Читать книгу Roman Daze - Brontè Dee Jackson - Страница 12

My heart is singing upon waking because of the knowledge that I am giving myself the day off to see the Renoir exhibition. It is that delicious feeling I used to get on Royal Melbourne Show day as a kid when I knew that even though it was a weekday I was going to use it to do a ‘weekend’ activity.

This particular day off is not an Italian public holiday, but a much needed day out to restore my mental health after too much study and work. In my view, there is nothing as frivolous or indulgent as going to see an exhibition of paintings. It won’t restore world peace, provide food for the hungry or help others, all of which I see as undoubtedly my responsibility. On a more practical note, how does it pay the rent, get my assignment finished, increase my marketability as a consultant? The point is that it doesn’t and I badly needed a day off from all of that.

Once outside, the day begins incredibly well with a lovely cappuccino at my local bar. It is such a nice day and I ponder whether I don’t just want to sit in the park on my day off and enjoy the sunshine rather than be inside. I comfort myself with the thought that I will have my cappuccino outside and read my book to get some sunshine. But for the first time in the two years since I have been going to my local bar, the barista is in a good mood and actually says hello to me, and then begins chatting to me. I desperately want to go outside and sip my cappuccino but do not want to miss the opportunity to befriend the barista, which is absolutely vital to your wellbeing here in Italy.

Any minute now I expect her to regroup and become her usual surly self, but she is talkative and smiley, and I keep the conversation going like a new juggler, amazed at how far it has gone and desperate to try to keep it going. We talk about Australia and how much she would love to go. I go through the paces. It seems everyone wants to live in Australia except me, and I have to answer the usual reasons about why I am not living there when everyone else wants to. If I had a euro for every Italian who said ‘it is my dream to go to Australia’ I would be rich.

I try to do it without sounding like a bad stereotype – I married an Italian man, I work for the United Nations and I am here for my job – or a bad advertisement for Australia, but some days I dismally fail and just draw blank looks. These are the same blank looks I draw from Australians when I tell them why I love living in Rome so much. I am overwhelmed by the fact the barista and I have chatted, however, which bodes well for my future wellbeing.

It is difficult when the absolute best coffee in your neighbourhood is served by someone who mostly tries to ignore you when you order, and then acts like you are a great inconvenience to her life when you do. Every now and then my husband and I get fed up. We have a few backup places when our weeks have been particularly bad and can’t handle feeling any more inadequate than we already do. However, we always come back here; the coffee is just too good.

‘Why is their coffee so damn good?’ I once asked my husband.

‘It’s because they take their time to make it,’ he said.

That certainly explains the long waits, the hundreds of people jostling and the mood of the barista as she tries to deal with many orders at the same time. It’s a catch-22 situation, though. They take their time, so their coffee is good, so they attract more customers, which annoys them, which makes them slow down, which makes their coffee good. Someone should tell them.

* * *

Even the bus is on time today, and I bounce and jostle my way to the doorstep of the museum. I am not sure if it will be open, as Italian museums and exhibitions can be closed for no reason on any particular given day. Websites are few and far between, and even then are not always connected to the reality on the ground. ‘Oh, we forgot to update it’ or ‘I don’t know, I only work here, I don’t take care of what the internet says’ are two responses I have had when politely asking why something is not as advertised. Therefore, it is always best not to have too firm a plan when having a day off in Rome and to have at least two or three other alternatives.

Most Italians are adept at this; I as an Anglo-Saxon still rely a little too much on planning for living in The Eternal City. My husband never says, ‘We are going to do X on Saturday,’ even though we are, according to me. I know it is because he has been trained to think it’s bad luck to pre-empt things and that you can never really rely on your planning to be the whole answer. It is also the reason that baby showers are not had in Italy. It is considered bad luck to celebrate before the baby is actually born; the cot and baby clothes are hidden until the moment there is a baby to put in them.

