They're here. I am feeling better about my Italian, as I was able to communicate the problems to Marco who is like a big teddy bear...sometimes cliches are accurate.
And in fact, there is one big problem with the plumbing so I am not an idiot...although I do confess to having a bit of the Howard Hughes aversion to germs.
Something really funny: There was a sign in Italian inside the front door describing what do to with the different types of trash. I struggled for many minutes trying to figure it out. Just now, Anna and I went down to read it. And there was a sign in English right next to it. I have gotten so used to struggling through Italian instructions that I didn't even see the English.
On the washer instructions, it sounded funny to have Anna ask for the libretto...instruction booklet. I had always thought of a libretto in connection with operas. I am reminded of the Zen saying, First enlightenment, then the dishes.
I'm off to school. I must be having a good time when it's fun dealing with plumbing and garbage.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Monday, March 18, 2013
#16—Power Outage...and No Oregon Storm!
Good Morning, All,
I forget what title I promised...but we must pause, as I have had to do, for the particulars of living.
It's 7:35 a.m., and I'm waiting for Anna and the plumber, Marco, who was supposed to come last night. Fortunately the smell that was like an open sewage pit emanating from every opening in the bathroom has subsided.
Marco was supposed to do something about this, the something feeling terrifyingly nebulous on Sunday. I stuffed plastic wrap into the holes where the washer pipes came through and put a plastic baggie over the shower drain. Did I tell you all of this? I am finally on Rome time, but am still a bit foggy in the memory.
Anna is coming to tell me about what to do with the garbage. It was all very Kafkaesque. When I arrived, Signora Stella was most welcoming and told me she would show me everything. What she actually showed me was everything by saying, "This is the washer. I don't know how to do it. The instructions are here." (in Italian, of course)..."We how do you call it...put things in bags...plastico, vetro, carte..." me- "Recycle." S.S.: "Yes, thank you. I do not know what to do with it. You may call Anna." (who does not, I learned yesterday, speak any English whatsoever.)
So Anna is coming to reveal the mystical movement of garbage. In Florence, they just dumped it in bins on the street.
Signora Stella said of Marco, "He is a very good plumber. But he is very big. Do not be afraid. He is very good man. And a very good plumber. Now I am going on the train to see my mother. Anna will also come with the plumber to show you the garbage and answer all your questions. Both will be there right at 8 because you must go to school by 9."
It's 10 to 8. I tried not to drink a lot of coffee, which I could really have used.
Okay, so I live on the Oregon coast. Power outages are routine. However, when it happens in my Rome apartment and Signora Stella does not answer her phone and the fuse box instructions are in Italian...well, OMG.
So I go across the tiny hall and knock. "Chi?" who? Well, I know the word for neighbor but the words across the hall suddenly vanish into the dark of my open door. I repeat the word neighbor. A very small, old, and round woman with no teeth opens the door. Now you must know that a grumpy man from this apartment has twice yelled at me. Why?
The locks in the place are ancient and noisy. The key to my apartment looks like a stage version of any key used by jailers in any Italian opera with jailers. The iron gate at the top of the steps is opened with a small key but locks by itself. The trick, the grumpy man showed me on day one is that you can't close the gate by closing it. You must allow it to close itself by simply letting it go. On the other hand, the door to the street must be slammed but not too hard because it wakes the grumpy old man from his nap and he will come out and yell at you like he did with regard to the iron gate.
So now I am talking to the old woman..."Non C'e' corrente." There is no power. The old woman yells what I have said into her lighted apartment. The grumpy old man appears with his nose now wrapped in a bandage. Did he have it out with another apartment dweller over the noisy doors? "Non c'e' corrente," he says to me as if I have deliberately cut the wires.
He then walks by me, goes to the fuse box inside the door, and with a flourish of the hand reminiscent of David Copperfield flicks a switch. C'e' corrente! I couldn't have been happier...it was as if God had spoken on the first day...it was the first day, wasn't it?
Anyhow, it's now 8:08. Rome time is like what we call ocean time. People get there when they arrive. I will apparently have more time to practice my Italian for...the terrible odor came from here and here and here. The worst was here. It was like an open sewage pit. I do not know how to say that it's like cars in America. The noise never happens when you get to the mechanic...and I am really feeling stupid because I know you don't believe me when I say it was like an open sewage pit. I really feel stupid. You probably think I'm the renter from hell. But honestly it was making me sick to my stomach and dizzy.
Non c'e' corrente.
