Читать книгу Dear Jeril... Love, Dad - Wayne P. Anderson - Страница 5

Aviano, Italy, September 1978

Dear Jeril,

Here we are in Sunny Italy, and it really is sunny. Italians seem to take a cloudy day as a personal affront. We live at the base of the foothills to the Alps, so mountains rise out of our backyard, often topped with fog. I understand in the winter they are topped with snow when there is no snow here in Aviano.

We are surrounded by grape fields; but since fifty-five percent of the farming here is grapes, I guess where ever you go, you will find grapes. This makes wine very reasonable; we are drinking good wine at fifty cents a liter. The bread is also excellent; we go each morning to the bakery to buy our daily supply. Cheese is also reasonable so we use quite a bit of it.

The small family restaurants are fairly cheap, but the bill always gives me a shock until I translate it. For example, L8800 looks like a lot of money, but it is only eleven dollars.

Tonight after gymnastics we’ll go out for a late dinner. Stephanie already plans on having an Atomic Pizza. Pizza is much better here than it was when we ate it in Italy six years ago. It’s almost as good as American, but not quite.

After all the trouble I had, or we had with the 411 Volkswagen last time we lived in Europe, I thought “never another one of those beasts.” Well, as you know by now, when we got here it was a 1973 412 not a 1973 1600 as I had expected, so we took it. The size is ideal, and at this point it runs beautifully. I’m hoping my run of bad cars in Europe is over.

It sounds like your social life is moving along. Once you get a start like you describe, it should build rapidly. As the “little” girls (Stephanie twelve, Rosie fourteen) have probably told you their social lives leave something to be desired. Rosie did go to a dance and had a great time—evidently the boys even slow danced with her.

The girls entered an Italian run with me Sunday and finished in time to collect their medals, but they said, “Never again!” I think I can get them out for another, however. We haven’t gone much of anywhere yet because of your mother’s abscessed tooth. It’s been slow to respond to treatment. The dentist changed antibiotics yesterday so I think the worse is definitely over. She does look much better today and even took a long walk with the girls and me this morning.

Jeril, your mother expects to write you tomorrow about plane tickets to Holland for your visit with us over Christmas. I’ll write more as soon as something happens.

Love, Dad

Aviano, Italy, October 2, 1978

Dear Jeril,

Even though we haven’t traveled much as yet, we still have the impression that most major cities of Italy have the second most famous palace in the country and the third largest cathedral. With so much to chose from, certain impressive structures don’t even get listed in the ordinary guidebooks. It’s like a comedian who has so much good material he can afford to throw away lines.

When we visited one of these throw-away palaces last week, we were most impressed. The last Doge of Venice had lived there, and on one of his visits Napoleon had slept there. Europeans use “Napoleon slept here” the same way we use “Washington slept here.” Actually Napoleon had stayed here long enough to arrange some important treaties and to get the area organized so that the mail ran on time.

Italians practice the art of keeping up a good front (far bella figura) and we visitors expect them to act happy and festive for our benefit. Sad is only allowed for women who are singing for the benefit of said visitors. It was therefore a bit disconcerting to have one of the young guards at the palace let the basic sadness and frustrations of his life show. His English was limited, but he had obviously studied the palace and its history. But he found the job dull, leading nowhere and for someone of intelligence allowed little use of his talent.

We live in one of the very few tall buildings, four stories, in Aviano. This may be a mistake. Within moments of meeting several Americans here, they were telling me the story of their experiences in the last major earthquake two years ago. It is a preoccupation with many, even those who feel Aviano is probably the best place in Europe to be stationed.

The whole earthquake experience was so shocking that they were left with many cues that now create anxiety. A rumbling sound, rooms with hard-to-use exits, driving along a cliff face—all bring back memories of the quake and send their hearts racing.

A number of my students who had lived in apartments first moved into tents, then at great expense in breaking leases moved into one-story houses. Their concerns now have me waking at odd hours of the night to contemplate quick exits from our fourth floor apartment.

Speaking of the apartment, it is an interesting mix of class and harass. We have real tile with beautiful designs in both bathrooms, the floors are made with very striking tile, we have generous hallways, three bedrooms and every room opens unto a balcony.

The harassment comes from water being off at odd hours, sewer smells in the bathrooms, and echoes so that it is difficult to talk from one room to another and be understood. We also have an elevator that attempts to maul passengers—that is, when it is working. If you don’t move briskly on exit or entry, it may close its doors on you and you must argue with it awhile before it lets you go. The girls have taken to moving in and out with a minimum of lost motion.

Besides fighting the elevator, we keep in shape with a daily run/walk. Weekends we join the Italians for a marcia (march) or group run with medals for all competitors. There is a charge for entry, the proceeds of which go for medals and wine halfway through and at the end. What is left goes to charity.

