I just keep having a sense of knowing people here. The ladies in furs, great noses, well coiffed - my aunts. Men gesturing, pointing, during dinner, sipping wine from small glasses - my uncles. The direct bright eyes of a guide, a sales person, drawing you in, suggesting, calming, laughing - my cousins. And it gets stronger the longer we are here.
http://goeurope.about.com/library/graphics/italy_rail_map.gif
We traveled south of Rome yesterday to Naples, which should mark nothing in particular, but marks much in terms of Italy and my own Italian heritage. My earliest memories of my Italian side of my family include mention of "where so-and-so came from on the boot." You see, information A (location) would tell you loads about B (motivation, personality, etc.) The farther north - Venezia, Milan, Firenze. The fairer haired, eyed, calmer, more organized, but, perhaps, maybe, not so fun-loving...The more southern, darker, more passionate, more temper. Gross exaggerations filtered through the mind of a six year old, but there you have it. Now how does this live in me? Well, as best as I can understand it, I am a mixture - a great grandmother from Florence, a grandfather from Manoppello, Abruzo (directly east of Rome), and family from Naples. Which makes me fair haired, passionately organized and prone to moments of temper. Oh.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/multimedia/archive/00146/Italian_train_146885a.jpg
So yesterday, it was with great curiosity that I boarded the train south. We have been traveling in second class - cheaper and by far more interesting in terms of contact with the Italian people. As we pulled out of the station, I heard a different Italian. It was faster, more musical, harder to make out - passionate. Hands were moving more. People were chatting more. Hmmmm...During our trip, for the first time, an Italian lady sitting next to Joe, after staring for several minutes, began to talk to us about where we were going. Our not understanding Italian did not deter her. She learned we were going to Sorrento. She pointed to our guide book, kept repeating her thoughts and them eventually pulled in the lady sitting next to Elle to translate. She lived in Naples. Had we been their before? Sorrento. Lovely. She went to convent school there. The nuns were kind. She heard they rented rooms. Did we need a place to stay?
This was not a northern conversation; it was southern.
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We got to the train station. We all clutched our bags. The rumors about the dangers of getting robbed are not fiction. 30 percent of Naples is unemployed. The city is crowded and poor. Hold onto your purse. The Naples train station, and worse yet the Circumvesusia Station (the local train that runs out to Sorrento) are rough places, and while we aren't screamingly American (people start by addressing us in French or Italian as much as English) we AREN'T local!
On the way off the train the lady gave me a look - mom to mom - which said: "keep a hold of your kids, your bag, your wallet!" Sí, grazie. Naples is lovely, interesting, she was telling me, but it had a bite. Oh.
http://www.vtf-vacances.com/voyages/img/costa-concordia/bay-of-naples.jpg
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