This morning, June 22, I took a car to Gatwick to fly to Italy. Getting there from the Kittredge’s house is complicated, so Pinto was called, and the car was outside the Kittredge home at 6:00. It cost me 40 pounds, but was well worth the expense, not only for the convenience but also for the story.
I sat in the front seat alongside the driver. Because neither his name nor the name of his village was clear to me, I have not included them here. But he was an interesting man, and prompted by some questions from me, he told me his story.
He is a native of Afghanistan, thirty-seven years old, and from the day he was born, war has plagued his country. Despite the conflicts with the Russians in his early years, he had a happy childhood. Then at age 22, he was forced to marry his cousin, who is five years older. Between them they produced three children. When he left home to come to Europe, he married again—an Italian woman he met in Rome—and is now divorced from her. He remains married to his first wife, but only returns home once or twice a year for a visit. There is no love between them—he bluntly said he wanted a younger woman. (He was most uncomplimentary to women over forty).
On his most recent visit to his village, just a few weeks ago for the marriage of two cousins (the girl is sixteen), his wife instructed him to show more love to his children. He told her he could not show them love because then they would be sad when he left again. He despises ISIS or ISIL or however you want to denote it because, as he said, “they kill Muslims and Muslims shouldn’t kill Muslims.” (I wanted to add that perhaps they shouldn’t kill anyone else either, but diplomacy prevailed).
He was a good driver, and I tipped him generously, telling him he should make a run back to Afghanistan soon.
Then on the plane to Rome I sat beside a twenty-nine year old named Ben. He grew up near Stroud, the town visited by my friend, John Peery, when he was in London with me. Ben told me that his village had forty houses and a church, and he had moved first to Manchester and then to London because he never wanted to live so isolated again. As a teenager, he was an Air Cadet (similar to our Civil Air Patrol, but with a little more attachment to the military), had attended university, and had worked since then for the Labor Party. He spoke of that party’s recent defeat, a surprise to nearly everyone here, and said that he quickly came to see that the LP had lost because it had in turn lost touch with the people. He was going off to Italy for a vacation from his hard work and to mull over what he might do with the next chapter of his life.
Upon our arrival at Fiumicino, an incident occurred that broke back memories of my visit here with my then new wife, Kris. The Romans, we discovered in 1978, didn’t understand crowd control. When the bank opened, for example, everyone waiting to get inside simply raced to the counters to be helped.
Some things never change. This time the mob of people numbered in the thousands, all of us standing in a hot corridor, pushing toward the windows of the customs agents. Finally, near the end, roped pathways guided us along.
And in the van into Rome, which I shared with a bunch of Brits—van scouts culled us from the crowd—the professor was to deliver a lecture on MRIs and prostate cancer. She was running very late, and the driver of the van promised to deliver her first. Instead, he delivered her dead last through some sort of mix-up. Except for her, I was last out of the van, and seeing she was near tears, I gave her five Euros and told her to buy a stiff drink. (Probably not enough money). She did start laughing, so maybe I did some good.
And then…then to the Hotel Due Torri. Located on one of the city’s twisting, tiny streets, the Vicolo de Leonetto, this hotel welcomed me like an old friend. Statuary and paints decorate the lobby, the sitting room, and the breakfast room. The marble floors gleam, no doubt due to the efforts of Aaron, the Puerto Rican who is polishing the steps when I enter. Laura and Paula greet me at the desk, take my passport, and send me up to Room 502. I take the tiny elevator to the fourth floor, lug my bags up the stairwell to the top floor, and enter the munchkin-sized room that will be my home for the next few weeks.
The glory of this moderately priced little room is the terrace, which is twice the size of the room and offers a view of tiled rooftops, church towers, and sea gulls. Decked out with large potted plants of all sizes, this terrace will serve as my office and reading room. I am sitting here as I write these notes, listening to church bells, distant traffic, and the cries of seagulls.
After arriving here, I tracked down a small grocery store, bought bread, olives, cheese, and wine, and made an occasion of it on the terrace. I then stroll out and find within a block of the Hotel Due Torri a small Catholic church lavish with artwork and famed for its organ, which the organist happened to be playing as I entered. Close by are tiny grocery stores, restaurants, antique shops, and a Barclay’s Bank, which made me feel a little at home again after England. A block or two more, and I am in the square of the Pantheon, surrounded by diners eating al fresco and street musicians and tourists who seem as lost and in love with room as I.
One final note: breakfast this morning was served continental style: yogurt, two types of egg pies, cereal, several different pastries and brioches, hard-boiled eggs, juices and milk, and the best cup of coffee I’ve had since my last cubano at the High Five. I was seated at a table for one near the breakfast bar, happily munching away, when an Englishman and his wife came into the room. He went to the bar, took one look, and said, “Why, there’s nothing here to eat.”
