Young Miss Tink’s Break with the Church of Rome

After I graduated I was so lucky to win a scholarship for Dublin University. I say lucky, as I don’t actually know how my name happened to be among the 10 Italians who won that year. My dissertation wasn’t even about an Irish author, but I won. Apart from flight, tuition fees, the accommodation by an Irish family was included. I have to say from the very first impact, that the Irish appeared to be a particularly welcoming, kind, sort of people and the family I was assigned to even kinder, if possible. Another thing I noticed when I entered that house was that religion mattered, and a lot.  In fact, while the landlady was showing  me around,  the great deal of sacred images hanging here and there couldn’t but come to my attention; even in the bathroom, I swear. It seemed we were never alone, HE was following us wherever we went.

I also sensed that I was taken into particular consideration compared to the other two girls that were hosted along with me: another Italian and a Dutch. At meal time I enjoyed bigger portions, if I had a wish it was always fulfilled, I was given the best of the best,  but why ? It couldn’t be my being Italian, as there was the Italian girl from Bologna too. One day, from something our mistress had hinted, I suddenly understood : I came from Rome, that was my wild card ! The lovely lady had somewhat associated my birthplace and myself to the Vatican and the Head of the Catholic Church. In a way, I was the closest person to the Pope she had ever met. My being Roman and living in Rome made me …”special”. She couldn’t know to what a snake she had given her warm undeserved attentions, but she was to discover soon. At the end of the first week, in fact, when she asked me if I wanted to join her for Sunday mass, I said with a faint and slightly guilty voice: ” I…..I’m sorry, but I do not profess ….. I am agnostic “. She paused and looked at me in a way as if she had seen me for the first time. Then, she put on her hat, smiled gently and popped out. She kept being nice, for sure, but something had broken between us. 

The point is that my relationship with religion has always been troublesome since…. ever. All the catholic architecture has never had a hold on me and my being inquisitive has always found religious dogmatism unsupportable. I still remember my dear aunt Mimma, one day, after one of those sermons of mine, which wilfully aimed at mining her certainties of good catholic woman, had eventually enough of  my profane words and went like:

Auntie😵 : ” If there is a hell, you’ll go straight down there, when your time comes!”😤

Little MissTink : ” You see? You said “if”! IF !!!There is doubt in you”!!😈

Auntie: 😭

There were two days of the week I particularly loathed when I was a girl: Friday and Sunday. On Fridays good catholic families were not used to eating  meat, but fish. So, every Friday my mother’s menu consisted in either boiled cod or (even worse)  brain.  I guess the reason why my mother kept stuck to this rule was not religious orthodoxy but rather she thought it was the kind of food that could have made me become smarter, so, two birds with one stone. No need to say that I found both boiled cod and brain repulsive. I actually believed that there was a reason why Saturday was placed between Friday and Sunday : first of all to make me recover from the disgust of Friday’s diet and then to find the strength to face what was for me Sunday’s punishment: Sunday mass. I had done whatever was in the powers of  a child to skip that weekly appointment for years : faking  sickness, crying, threatening and more, but eventually the squabble always came to an end  with me reluctantly pulled by an arm in tears and taken to church. This every Sunday.

My mother and I came to a truce on the occasion of my Holy Communion. I had become milder about church-going and I even attended months and months of catechism classes for one major reason which had nothing to do with religion: the dress. I was attracted to the idea of wearing that white dress and that made me more yielding, but after my Holy Communion reception, as there was no other reason to go to church wearing that virginal dress, the fights started over again.

I was eleven when a memorable event happened . My mother and I were at church and I remember the mass being more boring than usual. Insupportably boring. That priest had been talking and talking what was nonsense to me, for …how long? It seemed hours. I felt I had reached the limit of my forbearance and finding myself unable to restrain my intolerance, I exploded saying something that wanted to be heard and unheard at the same time, as what remained of my sanity made me fully aware that consequences to my words would have been inevitable:

Young Miss Tink: “Che palle!” (That sucks!) 😤😤😤😨

She had heard⚡ ⚡⚡. My mother looked at me and said nothing. She looked at me and I am sure I saw the green of her eyes turn black. What could I do? I prayed! I prayed like an angel for rest of the mass. I prayed like I had never done before, always checking with the corner of my eyes if that was enough to see that green again in her eyes. No way. I was doomed. As soon as we left church, out of the blue, she slapped me in my face, which made my lip bleed as she was wearing a big ring.

I didn’t cry and she didn’t say a word; but that event put an end to my church-going, or better, to our church-going, because this story took the most unexpected turn. 

