This is a project I have been busy with during lockdown. It is a writing project and also a memory test. I was encouraged by friends to try to recall the Summer after I graduated from college. It was a time filled with incident; and then life moved on so quickly I didn't take the time to put it down in words. Sadly I didn't keep a diary and many of the details and names have slipped anchor and drifted off. It is like trying to recapture a dream from 37 years ago. I have tried to stay true to what I can remember and improvised as little as possible. I did take photos at the time and so I fished them out. At least they break the monotony of the text, of which there is quite a bit.
Around 8800 words.
GATES of PARADISE
I spent 1979 to 1983 at Grays Art School in Aberdeen. It was an enjoyable escape from real life, only slightly marred by the prospect of what might follow in its wake. The country was going to the dogs under Thatcher and possibilities in the arts were slight. Towards the end of my Diploma in Sculpture an envelope dropped through my letterbox that was to answer the question the unemployed Summer of 83 was asking. It was marked John Kinross Travel Scholarship. I fully anticipated it would begin, “We regret to inform you...” Instead, with a great deal of surprise, I read “We are pleased to inform you...”
I had sent in 12 slides
of my final year show, some time previous. I should probably confess
here to a character trait of laissez-faire. Actually, that may
be underestimating my carefree indifference and general indolence
after 48 months immersion in strong drink and recreational
intoxicants. There was precious little I applied myself to back then,
other than absenteeism by chemical retreat, and nobody was more
surprised than I, when I shaved the deadline of this travelling
scholarship application with a dozen slides of my welded metal and
won 3 months in Florence, Italy.
Fisherboy by Gemito, Bargello
I was really pleased to win what seemed like a wheelbarrow of cash but didn't look forward to the admin side of things, which hung over me. Arranging travel and accommodation in a foreign country (long before the internet and email) seemed insurmountable. I do remember when I eventually got in touch with the RSA, I was the last of the 6 recipients by quite some time to check in and collect my winnings. We had been chosen from the Fine Art and Architecture departments of the various Scottish Schools. I was the first ever sculptor.
The RSA did offer a certain amount of advice. Unfortunately one of their pearls of wisdom cost me dearly. Along with an emergency address was the advice to lodge the award money (£1000 or was it £1200?) in a Scottish Bank and get them to transfer it to an Italian bank where it would be waiting for us. I presume this was instead of travelling with a wad of banknotes (or a cheque) on our person. I caught the train to London and on to Paris via a ferry across the channel, the Channel Tunnel still a decade away. Then onto Florence with a bankers draft for the money which I would present on arriving. It didn't cross my mind to fly, which shows how unfamiliar I was with foreign travel.
Immediately I was plunged into the world of Italian banking which only resembled the UK version in architectural surroundings. The rest was completely baroque. The Banco Ambrosiano, the second largest in Italy, had collapsed the previous year with huge debts and Italian bankers were nervous. Roberto Calvi, 'God's Banker' disappeared from the bank and was found hanged under Blackfriars Bridge, London, his pockets stuffed with $15,000 in 3 currencies and, more ominously, bricks.
The customers visiting the bank also behaved in a curious manner. First you charged into a scrum near the teller's counter and fought to get to the front. When you eventually got to the counter you had to hope the teller spoke English and then shout over the noise of the hostile contestants to try and get served. It became quickly evident my bankers draft was given very short shrift by the bank. I have vague memories of standing in a back office with a dubious looking official who regarded me at best, as a small-time crook. I stood my ground but it became apparent that the good old TSB in Edinburgh had transferred my Sterling into Lire (2 decades before before the euro) through a branch in Bologna and my draft would have to be sent there and fingerprinted before I could withdraw so much as a smile. I was shown the door and told to return in a day or 2. This became a daily routine of fighting through the scrum to get to the teller, who would tap some keys then shake her head and I would leave the bank again, penniless and hungry.
Life without money went from good to bad very quickly. In no time I was broke. I think my paperwork must have travelled to Bologna on the back of a donkey being walked there by a sixty year old. Who took long siestas in the afternoon.
