Divine Tuscan Hilltop Family Chaos

“You…” she points at her watch “pasta…” she points at the boiling pot of water containing the pasta “seis.” She smiles gently at me. “Ok?” “Ok,” I respond. Holding up six fingers, “Ho capito.” I understand. And I mark the time on my watch, determined to get this right. Then the marchesa bursts through the kitchen door, with her arms in the air, saying in Italian and Hungarian “Oh, carina… il cafe. My coffee.”

She places herself at the unfinished kitchen island and pops a slender cigarette in her mouth. The cloth-covered stuffed tomatoes offer a brief distraction before she lights her cigarette and tastes from her demitasse. She heaves a sigh, welcoming the respite from two hours of cooking in the now sweltering but deliciously aromatic kitchen.

Then the piccolo principe - only two, blond, with round eyes of blue - wakes up. His mother comes in to fetch him. And the marchese, his Nono, follows suit. The family hovers about this child, and not without cause, for he charms the way he says “O, Dio,” and “O, Mama,” corks wine bottles, makes up little songs, and laughs easily and often. Nono and Nona both tend to his afternoon snack, and the soft-spoken Hungarian cousin to a meat dish. The whole scene distracts me completely and I forget the time for the pasta.

Suddenly, bubbling from the stove reminds the marchesa and she cries, “The pasta!” Her cousin turns, looks at me guiltily. I say “culpa mia, culpa mia,” immediately, which is really quite a shame since the marchesa had just been singing my praises about what a help I was. Oops. I smile shyly and look at the cousin. She looks back at me, smiles and shrugs. The marchesa grumbles and resumes other kitchen activities, ignoring the pasta fiasco. Her cousin begins to dress the slightly soggy noodles with a poppy-seed paste, lemon zest and sugar. “Ok,” she whispers, smiling. “Ok.” And hands me a bow-tie for tasting. Ok, indeed. Just fine.

Soon, the wind of chaos blows in again. A servant goes to bring coffee to someone. “Vai!” “Dove?” “Come?” “Con questo! Dai” “Grazie.” “Ok!” Then someone gets a new idea. Moving something... “Can’t be done that way!” “Come?” Workmen shuffle around. “Cose?” “Perque!” And then dust settles again.

Chatting resumes over what little remains to be done in the kitchen. At this point I just sit. But nothing will budge me from my spot. Perhaps they will tell me to move more tomatoes or salt something. The marchesa tells me I do not have to help in the kitchen, if there is something else I would like to do. But I say I like to. What else will I do? What I have been doing the last two weeks: reading, writing, yoga, etc.? Anyway, it makes me feel useful. And less far from my own family. “Ah,” she replies. “Yes, that’s good. But also your family must be less chaotic.”

“Oh, noooo.” I smile. And explain my part Irish, part Italian, all Catholic family, with four of us growing up, fifteen cousins and dozens of second and third cousins. Divine chaos, divine, divine chaos defines our family get-togethers. Perhaps that is the energy of good families. Chaos and love.

These are the afternoon activities of a family at a (not-quite-finished) hilltop, Tuscan villa. And here I am, a part of it all. Why am I here? The paterfamilias has enlisted me to help improve his English. This we do when he can be spared from playing with his child, talking to his wife (the most beautiful 8-month pregnant woman I have ever seen), supervising construction , rounding up friends for a jetski outing or dinner party, watering his grass, hunting, or blackberrying or… well, eating. The latter takes a great deal of time; life revolves around it, understandably, as this is bella Italia.

This afternoon for lunch, we all sat “inside” to eat. The villa, built Roman style but to gigantic scale, has two cavernous rooms with yet unfinished fireplaces and still open, stable-like doors. The breeze blows in, but the wasps – a major problem just now – do not. So there we dined on meat and tomatoes, cucumber, and fried potatoes. To finish we had fresh peaches and grapes and some leftover tart. A little coffee, too.

