Getting married in Roma & other “stuff”

We have come to a close of a delightful, somewhat “laid-back” weekend in Roma.  Tomorrow it is a national holiday in Italy – the rough equivalent of “Australia Day” with the main drag past the colosseum and forum now decked out in temporary stands, elaborate enough to house the top officials for a military march past.  Our own “main drag” Viale Aventino will also be closed off for the march.

Ian is off to Washington DC for the week so he will miss the parade and the continued closure of the area for the major conference to be held Tuesday through Thursday on Climate Change and Soaring World Food Prices – hosted by FAO, with some 3 000 delegates including at least 35 heads-of-state.

So we started the weekend in style on Friday night at the British Embassy which abuts Porta Pia to the north of the centre of the city.  A concert band from the Sussex area was on tour (read holidays) and gave its third and last performance in the embassy grounds.  They were great, although we arrived very late so had a brief concert.  Then we all went to drinks at the embassy’s social clubrooms – the second storey bar effectively sits atop the ancient Roman wall (for which Porta Pia forms a gateway).  A glorious venue, a delightful, warm evening and good company.  This followed by a simple “band 

dinner” at a local but friendly trattoria.

We spent much of the weekend utilizing our new found cyber capacity, now having a wireless internet facility and Skype – what a wonder is Skype – keeps us in touch with the world.  Our Skype name can be obtained on application – email us – and we can bother you on weekends also.

And today, we walked to places yet “unwalked to”.  Including the Victor Emmanuel II monument where, for a modest fee, you can get a lift to the roof for “the view of Roma”.  Within is the equivalent of the Canberra War Memorial and around it the forum and some delightful churches.  The most interesting of which is probably St Joseph's of the Carpenters (San Giuseppe dei Falegnami) where you walk down into the dungeon or cell where St Peter was supposedly incarcerated - the Mamertine Prison.  The story goes that a spring emerged in his cell with which he baptised people.  The spring and a post where prisoners would have been chained are still there.  Although Rome is reputed to contain enough pieces of the actual cross to build an ark,

 this story is actually quite credible because if St Peter was incarcerated in Rome as history dictates, then this cell would have been a likely place to do it.

So our travels take us into many churches – and believe us, Rome has no shortage of churches.  They vary from the delightfully simple (eh! a few of them) to delights of marble, mosaic and gold.  The smaller ones are very popular for weddings, and are set for bride and grooms’ seats and kneelers with mum and dad seats and kneelers at either side of the altar – much as we experienced last year in our introduction to church weddings in Mexico.

We also see the wedding parties in parks and monuments getting photographed and leaving the churches with all their guests.

So, some differences.  First, no attendants.  We are not sure who witnesses but clearly no bridesmaids or groomsmen.  The brides are all cloned into long off-white strapless dresses.  Convertible Volkswagons are a popular “ride”.  But almost all the guests attach white poesies and ribbons to their radio aerials for the trip – they then depart the church as a pack and noisily sound their horns.

Confetti is “in” at present – but very large paper hearts and coloured rice.  I can just imagine Father Giovanni advising that this should not be used in the church precincts – but hey, who follows instructions here.

An exhausting, hot but thrilling walk, punctuated by a beer/prosecco and ice cream at our local bar and a quiet night blogging.

There do seem to be a lot of weddings going on in Rome at present.  Is it the season?  Is it the age group?  Do they do it often?  Either way they look delightful and seem to have a ball.  Their weddings must be memorable, Roman style – here’s to the marriages.

 

 

The Neighbours



As you now are aware, we have settled in Aventino. We have made a “Google Maps” map that marks our abode and Ian’s office – (apologies that earlier versions of this post left you in limbo but) the reference is:

http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=115571076803304747106.00044cc76915ffaf6874f&z=17

Click that and you should go to Google Maps and to our marked map. Then click on satellite and you will get a great view.

In our apartment building there are clearly some other people but we do not see or hear from them much. A couple of people above us frequently seem to come home very late, walk around and listen to music – but they are not really a problem. A young woman and a German Shepherd reside in the basement. The other apartment on our level, owned by our landlady, is being renovated – has been for some months now. The builders have been a headache and she has sacked a few. The latest “sackee” was quite enthusiastic and made a small hole in our living room with his coal chisel – mistakes happen – “Eh!”