As we didn’t go to church any longer, we had the Sundays free, so, well, I don’t know how, but it was decided to embrace another faith, my father’s faith, that is: football. We became devoted to S.S. Lazio, after all the pattern is the same : choirs, anthems, sanctification of the players, people gathering etc. .The stadium had become our new church and every Sunday we followed the team wherever they played, whether it was Rome or other places in central Italy – the team at the time wasn’t very good as they stalled in second division . We also made new proselytes among our relatives living in Rome and in the other regions nearby. They didn’t care much about S.S. Lazio, actually, but the Sunday match had become the occasion for us to meet and visit beautiful towns all together.  I have splendid memories of that time. 

Growing for me has been nothing but losing “faiths”, I have to say, but still there is one that survives, very childish indeed, I know : my team and I am confident it will stay with me forever. I have no doubts about it.

The Dark Side of Talent

There is one infallible and quick way to determine the language level of  non-native speakers, that is, detecting the way they more or less nonchalantly use bad words, but also their reaction when they become the object of that language too. Hence, when the most common Italian  swearword, for example, the one which begins with a “V…”  , to be clear, is translated into the equivalent in English which  begins with an “F…”,  well,“ its native hue of resolution is sickled o’er the pale cast of translation and loses the name of swearword” for an Italian. Of course, one understands the meaning, but somehow it is as if it were blunted in its effect.

So, when I accidentally came across an Instagram page with the name of my school preceded by that word which begins with the “F”, the options were just two: either the owner of the page wanted to soften the effect of the word, fearing the impact of the one with the “V” – and that would make this person an excellent English speaker – or simply, and more likely, only the poor knowledge of the language was the reason of  that choice, thus underestimating the inevitable consequences.

On that page there was also a sort of manifesto where the owner blabbed about the absolute necessity of changing the school system introducing new subjects  – those you don’t have to study, of course –  to replace the old ones, pleading also that this revolution should have been made with the teachers. One thing in particular really struck me: the core of those words was the necessity to speak and to be heard by adults, which could be a good thing but for the fact that the name of the page began with the word which begins with the “F” and the few pictures that had been posted represented all threatening people holding a gun.

Something had to be done. It was decided to give CSI Casalpalocco/Roma the charge of the investigation in order to quickly spot the rebel out of 1.300 students. Despite all the efforts, after weeks of inquests the crime division came up with nothing – actually, I have to say I was quite disappointed, as this Italian unit seemed to be much below the standards of the American ones. However, there is one thing I have learnt watching series, namely,  these kind of minds enjoy being tracked down just to demonstrate how smart they are in eluding any attempt to spot them , but in so doing they often make a mistake and this is what happened. Our rebel, in fact, yielded the temptation of sharing the shot of a note from the electronic register. Even if names were deleted, it was easy to identify the class, so, after some cross interrogations and a few threats we found our culprit.

Yet, I am sure that had the name of the page started with the “V” rather than with the “F” the fate of our “hero” would have been a tad more trying, as, after all, everything ended with no much fuss: the page was deleted, one day suspension and not much more than that, as far as I can remember. This was four months ago.

After a few  weeks, while I was examining some videos, 253 actually, of the students who were taking part in a challenge I had organized ( https://makeiteasychallenge.it/) which aimed at selecting the best candidates for the Breakthrough Junior Challenge, my attention was particularly drawn by one of them. The subject was not that challenging but that guy definitely knew how to nail the attention: he looked straight into the camera, relaxed, with a confident smirk, he definitely enjoyed what he was doing.

The video was extremely accurate, he had even subtitled it and that meant he had clearly in mind the effect images and words had to have on the viewers. He wanted to be heard and understood.  I had never seen him before, so I checked his name as it sounded, somehow, strangely familiar. I am sure you have clearly understood that it was our guy we are talking about. It could not be otherwise, in fact , I had not  noticed before, but even in that video there was the stamp of his rebellious nature, that sordid pleasure one must feel in daring break the rules, even for one second.

The second I am talking about is the one I resolved about censoring, as while talking about Dopamine effects, he had  thought necessary to mention and show  the name of a porn site. I  had not said anything to him, after all, it was just a second. “He’ll never notice it”, I was sure. Well, he did notice it. One day, in fact, he came to visit me, claiming his second back.  He did his best to explain his reasons. Apparently, without that precious second the balance of his work so meticulously achieved was lost forever. He was absolutely determined, and as he didn’t mean to listen to my reasons, so, I had to tell him that the price for having that second back was being out of the competition.

It was an effective argument, and you know why? Because he cared about it and a lot. He cared, and when he learned he was among the 25 finalists in the school, he soon shot the most amazing video demanding the vote of his mates, friends and relatives for the following step of the competition, showing a great deal of pride for his achievement. He cared, as when we eventually were in more friendly terms he helped me promote the final award ceremony. He cared, as in that ceremony I noticed he was definitely the most elegant among the finalists and eventually, no need to say, he won.

Few days after his victory in a video on TikTok he had made for other exciting plans he was pursuing, he mentioned these four crazy months of his young life . “We decide what we want to be” was the moral he had learned from this adventure and now he had decided that it was much more rewarding being constructive than destructive, that he could also be, nay, he was an “excellence” of this school and even more. Way to go, Gabriele!