This last weekend the girls and I went through a beautiful mountain pass, narrow, steep and scary, to a mountain village where the marcia was held. The biggest excitement of the day was at the parking lot where the first arrivals had carefully filled two rows down the middle of the lot completely cutting off the other half. The police kept directing traffic down the narrow drive to the lot expecting them to find a place to park.

This allowed us to see Italians at their most exuberant—waving arms, shouting, honking horns and generally having fun. The cheerful(?) shouts my friends translated for me consisted of “idiots,” “insane bastards” and other terms they felt would be inappropriate for the girls to hear.

Anyway, eight hundred Italians and many Americans were led off by a full Italian military band for a 14k (8.5 mile) walk. The band dropped off after four blocks and went back to wait for our return two and a half hours later.

Small change is a chronic problem in Italy as anything less than a one hundred lira piece (thirteen cents) is rare. As a result some strange things turn up; telephone tokens, sticks of gum and small candies are used for change. My baker just takes turns with me taking the loss my turn today, her turn tomorrow. The bread as expected is great so I’m out of the bread baking business for this year. Their pizzas are tasty and cheap so ditto on that.

I certainly can’t complain about being overworked with my teaching assignment. My three classes of three, nine and fourteen students respectively have been a problem to instructors in the past. The students are very close knit and had evidently worked out ways to manipulate instructors, who were seen as outsiders unless they became part of the local party cycle. My predecessor, who saw the conflict of interest in this, seems to have shaped them up since I find them a hard working, cooperative group.

There has been a real problem in our getting organized to see Italy. I’ve been like an addict who has just discovered a new source of drugs, except its books to read and the time to read them. I’ve probably read a dozen books in the last two weeks. I’ve just had a long talk with myself and expect we’ll be moving out to some real adventures in Italy this weekend.

Love, Dad

Aviano, Italy, October 1978

Dear Jeril,

Italians are people watchers—sitting in a sidewalk bar or café, standing in a group on the corner—they watch. They have even organized, unofficial and somewhat spontaneous, their watching into a promenade. We’ve been involved in these promenades that take place in the main public square and streets in at least four cities. The women get dressed in their best, and where we’ve been their best is very nice. They wear high narrow-heeled leather boots, well-cut dresses and marvelous makeup, and parade in pairs and threes.

The young man and woman who have found each other walk with arms around each other showing off the magnificence of their catch. The young men who parade in groups are not as well dressed, but are better dressed than the men who stand with their motorcycles on the corner and look masculine.

Everyone looks and admires and is admired. In spite of the stories I’ve heard about Italian men as rather aggressive women watchers, I have only seen the most polite behavior.

The beach appears to be something else. Our time on the Italian Riviera, after the official season, allowed me only minimum chance to watch the watchers. Italian men wear the briefest of jockey bikinis. Women also leave little to the imagination. But here there is little staring except by American males who wear walking shorts or long bathing suits. In fact, if you want to talk to an American, just strike up a conversation with the man in the long drawers.

As a consequence of some of my watching here and there, I have drawn some conclusions. While women in Italy are rumored to know their place and to give appropriate respect to men, here are some of my observations.

1. There appear to be many women disk jockeys and announcers on the radio.

2. Even older women ride motorcycles and Vespas (motor scooters) cutting in and out of traffic with the best.

3. You do not step ahead of Italian women in a line at the market, else you will see what a few assertiveness training programs do for women in America.

4. Women do not wear slacks or shorts; younger women do wear bright colors and shoes with high platforms.

5. As Italians put on weight they seem to distribute it fairly evenly over their bodies as opposed to Germans who put it all in a few places.

As Italians still like demonstrations, in both Florence and Venice we were treated to protest marchers. In Venice the hospital workers for the area were on strike and paraded. Since there was no vehicle traffic to block, they blocked the grand canal with small boats.

We’ve really been traveling the last three weeks and have touched base in a fair number of cities. We are still overwhelmed by the number of things to see and the richness of art, architecture and history in even small cities like Lucca, Ravenna and Rimini. I’m too lacking in observation skills and knowledge to deal with all I’ve seen in any meaningful way; instead my memories are of sharp little moments such as these examples:

Venice: The old street singer with a black eye and a slightly alcoholic demeanor (rare in Italy) was singing in a charming, rich voice to a very appreciative audience.

Pisa: My eyes were fighting my sense of balance as I walked the winding staircase to the top of the Leaning Tower, where my cowardice at heights was fully aroused by the feeling that if I got too close to the lower edge, the whole thing would topple over.

San Marino: In the mythical kingdom of my youth, streets were so steep a mountain goat would be challenged, but then so were the many armies that tried to conquer it, but it remains after 1300 years the oldest republic in Europe. Also, in Charlie’s Bar and Grill in a room full of British voices, we ate fish and chips that would not have passed muster in any sidewalk stand in England.

