October 8, 2009



More than eight years after purchasing my little house, I will finally get the chance, in a few weeks, to sleep in the tiny bedroom and make morning coffee on my little stove! The prospect is not only thrilling but likely to be chilling as well; my trip is scheduled for November 11th, a time of year when, as Judy says, the "Umbrian killer chill" takes over the region. With no radiators, I need to purchase a "stuffa" - a sort of space heater - a down blanket and serious sweat socks in order to make it through the night. Despite the fact that the dollar is at an all time low and airfares at a record high, I've decided that I need an Italy fix, and, more importantly, I need to break in my miniature villa, my petite palazzo, my rustica. I need to spend a night there.

In order to legally "inhabit" the house, a certificate is required, one that can only be issued through a geometra. Fausto has paid a visit to Carlo, whose wife has informed him that I owe them money, apparently for the horrific, poorly constructed staircase leading from the terrace to the garden; a staircase that was built, but the cost of which was not included in the original estimate. I consider what might happen if I don't pay up: a penalty, a serious fine, the rest of my life in prison? Will anyone know if I spend one night or perhaps two at the house? This is Italy! Amanda Knox has been on trial for more than a year. Yes, yes, that's a murder trial and this is potential construction code violation but I'm a foreigner and this is a country that takes its real estate and its draconian customs seriously. The commune rules!

A Pig out of Place

A breezy, sun-soaked September afternoon finds me at a pig sagra. Il Buco, a restaurant in Nolita featuring Umbrian cuisine, strives to bring a little Italy to America with this annual pork roast, attended by serious foodies from around the city. It's Rosh Hashannah, the Jewish New Year. I wonder if this is a coincidence or some twisted plot designed to weed out the irreverent, the sinners, those members of the tribe who prefer cingale to challah.
in downtown Manhattan

The air on Bond Street is thick with smoke, intense and overwhelming. There's already a critical mass lining the sidewalk, desperately seeking panzanella, homemade sausage and porchetta sandwiches. The enormous roaster is open for viewing, the unfortunate boar drawn head to hoof, stretched on a spit, rotating for the pleasure of spectators holding video cameras and canon elphs.

Therein lies the problem. In the Italian countryside, a pig roast is a normal Sunday occurence. Sagras are organized and attended by neighbors and include music, activities for children, raffles. The food is inexpensive and delicious. This is a promotional event for the restauarant, $20 a plate, $8 for a glass of wine. No refills. It's a little depressing, confirming for me the absolute futility of trying to duplicate the Italian rustic experience in mid-Manhattan. At least Florent, the bygone French diner in the meatpacking district, had included a petting zoo and a Marie Antoinette look-alike contest in their annual Bastille Day celebration. Come on, Il Buco; a little imagination, authenticity, or just plain fun, is in order.

Scale

An email from Judy:

hi kiddo
been meaning to write but its been so f... hot noone has the energy to do anything.... been working, which after Zoe and the baby is a piece of cake!!!!!

good news though................... you now have inside stairs!!!! they were delivered and installed on thursday..... we also picked up the beds so they too are in the house................ unfortunately (you knew all this good luck something wasn't going to be right!!!) the toliet is still pending!!! not sure when hopefully before sept... which means at the moment no water or gas!!!

one more thing......................... your property......... do you have the papers that explain exactly what you own........... the exact borders etc............. to make a long story short. the house you bought and are now redoing was once the home of a relative of faustos. during a conversation with him this week he mentioned that if you go around the road that circles your garden and under your house built into the wall there is a hugh cantina that should belong to you. but again we don't know if in your bill of sale this was specified etc. etc. etc. its something that you'll need to look into when you get back here.

am assuming that you are swamped with work so when you get a free moment write. will have fausto send the pictures of the stairs this wekend...xxxxx judy

I am delirious with joy! I have stairs! I can now go up and down in my house without going outside. My joy is equal to the frustration I feel at not being able to see the stairs in person. But this is such a milestone that I also feel tremendous satisfaction at having finally reached this point. And perhaps this news from Judy is true; maybe my property is bigger than I thought. This kind of thing happens in Italy where houses have been bought and sold with a handshake for centuries and boundaries and property lines are blurry. After all, if I am to believe the realtor that sold me the house, it was built in 700, making it nearly 1400 years old. In all that time I assume it has gone through many transformations, shrinking and expanding as it passed through the hands and lives of the various owners who laid claimed to it.