Four years of student grants in Aberdeen had taught me to live on, as John Martyn put it, solid air. Never having been a master of foresight I'd arrive at the end of a term counting out meals in slices of bread. And strong drink and roll-ups were always higher on the agenda than food. This was good practise for a couple of weeks of starvation in Italy. Not wanting to make a fuss I went rather longer than perhaps I should have. I was reluctant to fall at the first hurdle and admit defeat and regarded this as a challenge. I would hold out just another day. I can't remember accurately how long this went on but my resources were spread mighty thin and I'm surprised my health didn't suffer more.
This was Summer in Tuscany and it was beginning to warm up. I carried the last bottle of bought water AND FILLED IT FROM THE FOUNTAINS IN FLORENCE. Push had indeed come to shove. I had plenty of time to find what looked like the cleanest running water fountain and wait till there was nobody looking. Then lean over the railings and fill my bottle. I had a few days of this behaviour and no food while life descended into a giddy fever dream of ancient churches and frescoes viewed from a level of Dante's hell. I realised I should contact the emergency address before I contracted typhoid or cholera.
I would have had to work out how to use a public telephone and call the emergency number. An elderly woman answered, let's call her Signora Flavia, because 37 years has robbed me of her name. I must have explained my situation and she would have invited me to her home on the outskirts of town, perhaps even telling me what bus to get and when to get off. I assume this but can't remember how it all came about. I do remember the tomatoes. I was shambling up the drive to her place and 2 young women passed me, coming from the house. I tried to ask in my limited Italian was this the right place for Signora Flavia? They said yes and then turned away and tried to hide their laughter. I reviewed my question and realised I had asked for Signor Flavia. I can remember my mistake all these years later but not her name. Maybe it will return. They were fond memories. We sat in some sort of outside pergola in her garden and she listened to my tale of woe. Absent-mindedly she offered a small selection of cut tomatoes and salad with a vinegar dressing and I helped myself with as much restraint as I could manage. The first taste and I had to blink hard to chase away the tears. I have never tasted tomatoes as good, before or since. The Signora wrote a note and put it in an envelope to present to the bank tellers asking one of the staff there, a friend of her son, to place every trust in my account.
bronze owl, Giambologna, Bargello
It was probably during this meeting, perhaps my only meeting with Signora Flavia, that I heard about a fellow John Kinrosser, Neil. He had been unable to find suitable accommodation and had used the emergency address contact, and ended up renting a room at Villa Flavia. I must have made arrangements to meet up with him but again have no idea how it came about. He was out of town during my tomato visit. But was to have a significant influence on my travels.
Meanwhile my financial woes weren't
quite over. I returned at great speed to the bank and presented my
letter of vindication. Unfortunately the member of staff who was to
vouch for me was off sick. I began to wonder if this was some
elaborate practical joke. I maybe went another day or two of eating
nothing and drinking fountain water until I eventually broke and went
to the British Consulate. I sat on a couch waiting until the
attendant at the counter was free (much more civilised queueing here
in Britain than at that bank) then told my story. I was totally spent
and couldn't stop a couple of tears escaping as I recounted my
impoverished tale. They gave me some money until things were sorted
with the bank.
When eventually the bank released my money
they gave me the lot in a bundle of large denomination notes,
apparently keen that our interactions be terminated and that I never
darken their doorstep again. I reflected that I'd probably used
strong language and exasperated gestures during our many interactions
but was surprised to be dismissed so curtly, as if it was myself who
welched on the deal. I didn't open another account but just kept the
notes hidden in my room for the remainder of the stay. Somehow, I
survived drinking the local water.
In 1983 Italian currency
was the lira. There were 2200 lire to the pound back then, according
to the internet, which is not what I remembered, but I do recall it
was tricky to convert prices (and all those zeros) into a value I was
familiar with, and often I had to stop and work out whether that
slice of pizza was 70p or £7. For a week or two I carried a small
list I had written out of what a pound, a fiver, a tenner was in
lire.
On my journeys to and from the bank I had been
thoroughly researching the best looking pizzas. It was sold cut in
slabs from rectangular trays in open air restaurants and handcarts as
a local delicacy. As soon as I had cash I knew where I'd get my first
large slice. Unlike the tomatoes it did not live up to the
anticipation. My palate had grown soft from eating nothing for so
long that the crust blistered my mouth. I gradually acclimatised.