Perhaps I will be better at the particulars after my two weeks of school. My teacher Marta is very good—young, hip, and patient. My Italian is very bad. I am trying not to feel discouraged and give myself credit for teaching myself over the last two years.
Next we finally begin our tour of the grandeur that is still Roma.
The bells are now ringing like crazy. Today is the Pope's inauguration. I would like to have gone, but I have school. There will be plenty more Pope Happenings.
Oh, yeah, now I sort of remember what today's title was suppose to be My First Day and the Pope's. Stay tuned.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
I forget what title I promised...but we must pause, as I have had to do, for the particulars of living.
It's 7:35 a.m., and I'm waiting for Anna and the plumber, Marco, who was supposed to come last night. Fortunately the smell that was like an open sewage pit emanating from every opening in the bathroom has subsided.
Marco was supposed to do something about this, the something feeling terrifyingly nebulous on Sunday. I stuffed plastic wrap into the holes where the washer pipes came through and put a plastic baggie over the shower drain. Did I tell you all of this? I am finally on Rome time, but am still a bit foggy in the memory.
Anna is coming to tell me about what to do with the garbage. It was all very Kafkaesque. When I arrived, Signora Stella was most welcoming and told me she would show me everything. What she actually showed me was everything by saying, "This is the washer. I don't know how to do it. The instructions are here." (in Italian, of course)..."We how do you call it...put things in bags...plastico, vetro, carte..." me- "Recycle." S.S.: "Yes, thank you. I do not know what to do with it. You may call Anna." (who does not, I learned yesterday, speak any English whatsoever.)
So Anna is coming to reveal the mystical movement of garbage. In Florence, they just dumped it in bins on the street.
Signora Stella said of Marco, "He is a very good plumber. But he is very big. Do not be afraid. He is very good man. And a very good plumber. Now I am going on the train to see my mother. Anna will also come with the plumber to show you the garbage and answer all your questions. Both will be there right at 8 because you must go to school by 9."
It's 10 to 8. I tried not to drink a lot of coffee, which I could really have used.
Okay, so I live on the Oregon coast. Power outages are routine. However, when it happens in my Rome apartment and Signora Stella does not answer her phone and the fuse box instructions are in Italian...well, OMG.
So I go across the tiny hall and knock. "Chi?" who? Well, I know the word for neighbor but the words across the hall suddenly vanish into the dark of my open door. I repeat the word neighbor. A very small, old, and round woman with no teeth opens the door. Now you must know that a grumpy man from this apartment has twice yelled at me. Why?
The locks in the place are ancient and noisy. The key to my apartment looks like a stage version of any key used by jailers in any Italian opera with jailers. The iron gate at the top of the steps is opened with a small key but locks by itself. The trick, the grumpy man showed me on day one is that you can't close the gate by closing it. You must allow it to close itself by simply letting it go. On the other hand, the door to the street must be slammed but not too hard because it wakes the grumpy old man from his nap and he will come out and yell at you like he did with regard to the iron gate.
So now I am talking to the old woman..."Non C'e' corrente." There is no power. The old woman yells what I have said into her lighted apartment. The grumpy old man appears with his nose now wrapped in a bandage. Did he have it out with another apartment dweller over the noisy doors? "Non c'e' corrente," he says to me as if I have deliberately cut the wires.
He then walks by me, goes to the fuse box inside the door, and with a flourish of the hand reminiscent of David Copperfield flicks a switch. C'e' corrente! I couldn't have been happier...it was as if God had spoken on the first day...it was the first day, wasn't it?
Anyhow, it's now 8:08. Rome time is like what we call ocean time. People get there when they arrive. I will apparently have more time to practice my Italian for...the terrible odor came from here and here and here. The worst was here. It was like an open sewage pit. I do not know how to say that it's like cars in America. The noise never happens when you get to the mechanic...and I am really feeling stupid because I know you don't believe me when I say it was like an open sewage pit. I really feel stupid. You probably think I'm the renter from hell. But honestly it was making me sick to my stomach and dizzy.
Non c'e' corrente.
Perhaps I will be better at the particulars after my two weeks of school. My teacher Marta is very good—young, hip, and patient. My Italian is very bad. I am trying not to feel discouraged and give myself credit for teaching myself over the last two years.
Next we finally begin our tour of the grandeur that is still Roma.
The bells are now ringing like crazy. Today is the Pope's inauguration. I would like to have gone, but I have school. There will be plenty more Pope Happenings.