We look out over three sides of the building (from the first floor) – with pleasant gardens to the north and east, and a tall apartment building blocking out much of the street noise about twenty metres to the south. The western sun is blocked by the other apartment and stairwell on our floor.

To enter our flat we negotiate three doors – one to the street, one shared with the next-door unit and our own door. We don’t have a terrace but we are very secure. From the door next to the street, about ten steps down our marble spiral staircase, we can see two churches within 200 metres and there are at least another three further up the hill. Our street rubbish bins are 50 metres up the street on our side – blue for bottles, glass and plastic, white for paper and green for general rubbish. We have never forgotten to put the bin out – it’s always out.

Turning left outside our door, we walk past the entrance to the nearby apartment building, veer left past the service station, dodging puddles of oil on the cobblestones and the traffic. The servo does not have any clear start or ending and just “merges” with Via di Santa Prisca. So on weekday mornings, as the rat-runners whiz up the street, and as others jockey for a place at the servo pumps, and as the mechanics and customers wheel and deal for the day’s repairs, we blissfully stroll around and on the roadway with an eye to the on-coming vehicles.

That obstacle behind us we are then on Viale Aventino, a broad avenue that runs from its intersection with Via di Santa Prisca to the Circo Massimo (and to my office). Probably six lanes wide, Viale Aventino is in three parts. A central corridor is a busway and tramway with raised platforms where the buses and trams stop. Only two bus routes run through this centre path along with taxis and limousines and ambulances and police cars. Oh! And some Romans in a hurry and prepared to break the rules. Other buses take the two lanes either side of this central “divider”, along with the bulk of other vehicles – mostly small cars and “motos”.

At the traffic lights, the motos manouvre until they are near the front and when “the flag drops”, the throttles twist and with a massed whine, but not much speed, this herd of vespas moves in a wobbling, but unstoppable cloud across the intersection.

As a pedestrian, one has choices. Those with death wishes jaywalk. The careful and patient find the remnants of paint that used to mark zebra crossings and cross (basically jaywalk). Or there are some pedestrian lights, some automatic, some requiring a button push. The green, amber and red symbols (or sometimes the “avante” and “stop”) are interesting. When green goes to amber, the Roman gets to guess how long will elapse before the red. If misjudged, he or she finds themselves in front of the whining vespas. A lot of ineffectual horn tooting results, some uniquely Roman hand gestures and a fair amount of “Eh!”ing.

So we walk towards the city, past a small pizzeria, and alimentaire, and currently some delightful hedges of star jasmine in full perfume. Onwards are three bars (coffee and alcohol) with street-side tables, the supermercado, a ristorante, a pharmacy, two hairdressers, an antique restorer, a moto dealer, and a lot of other places that we are yet to really work out. Around the corner, with the UN flag fluttering to our right, we are on Via del Circo Massimo and we are walking along the valley between our Aventine hill and the Palantine hill, past the Metro station (Circo Massimo).

To our left is Rome’s rose garden, currently open due to the climax of this year’s international competition and looking a picture. Up the hill from the garden, we come to a road that runs past three old churches and two parks, one of which is the popular “Orange Garden” with its spectacular views over the Tiber. The most distant of the churches has a connection with the Order of Malta and a Maltese Cross flag. It also has a “spy-hole” in a gate that enables the viewer a “peak” at St Peter’s Basilica in the distance. Usually, the tourists are lined up to look through this hole. Santa Sanselmo also has a delightful gift shop with all sorts of treasures, some of which have a religious angle to them. The church is well guarded by the Carabineri due to its neighbour being the Arab Republic of Egypt’s embassy.

There a couple of very sweet (very expensive) hotels on the hill and a range of apartments, villas and convents running down to our home. The Aventine hill has an air of serenity to it, even at its base where we live. Although we tend to walk into the Centro historico, or old city, we are well supplied by buses and metros. We have been attending some great private dinners at colleagues’ apartments across Rome lately and find little difficulty in getting around, with only one cab needed.