Accommodation was next. I paid my outstanding dues to the pensione I had been staying at (I think they kept my passport until I made good the bill.) Then went to my new home in Piazza dei Ciompi. (Pronounced Chompy.) I had found this room advertised in the Paperback Exchange, an Anglo-American bookshop in the shadow of the Duomo, that I subsequently visited to get reading material for the duration. They had adverts up for rooms to rent and although there was no price mentioned, the room in Piazza dei Ciompi looked suitable. I met Antonio on the premises and he showed me the large room partitioned into 3 areas; one his, one for me to sleep and sit at a table, and a shared kitchen area. His English was better than my non-existent Italian and we got on well. He told me the price of the place and although high, it was a great area, very central. 5 minutes walk North of Santa Croce, 10 minutes East of the Duomo. We shook on it.
the Duomo from Piazza dei Ciompi, 1983, watery sun
google maps - note height trees have risen in 37 years
He was sometimes in the flat but more often out, and I never
knew whether he would be around. Or what he did for a living. It was
only quite a bit later I realised he also sub-let another room across
the hall. And probably didn't own the place. I was not that
interested in the fine print and just happy to have a base from which
to operate. I spent a few days settling in and eating and drinking,
glad to have the worst behind me.
I found a ceramic shop that
sold off the small reject vases that came out their kiln wobbly or
with burnt glazes, at super low prices. I bought them as gifts for
family on my return and brightened up my bare shelves before
collecting books from the Paperback Exchange. When I went back for
the third time the reject ceramics had soared in price.
I loved taking photos. I spent many hours walking to churches and museums, the Blue Guide (240 pp of everything in Florence worth visiting) always in my bag with my camera. A Pentax ME Super. Film. Manual focus. Thirty six exposures, then hand them in to be developed, and a few days later, 36 prints. I pinned photos to my walls and read books. There was a TV but I rarely switched it on. I had planned to learn the language but so far the only concerted effort to absorb any Italian was consuming the wine. I moved from red to white. From Chianti Classico (look for the Black Rooster on the neck of the bottle) to Supermarket White. I bought bottles of sweet fizzy white in packs of 4 or 6 and popped the plastic corks out the giant window of my first floor room onto the corrugated roofs of the covered market below, empty in the evenings.
Luckily, Neil got in touch. He was an architect and the sort of person who actually should win travel scholarships. Perhaps a bit square but what use an architect who isn't? Whatever the opposite of leading me astray is, he did that. We must have made contact through other people's landlines and he came to meet me at Piazza dei Ciompi. I think it was number 11.
1983
Room with a bit of a view. (Not my towels!)
(I looked up google earth 37 years
later to remind myself of that dreamtime. I had spent many hours
hovering over maps in '83 – I lived by maps, a continual tourist
for months – and went quickly to my old home, unsurprised I found
myself standing virtually outside that doorway on the first click. I
knew the old plaque wouldn't have survived; a big crack and a portion
missing back then. In its place a new sign above the doorway... “Di
Lorenzo Ghiberti Dalle Porte Questa Fu La Casa”. Literally, By
Lorenzo Ghiberti From the Doors This was the House.
(Not
the band The Doors you
understand.) Back in the Early Renaissance Lorenzo had
famously made the bronze doors of the Baptistery. Which caught the
eye of Michaelangelo who called them the Gates of Paradise. And there
was I, six hundred years later popping plastic corks out his
windows.)
Back at Ciompi and Neil comes in while
Antonio is there. They say hello and quickly I get the feeling this
is not the first time they have met. In due course I find out that
Neil too had seen the advert for this room in the Paperback Exchange.
(Weren't we all given the same advice and addresses and money, much
like a full size game of monopoly, and let loose while the dice were
cast?) He said he couldn't afford the asking price. Which was
considerably more than I was paying. I think we let the conversation
drop rather than analyse whether Antonio had lowered the weekly rent
because the market wouldn't sustain it, or because he made on the
spot decisions (never mentioning the price until meeting the
individual) basing price on the appearance and nature of the
candidate.
Antonio was a bearded lean bloke with dark olive
skin and wiry dark hair. He meditated and aspired towards the
spiritual. Or at least vegetarian. Non smoking, non drinking and yet
he was cool about me smoking roll-ups indoors. If you threw a sheet
round him he might look very like Jesus. Slightly thinning on top.
