LIFE: What I Love About Italy Redux

CHIAVARI, Italy – As I sat back with my feet up, sipping lemonade this week, I started thinking about the things I love about Italy. I realized it wasn’t one big thing that captured my heart, but many little things. If you think about it, it’s never the big things that draw people to something. I mean did you ever hear anyone say they pulled up stakes and moved to Rome because of the Coliseum, or that they simply couldn’t bear to live another day without the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. Me neither. 

Trevi Fountain, Rome

For me, this list of things I love started when I lived in Rome. Every Saturday I would leave my apartment on the Via della Vite, cross Via del Tritone and go up Via della Stamperia to a small street market near the Trevi Fountain. At a certain point I would be greeted by a John Hamm look alike who would smile and bow ever so slightly and say, “Buon Giorno Contessa.”

With no real language skills I would stammer something back and continue on my way, but I ask you, who would not want to start their day like that.   
 
I also love the way Italians live with their art.

“Oh this fountain, yes, well yes it is a 16th century masterpiece by bla bla bla,”  they will say and then the conversation about where to go for pizza continues for there are many incredible masterpieces stuck here, there and everywhere.

 Lecce

I love my green grocer when she tells someone looking for zucchini in January to come back in April. Of course you can find zucchini in January but zucchini grown who knows where and tasting like who knows what.

I love the fact that Italian orthopedic surgeons from Gaslini Hospital in Genova go to Africa every year and perform hundreds of operations on little African kids, free of charge and they don’t tell anybody about it. It’s all arranged through anonymous church missions staffed by Italians giving their all in the name of humanity.  

I love the way hospital patients drift down to the hospital bar in their pj’s for a coffee or a grappa and a smoke. I love the fact that hospitals want your friends and relatives to be with you when you are sick. After all, what are friends and relatives for? 

 Friends Forever

And speaking of friends, the day my friends Tracy and Daniele got married in Savona there was a wicked storm and the road to the restaurant where the reception was to be held was closed. That meant no reception and that would never do. The bar in the Savona City Hall, where Tracy and Daniele  got married was closed, but we managed to talk the barman into selling us some champagne, providing us with glasses and throwing in some nibbles as well. Instant party. Try that in NYC. 

I love the shiny brass name plates on the buildings. You rarely see names scribbled on scraps of paper stuck between two pieces of plastic to indicate this month’s occupant is….. . And the two names on those brass plates? The husband’s and the wife’s. 

 One Way of Keeping His Attention

I love the way Italian men look at women – even if it is a little unnerving at times. I love the way Italian women start talking faster and pull, ever so slightly on their husband’s arm whenever a pretty girl walks by. He can look, but why make it easy for him. 

I love the bars, the big bars, the little mom and pop bars, especially the old historic bars in the center of most cities. To sit and have a coffee in the Café’ San Carlo in Torino, or Covo in Milan is to be part of the drama being played out in those places at that time.

I love the names of the streets. Via Gabriele D’Annunzio, Vicolo Simon Boccanegra, Piazza Camillo di Cavour. It’s like walking around in a history book. Piazza Savonarola? Oh right, he’s the 15th Dominican friar and prophet of doom that they burned after they hung him back in 1498.” And the best part is everyone knows who’s who.

I love the fact that Italians make up the rules as they go along. I remember forgetting my passport on a trip up to Switzerland and reporting it to the Italian police when they came on board the train in the border town of Chiasso. 

 Don't Worry, Be Happy

 “Signora,” they said, “you are leaving Italy, that is a problem for the Swiss border guards.”

 “Yes,” I said, “but when I have to come back? I have to work on Monday.”

“Ah, Signora, you worry too much. Just sit down, be calm and pretend we never had this conversation.”

So I did. I continued up to Switzerland, had a great time with my friends, came back into Italy, no passport, no hassle, no problem.

Yes there have been problems over the years, mostly having to do with trying to get a work visa, but there was never any doubt in my mind that I had made the right choice. I knew from the beginning I was in the right place and I know it now for while this isn’t a new list, it is still a true list.