I'm not even sure what it might mean to find a cantina below my house; would I have a subterranean room? Is that where I would keep the wine made from the grape vines that don't yet exist on the property? And what would be the cost of bringing a cantina back to life? I've already got two houses and a garage that need restoration and no money to complete the task. An embarassment of riches, so to speak.

Tasting

I spent the better part of today in the elegant tasting room of one of New York's top caterers, along with the public relations team from Versace USA. We are collaborating on a gala event with the famous fashion house and part of the process is menu selection. A table has been set for us, adorned with creative touches designed to impress - a pure linen table runner, several crystal goblets (one each for water and red and white wine), and a dizzying assortment of utensils. Ten fantastic hors d'oeuvre selections - from truffled eggplant with green olive aioli to cauliflour-reggiano flan and brown butter jus served in an actual egg accompanied by a teeny spoon - are offered up in a variety of imaginative presentations, followed by two entrees and three different desserts, one more luscious and mouth-watering than the next. Having watched my dress size go up after two weeks in Italy, I decide to take small bites, forgo the free-flowing wine and pass on the tantilizing cheddar biscuits with three butter choices that are parked next to my plate.

With this array of delicacies before me, I am struggling to get rid of my recently acquired stomach, or at least slow the growth. Next to the Versace team - young, bronzed Amazons in platform stilettos and tight fitting dresses - I feel like the house mother, hiding her tummy under a mumu. One of the girls confesses to me that the bottle of wine she consumes nightly is making her fat (or what passes for fat in the fashion world). She looks extremely thin to me.

I would trade all of this splendor for some of my gorgeous figs. I converse with the caterer, who travels to Greece annually, about the superior quality of home-grown, fresh-picked mediterranean fruit. Figs, olives, cherries. All of this fancy stuff is fine, but a steady diet of it makes for poor nutrition and leaves you longing for something pure and simple. That's why rich people take holidays in Sardegna, Positano and Mykonos; to get a taste of how the people in these places live, and especially how they eat. What they find is uncomplicated cuisine and exquisite ingredients.


How do I reconcile my life in New York with my burning desire to be in Italy? It seems absurd to complain about spending my days among some of the world's most beautiful art, organizing elaborate events for a world class museum. If you have to work for a living, it's certainly not the worst job to have. And if there aren't a lot of people who would kill for it, I'm guessing there are a few (some on my staff) who wouldn't mind if I disappeared so they could fill the vacancy.

It's not that I want to live there; 365 days a year in Todi, or any part of Italy, would wreak havoc on my nerves and my waistline. For better or worse, I am a New Yorker, one who loves the diversity of the population and the variety of options in every conceivable category that comes with living in New York. My city-bred intolerance for long lines and long waits makes me a poor candidate for full-time residence in Italy.

What I long for is a good chunk of time, maybe three months, from April through June, or September through November. Enough time to make the transition from American Urban Woman, to one more in tune with the pace of Italian rural life. What typically happens is it takes three days or so to get over jet lag and begin to feel comfortable with the strange rhythm produced by the mid-day shut down; then just as I start to get into the groove, a sort of panic creeps in, when I realize that there's only another week before I head back to the U.S. How will I possibly do everything that needs to be done? And how soon will I be able to come back and do this again?

Back in the U.S.A.

It's not unusual to return from a trip with souvenirs, and mine include hand-painted ceramic wine corks, bottles of grappa and vin santo, and a curious rash that has invaded my legs and torso. My first thought was that this came from the garden - perhaps poison ivy. The rash first appeared in Italy, then vanished for a day or two before re-emerging on my second or third day back in New York. An emergency dermatologist visit had my doctor prescribing an anti-itch creme and some medication to help me sleep. Among other things, this afflication has reminded me of the potential hazards that lurk in any garden, and the need to protect oneself, even while blissfuly surveying the extraordinary landscape view from an Italian garden.

Back in New York I am a junkie for the Italian experience. The newspaper never fails to provide a brief fix. There is always some fresh story of the buffoonish president Berlusconi, today having shrugged his shoulders (in that quintessential Italian fashion) when accused of palling around with prostitutes. "I'm no saint", he says, and the Italians love him for it. Earlier this week, a new (at least to me) strain of crime family, the 'ndrangheta, described as "a mob organization based in Italy's southern Calabria region" was identified as owners of a cafe on the Via Veneto, scene of the Fellini film "La Dolce Vita".