Oh, yeah, now I sort of remember what today's title was suppose to be My First Day and the Pope's. Stay tuned.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Sunday, March 17, 2013
#15—Getting Connected
Sorry about the grammar in the previous posting. I posted before editing in order to save the work, only to find that editing is difficult after posting. Anyway, I tried to go back to sleep. No to. It's 5:57 a.m. so I might as well have some coffee and stay up. I'm not guaranteeing the editing on this one either. It's now 7:19, and I must prepare for school at 8:30. Also, Blog Press won't let me skip a space between paragraphs. Sorry.
Saturday, March 16: My first day in Rome...a half day that seemed like a month:
According to the guide book, the cure for jet lag is exercise, sunlight, and protein. I tried this, thinking that in addition to overcoming the movement through time and space, I could get some groceries and find a wifi hot spot.
The guide book apparently was not taking into account the movement through time and space from a town with 400 full time residents and only one road into the big city of 4000 people to a foreign metropolis of 3 million people where the streets are a maze of diagonal streets. And when the traveler has no sense of direction or map-reading skills, well...
It took me half an hour to get to the grocery store, which I have since learned is two blocks away. At least I now knew enough to weigh my own vegetables and to use the plastic guanti provided when handling the produce. Gloves are so much more civilized than having scores of shoppers pawing over the vegetables and fruits. Good gluten free section. Even bread. Moving on.
Sure I had learned from my mistakes, I took the direct route back to the apartment. This only took me 40 minutes. However, when I was barely 50 yards from the place, I got directions from a cute waiter who also told me how to get to the local wifi hot spot. Except the hot spot would not allow me to use my iPad there. No phone. No iPad. The waiter let me try the restaurant's wifi without buying so much as a cup of coffee. Only moderate luck on the phone, not the iPad.
The waiter then suggested a phone store. The ten minute walk took me just a little over half an hour. The good news is that I am improving my speaking and listening skills with regard to finding my way and discussing technology. I also learned that you don't want to buy water from a tobacco store where you ask directions because a liter bottle will cost you about $5.
I bought a cheap phone and called Verizon. It is a very long story. I'll spare you the entire Theater of the Absurd endeavor...except to say that Vanessa is a saint. I'm mortified now as I recall her kind and calming voice as I was having an out of body experience watching myself after eighteen hours on road and plane shrieking bad words to this poor woman who was merely following a trouble-shooting protocol. She finally decided to connect me to Global so I could talk for free, as I started yelling that was paying $500.00 a minute to the Italian phone company to get this f****** iPhone to work. As I waited for Global, I started shouting at the elevator music, which remained impervious.
To make a long story longer, after two more calls, I finally got Victoria at Global who had me turn on Roaming, which everyone else told me to turn off. She then had me unplug the wifi device here and plug it back in. I had phone and internet and told Victoria to make a wish, that I was going to throw a euro into Trevi Fountain for her.
After emailing my family that I had arrived safely.
I now set out to buy bandaids because I realized at the phone store that my thumb was bleeding on my money pouch.
At the Farmacia, I was looking at the gluten-free pasta...sold in some groceries but in all pharmacies. I learned that "just looking," at least in this Farmacia, is treated as a federal offense. $4.00 for 12 bandaids made of a plastic which tore the skin off the other side of my thumb. $4.00 for paper bandaids at a second Farmacia.
....Wow, it's pouring down rain. The excessive rain is what's causing the smell in my bathroom. It was putrid yesterday as sewage smell backed up from all the holes. I put plastic over the shower drain and stuffed plastic into the hole where the washer is connected. The fan somehow drew the smell into the kitchen through the stove hood. Why did I ever leave Netarts.
I emailed Isabella, as I was unsure how Signora Stella would respond now that she had a bundle of euros from me. Both responded immediately on Sunday morning. The plastic is working, and the plumber is coming tonight. Signora Stella felt so bad that she is taking me out for a glass of vino. She also offered to talk to Polma on the phone if I had trouble communication.
Yes, with my new Italian phone, I made contact on Saturday with Polma Cutuli in Calabria. I am going to meet mia famiglia, 2 aprile. When I said I was coming, Polma started shouting Va bene! Va bene! Va bene!
It was her excitement that made me realize all was going to be well.
That was Saturday afternoon. After all that had transpired, I was exhausted and unable to eat so I took yet another 10 minute walk to Piazza Navona which only took me 20 minutes to find and 30 minutes to find my way back. It was dark by this time...no DST until the 31st. As I stood in the piazza looking at the fountains and everything around me, all I could think of was how big everything is in Rome. Everything. I think it feels even bigger because I'm alone without someone to bring my focus down to a manageable level.
