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2 Where Art Thou Romeo? The sun's morning rays focused directly on our tiny domicile. I peeked out and saw the sun's beam split by blades of grass into a stream of sparkling diamonds on the water's surface. In a short time I grew uncomfortably hot. Sharon said, "For the first time in ages, I'm just the right temperature." Climbing hills, she had complained of being too hot, then downhill she had complained of being too cold. Unfortunately for her, the landscape was a series of hills. The countryside was remarkably similar to anywhere in America: Fields of yellow canola and small red buildings sat atop knolls. Farmers worked fields amidst the rich smell of freshly tilled earth. The air permeated my olfactory senses bringing back childhood memories of when my Grandfather plowed. And I never imagined we would find such quiet roads and superlative vistas in Italy. Only the olive trees were out of character for a North American landscape. The hilly terrain and small tracts of land favoured small machinery farming. A group of men cleared a treed area by hand. There were some incongruities that reminded me I was no longer in America. In Sutri we visited an amphitheatre used for religious ceremonies and funerals. Hewn out of soft local rock it was thought to be built around the last years before Christ. We visited a Roman necropolis with tombs and a church carved entirely into the rock. Ancient crumbling and peeling frescoes were barely discernible inside the crypt. I was beginning to get the feeling it wasn't much like North America after all. The medieval towns, washing hung on stone walls, struck me as another big difference between North America and Europe. Rock arches held doors opening into the walled city of Ronciglione, Italy. Sharon and I bumped along cobbles into the old portion of town, and in the town centre, we stopped and filled our water bottles from an elaborate bronze unicorn and lion-head fountain. Sharon was aghast when she noticed a dead fish floating in the fountain -- someone with a twisted sense of humour had apparently thrown it in. Sharon noticed people carrying bread sticks and sent me into a bakery to get some. Not knowing what the word for bread sticks was I pointed at the bread behind the counter and made a stretching motion with my hands. "Baguette?" the woman asked. "No. Piccolo," I replied. "Loaf?" she asked. "No." "Rosette?" she tried. Still no. Finally she pulled a bread stick from a bag on the counter. "Si!" I exclaimed, pointing happily. "No," she said. They had sold out. The bag left was for a regular customer. Exiting the bakery, an old woman leaned out her upstairs window and bellered at me in a very unladylike manner. "Señor!" she kept hollering (plus a lot of stuff I didn't catch). I felt like Romeo with her hanging over the balcony like that. She was hoarse by the time we rode away. I had to admit, nothing like that had ever happened to me back home.It was still multi store shopping--no superstores. I bought bread at one shop, cured ham at another (where the seller insisted he introduce me to an English speaking fellow from Brazil), at a third I procured cheese, but couldn't get across I wanted ten thin slices and had to settle instead for four thick slices he hacked off with a butcher knife. By that time, I had to admit Italy wasn't even remotely like America. |
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