Dark swimmy eyes and a warm smile that was worth waiting for. As well
as being a capitalist and profiteer of the tourist trade. I slowly
got to know him and sometimes we would spent time together. It was
limited by language difficulties and he often urged or encouraged me
to speak in Italian. I was a poor student and never got beyond a
couple of basic sentences to see me through supermarket
interactions.
the Duomo from Palazzo Vecchio
The centre of Florence, the centre of Firenze, is one huge Museum. It is a Museum Town and the whole world comes to visit the churches and museum galleries as they have been dusted down and preserved since the renaissance. Nothing much has been built since then and the narrow streets are not wide enough for the cars and taxis and mopeds that jockey for position. Soon I began to walk the streets without a map. They are all remarkably tall and narrow and similar looking. I lived 10 minutes from the colossal Duomo, the Cattedrale di Santa Maria del Fiore, the largest brick dome ever constructed and from the end of my road you could see the huge red-clay dome of the enormous church lowering over the city. It is a thing so giant it can be seen from everywhere. It is the third highest dome in world, 375 feet tall! And just defies comprehension. From the plans being given the thumbs up, to consecration, was 142 years. That's 2 full lifetimes, possibly 3 in the 15th century. And the decoration, the polychrome marble façade begun in the 14th century was not completed until 1887.
view from the top of the Duomo
Palazzo Vecchio, Uffizi, Forte di Belvedere,
Boboli Gardens, and Palazzo Pitti from the Duomo
I began to catch sight of Antonio's other lodger. She would exit the room across the way mid-morning and leave by the tiled hallway. The drinker's large dark glasses and scarf over unbrushed hair. Let's call her Sophia the American. Her real name flit my brainbox a long time ago. We mostly kept to ourselves but I can remember sharing drinks on a couple of occasions without a clue how that might have come about. She was maybe twice my 21 years but looked more like the other end of her 40s. She had a squarish masculine frame and a drawl that might have been from the Southern states, had travelled a lot and didn't reveal much of her past. It sounded like she had been previously involved with a religious group or maybe cult from which she had untangled herself. But hadn't dropped the hocus-pocus. She shamelessly talked about her kundalini and chakras like you might say 'eyebrow' or 'pencil sharpener'. It was the first time I had heard these words used in day-to-day speech but I had spent enough time in raddled company that I was familiar with bullshit and insecurities, and so just let it blow by, forgiving her mish-mash of spiritual redemption and rum-soaked hokum. I never discussed her with Antonio, other than him mumbling that maybe she drank too much.
On reflection she must have been there for the art and museums, because after Rome and Venice, Florence was the most expensive drinking spot in Italy. People there were paying for the culture, whether you drank it in or not. If you just wanted to soak in booze you would go elsewhere. I watched Sophia leave the flat and disappear into the narrow streets. It might have been fun to shadow her to see whether she bar-hopped between churches but my younger self wasn't as big on judging folk.
I
would tour churches and museums with Neil the architect. He had
arrived in Florence ahead of me and already seen a fair amount. And
so was able to advise what was worth the entrance fee. We would also
travel together to places like Bologna to see the cathedral there,
which was kind of interesting but probably not sufficiently that I
would have bought the train ticket and gone myself. Neil would get
out a sketch book and do a quick and pretty decent front elevation of
this sacristy or perspective of that basilica. Sometimes I'd do the
same, other times I'd take a photo and go for a wander till he had
filled a page with converging lines.
Neil
Antonio's brother turned up maybe halfway through the holiday, I mean scholarship. A smaller man than Antonio with a larger smile, I warmed to him immediately. He was just back from the obligatory military service (which only ended for Italian males in 2005) and was celebrating like it was the end of a war, which in a way it was. We got drunk and smoked spliffs together while he told me in charades and wild tales, about operating tanks and firing guns. He would have been more suited to being a jockey than a warrior which made his stories of military life all the more hilarious. His relief to be shot of it was tangible. Antonio and his brother were close, but it was I who smoked and drank with the smaller Calabrian late into the night. It was my first contact with hashish in Florence and while great fun indoors presented problems outside. I found myself disorientated. It was like back to square one and I had to check in my bag for my map which I had stopped using weeks ago. I would see an ornate doorway and swear I'd never been down this street in my life. I remember walking back from the Duomo, down streets I'd been dozens of times and having to backtrack to a point of recognition then going round the block to double check I was in the right place. As with many intoxications it was fun if you went with it, a bit alarming if you tried to fight against it. Antonio's brother was around for a while but not so long I can recall his name or whether he stayed with us or elsewhere.