I stopped for gelato and decided to try pistachio. peestahkeeyo in italiano. I had a nice chat with the young woman who complimented me on my italian. I figured that this was a nice note on which to end my first day in Rome. I went back to the apartment to unpack. It was upon getting lost and discovering that I spent that half hour just yards from my apartment that I decided to use my new phone to call Verizon.
I realize that the chronology of this blog is floundering in time and space. Sorry. But that, in a nutshell, was my first day in Rome. Oh yeah in the Piazza Navona, I saw a great T-shirt: Keep Calm / You Are in Rome. I'm glad I didn't buy it because I saw a better one the next day: Stai calmo / Sei a Roma.
Next: First Sunday for Joan and the Pope
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Saturday, March 16: My first day in Rome...a half day that seemed like a month:
According to the guide book, the cure for jet lag is exercise, sunlight, and protein. I tried this, thinking that in addition to overcoming the movement through time and space, I could get some groceries and find a wifi hot spot.
The guide book apparently was not taking into account the movement through time and space from a town with 400 full time residents and only one road into the big city of 4000 people to a foreign metropolis of 3 million people where the streets are a maze of diagonal streets. And when the traveler has no sense of direction or map-reading skills, well...
It took me half an hour to get to the grocery store, which I have since learned is two blocks away. At least I now knew enough to weigh my own vegetables and to use the plastic guanti provided when handling the produce. Gloves are so much more civilized than having scores of shoppers pawing over the vegetables and fruits. Good gluten free section. Even bread. Moving on.
Sure I had learned from my mistakes, I took the direct route back to the apartment. This only took me 40 minutes. However, when I was barely 50 yards from the place, I got directions from a cute waiter who also told me how to get to the local wifi hot spot. Except the hot spot would not allow me to use my iPad there. No phone. No iPad. The waiter let me try the restaurant's wifi without buying so much as a cup of coffee. Only moderate luck on the phone, not the iPad.
The waiter then suggested a phone store. The ten minute walk took me just a little over half an hour. The good news is that I am improving my speaking and listening skills with regard to finding my way and discussing technology. I also learned that you don't want to buy water from a tobacco store where you ask directions because a liter bottle will cost you about $5.
I bought a cheap phone and called Verizon. It is a very long story. I'll spare you the entire Theater of the Absurd endeavor...except to say that Vanessa is a saint. I'm mortified now as I recall her kind and calming voice as I was having an out of body experience watching myself after eighteen hours on road and plane shrieking bad words to this poor woman who was merely following a trouble-shooting protocol. She finally decided to connect me to Global so I could talk for free, as I started yelling that was paying $500.00 a minute to the Italian phone company to get this f****** iPhone to work. As I waited for Global, I started shouting at the elevator music, which remained impervious.
To make a long story longer, after two more calls, I finally got Victoria at Global who had me turn on Roaming, which everyone else told me to turn off. She then had me unplug the wifi device here and plug it back in. I had phone and internet and told Victoria to make a wish, that I was going to throw a euro into Trevi Fountain for her.
After emailing my family that I had arrived safely.
I now set out to buy bandaids because I realized at the phone store that my thumb was bleeding on my money pouch.
At the Farmacia, I was looking at the gluten-free pasta...sold in some groceries but in all pharmacies. I learned that "just looking," at least in this Farmacia, is treated as a federal offense. $4.00 for 12 bandaids made of a plastic which tore the skin off the other side of my thumb. $4.00 for paper bandaids at a second Farmacia.
....Wow, it's pouring down rain. The excessive rain is what's causing the smell in my bathroom. It was putrid yesterday as sewage smell backed up from all the holes. I put plastic over the shower drain and stuffed plastic into the hole where the washer is connected. The fan somehow drew the smell into the kitchen through the stove hood. Why did I ever leave Netarts.
I emailed Isabella, as I was unsure how Signora Stella would respond now that she had a bundle of euros from me. Both responded immediately on Sunday morning. The plastic is working, and the plumber is coming tonight. Signora Stella felt so bad that she is taking me out for a glass of vino. She also offered to talk to Polma on the phone if I had trouble communication.
Yes, with my new Italian phone, I made contact on Saturday with Polma Cutuli in Calabria. I am going to meet mia famiglia, 2 aprile. When I said I was coming, Polma started shouting Va bene! Va bene! Va bene!