LIFE: Knox'd Out

SARONNO, Italy - I don’t know about you, but I’ve been Amanda Knox’d up to my eyeballs. I watched her appeal to the Italian court last week and frankly it was nice to see that she finally took her situation seriously. In my opinion the four years she spent in Capanne women’s prison in the green hills of Umbria will probably end up doing her more good than harm, and I’m not talking about the million dollar book deal she’s got either. There’s nothing like a slice of real life to make you appreciate what you have and who you are.

Amanda Knox

I can’t help but compare Amanda Knox to some of the  students I had when I taught a writing course at a  private university here in Italy. For the most part the American and Canadian students were away from home for the first time, ready to party, to let loose, and show the Italians how much they could drink, how much they could smoke and just how cool they were. 

One of the biggest complaints the Anglo-Saxon’s had was that the Italians took three hours to get dressed and then when they were finally out at a club they would only have one drink.  They were no fun, they never got drunk and danced on the tables or threw up all over themselves. In fact they were downright boring.

Meredith Kercher

But the Americans knew how to party, and they liked to party hearty, so hearty that the university came close to shutting the entire exchange program down one year after they were required to pay out a large chunk of money to local taxi owners to clean up their taxi’s after the Anglo party goers had thrown up in them.

So starting with Amanda’s behavior after she was arrested, that irresponsible, self-centered attitude is what I saw in her, and frankly I still see. She’s just a little smarter now.  Being locked up for four years will do that to you. Life in any prison cannot be easy, and most certainly Amanda went through a difficult period of adjustment. But the way she is being canonized on American TV, you’d think she had been swept up off the street and dropped into a hole in a prison in the middle of a jungle. 

Capanne Prison, Umbria, Italy

Compared to other countries, Italian prisons are quite civilized. When Amanda was first convicted she shared a cell with three other women, a Kosovan, a Chinese and a Roma (gypsy). Toward the end of her sentence she was sharing the space with two Italian women and a Bolivian. In each cell there are cooking facilities, a shower area and a TV. During the day the doors of the cells are open and the inmates are free to walk around and visit with other inmates. 

During her time in prison Amanda continued her language studies with her professors at the University of Washington.  She also spent time reading, watching television, exercising in the prison yard and listening to music.  She had a small part in a film that was shot in the prison and apparently took up singing and gave little concerts for the other inmates. I don’t know what prisons are like in the United States, but somehow I think they are a little more restrictive.

With more visiting privileges than any of the other inmates, she saw her parents often and not from behind a plastic shield. Visits were held in a private room where they could sit and talk, and hug.  

Now she’s claiming she was sexually harassed by a prison official. How come she never mentioned this before? It seems very odd. It’s not as if she could not have been transferred to another facility.

Patrick Lumumba

Did she get away with murder? Only she knows the answer to that. Personally I don’t feel sorry for her. When Amanda was arrested, she tried to push the blame for Meredith Kercher’s  murder on Congolese bar owner Patrick Lumumba. Why? 

It is difficult enough for Africans to make a living in Italy, but after being accused of assault and murder during a drug-fueled sexual encounter, it must be just about impossible for him now. My sympathies lie with Mr. Lumumba and his wife and children. I doubt that he has a million dollar book deal in the works. And the fact that Amanda has been found guilty of slander doesn’t change the fact that his business and his life are ruined.

 Rudy Guede

And I feel sorry for Meredith Kercher’s family. They lost their daughter. They sent her to Italy to study and she ended up dead. There’s no do over. 

It may very well be that the other person arrested for the murder, Rudy Guede, is guilty, after all his DNA was found at the scene, but it's hard to tell. There is very little information about him. All we know is that he is from the Ivory Coast, he’s a small time drug dealer and he is in Italy illegally, but that's nothing new. A lot of people are in Italy illegally these days. His trial seemed to be an open and shut case, but what was his motive? 

I wish I could say I was the only one who feels this way, but in talking to the Italians I know in Saronno they seem to think that there is a lot more to this story than what has come out so far. On a national basis, Il Secolo, one of Italy’s leading newspapers asked more than 2,500 people if they agreed with the decision of the judges in Perugia and 68% of them said they did not.