On one occasion when I wasn't that busy, I was urged to go with the two of them to a friend's place. I went along and we climbed countless stairs in an ancient building, five, six or maybe seven stories high. It was like climbing back in time, the stairs going from modern to rickety as we ascended to an ancient medieval world. When we eventually got to the impressive flat, joints were passed around and the four or five of us were given a tour. I followed in confusion, going from room to room, understanding little of the rapid Italian banter. Occasionally Antonio would translate something but it would often seem mysterious or just incredible. A stoppered jar was passed around and we each took a sniff, put the stopper back in and passed it on. A woman's perfume from centuries ago. Could that be right? There were too many questions to make sense of this and I just floated around like I was in a dream. Next object; a saxophone.
The language barrier was a huge problem of my own making. It meant I was almost continually missing the full picture or unaware of what precisely was going on. There was another situation occurred while I was walking home late one night. Perhaps it was after visiting Neil. It was way across town and my internal navigation was on auto pilot. I enjoyed strolling across town at night, the ancient paving, like a storage heater, releasing the day's warmth. And maybe seeing a spotlit church facade at the end of a narrow passageway or reflecting across the blackness of the Arno. I had almost certainly had a few drinks and so didn't really mind when an attractive Italian woman approached me briskly and asked something of me in rapid Italian. I gave my standard apology in Italian, that I didn't speak much Italian; the phrase I had committed to memory and polished comprehensively hoping that it might excuse learning the remainder of the language. She shushed me, and looking around with caution said something in broken English, perhaps help or could I do something? I was definitely up for pretty much anything and delighted to have my evening stroll home interrupted with this drama. “Pretend you are with us, please!”
I was ushered over to a small huddle of women who smiled nervously and were keeping an eye on a sinister bloke down the other side of the street. From what I could gather my masculinity was somehow an amulet against the powers of this (quite obviously) evil demon. Nothing further seemed to be required of me other than to stand like a spare piece next to these girls. Had I had a command of Italian I might have asked if it would help the one act play we were clearly improvising, if I pretended to kiss one or maybe all of the women. As I was scrabbling to think of the Italian phrase for that, I was bundled into a tiny Fiat with all of the women. I was in the front passenger seat as we set off, wheels screeching.
The
girls were full of chat and excitement but only between themselves as
if they had forgotten they had kidnapped a total stranger and taken
him hostage. I had a mild concern this might all end up down a dark
alley and my few possessions changing hands, but the atmosphere in
the tiny car was more celebratory. I wished I had the nerve and
language skills to ask where the party was. After a while I
recognised the area we were going through and when the driver asked
me a 'dove' question I said Santa Croce and was dropped 5 minutes
from home. I was left none the wiser but was given a cheeky wave and
smiles from the car.
*
A
few weeks before I left for Florence, back at Art School in Aberdeen,
I was approached by the head of the ceramic dept. to do a favour for
a colleague. Myself and Firthy must have been lounging in the
sculpture dept. next door, smoking cigarettes and debating something
of no doubt monumental importance. There was a woman, he said, who
required the services of a couple of energetic brawny young men to
move some boxes. (Failing that, we would do.) Remuneration was
unspecified but promised.
The woman in question, Faye, had
been studying pottery in Grays and had a load of boxes half packed
that were to be moved from A to B in time for C (an emigration to
Tuscany) and since she had sprained a wrist couldn't finish packing
everything up and it would be marvelous if Firthy and I could come to
her house and oblige. Her husband was offshore so wasn't able to
help. We would be paid and could keep as many of his porn magazines
as we could carry. Firthy and I exchanged a smirkless glance. The
details are lost in time but I have a faint memory of lots of boxes
and tea-chests up and down expensively carpeted stairs for a couple
of hours. And coming to the conclusion that the remuneration, the
only important part of the transaction as far as we were concerned, a
crisp £20 note each and a large single malt, was a successful and
suitable outcome. In an effort to at least mimic respectability we
did not leave with armfuls of magazines.