A certain lack of clarity on our part led the driver to want to take his two “gringos” to the Hotel di Santa Prisca rather than to Via di Santa Prisca. A certain outrage on our part that we were being taken for anything other than residents, but a certain lack of enthusiasm (and Italino) to argue the point … it was a nice night so we got out and walked the last kilometre home. After all, it is a nice neighbourhood.

A somewhat unusual blog this time – we are coming to you from the north of England – northern Yorkshire in fact. We have settled into our final Rome residence, but more about that at some future blog.

My office had a four day weekend including May Day, so we took the opportunity to travel to visit Lachlan and Emily. We flew into Liverpool (John Lennon Airport) and drove a "renta" the two or so hours to beautiful Skipton. This is a significant market town, a centre for the district, not far from the well-known tourist haunt of Bolton Abbey.

Photo: The scene of a Turner painting - and reputed to be the most beautiful view in England ("and hence - the world") near Kirkby Lonsdale and "Ruskin's Walk"

Our expectations of this part of the world (given we had never before been to the north of England) were far exceeded – had a delightful time. First, of course, we saw L & M again. They are just great and seem really very happy and well settled. But we were also the tourists, on this Spring weekend that is notable for Skipton as the “water festival”. You see Skipton is connected to Liverpool (and the rest of England) by the Liverpool-Skipton canal, so this weekend the canal boats gather at Skipton and there is a carnival atmosphere with crowds of people, decorated boats and street entertainment and partying.

On Thursday night we walked through he woods around the castle with Lachlan and had our first taste of the dry-stone walls that enclose the fields, the sheep, and the wildflowers (especially the blue-bells).

Lach worked at nearby Settle on Friday so we drove him there in the early morning and went on to the Lakes District, eventually finishing beyond Lake Windermere – so many stunning views. After pick up he took us via the scenic route through the dales and moors to the “Tarn” or lake/loch.

Photo: Skipton Castle and the Keep

On Saturday we pottered about and went through the Skipton Castle before driving to Bolton Abbey for a short “bush walk”. The weather was glorious and the locals were our on the banks of the river in force, barbequing and swimming (at least the brave few swam).

The blue skies and warm conditions could not last and Sunday was cold and damp, but it did not stop us walking to church and venturing out to see the canal boats and activities. Pub food does wonders for one’s outlook on life.

Skipton enjoys street markets on four days of the week in the High Street in addition to many interesting and varied permanent shops. This is James Herriot country and it is not hard to translate the present habits with the “all Creatures Great and Small” narratives.

Photo: Bolton Priory

So, as an avid collector of peculiar hats from all parts of the world, I made some very good purchases from the market – a “county hat” (the standard peaked cap), a “trilby” and a “deer stalker”. Why would Ian purchase a deer-stalker? Elementary my “deer” Watson! One never knows when one is confronted by a stag, or a night out playing “Cluedo”.

So our photos this time are all English. Must toddle off now – almost tea time.

We are falling a little behind in the “blog-world”, but much has happened this last four weeks and it has been difficult to put cyber-pen to cyber-paper. The news is all good and we can take a deep breath and now post something meaningful.

I (Ian) have been an inhabitant of Lazio (the region of Roma) for a full four weeks now and even Cathy has been here for more than a week. We (Ian at least) is in his third separate “accommodation” in that time and next week, all being well, we will move onto our fourth and final abode.

Abode #1 was five nights in a single room in the Gambrinus Hotel where I had stayed previously. This room was probably the smallest hotel room in the world but it had all mod cons and was comfortable (albeit one could not yawn and stretch for fear of bursting through the (padded) material wallpaper. A forced eviction on Good Friday saw me move to a much, much larger apartment (abode #2) – but one that just didn’t quite “work”. The bathroom and hot water system from hell, the bed heralded by the Michelin group as the least comfortable in the northern hemisphere, and conveniently situated between the nightclub district of Rome (Testaccio) and where all the happy-go-lucky and drug-fuelled revellers walk past at anytime between midnight and dawn, yelling loudly in Italiano. Not to mention the trattoria beneath.