When the piccolo principe went for a nap, quite a tiring afternoon playing in the baby pool, chasing cats and dogs, running from wasps, rolling about with Nono and Nona, the mater and paterfamilias and the Noni relaxed for a few moments on the couches at the gigantic room’s entrance, from where one can see a nearly complete panorama of the Tuscan hills. The gentle cousin made her way to her room in search of lighter clothing for a little sun bathing.

Only a few breaths went by, and familiar chaos began again. “Where is the mattress of the guest?” “The cupboard is in the wrong place.” “I have to watch him fix the closets, O, Dio!” “Senti, amore, what are we going to eat tonight?” And within a blink I found myself seated alone with the marchese, as he finished his pipe (he had not yet been called away, though his time came within moments), chatting about language.

I like this Calabria born man, with his bright blue eyes and his great patience. Last night, some fireworks surprised us all after dinner. We watched, from above, in silence. During the grand finale, the marchese remarked, “Ah, the grand finale. Il strazia bracchi.” “The what?” I asked, wanting to know the word in Italian. He smiled, a little embarrassed, “it’s the Neapolitan for ‘grand finale.’ ‘Strazia bracchi.’ It means… ‘strazia,’ break. ‘bracchi,’ the underwear.” He laughed. “It’s slang. From Naples.”

Into..... Civilization and the City of Lights

In just 8 or 9 relatively short hours by plane, I went from the capital of China to the capital of France. The world's fastest train carried me a whizzing 431km/h to the Shanghai airport from whence a plane zipped me to Beijing. From there, and without further adieu, another plane dropped me ahead of schedule at (the loathed) CDG airport in Paris.

Once in Paris, well, I queued for a half hour to buy a ticket of equal cost to the super-fast Maglev train for the RER train that took five times as long and was filled with gypsies and graffiti. Ah, back to civilization.

Of course, I had to transfer trains too. And with my two carry-ons and my 50-lbs rolling bag, that was no small task. As always and even with explicit directions, the RER system confounded me, as I went down the wrong platform and up again to find the right one, only to discover I couldn't go down again without going up yet again. A pleasant looking security man with a mean looking German Shepard took pity on me, or perhaps it was that my tear-swollen eyes and and the sweat rolling down my temples, and told me to follow him when I asked, in a trembling voice, (gimme a break, it was already past midnight, China time), how the (HELL) I to get down to the other platform.

I have to imagine we made a mad scene, me in my hat and my three bags and him with his vicious K-9 in its studded, black leather muzzle. He chatted away in Parisian slang and I "oui-ed" along until we landed where I needed to be. One stop and many sketchy looking folk later and I found myself on Haussman Blvd at an overpriced cafe, having wine with a French screenplay writer I'd met several months before.

Paris may have lovely weather in the summertime but it sure brings out the freaks. This was all new to me... I am a Paris-by-summer-virgin (or was). As I waited for my brother, sipping a cafe and pouring over J D Salinger's short stories, I ignored the street insanity before me like a professional (as it doesn't differ much from the usual Bologna scene, to which a year of living had me quite accustomed).

When finally my brother arrived (late plane from Italy where things run less efficiently than they do in China), we had a glass of wine and a midnight, sidewalk dinner of Steak Frites and Salade Poulet. Have you ever noticed that the French like to sit like sardines, all lined up along the sidewalk, so as to best people-watch? It quite differs from the manner in which the Chinese sit grouped around the largest tables they can find (2-3 people to a 5-10 top table) in wide spaces like courtyards or parks.