I think Faye must
have given us business cards with her Italian contact details on them
saying, “if you're ever in town...” She can't possibly have
anticipated a call from me only a couple of months later saying
“guess what..?”
Faye was fairly pleased when I got in touch. They were staying in the hills outside Florence while going through the interminable process of buying an old ruin. The official line was they (non-Italians) weren't allowed to buy a local property, with the intention to restore it and then run it as a hotel. However as it benefitted everyone within the deal to turn a blind eye while exactly this happened, there was a substantial amount of red tape to accommodate, and lawyers to grease.
Galleria dell'Accademia
David by Michaelangelo
Siena
On one occasion we went to Siena, an amazing hill-top miniature version of Florence. Possibly even more lovely than Florence, (aside from the tortures of the Palio), certainly less to traipse around. I see animal rights campaigners have done an amount to clean up the Palio which used considerable amounts of stimulants (in the horses) to produce the spectacle, up until the end of the millennium.
the Duomo from S. Lorenzo
S. Lorenzo from the Duomo Cupola
Below the Duomo - note walkway below circular window
I had slowly overcome my vertigo climbing the many towers and churches that Italy offered that Summer. Pisa, with its famous leaning tower. I did that on a day when the rain made the lower side of polished marble extremely slippy in espadrilles and I had to use hands on the columns like Samson to prevent an early exit. Bologna has three towers, none of which are true to the vertical. The interior of the Duomo in Florence was the one that rattled my cage the most profoundly. You climb up between the skins of the building without much of a view before edging out onto a 600 year old walkway that seems even higher for being an internal space. The dome arches above and the trompe-l'oeil floor tiles suggest an infinite plunge downwards while a curious feeling percolated somewhere within my lower abdomen. Standing hundreds of feet higher on the cupola was doddle by comparison, with all Florence below like a map.
Pisa and that tower
Similarly the view from the top of the tower in Fiesole was educational. Randy sat at a cafe sufficiently close to observe his intentions while he watched young women going past. Often they would approach and lean over to pat the dog and speak to it. Italians at that time only kept large dogs as behind-fence-security to bark at, or bite, intruders. The idea of a large friendly dog kept as a slightly underachieving family member was so rare it provoked as much enthusiastic interaction as if you had the Pope on a leash under the table.
One night I woke to find my room being lit up by flashes of lightening. I looked out the window and there seemed to be a massive storm passing by. But no rain and more strange yet, no thunder. The flashes were more like sheet lightening and like someone was soundlessly taking flash photos of the city from above the partial cloud cover. I was captivated and jumped into my clothes and ran out the front door with my camera. I went to the river and stood on a bridge - the only place to get out from the rat-run streets and buildings which blocked longer views of the landscape. I had bought a small tripod in a camera shop just a few days before and set the camera up for long exposure shots. The only film I had in my bag was a black and white. But that was perfect for what I imagined would be groundbreaking long exposure art shots using my camera and god's flash. After a giddy hour or more I finished the film and wandered home. Still no rain or thunder but a stiff breeze maybe carried both away from the city. It was a mesmerising experience that not even the photographic upshot could spoil.
Weeks later Alison, back at college after Summer, volunteered to develop and print them using her college facilities. Since I was broke I handed over the spool of film. She came back from college saying none of the photos came out. Over-exposed or whatever. I felt the night of wonders slip through my fingers. I knew she wouldn't deliberately have botched the processing but could easily have messed up because she was a student and was just learning about photography. It was also possible although less likely I'd over-exposed the whole film. I'd have been more convinced by 6 bad pics and 30 overexposed but Alison was empty handed save for a tale of blank negatives. And best I didn't question her abilities as no amount of argument would bring back a miraculous night of fireworks.
Alison wrote to say she would come visit. Our relationship was floundering and perhaps heading to a natural conclusion as she would continue at her college in Aberdeen and was making new friends, and I tried to make some sort of a living doing anything that came to mind, based some of the time in Edinburgh, some in Aberdeen.