Rimini: The gang and I were sitting on the steps of a church eating hot chestnuts from a corner roaster as we watched the promenade.

Padova: I was impressed at being in the cathedral in which St. Luke is buried since, to the best of my knowledge, he’s only been buried in three other cathedrals. I mean, after all, that’s not bad—one-fourth of a saint. St. Sebastian is claimed by nineteen cathedrals.

The pastas continue good, and we still eat more than our fair share. The wines continue excellent, and we now know which ones to look for in the stores. So we continue to be content with our lot.

Love, Dad

Aviano, Italy, October 1978

Dear Jeril,

This is a special, limited edition letter with the inside information on what it is really like for a family of four to be ripped from secure moorings in mid-America and set adrift in a sea of foreign faces.

One area of deprivation that is a cause for concern is the lack of TV for a TV addict. How does one deal with the withdrawal symptoms? I personally have handled it by a change in my dreams, and I now have reruns, commercial breaks and trouble with the color adjustment.

It’s been hardest on Stephanie (twelve). When an attack is coming on, she starts to sing TV jingles and then goes on to recite a beloved commercial. But this does not hold, and when we can no longer restrain her, she goes to the base thrift shop and buys big piles of old comics that she eagerly devours by the hour. After that she loses some of her tensions and is relatively normal for awhile. Rosie (fourteen) is less of a problem since a weekly PG movie seems to hold her. Carla doesn’t seem to notice that we don’t have a TV set.

Our life has fallen into a pattern now, and we can pretty much predict what will happen on any day in at least a general way. Much of the pattern revolves around food and eating. The theory is that when man’s basic needs for food and shelter are taken care of, he turns his mind to higher things. Our capacities in that direction must be limited since we find ours turning right back to food.

Tuesdays are market days in the village, with street stalls all over the main square. Among the half that don’t sell shoes (Italians are evidently mad, crazy for shoes) are stalls selling great fresh vegetables and fruits and others selling a wide variety of Italian cheeses. The fruits are evidently tree ripened and are much sweeter than anything we’ve eaten in America. Our cheese consumption has also gone up markedly.

Wednesday night after the girls’ gymnastics class is pizza night. Each week we go to a different place to eat pizza. The different place is usually closed for vacation or out of pizza so we come back to Mario’s in Aviano and eat local pizza.

Pizza here is cooked in an oven with the wood burning right alongside the pizza. This gives the pizza a nice charred edge and ashes on the bottom that adds a special appeal to its taste. We find the pizza much better now than we did in 1973. We think they’ve been studying American methods of cooking it and have finally found out how to do it right.

Thursday, and if we’re in town Friday, are the family’s days for experimenting with Italian cooking. The girls have been practicing with new recipes they find in the armload of Italian cookbooks that Carla dragged home from the base library. A little chopping, a little tasting, a little panicky screaming for mother’s help, and we are served Italian food fit for Mama Mia.

Weekends are for exploring the Italian restaurant cooking. We still find ourselves fixated at the pasta level, rigatoni, linguini, spaghetti, tortellini, ravioli, lasagna, and on and on. We particularly enjoy some of the cream sauces they put on them.

The other day we did get a mad craving for American bread and baked up a couple of loaves, and one does need an occasional hamburger or piece of fried chicken in order to not to lose touch with our American roots.

By the way, the general rule here is, “Don’t drink the water.” We carry all our drinking water from the base. It seems that the water here is mostly good, but the use of fertilizer from sewage brings problems when the rain runs off the fields carrying various odds and ends into the water supply. We understand the water can go from safe to dangerous in hours.

The weekends are mostly for seeing Italy. Driving our yellow Volkswagen station wagon, we have sped through many a village. Many because they sit shoulder to shoulder on the back roads. Italy has a very dense population.

There are sections on the map with no roads. We took one of these the other day and found ourselves crossing a two-mile-wide river bed marked in places with just sticks. It seems that northern Italy gets by with temporary rivers. When it rains or the snow melts in the mountains, they have a river for a few days, then nothing but a dry rocky bed.

I’ve fallen into the bad habit of reading about places after we’ve visited them, This allows me to say, “Damn, do you know what was just down the street from that square we were in last week?” Speaking of last week we were in a town fifteen miles from here with many of the main buildings still being held up by large braces—the consequence of the last big earthquake in the area. The buildings that fell down have been cleared out, but those about to fall down have yet to be rebuilt.

In looking at picture books of Italy we have been surprised to see how much we have seen of the major sights between our travels in 1973 and now.