En Plein Air

How long had we been looking forward to May 4th, the day of the lockdown ease in Italy? Two months. A long time indeed. What shall I remember most of this period? The singing on the balcony every evening at 6.00pm right after watching the daily bulletin of Covid-19 victims or the frightening number on my scale as the result the absurd amount of food I have swallowed in these months, mostly carbs – and I can distictly see them all deposited right here 😱- ? Now that I am thinking about it, I have to say that my time has been spent in the company of screens mostly, whether it was that for smart working/on line lessons or the tv screen. I have watched the 200 and more episodes of “How I  met your mother” (brilliant), four seasons of “How to get away with murder” (super), “Unorthodox”(great), 3 seasons of Versailles (legendary, oops this is the Barney in me speaking) and there must be something I am missing for sure. For the first time in my life I have showed no interest at all for clothes or shoes, as I have been wearing mostly the same stuff, actually, I look rather shabby, I dare say.

My husband Mr Run has suffered these lazy days much more than me. He is an active sort of man, who is used to running 70 km per week at least and driving 100 to go to work and back every day. His very last purchase the day right before the lockdown had been another shining pair of running shoes, the same pair he decided to wear the morning of May 4th. It was 6.30 a.m. . “I am off to run to the pinewood” he whispered to me, as I was was still slumbering. “Let’s hope he comes back with a good provision of endorphines” I thought, and I went back to sleep.

The latest ordinance had set runners free, but what about non-runners like me? Well, all the other people were left with a dilemma to solve before attempting to quit home:  what does “congiunti” mean? We were allowed to go to the supermarket, like before, but now the exciting news was that we could also pay a visit to our “congiunti” . What a peculiar choice of word, we all thought!  “Congiunti”! The English word “relatives” could be the equivalent translation, but it not exactly so, as if they had actually meant “relatives”, they would have chosen a more clear word for the Italian speaking world as “parenti”. We instictively understood that they had employed the word “congiunti” as a limititation to the number of “parenti”/relatives one may have, as if they meant close relatives only. But how close? After having looked up into many dictionaries and followed learned debates, I haven’t actually understood what makes you downgrade from the status of “congiunto” to that of a simple “parente”, but all I needed to know was that in case somebody had stopped me, “congiunto” should have been the most advisable term to use.

Once “en plein air”, the world around me is not exactly as friendly as I expected. You feel the presence of the unseen enemy and like me anybody else. First of all I notice that we are all wearing far too heavy clothes for the season. It is full spring and quite warm, “we have missed the best part of it” I think with a certain disappointment. Behind their masks I barely recognize the people I know. Everybody casts suspicious glances, all distanced, all distressed, watching their backs if someone gets too close and ready to “bark” in case they really do. With the majority of shops closed, even if we were allowed, strolling around is not that tempting. There is no sign of joy around me and I feel a kind of uncomfortable. I realize that my pace is getting faster than usual among the shelves of the supermarket. It is as if I felt the urge of doing quickly my errands and…..going home.  It may sound strange, but this is what I truly wished that coveted 4th of May: going back home, where I feel at ease, where I feel protected.

Once safely on my couch, where I can confess to have spent half of this couple of months, I couldn’t help but wonder how this quarantine had turned me into something T.S. Eliot would call: a “dull root”. Our longed freedom has actually a bitter taste. It is more frightening rather than exciting and despite the call to life represented by this beautiful May ( April in the poem), most of us prefer to remain rooted at home. “Ain’t you going to run this morning, love ?” No” Mr Run grunts,” not today ” and turns his back. He doesn’t want to admit it, but he has become a “dull root” too.

Stay At Home!

Who ever said that simplicity in communication works? It does not. Because simplifying a concept too often corresponds to a mere banalizitation, which may be misleading for many.There are occasions when words are never enough to grasp the complete meaning of a message, and, being words free, should never be spared. A couple of days ago an entire nation experienced one of those occasions.

It was Monday at about 9:00 p.m. when our premier Conte spoke to the country on tv to refer about the new strict measures which were to be undertaken to stop the outbreak of Covid-19 in Italy. I was a bit of annoyed and with me other 10 million Italians, as we were all ready to watch the new episode of Commissario Montalbano, after all, what could be said that we didn’t know already! Well, he came up with a brand new decree, the previous one was only 48 hours old, whose name was: Stay at home!

We heard – did we? – him speak: the number of cases, deaths, red zone, orange zone, wash you hand, don’t hug, don’t kiss, do this, don’t do that, till he concluded that the entire nation was to be put on lockdown, so, he ended :” just stay at home”. Did we fully understand the meaning of those words at first? I don’t think so. I did not. For many of us staying at home was a sort: “Wow, we won’t have to go to work till April 3rd!” Splendid!. And I bet that soon after that speech many chats like these followed: “Have you heard?” “Since we are on vacation, we may catch up for a drink tomorrow at last, let’s say at 12:00” “All right”! And then we went all back to watch Montalbano. Of course, I’m talking about those who did not live in the red zones like me.