Alison, like myself, travelled by train and ferry to get to Florence. I suspect there just weren't cheap flights in those days. I met her off the train. I should have taxied her back to my room for a cold beer but instead wanted to show her all the cool things in my new town. Big mistake. I was forgetting the 24hrs of hell that travelling from Scotland on a train involves. She really didn't want to hoof it across a baking landscape of ancient churches and yet more ancient churches. I probably just wanted to show off. Also I was dressed entirely in quite loud and unexpected clothes.
a rare selfie with Alison
What started poorly did improve. Though there were a few incidents along the way. I had asked Antonio where might be worth a visit outside Florence. He had pointed us towards Grosseto, a beach fronted town past Sienna on the train South, halfway to Rome. I think we stayed in a cheap hotel and sat on a part of the beach reserved for an expensive hotel. Other than that I can remember nothing. When I saw the word Grosseto, it rang all sorts of bells but I was unable place it. I found a photo with Grosseto written on the back but nothing giving away clues on the other side. I think we went South with the romantic idea of sleeping on beaches, but suspect the reality may have been different. My memories are limited to a return train journey to Florence, horribly crowded and standing. I was so tired that I fell asleep standing up for the first time in my life. Perhaps a restless night in the sand dunes was the cause.
Alison at Piazzale Michelangelo
When I think about the patterns I fell into, the places I went and things I did, I can see an echo of the activities I now practise every weekend. Looking through the faded photos from back then, there is one of a dragonfly perched on my finger. It could have been taken last Summer. The fact I recorded all that not with sketchbooks or a diary but through photography, has stayed with me as well. The Pentax was my first decent camera, and since then I have never gone far without a camera on board. And so many adventures. I have replaced the drink and drug induced exploits with physical endeavours; finding greater rewards in rambles through the country in search of trails and butterflies, than ever found in beer and cigarettes. I have always sought out adventures, and felt their absence when my life became dull and domestic.
Antonio
came in sweating saying he had already had 2 showers that day alone
and would need another one shortly. It was 34 degrees. I was
listening to the radio and reading a book from the paperback
exchange, too hot to go out. He said he was going swimming tomorrow
if I wanted to come along. I said that would be good and looked out
some swimming gear. He told me he would drive us to the hills, to a
quiet spot he knew. He drove a beaten up van something like a VW
camper but not as swish. We climbed out the city in the punishing
sunlight and arrived, after about an hour, at some lake. I was
surprised to see loads of people there already as it was not quite as
scenic as I had hoped. A long way to go for a dusty beach next
to some not-particularly-fresh looking water. I was not surprised to
see the majority of the people were naked. Antonio had warned me. I
think he went off to find pals and left me to spread out a rug and
lie in the baking sun. I would have gone in for a swim as well though
remember nothing of it. I do remember I kept my shorts on. Not
because I was embarrassed or uptight, but because it was what I would
have done had nobody at all been there. It was more normal to me than
running about naked. I was also very white and liable to scorch
easily. It would have been no big issue to go naked, to fit in with
the anonymous surroundings but there was no pressure to do so, and
I'm quite impressed looking back, at my indifference to the sway of
the majority. I may
even have avoided getting sunburned.
It was perhaps that evening, or
another, sitting at the small table in our place with Antonio, that I
asked to see his wrists. The cuts had long healed but the wounds had
left thick corded scars that snarled across the inside of his wrists.
He said they were the result of a car accident a long while back, his
hands and arms thrust through a windscreen. I took him at his word;
there being no alternative.
The radio must have been Antonio's. I can't imagine I carried one from Scotland. I was not a big fan of radio. Until all other forms of music were denied me. And then it became a lifeline. Mostly it would just play in the background but once every few days I'd hear this tune, an electronic ditty, a fifty fifty mix of cheese and catchy rhythm (no words) and I thought I have got to have that. I have to find out what it is and buy that track. There was no way to distinguish what it was and I had no machine to record it. The DJ either wouldn't name it, or I'd only hear a rapid fire sentence in Italian I couldn't make head nor tale of, or the next track of music would fade in immediately it finished. Antonio was never in when it played and I'd not want to drag him down from his higher plane to identify a cheesy pop tune. Now if it were a yoga move or an Indian deity... “The lady on the batik with all the arms is Shiva and she is not stamping on a child, she dances on the dwarf of human ignorance...”