The next day my littlest broski - as he likes to refer to himself in emails to me - and I did a speed version of our favorite sort of Paris visit together. Food, shopping, sightseeing, coffee, sightseeing, wine, shopping, sightseeing, food, wine, food. Oh, and chatting chatting chatting. As he was oriented in the 8th, we made our way toward the 5th and 6th to begin our day. At one point, during haircuts, I described my desire to learn to pincurl my hair and my brother pointed out that he always learns pointless girl trivia while hanging out with me. I pointed out that that was, in fact, what sisters were for. And, likewise, that he served perfectly for feeding me rich philosophical and historical trivia, thank you very much, and making me sound much more intelligent than I might otherwise. (Turns out his trivia came in very handy later during some dinner parties in Tuscany, making me sound very educated indeed).

Later in the day, I learned that Napoleon had his own entrance at the opera, big enough for him to ride in astride a horse.

In the evening, we lost ourselves in the lovely shops of the 6th and a cozy little wine shop that must have had a very different atmosphere when, centuries (years) ago, artists and philosophers sat about and sucked at their Gauloise, creating a foggy, aromatic haze in the rafters. When we finally wandered back to the apartment little broski called home temporarily, hunger had turn us both into evil versions of ourselves so that any dinner planning became impossible until we remembered the cheese and champagne we'd procured to assuage our low-blood sugar afflictions.

Somehow, later, we found ourselves seated in a fancy little place in the 5th, decor recalled the 1920s - or maybe a little earlier - with mirrors and metal molding everywhere. We feasted on snails, pate, suckling pig and roast duck. For desert we shared a creme brulee. The waiter fancied my brother a bit (lovely eyes, he told him) so after we polishing off our drinks and paying we ducked out before anyone got any ideas... The rain dampened our plans to find dancing or ride the big ferris wheel and watch the lights.

In the morning brunch was delicious but became quickly painful as the waiter took a seemingly pointless lunch break in the middle of serving our table and couldn't be budged to get our check. Clock ticking... plane to catch. When finally a taxi dropped me at Orly, I joined the already impossibly long line for my discount flight to Italy. Merci beacoup, French attitudes about serving tables. But the flight was delayed any how. So I guess I can thank French attitudes about timeliness for it not mattering in the end anyhow.

I made it to Italy, late. And it was hot when I got there. And, I should point out, it was August 1: The beginning of holidays in Europe. So let me lend some advice: if you do not speak Italian, this is not the day to land in Italy. As I rushed to make a late bus and make the last regional train going to a tiny town north of Rome, I never would have known what to do if I hadn't been able to ask quickly in Italian and understand the response. Everything was crowded and running late. Back in the developed world!

I arrived in fine form, sweating and stressed, for my first day on the job as an English teacher in the rolling coastal hills of southern Tuscany.

China in Sum, if I may

One of China's most remarkable qualities is its ability to produce endless contradictions. It contains some of the poorest regions of the world and has been home to some of its greatest disasters (the Sichuan Earthquake 2008) and conflicts (Tibet, the recent terrorist attacks in the western provinces, decades past massacres and genocides). It also houses a great part of the world's factories now and has proven enormous economic success in the last couple decades. It possesses great expanses of mountains and deserts, cold and hot, camels and pandas, giant cities and humble rice villages. There exist delicate and ancient secrets buried deep in gorges, beneath tropical foliage and craggy rocks. The most sophisticated of technologies carry passengers on the world's fastest train from one of the world's largest cities to an enormous international airport at 431 km/h while the same city's streets teem with bikes and rickshaws.

The Chinese government is one of the most closed and secretive in the world. But the people and the culture are open and warm. There exists a dual inclination to obey, to a degree, the regulations set out by the government and also to evade them. The system may be socialist but yet the machine at work supports one of the strongest capitalist systems in the world.

As I sit and try to compose thoughts about my days in China, I find the task I rather overwhelming one. The hospitality shown me by my friends and those I encountered in different cities around China touched me deeply. One friend drove with me, though I had a driver to take me, all two and half hours to the airport in Wuhan, stayed for lunch, and saw me off through security, waving all the way. He showed me the honor one would to a dear friend - only having known me ten short days. Another friend insisted upon shipping all my purchases back to my apartment for me by DHL so I wouldn't have to carry them with me through the rest of my travels. Yet another took me to dine an Italian restaurant, thinking I might miss the food I loved so much.

