Friday, July 31, 2009

Musings on Italian shoes, Siena and a linquistic cautionary tale...



This article also appears on our Italian Journal page.

There was the time my friend Lena and I went to Siena. We walked all over that beautiful city, tracing the circular patterns of its narrow stone streets for hours. We marveled over how we were doing this in Italian shoes purchased only the day before...and neither one of us wearing socks. My shoes were medium heeled, black suede, square toe, adorned with silver and black metal shapes across the upper. Hers were low heeled, black suede loafers that were crafted so stylishly they made you forget that penny loafers ever existed. After hours of walking on stone surfaces, our feet still felt like they were encased in clouds. No blisters, bleeding or painful stepping. This, we decided, is why Italian women are always wearing beautiful shoes no matter what they're doing. Because they can. Because they are always comfortable. They have no reason to reach for shlubby sneakers ever. (Just to clarify, this was the mid 1990's, well before the stylish sneakers we now enjoy were available. But even now, the Italian ones look and feel better). This theory was reinforced later in the trip when we drove past an elderly, rather stout Italian woman walking up a hill in a pair of black pumps with narry a trace of discomfort on her serene face. This woman was walking up a hill in heels, and she was happy about it. Surely Italian shoemaking secrets can help bring about world peace.


But back to Siena. At this point, we had finished a wonderful dinner in one of the restaurants in il campo, the main piazza. We were trying to find our way back to the parking garage to get our car. I say "trying" because it wasn't easy. As I mentioned earlier, the streets of Siena are built in a kind of circular fashion. This leads to all kinds of interesting paths, whether you're trying to make sense out of a street sign or the directions a kind soul has just given you in rapid fire Italian, complete with at least 3 options to get to your destination. To give you an idea of what we were up against with the street signs, at one point we raised our weary eyes to a big sign screaming "Parking Garage" (Yes! in English!). We thought we were saved; all we had to do was follow the arrow. Make that 2 arrows. Each pointing in an opposite direction. Oh, the joys of circles.


By this time, the streets were dark and the stores were closed. Most of them had metal grates pulled across the windows so we couldn't see what they were selling. We kept walking and asking and reading and yawning and sitting. It was during one of these sit-downs that we read the sign over the store next to us that read "Morbidi". (Please keep in mind that this was only our first or second trip to Italy, so we knew very little Italian between us. I was still making the rookie mistake of thinking that if an Italian word sounded like an English word, it must mean the same thing). Morbidi? Morbid? What kind of a store is that? What on earth are they selling? Caskets? Cemetary supplies? Ewwww.

The following day we got ourselves an Italian-English dictionary because we had to figure out what that store was selling. We found morbido, the singular version of morbidi. It means "tender, soft". The store was probably selling lingerie, jewelry or any number of adorable things. Not caskets. We looked at each other in horror and then burst out laughing. We spent many happy hours since then singing "Love Me Morbidi" to the tune of "Love Me Tender". So it wasn't a total loss.

Click here to view selections from Carolyn's Photograhic Collection "Italy Through The Eyes Of Love"

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How Did All This Italy Stuff Get Started, Anyway?


This article also appears on our Italian Journal page.

My first trip to Italy was in 1995, for 2 glorious weeks in October. It was a trip of several firsts for me: first vacation with a girlfriend, first villa rental, first overseas car rental and of course, my maiden voyage to the land of half of my ancestors (the land of the other half, Sweden, would have to wait).

It was perfect timing for Lena (not her real name) and I. Each of us had finished with a marriage and freed ourselves from romantic entanglements for the time being. Each of us had migrated to California from our East Coast origins. Although we had moved for our own personal reasons and at separate times (we had only met a year or two beforehand), we found ourselves sharing some very similar life experiences and open-ended, who-knows-what's-going-to-happen-to-us-from-here future uncertainties. So, it was the perfect time for a vacation.

Fast forward to a gloomy, gray and damp-cold winter day. If you were a fly on the living room ceiling, you'd look down and see the San Francisco Chronicle Travel Classified Section spread out on the floor. Next to that, a world atlas (because we weren't sure where a lot of the places we were reading about actually were). Interspersed among the papers, you'd see glasses of red wine constantly moving from hand to mouth to floor to hand to mouth as two women study the information laid out before them with all the intensity of the Normandy invasion. From your vantage point on the ceiling, you'd hear "Fiji! Let's go to Fiji!" "Yeah! Where is Fiji?" "I don't know; I'm checking the atlas! I don't know where to start; doesn't this atlas have an index?" and on and on.

We almost decided on Fiji, until I saw an unassuming little ad that said something like "Rent a Villa in Tuscany". It sounded right to me. It sounded right to her. Although she'd already been to Italy and had some idea of what we'd be in for, I had no idea whatsoever. Looking back, we were happy at that moment with our decision, but there was no fanfare, no instantly recognizeable bolt of universal confirmation. Instead, it just sort of snuck up on us. It just seemed like a good idea at the time. I didn't have a clue as to how it would alter my life.

So much has changed since then. After several trips to Italy and some astonishing life experiences, Lena and I lost contact a few years ago. As for me, Italy has continued to beckon and I have answered as often as I could. I've traveled throughout the country, taken classes in language and dance, planned many a foreigner's wedding in Italy (Italians don't need to hire a wedding planner; they've got mothers and grandmothers and aunts and cousins), attended conferences, concerts, birthday parties, lost my way down dark narrow streets and found myself in places I never knew existed.

Click here to view selections from Carolyn's Photograhic Collection "Italy Through The Eyes Of Love"

Click here to send beautiful ecards or to download exquisite desktop wallpapers from our unique selection.

This article and the images contained herein are protected by copyright laws and may not be copied without permission.