For others those words were reason enough to hurry to the nearest supermarket to stock on food and drinks – no cases of people stocking on toilet paper here, we actually didn’t think about it or it was not our primary issue like in other non-EU countries – so the following day there were those who lightly thought that the present situation was an occasion to improve their social life and those, a minority, who had barricaded themselves wearing face masks and gloves. It didn’t take long to understand that the simple phrase “stay at home” was not clear enough and some explanatory notes were required.

So we have learnt that staying at home means literally staying at home and since it seems we still had a little trouble in accepting it – as usual – all shops, bars, restaurants have been closed till (at least) March 25th. So there is no chance of having any social life. We can leave home only to buy what is strictly necessary, queue are so long that you don’t certainly feel like waiting an hour to get a bottle of coke. Jogging, going for a walk are forbidden and if we need to drive somewhere, we have take with us a sort of self-declaration, in which we state the urgent reason why we are moving to show it to the police in case we are stopped. For any violation we may either be fined or prosecuted .

So everything is clear now. By staying at home our premier meant being under house arrest with the possibility of spending our yard time at the supermarket only. Of course in the next two weeks (at least) we could do many things, but I am sure that among the vast range of opportunities, one in particular will be explored more than others: eating and since we cannot move much, at the end of this tunnel our next goal will be just one: seeing a dietitian.

P.S. Two posts ago (February 26 th) the cases were 378 and 12 deaths. One post ago (March 8th)  they had raised to 5883 and deaths to 223. Today’s bulletin is: 15.113 cases and 1.054 deaths. “Things are going so fast that this article will be old by the time I post it, that is: now.” We must all stay at home.

Sardines in the Ocean

Mala tempora currunt. These are desperate times and it has been so for quite a while. Too much. The outcomes of global politics of these last years has been so far only division, hatred, selfishness and it seems that perspective of erecting barriers, thus protecting our little world, makes everybody happy. Those who don’t find themselves in all this have been left alone, as that disruptive wave of populism with its simple but effective language has found the political antagonist forces unprepared and weakened, if not ridiculed, by the power of  their slogans and tones. So, we have become hopeless spectators of what to me is a cultural disaster, waiting for “a someboby” that when the time comes takes us out of this mess. But, what if we imagined ouselves to be that somebody?

Mattia Sartori

Only a month ago Mattia Santori, 32, from Bologna, felt the urge of doing something. A couple of days before Salvini and his coalition partners, the smaller far-right party Brothers of Italy, and Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia, were due to launch their campaign for the Emilia-Romagna regional election at an indoor sports arena in Bologna. Emilia-Romagna has been since ever the stronghold of Italian left wing and there is a real danger that Salvini might win the election. He sent an urgent message to three friends late at night telling them to meet the next day. Over lunch, the four friends hatched a plan to Salvini’s boasts about filling Italy’s squares with supporters. The sports arena had a capacity for 5,700 people, and so, via an announcement on Santori’s private Facebook page, the group invited people to a counter-rally at Bologna’s Piazza Maggiore, with the aim of attracting 6,000 people. 15,000 people filled the Bologna square.

Sardines in Bologna

As Salvini’s far-right electoral alliance pursued its campaign, the Sardines converged in other Emilia-Romagna cities before spreading across   Italy, Turin, Florence, Naples and  yesterday they arrived in Rome. They call themselves “Sardines”, as they aim at filling squares packed together like sardines in a tin box, so sardines are the thousands of people who spontaneously gather to manifest their discontent towards the language of populism embodied  by former minister Matteo Salvini and his party.

Sardines in Rome

Yesterday’s square, Piazza San Giovanni in Rome, was not a tight space, it was enormous, an ocean.  Nonetheless, and immense crowd of sardines, young and old succeeded in filling a landmark which has hosted memorable rallies. All of them demanded another way of doing politics, a different storytelling, which is not only a never ending political campaign on twitter or fb, which feeds itself with fears and the rethoric of hatred. The only way which leads to a future of peace is that of anti-fascism, anti-racism and solidarity.The full squares are a clear message to politicians, both left and right.

Sardines in Rome

Very interesting so far, but what comes next? This is a movement, and movements only dent the so called political system or they may end up being swallowed by it, if they just aim at agitating waters. As after a while, sediments, having recovered from the unexpected tides, settle comfortably again, so nothing changes. Our recent history has already undergone the effects of another movement, the so called “five star movement”. They believed they embodied the revolution in politics and would have opened parliament just like a can of  tuna –  fish metaphors seem to be very en vogue and effective here – , but when they turned into a party and got the majority of votes with an incredible 34%, they actually upset the political balances of parliament, only, they didn’t understand that that was the easy part. Once elected and comfortably seated in the can, the destructive phase was now over and  should have been replaced by the constructive one. Their effective slogans crashed against reality and furthermore, being totally inexperienced, they paved the way to a much more skilled shark named Matteo Salvini.