Evicted from this as well after just two odd weeks, the apartment was taken over by two priests. Perhaps they will not be home much because they will either be in prayer or drug-fuelled and loud at the Testaccio nightspots. Anyway, we plan to, at an appropriate time, press anonymously on their intercom and greet them with “Bless me father, for I have sinned!”. At least in annoying them.





Abode #3 is really sweet and much larger than the Gambrinus – but this in itself is misleading because it packs into its 30 square metres of neatness and renovation – “compactness” – perhaps best exemplified by the shower that ejects itself in the middle of the bathroom floor – just a wall and a curtain on three other sides. We are very happy here. It is truly less than 5 minutes from work, in the suburb of Aventino.

The Circo Massimo is within view of our gate, although we do not see this as we are a semi-basement at the back (with our own private terrace mind you). The magic evaporated slightly when, during the culinary crescendo of dinner on Saturday night, we turned on just too many electrical devices and blew the fuse. Of course, not knowing much about the Aventino fuse conventions, we could not fix that. All we could do, courtesy of the laptop light, led to nought. A desperate Sunday morning call to our landlady, Margheurita, did not achieve much as we had to wait til our doorman, Mossimo, returned on Monday morning. We had worked it out but the fuse box we needed was locked from us in the bowels of this building. An interesting couple of nights and cold showers – sadly our little stock of fresh food in the fridge had to go to the great street bin of Aventino.


We are finalising negotiations on a larger place, still in Aventino, but perhaps in a less highbrow area of it. But it is sweet and Roma leaps out of every ounce of it. If this happens, we move into the currently being renovated abode #4 in just over a week.

Incidentally, Aventino is the “Hamilton” of Rome, so close to the business end and it reeks of history.

We are starting to feel Italian and must be looking a little Italian because Italians are starting to ask us for directions. And, indeed, we are starting to know how to satisfy them.

Ah! Roma! Delightful restaurants, good wine, a city of drop-dead beautiful people in tight jeans – (these are apparently highly uncomfortable as they cause very snooty expressions). We need to master a little more Italian – but Cathy has begun formal lessons and Ian is surrounded by it all day.















It is hard to walk any distance from any of the abodes, without being stunned by the beauty and uniqueness of the eternal city and its inhabitants.

So, Rome at last!

But not without some traveller's tales getting here. I departed Brisbane airport at 12:15pm on Saturday the 15th – the Ides of March. Seemed a somewhat appropriate date for an assault on Roma – a six-month campaign. The QANTAS (domestic) jet was spot on time and I was soon winging towards Sydney and it's international terminal. After a brief transfer, again spot on time, we were invited to board. I must have been in the first group of 20 passengers and had just settled into my seat and overhead compartment when we were called upon to 'de-plane' so that the mechanical fault could be repaired – always an encouraging sign for flyers.



But this aircraft, one of only two Airbuses of its type in the QANTAS fleet, was out for the count, so they diverted the other (of its type) from duties getting folks to the Grand Prix in Melbourne and we “swapped” - over four hours late. My connection in Hong Kong had a two-hour transfer and sadly they did not wait for me. At three in the morning they put me up in a very nice airport hotel room and told me that I was booked on KLM to go to Rome via Amsterdam at 11:00am. Nervously worrying about sleeping through, I arose to check out at 8:00am but was too early at check in because I was wait-listed only and had to “wait” which I did for 90 minutes until I was given a ticket.

I have to admit that the flights into and out of Honkers were very good and I was able to sleep. The hotel room was handy because I was able to shave and shower and started again somewhat refreshed, but the first and last legs were ordinary and the whole process turned what could have been 24 hours from airport to airport into a marathon.

I arrived in Rome just after 10:00pm local time (or 7:00am Brisbane time – on Monday). So that was a 43-hour trip (door to door – 46 hours).

I understandably crashed in my hotel room in Rome. A dangerous thing to do in a hotel room that is only 5 feet wide (I could not stretch without putting my hands through both walls. The same hotel where I stayed when last in Rome but then it was a small room that was two or three times the size of this one. However my mini room had all mod cons and was very neat. I just had to be careful when I moved about.