Another story features a group of convincted criminals in a maximum-security prison in Volterra who have formed a theatrical company called "Compagnia dela Fortezza, named after the fortress that houses the jail where the convicts are imprisoned. Right now they are doing Alice in Wonderland. The article is accompanied by a photograph of the inmates in heavy commedia make-up, elaborate wigs and tutus. Turns out more than half of Italy's prisons have theater programs; I am surprised that it's only half of them. There is no more theatrical personality than the Italian, inventors of opera, commedia dell'arte and Anna Magnani. I love these stories; they remind me that while the rest of the world goes global Italy remains provincial. That is its charm.

Ralph prepares a dinner of fresh bufalo mozzarella from Agata and Valentina (the very best in New York, and believe me, we've tried them all), sliced vine ripened tomatoes, grilled asparagus and a crisp Pinot Grigio, followed by chilled, sliced peaches and strawberries which we splash with Vin Santo brought back from my trip. We slice up some crusty Italian bread and dip it in Umbrian olive oil. After dinner we watch the Italian news channel, even though neither of us knows the language well enough to understand the rapid fire speech of the on air reporters. The newscasters are much sexier than their American counterparts - the women especially are provacatively dressed and bejewelled, and deliver the news in an almost defiant manner - how can I describe it? It's like listening to a dominatrix.

L'ultimo Giorno

The last day is the most difficult. Fausto and I went to the district office of water control to arrange to have my water bill paid automatically from the bank account. On the advice of friends, we arrive early, since the line forms quickly and the wait can be considerable.

We are there a half hour before the office opens and already there are five people before us. The waiting area is small and not air conditioned. Everyone is fanning themselves with a hand fan or booklet or whatever is available. The topics of conversation are the heat and the long wait. Fausto and I manage to converse despite the language difficulty. There are two categories of women here ; the elderly nonne, all of whom wear sunglasses by Fendi, Versace or some other Italian luxury brand, support hose and orthopedic shoes; and the younger sexy type, dressed to show what she has to offer. There is a young woman in her 30’s with platform heels, a very short one-piece skirt/tank top combo and white rimmed sunglasses, dangling earring. Her hair is dyed an unnatural shade of orange.

There are two small offices and when one’s turn is called, you go into the office and do not emerge before at least an hour. What could be taking so long? When our turn is up we find out; it’s not the business at hand that takes so much time, but the intermittent phone calls, the bathroom break, the time out to deal with some unrelated matter. We are told that in order to arrange to have the bank pay my bill, we must arrange directly with the bank and not here. But so the trip is not a complete waste, I ask I can pay my current bill in cash, and I am able to do so.

Following this episode, I drive to the Deruta branch of my Italian bank. Rather than driving the 40 minutes to the bank where my account sits, I think it will be easy for me to write a check at another branch and get some money for last minute expenses, since I’ve run out of cash. I discover that getting money from this branch is not so easy. Many years back, this account was opened by someone who was helping my realtor and it is her name that is the authorized name on the account, even though the account is under my name. So she is the authorized person to make withdrawals at this particular branch, not me. Even Judy’s name is on record as being able to withdraw funds. I show them my passport, but they tell me that they cannot cash a check for me.

This for me is the ultimate ridiculous Italian experience. I show my passport, with my photo. I tell them this is my last day in Italy and I don’t have time to go to Ponte San Giovanni. An officer is brought into the situation and after much explanation, phone calling, a call to the P. San Giovanni branch to fax a copy of my signature, I finally am able to withdraw 200 euro from the account, exactly five minutes before the bank closes for lunch. Everyone at the branch is so happy that this is resolved successfully they cheer, and I fully expect them to open a bottle of wine to celebrate.

I hurry to Todi to purchase a copriletto, or bedspread, that I had seen a few days ago. It is simple, beautiful, washable and affordable, things not so easy to find here. My last day at Le Caselle is sad. I don’t want to leave. There are several trees with obviously dead branches and I hack away at them with the rake. Branches are falling all around, helping to sculpt the view. I save all of the dead wood to burn in the fireplace on my next trip. Fausto arrives and we talk about a variety of things, what kind of pavement is best, what sort of fence to build, how to do the ballustrade on the internal staircase. There are two small sprouts of grape plants in the garden and Fausto suggests connecting them with a metal arch and allowing them to grow around it. I think this is a great idea, and the garden begins to take shape in my mind.

