Piedmont

On Saturday, I hopped on a train, heading for parts unknown to me ...

Stefano picked me up at Novi and then I arrived, on a small patch of paradise, in the Italian countryside.  Before any of my more cynical friends roll their eyes over my casual use of the word 'paradise', I will explain. 

In New Zealand, I was a creature who loved nature.  I didn't need wilderness, I just enjoyed the sky doing its thing, seeing healthy plants, walking my dogs in school fields, along beaches or river edges.  It was a recipe for dreaming.

And I have always loved the scent the nature, especially in Spring, when plants seem to celebrate their winter survival and fill the air with stunning scents.

In Piedmont, Italy, the air, without exaggeration, seemed to be constantly scented by some delicate flower.  Acacia I suspect but I don't know enough about the beautiful plant, I photographed, to be sure.  Does anyone know what the flowering 'tree' at the end of this post is?  Or what the gentle, jasmine-like scent might have been?

Update: Stefano let me know the name ... it is Robinia pseudoacacia or False Acacia.

I rested, in a way that I haven't rested in a long time.  I watched the clouds put on a small show and I photographed so many of the plants as I wandered the grounds.

But that aside, I met excellent people. On Saturday evening, friends of Stefano and Miriam gathered and the Genovese humour made me laugh.  It's a wicked humour but gently wicked.  And I tried a range of Genovese foods, out there in the Piedmont countryside ... Cima stood out as a new favourite.   I'll write of it another day but Miriam's mother made it and it was delicious.

And wine ... the wine I tasted, it came from the area and was unlike any I had tasted before but in a good way.

Yes, let me say quietly ... I had a most marvellous time.  Grazie mille, Stefano and Miriam.

Just a note really ...

Life goes on, here in Genova.  It's 20 celsius, as I write this, and I can hear the beautiful hum that this city makes, as people end their day of working and meet for aperitivo.

I've been working at the kitchen table that looks out over Via Ravecca, window open ... washing drying in the beautiful weather.  I can hear the Swallows playing their kamikaze-like games out in the skies.  They squeal as they chase each other up and down streets.

I found a wonderful art gallery today. We couldn't talk because we lacked language but I loved the work I saw there.  It's not the photograph, which is beautiful anyway, but what the artist does with the photograph afterwards.

The lion you see on the home page of this site inspired me to visit with the lions of San Lorenzo as I passed by them today but I just discovered my TIM connection is too slow here, in Genova ... I  can't load my image.  Perhaps I'll stop by at the internet cafe tomorrow anyway ... ciao from Genova.

Wandering ... and stuff.

Furthermore, we have not even to risk the adventure alone; for the heroes of all time have gone before us; the labyrinth is thoroughly known; we have only to follow the thread of the hero-path. And where we had thought to find an abomination, we shall find a god; where we had thought to slay another, we shall slay ourselves; where we had thought to travel outward, we shall come to the center of our own existence; where we had thought to be alone, we shall be with all the world.
Joseph Campbell, The Hero with a Thousand Faces, p. 18 (3rd edition)

This quote popped up on my Facebook wall and bemused me some ... because it seems true to me, in a way.

I come on these solitary pilgrimages to Genova.  I'm seeking something of home.  The sea, the hills, even the friendliness of Genovesi, (sometimes biting humour too) ... all of it feeds something inside of me.

But don't imagine I'm a fearless wanderer.  I'm really not.  I love it here, more than anyplace else but, it's not all simple or beautiful.

On Monday night, I struggled for most of the night, with what I initially imagined was an allergy problem.  My mouth was incredibly dry and, of course, the more I thought about it, the worse it got.  I had eaten a couple of things that I usually avoid and so allergy attack was there at the top of the list.

I thought I could tough it out but the night was long.  It's amazing how alone you can feel in a country not your own, when you're struggling with your body in the night.  So ... around 4am, I decided to call a taxi and quietly visit the emergency room.  Well, my Belgian phone didn't want to play and it may be, that I panicked ... which, of course, made the dry mouth dryer.