It was her excitement that made me realize all was going to be well.
That was Saturday afternoon. After all that had transpired, I was exhausted and unable to eat so I took yet another 10 minute walk to Piazza Navona which only took me 20 minutes to find and 30 minutes to find my way back. It was dark by this time...no DST until the 31st. As I stood in the piazza looking at the fountains and everything around me, all I could think of was how big everything is in Rome. Everything. I think it feels even bigger because I'm alone without someone to bring my focus down to a manageable level.
I stopped for gelato and decided to try pistachio. peestahkeeyo in italiano. I had a nice chat with the young woman who complimented me on my italian. I figured that this was a nice note on which to end my first day in Rome. I went back to the apartment to unpack. It was upon getting lost and discovering that I spent that half hour just yards from my apartment that I decided to use my new phone to call Verizon.
I realize that the chronology of this blog is floundering in time and space. Sorry. But that, in a nutshell, was my first day in Rome. Oh yeah in the Piazza Navona, I saw a great T-shirt: Keep Calm / You Are in Rome. I'm glad I didn't buy it because I saw a better one the next day: Stai calmo / Sei a Roma.
Next: First Sunday for Joan and the Pope
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
#14—Finding Fabio
Good Morning. It's nearly 3:30 a.m. I'm still too jet lagged to do the math to figure out what you're all doing across the time zones of the U.S.
My Italian adventure began at the Rome airport. Following a perfect flight...not counting the failures of signage at the Amsterdam airport. I had a very close connection, and the lines through passport ID and security looked like St. Peter's Square on Pope Night. Across the minions in the Economy Class Lane was a line for close connections...those listed on the screen. Except the screen was too small to read even with my $2000 20/20 lens implants. So I took a chance and made my way through the line. Nope, if I were going to three places I couldn't spell, okay. Rome, no. So now I was even farther back in the economy lane. By the time I got to the passport inspector...what is he called?...I was sure my meeting with Fabio would never happen. I must have been radiating frantic energy because the passport guy told me not to have a heart attack. Good advice, as I started filling plastic security trays with iPad, liquids, and everything I had that could not blow up a plane. I made it with a few minutes to spare so decided to text the family, only to experience the first sign of difficulties to come. My phone did not work. Here, I will pause in my narrative to warn you: Even if you call Verizon 4 times to be sure their instructions for using your iPhone overseas, call a 5th time...or better yet, demand to speak to a global operator. More later on the Verizon global operators Vanessa and Victoria.
So I get to Rome with my instructions to meet Fabio at the exit. Following those dreaded moments of It's taking Way Too Long for My Luggage to appear, I was rolling my suitcase to the exit...whoops, there were three. I cannot find Fabio through any of them. My phone didn't work. I go to Customer Service and explain my problem to the only available agent, who does not speak English. You know how singing sounds better in the shower. I alway sound so, well, Italian...a grammatical Italian, in fact...when I talk to myself strolling along Netarts Bay. Suddenly, I am sounding like a refuge from a world before fire and grammar were invented. But the intrepid agent must have followed because he asked me for Fabio's number so he could place the call. After the first call which appeared to end with someone on the other end who never heard of Fabio Testorio, the agent tried again and instructed, "Dritto, secondo porta."
Outside the second door, I rolled my suitcase back and forth in front of the line of drivers who looked like casting call-backs for The Sopranos. Cuttullio? Fabio? No, signora. Finally, a tall pencil-thin man appeared with the look of one who could use a good sleep and a salad and had stepped out for a smoke and held up his sign. Cutuly. Fabio? Si, Signora.
So off we went with Fabio, apparently none the worse for his lack of greens and sleep, speed-walking me to the car, my suitcase wheels clanking over the pavement. Now driving in Italy reminds me of those bumper cars at amusement parks, except here, you don't actually hit the cars and pedestrians but rather see how close you can come to hitting them. The guide book instructions say very clearly: Walk confidently. Never pause. As I was trailing the speed-walking Fabio like the dutiful wife, I was nearly flattened by a red Smart car.
The 30-minute ride to the apartment took 20 as we careened through traffic, tail-gating, weaving in around through, missing cars by inches, showing no mercy for pedestrians. I glanced at the speedometer at one point. 125. The Amsterdam agent's message rang in my ears. Don't have a heart attack. Oh, yeah, kilometers, not mph. Still....