In the evening, against my better judgement, I go with Judy and Fausto to a barbeque at the home of one of their friends near Assissi. In the end, I’m happy I went, since the both the company and the food are great. We are at an agriturismo owned by Vickie, an Australian married to an Italian, her neice is visiting from Greece, a friend Sabra is from England - each one of these meals is a microcosm of the new global society.

Mellow Monday

The most precious time I spend here is at Le Caselle, getting to know the house and the land. Today is just a gift, a day with no time constraints, when I can look at a window and imagine a tableau. Simplicity is the word I keep coming back to. This is a "rustica", not a palazzo, so while I am attracted to the ornate aspects of Italian design, what is appropriate here is the basic, the muted colors, the various shades of green that color the garden. The materials - stone, iron, wood - that define the rustic nature - are what feels right at every turn.

What a wondrous world we live in where we can be connected to thousands of miles away with a cellphpone or a computer! Just fifty years ago a phone call across continents was not something to be taken for granted by the average person.. And computers were not even part of the collective consciousness. Perhaps there was a Leonardo da Vinci-like person somewhere who saw possibilities that might become actualities. But for most people, still trying to comprehend the concept of space travel, this kind of communication did not enter into their minds.

This morning I awoke at around 5:30 - the same time I awaken in New York. There is not much to do here at 5:30 so I shower, eat breakfast and take a walk. The road behind Piedicolle is serene and affords the "bella panoramica" of a hill town. Wealthy people are constructing homes up here and I study the details to see if there is anything I can translate to my little house. Suddenly two bear-like animals cross the road ahead and I realize that these are maiali, a boar that is distinct from the cinghiale, and which look something like a hybrid bear/pig. They are hefty and heavy, but cross the road swiftly. They make me think of my friend Jane and a trip we took nearly ten years ago when we rented a house near Siena and encountered some local boars one day making a mad dash across the road in front of us as we drove up to the property.

It's still early so I go to Ali Blu for capuccino and then reutrn to Pidicolle to sit in the local park. This time of the morning is very quiet. No one is out except the person assigned to clean up from last night's festivities at the soccer game. He is an elderly man wearing shorts and a baseball cap and goes about his work very methodically. I ask him if it's okay for me to sit here and he smiles and nods his head.

I have not been able to find my phone since last night. I head for Judy's in the morning thinking that I left it there. The phone is not at Judy’s but she suggests I look in the car. “I have turned the car upside down,” I say. “It’s not there, it’s not at Piedicolle”. After misplacing nearly everything during this trip, have I finally lost something. I go over in my mind the steps needed to replace the phone and I get a headache. Nothing is easy. Judy says she’ll look in the car, even though I know it’s futile. Of course she finds the phone stuck in the pocket of one of the doors. Once again, I have been spared.

Whoever will be the first person to stay at Le Caselle will need things to cook with, so I go to the discount store in Marsciano and buy a menagerie of pots and pans, covers (sold separately), utensils, cutting knives and a cutting board, a cheese grater, scissors and colander. The whole thing costs about 49 euro, a considerable bargain. This will do until I can decide exactly what kind of cookware I really need or want. Maybe in the end this will really be enough.

I buy two bottles of wine and some white paint to re-do the mirror that came with the bathroom sink and cabinet, and drive to Le Caselle. By the time I get there it is 2pm and time for lunch. I have purchased a folding table to complete the terrace dining capabilites and unload everything, cover the table with a colorful cloth and settle down for lunch. After several muscular attempts I am unable to open either of the wine bottles. It’s amazing how desperate one can feel about the inability to open a simple wine bottle. I call Ralph. He suggests I ask one of the workers in the borgo to open one bottle and give him the other as a thank you. I am reluctant to establish this kind of relationship , but decide that Ralph is wise in this area. So I take a breath and walk two houses down and call out “Ciao”! “Bisogno ayuda” I say, lifting up the wine bottle. The young man tries but can’t get the cork to loosen. He calls for another worker. “bisogno ayuda” I say again” and hold out the other bottle “Per tu”, I say. “Per noi?” he asks, as though he can’t believe I’m offering him a bottle of wine for his assistance. “Si,” I say. With little effort he opens my bottle and then asks for the corkscrew back to open his. He smiles and thanks me. “Saluti”, he says as he puts the bottle to his mouth, raises his head and drinks.

I call Ralph back and thank him for his good advice.