Definitely a ham-and-egger.
He is a native of Afghanistan, thirty-seven years old, and from the day he was born, war has plagued his country. Despite the conflicts with the Russians in his early years, he had a happy childhood. Then at age 22, he was forced to marry his cousin, who is five years older. Between them they produced three children. When he left home to come to Europe, he married again—an Italian woman he met in Rome—and is now divorced from her. He remains married to his first wife, but only returns home once or twice a year for a visit. There is no love between them—he bluntly said he wanted a younger woman. (He was most uncomplimentary to women over forty).
On his most recent visit to his village, just a few weeks ago for the marriage of two cousins (the girl is sixteen), his wife instructed him to show more love to his children. He told her he could not show them love because then they would be sad when he left again. He despises ISIS or ISIL or however you want to denote it because, as he said, “they kill Muslims and Muslims shouldn’t kill Muslims.” (I wanted to add that perhaps they shouldn’t kill anyone else either, but diplomacy prevailed).
He was a good driver, and I tipped him generously, telling him he should make a run back to Afghanistan soon.
Then on the plane to Rome I sat beside a twenty-nine year old named Ben. He grew up near Stroud, the town visited by my friend, John Peery, when he was in London with me. Ben told me that his village had forty houses and a church, and he had moved first to Manchester and then to London because he never wanted to live so isolated again. As a teenager, he was an Air Cadet (similar to our Civil Air Patrol, but with a little more attachment to the military), had attended university, and had worked since then for the Labor Party. He spoke of that party’s recent defeat, a surprise to nearly everyone here, and said that he quickly came to see that the LP had lost because it had in turn lost touch with the people. He was going off to Italy for a vacation from his hard work and to mull over what he might do with the next chapter of his life.
Upon our arrival at Fiumicino, an incident occurred that broke back memories of my visit here with my then new wife, Kris. The Romans, we discovered in 1978, didn’t understand crowd control. When the bank opened, for example, everyone waiting to get inside simply raced to the counters to be helped.
Some things never change. This time the mob of people numbered in the thousands, all of us standing in a hot corridor, pushing toward the windows of the customs agents. Finally, near the end, roped pathways guided us along.
And in the van into Rome, which I shared with a bunch of Brits—van scouts culled us from the crowd—the professor was to deliver a lecture on MRIs and prostate cancer. She was running very late, and the driver of the van promised to deliver her first. Instead, he delivered her dead last through some sort of mix-up. Except for her, I was last out of the van, and seeing she was near tears, I gave her five Euros and told her to buy a stiff drink. (Probably not enough money). She did start laughing, so maybe I did some good.
And then…then to the Hotel Due Torri. Located on one of the city’s twisting, tiny streets, the Vicolo de Leonetto, this hotel welcomed me like an old friend. Statuary and paints decorate the lobby, the sitting room, and the breakfast room. The marble floors gleam, no doubt due to the efforts of Aaron, the Puerto Rican who is polishing the steps when I enter. Laura and Paula greet me at the desk, take my passport, and send me up to Room 502. I take the tiny elevator to the fourth floor, lug my bags up the stairwell to the top floor, and enter the munchkin-sized room that will be my home for the next few weeks.
The glory of this moderately priced little room is the terrace, which is twice the size of the room and offers a view of tiled rooftops, church towers, and sea gulls. Decked out with large potted plants of all sizes, this terrace will serve as my office and reading room. I am sitting here as I write these notes, listening to church bells, distant traffic, and the cries of seagulls.
After arriving here, I tracked down a small grocery store, bought bread, olives, cheese, and wine, and made an occasion of it on the terrace. I then stroll out and find within a block of the Hotel Due Torri a small Catholic church lavish with artwork and famed for its organ, which the organist happened to be playing as I entered. Close by are tiny grocery stores, restaurants, antique shops, and a Barclay’s Bank, which made me feel a little at home again after England. A block or two more, and I am in the square of the Pantheon, surrounded by diners eating al fresco and street musicians and tourists who seem as lost and in love with room as I.
One final note: breakfast this morning was served continental style: yogurt, two types of egg pies, cereal, several different pastries and brioches, hard-boiled eggs, juices and milk, and the best cup of coffee I’ve had since my last cubano at the High Five. I was seated at a table for one near the breakfast bar, happily munching away, when an Englishman and his wife came into the room. He went to the bar, took one look, and said, “Why, there’s nothing here to eat.”
Definitely a ham-and-egger.