Two comments before I close. Italians in the north are remarkably individualistic looking. The men wear different amounts of facial hair, clothes that are often striking in style but don’t look like the next person’s. And faces abound that would delight any movie casting director looking for clowns, heroes and bad men.

The other thing is Italian drivers—they turn two-lane roads into three-lane roads. The passing here will take your breath away. They allow small tolerances and cut in sharply and don’t know what a safe following distance is. If you have a two-car-length between yourself and the car in front, it will soon be filled with two cars from behind. If you have a half-car-length, a midget Fiat will fill it. It’s a bit like being in a constant road rally.

Love, Dad

Aviano, Italy, November 1978

Dear Jeril,

Usually getting on and off this base is easy, but today the armed guards are out checking everything very carefully. The Red Brigade has threatened to blow up one of our bases so we’re back to maximum security.

Our most recent travel experience has been Yugoslavia. We didn’t know much about the country since it’s not the kind of place that we spend much time reading about, and Time magazine seldom mentions it. As a result most of what we saw was a pleasant surprise or at least unexpected.

Once you get your visa, the border crossing is easy, but at Trieste it’s crowded as Italians cross over to Yugoslavia to buy cheaper gas, meat and leather goods. The Yugoslavs cross to Italy to work and to buy shoes, toys and American jeans.

Old castles abound in the country as a result of frag-mentation and frequent small wars. You see them on hills, built into mountain sides, standing on sheer cliffs and in the middle of lakes and rivers. The best meal we had in the country was in a castle built on a small island in the middle of a river.

Prices are lower than those in Italy, and while not a bargain an American can feel he is not going to go bankrupt. Food is well prepared and plentiful, and you can drink the water. Department stores have a wide variety of goods, and even the common folk seem well dressed and fashionable. Not the older women, however, as they look the same in Greece, Italy and Spain with their dark heavy clothes that like the women are built to last.

Slavs are a particularly handsome people. Some say they have the most beautiful women in Europe. I still opt for the Scotch. I am aware of almost as much a mixture of people as we have in America—a fair number of tall people, and blondes and redheads are not rare. They seem to have a particular aptitude for languages, and with English and German I found I could get along very well.

I think Rosie may have become an opera fan in Zagreb where we saw a highly emotional performance of Tosca. We also took in a performance of the Lipizzaner horses in Lipica and were impressed with the variety of steps they can be trained to do to music.

While we were in Yugoslavia, we thought we felt quite comfortable, which leads to my unusual feeling of the week: when we crossed the border back to Italy, I felt a sense of relaxation as if we had just entered home territory.

The scars of World War II are still around us, and the war has been called to my mind a number times in the last few weeks. A small village up the mountainside from us is the “village of old women.” During the war they sheltered some American fliers, and as punishment all of the males in the village were shot.

We came upon a similar situation in Yugoslavia except their crime had been killing a German officer. For these and similar acts neither group has much love for the Germans.

In addition the Yugoslavians near the border have negative feelings about the Italians. Italy controlled this area until the war, at which point the Germans took over and moved the Italians out since they were singers and lovers and not warriors. Anyway, that’s the Yugoslavian version. Being themselves real warriors, the Yugoslavs hassled the Germans resulting in a loss of about twenty percent of their population.

The cave at Postujna—so huge you tour it on a small train—was the storehouse of ten thousand tons of petrol. A group of Yugoslavs went in a secret entrance and blew it up. Our guide, who at the time was an eight-year-old living near the entrance, pointed out the blackened walls. The caves were also full of potholes that both sides used to dispose of wire-bound prisoners.

While I’m on topic of death, we visited a graveyard on All Saints’ Day. As on our Memorial Day the graves were decorated and a large crowd milled around. The Italians have an interesting custom of putting pictures of the decreased on the headstones. We feel this makes a cemetery a much more interesting place to visit.

Many grave sites are held only temporarily. After you have been buried for ten years, your bones are dug up, put in a box and someone else gets to use the grave for awhile. If a family has a large tomb above ground, they may rent space in the wall to others.

Disappointment of the week: we drove up to Piancavallo that is only a half-hour drive into the mountains. It’s a beautiful ski resort town that looks much like those in Colorado. Really convenient skiing—the problem is we leave here for Holland November 27 and skiing never opens before December 1.

What the guidebooks don’t tell you because there’s no reason for you to know:

1. Dogs in Venice roam freely about, but all wear muzzles, often of excellent design and workmanship.

2. In restaurants you get one menu per table, regardless of the number in your party.

3. It’s almost impossible to ask an Italian a question in Italian and get a yes, no or over-there gesture. You are flooded with words and body movements. They assume that if you know enough Italian to ask the question, you should know enough to understand the answer.

This will be my last letter from Italy. We now enter a crazy period of last-minute preparation for travel, and then the mad dash to get settled in Holland before my next classes start.

Love, Dad