My street was too narrow and allows no parking, so Fabio found a space and rolled my suitcase at a rapid and relentless pace over the cobblestones with me following like a beaten wife. Stopping at #36, he rang the bell. The window above opened. An elegant woman leaned out. "Joan Cutuly?"
"Signora Stella?"
"Si, Si. Benventua. Come come. I ring you in."
With what felt like my last ounces of strength, I lugged my suitcase up the steep stairs where Signora Stella opened an iron security gate. "Piano, piano," she said. "No hurry."
After my Florence apartment that made Motel 6 look sweet, I was afraid to look. But La Dolce Dimora, as the apartment is called, is indeed The Sweet House.
Except for the smell. And the wifi doesn't work. And my phone still doesn't work. And I walked up the block for groceries and it took me an hour to find my way back...why did I ever leave Netarts.
Next: Getting Connected
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
My Italian adventure began at the Rome airport. Following a perfect flight...not counting the failures of signage at the Amsterdam airport. I had a very close connection, and the lines through passport ID and security looked like St. Peter's Square on Pope Night. Across the minions in the Economy Class Lane was a line for close connections...those listed on the screen. Except the screen was too small to read even with my $2000 20/20 lens implants. So I took a chance and made my way through the line. Nope, if I were going to three places I couldn't spell, okay. Rome, no. So now I was even farther back in the economy lane. By the time I got to the passport inspector...what is he called?...I was sure my meeting with Fabio would never happen. I must have been radiating frantic energy because the passport guy told me not to have a heart attack. Good advice, as I started filling plastic security trays with iPad, liquids, and everything I had that could not blow up a plane. I made it with a few minutes to spare so decided to text the family, only to experience the first sign of difficulties to come. My phone did not work. Here, I will pause in my narrative to warn you: Even if you call Verizon 4 times to be sure their instructions for using your iPhone overseas, call a 5th time...or better yet, demand to speak to a global operator. More later on the Verizon global operators Vanessa and Victoria.
So I get to Rome with my instructions to meet Fabio at the exit. Following those dreaded moments of It's taking Way Too Long for My Luggage to appear, I was rolling my suitcase to the exit...whoops, there were three. I cannot find Fabio through any of them. My phone didn't work. I go to Customer Service and explain my problem to the only available agent, who does not speak English. You know how singing sounds better in the shower. I alway sound so, well, Italian...a grammatical Italian, in fact...when I talk to myself strolling along Netarts Bay. Suddenly, I am sounding like a refuge from a world before fire and grammar were invented. But the intrepid agent must have followed because he asked me for Fabio's number so he could place the call. After the first call which appeared to end with someone on the other end who never heard of Fabio Testorio, the agent tried again and instructed, "Dritto, secondo porta."
Outside the second door, I rolled my suitcase back and forth in front of the line of drivers who looked like casting call-backs for The Sopranos. Cuttullio? Fabio? No, signora. Finally, a tall pencil-thin man appeared with the look of one who could use a good sleep and a salad and had stepped out for a smoke and held up his sign. Cutuly. Fabio? Si, Signora.
So off we went with Fabio, apparently none the worse for his lack of greens and sleep, speed-walking me to the car, my suitcase wheels clanking over the pavement. Now driving in Italy reminds me of those bumper cars at amusement parks, except here, you don't actually hit the cars and pedestrians but rather see how close you can come to hitting them. The guide book instructions say very clearly: Walk confidently. Never pause. As I was trailing the speed-walking Fabio like the dutiful wife, I was nearly flattened by a red Smart car.
The 30-minute ride to the apartment took 20 as we careened through traffic, tail-gating, weaving in around through, missing cars by inches, showing no mercy for pedestrians. I glanced at the speedometer at one point. 125. The Amsterdam agent's message rang in my ears. Don't have a heart attack. Oh, yeah, kilometers, not mph. Still....
My street was too narrow and allows no parking, so Fabio found a space and rolled my suitcase at a rapid and relentless pace over the cobblestones with me following like a beaten wife. Stopping at #36, he rang the bell. The window above opened. An elegant woman leaned out. "Joan Cutuly?"
"Signora Stella?"
"Si, Si. Benventua. Come come. I ring you in."
With what felt like my last ounces of strength, I lugged my suitcase up the steep stairs where Signora Stella opened an iron security gate. "Piano, piano," she said. "No hurry."
After my Florence apartment that made Motel 6 look sweet, I was afraid to look. But La Dolce Dimora, as the apartment is called, is indeed The Sweet House.