No longer in China, I find myself constantly confronting those misconceptions about the Chinese I myself once also held: They are truly a diverse, interested and interesting people and, in my opinion, some of the most generous.

I also met Americans and Europeans on my travels. People who, like me, had found their way to China in search of something - be it a job, money, love, adventure, themselves, the next step, mystery... Some of these people were profoundly interesting. Some, not so much. I chatted with people working in hotel design (a hot business), marketing, environment, oil drilling, English teaching, economic development, finance, banking, and TV. Sometimes I met people who came just to visit (few yet).

No doubt, the economic crisis can be felt in China too. People talk about it - as they do everywhere - but here, unlike in the US, the government has taken the unlikely opportunity to use money usually invested abroad for heretofore neglected domestic projects. For a country with a 50-60% savings rate, too high, really, for a developing country and high even compared to developed countries, this comes as a disguised blessing. New construction is everywhere - and this time not on factories and high-rises - but on roads, bridges and other necessary infrastructure. Could the financial collapse of 2008 bring a better quality of life to the common Chinese person? It's possible...

At this point, while sitting on a cushion in southern Tuscany, I want to conclude with some thoughts (in accord, I think, with the opinions of one James Fallows, who I have mentioned before and whose book, "Postcards from Tomorrow Square," I recently finished and immensely enjoyed): It is evident from spending but 4 weeks in the Republic of China that a strong economic and political future for the US will necessitate a strong relationship on every level with China. This includes more visas for students and teachers, better attempts at understanding the motive of our neighbors across the Pacific and more openness and willingness to shift our own policies toward them. China is strong but it is not "there yet." Links may be made that will become strong bonds. China and America have more in common than not what is not might be yet change. For now, the Chinese seem to have a deep curiosity and, for now, respect for the US. That is something we should not disregard lightly.

Shang Hai on Life

A visitor spending time alone in big cities like New York, Paris, Berlin, and Shanghai might compare a bit to a kid standing just outside the display window of a great toy store - like NYC's FAO Schwartz - or wandering around the aisles, but without permission to play with any toys.

The city sparkles and entices and a while a lonely, short term visitor can participate in sightseeing, shopping, eating or pampering activities, she cannot expect to truly engage in what makes the city sparkle, glitter and "go." Nonetheless, with the right sort of attitude, one might derive a great deal of pleasure from simply gazing from the outside, so to speak, and taking in the delicious sights and sounds and tastes of the Shanghai toy store.

So, Friday night I dined Italian style with some Chinese friends at a restaurant run by a Shanghainese woman who lived 30 years in Milan and spoke lovely, lilting Italian and whose food, really, was as good as one can expect for Italian food halfway across the world. Afterward we went to see Harry Potter. This time, my movie viewing experience was in English, since unlike Transformers 2, I'd been anticipating this flick for about a year or so.

The stunning and (excuse me for judging, I love the Harry Potter movies) annoying cultural revelation I made that night that everyone seems to whip out the mobile devices more at movies than any time else - more so than while driving, on the subway, walking, standing on the street corner looking bored. Oooo... glowing lights..... There is just something, I suppose, about a dark movie theater, particularly one in which occurs the fantastically exhilarating climax that determines the fate of one Mr. Potter. Between the rattling of candy bags and flicking iridescent lights across the dark room... well, you get the point.

The next day I thought I'd brave the Bund alone. If you've been following, you'll known that I dined there my first weekend in Shanghai, and so it seemed an appropriate place to close my China chapters. After weeks of planned (though delightful) outings with my Chinese friends, the silent hours of aimless wandering was pleasant change.