The only way, was to go to a record shop and la la la the wordless tune at the counter. I never got halfway down the street with enough of the tune intact in my head, and even if I had I would have had to send in Antonio in advance to ask them to turn off the blaring music because this tourist was coming into the shop to sing la la la so you can sell him the cassette tape and he can't hear himself think while you're playing that rock. Yeah that would work.
grotto, Villa di Castello
It was
later on I discovered the
TV channel. I was in at night alone, drinking fizzy white and popping
corks across the market. The TV was there, I hadn't seen a film in
months, stick it on why don't you? I think there were 3 or 4 stations
from one end of the dial to the other. I left it on the one with the
best reception. Fine drinking company. Back in the UK at that point
we only had 4 channels. The most recent to arrive just the previous
year, Channel 4, finished transmission every night with a 4 chord
signature tune as the numeral logo slowly exploded into component
parts. Considerable improvement on BBC1 who played the National
Anthem. I can't think of a more compelling reason to switch off the
TV. As I watched the box my attention was caught as the female
presenter started dancing to the tinny background music then taking
her clothes off. Somehow I had struck gold and come across, by
complete accident, a channel that celebrated the end of the day's
transmission with a stripper. What had I done to deserve this? When
no one else was about (which seemed to be most of the time these
days), I'd tune in, and anywhere between 11.30pm and midnight, the
last program would finish and then, with no great fuss, tinny music
would start to play. It was a scenario that did not require
translation. You have to remember these were innocent days long
before the internet. And the extent of these closedowns differed
greatly, night to night. They had a look of amateurishness about them
that was greatly appealing. It was as if all the production crew from
the day's shooting were having a few drinks at the after show party
and said hey
everyone throw 10,000 in the hat and we'll get a stripper.
Then the stripper didn't turn up and one of the crew says, hey for
that, I'll do it. Roll the camera! Sometimes a dancer would appear,
take off her gloves, turn round once and the channel would close
down. There's me with my glass half empty. On another occasion 2
nights later waiting for shutdown and a different dancer does 10
minutes. All her clothes on the floor 5 minutes ago and she is still
doing the cha cha cha. I am cheering and whooping and hollering and
popping corks across the rooftops, glass half full!
The original scholarship had suggested we spend 3 months in Italy. Having no further resources than the budget of the award I had to keep a close eye on the diminishing wad of notes under my metaphorical pillow. I think it came to a conclusion about 10 weeks after I arrived. I have no recall how far through the Blue Guide I had got and whether there were still unvisited masterpieces yet to tick off. Or whether I had bought a ticket for the homeward bound journey a week or 2 in advance of leaving. I do remember I had forgotten to leave enough spare cash for a meal on the ferry and that back in the day I did not carry credit cards or any method of extending myself. I may well have visited my pals in London on the way home, who would have looked after me.
On my last night I took chalks to the Piazza della Signoria and drew
on the paving slabs, Klimt's The Kiss.
A while after
returning we were held to account by the awarding body and asked to
present ourselves as a group of 6 for a show-and-tell. We were given
plenty warning and I planned to develop some drawings from the many
photographs I'd taken into a bulging portfolio of what
I did in my Summer holidays. Unfortunately,
diligence and hard work were not two of the disciplines I'd developed
abroad and the sketchbook I presented along with a small daub or two
was probably about 12% full. As a token gesture I cut a couple of
hundred rectangles of card and mounted all the best photos of the
trip. They just about covered my embarrassment and, of the 6 of us
that travelled that year, I wasn't the one with the least evidence of
endeavour. My accomplice Neil had the fullest sketchbook with great
drawings of all the right stuff. A week ago I emailed an Architect
who runs his own business from home in Edinburgh to ask if he
remembered much of that trip. There has been no reply.
The
scholarship still exists today. Ten final year students receive an
initial payment of £2,300 for travel, accommodation and subsistence,
“with the remaining £200 awarded on the satisfactory completion of
the scholarship”. I did wonder what the circumstances were (and
which recipient was it) that had incited a £200 fine for behaviour
unbecoming.
Alison and I stayed together for maybe another
year before parting company. We got in touch twelve years later and had too many drinks during
an evening of nostalgia and laughs. She hasn't responded to my recent
facebook request but doesn't appear to be a big fan of that medium. I
don't blame her.
PB January 2021
Sunset over the Arno and the Ponte Vecchio
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