Sardines in Naples

So I ask again: what comes next? Pietro Nenni, an Italian politician, long time ago warned that full squares don’t fill ballot boxes, as the recent history of Brexit demonstrates, so we cannot hope that the “sardines” will stop Matteo Salvini and friends, for sure. However, the people in  these squares showed us that we are not alone, we are many and in our small way we can react to the populist wave.  It is good to talk about politics rather than empty slogan again, it is good to see anti-fascist and anti-racist squares, it is good to see a positive attitude in all the people who joined the rallies and this gives me hope. From Piazza San Giovanni, together, we may start to make a better future.

A Christmas Fairy Tale

Even that year a beauty contest was held among the firs of the snowy valleys of the North of Italy in order to spot the most luxurious, majestic tree worthy to represent the Christmas spirit in the capital; yet, something really extraordinary happened for the first time: the contest got deserted. The sad story of the winner of the previous year, which was of a stunning beauty, as far as everybody could remember, had been the talk of the those valleys for months and months. How could it be that such a magnificent tree had become the object of worldwide derision so that to be named: “Spelacchio”(Mangy)? Nobody could explain it. There were also rumors about its having been turned into lumber to build a wooden house, where, it seemed, mothers could change and breastfeed their children. “Mothers in Rome don’t have proper places to perform those operations?” they murmured. “Strange, indeed.” “How had they called it?” “Oh, I know it: “Baby Little Home“.Those stories were too scary to remain indifferent. That was not exactly the destiny that a winner of a beauty contest deserved, everybody believed. “Turned into logs to make a hut?” “No way!”

So, when Christmas time approached, all the firs made their best to look as shabby as possible in order to avoid to be chosen. Those which were easily affected by these tales, turned soon grey with fear, while others thought about asking the help of some birds which hovered nearby for : ” Could you pluck some of my pine needles, please?” the fir asked some finches, which had just comfortably perched on one of its branches. “But, isn’t it going to be too painful?” “Don’t worry. You would save my life!” “Pluck as many as you can, please!” The finches were so touched by the imploring tone of its voice, that they demanded no more explanations and promptly set to work. They knew the poor fir was suffering, even if they endeavoured to be as delicate as possible. The brave tree bore it, without saying a word.

“What’s happened here?” said one the organizers of the contest. It seemed as if some sort of virus had spread among the firs of the Alps. “So weird! It has infected only the firs, as the pines, the larches and even those chestnuts look perfectly well !” “What shall we sent to Rome?” “Oh, they might use an artificial tree!” said another one. “An artificial tree! After what happened last year! Nonsense!” While they were walking through that desolation,wondering about what was the best option they had, they couldn’t believe their eyes! What a stroke of luck ! Before them stood a strong, healthy, fabulous tree. “Quick, pull it down!” said one of the organizer, as they were already late in delivery and after a few hours they left the place. It was only when all the men and the unfortunate tree were far enough that the firs recovered their bloom,vigor and serenity. At least for a year.

The winner had recently emigrated from a Southern valley of the Apennines and knew nothing of the sad story of Spelacchio. He had been fully informed by the trees nearby too late to put in place the strategies of its neighbors and now, there it was. Just like the previous year, the fir was accurately prepared and delicately placed on a lorry on a bed of cushions and tied, but this time, as it was too long and big for that lorry, many of its branches were cut. The tree heard some men saying that those branches would have been nailed to the stem once arrived at “Piazza Venezia” in Rome. “What a barbarous treatment!” he thought , “Being crucified at Christmas! That’s intolerable!” But nothing could be done, it was decided.

When it eventually arrived in the capital, it was so tired and looked so ruffled and poor after having been mutilated that not even in its wildest dreams the fir believed it might become that Christmas tree the capital deserved and had been waiting for years. A group of people were made curious by that scene, gathered around it and started frantically to take pictures: “This is even worse than Spelacchio” they sneered “at least, it had its branches on. Let’s call it Spezzacchio (from to cut= spezzare)” and went away laughing. It was mortified.

But that night, after the workers had reassembled its branches, something extraordinary happened. While it was sleeping as it was too worn out, a fairy, named Netflix, came by moved to pity and sprinkled some of her magic dust all over the fir. In a bit the tree found itself covered with Christmas ornaments, thousands colorful balls and a myriad of lights. When it opened its eyes, the fir could see only happy faces that looked on it in admiration. It could even feel a warm touch. It was a child who was petting its left branch tenderly and exclaimed: “Look mum, what a wonderful Christmas tree!”