By day the Bund reminded me of 5th Ave. NYC with a river-side Central Park directly across the street (though it's completely under construction in preparation for the 2010 World Expo). As I walked along the wide sidewalk, passing Armani, Dolce Gabbana, Gold Exchanges, Development Banks, shouting rickshaw drivers, laughing tourists (mostly Chinese, though the odd Westerner too), buses, and vendors, the wind blew and the sky shined a brilliant blue and I recalled the city's birth in the Opium Trade and comeback when the Shanghai Stock exchange reopened and international traders and businesses moved back in the last few decades.

Doubt ye not Shanghai's glory.

The shopping in this quarter too rich for my wallet, I simply made my way all the way down the promenade for a better view of the Oriental Pearl on lovely bridge. There I joined the cluster of tourists to take photos on the unlikely clear Shanghainese summer day.

In the evening I made my way to the French Concession for a two hour acro-yoga, ashtanga session during which I had my proverbial butt kicked by a tattooed, pony-tailed, American expat yogi. Afterward, some ladies from the class recommended a nice mani/pedi salon that in turn recommended a nice massage parlor where I enjoyed a deep tissue massage while my nails dried. Within a few hours my body had forgotten all about the twisted handstands I'd attempted.

The French Concession has been historically and still is where most ex-patriots prefer to live in Shanghai. It is asthetically the most pleasing area of the city, lower buildings, festooned with parks, and has the longest stretch of Art Deco buildings in the world. The latter comes as a bit of a shock, considering it is also the area where the Communist Government of China made its first gain in the '20s, hence the name of the neighborhood (which doesn't exist in Chinese), the "Concession." Truly, the neighborhood defies square block construction and faded, unimaginative architectual design the country's image projects.

Reflective of a great, growing, bold international city with vast professional opportunities, the ex-pat scene in China is young, bright, beautiful, and intense. Forget NYC, Paris, or San Fran. If you want to go somewhere to live life and make money, go to Shanghai where there's money to be made in just about every field, the night life is hopping, the people are pretty, and seem - from what I could tell - rather whip smart, too. Clubs are clubs, but as clubs go - the ones I saw had fantastic live bands, free champange for the females on ladies' night, a cleanc crowd, open spaces, great DJ's, weird add-ons like outdoor pools and seemily effective bouncers (but then, Shanghai's a pretty safe city too). Like all ex-pat scenes, one notices the darker underbelly of life abroad - local girls skanking out to expat guys, a touch of hedonism amongst the expats, and other behavior that goes along with these themes.

When out and about, one cannot help but learn a great deal about the Shanghainese life and culture - or at least a corner of it. And I think I did. But far be it for this lowly wanderer to claim intimate knowledge of a city quadruple the size of New York City with less than two weeks under her belt. Nonetheless, I can testify that the subway system is one of the best in world - if not the best, some Shanghainese do, in fact, wear their PJs on the streets, that there's a major fad in Shanghai - and throughout China - surrounding SMSing, mobile games and anything else on a little LCD lit screen. Ah, the Wonders of communication technology. I can also tell you that the city's booming and, economic slump and population problems aside, the 10s of millions of people-large city seems on the up and up in a big way.

If you have time, check out the 2010 Shanghai Expo... "Better City, Better Life" (one day). When out in this big city for a short period, there's no fun to be had if you just go out and have it. But after a couple weeks there, one does have the impression that to get into the gears of the city, much more time is needed.

Shanghai Daze Dog Night

As celestial events go, a full solar eclipse ranks as one of the most miraculous, most awesome and maybe - at times in history and in some places on the planet still - most fearsome. This July, from along a thin strip of southeast Asia and the Pacific Rim islands, appeared the longest solar eclipse of nearly the next half millennium. One of the best places from which to view this event was Shanghai -- geographically, though not necessarily meteorically speaking.

It rains in Shanghai in the summer. It rains. Buckets.