Except for the smell. And the wifi doesn't work. And my phone still doesn't work. And I walked up the block for groceries and it took me an hour to find my way back...why did I ever leave Netarts.
Next: Getting Connected
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Saturday, March 9, 2013
13—Preparing to Sift Through the Ruins
I suppose you could say that I started to prepare for this trip during the five weeks I spent in Florence back in November 2011. In fact, it's taken me all these months to realize that the Florence adventure was more than the expensive disappointment I thought it to be at the time. I still think my Italian studies did little to improve my conversation as I was in an intermediate class where everyone spoke Italian as faulty as mine and did so with German, Swiss, Australian, Spanish, Mexican, Portuguese, Polish, and Japanese accents. I also went to Florence believing that immersing myself in the birthplace of humanism would inspire my own personal rinascimento . . . renaissance. I expected to return home imbued with the creativity and inspiration that would enable me to write movingly about the need to restore the arts and humanities in our schools to their equal and rightful place alongside math, science, and technology. Instead I returned exhausted. My mind was blank; my spirit, flat. For months, I studied no Italian and my writing remained uninspired.
I understand now that I did experience a kind of rebirth. It just wasn’t what I expected. While immersed in a foreign culture with few language skills, I had no identity. I was stripped of that persona we create for ourselves by telling our stories. My past was reduced to very basic, uncomplicated events without any of the drama and nuances that may or may not be true through the filter of memory and point of view. As a result, I became reacquainted with my most basic and essential self.
Also by the time I left Florence, I was disturbed by the fact that so much of the art was paid for by the wealthy who wanted to immortalize their final resting places and, while alive, to impress others with their spiritual worthiness. By my fourth week in Florence, I would look at the Duomo and think not of artistic and spiritual grandeur but of the workmen slogging along day after day to build it, eating their lunches high on rafters overlooking the city. Walking home alone at night through the narrow back streets, I became one of those anonymous craftsmen lost in the grit and dust of time. It felt very lonely, and I wanted to go home.
In my final days in Florence, I spent the better part of a day at an exhibit called Denaro e Bellezza, Money and Beauty. As Florence grew to be a powerhouse of commerce, spiritual salvation and prestige of power became one as the mighty commissioned great art works to celebrate and redeem themselves. In the latter years of the fifteenth century, the mad monk Savonarola railed against the material excesses of the time. I stood on the spot in the Piazza della Signoria where in 1497, Savonarola’s followers ignited his Bonfire of the Vanities and burned to a crisp gaming tables, fine clothing, books, works of famed poets and artists. The following year, Savonarola himself was burned on this same spot for his fanatical defiance of those in power.
The excesses of wealth were real. Florence eventually deteriorated in large part due to the failure of the elite to care about anything but themselves. Savonarola had a point but also his own form of excess, as he gathered followers by claiming clairvoyance through prophecy and vision.
I left Florence, like one of Michelangelo's Prisoners: a form trapped in the stone from which it emerged through the hand of art. These marble figures begun for the tomb of Pope Julius were abandoned when the project was decommissioned or cancelled. The story isn't clear. It might have been that the artist left the figures unpolished and fighting their way out of the stone. Now they struggle in the long narrow room of The Accademia that opens into the space where the 17-foot David stands. It's thought that the glare in David's eyes represented the defiance of the city-state of Florence which was surrounded on all sides but threats to its independence. The irony, of course, is that in the end, the failure of self-absorbed leaders brought it all down.
When I think now of Florence, I enter a place of quiet like the cells of a Franciscan monastery in Fiesole, a town on a hill above Florence.
In each tiny cell, less than half the size of my small bedroom, was a wooden table and chair and a wooden slab for sleeping. In 1219, Francis made his way from Assisi to Egypt to confer with the Sultan with the hope of converting him and ending the brutality of the crusades. While the man who would become a saint did not succeed as he had hoped, this impoverished believer was received and welcomed by the Sultan who had a reputation for goodness and did not believe that war was ever an answer.
What an incredible act of imagination it was that led Francis to make that long trip with nothing. Nothing. And here I am with various piles of preparation surrounding my suitcase: clothes, iPad, iPhone, camera, guide book...and just how many of those little bottles of liquid will fit into my quart baggie...and will they let me on the plane with my gluten-free protein powder if it's not in its big and bulky original container....
Francis made his trip during the time of that fifth and really bloody crusade. How many crusades have we fought since 1219? How many are we still fighting?