This story has a moral: there is always hope. After almost three years of this adminstration we have eventually succeeded in having a decent Christmas tree, maybe in 20 years pot-holes and garbage won’t be a problem any longer of this city. We must learn to be patient and believe that a fairy one day will make things right. You’ve got to believe it, at least at Christmas time.

In the meantime, Merry Christmas everyone!!

The Patience of a Fisherman

Subiaco is a charming little town on the top of a hill. The perfect place to go if you want to escape the noise and the confusion ( and the dirt) of such a big city like Rome and feel like living in the contemplation of those beautiful surroundings for a while. There is a rich, flourishing nature and amazing views, which make it fit for walks; you can also enjoy a visit  to the spectacular Abbeys of Santa Scolastica and St Benedict. It sounds like heaven, I know, but that heaven has always been the bugbear of any substitute teacher living in Rome and in its surroundings. Being very distant from the capital, it means you need to move there and live in that sort of holy hermitage for a year. And it snows heavily in winter. Apart from the distance, the point is that I am a sea creature, accustomed to the warmth of the sun and immensity of the sea, how could I have endured an entire year alone on the top of a hill, surrounded by snow?

A call came to my aid. I was offered a one year contract in a school nearby. It wasn’t exactly kind of school I was used to teaching, but one whose majority of students is not fully aware about what they ought to do and why. Literature was not of much use there, apparently. By the way, I had escaped Subiaco.The afternoon I came back after my first school day is still impressed in my mind. I went straight to my bedroom, I laid on my bed staring at ceiling wondering: ” What shall I do ?” “An entire year like this?”  I had bartered the exquisite, holy permanence in Subiaco with the chaotic, undisciplined noise of that school. I did deserve to rot in that hell. What would I do? I have to say that in that period I felt a sort of a Roman Michelle Pfeiffer in the movie “Dangerous Minds” and just like her I needed time to be familiar the overall situation and understand the primary law of teaching : never count on the support of principals.

In a school there is always a boss among students, a leader who is respected, intimidating and very popular and that student was in one my classes, let’s call him Riccardo. I guess Riccardo must have been 15 then, a plumpy boy with lots of earrings and spiky hair. He always looked at me with his black, defying eyes and often made me the target of his mockery. Of course, every time he did something annoying ( let’s say 5 times in two days if I was lucky), I wrote a disciplinary note on the school register and proudly took him to the principal, who happened to be a former English teacher. The last time I took him there, she scolded him once again and sent him back to his class. I was about to follow him, but she made me a sign to stop. When the door was closed, she said: ” Do you mean to fill the entire register with your disciplinary notes, Miss Tink?”

Since that day I knew I could not count on the principal’s support, and having learnt that disciplinary notes are a sign of weakness rather than of strength, I thought: had I made Riccardo respect me, I would have gained the respect of all the others. Maybe flattery could have worked.I started to talk to him in a more friendly way and tell him about all the marvels and the importance of learning English. I told him how his life would have changed, he would have found a good job and travelled; he could have seen the world and escape his harsh reality, he could have been, why not, a steward ( after a good diet, of course), Fiumicino airport is very close from where we live and……as I kept telling him this sort of things, he kept on looking at me with his interrogative eyes and put an end to that flood of nonsensical words with this statement: “But, Miss Tink, I will never leave Ostia!” Ostia! I was prospecting him a grand future, I was offering him the world and he had said he would have never left Ostia, as if his real world began and ended in Ostia – an area of Rome – ; he couldn’t even think of Rome or Italy. Humbled and defeated,I understood that if I wanted to survive that school year, I could only rely on my imagination, breaking the schemes, just like Michelle had done.

So, one day I came up with the idea of dividing the class into two groups, or better in two teams and give them the glorious names of universities, like Oxford and Cambridge, for example. I appointed a team leader for each group, and told them that every grade, every activity would have been turned into points to be added day after day. At the end of the school year, there would have been a big party to celebrate the winning team and the best students with cups, medals, diplomas. As soon as I turned myself into a teacher referee, I realised I had gained an immense power. Everybody wants to win and once you accept to be part of a team you are no longer responsible for yourself, but for the team as well, that was my trap. If you miss one test, for example, your team will score less and that might be decisive for the final defeat. Therefore, I soon noticed that nobody skipped tests any longer, but above all everybody wanted to take part in the competitions/tests I did every day. They could be the heroes of the day. Effort had turned into fun.

Riccardo had become a burden for his team and had lost much of his influence over his mates. He wanted to have their attention back, of course, but unfortunately (for him) by means of the most unheroic deeds. One day, for example, while their mates were working on negatives and questions, he decided to zip up his parka so that his head could not be seen and yelled: “It’s hot in here!”  Noboby said a word or attempted to laugh for fear of having points deducted. It was my triumph, but I wasn’t satisfied.