When I woke in the morning around 6am, the sun was visible in the sky but dark ominous cloud loomed behind it. Rather than curse my stupidity for leaving Jingzhou, where the weather was clear and lovely but a day early, I decided to pray. By my figuring, God's almighty and thus shouldn't offhandedly dismiss a prayer to see such a great event as a full, 10-minute solar eclipse. A once in a life time thing.. right? So, I didn't even ask Him for the full deal. "Just a gilpse, please. That's all I ask." Thinking my humility might be rewarded with, maybe, some magnanimity...

The Hua Ting Towers had become a home, if I had any place to call "home" in China, as I spent more nights there than any other place (about two weeks in all). I headed for the now familiar 5-star breakfast buffet and entered the massive dining room (to my mind, mini replica UN cafeteria) filled with squeaking tourists and businessmen from all corners of the planet, sucking noodles, slurping coffee, smoking cigarettes, and guffawing loudly. I swear the hostesses conspired against me daily, because I inevitably found myself cornered by several Japanese and some Chinese, all with (traditional breakfasts) large bowls of noodles before them; wet noodles that need to be hoisted heavily with chopsticks into the mouth and then vacuumed in the rest of the way, broth to follow later with much lapping noises.

Oh, give me a quite cafe corner or breakfast nook with a coffee and a pastry or one egg over easy on toast. I cannot bear breakfast-included buffets... especially ones with wet noodles.

In any case, after a breakfast of whatever I decided I could hold down that day (yogurt? Juice and a piece of fruit or cereal? The places that cater to Westerners, God bless them), my friend Grace and I went out, into the encroaching gloom, toward the stadium park across the street to find a place to view the eclipse.

In the week or so leading up to the great solar event, the Chinese government (news) had really broadcast information to the people, from what I could tell. Not understanding (really) or reading the People's Language (Mandarin), I rely on my ability to interpret pictures. From the photos of solar eclipses I saw on front pages it seemed to me, well... the word was out. My friends started counseling: "Be sure to watch the eastern horizon around 8:45am!! The darkest minutes will be at 9:40!"

In Shanghai, people sported the latest fashion, a short lived style: solar eclipse viewing glasses. Thick, heavy, square-shaped, grandpa lenses. Seeing these perched on peoples heads (not to mention the pair gripped in my own sweaty palm) only made the pain of those darkening clouds more acute. The weather worsened as the hour approached.

As Grace and I neared the park where still hopeful crowds amassed, the Man upstairs answered my prayers and gave me what I would later cherish as my one and only glimpse of the solar eclipse: The clouds parted to reveal the first quarter of the Earth's shadow as it began its half hour long march to cloak the Sun. Just a sliver of a shadow but enough for distinction. A glorious sight. Then clouds rolled back over. And, eventually, dark gray, sheet-like rain consumed the scene.

Around the park the punky looking, smoking Shanghainese, downtrodden, damp-looking families, half interested loudmouthed Aussies, frazzled local photographers, one lanky, croissant-munching and very focused photo-snapping blond guy and various other Shanghainese moved under a building overhang. But no one left the park. Everyone meant to witness this event.

Gray light turned to dark yellow. Yellow turned to dark gray. Then we simply slipped into night. The temperature dropped maybe 5-10 degrees Celsius. And at the peak of the eclipse, we stayed in dark, cold rain for ten minutes, motorcycle alarms going off as people shuffled around, unnaturally loud laughter, camera flashes blinking everywhere, loud, excited conversations replaced subdued disappointed tones, security guards closing around crowds, and streets and building lights blinking on everywhere.

For ten minutes one July morning in Shanghai, it was night.

And then the reverse process began. Black faded to darkness and then yellow and then gray and we began slipping into a rainy, dull morning again.

Later I talked to my friends in Jingzhou and they told me they could see the stars at the full eclipse. One said he could die tomorrow he felt so overwhelmed by the beauty. I haven't looked at the photos they sent yet... But I am I grateful for my glimpse of the mid morning night.

(photo courtsey Frank Zhou)