I walk up the magnificent stairs of the Campidoglio to the official Town Square of Rome, avoiding the many excited Spanish teenagers who are there for the day to visit the Capitoline Museums. I wander lazily through the square, imagining how amazed those visitors will be at Rome’s magnificent squares, statutes and history, just as I still am after so many years of living here.

I am not sure exactly how to get to the entrance of the Vittoriano Museum that houses the Renoir exhibition, but I spy a delicious and fresh-looking garden that gives a magnificent view over the Forum, the Coliseum and from which I judge I will be able to see the entrance. The view over the Forum is spectacular and the garden is quiet, sun-filled and has seating, a rare treat in Rome. I walk over to the edge and on my way spy a backpacker who has taken an interest in me.

From my solo backpacking days, I can spot a man longing for company from a hundred paces. Solo backpacking is lonely – great but lonely – especially in big cities, where most other backpackers are just moving through and you don’t get the groups that stay for weeks who get to know each other. It’s also lonely seeing some of the world’s greatest monuments on your own and having no-one to go ‘wow’ with.

This is probably why sex and backpacking go hand-in-hand. Firstly, because you’re often frightened, sometimes a lot, and sex is a life-affirming activity that calms you and convinces you that you are closer to life than death. And secondly, the feeling of danger and of being alone and in a strange place increases your sex drive. Backpacking is also incredibly romantic. Meeting attractive strangers in beautiful cities, neither of you knowing anyone else, both of you only passing through, both of you with travel stories to tell, you therefore share more in common than with any other person on the planet in that moment. So I feel the interest as the backpacker comes to rest by me on the ledge, gazing out over Rome.

Since my backpacking days are long over and I have a wedding ring on my finger, I march smartly off, run down the stairs and into the museum. I feel his eyes on my back the whole way and I am surprised and flattered that I can still get this attention, even though it has been many years since I hung my backpack up.

I am so delighted that the museum is open, that the exhibition is actually on, that I can leave my bag in the cloakroom, that I can indulge in as many hours of frivolous and indulgent painting ogling as I like.

Italians know how to do galleries and museums. The setting is always magnificent – large marble staircases, huge stone columns and beautiful sculptures at every turn, and just for decoration. The building is very classical and has been modernised for the exhibition. The two-storey high columns are encased in wood and glass, the walls repaneled with light yellow wood to make false walls and barricades of glass, transforming the room into something that will better frame the exhibition.

First off, there is a film about the life of Renoir that runs continuously in a small dark theatre at the beginning of the exhibition. I feel my whole body relaxing as I experience the effects of doing something for no purpose at all except to enjoy it. What a fitting subject: a painter who had almost no public recognition in his lifetime, painted things no-one wanted, but painted solely for his own pleasure. I feel a freedom in hearing about this life which so contradicts my regimented, over-achiever, goal-oriented one, and I suddenly know why it is so important that I am here today. This is my homeopathic remedy: take one day’s dose of your worst nightmare, living without a specific purpose, and just please yourself. This should help me mange the symptoms of my disease better.

I know from experience that painting ogling is a limited activity for me and that I can only spend about two hours on my feet before they start to ache so much that I don’t care if I am looking at the Venus de Milo, I want to sit down. I also know that I have loads of energy at the beginning and spend an inordinate amount of time on introductions and ‘first attempts’ but can suffer from the Venus de Milo syndrome by the time I get to the main event, so I usually try and start where the important stuff is.

So I quickly take in two floors, then go to the nearest security guard to ask if these are all the rooms the exhibition is in, or whether there is another room with all his most famous pieces at the end. He is about sixty-five and a snappy dresser, as many older Italians are. He tells me that these two rooms are the sum of it and then goes on to try and make conversation as I am turning away. I am puzzled; most officials act as though you are disturbing them while giving birth if you ask for information. I am not used to one wanting to engage me in conversation.