One day Riccardo arrived a little late. Before he could reach his seat, I attempted to set the bait one more time and said: “Riccardo, come here. If you can write the conjugation of “to have” on the blackboard, I’ll give you……..20 points”. It was a very generous offer for that challenge and he knew it. He took the piece of chalk, advanced to the blackboard and gazed it for a while. Nobody said a word. There was a solemn stillness in the air. It took him almost five minutes to write it down and every time he seemed to be on the point of doing wrong, I could feel the tension among his mates. He did it; eventually.The entire class burst into a loud applause. He was moved, happy, stronger in a more positive way this time.

Riccardo failed in all the subjects that year, all, but English. Today, when I think about those episodes, I cannot but thank him for having inadvertently contributed in making that school year was one of the most memorable of my entire career.

The Importance of a Good Mattress

This morning was scrolling down my reader, when my attention was caught by an article of a blog “romandispatches” (whoever would like to venture to Rome even in such “desperate” times I heartily recommend it). The blogger, I guess his name is Peter, had exhumed a post about recycling that dated back to five years ago to strike the actual situation in Rome for what concerns garbage collection. To his eyes, at that time we Romans looked very attentive to recycling, he had actually used the word: “obsessed“. “Obsessed?” Had we been truly obsessed with recycling there would have never been such environmental degradation in spite of the manifested incompetence the administrators who have been sitting in Campidoglio in recent years.

The truth is that about six, seven years ago each Roman family received a recycling kit made of a pretty bin for wet waste and four of five bags, I can’t remember now, where  paper, glass, plastic had to be properly sorted. The bags were so popular, actually, that one of my colleagues, who clearly doesn’t suffer from shopping addiction like myself, loved them so much that decided to use the entire set even to go to work…… to school😳. One day she came with the bag for glass and the next with the bag for paper. I am sure she had never experienced such extravagance of habit in her entire life.

There was also a booklet included in the kit with all the instructions so that everybody could have his chance to become a good, caring citizen. I may say that it worked at the beginning. Even those who lived in small flats like myself of about 60 square meters were proud to sacrifice almost five of them to the 5 big bags destined to garbage. So all the Romans started the recycling adventure. Everybody went to the dumpsters and diligently emptied those bags in the way they had learnt from the booklet, it was good after all to have 60 square meters back for a while.

Problems turned up when we, diligent citizens, started to find the dumpsters full as they had not been emptied. At first we didn’t mean to give in and walked till we came upon one empty and this soon became part of a fitness routine for many of us I dare say, but if it rained or you were just too fatigued, you couldn’t but carry your full bags back home. Till one day, since the dumpsters were constantly full, I guess somebody, fed up with sorting uselessly garbage every day, must have chosen to follow a shortcut, that is, putting the paper, for example, in the first empty dumpster he found, while somebody else started to think that it was high time to exhume the old polluting plastic bags, so that, if necessary, they could be placed next the dumpster and the redirect the usage of the other bags to other purposes. I guess my colleague was one of them.

Sooner or later all of us have fully or partially followed these shortcuts.So this is how everything started and it cannot but getting worse as there is not a plan, any realistic plan for what concerns separating collection of waste. Administrators cannot be of any help and this can be easily understood  just reading this tweet of Virginia Raggi, who has been Mayor of Rome, the capital I would like her to remember, for more than two years now:

This morning the mattress, which had been abandoned in Viale Filarete in Tor Pignattara  by a couple caught red-handed thanks to a videotape made  by a citizen who, like most Romans, cares about the city’s decorum, has been removed.

 

Wow, I feel much better now and more hopeful for the future. The wind is changing.

Stay Worried, Stay Foolish!

I have always been inspired by Steve Jobs’s famous speech at Stanford. So motivating. In particular by his use of the word “foolish”. For foolish he meant to be daring, creative and ready to explore paths unseen to the wise. You must be courageous and determined to do that of course, but above all: fool. That is why I can undoubtedly say that Rome has been in these last two years the splendid lab of that foolishness as Steve Jobs did mean it, especially for what concerns public administration, no joking. Let’s give some examples.

When roads  become for many reasons very dangerous as it is in Rome these days, I guess that organizing public procurements for road maintenance could be considered a wise plan, but this would be so for anybody else but the foolish. In Rome, in fact, it has been decided to solve the problem in a very creative way: reducing the speed limits thus saving the money for road maintenance. Amazing, isn’t it?. So it may happen to drive along large roads that seem highways trying not to exceed the maximum speed limit allowed of 50 km per hour, if you don’t want to be fined. Slow but safe. Of course, a lot of fb pages have flourished with the aim of alerting drivers when there are traffic police units in sight. After all, we citizens have to defend ourselves in some way and naturally, I may define foolish this as well in a certain way. Therefore, for our administration fixing road potholes is nothing but a waste of money, especially when only a shower is enough to make all the maintenance useless here. So this is what driving in Rome has become nowadays and you may understand it better if we compare it to another city like Los Angeles mostly inhabited by the wise:

sobrio= sober; ubriaco=drunk

Of course, in Rome the drunk is the one who keeps the straight line as he can’t see or avoid the potholes. Would you like another example? About 20 years ago the then Mayor Rutelli planned to retrain 100 squares, mostly in the suburbs, not only having them cleaned but also creating a lot of green spaces for families and children. Of course, even those squares and green spaces would have required regular maintenance, but unfortunately it did not happen. So, after 20 years they have become just what they used to be or even worse. The problem of green area maintenance regards also the big and famous parks and villas in Rome, the roads and sidewalks where weeds keep growing wildly and the trees which have not pruned for years. If you ventured to read the post that far I guess you have understood that it seems that there is not much money to spend on this project ( nor any other project), so what would you think the foolish have thought about?

Yes, sheep. So pretty soon my dear tourists, you might see sheep graze in Piazza Venezia or walk lazily along Via del Corso to reach Villa Borghese through traffic. Think about sheep manure especially at summer time, what a pastoral sight and smell! Don’ t forget that we are talking about the capital.

The point is that this foolishness is destined to cross the borders of the capital and become national as the party that runs Rome won the national elections almost three months ago and made a contract with the most reactionary and anti-European faction in Italy in order to rule the country. It is a very ambitious contract, indeed. First of all they aim at reducing the public debt. At last, you would say, as we have the third largest debt in the world, but how? Making reforms, reducing waste or combating tax evasion? Oh,no.That would be too wise. The foolish recipe is: not to pay, as they aim at negotiating with the BCE a cut of the public debt of 250 billions of euros for…..nothing.

Maybe, you may wonder, strategies will be implemented to stop the public debt, for sure. Not exactly, as they have in mind a “flat tax”, that is, two tax rates of 15% up to 80.000 euros and 22% if you exceed that income threshold.  That is the revenge of the Sheriff of Nottingham over Robin Hood, who is rolling over in his grave I am sure by now, as that would mean that the poorer classes will be damaged more and pay for the rich. How can it be that a footballer, for example, and a teacher are subjected to a similar tax rate?

And the poor? Don’t you worry, they will be given a sort of “basic income” of about 1.000 euros or more to stay at home. I forgot to mention that those who are holding the reins of the destiny of this country have little working experience. I don’t mean political experience, bur really working experience. One of them before becoming deputy and now candidate Prime Minister, was a steward at San Paolo football stadium and webmaster. Nothing more can be found in that C.V., but maybe I am not fool enough to understand all this.

 

 

On Witches and Socks

According to a Christian legend, while the Three Wise Men were on their way to Bethlehem to bring gifts to the Infant Jesus, they bumped into a very old woman and asked her if she knew were the Son of God was, as they seemed to be quite disoriented. Unfortunately she didn’t know. Nevertheless, she offered them accommodation for a night, after all, she was the best housekeeper in the village, with the most comfortable home. The following day, the Three Magi tried to convince the old lady to join them to the visit to the baby Jesus, but despite their insistence, she refused, as did not feel like leaving the house, she was too busy with her housework after all.

Yet, very soon she repented for not having gone with them. She quickly prepared a basket of sweets and left the house in search for the Three Wise Men, but in vain. She stopped at every house she found along the way, giving candies to the children she met, in the hope that one of them was the baby Jesus. Since then, she goes around the world, giving presents to all children, so that she might be forgiven.The good ones will have toys, candies or fruit, while the bad ones get only coal, onions or garlic. That’s why it is tradition here in Italy to leave empty socks next to beds of children the night of the Epiphany, so that the old lady, that is actually called Befana, may fill them with presents. Befana’s iconography is a little scary, however, as she wears a dark and wide skirt, an apron with pockets, a shawl, a handkerchief or broad black hat on his head, a pair of worn slippers, all enlivened by numerous colored patches and she travels around the world flying on a broom.

🤔🤔🤔

Wait, wait, wait, but if Jesus was not born on Christmas day, even the date of his revelation to the Magi cannot be that certain. Why was it fixed on the 6th of January? Even in this case a Christian tradition actually overlapped a pagan one. We have go back to Roman Mithraic rites, again. If you remember, we have already stated that originally on the 25 th of December the winter solstice was celebrated along with Mithras, the Sol Invictus. On the twelfth night after the winter solstice, that is the day of the Epiphany, the death and rebirth of nature through Mother Nature was solemnized. But why after 12 days? Because the twelve days represented the twelve months of the years, therefore, the entire natural cycle. It seems that on those days, female figures flew over the cultivated fields, to propitiate the fertility of future crops, hence the myth of the “flying” figure, the so-called Befana.

Now, I cannot but go and look for a capacious sock, and advice you to do the same, you’ll never know.😜

“The Befana comes by night
With her shoes all tattered and torn
She comes dressed in the Roman way
Long live the Befana!”