The hotel was booked before departure from Brisbane and I chose only to reserve for five nights, thinking I might change into more permanent accommodation. When that didn't happen and I asked to stay on, I was told that the hotel was booked out over Easter. So I had to make some sudden plans and moved into an apartment on Good Friday. I will only be here for a few weeks pending better digs coming along. My present abode is very Italian. Also a little tired and a little noisy, being a corner apartment on a busy street, in a “night club district” – read an area where Italian yobbos greet the wee hours of the morning with a loud delight in their language. The stairwell is being renovated and looks like London during the blitz, and there are six flights of stairs to this, the third of four floors.

But I was able to have a home-cooked meal on Good Friday night for the first time – spinach and ricotta torteloni cooked to the accompaniment of some Italian opera courses on Mac's iTunes – Hey! When in Rome!!!

This apartment is but 15 minutes walk from my office so that is a pleasant distance. The hotel was 45 minutes walking, pretty much across the centre of Rome. It was near the Porta Pia. A straight walk down the Via XX Settembre (viente settembre - 20th September) that continues as the Via del Quirinale, past the Presidential Palace. Thence down a narrow street lined with ruins and hotels (and ruined hotels) and you are on the road to the Colosseum. I work about 800 metres past it.

The twice a day walk for five days was delightful. The Forum on my right and very few tourists about, just commuters and street sweepers, unlike in the middle of the day when the whole area is invaded by Lonely Planet-clutching, camera-clicking and excited visitors.

The mornings and evenings have been very brisk – one or two days quite cold but I really enjoyed the exercise of walking especially after being restricted in planes for two days. I am already feeling much fitter and as I tend to hit the sack early for the first few days (8:00pm is 5:00am according to my body clock), my meals were solely a solid breakfast and a light lunch in the office cafeteria. So I might have lost a pound or two to boot.

Apart from the cold, the weather has been very changeable with a night time electrical storm, drizzle, rain, some brief hail and a wet Easter.

Observations so far in Rome? Well, I have now been here longer than all of my other trips combined, no dramatic differences this time, although being a resident now, I have learned how complex everything is. I doubt that it is even easy for the Romans, and they speak the language at least. I now understand why they left the place to conquer Gaul and the Britons – they wanted to avoid filling in forms and paying fees!!!

But apart from the Italian language – still pretty much a mystery to me – crying out that I am in Rome, there are lots of other spectacular “flags” – the (frequent) whining of ambulances as only they can whine here (reminiscent of so many European movie soundtracks); the proud “SPQR” on every manhole (Senators & Patricians of (Quo) Rome???); the small coffees and the need to pay for them somewhere other than where you obtain them and drink them; skin tight jeans and snooty or painful expressions; communal rubbish bins on the streets; dogs in restaurants; the morning an evening clip-clop of horses hooves as they travel to and from the tourist haunt of the colosseum; yep!! This is Rome.

'Til next time

Your obedient “The Douglas Report” correspondent

After a long period of silence, The Douglas Report is reactivated.

Not that the intervening period has been boring – the family has visited Mexico, the US, NZ, Israel, India and the UK since my last post and I returned to a delightful three weeks in Cairo in May of 2007.

But the spotlight has changed and tomorrow I embark on a six month journey – based in Rome.

I will keep you up to date and try to include plenty of photographs.

Here goes Ulysses again!!!

My first posting to this blog, three months ago, began - “And so, the odyssey begins ….”.

Now, as I sit in an airport lounge to begin the final episode, I have to suppose that the odyssey is coming to an end.

I am not sure how much I have in common with Ulysses returning to his beloved Ithaca. If I am Ulysses then I have no old dog, no “Argus”, to greet or recognise me on my return, but equally I trust that my “Penelope” will not have been suffering from the excesses of too many suitors.

And of my time in Egypt, I am pleased to say that there was no descent into hell, no Cyclops. Things went, by and large, very smoothly – no disasters, only traveller’s tales.

This blog has been my medium for recording some of the adventures. Like the narrations of Ulysses I have attempted to capture here the things that I found interesting in the past three months. For those who have persisted this far, I can only applaud you. I hope, if nothing else, this has stirred an interest in travel.