What I didn't know about Italy was how stunning their emergency services are. The Genovese should so proud of the people who work the phones.  I phoned in, they found someone who spoke English ... the calmest man in the world I think.  He asked me what was wrong and I told him that I thought I was having an allergy problem and my mouth was very dry and yes well ... I was a bit shaky by then.

He said, shall we send an ambulance.  The New Zealander in me was horrified.  I explained that I had failed with a taxi and I was only trying to get myself to the hospital, just in case it wasn't serious. 

He asked, shall I send a house doctor.  I quaked in my boots and said, 'will it be expensive'.  He said, 'no, it's free'.

I was stunned.

So, at 5am, a doctor arrived.  A practical kind man, from Syria originally and, using our English, his German and Italian, we solved my problem. 

I was alternately mortified and grateful.  It seems that there three options and none of them too serious.  In German, he told me it was small problem.

He was kind, he left, having reassured me and said, 'and now sleep'. 

And I did.

The books I am reading here in Genova

As always, I am reading more than one book.

The book that is all but making me melt with pleasure is titled, Waiting for Robert Capa.  It's by Susana Fortes and I love it.  I would rate her poetic prose as highly as Anne Michaels writing. I loved her book Fugitive Pieces ... in terms of beautiful writing.  Actually, I loved Anne's poetry too.

I am also reading an old favourite, in terms of author.  William Dalrymple's, Nine Lives, is a most delightful series of travel stories that I am biting into whenever I want something different.  I love his writing and have done since first reading In Xanadu, forever ago.

And then, I am also working through The Fire Starter Sessions by Danielle LaPorte. 

Each of them have their own wisdoms, their own electricity, their own beauty.

Oh yes, and I'm writing a book, here in Genova.  Did I tell you?  I'm sure I did.  Piano, piano ...

Kim asked about me and Genova ...

Kim asked if I was in Genova yet ...

I so am.

I have this huge and uncontrollable smile on my face.  It started as I journeyed from Milan towards the mountains and Genova ... and I can't stop it.

I've been trying not to frighten anyone, with my madly happy face, as I run errands upon arrival.  I'm working on containing it within me, as a quiet bubble of joy. 

I have a beautiful bouquet of flowers.  I have an internet connection.   I have wine ...  and I'm still smiling.  It's like that.

I am back in this city I love so well.

All kinds of threats have been made if I return without completing the book this time ... and so I must.

But Kim, yes, I am back.

More rain in Genoa ...November, 2011

Just after 3am, I woke to a noise that sounded remarkably like a big building collapsing.  The boom of it echoed through the caruggi, the narrow alleyways here.

I lay there, not really wanting to think about what it might have been.  Soon after, it happened again.  Thunder?  I got up to look and discovered yes, thunder, lightning and heavy rain.  I went back to bed hoping that the flash floods of last week had cleared streams and pathways so that this torrential rain might cause less problems ... then realised it may still be a case of a lot of water cascading down from the hills above the city, overflowing streams and streets ... and I hoped not. 

I lay there, listening, hoping that this was more about the sound and the fury of a storm and less about many mm’s of rain in a short period of time.

5am, I woke up to the crashing of thunder and wondered if it was the same storm or a new one. 
6.50am, I gave in and got up.  The storm continues and is incredibly noisy.  Perhaps it is trapped between the high hills of Genova and the sea.  It’s not going away.

I remembered Cinque Terre were concerned about this next lot of heavy rain, I don’t know if Genova needs to be too but it doesn’t seem like the best kind of weather for a city so recently hit by serious flooding.

Genova’s Righicam gives you a peek in at the weather and the weather forecast it links to tells me that there is a 100% chance of rain until 11am, easing to a 90% chance of light rain from about 5pm.

So, today one might be sure in the knowledge that it’s going to rain.  Reassuringly ... surprisingly, I can hear people in the alley below.  Hardy souls out with umbrellas on their way to work I guess. It’s still dark, except for those moments when lightning fills the sky.