Yesterday, I took all of my journals to the recycling center. While ripping the pages off the metal notebook spirals, I glanced over the entries, so many of which detail my own personal crusade against the failures of education reform in America. So many best sellers have been written on the subject, just as many educators have created successful alternatives to public education. But these books have done nothing to strengthen public education, which a free people should champion above all else. What answers might I find as I sift through the ruins of empire? And what will I learn about myself as a descendant of that empire?
Thursday, March 7, 2013
#12—Good Morning, America...how are you?
Love this image from my good friend and photojournalist, Stevi Carroll:
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Wednesday, March 6, 2013
#11.Part 1—16 Shetland
Note to Readers: The following 7 blogs are a letter that is part of a series of letters about family history that I am writing for my great niece and her unborn sibling. The agreement is that for the sake of time and the truth of spontaneous thought, I write in stream of consciousness without much editing. "16 Shetland" is a companion piece to "528 Halcomb" which was the home of my maternal grandparents. I believe my current quest which led to this trip began at 16 Shetland, the home of my paternal grandparents. It's long, so I broke it up into sections. While the latest post is usually first, for the ease of reading, I published them so that you can read downward, 1 through 7.
Oh, dear Lucy and the One For Whom We Wait,
Setting out to tell you about 16 Shetland in East Liberty is a lot like walking up the steps of the house. We park on a narrow street that looks like any old Pittsburgh neighborhood. The houses are mostly brick, close to one another, with large porches along the front. Just enough greenery to make the place looked lived in. The air is calm. The world appears quite normal. But what is about to happen fills me, even now with a unsettled feeling, not dread exactly but preparedness. You must prepare because you are not simply entering a house. You are walking into the World of Grandpa. Fa as his children called him. I can describe this world, for in it there are tables, beds, chairs, a bathroom and kitchen, everything you would find in a house of that era. But there was something else there, something invisible, powerful, full of awe and a little scary . . . something I cannot fully describe but will try. Thinking of it, I am reminded of Luke’s conversation with Yoda as Luke paused before entering the dark cave. My recollection is that going inside this dark place was a prerequisite for becoming a Jedi master.
"That place… is strong with the dark side of the Force. A domain of evil it is. In you must go," Yoda instructed.
"What's in there?" asked Luke.
"Only what you take with you," Yoda told him.
Before I elaborate, I would like to start with the fact—and I have no idea why I am moved to do this—that I saw my first lightening bugs in the yard at 16 Shetland. I was four or five. Lightening bugs have all but vanished. They are a form of beetle that flies and because of some chemical, they emit a luminescence that flickers on and off at night. They are also called fireflies. It is thought that the painter Caravaggio put dried fireflies on his canvas to create the luminous essence for which his paintings are known.
Being environmentally minded, I will never look at a Caravaggio again in the same way. Although I was also not innocent in that when I was a child, we used to catch lightening bugs in a jar. I always let mine go. But can you imagine some large thing trapping you in a small container and whisking you off somewhere to sit in foreign place only little holes to let in air. It’s a lesson in living: Always be conscious of what you do because there may be consequences that are not yet apparent. And in fact, lightening bugs have all but vanished from the time when swarms of them flew about as a delight in the night.
But it does not appear to be the work of thoughtless children or the passion of artists that has taken this fascinating creatures from our scene. Firefly larvae thrive in rotting wood, and Americans have done a very good job of paving over our country to the detriment of wild things. Also, scientists have found that fireflies use their flashing lights to communicate. Light pollution has interrupted their patterns of flashing. The world has changed since my childhood years in the 1940s. We sharpened our motor skills by catching fireflies in jars, for it was no easy task to catch a small flying thing. I remember the first time I accomplished this. It was splendid. I loved my firefly, cruel as I was in trapping it.
Children today play video games. I will leave it to you to write a letter to your great nieces or nephews about this.
Perhaps in some unconscious way, I recall the lightening bugs at the outset of this piece because I have learned over the years that in any dark situation, there is generally some light, no matter how small it may be. And among life’s dark situations, I think it might be possible to include 16 Shetland.
So now, after procrastinating, we must make the visit, which my parents, sisters, and I did at Christmas and Easter, as the holiday celebrations took place at Aunt Carrie’s house. Before she bought that house, the Cutulys congregated on Christmas eve at 129. Grandpa, of course, never came.
Remind me to tell you about the night Mr. Parks, our neighbor, came over dressed as Santa Claus and Aunt Carrie had, as we say, had a few. But for now I must not digress.
And yet, I must digress in order to stay on track:
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