I have been in the Middle East for 20 of the last 60 weeks. I have been to five different countries (and three emirates). I have lived in Egypt for longer than I have lived anywhere other than Australia. Yet, if two or three years ago, someone had asked me whether I might ever travel to the Middle East, I guess I would have had to reply “probably not”.

But now, I am sure that I will return at some time to these fascinating lands.

It has been a long time to be away from the people and places I love and I will enjoy being back in Brisbane, the place of my birth. Three months allows plenty of time to suffer mood swings – from the sheer excitement of being in Egypt to some home-sickness at not being where your life otherwise resides. “Be it ever so humble, there is no place like home”. Maybe a little trite, but in accord with Homer who wrote:

“Happier his lot, who, many sorrows’ pass’d,
Long labouring gains his natal shore at last.”

Would I make the same decision to come here again – absolutely!

It is not that I am in raptures with everything that is Egypt. If I had to make a list of things that I don’t like about it, the list would be substantial. Things like littering, smog, poverty and the class system, (traffic of course) would appear on the list. But the overall effect is what counts and I really enjoyed my time here.

The long time I had here came to an end with a rush – I remained very active until the last. I have made some good friends and met some great people here. I will miss them and hope to maintain some form of contact with some. The Egyptians that I met were really very generous and pleasant to me. That may be because of my “grey hair” – there is much more deference to seniors here than at home. So if you find you are not getting the respect you think you deserve, move to Egypt!!

During this past (very busy) week, I experienced an odd mix of exuberance with imminent departure for home and a melancholy fuelled by the very thought of leaving Cairo. One night a group of us went to an, as yet untried, restaurant – another Egyptian food restaurant floating on the Nile off Zamalek, called “Le Pasha”. The food and atmosphere were great. We had a good table overlooking the Nile where we could watch the brightly and colourfully illuminated little “cruise” boats go by. A little later, an Oud (lute) player and a drummer (single drum) came out and began to play and sing.

The very strange sensation that I experienced was a feeling of being “at home”. This situation was entirely usual to me – it was comfortable and comforting. I started to think that I was seeing things more as they were, and in a way that I would not have three months ago. In unfamiliar surroundings, I can’t possibly take everything in and I have “survival” and what happens next on my mind. But I think with time, much of the things that were always there to see, and feel, and smell, become apparent. I compare it to observing a far off forest. What appears only to be a group of trees comes alive when some animal in front of it moves. The animal had always been there, unnoticed, and if I had watched for only a short period of time I would not notice it.

So I think that the extended stay here displays different dimensions of the place. And I think it has changed me in some ways, such that I am more attuned to it.

It was a very strange feeling to be leaving Cairo today. The traffic was terrible and my passage through immigration delayed by an officer who couldn’t count to three. I am three days short of overstaying my three month visa but it seems he detected a breach and I had to report to the boss in the office, who (with some difficulty) eventually got the count correct. So Egypt has been Egypt to the last.

I will finish this, the final chapter of this blog, and when I get home I will publish it, effectively closing the series. Insha’allah no disasters will befall me on the journey. If you are reading this, I guess this means that I have arrived safe to my home. (I recall a high profile politician making the reverse point that if you were watching her video it meant that she had met her demise).

My task over the coming days will be to settle my jet lag and travel weariness and to attack life in Brisbane again – something that has been “on hold” for sometime now. I look forward to seeing everyone again.

Post Script

My flights to Australia were bearable and made more interesting by the company I kept. First, from Cairo to Dubai with Latifa, a native of Dubai and thence to Brisbane with Doris, a native of the British midlands. Doris, aged 82 has seen much in her time, with two of her four children predeceasing her with tragic circumstances. Latifa, age not determined but very young for the mother of four daughters, two of whom have finished university, told me of her marriage at age 13. From each I was taught more about what it means to have been a woman in different parts of the world these past eighty odd years. For each they are seeing their daughters’ worlds change dramatically, creating a challenge for them because their values, forged by what seemed proper in their day, those values that help to make them what they are now, are not translating as plainly as they would hope to their children. The world is wide and diverse, but, in essence, so very much the same.

Happy New Year! This blog has now closed – (“for the moment”).