre. George Lathouras later left the Elite and moved to Brisbane, leaving Theo and Con Catimergis to run the business. When Con died, Theo took over and ran it on his own until its closure. Source: www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/bundaberg/the-oldf...