I begin my tour and am absolutely entranced. I cannot get enough of the paintings. I stare at each one a long time, first up close as I admire the brushwork, then from a distance to marvel at how magnificent the image is. I also marvel at the type of images. They are mostly nudes and hugely fat, according to my standards, the category of which I fall into myself. I am so happy to see women who look like me, who have out-of-proportion bottoms, hips and thighs that are displayed so proudly, and painted so lovingly and tenderly. It makes me feel better being surrounded by these images rather than with the daily barrage of images of women who have slender hips and no-carb thighs. Life for me would just be better in general if we could have less of those images and more of Renoir’s.

I feel a presence. It is the security guard looking at me; not just looking but watching. From years of experience of being ogled at, mostly because I look different and am doing odd things like walking along on my own rather than because I am anything special to look at, I can immediately feel it. Also, women-watching seems to be the hobby of the Italian male. I used to comfort myself with the fact that one day it would all be over, that I would get old and not be worth looking at, and I could go back to enjoying walks by myself. However, it has never stopped; the men just get older.

I know the dance well. He remains just out of my direct eyesight; it would be unsophisticated to be directly in front of me. By being in my peripheral vision, when I change position he will be there, smiling and making ‘accidental’ eye contact, which means I will have to acknowledge him and which will give him an opening to start a conversation. He is patient, as I studiously avoid making eye contact with him about forty times while I work my way around the room. Sometimes he comes quite close, as though studying another painting himself, but although he is good, I am better. After years of studying the art of avoidance, I manage to blithely pretend that I miss him in my peripheral vision, over and over again.

This is important, as to openly ignore him would be rude and provoke a negative reaction. However, to confront him and ask him to stop would result in him innocently protesting he was doing nothing, though in fact he was, and could possibly result in making a scene with me at the centre of it. Although he has annoyed me by being so assiduous in his attentions that my attentions have been focused on him rather than the paintings, I know that he can only persist for so long, and I am used to winning. It is a competition of Masters.

Again, my backpacking experience comes to the fore. Years of travelling the world alone and seeing places for maybe the only time, yearning to take them in and fully experience them, memorise them and capture my own unique experience of them rather than be chatted up, sold something or given a tour I did not want, has enabled me to zone out distractions. Backpacking in a couple or with guys in your group halves these distractions. Backpacking in a group of girls, we would always designate a ‘deal with the distractions’ woman for the day, place or monument. That way, the rest of us could view it in peace. We would then change designated dealers and go through the place again. Travelling solo puts a whole load of responsibility on the individual. While for you the event is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to experience something, for them you are a desperately needed distraction or dollar.

After the guard has given up, I do the room again, this time focusing more on the paintings. I am aware that he has spoken with all the other guards in the room and now they too are watching me, but it is from a distance and I can easily zone out their presence. It is the same in any arena of Italian life, but I must admit I have not experienced it quite so intensely in a museum before. I am mostly protected these days by my husband, who makes a habit of scowling at any male in our neighbourhood, which means that when I go out by myself they never dare look at me twice.

As I finally turn to leave the exhibition I stop and ask another museum attendant, one of the ones who has been keeping an eye on me for his friend, for directions to make sure I am heading out of the building. He answers me in newly-learnt English and in a last-ditch effort, on behalf of the museum guards that have been watching me all afternoon, says, ‘Yes it is that way, and you are a very nice and beautiful girl!’

‘Thank you,’ I reply and scurry away, amazed and abashed all at the same time. Since when do retirement age museum guards speak English? There was a time not so long ago when even the English teachers in Italian schools didn’t speak English. A revolution has occurred since I first arrived in Italy, an acknowledgement that billions of visitors each year speak English and need to know where the exits, toilets, bank and stations are. On the other hand, some things never change, and I laugh to myself at the audacity of a museum attendant using his new-found skill, plus his position, to engage in picking up women.

My day has been a complete success. My mind is off the unimportant stuff and back into wondering about human capacity, beautiful images of the female body, and how surprising and unpredictable life continually is.