Kate, an American who has been living in Cinque Terre for years, posted an email she initially began writing for friends and family ... after realising they seemed to have no idea of how bad things are here in Italy.  So many Americans have wandered through, and fallen in love, with Cinque Terre that she and other American bloggers living in the area were disappointed by the lack of coverage the devastation in their area is getting.  They’re encouraging donations to Red Cross

I have to admit to being worried if Cinque Terre is receiving the rain we’ve been having here in Genova these last few hours, and yet I don’t want to be alarmist.  This isn’t my country and it’s not my landscape.  Unlike the corners of New Zealand I lived in, I don’t know the area well enough to understand whether it can cope with the rainfall we’re having right now.  I guess it’s just a matter of waiting and seeing, hoping that those in authority here in the city get the warnings out this time and no more lives are lost because the 10-20% of Genova that is down low or situated in the flat places may be taking a hammering now.

I took this photograph down at the ruin of the ancient temple yesterday.

The Passion of Artemisia, by Susan Vreeland

We’ve been lucky, I said.  We’ve been able to live by what we love.  And to live painting, as we have, wherever we have, is to live passion and imagination and connection and adoration, all the best of life - to be more alive than the rest.
Extracted from The Passion of Artemisia, by Susan Vreeland.

Genoa, in Reflection

I have loved the world in reflections since those days when I was a small child traveling to my Nana and Grandad’s house in Invercargill.

The swampy creek that ran alongside State Highway 1 over near Berwick was almost always a place of perfect reflections.  No one realised probably but I was contemplating that world so perfectly reflected, wondering if it might be another world, a parallel world perhaps, a magical world.

These days, I have discovered I can go some way to photographing those worlds reflected in puddles.  And I love it.  The rain stopped for a while today, the sun came out and voila, there we all were, out on the beautiful streets of this city.

So ... here’s a little of the beauty I find in Genova, in reflection.

The rain continues to fall, Genoa, November 2011

It seems that we have a stubborn zone of low pressure spinning round and round over us ... she writes, probably not quite getting it right.  It looks like we might have rain here until Tuesday ... so frustrating.  It’s not particularly cold but wet ... oh so wet.

Meanwhile I wasn’t really sure what we might find outside this morning but the bakery was open and so we had the best kind of focaccia breakfast.  Then we were off into the alleyways in search of water supplies.  Shops were open, people were out and about, and slowly I was able to line up reality and seperate it from the flood chaos we had viewed online.

We went down into the Centro Storico because we knew one of our lovely Genovese friends had been considering spending the night in her shop, worried about water damage.  It was good to find her safe and well.

And so it has been another day of quiet sadness, here in Italy, thinking about those who have died in the flash flooding during this last week.  I’ve been following Kate’s news from Cinque Terre, on her blog called Little Paradiso.  Today she wrote of another American who experienced the floods there.  Christine is blogging of her experience in the floods last week and the ongoing worries they have about this weather that just keeps spinning round over top of us all.

Meanwhile, a photograph snapped out on Piazza San Lorenzo ...umbrellas are required.

An update on the rain, November 2011, Genoa

The flooding is rather serious here ... 3 rivers have broken their banks and already 5 people are confirmed dead, with 3 missing.

We’re up on the hill here in the city and, as far as I know, there are no rivers close by ...  We have bought supplies and hope that the rain stops soon but already noted that via XX Settembre is closed down by the covered market.  Rain is predicted for a couple more days.  There have been some impressive ‘Fiordland rainforest’ downpours througout the day, the difference being that Fiordland New Zealand sits on glacial moraine and drainage is rather efficent.  Here the rain all runs down off the hills that surround Genova ... down into the homes and streets that lead to the sea.

It’s 18 celsius, with a warm wind blowing, as I write this at 17.11.  It’s disturbingly dark ... daylight saving ended at the weekend, and there is this odd sense of not being sure of what is happening in the city, beyond what I’m reading in the English newspaper found online.  It was like this in Istanbul when the city was closed by two huge snowfalls but somehow, this is different. I am realising, once again, that I didn’t prepare for stuff like this.

You will get a sense of it perhaps when viewing one of the early slideshows of the flooding.